Our Awful Situation

Archive for the ‘Military’ Category

Half of UK forces ‘ready to quit’

Posted by Charlie Kilo on July 10th, 2008

Almost half of UK military personnel are ready to leave the forces, a Ministry of Defence survey suggests.

Some 47% of Army and Royal Navy respondents and 44% of those in the RAF said they regularly felt like quitting. Among the concerns raised by the 9,000 servicemen and women surveyed were the frequency of tours, levels of pay and the quality of equipment and housing.

Feds arrest Miami Beach munitions dealer

Posted by Charlie Kilo on June 21st, 2008

Strange, strange, strange:

A 22-year-old munitions dealer and others in his Miami Beach company were arrested on charges of selling prohibited Chinese weaponry to the U.S. government to supply allied forces in Afghanistan, according to law enforcement officials.

Efraim Diveroli, president of AEY Inc., and three other employees were arrested Thursday night and Friday morning — accused of conspiring to misrepresent the types of munitions they sold to the U.S. Department of Defense as part of a $300 million Army weapons contract, officials said.

Diveroli and the others are charged with violating the Arms Export Control Act stemming from an investigation that began earlier this year by the Pentagon and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Tomgram: Why We Can’t See America’s Ziggurats in Iraq

Posted by Charlie Kilo on June 16th, 2008

Finally, the U.S. Mega-Bases in Iraq Make the News:

It’s just a $5,812,353 contract — chump change for the Pentagon — and not even one of those notorious “no-bid” contracts either. Ninety-eight bids were solicited by the Army Corps of Engineers and 12 were received before the contract was awarded this May 28th to Wintara, Inc. of Fort Washington, Maryland, for “replacement facilities for Forward Operating Base Speicher, Iraq.” According to a Department of Defense press release, the work on those “facilities” to be replaced at the base near Saddam Hussein’s hometown, Tikrit, is expected to be completed by January 31, 2009, a mere 11 days after a new president enters the Oval Office. It is but one modest reminder that, when the next administration hits Washington, American bases in Iraq, large and small, will still be undergoing the sort of repair and upgrading that has been ongoing for years.

In fact, in the last five-plus years, untold billions of taxpayer dollars have been spent on the construction and upgrading of those bases. When asked back in the fall of 2003, only months after Baghdad fell to U.S. troops, Lt. Col. David Holt, the Army engineer then “tasked with facilities development” in Iraq, proudly indicated that “several billion dollars” had already been invested in those fast-rising bases. Even then, he was suitably amazed, commenting that “the numbers are staggering.” Imagine what he might have said, barely two and a half years later, when the U.S. reportedly had 106 bases, mega to micro, all across the country.

By now, billions have evidently gone into single massive mega-bases like the U.S. air base at Balad, about 60 miles north of Baghdad. It’s a “16-square-mile fortress,” housing perhaps 40,000 U.S. troops, contractors, special ops types, and Defense Department employees. As the Washington Post’s Tom Ricks, who visited Balad back in 2006, pointed out — in a rare piece on one of our mega-bases — it’s essentially “a small American town smack in the middle of the most hostile part of Iraq.” Back then, air traffic at the base was already being compared to Chicago’s O’Hare International or London’s Heathrow — and keep in mind that Balad has been steadily upgraded ever since to support an “air surge” that, unlike the President’s 2007 “surge” of 30,000 ground troops, has yet to end.

Supreme Court restores habeas corpus, strikes down key part of Military Commissions Act

Posted by Charlie Kilo on June 13th, 2008

Glenn Greenwald’s commentary on yesterday’s Supreme Court victory:

In a major rebuke to the Bush administration’s theories of presidential power — and in an equally stinging rebuke to the bipartisan political class which has supported the Bush detention policies — the U.S. Supreme Court today, in a 5-4 decision (.pdf), declared Section 7 of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 unconstitutional. The Court struck down that section of the MCA because it purported to abolish the writ of habeas corpus — the means by which a detainee challenges his detention in a court — despite the fact that the Constitution permits suspension of that writ only “in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion.”

