Thursday, October 13, 2011

USA Wanting War

FBI Insider: Obama Administration Likely Manufactured Dubious Terror Plot
No information about plot exists within FBI channels


http://www.infowars.com/fbi-insider-obama-administration-likely-manufactured-dubious-terror-plot/

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Tarpley: US plans to 'stoke up another crisis with Iran'

U.S. accusations that Iran plotted to kill the Saudi Arabian Ambassador to Washington "are running into increased skepticism here in the United States," Webster Griffin Tarpley, an American journalist, said on Thursday.

"I was interested to see that on the night these charges were launched, the NBC Nightly News was skeptical, Michael Isikoff on MSNBC was skeptical," Griffin Tarpley told Press TV's U.S. Desk in an interview.

He also said that the U.S. made such allegations to "stoke up another crisis with Iran."

Video: http://www.presstv.com/usdetail/204387.html

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White House Calling for Global Support against Iran

The White House is working to drum up worldwide condemnation against Iran for the foiled plot to kill a Saudi ambassador on U.S. soil.

Iran claims the U.S. has made up the story, even as the U.S. explores more sanctions on Tehran.

However, getting the rest of the world to move against Iran will not be easy.

The administration is sending out its top diplomatic brass to express outrage over the plot to kill Saudi Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir in a Washington, D.C., restaurant.

"This kind of reckless act undermines international norms and the international system. Iran must be held accountable for its actions," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.

The White House has made clear is that it has no plans to take on Iran by itself. Vice President Joe Biden emphasized that more sanctions is the administration's goal.

"That the world is united, that it's not the United States versus Iran, that the isolation of Iran and the attempt to change the behavior is universal," Biden explained.

However, that may be easier said than done. For the better part of a decade, U.S. sanctions efforts against Iran has been less than effective -- stymied sometimes by Russia, sometimes by China, and sometimes by European nations who have business ties with Tehran.

Many Middle East observers believe the plot is a brazen escalation in Iran's 32-year record of hostile acts against the U.S.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said the administration will have bipartisan support but urged a tough stance against Iran.

"I would hope that our administration would hold the Iranian government, and hold their feet to the fire over the actions that have been alleged in this complaint," Boehner said.

Meanwhile, on the streets of Tehran, citizens are reading the headlines and wondering if the world will do anything about the latest threat from the mullahs.

http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2011/October/White-House-Seeks-to-Drum-Up-Support-Against-Iran-/
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Iran Scoffs at U.S. Account of Alleged Assassination Plot

Iran’s top leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said on Wednesday that the alleged plot was concocted in Washington to distract Americans from their own economic problems.



The government of Iran on Thursday escalated its rebuttal of American criminal charges that it was behind a murder conspiracy in Washington, calling the claims that Iranian agents had plotted to kill the Saudi ambassador with the help of a Mexican drug gang so ludicrous that even politicians and press in the United States were expressing skepticism about such a scheme.

The latest rejoinder added to the response of Iran’s top leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and his subordinates, who said on Wednesday that the suspected plot was concocted in Washington to distract Americans from their own traumatic economic problems, highlighted by the Occupy Wall Street movement.

At the same time, however, Saudi Arabia, which is deeply suspicious of Iran, suggested that it accepted the American accusations as fact, and Britain said it was taking the accusations seriously. The Saudi foreign minister, Saud al-Faisal, told reporters at a news conference in Vienna that “this dastardly act reflects the policies of Iran.” The Saudi government has not yet decided whether to withdraw its ambassador from Tehran in protest, he said.

In London, the British foreign secretary, William Hague, told the House of Commons that the suspected plot “would appear to constitute a major escalation in Iran’s sponsorship of terrorism outside its borders,” British news agencies reported. He added that the British government was “in close touch with the U.S. authorities and will work to agree an international response, along with the U.S., the rest of the E.U. and Saudi Arabia.”

On Wednesday, France, which has taken a hard line toward Iran and its nuclear program, also appeared to accept the American accusations without a hint of skepticism. "France considers this an extremely serious issue and a scandalous violation of international law,” said the Foreign Ministry spokesman, Bernard Valero. He said France was in close contact with Washington on the matter, and as for Iran, "we expect the planners and those responsible to explain themselves.”

The foreign policy chief of the European Union, Catherine Ashton, was more cautious in her appraisal of the charges pending more information about the evidence. Nonetheless, Ms. Ashton said she viewed the charges "with grave concern.”

The charges, announced in Washington on Tuesday by Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., asserted that officials in the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps had conspired to kill Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United States by hiring assassins from a Mexican drug cartel for $1.5 million. The main suspects were identified as Mansour J. Arbabsiar, a naturalized American citizen of Iranian descent from Corpus Christi, Tex., who has been taken into custody, and Gholam Shakuri, described by the Justice Department as a member of the Quds Force, who is at large and believed to be in Iran.

Mr. Holder said American investigators believed that high-level officials in the Iranian government “were responsible for this plot.”

President Obama, making his first public comments on the accusations Thursday, did not go quite as far. But at a news conference with the visiting president of South Korea, Lee Myung-bak, in Washington, Mr. Obama said in response to a question about Iran: “We believe that even if at the highest levels there was not detailed operational knowledge, there has to be accountability.”

On Wednesday, Obama administration officials sought to counter skepticism from outside experts on Iran and from some foreign leaders about the logic of such a plot, arguing that evidence such as bank transfers and intercepted telephone calls substantiated it. Some Iran experts nonetheless said it made little sense that the Quds Force, a highly skilled organization, would plot an attack in such a risky and amateurish way.

Seizing on this theme, Iran’s state-run media was dominated on Thursday by rejections of the American charges. Press TV, an English-language news web site controlled by the Iranian government, quoted the foreign minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, calling the charges part of a “new propaganda campaign.” The official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Ali Ahani, the deputy foreign minister, saying that “the absurd and conspiratorial scenario was made so immaturely that even political circles and media of the U.S. and its allies were suspicious about it.”

He called the charges an attempt to “weaken Iran’s increasingly strengthening position in the region.”

On Wednesday, the Foreign Ministry of Iran complained angrily to the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, which has monitored United States interests in Iran since diplomatic relations were severed in 1980 . The ministry said it summoned the Swiss ambassador to convey its outrage over the American charges in person and to warn “against the repetition of such politically motivated allegations.”

Ayatollah Khamenei predicted what he called the demise of American capitalism and corporate favoritism. Press TV quoted the ayatollah saying in a speech that “the corrupted capitalist system shows no mercy to any nation, including the American people.”

