Nuke transportation story has explosive implications

By ROBERT STORMER
Special to the Star-Telegram

Last month, six W80-1 nuclear-armed AGM-129 advanced cruise missiles were flown from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana and sat on the tarmac for 10 hours undetected. Press reports initially cited the Air Force mistake of flying nuclear weapons over the United States in violation of Air Force standing orders and international treaties, while completely missing the more important major issues, such as how six nuclear cruise missiles got loose to begin with. Opinion columns and editorials appeared in America’s newspapers, some blasting the Air Force for flying nukes over the U.S. and some defending the Air Force procedure. None of the news reports focused on the real questions of our nuclear security. Let me be very clear here: We are not talking about paintball cartridges or pellet gun ammo. We are talking nuclear weapons. There is a strict chain of custody for all such weapons. Nuclear weapons handling is spelled out in great detail in Air Force regulations, to the credit of that service. Every person who orders the movement of these weapons, handles them, breaks seals or moves any nuclear weapon must sign off for tracking purposes. Two armed munitions specialists are required to work as a team with all nuclear weapons. All individuals working with nuclear weapons must meet very strict security standards and be tested for loyalty — this is known as a “Personnel Reliability Program.” They work in restricted areas within eyeshot of one another and are reviewed constantly. All security forces assigned are authorized to use deadly force to protect the weapons from any threat. Nor does anyone quickly move a 1-ton cruise missile — or forget about six of them, as reported by some news outlets, especially cruise missiles loaded with high explosives. The United States also does not transport nuclear weapons meant for elimination attached to their launch vehicles under the wings of a combat aircraft. The procedure is to separate the warhead from the missile, encase the warhead and transport it by military cargo aircraft to a repository — not an operational bomber base that just happens to be the staging area for Middle Eastern operations. Yes, we still do fly nuclear warheads over the United States today. We also drive them over land as well. That’s not the point. This is about how six nuclear advanced cruise missiles got out of their bunkers and onto a combat aircraft without notice of the wing commander, squadron commander, munitions maintenance squadron (MMS), the B-52H’s crew chief and command pilot and onto another Air Force base tarmac without notice of that air base’s chain of command — for 10 hours. It is time that we got to the bottom of it through a comprehensive investigation. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked Larry Welch, a former Air Force chief of staff, to lead an independent inquiry into the implications of the incident. That is in addition to the existing Air Force investigation 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. The questions that must be answered: 1 Why, and for what ostensible purpose, were these nuclear weapons taken to Barksdale? 2 How long was it before the error was discovered? 3 How many mistakes and errors were made, and how many needed to be made, for this to happen? 4 How many and which security protocols were overlooked? 5 How many and which safety procedures were bypassed or ignored? 6 How many other nuclear command and control non-observations of procedure have there been? 7 What is Congress going to do to better oversee U.S. nuclear command and control? 8 How does this incident relate to concern for reliability of control over nuclear weapons and nuclear materials in Russia, Pakistan and elsewhere?9 Does the Bush administration, as some news reports suggest, have plans to attack Iran with nuclear weapons?10 If this was an accident, have we degraded our military to a point where we are now making critical mistakes with our nuclear arsenal? If so, how do we correct this?Yes, heads must roll and careers will end. But let’s make sure that this includes the ranks from general officers to noncommissioned ones.Or is this to be the Air Force version of the Abu Ghraib investigation?

http://www.star-telegram.com/245/v-print/story/259201.html

Navy veteran questions why six nuclear missiles were flown on combat aircraft to staging area for Middle East

10/08/2007 @ 5:52 pm

Filed by John Byrne

A retired lieutenant commander in the Navy Reserve who served with the Navy’s Supervisor of Salvage questioned in a little-noticed editorial Sunday why six active nuclear armed cruise missiles were being transferred to an active bomber base that “just happens to be the staging area for Middle Eastern operations.”

“The United States also does not transport nuclear weapons meant for elimination attached to their launch vehicles under the wings of a combat aircraft,” Navy veteran Robert Stormer wrote in the Texas-based Star-Telegram. “The procedure is to separate the warhead from the missile, encase the warhead and transport it by military cargo aircraft to a repository — not an operational bomber base that just happens to be the staging area for Middle Eastern operations.”

Six nuclear W80 nuclear-armed cruise missiles were flown to Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana where they sat for ten hours undetected.