In Debate Over Permanent Bases In Iraq, U.S. Seeks Authorization For War In Iran

Posted by patriot on June 12th, 2008

Via Think Progress:

The ongoing negotiations between Iraqi leaders and the Bush administration over the future role of the military occupation “have turned into an increasingly acrimonious public debate.”

The Bush administration’s demand for 58 permanent bases in Iraq — a near doubling of the current 30 bases — are causing Iraqis to warn that the status of forces agreement would be “more abominable than the occupation.” The administration is reportedly holding hostage “some $50bn of Iraq’s money in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to pressure the Iraqi government into signing an agreement.”

The reason the White House is so hell-bent on signing a long-term agreement may have less to do with Iraq and more to do with Iran. According to press reports of the ongoing negotiations, the Bush administration is seeking the “power to determine if a hostile act from another country is aggression against Iraq.”

U.S. seeking 58 bases in Iraq, Shiite lawmakers say

Posted by Charlie Kilo on June 10th, 2008

100 years may be less time than they are really thinking:

Iraqi lawmakers say the United States is demanding 58 bases as part of a proposed “status of forces” agreement that will allow U.S. troops to remain in the country indefinitely.

Leading members of the two ruling Shiite parties said in a series of interviews the Iraqi government rejected this proposal along with another U.S. demand that would have effectively handed over to the United States the power to determine if a hostile act from another country is aggression against Iraq. Lawmakers said they fear this power would drag Iraq into a war between the United States and Iran.

USA in Iraq… forever?

Posted by patriot on June 5th, 2008

That’s what the PTB seem to want:

A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the US presidential election in November.

The terms of the impending deal, details of which have been leaked to The Independent, are likely to have an explosive political effect in Iraq. Iraqi officials fear that the accord, under which US troops would occupy permanent bases, conduct military operations, arrest Iraqis and enjoy immunity from Iraqi law, will destabilise Iraq’s position in the Middle East and lay the basis for unending conflict in their country.

Soldiers using drop weapons to claim innocent deaths were justified

Posted by patriot on June 3rd, 2008

From the HuffPost:

Several soldiers who have returned from combat zones talk with the American News Project about what they say is the widespread practice of using “drop weapons” to cover up the killing of innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. We feature five veterans and current members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, plus retired Lieutenant Colonel Gary Solis, a Vietnam War veteran and legal scholar who taught “Law of War” at West Point. Watch the video from ANP below:

U.S. Fourth Fleet in Venezuelan Waters

Posted by Charlie Kilo on May 26th, 2008

Saddam Hussein may have temporarily saved Hugo’s butt, but the US is now setting its sights clearly on Venezuela - the US. 4th Fleet will activate in July:

With U.S. saber rattling towards Venezuela now at its height, the Pentagon has decided to reactivate the Navy’s fourth fleet in the Caribbean, Central and South America. It’s a bold move, and has already stirred controversy within the wider region.

The fleet, which will start patrolling in July, will be based at the Mayport Naval Station in Jacksonville, Florida and will answer to the U.S. Southern Command in Miami. Rear Admiral Joseph Keran, current commander of the Naval Special Warfare Command, will oversee operations. About 11 vessels are currently under the Southern Command, a number that could increase in future. The Navy plans to assign a nuclear-powered air craft carrier, USS George Washington, to the force.

It’s difficult to see how the revival of the Fourth Fleet is warranted at the present time. The move has only served to further antagonize Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez…

Gates: consider reinstituting the draft

Posted by Charlie Kilo on May 22nd, 2008

Oh boy…

In an exchange sure to send ripples of anxiety through the all-volunteer military, the Senate’s senior defense spending member asked Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen if it is time to “consider reinstituting the draft.”

Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), chairman of the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, asked Gates and Mullen the question he said no one wants to ask: “Is the cost of maintaining an all-volunteer force becoming unsustainable and, secondly, do we need to consider reinstituting the draft.”

Inouye cited the ever-increasing pay and benefits paid to active and reserve service members, noting that it now costs an estimated $126,000 per service member.

Gates and Mullen both said they thought the current volunteer force was the finest the U.S. has ever fielded. Gates said he “personally” believes that “it is worth the cost.”

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