The ayatollah also commended the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York, Washington and other American cities, calling them a consequence of “the prevalence of top-level corruption, poverty and social inequality in America.”

Reporting was contributed by Artin Afkhami from Boston and Steven Erlanger from Paris.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/world/middleeast/iran-broadens-counter-rhetoric-on-alleged-plot-calling-it-a-joke.html

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Feinstein Questions Whether Iran Backing More Plots in Wake of Alleged Assassination Scheme

Published October 13, 2011

| FoxNews.com

A top senator warned that the United States should be on "alert" about other Iran-driven terror plots in the wake of the alleged scheme to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to Washington.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said she's been aware of the investigation for about a month and that "intelligence indicates" there could be "problems" elsewhere.

Feinstein declined to get into detail and stressed that she wasn't saying other diplomats are necessarily in danger. But she raised the question of whether an Israeli ambassador or American ambassador could also be targeted, if Iran's special operations Quds Force was involved in this plot as alleged.


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10/13/feinstein-warns-other-iran-backed-plots-in-wake-alleged-assassination-scheme/?test=latestnews
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WaPo and Harvard University:
Iran terror is FALSE FLAG and 100% BULLSHIT!

The neocon controlled Obamazombie is going off script and even Bilderbergers are telling him to shut the f**k up!

NY Times also says the Iran plot is BULLSHIT

Alex has issued an emergency notice on the broadcast today that the Neocon controlled Obamazombie is helping a subset of globalist Nazis to assist Israel on massive genocidal bombing on Iran along with staged terror attacks all over the US/Britain/Canada. Colonel Schaffer has raised the FALSE FLAG alert flag and the military is 100% against this. Even DHS has not gone along with this bullshit terror alert. It seems to only be coming out from the justice department as if a rogue action. But we all know the puppet masters may be using any excuse (even a seemingly 'rogue' element) to initial martial law and to initiate full blown WWIII to stop all the truth coming out about the banksters theft of over $100 trillion globally. LaRouche has stated that there will be a British backed coup with this exact type of scenario planned. We know now that OWS is being controlled by offshore and non-American interests. It was started by a Canadian magazine which is focused on globalized cybernetic control...the exact future that Rockefeller and Brzezinski wish to bring about. The people at the protests now see there is an elite group of insiders that set all policy for the protests and anyone deviating from that policy faces harsh reprimand and outcasting by the controllers. Senators have leaked the fact that the plan is to transform the protests into violent mobs so that martial law can be implemented. But they need the Iran bullshit to get the army involved.

To my knowledge, WaPo and Harvard have never raised the red flag like this, but they are doin g it, check it out...

this article from foreignpolicy.com actually mentions the term 'false flag' which seems like a departure
from their typical protocol...and esp in terms of such a current event.

weird.

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'Something just doesn't add up...'

http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/10/13/something_just_doesnt_add_up

Iranian terror plot looks more and more like a "False Flag" operation
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/10/13/something_just_doesnt_add_up
Posted By Stephen M. Walt Thursday, October 13, 2011 - 11:58 AM

Unless the Obama administration (and in particular, Attorney General Eric Holder), has more smoking gun evidence than they've revealed so far, they are in danger of a diplomatic gaffe on a par with Colin Powell's famous U.N. Security Council briefing about Iraq's supposed WMD programs, a briefing now known to have been a series of fabrications and fairy tales.

The problem is that the harder one looks at the allegations about Manour Ababasiar, the fishier the whole business seems. There's no question that Iran has relied upon assassination as a foreign policy tool in the past, but it boggles the mind to imagine that they would use someone as unreliable and possibly unhinged as Ababsiar. I won't rehash the many questions that can and should be raised about this whole business; for compelling skeptical dissections, see Glenn Greenwald, Juan Cole, Tony Karon, and John Glaser.

As I said yesterday, I don't know what actually happened here, and I remain open to the possibility that there really was some sort of officially-sanctioned Iranian plot to assassinate foreign ambassadors here on U.S. soil. But the more I think about it, the less plausible whole thing appears. In particular, blowing up buildings in the United States is an act of war, and history shows that the United States is not exactly restrained when it responds to direct attacks on U.S. soil. Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and we eventually firebombed many Japanese cities and dropped two atomic bombs on them.... When it comes to hitting back, in short, we tend to do so with enthusiasm.

Iran's leaders are not stupid, and surely they would have known that a plot like this ran the risk of triggering a very harsh U.S. response. Given that extraordinary risk, is it plausible to believe they would have entrusted such a sensitive mission to a serial bungler like Ababsiar? If you are going to attack a target in the United States, wouldn't you send your A Team, instead of Mr. Magoo?

Hence the growing skepticism, including the possibility that this might be some sort of "false flag" operation by whatever groups or countries might benefit from further deterioration in U.S.-Iranian relations. If the Obama administration can't back up their allegations in a convincing way, they are going to face a diplomatic backlash and they are going to look like the Keystone Cops. They could even face a situation where rightwing war-mongers seize on their initial accusations to clamor for harsh action (a development that has already begun), while moderates at home and abroad lose confidence in the administration's competence, credibility, and basic honesty.

So my advice to Holder & Co. is this: you better show us what you've got, and it had better be good.

Stephen M. Walt is the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University
Foreign Policy Magazine is published by a division of The Washington Post

Read the comments in the article and please listen to AJ's emergency broadcast today

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Obama: U.S. Will Make Sure Iran 'Pays the Price' for Assassination Plot

Published October 13, 2011

| FoxNews.com


President Obama, in his first public remarks on the alleged Iran-backed assassination plot, defended U.S. claims that the plot had "direct links" to the Iranian government and said the international response will ensure the country "pays the price" for its behavior.

"This is part of a pattern of dangerous and reckless behavior by the Iranian government," Obama said, in response to a question from Fox News.

He spoke about the alleged plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. during a joint press conference with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak. During his remarks, Obama said there is a "great similarity" between the behavior of Iran and that of North Korea.

Obama did not go into specific detail about what the response to the plot might entail, but said it will start with the Justice Department-level prosecution over the plot and the application of the "toughest sanctions" toward Iran. He said the U.S. would continue to "mobilize" the international community to isolate Iran, predicting other nations will "punish Iran" for this decision.

Iranian representatives have vigorously denied charges that the government was involved in the plot


http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10/13/obama-us-will-make-sure-iran-pays-price-for-assassination-plot/
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U.S. Challenged to Explain Accusations of Iran Plot in the Face of Skepticism

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/13/us/iran-sees-terror-plot-accusation-as-diversion-from-wall-street-protests.html?_r=3&hp


WASHINGTON — The Obama administration on Wednesday sought to reconcile what it said was solid evidence of an Iranian plot to murder Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United States with a wave of puzzlement and skepticism from some foreign leaders and outside experts.