“Press reports initially cited the Air Force mistake of flying nuclear weapons over the United States in violation of Air Force standing orders and international treaties, while completely missing the more important major issues, such as how six nuclear cruise missiles got loose to begin with,” writes Stormer.

“Let me be very clear here: We are not talking about paintball cartridges or pellet gun ammo. We are talking nuclear weapons.”

Stormer doesn’t buy reports that the missiles were simply lost. The title of his piece is “Nuke transportation story has explosive implications.”

“There is a strict chain of custody for all such weapons,” he said. “Nuclear weapons handling is spelled out in great detail in Air Force regulations, to the credit of that service. Every person who orders the movement of these weapons, handles them, breaks seals or moves any nuclear weapon must sign off for tracking purposes.”

“All security forces assigned are authorized “to use deadly force to protect the weapons from any threat. Nor does anyone quickly move a 1-ton cruise missile — or forget about six of them, as reported by some news outlets, especially cruise missiles loaded with high explosives.

“This is about how six nuclear advanced cruise missiles got out of their bunkers and onto a combat aircraft without notice of the wing commander, squadron commander, munitions maintenance squadron (MMS), the B-52H’s crew chief and command pilot and onto another Air Force base tarmac without notice of that air base’s chain of command — for 10 hours.”

At the end of his editorial, he poses the following questions.

The questions that must be answered:

1 Why, and for what ostensible purpose, were these nuclear weapons taken to Barksdale?

2 How long was it before the error was discovered?

3 How many mistakes and errors were made, and how many needed to be made, for this to happen?

4 How many and which security protocols were overlooked?

5 How many and which safety procedures were bypassed or ignored?

6 How many other nuclear command and control non-observations of procedure have there been?

7 What is Congress going to do to better oversee U.S. nuclear command and control?

8 How does this incident relate to concern for reliability of control over nuclear weapons and nuclear materials in Russia, Pakistan and elsewhere?

9 Does the Bush administration, as some news reports suggest, have plans to attack Iran with nuclear weapons?

10 If this was an accident, have we degraded our military to a point where we are now making critical mistakes with our nuclear arsenal? If so, how do we correct this?

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Navy_veteran_questions_why_six_nuclear_1008.html

Britain ‘on board’ for US strikes on Iran

British defence officials have held talks with their Pentagon counterparts about how they could help out if America chose to bomb Iran.

Gordon Brown ‘will back air strikes on Iran’ The man who stands between US and new war Michael Burleigh: Drum beaters for Iran war should think again Washington sources say that America has shelved plans for an all-out assault, drawn up to destroy the Iranian nuclear facilities and take out the Islamist regime. The Sunday Telegraph has learned that President Bush’s White House national security council is discussing instead a plan to launch pinpoint attacks on bases operated by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Quds force, blamed for training Iraqi militants. Pentagon officials have revealed that President Bush won an understanding with Gordon Brown in July that Britain would support air strikes if they could be justified as a counter-terrorist operation. Since then discussions about what Britain might contribute militarily, to combat Iranian retaliation that would follow US air strikes, have been held between ministers and officials in the Pentagon and the Ministry of Defence. Vincent Cannistraro — who served as intelligence chief on Ronald Reagan’s National Security Council and then as head of operations for the CIA’s counter-terrorist centre — said: “What’s on the table right now is tactical strikes.” Last night, Downing Street declined to comment on the suggestion. But Mr Cannistraro has talked about the preparations to senior Pentagon officials and with military and intelligence contacts in the UK. He said: “The British Government is in accord with plans to launch limited strikes on facilities inside Iran, on the basis of counter-terrorism.” While the US Air Force and naval jets could carry out raids without help from the RAF, the Pentagon is keen to have the Royal Navy’s cooperation in the event of an attack, to prevent Iran from sowing mines in the Gulf to block oil exports in retaliation. Mr Cannistraro said: “The British have to be a major auxiliary to this plan. It’s not just for political reasons: the US doesn’t have a lot of mine clearing capability in the Gulf. The Dutch and the British do. “There will be renewed discussions with British defence officials about what role Britain would perform in the naval sphere. If there was a retaliatory response by the Iranians, they might close the Straits of Hormuz and that would affect the entire West Fullarticle

R & P divided since power began

The Christianizing of Tahiti

Reacting to the stories of Tahiti, and troubled that the crew of HMS Bounty could have found life among the Tahitians preferable to life among Christians, the religious orthodoxy of England founded the London Missionary Society in 1795 (which included their own armed police force). The sole purpose of the society was to bring Tahiti under Christian rule, in effect to remove a more pleasant alternative lifestyle that threatened Christian power. Two years later the first missionaries arrived in Tahiti and were as warmly treated by the Tahitians as had been earlier visitors. But after 7 years of missionary work (children were required to recite, “For what is Jehova angry with thee? Because I am evil and do evil.” in Tahitian) there were few willing converts to Christianity.

