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21st Century Strategy: Militarized Europe, Globalized NATO
by Rick Rozoff
Global Research, February 26, 2010

With the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) on the Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms expiring last December 5 and its successor held up almost three months in large part because of U.S. missile

shield provocations in recent weeks, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is forging ahead with the formulation and implementation of a new Strategic Concept.

On February 5 Russia unveiled its new military doctrine, which identified further NATO expansion eastward to its frontier and American and NATO interceptor missile deployments on and near its borders as the “main external threats of war.” [1]

On February 23 NATO held its fourth seminar on the new – 21st century – Strategic Concept decided upon at the sixtieth anniversary summit in April of 2009 in Strasbourg, France and Kehl, Germany. After previous meetings in Luxembourg, Slovenia and Norway, the final – and far most important – meeting was held in Washington, DC. Entitled Strategic Concept Seminar on Transformation and Capabilities, it was conducted at the National Defense University in the nation’s capital.

The Strategic Concept endorses expansion of the bloc deeper into the Balkans and the former Soviet Union, broadening global partnerships outside the Euro-Atlantic zone and consolidating an interceptor missile system to cover all of Europe as a joint U.S. and NATO project. READ FULL STORY

 

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The 700 Military Bases of Afghanistan
By Nick Turse, February 11, 2010

Originally published in TomDispatch
In the nineteenth century, it was a fort used by British forces. In the twentieth century, Soviet troops moved into the crumbling facilities. In December 2009, at this site in the Shinwar district of Afghanistan’s Nangarhar Province, U.S. troops joined members of the Afghan National Army in preparing the way for the next round of foreign occupation. On its grounds, a new military base is expected to rise, one of hundreds of camps and outposts scattered across the country.

Nearly a decade after the Bush administration launched its invasion of Afghanistan, TomDispatch offers the first actual count of American, NATO, and other coalition bases there, as well as facilities used by the Afghan security forces. Such bases range from relatively small sites like Shinwar to mega-bases that resemble small American towns. Today, according to official sources, approximately 700 bases of every size dot the Afghan countryside, and more, like the one in Shinwar, are under construction or soon will be as part of a base-building boom that began last year.

Existing in the shadows, rarely reported on and little talked about, this base-building program is nonetheless staggering in size and scope, and heavily dependent on supplies imported from abroad, which means that it is also extraordinarily expensive. It has added significantly to the already long secret list of Pentagon property overseas and raises questions about just how long, after the planned beginning of a drawdown of American forces in 2011, the U.S. will still be garrisoning Afghanistan. READ FULL STORY

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Arrested Terrorist Leader Exposes Extensive CIA Connections
Al Qaeda affiliate says his group was armed and assisted by U.S., Britain and Israel
Steve Watson
Infowars.net Friday, Feb 26th, 2010

The leader of a Pakistan based terrorist organisation closely affiliated with Al Qaeda has detailed how his group benefited from extensive political and financial support from the CIA in return for continued attacks against the government, the people and the infrastructure of Iran.

Abdolmalek Rigi, the leader of the Pakistan-based Jundullah terrorist organization was captured earlier this week by Iranian security officials in the south of the country.
Rigi was tracked by Iranian intelligence when he boarded a flight from Dubai to Kyrgyzstan on Tuesday.
According to officials, Rigi was using a forged Afghan passport which was issued to him by the U.S. government.
The 31-year-old terror leader issued a statement on Iranian state TV yesterday, during which he alleged that he had made a pact with the U.S. for safe haven and unlimited military aid to pursue terrorist activities against the Iranian government.
“They said they would cooperate with us and will give me military equipment, arms and machine guns. They also promised to give us a base along the border with Afghanistan next to Iran,” Rigi said.
“They [were] prepared to give [us] training and/or any assistance that [we] would require, in terms of telecommunications security and procedures as well as other support, the Americans said they would be willing to provide it at an extensive level,” he added.
Rigi indicated that the relationship with U.S. intelligence continued through the election of Barack Obama and up to the present day. READ FULL STORY

 

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Defense Secretary Robert Gates Confirms Blackwater in Pakistan
By Jeremy Scahill

In an interview with the Pakistani TV station Express TV, Defense Secretary Robert Gates confirmed that the private security firms Blackwater and DynCorp are operating inside Pakistan. “They’re operating as individual companies here in Pakistan,” Gates said, according to a DoD transcript of the interview. “There are rules concerning the contracting companies.

If they’re contracting with us or with the State Department here in Pakistan, then there are very clear rules set forth by the State Department and by ourselves.” READ FULL STORY

 

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YEMEN: Food security takes a knock
Late and scarce rainfall have caused many crops to wither

SANAA, 25 February 2010 (IRIN) - Cereal production in Yemen has declined for the second consecutive year due mainly to a lack of rainfall, according to Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation Abdulmalik al-Thawr.
Yemen’s grain production, including sorghum and wheat, declined to 675,000 tons in 2009 from 715,000 in 2008, according to the government’s Central Statistics Organization (CSO).

While aggregate cereal production in 2009 was only slightly lower than in the previous year, it was about 24 percent less than the 2007 bumper crop, according to a report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

“Most of the water sources in valleys producing grain dried up… About 97 percent of the country’s agricultural land is threatened by desertification," al-Thawr said.

Ismail Muharram, head of the Agricultural Research & Development Authority based in the central governorate of Dhamar, said agriculture in Yemen largely depended on rainwater.

"The rainfall season was three weeks late, and as a result many crops withered, particularly in the central highlands," he said, pointing out that 2009 rainfall was much lower than average. READ FULL STORY

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US: The Nuclear Lobby`s $645 Million Con Job
Posted: 2010/02/25
From: Source
By Harvey Wasserman (Counterpunch)

The mystery has been solved.
Where is this "new reactor renaissance" coming from?

There has been no deep, thoughtful re-making or re-evaluation of atomic technology. No solution to the nuke waste problem. No making reactors economically sound. No private insurance against radioactive disasters by terror or error. No grassroots citizens now desperate to live near fragile containment domes and outtake pipes spewing radioactive tritium at 27 US reactors.

No, nothing about atomic energy has really changed.

Except this: $645 MILLION for lobbying Congress and the White House over the past ten years.

As reported by Judy Pasternak and a team of reporters at American University's Investigative Reporting Workshop, filings with the Senate Office of Public Records show that members of the Nuclear Energy Institute and other reactor owner/operators admit spending that money on issues that "include legislation to promote construction of new nuclear power plants." READ FULL STORY

 

 

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