Senior American officials themselves were struggling to explain why the Quds Force, an elite international operations unit within Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, would orchestrate such a risky attack in so amateurish a manner.

The White House spokesman, Jay Carney, would not go further than to say the plot “clearly involved senior levels of the Quds Force.” But other American officials, armed with evidence such as bank transfers and intercepted telephone calls and with knowledge of how the covert unit operated in the past, said they believed that Iran’s senior leaders were likely complicit in the plot.

“It would be our assessment that this kind of operation would have been discussed at the highest levels of the regime,” said a senior American official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the government’s analysis.

American officials offered no specific evidence linking the plot to Iran’s most senior leaders. But they said it was inconceivable in Iran’s hierarchy that the leader of the shadowy Quds Force, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, was not directly involved, and that the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was not aware of such a plan.

Iran’s leaders marshaled a furious formal rejection Wednesday of the American accusations, calling the case a cynical fabrication meant to vilify Iran and distract Americans from their severe economic problems. A senior member of Iran’s Parliament, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, said he had “no doubt this is a new American-Zionist plot to divert the public opinion from the crisis Obama is grappling with.”
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Republicans Adopt Obama’s “Bad Movie” Iran Terror Plot

http://www.infowars.com/republicans-adopt-obamas-bad-movie-iran-terror-plot/

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
October 13, 2011

Despite the fact experts on Iran and its Quds force have responded with skepticism to an alleged plot and many have dismissed it as fantasy, a number of establishment politicians are demanding the Obama administration take action.

Arizona Senator John McCain lost little time exploiting the unproven plot. He told CBS today that Iran is a “threat” in the Persian Gulf and Obama is to blame for not meddling in Iran’s internal affairs and exploiting the 2009 street protests many believe were orchestrated in color revolution fashion by the CIA to overthrow the government in Tehran.

“This kind of reckless behavior they’ve displayed here could translate into a real serious problem,” said McCain, citing Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program.

Although the U.S. and Israel have tried for years to convince the world Iran is secretly working on nuclear weapons, the international community has admitted there is no evidence Iran is doing so.

Another Arizona politician, Rep. Trent Franks, used the dubious plot to attack Obama. “If this effort had been successful, it would have constituted an act of war against the United States of America, and it should demonstrate Iran’s true intentions toward America in the clearest possible terms, even to this administration,” Franks said on Wednesday. He called for a military response to the alleged assassination plot.

“If they are committed enough to try to foment an attack here, and literally try to blow up the Israeli embassy here, or kill the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the U.S., let me suggest to you that the intent is so clear that our entire focus now should be upon dealing with the capacity,”
he said. “Perhaps this president would do better if he were able to focus on the threats of our nation without being so busy apologizing for American at every opportunity.”

Speaking from the House Floor Wednesday night, House Republicans said the Obama administration needs to take immediate action. “This event that has occurred should tell us a lot of things,” declared Texas Republican Ted Poe. “One, that the country of Iran is so bold that they believe they can commit a crime of terror on the soil of the United States and get away with it.”

“It is a real concern when you’re talking about 1,200 miles of border between the United States and Mexico, that someone would have a plan to invade our country and take control of those border counties,” Rep. John Carter, another Texan Republican, added. “I would call that invasion.”


Not to be left behind in the rush to exaggerate the dubious plot, Texas governor Rick Perry mentioned the imaginary plot from the campaign trail in Indiana and linked it to border security. He said the supposed plot is “business as usual” for Iran.

Establishment Tea Party diva Michele Bachmann also weighed in. “If I was president I wouldn’t have taken my eye of the number one issue in the Middle East, which is Iran obtaining nuclear weapons. The problem with the Obama administration is they put serious daylight between Israel and the United States from day one of the Obama presidency, so the president unfortunately sent signals of weakness,” Bachmann told CNN.

Republicans received support from hysterical Democrats. Senator Dianne Feinstein of California said Congress needs to investigate the supposed plot. “There may be a chain of these things,” she speculated. “I think we need to explore whether there are other plots going on into other countries.” Feinstein chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee.

As should be expected, the corporate media by and large is falling in line with the desperate effort to demonize Iran.

A Washington Post editorial today admits there is skepticism about the alleged threat and states “it is certainly prudent to reserve final judgment until all the facts of the case are known.” It then dismisses the skepticism and states “the alleged plot is not a large leap from Tehran’s past acts” and concludes whatever “the cause, the scheme’s discovery should serve as a warning of the escalating threat posed by Iran — and the need to act more forcefully against it.”

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Sources: US Gives Israel Green Light For Iran Strike

http://www.infowars.com/sources-us-gives-israel-green-light-for-iran-strike/

Fabricated terror plot provides pretext for intervention following Panetta’s October 3 Tel Aviv visit

Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
Wednesday, October 13, 2011

The Obama administration’s fabricated terror plot blamed on Iran represents the green light for an Israeli attack on Iran set to take place within the next two weeks, according to confidential military sources who spoke with Alex Jones.

Israel is concerned that major powers like Germany are moving closer to smoothing relations with Iran and allowing Iran to continue its nuclear enrichment program unimpeded. A two month window has been allocated during which Israel has the opportunity to launch a military assault, waiting until winter when the attack will be more difficult to pull off is not an option.

US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s October 3 Tel Aviv visit was used by Israeli hawks to convince the United States that it should green light the attack. Less than 10 days later, a fanciful terror plot involving a used car salesman was invented to implicate Iran and create the pretext for a military assault.

“In recent weeks, intense discussions have taken place in Israeli military and intelligence circles about whether or not to launch a military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Apparently, the key question in the debate was how to ensure that the United States took part in the attack or, at the very least, intervened on Israel’s side if the initial strike triggered a wider war,” writes Patrick Seale of Gulf News.

That intervention has now been mandated by the announcement of the fabricated terror plot, which was actually concocted last month but only made public now.

While U.S. intelligence officials prepare to release claims about a “chain” of plots that will be blamed on Iran, Time Magazine reports that the Obama administration is preparing to use the accusations to take action beyond mere isolation tactics.

“If the Administration fails to win support for a significant escalation of sanctions or other forms of punishment for the Tehran regime after presenting evidence of the latest allegations of Iranian malfeasance, the ball will land back in Obama’s court,” writes Tony Karon. “Having made the case that Iran has crossed a red line, he will be under growing pressure to act — or risk entering a highly polarized election season haunted by a “soft on Iran” charge.”