What happened next is documented in a letter to home by one of the brethren, J.M.Orsmond. All the missionaries were at that time salting pork and distilling spirits. Pomare (the local chief) was introduced to the bottle by the missionaries. Orsmond describes the compact by which Pomare, reduced to an alcoholic, would be backed in a war against the other island chiefs on the understanding that his victory would be followed by enforced conversion (This is the same deal that Papal Nuncio Eugenio Pacelli made with Hitler, trading the Vatican’s support for Hitler’s promise to declare Catholocism Nazi Germany’s state religion).

Since Pomare was supplied with firearms to be used against his opponents’ clubs, victory was certain. “The whole nation”, Orsmond wrote, “was converted in a day.”

There followed a reign of terror. Persistent unbelievers were put to death and a penal code was drawn up by the missionaries and enforced by the mission police. it was declared illegal to adorn oneself with flowers, to sing (other than hymns), to surf or to dance. A moral code of such strictness was then enforced that a man walking with his arm round a woman at night was compelled to carry a lantern in his free hand. On the island of Raiatea a man who forecast the weather was treated as a witchdoctor and put to death.

Within a quarter of a century the process by which the native culture of Tahiti had been extinguished was exported to every corner of the Pacific, reducing the islanders to the level of the working class of Victorian England.

After their mass conversion it was hoped that the Tahitians might be induced to accept the benefits of civilization by putting them to [servile] work growing sugar cane… The enterprise failed, and Mr. Orsmond, believing that “a too bountiful nature diminishes men’s natural desire to work”, ordered all the breadfruit trees to be cut down so that the lack of a natural food supply would force the Tahitians to seek employment in the mission plantations.

Captain James Cook estimated that 200,000 people were living on Tahiti. After thirty years of missionary rule, only 6,000 remained.

Their power base firmly established in Tahiti, the missionaries moved swiftly to other islands. The methods employed were the same as before. A local chieftain would be baptized, crowned king, presented with a portrait of Queen Victoria, introduced to the bottle, and left to the work of conversion.

By 1850 the Christian conquest of the Pacific was complete.

so maybe “civilization” needs it’s slave labor force. the hungrier the better.

the above story was taken from:
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/ATHEISM/inquisition.html

Report: State Dept., Blackwater cooperated to neutralize killings

By Warren P. Strobel | McClatchy Newspapers

• Posted on Monday, October 1, 2007

WASHINGTON — State Department officials worked closely with the private security contractor Blackwater USA to play down incidents in which company operatives killed innocent Iraqis, according to Blackwater and State Department documents obtained by a congressional committee.

When a drunken Blackwater contractor killed a bodyguard of Iraq’s vice president last Christmas Eve, the State Department helped spirit the contractor out of the country within 36 hours, according to the report, released Monday by Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Officials in Baghdad and Washington then dickered with Blackwater on the compensation for the family of the guard, Raheem Khalif. An unnamed official in the State Department’s Diplomatic Security service complained that the $250,000 payment proposed by the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad was too much, because it might lead Iraqis to “try to get killed so as to set up their family financially,” according to a State Department e-mail obtained by the committee.

When a Blackwater contract employee killed an Iraqi in Hillah in June 2005, the State Department asked the firm to pay $5,000 in compensation. “(W)e are all better off getting this case — and any similar cases — behind us quickly,” a department official wrote.

The disclosures appear to contradict past claims by State Department officials that they aggressively investigated wrongdoing by Blackwater. The company has received $835 million in contracts to guard U.S. civilians in Iraq.

Blackwater has come under heightened scrutiny since a shooting Sept. 16 in Baghdad that left 11 Iraqis dead. On Monday, the FBI said it has begun a criminal investigation.

