WASHINGTON POST– The CIA is making secret payments to multiple members of President Hamid Karzai’s administration, in part to maintain sources of information in a government in which the Afghan leader is often seen as having a limited grasp of developments, according to current and former U.S. officials. The payments are long-standing in many cases and designed to help the … Read More
ABC NEWS– The young woman brushes her metal detector over coarse, dry grass in a field near a primary school. Against the sound of children playing, the machine beeps as she searches for unexploded bombs dropped by American aircraft four decades ago. Most of those were cluster bombs — shells that open midair scattering tennis-ball-sized “bombies,” as they are known … Read More
REBEL REPORTS– A couple of years ago, Blackwater executive Joseph Schmitz seemed to see asilver lining for mercenary companies with the prospect of US forces being withdrawn or reduced in Iraq. “There is a scenario where we could as a government, the United States, could pull back the military footprint,” Schmitz said. “And there would then be more of a … Read More
SYDNEY MORNING HERALD– The US State Department is to more than double the number of security contractors it employs in Iraq to around 7000, filling a gap left by departing troops, the New York Times reported on Thursday. The newspaper said the contractors would be deployed to defend five fortified compounds that will be left behind as US combat forces … Read More
August 16,2010 COMMON DREAMS– It’s already history. In mid-August 2010, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan launched a huge media campaign to prevent any substantial withdrawal of military forces the next summer. The morning after Gen. David Petraeus appeared in a Sunday interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” to promote the war effort, the New York Times front-paged news of its … Read More