With neo-cons rushing to support aggressive measures against Iran, Obama will now be given right cover to pursue yet another act of regime change. As we postulated back in February last year, Obama is being blackmailed into supporting an attack on Iran as the only way to save his presidency. We also speculated that an assassination attempt would be used as the pretext to implicate Iran.

Geopolitical experts have been consistent in their warnings that Israel was preparing to strike Iran this fall.

Back in July, 21-year CIA veteran Robert Baer told KPFK Los Angeles that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was planning an attack on Iran in September to coincide with the Palestine bid for UN membership.

Speaking with the Alex Jones Show today, former State Department official Steve Pieczenik, who has numerous inside intelligence sources having worked in several sensitive positions during the course of his career, also indicated that the terror plot was completely fabricated and that it would be used a pretext to justify a military strike against Iran.

Pieczenik also pointed out that Israel had recently taken delivery of a large amount of bunker buster missiles.

As we have documented, the alleged assassination plot against Saudi Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir, which is now being cited by everyone from John Kerry to John McCain as a justification for a potential military strike, is a complete fantasy.

Retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer has revealed that an FBI insider with a high security clearance told him no records whatsoever detailing the plot existed within FBI channels, clearly indicating the whole episode was manufactured.

It has also now emerged that the alleged “mastermind” behind the plot was a drunk pothead who liked to frequent with prostitutes and was described by those who know him as a “joke”.
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Pieczenik: Obama and Israel to Attack Iran Under Cover of Bogus Terror Threat


http://www.infowars.com/pieczenik-obama-and-israel-to-attack-iran-under-cover-of-bogus-terror-threat/

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
October 13, 2011

Appearing on the Alex Jones Show today, former State Department official Steve Pieczenik said Israel and the United States will use the cartoonish terror plot invented by the DEA and the FBI now dominating headlines as a false flag pretext to wage war on Iran.

Pieczenik said Iran does not need to wage war within the United States and is more focused on confronting Israel through its Hezbollah proxy in Lebanon. He said the government of Benjamin Netanyahu and the reactionary Likud party are turning up the heat on the long simmering Iranian pretext – based on its alleged and undemonstrated nuclear weapons program – in order to take attention off demands by the Palestinians and a growing contingent at the United Nations for statehood. Israel, according to Pieczenik, also wants to distract its populace from a deteriorating domestic situation.

Moreover, the remarkably incompetent Obama administration is using the fallacious plot to divert attention from its involvement in the criminal Fast and Furious gun-running operation and Obama’s rapidly falling popularity rating as the election approaches. A growing number of Democrats are now talking about running a candidate other than Obama.

Like his predecessor, Obama will use the rally ’round the flag tactic to prop up his sagging popularity rating. Bush realized a boost after the attacks of September 11, 2001, and his invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

The Bush era neocons, long ensconced in the Pentagon, have for years attempted to steer U.S. foreign policy toward a cataclysmic confrontation with Iran.

In June, AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, renewed its push to convince the U.S. government that Iran is secretly developing nuclear weapons that threaten Israel. Pieczenik noted that AIPAC is instrumental in efforts to start what will amount to World War III. He said Israel has consistently manipulated AIPAC.

In September, it was reported that the Obama administration had approved the sale of 55 powerful GBU-28 Hard Target Penetrators, better known as bunker-buster bombs, to the Israeli government. The high-tech munitions, according to Newsweek, are deemed important to any future military strike against Iranian nuclear sites. The deal also includes a network of radar sites designed to help Israel ward off a missile attack, as well as joint military exercises and regular national-security consultations.

The Obama administration made the weapon and technology transfer under the cover of headline-grabbing and theatrical disagreements with the Jewish state over the Palestinian issue.

Pieczenik said cluster-bombs sent to Israel will be used to target Iranian airfields and immobilize its air force during the attack. In 2006, the U.S. said it would stop sending clusterbombs to Israel after the discovery of hundreds of US-made cluster bombs among the tens of thousands of unexploded munitions carpeting the south of Lebanon following Israel’s most recent invasion of its northern neighbor.

Finally, Pieczenik said “Israel is out of control” and “dysfunctional.” He said it is up to the people of Israel to go into the street and protest the actions of its government,.

The American people as well need to go into the street and protest the move toward World War III and also demand the impeachment of Obama, who deceptively portrayed himself as a peacekeeper during the election but immediately continued the wars and provocations of his predecessor.

Video Clip from the first hour:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-6J0bTskRg

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Iran Charged with Fake Terror Plot
http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/14120-fake-terror-plot.html

Thursday, 13 October 2011 10:07
By Stephen Lendman

Since Iran's 1979 revolution and US hostage crisis, Washington's been spoiling for a fight. The Carter administration considered invading and seizing its oil fields.

Washington exploited Iran-Iraq tensions and encouraged Saddam Hussein to attack. Earlier Iran's Shah was supported. After 1979, US foreign policy shifted.

The Carter Doctrine pledged Middle East military intervention if US interests were threatened. Reagan escalated Carter policies short of committing US forces in combat. Saddam then got US backing. A decade of war followed. America pretended support for both sides, but mostly gave it to Iraq.

US/Iranian relations remain tense. Washington's sought regime change in Tehran for years. Various confrontational tactics include on and off saber rattling, sanctions, and direct meddling in Iran's internal affairs, perhaps including covert US Special Forces and CIA operatives there causing trouble.

Why not? They do it in dozens of countries globally, using death squads and other destabilizing tactics.

Washington also makes baseless accusations of anti-US involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. It calls Tehran a threat to world peace, saying its commercial nuclear program plans nuclear weapons development. Unmentioned is Israel's known arsenal and willingness to use it preemptively.

US media scoundrels regurgitate official lies and suppress vital truths. New York Times writers and commentators play lead roles. The latest alleged plot is laughable on its face. But it's headline news across America, including on The Times' front page, saying "US Accuses Iranians of Plotting to Kill Saudi Envoy."

What's explained sounds more like a bad film plot, saying:

Washington "accused Iranian officials of plotting to murder Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States (Adel al-Jubeir) in a bizarre scheme involving an Iran-American used-car salesman who believed he was hiring assassins from a Mexican drug cartel for $1.5 million."

Also allegedly involved were plans to bomb Israel's Washington embassy and Saudi and Israeli embassies in Argentina.

