Pakistan: Pakistan is coping with three major internal political crises and one foreign crisis. Any one of these could prevent the first ever transfer of power in March 2013 between successive constitutional, civilian, elected governments in the history of Pakistan.
NIGHTWATCH: French with UK Lift & Africans Handle Mali — SOF in Africa at Greater Risk? Islamists and Food Security — Islamists versus Separatists
04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 11 Society, Cultural Intelligence
Mali-France: Last Friday, France began its direct intervention in the Malian civil war, at the request of the Bamako government after Islamists, terrorist and jihadis captured a key town on the road from the north to Bamako. The immediate French objective was to stop the jihadis at Konna and to deter them from moving farther south to capture Bamako. Konna had been the boundary between the Islamist and government held regions.
French Rafale fighter jets bombed Islamist rebel targets in central Mali for three days. With French Air Force support, Malian forces – almost certainly with French ground forces –recaptured Konna on Saturday, a day after it was seized by Islamist rebels.
A Malian rebel spokesman said the French also bombed targets in the towns of Gao, Lere and Douentz, over the weekend.
France's Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said French intervention on Friday had prevented rebels from seizing Bamako itself. He said air raids would continue in the coming days. He also said that France has deployed about 550 soldiers to Mali, split between Bamako and the town of Mopti, 500 km northeast, as part of “Operation Serval” – named after an African wildcat.
The French foreign minister made it clear that France was now targeting Islamist bases in the north of Mali and said Algeria, which shares a long border with Mali, had given permission for its air space to be used for bombing raids “without limit”.
Islamist rebels reportedly were abandoning Timbuktu and other northern towns to try to escape the French air attacks for which they have no defense.
NIGHTWATCH: Mali, Islamic Fundamentalism is NOT Al Qaeda, Slow Learners
04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, Officers Call
Mali-Burkina Faso: Government officials from Mali held the first direct talks with delegates from the Tuareg and Islamist rebel groups that seized the north of the country after a coup earlier this year. The talks occurred in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. The rebels pledged to respect national unity and to reject all forms of extremism.
Comment: The rebels appear to be trying to avert or at least delay the planned West African military operation to recover the north. Their profession of support for national unity and rejection of extremism requires clarification because the pro-al Qaida group has instituted the strictest form of Islamic law in Timbuktu and other northern cities, destroyed ancient shrines and ignored direction from the government in Bamako.
Continue reading “NIGHTWATCH: Mali, Islamic Fundamentalism is NOT Al Qaeda, Slow Learners”
Owl: “What If” US States Declare War on Each Other?
04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, Augmented Reality
If Every U.S. State Declared War Against the Others, Which Would Win?
Slate, Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2012
This question originally appeared on Quora. It was taken from Quora's “hypothetical battles” topic, where readers “can ask questions and get answer on fighting that wouldn't likely or ever happen in real life.”
Answer by Jon Davis, veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, sergeant in the U.S. Marine Corps:
These are the accounts of the Second American Civil War, also known as the Wars of Reunification and the American Warring States Period.
After the breakup, many wondered which states would come out in control of the power void created by the dissolution of the United States. There were many with little chance against several of the larger more powerful states. The states in possession of a large population, predisposition for military (i.e.) military bases, and a population open to the idea of warfare fared the best. In the long term, we would look to states with self-sufficiency and long term military capabilities.
Here are the states that held the greatest strategic value from day one. They have the ability to be self-sufficient, economic strength, military strength, the will to fight, and the population to support a powerful war machine.
- California
- Texas
- New York
Mini-Me: False Flag Nuclear Christmas? Deceitful “Allies” and Enemies Within
04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Proliferation, 10 Security, 11 Society, Officers Call
Huh?
WARNING NOTICE: The raw material is 80% speculative. The 20% is so real as to warrant real alarm and extraordinary measures within the virtually non-existent US national counter-intelligence community that is generally inept at real-time cyber-monitoring in multiple languages across all cyber-domains (e.g. skype, steganography, etcetera). We also do not “own the street,” rule one in counter-intelligence–all fifteen slices of HUMINT are in the basement, foreign counter-intelligence (offensive and defensive) being the runts of a very weak litter. DHS has wasted a decade doing the wrong things wronger, and is part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Nuclear Christmas, false flag in America to blame on Iran
There are strong confirmations that one or more nuclear weapons, known to have been stolen but kept from the public to “prevent panic,” may well be deployed in American cities by extremist elements with probable ties to a foreign intelligence agency.
This scenario was the basis of the television show “Jericho” several years ago. However, this time there are real culprits and real motivations, both the overthrow of the government of the United States and the naming of Iran as a “scapegoat.”