“At the request of the Department of State, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is sending a team to Iraq to assist in the ongoing investigation into the September 16, 2007, shooting incident allegedly involving Blackwater employees,” FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko said in a statement.

The memorandum released Monday by the House committee’s Democratic staff describes other questionable incidents.

On Sept. 24, 2006, a Blackwater detail driving on the wrong side of the road caused a red Opal driven by an Iraqi to skid into a Blackwater vehicle, hit a telephone pole and burst into flames. Blackwater personnel collected people and equipment from their disabled vehicle and left without aiding those in the Iraqi vehicle, described as being “in a ball of flames,” according to a company report.

On Nov. 28, 2005, a Blackwater motorcade making a round-trip journey to Iraq’s Oil Ministry collided with 18 different vehicles, according to another company document. Team members’ written accounts of the incident were found by the company to be “invalid, inaccurate and, at best, dishonest reporting.”

No employee of a private military contractor has been criminally charged for actions in Iraq.

Blackwater spokeswoman Anne Tyrrell didn’t return phone calls and e-mails seeking comment. She told the Associated Press: “We look forward to setting the record straight on this and other issues” at a hearing Tuesday of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Three senior State Department officials are also to testify.

State Department spokesman Tom Casey said, “We are scrupulous in

terms of oversight and scrutiny, not only of Blackwater but of all our

contractors.”

The committee staff working for Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., also reported, based on company documents, that Blackwater has fired 122 employees for misconduct under the State Department contracts.

Of those, 28 were let go for weapons-related incidents, 25 for drug and alcohol violations and 16 for “inappropriate/lewd conduct.”

“The only sanction that has been applied to Blackwater contractors for misconduct is termination of their individual contracts with Blackwater,” the staff memorandum says.

It quotes David Satterfield, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s senior Iraq adviser, as saying that Blackwater has 861 personnel working in Iraq. Two other companies, DynCorp and Triple Canopy, also conduct protective security details in the country.

Citing Blackwater’s security incident reports, the memorandum says Blackwater employees used their firearms 195 times from Jan. 1, 2005, through Sept. 12, 2007. Blackwater fired first in 84 percent of those incidents.

Blackwater documents acknowledge 16 Iraqi casualties in that time frame. But that number appears low.

The House committee says that in many cases, Blackwater employees fire from moving vehicles and don’t “remain at the scene to determine if their shots resulted in casualties.”

In the case of the Christmas Eve killing of a guard to Iraqi Vice President Adel Abdul Mehdi — which enraged the Iraqi government — the Blackwater contractor fled to a guard post operated by Triple Canopy and was later apprehended by police in Baghdad’s Green Zone.

According to investigative reports the committee cites, he claimed to have fired in self-defense, but Blackwater fired him on Christmas Day for violating its policy against possessing a firearm while intoxicated.

With the knowledge of State Department officials, he was put on a plane out of Baghdad on the morning of Dec. 26.

(Marisa Taylor contributed.)

To read the House committee memorandum, go to http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20071001121609.pdf

Dear Mr. President

Cheney mulled Israeli strike on Iran: Newsweek

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Vice President Dick Cheney had at one point considered asking Israel to launch limited missile strikes at an Iranian nuclear site to provoke a retaliation, Newsweek magazine reported on Sunday.

The news comes amid reports that Israel launched an air strike against Syria this month over a suspected nuclear site.

Citing two unidentified sources, Newsweek said former Cheney Middle East adviser David Wurmser told a small group several months ago that Cheney was considering asking Israel to strike the Iranian nuclear site at Natanz.

A military response by Iran could give Washington an excuse to then launch airstrikes of its own, Newsweek said.

Wurmser’s wife, Meyrav Wurmser of the neoconservative Hudson Institute think tank, told Newsweek the claims were untrue.

Wurmser left Cheney’s office last month, the magazine reported. The steady departure of neoconservative hawks from the administration has also helped tilt the balance against war, it said.

Washington has been pursuing diplomatic efforts to persuade Iran to alter its nuclear program. It has refused to take military options off the table, even U.S. resources are taxed by having 169,000 troops in Iraq.

Although some intelligence sources say Iran is years away from nuclear capability, Israel believes that military action may be necessary as early as 2008, Newsweek said.

Israel has declined to comment on the reported air strike, while Syria has denied receiving North Korean nuclear aid and said it could retaliate for the September 6 violation of its territory.