But there's more, a "side deal" said The Times between Iran's Revolutionary Guard (its elite military unit) and Mexico's Los Zetas drug cartel to smuggle opium from the Middle East to Mexico.

The alleged plans "never progressed," perhaps because there were none, just baseless accusations to further heighten US/Iranian tensions and get hawkish congressional members to call for direct confrontation.

On October 11, Attorney General Eric Holder said:

"Today, the Department of Justice is announcing charges against two people who allegedly attempted to carry out a deadly plot that was directed by factions of the Iranian government to assassinate a foreign ambassador here in the United States."

Accused were Manssor Arbabsair, a naturalized US citizen holding an Iranian passport, and Gholam Shakuri, an Iranian-based member of its Revolutionary Guard Quds Force. On September 29, Arbabsair was arrested. Shakuri is still at large.

"The complaint alleges that this conspiracy was conceived, sponsored and directed from Iran and constitutes a flagrant violation of US and international law...."

Besides charging Arbabsir and Shakuri, Holder also said Washington "is committed to holding Iran accountable for its actions."

Both men are charged with "conspiracy to murder a foreign official, conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction, and conspiracy to commit an act of international terrorism, among other charges."

According to Holder, they met a "confidential informant from the Drug Enforcement Administration" in Mexico last May, posing as a drug cartel member.

The Washington Post said the "confidential DEA source (called "the Mexican") was described in court papers only as a paid informant who was once charged in the United States with a drug offense. The charges were dropped (in return for his) provid(ing) valuable information in a number of (sting) cases...."

Allegedly, Arbasair wired $100,000 to a US bank account "as a down payment for the attempted assassination." Holder also claimed he confessed and provided "other valuable information" with no corroborating evidence to prove what's clearly an Obama administration plot to file bogus charges and heighten tensions with Iran.

In fact, Arbabsiar's lawyer, Sabrina Shroff, said her client will plead not guilty if indicted. Apparently he denies involvement despite Holder claiming he confessed.

Iran's UN ambassador Mohammad Khazaee said his nation is "outraged" about clearly baseless charges. In a strongly worded letter to UN Secretary-General Ban K-moon, he wrote:

Iran "strongly and categorically rejects these fabricated and baseless allegations based on the suspicious claims by an individual."

President Armadinejad's spokesman Ali Akbar Javanfekr said:

"The US government and the CIA have very good experience in making up film scripts....It appears that this new scenario is for diverting the US public opinion from internal crises."

Suggesting it's connected to diluting ongoing anti-Wall Street protests across America.

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast called Holder's accusations a "new propaganda campaign" involving a "prefabricated scenario."

Hillary Clinton said Washington is "actively engaged in a very concerted diplomatic outreach to many capitals" to counter Iran's denial. She added that the issue has "potential for international reaction that will further isolate Iran," stopping short of calling for direct action.

Congressional hawks and America's right wing media do it often on their own.

An October 11 Wall Street Journal editorial called the plot "a sobering wake-up call" in America's "war on terror."

"Had it succeeded, (it) arguably (would have been) an act of war....The appalling news needs to be placed in the broader context of Iran's behavior," involving "conspiracy to commit international terrorism....It's past time for US policy toward Iran to reflect the reality of what it is dealing with."

Obama "underscored that the United States believes this plot to be a flagrant violent of US and international law, and reiterated (his) commitment to meet our responsibilities to ensure the security of diplomats serving in our country."

Bill Clinton called the accusations "well-founded."

The extremist right-wing Heritage Foundation's foreign policy director James Carafino called the alleged scheme "a belligerent act against the US (that) as such would call for a proportional military response."

A more sober Stratfor Global Intelligence called the plot "far-fetched." Cautioning against claims against Iran, founder and CEO George Friedman said doing so "involve(s) substantial political risk."

"Iran has been known to carry out preoperational surveillance in the United States, but it has not yet used this intelligence to carry out a high-profile attack."

He added that Iran has nothing to gain from committing a terror attack on US soil and everything to lose.

Former Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs PJ Crowley commented in the London Guardian, calling the alleged plot "far-fetched....(O)n the face of it (it's) so fantastic that it begs a disclaimer....It's unclear how much Iran would stand to gain by sanctioning or supporting this plot."

Former CIA case officer Robert Baer said: "the Quds are better than this. It they wanted to come after you, you'd be dead already."

Alireza Nader, Rand Corporation Iran specialist, asked: "Why would Iran want to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington? (The plot) would be outside the norm."

Congressional Reaction

Senator Joseph Lieberman (Indep. Dem. CT) called the alleged plot a "profound threat posed by the Iranian regime and the reach of its terrorist activities to American soil."

Senator Saxby Chambliss (R. GA) said "In addition to allegedly sponsoring this plot, Iran has supported and provided weapons for attacks on our soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. This has continued far too long with no repercussions."

Rep. Peter King (R. NY) said "Iran's assassination of a foreign diplomat in our country would have violated both US and international law, and represented an act of war."

Rep. Michael McCaul (R. TX) said if true "this would constitute an act of war not only against the Saudis and Israelis but against the United States as well."

Rep. Ted Poe (R. TX) on Fox News called the alleged plot "an act of war against the United States."

A Final Comment

A May 2011 study by New York University's School of Law Center for Human Rights and Global Justice headlined, "Targeted and Entrapped: Manufacturing the 'Homegrown Threat' in the United States."

It discussed what this writer's featured in dozens of past articles on Muslim Americans victimized by false accusations.

It explained how, post-9/11, entrapment by FBI plants led to prosecutions of over 200 individuals on bogus terrorism related charges. Washington highlights them as proof of foiling plots that, in fact, never existed.

Nearly always innocent Muslims are targeted for their faith and ethnicity for political advantage. Major media scoundrels regurgitate official lies, pretending they're accurate accounts of foiled plots.

That none ever succeeded is reason enough to suggest none existed, but media reports leave that unexplained, let alone the implausibility of some charges.

They included blowing up Chicago's Sears Tower, destroying New York landmarks, targeting US soldiers at Fort Dix, NJ, US marines at Quantico, VA, downing National Guard aircraft with stinger missiles, and a Pakistan ambassador's with a surface to air one.

Not a shred of evidence provided proof, just the word of FBI informants well paid to entrap and lie, then get America's media to repeat them without questioning the validity of any charges.

The likelihood that any country, let alone Iran, would plan terror plots on US soil is preposterous on its face. Cui bono is issue one. Clearly, Iran has nothing to gain and everything to lose by plotting what Holder charged.