The plot has been tracked to groups within the Pentagon, several government agencies and wealthy and powerful extremist backers of Netanyahu and, in particular, the “Gulf Cartel” operating from Mexico that has penetrated nearly all levels of government, law enforcement and the military across the country.
Using surprisingly direct language, President Obama has officially confirmed this conspiracy.
Six days ago, the President of the United States, on his official public website, issued a warning about “government insiders” who were planning “violent acts” against the “government and the nation.”
Continue reading “Mini-Me: False Flag Nuclear Christmas? Deceitful “Allies” and Enemies Within”
Chuck Spinney: Palestinians Win Gaza Scuffle – Time On Their Side
04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 06 Genocide, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Ethics, Government, IO Deeds of Peace, IO Deeds of War, Military
As we proved in Vietnam, and are about to prove again in Afghanistan, you can win most battles in a tactical sense but still lose a war at the far more decisive strategic and grand-strategic levels of conflict. (Grand strategy is explained here.) Israel's grand strategy is to establish a Greater Israeli Apartheid State (by annexing Area C of the West Bank and Gazifying Areas A and B) by (1) keeping the US firmly in its camp so (2) it can ignore the growing disgust in the rest of the world. That grand strategy has worked in the short term, most recently by hyping the Iranian threat and now the Gaza mini war to distract attention from the growing encroachment of illegal Israeli settlers in Area C.* But that strategy is turning the world against it (see Israel is all but alone in the Middle East). While recent pronouncements by President Obama and Secretary Clinton suggest Israel's influence in US domestic politics remains as strong as ever, the political sands in the US may be slowly insensibly shifting toward ambivalence, if not outrage, in the United States as well — and, as a practical, the US has enormous problems elsewhere (in Afghanistan) as well as home that may well evolved to take precedence over the US blank check to Israel. So, is Israel on the slippery grand-strategic slope of winning its battles while losing war?
Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Palestinians Win Gaza Scuffle – Time On Their Side”
NIGHTWATCH: Israel & It’s US Enabler Uniting Muslims
04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 06 Genocide, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 11 Society, Corruption, Government, Military, Officers CallSpecial Comment: Feedback from brilliant Readers conveys concern that Israel is presented as justified in its retaliation and not as the instigator of the latest round of attack exchanges.
In the NightWatch experience, causality takes about 20 years to determine with any confidence. Survival in the neighborhood requires that the intelligence and special operations forces of all parties constantly are at work all the time. Thus, escalation is always a political decision, often related to political maneuverings and calculations in Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, Iran or Israel that cannot be known from open source channels.
Both sides of this conflict are fighting as they must or can. Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and others Palestinian groups have no weapons to attack Israel except rockets. As for Israel, the day it fails to fight asymmetrically, that is the day it submits to national suicide. Asymmetrical tactics have nothing to do with justice.
Conflicts often bring clarity to political struggles. The US has unequivocally backed Israel's right of self-defense, which implies endorsement of the Israeli interpretation of events. However, a look into the exchanges of attacks in September and October and earlier clouds the determination of who shot first.
For NightWatch that question is less interesting than what comes next. This is the first major combat action between Arabs and Israelis since the Arab Spring uprisings changed governments in Tunisia, Egypt and, arguably, Libya. New Arab governments will be judged on their reaction to it.
It contains ominous portents because Hamas would have been reluctant, if not unable, to engage Israel in this fashion were Mubarak still in power in Egypt. It has rallied Muslims of all sects and ethnicities, and as far away as Malaysia and Indonesia to denounce Israel and state their support for the Palestinian Arabs in Gaza.
Thus one ripple effect of this fighting is that it shows that hostility to Israel can unite Muslims across national, ethnic and sectarian divides. The emergence of pro-Islamist governments in previously secular states always has contained the potential for the emergence of a greater threat to Israel than has been the case in many decades.
Another ripple effect is that the US outreach to Muslim countries has been undermined by the decision to take sides, supporting Israel as acting in self-defense. Arabs do not agree with that view of events and will distrust US diplomats in the future. Some Arab commentators have criticized the US for not restraining Israel.
A third ripple effect is that the Israel-Gaza crisis has displaced the Syria crisis as the headline news item around the world. International attention on Syria has been refocused on Gaza. The fight in Syria is less consequential than the fighting in Gaza because the Gaza fight risks regional conflict in ways Syria does not.
This does not appear to be accidental and appears to benefit Iran. At this point, however, Iranian instrumentality in provoking a proxy fight between Hamas and Israel remains only a working hypothesis.
Continue reading “NIGHTWATCH: Israel & It's US Enabler Uniting Muslims”