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Blackwater, America’s Private Army

Feds target Blackwater in weapons probe

WASHINGTON – Federal prosecutors are investigating whether employees of the private security firm Blackwater USA illegally smuggled into Iraq weapons that may have been sold on the black market and ended up in the hands of a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, officials said Friday.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Raleigh, N.C., is handling the investigation with help from Pentagon and State Department auditors, who have concluded there is enough evidence to file charges, the officials told The Associated Press. Blackwater is based in Moyock, N.C.

A spokeswoman for Blackwater did not return calls seeking comment Friday. The U.S. attorney for the eastern district of North Carolina, George Holding, declined to comment, as did Pentagon and State Department spokesmen.

Officials with knowledge of the case said it is active, although at an early stage. They spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter, which has heightened since 11 Iraqis were killed Sunday in a shooting involving Blackwater contractors protecting a U.S. diplomatic convoy in Baghdad.

The officials could not say whether the investigation would result in indictments, how many Blackwater employees are involved or if the company itself, which has won hundreds of millions of dollars in government security contracts since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, is under scrutiny.

In Saturday’s editions, The News & Observer of Raleigh reported that two former Blackwater employees — Kenneth Wayne Cashwell of Virginia Beach, Va., and William Ellsworth “Max” Grumiaux of Clemmons, N.C. — are cooperating with federal investigators.

Cashwell and Grumiaux pleaded guilty in early 2007 to possession of stolen firearms that had been shipped in interstate or foreign commerce, and aided and abetted another in doing so, according to court papers viewed by The Associated Press. In their plea agreements, which call for a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, the men agreed to testify in any future proceedings.

Calls to defense attorneys were not immediately returned Friday evening, and calls to the telephone listings for both men also were not returned.

The News & Observer, citing unidentified sources, reported that the probe was looking at whether Blackwater had shipped unlicensed automatic weapons and military goods to Iraq without a license.

The paper’s report that the company itself was under investigation could not be confirmed by the AP.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ordered a review of security practices for U.S. diplomats in Iraq following a deadly incident involving Blackwater USA guards protecting an embassy convoy.

Rice’s announcement came as the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad resumed limited diplomatic convoys under the protection of Blackwater outside the heavily fortified Green Zone after a suspension because of the weekend incident in that city.

In the United States, officials in Washington said the smuggling investigation grew from internal Pentagon and State Department inquiries into U.S. weapons that had gone missing in Iraq. It gained steam after Turkish authorities protested to the U.S. in July that they had seized American arms from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, rebels.

The Turks provided serial numbers of the weapons to U.S. investigators, said a Turkish official.

The Pentagon said in late July it was looking into the Turkish complaints and a U.S. official said FBI agents had traveled to Turkey in recent months to look into cases of missing U.S. weapons in Iraq.

Investigators are determining whether the alleged Blackwater weapons match those taken from the PKK.

It was not clear if Blackwater employees suspected of selling to the black market knew the weapons they allegedly sold to middlemen might wind up with the PKK. If they did, possible charges against them could be more serious than theft or illegal weapons sales, officials said.

The PKK, which is fighting for an independent Kurdistan, is banned in Turkey, which has a restive Kurdish population and is considered a “foreign terrorist organization” by the State Department. That designation bars U.S. citizens or those in U.S. jurisdictions from supporting the group in any way.

The North Carolina investigation was first brought to light by State Department Inspector General Howard Krongard, who mentioned it, perhaps inadvertently, this week while denying he had improperly blocked fraud and corruption probes in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Krongard was accused in a letter by Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, of politically motivated malfeasance, including refusing to cooperate with an investigation into alleged weapons smuggling by a large, unidentified State Department contractor.

In response, Krongard said in a written statement that he “made one of my best investigators available to help Assistant U.S. Attorneys in North Carolina in their investigation into alleged smuggling of weapons into Iraq by a contractor.”

His statement went further than Waxman’s letter because it identified the state in which the investigation was taking place. Blackwater is the biggest of the State Department’s three private security contractors.

The other two, Dyncorp and Triple Canopy, are based in Washington’s northern Virginias suburbs, outside the jurisdiction of the North Carolina’s attorneys.

___

Associated Press writers Mike Baker in Raleigh and Desmond Butler and Lara Jakes Jordan in Washington contributed to this report.

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The real axis of evil

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