Yet political Washington and major media scoundrels highlight baseless accusations without demanding clear proof they're true. There is none except for what a DEA agent plant (a former felon) and Holder claim.

It's their word against common sense, suggesting the implausibility of what they charge. It also highlight's iconic radical journalist IF Stone (1907 - 1989) saying:

"All governments are run by liars and nothing they say should be believed."

With his own in Washington in mind, he taught that to young journalism students, suggesting they paste it on their bathroom mirrors so not to forget.

It makes sense, as well as avoiding major media liars and using reliable online sites for real information and analysis.
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Obama: No options off the table with Iran
http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=241635

"We believe that even if at the highest levels there was not detailed operational knowledge, there has to be accountability," Obama said.

In addition to prosecuting the men, Obama told reporters that the United States would continue "to apply the toughest sanctions and continue to mobilize the international community to make sure that Iran is further and further isolated and pays a price for this kind of behavior."

"Now, we don't take any options off the table in terms of how we operate with Iran, but what you can expect is that we will continue to apply the sorts of pressure that will have a direct impact on the Iranian government until it makes a better choice in terms of how it's going to interact with the rest of the international community," he added at a news conference with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak.
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US benefits from Saudi envoy death: Iran
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/204411.html

A senior Iranian official says the US allegation about Iran's involvement in the plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to Washington gives rise to serious questions.

Calling for the identification of the parties that stand to benefit from the creation of this scenario, Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for Europe and Americas Ali Ahani said this scenario benefits the US and Israel as Tehran gains nothing from the assassination of the Saudi envoy.

Ahani urged Saudi Arabia to be vigilant about this plot and not fall for into a trap as tensions in regional relations would benefit the US and Israel, IRNA reported on Thursday.

These allegations are leveled against Iran, which is a victim of terrorism and has always had a clear position towards terrorism due to its Islamic principles, he added

On Tuesday, the US Justice Department accused Iran of involvement in a plot to assassinate Saudi Arabian Ambassador to Washington Adel Al-Jubeir with help from a suspected member of a Mexican drug cartel.

Iran's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast rejected the accusation, saying such 'ludicrous' claims hinged on the hostile joint stances adopted by the US and Israel against the country.

The latest accusations come as the United States and its staunch ally, Israel, have devised numerous anti-Iran plots over the past years, including the targeted assassination of Iranian scientists.
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Remember one of the motives for the Committee of 300/Bilderberg/CSIS/CFR to go after Iran now more than ever. And that is because Iran is defying the elites agenda of forced fake energy scarcity. They have propagandized for years the lie that Iran has always been seeking nuclear weapons, when the New World Order's only concern was the fact that they were creating true energy independence. Iran has created that which is now being destroyed in America--the evisceration of all nuclear power plants via fraudulent justification from inside job sabotage, false flag cyber attacks via Stuxnet/Ptech override of programmable logic controllers/electronic systems. You can only destroy an economy totally when you deprive a country of their ability to generate cheap, highly abundant energy--and that is why they want Iran obliterated for "having the audacity" to provide what the elite consider "slaves" with exactly that.

Remember--nuclear power is only allowed to be used by countries that are already in a state of far greater slavery than Americans, such as China and India. They are engaging in full spectrum decapitation of the U.S. because the elite do not need any Americans to build or create anything for them anymore when they have 1 billion slaves in China that have zero concept of unalienable rights.

September 4, 2011

Iran's nuclear plant connects to electric grid, the country says
http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/meast/09/04/iran.nuclear/

Iran's Nuclear Plant Connected to Grid
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/middle-east/iran/Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Connected-to-Grid-129220933.html

Iran's nuclear power station hooked up to national grid
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/8740328/Irans-nuclear-power-station-hooked-up-to-national-grid.html

Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant
http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Iran+Bushehr+nuclear+plant/5352444/story.html

Iran’s First Nuclear Plant Connected to National Power Grid, Agency Says
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-04/iran-s-first-nuclear-plant-connected-to-national-power-grid-agency-says.html

Iran nuclear plant connected to national grid
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-09-04/iran-nuclear-reactor-online/2870038/?site=melbourne

Iran’s First Nuclear Power Plant Goes Into Operation
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/world/middleeast/05iran.html?_r=1

Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant connected to national grid
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-14779227
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'Israel pushing Obama into war with Iran'
Thu May 19, 2011 11:45AM GMT
video:
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/180700.html

The Israeli lobby in the US is pushing President Barack Obama to go to war with Iran and the Middle East countries need “to be on guard about this [plot],” says a political analyst.


“Israel lobby AIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee] is pushing for confrontation with Iran,” James Morris told Press TV in an interview on Thursday.

Morris said it was worrying that Obama's National Security Advisor Tom Donilon has called on the Washington Institute for Near East Affairs to take stronger actions against Iran.

The analyst added that neo-conservatives in the US are also plotting against Syria since Damascus supports the Lebanese resistance movement of Hezbollah.

“What is happening in Syria with the protests...I think the neo-cons through the National Endowment for Democracy have been involved with this, perhaps in terms of rabble-rousing in Syria,“ Morris said.

“They want to create strife there [in Syria] and get President Barack Obama to intervene like he did in Libya,” he said.

Morris urged the Middle East countries to be vigilant against US and Israel's plots in the region.

“The only thing I can say is to be ready for more war...It is all part of a plan to get an eventual war for Israel against Iran and Syria and the region really has to be on guard about this... We just have to watch out for that.”

MN/AKM
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Sunday, July 17, 2011

Israel-Iran War in September?

Click to enlarge.

Zerohedge is reporting on some very interesting positioning of U.S. naval ships:
As the most recently updated naval map from Stratfor demonstrates, the CVN 77 G.H.W. Bush has just entered the Persian Gulf, the first time a US aircraft carrier has passed through the Straits of Hormuz in months. What is also notable is that the LHD 5 Bataan amphibious warfare ship has just weighed anchor right next to Libya: this is odd since the coast of Tripoli had been left unattended for many weeks by US attack ships. And topping it all off is that a third aircraft carrier, the CVN 73, is sailing west from the South China seas, potentially with a target next to CVN 76 Ronald Reagan which is the second carrier in the Straits of Hormuz area. Three carriers in proximity to Iran would be extremely troubling.
Zerohedge goes on to report:
CIA veteran Robert Baer, the man played by George Clooney in Syriana, who as Al Jazeera reports, appeared on KPFK Los Angeles, warning that Israeli PM Netanyahu is "likely to ignite a war with Iran in the very near future." It gets worse: "Masters asked Baer why the US military is not mobilising to stop this war from happening. Baer responded that the military is opposed, as is former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who used his influence to thwart an Israeli attack during the Bush and Obama administrations. But he's gone now and "there is a warning order inside the Pentagon" to prepare for war." The punchline: "There is almost "near certainty" that Netanyahu is "planning an attack [on Iran] ... and it will probably be in September before the vote on a Palestinian state. And he's also hoping to draw the United States into the conflict", Baer explained." For the betting public out there, an September CL call may not be the dumbest trade possible...
All this is real interesting, but here's the real kicker: Economist Nouriel Roubini has tweeted the link to the ZeroHedge story. As long-term EPJ readers know, I consider Roubini the most connected man in finance. He has a small house warming party and George Soros shows up. To ring in the New Year, he shows up at billionaire Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich's New Year's eve party. He gave Larry Summers stock in his company. Within hours of DSK being arrested, he tweeted that Christine Lagarde would take his place--as she has done. He is a consultant to most of the central banks in the world.

