Journal: Colombia-Venezuela Denounce Each Other within OAS–US is the Loser, Cuba Spins Up OAS Alternative Without the North

07 Venezuela, 08 Wild Cards, Cultural Intelligence, Government, Military, Peace Intelligence

While the US watches another CNN story on rape, Latin America has been watching CNN Espanol where  the Ambassador of Venezuela to the Organization of American States (OAS), has just delivered a phenomenally detailed, articulate, and persuasive denunciation of the US and its regional allies, particularly Colombia.

Hugo Chavez has then come out, breaking relations with Colombia (with great sadness), while offering Guyana the oil it needs, and calling again for a regional organization, the only thing “missing” in t he Bolivarian reconstitution.  He anticipates that the incoming government of Colombia will restore rational and reasonable relations.

Off to the side, Cuba is re-presenting its proposal for an OAS without the US and Canada–a regional organization that goes beyond UNASUR (Union of South American Nations) to include the Carribean and Central America.

What one notices from the South is that nothing has changed in the US between the Bush and Obama Administrations.  The Ambassadors are the same, the policies (if they can be called policies) are the same, the military mumblings about Hugo Chavez are the same.

Journal: Conflicted Loyalties

Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, Government

Marcus Aurelius Recommends

(COMMENT:  Not a good day for the DGI…)

US analyst, wife sentenced for spying for Cuba

By PETE YOST, Associated Press Writer Pete Yost, Associated Press Writer 1 hr 13 mins ago

WASHINGTON – The 73-year-old great grandson of Alexander Graham Bell was sentenced Friday to life in prison without parole for quietly spying for Cuba for nearly a third of a century from inside the State Department. His wife was sentenced to 5 1/2 years.

Retired intelligence analyst Kendall Myers said he meant his country no harm and stole secrets only to help Cuba's people who “have good reason to feel threatened” by U.S. intentions of ousting the communist Castro government.

FULL STORY ONLINE

Reference: Lee Felsenstein & Dave Warner Converse

08 Wild Cards, Augmented Reality, Correspondence, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, info-graphics/data-visualization, InfoOps (IO), Methods & Process, microfinancing, Mobile, Peace Intelligence, Real Time, Tools

Conversation Starting Point:

Afghan Self-stabilization from Below – and Above

Who’s Who in Peace Intelligence: Lee Felsenstein

Who’s Who in Peace Intelligence: Dave Warner

Monday 12 July 2010 (Read from Bottom Up)

Continue reading “Reference: Lee Felsenstein & Dave Warner Converse”

Reference: Mini-Atlas of Human Security

01 Poverty, 06 Family, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Immigration, 10 Security, 11 Society, Academia, Cultural Intelligence, Non-Governmental, Peace Intelligence, Strategy-Holistic Coherence
Berto Jongman Recommends...

Phi Beta Iota: One day the World Map ofConflict & Human Rights pioneered by Berto Jongman will return–it is a travesty that his official duties do not allow him to continue this hugely significant endeavor.  In the interim, he recommends, as do we, the below effort.

The miniAtlas of Human Security

An at-a-glance illustrated guide to global and regional trends in human insecurity, the miniAtlas provides a succinct introduction to today’s most pressing security challenges. It maps political violence, the links between poverty and conflict, assaults on human rights—including the use of child soldiers—and the causes of war and peace.

The miniAtlas is available in print and online in English, French and Spanish. The miniAtlas is also available in print in Russian and Japanese. It will be available online in these languages in the summer of 2010.

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See Also:

Graphic: Simplified World Conflict Map

Graphic: Global Threats to Local Survival (1990′s)

Search: world map with 8 conflicts

Search: world map with conflict marked other maps

Search: The Future of OSINT [is M4IS2-Multinational]

Journal: UN Increasingly Intelligent

06 Family, 11 Society, Cultural Intelligence, Non-Governmental, Peace Intelligence
Berto Jongman Recommends...

Journal: NYT to Robert Young Pelton–Sorry, Our Bad

08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Cultural Intelligence, Media, Military, Peace Intelligence

Setting the record straight on ‘contractor' spies

The Washington Post Spy Talk    Jeff Stein

Robert Young Pelton spent years investigating counterterrorism mercenaries, so the last thing he expected was to be branded one himself.

Yet there he was on the front page of the New York Times on March 14, his color picture flanked by photos of legendary ex-CIA official Duane R. Clarridge and Michael D. Furlong, a Pentagon psychological warfare official.

The headline: “Contractors Tied to Effort to Track and Kill Militants.”

Today the Times corrected the story.

FULL STORY ONLINE

Robert Young Pelton's Web "Come Back Alive"

Robert Young Pelton comments:

I am happy to report that the New York Times has done the right thing and corrected their depiction of me in their recent series of articles about Afghanistan and “rogue” contractors.  Although I have no personal or ethical problem with DoD contractors, information operations,  intelligence activity  covert operations or any other programs funded by the Department of Defense to protect our citizens here and overseas. I was not a DoD contractor nor was my company or were my employees  involved in any spying, clandestine or illegal activity.

I do have a problem with the illegal use of contractors for espionage, breaking laws or stepping across clearly identified moral boundaries in the use of journalists. But I did not make these allegations, the source for the current activity (almost half a year after we were told the DoD would not be a subscriber) is a leaked memo and DoD insiders. Not my company.

Continue reading “Journal: NYT to Robert Young Pelton–Sorry, Our Bad”

Journal: Towards the Eighteenth Brumaire of General David Petraeus?

02 China, 05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards, Cultural Intelligence, Military
Webster Griffin Tarpley

Webster G. Tarpley  TARPLEY.net June 23, 2010

Prodded doubtless by forces above and behind the Oval Office, Obama has ousted General McChrystal in favor of General Petraeus, who now combines the post of CENTCOM theater commander with that of NATO commander in Afghanistan. This is a move deriving from the inherent fecklessness and incompetence of the Obama administration, especially from the imperialist point of view. Recent events have highlighted Obama’s total lack of executive ability, leaving him weakened as he faced the bizarre flap about some barrack-room gripes by McChrystal’s staff collected by a correspondent from Rolling Stone magazine. Because of Obama’s weakness, he felt obliged to react to the scuttlebutt peddled by Rolling Stone, when a stronger president could have dismissed it or ignored it. As Fletcher Pratt once wrote, Abraham Lincoln was capable of laughing an attempted coup d’état out of existence with an off-color joke. Obama is far too weak for that.

As for General McChrystal, he was critically weakened and made vulnerable to ouster by the total failure of his counterinsurgency strategy, with the Marja offensive faltering and the Kandahar offensive indefinitely delayed, even as NATO losses rise exponentially, President Karzai turns towards Tehran and Beijing, and many of the NATO coalition partners prepare to defect.

One effect of the sacking of McChrystal is likely to be the accelerated breakup of the US-led Afghan invasion coalition, which was already in bad shape before this incident. The Netherlands and Canada are leaving, the British and the Poles want to join them, and the Turks can hardly be enthusiastic. Who else will join them in the race for the exit door? NATO Secretary General Rasmussen, anticipating such a result, spoke out yesterday in favor of keeping McChrystal, who works for him as well as for Obama. More countries may now announce their departure even before the November NATO summit in Lisbon, Portugal.

Another of McChrystal’s bosses, Afghan President Karzai, also made clear that he wanted McChrystal to stay. He will now use Obama’s flaunting of his wishes to accelerate his own playing of the China card in economic policy and the Iranian card in cultural and religious affairs. Afghanistan is likely to slip into the Chinese orbit.

FULL STORY ONLINE