I have never seen Roubini tweeting on foreign affairs before, he is unlikely to be tweeting because he finds the story interesting. The story likely falls in line with what he is hearing from his very in the know network.

Israel-Iran war in September, mark your calendar.
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Israel must not strike Iran without U.S. permission
Published 09.10.11
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/israel-must-not-strike-iran-without-u-s-permission-1.388871
If Israel had disobeyed Washington and attacked first, it would have played into the hands of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.

By Amir Oren

When people in Israel are pondering whether to embark on a hasty and unnecessary war against Iran, they should study well the unfortunate case of 1973 from two perspectives - the domestic and the American.

The decision-making process suffered from basic defects. Essential reading in this case is the book by Maj. Gen. (res. ) Emanuel Sakal, "Hasadir Yivlom?," about the battles to hold back the Egyptian army in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, where he fought as a determined and outstanding battalion commander. It is a harsh and persuasive indictment of Prime Minister Golda Meir and Defense Minister Moshe Dayan, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff David Elazar, GOC Southern Command Shmuel Gonen and the commander of Division 252, Albert Mandler.

But in conclusions about the diplomatic sphere, Sakal is mistaken and Meir and Dayan were right: If Israel had disobeyed Washington and attacked first, it would have played into the hands of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.

In 1973, not for the last time, the prime minister and the defense minister were locked into a rigid mode of thought and withheld critical information about conversations with Washington from the head of Military Intelligence and the chief of staff. In so doing, they compromised the ability of the latter to assess and prepare.

The same Dayan - who was working for Meir when he concealed from Eli Zeira, the chief of Military Intelligence during the Yom Kippur War, and from Elazar, the content of conversations with U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger - reappeared as Menachem Begin's foreign minister and concealed talks with Sadat from MI chief Shlomo Gazit and from Chief of Staff Mordechai Gur. During the Oslo talks, Yitzhak Rabin treated MI chief Uri Saguy and Chief of Staff Ehud Barak in the same way.

Lacking key data, Gur publicly expressed in 1977 concern over another deception by Sadat, this time in Sadat's announcement that he was coming to Jerusalem. That, in itself, is understandable and excusable. But the attitude to the "deception" reflects a common and deep-rooted misunderstanding of the events of 1973 to this day: Sadat did not want to deceive Israel, but to motivate Washington in turn to motivate Israel - through talks if possible, by attack if necessary - toward a final-status agreement that would return the Sinai to Egypt.

That was well-known truth, so frequently heard as to elicit a yawn. Beneath it lurked a system-wide deception in September and October to conceal the date of the attack that Egypt and Syria had decided on. But the strange circumstances of the spy for Israel, Egyptian businessman Ashraf Marwan's scheduling of his meeting with Mossad chief Zvi Zamir, half a day before the war started, hints that Sadat was even more cunning than was commonly believed, and that it was Sadat who conveyed the warning to Meir, through the Marwan-Zamir channel.

To Sadat's mind, it would be too late to thwart the military campaign that was intended to break the diplomatic impasse, but still early enough to lure Israel into acting, as it usually did, according to the 1956 and 1967 modes, and strike first.

An Israeli strike on Sadat's air bases, which were put on high defensive alert, would have served Sadat's purposes. Militarily it would not have extensively disrupted the Suez Canal crossing, with aerial coverage provided by ground-to-air missiles, not aircraft. In a more important arena, the diplomatic one, it would reveal Israel as the aggressor and push Richard Nixon's administration to move ahead on, and perhaps even to impose, an agreement - back to the June 5 lines, and not to those of October 6, as some in the IDF innocently hoped.

Meir and Dayan knew that Israel would be penalized in war and peace, if it broke its pledge not to launch a pre-emptive strike. Sadat secretly renewed contacts with Kissinger on the second day of the war. From his point of view, that war could have ended then. The military aim had been achieved with the crossing of the canal and with a foothold on its eastern side; the depth and strength of that hold were less important. If Israel had agreed to such an end, thousands of casualties could have been averted.

Israel must not embark on a war that is unjustified in terms of immediate survival without American permission. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, who visited Tel Aviv to publicly coordinate with Israel on Iran, acted like an American father informing his son that he can have the family car for the weekend only if he checks with him first.

Moreover, the thought gnaws at one that perhaps Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei learned from Sadat and is luring Israel into an attack on Iran so that Iran can respond militarily, earning public-relations points and advancing its strategic goals.
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U.S. Makes 'Direct Contact' With Iran Over Terror Plot, Obama Says Tehran Will Pay 'Price'

Published October 13, 2011

| FoxNews.com

The United States has made "direct contact" with Iran to discuss the alleged Tehran-backed plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to Washington, the State Department said Thursday.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, without saying who was involved in the talks, confirmed that the Obama administration has contacted Iran over the charges unveiled Tuesday.

"We have had direct contact with Iran. I'm not going to give you any further details than that," she told reporters.

The outreach comes as President Obama forcefully defends U.S. claims that the plot had "direct links" to the Iranian government.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10/13/obama-us-will-make-sure-iran-pays-price-for-assassination-plot/
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Intel chair: "Chain" of Iran plots possible

(CBS/AP)

WASHINGTON - The alleged plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United States was comically amateurish, but the U.S. government believes not only that it was approved at high levels in Tehran but also that it was not the only plot, CBS News correspondent Bill Plante reports.

"There may be a chain of these things," Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Wednesday.

Feinstein said there's information that the Iranians may have other targets.

"I think we need to explore whether there are other plots going on into other countries," Feinstein said.

More + Video: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/13/earlyshow/main20119740.shtml
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Proliferation of Drones Could Aid Biological Strikes

Thursday, Oct. 13, 2011

The proliferation of unmanned aircraft around the world has some experts worried the technology could be used by hostile states or extremist groups to disperse biological warfare agents, The Australian reported on Tuesday (see GSN, March 3, 2010).

As technology improvements allow remotely controlled aircraft to shrink in size and be more easily transported, their potential to be acquired by extremists increases. The pace of development is moving at such a brisk pace that analysts have a hard time predicting all the potential applications for the aircraft, according to the newspaper.

"I think of where the aeroplane was at the start of World War I: at first it was unarmed and limited to a handful of countries. Then it was armed and everywhere. That is the path we're on," said P.W. Singer, who has written extensively on emerging weapons and their possible applications (The Australian, Oct. 11).

While the United States maintains a considerable lead in drone development and operations, there are approximately 50 other countries that have purchased or are producing their own unmanned aircraft. They notably include China, India, Iran, Mexico, Pakistan and Russia, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

China is marketing 25 different kinds of drones. With so many systems being produced or available for purchase, fears the new-age weapons could be used to strike U.S. targets are growing, according to the newspaper (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Oct. 12).

http://www.globalsecuritynewswire.org/gsn/nw_20111013_7280.php

Air Force disputes drone virus reports
http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20111013_3737.php?oref=topnews

By Aliya Sternstein 10/13/2011

In an atypical disclosure, military officials on Wednesday night divulged details of a virus that infected computers supporting drones that fly over battlefields. The announcement came after reports surfaced that malicious software recording the keystrokes of pilots based in Nevada had wreaked havoc on U.S. Predatory and Reaper unmanned aerial vehicles. Wired's Noah Shachtman first reported the breach Friday.

Air Force officials said they departed from standard procedures to explain the situation so people would not be concerned that missions were ever in jeopardy.

Earlier in the day, a security adviser told Nextgov the virus was custom-made to hijack the drones, creating an Achilles' heel for the Defense Department's multibillion-dollar automated weapons program.

"It's standard policy not to discuss the operational status of our forces," Col. Kathleen Cook, spokeswoman for Air Force Space Command, said in Wednesday's press release. "However, we felt it important to declassify portions of the information associated with this event to ensure the public understands that the detected and quarantined virus posed no threat to our operational mission and that control of our remotely piloted aircraft was never in question."

Air Force officials disputed many reports that the virus was a key logger. "The malware in question is a credential stealer, not a key logger, found routinely on computer networks and is considered more of a nuisance than an operational threat," the statement noted.

The service detected the worm on portable hard drives at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada on Sept. 15 and has since isolated the malware, the announcement said. It did not say whether the malicious code has been removed.

The bug was not devised to transfer data or video, nor was it designed to corrupt files on the infected computer, according to the statement.

The ability of ground crew members "to safely fly these aircraft remained secure throughout the incident," officials said. "We continue to strengthen our cyber defenses, using the latest antivirus software and other methods to protect Air Force resources and assure our ability to execute Air Force missions."

Initial descriptions of the exploit differ dramatically from the Air Force's account.

"This was a targeted virus," national security specialist Charles Dodd, who has been advising senior congressional and Defense officials, told Nextgov. "This was just detected three weeks ago. That doesn't mean it hasn't been utilized way beyond this." It is not coincidental that the malware was suited to exploit unmanned aerial systems, he added.

The compromise in some ways sounded reminiscent of the Stuxnet computer attack discovered in the summer of 2010 that programmed the control systems running Iran's nuclear operations to self-destruct. Both viruses were tailored to overtake particular command-and-control systems
, but the perpetrators in each incident likely were not the same people and had different motives, Dodd said.

He did not say that intruders had commandeered Air Force crew members' keystrokes to redirect aircraft. "If you're at the level of control where it's recording the keystrokes of the pilots who are operating the aircraft -- at that moment, you then can be in control of that weaponized drone," Dodd said. "I'm not saying that they did it. It is very logical that they did so . . . If you are already at the keyboard of the guy or woman who is controlling it, you do the math."

Neither the Iranian nuclear systems nor the U.S. aircraft were connected to the Internet. In each instance, the worm likely crept in through "air gaps" between classified and public networks that users overcome by inserting jump drives
, according to Wired's original report.

"This is the first example of our command-and-control systems being touched," said Alan Paller, research director for the SANS Institute, a security training center. Paller said he has no inside knowledge about the bug, but any infection provides an entry point for other infections.

"Once a machine gets infected, it tends to stay infected," he said. "Even if it was an accident, it has a high probability of being found by other bad guys looking for ways in."

The military had deployed more than 6,000 unmanned aircraft as of 2008. In 2010, the enacted budget for drone systems was $4.5 billion and Defense has requested $4.8 billion for fiscal 2012.

If intentional, the exploit represents a new, low-cost way of crippling U.S. forces that the Pentagon might not have the money to defend against, experts said. "We've had such an economic push to automate systems and make them more digital that we have now created our own Achilles tendon," Dodd said. Paller said, "We're spending a huge amount of our money on kinetic weapons. The other side is spending a small amount on cyber to take over our command and control." The Defense Department is not accustomed to calculating spending for cybersecurity operations, he said.

The head of the U.S. Cyber Command established a year and a half ago, Gen. Keith Alexander, "is desperately trying to put things in order. And you also have people on the Hill who are trying to put things in order. They get it," Dodd said. But the majority of Defense officials are of the old-school mind-set that whoever has the bigger gun wins the battle, he said. "This is sort of getting a taste of your own medicine," by paying billions for a weapon that adversaries can crush with a relatively smaller sum, Dodd said.

On March 21, in response to Nextgov query, Pentagon officials said their $2.3 billion budget request for 2012 to protect networks covered all Defense components. On March 23, officials changed that response and provided a higher total -- $3.2 billion -- to reflect the cost of cyber pieces of larger programs, plus activities typically not defined as information assurance that are critical to the military's overall cyber stance.

Federal auditors this summer found the U.S. military had no methodology for collecting and compiling cyber budget information. "During February and March 2011, DoD provided Congress with three different views of its cybersecurity budget estimates for fiscal year 2012 ($2.3 billion, $2.8 billion, and $3.2 billion, respectively) that included different elements of DoD's cybersecurity efforts," stated a July Government Accountability Office letter to the House Armed Services Committee.

In responding to the findings at the time, Pentagon officials said they would define what activities are considered cyber operations and establish a means of accounting for all such activities.
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