Watching the Warmakers is based in Brighton, England.
Our aim is to support activists in educating themselves in the issues
which confront those struggling for peace and justice.

News archives for the week ending 4th September 2009

Defence aide resigns over Afghanistan

Prime Minister Gordon Brown will set out his commitment to Britain’s role in Afghanistan after a lawmaker aide to Defense Secretary Bob Ainsworth resigned last night over the country’s involvement in the war.

Brown will use a speech in London today to answer points raised by Labour Member of Parliament Eric Joyce in his resignation letter. Joyce called on the premier to make it clear to the British people that the Afghanistan campaign is “time- limited,” arguing that voters would not accept for “much longer that our losses can be justified by simply referring to the risk of greater terrorism on our streets.”

Joyce, who served as a major in the British army, last night called for a reduction in the country’s commitment to the war. In his letter he said Labour would not win the next general election until it got a “grip” on the issue of defense and he demanded a speeded-up exit strategy from Afghanistan.

Bloomberg, 4/9/09

China increases involvement in IMF

China is buying the equivalent of $50 billion of the International Monetary Fund's first bond sale in a move that might boost Beijing's standing in the Fund and help its quiet campaign to expand the reach of its tightly controlled currency.

Beijing wants a bigger voice in the Fund and other G-20 nations say such bodies should be reformed to give more say to developing countries, though they have yet to agree on details.

"It certainly helps to raise China's status in the IMF," said Zhang Bin, a specialist in international finance at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a government think tank.

The new bonds are denominated in Special Drawing Rights, a quasi-currency used by the IMF in its dealings with member governments. China has suggested using SDRs as a substitute for the dominant U.S. dollar as the world's reserve currency. Beijing has invested more than $800 billion of its $2 trillion in foreign reserves in U.S. Treasuriess but is uneasy about the dollar's stability and says the world financial system should be more diversified.

Business Week, 3/9/09

Afghan election 'a major reverse'

Last month we expected that Afghanistan's elections would mark a modest step forward for the country. Now it appears that they could be a major reverse.

Though the election campaign was positive in many respects, Election Day itself is emerging as a disaster of relatively low turnout and massive irregularities -- including ballot-box-stuffing on behalf of both incumbent President Hamid Karzai and his leading opponent.

Unless the fraud can be reversed or repaired through a U.N.-backed complaints commission or a runoff vote, Mr. Karzai may emerge as a crippled winner, his already weak and corruption-plagued administration facing further discredit or even violent protests.

This grim prospect is particularly worrisome because the United States and its allies were counting on the election to provide the Afghan government with a new lease on public support. They hoped the vote would be followed by a drive to reform both national and local administrations and extend their authority to areas where only the Taliban has been present.

That construction of government capacity -- call it nation-building if you like -- is essential to the counterinsurgency strategy adopted by U.S. commanders during the last year and embraced by President Obama in March.

Washington Post, 3/9/09

Japan cools on US involvement and bases

For now there remain more questions than answers about how the government of Japan's new prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, will shape its foreign policy. There have been some indications he will seek to forge closer relations with East Asia, and possibly temper the country's tight alliance with the United States.

Yukio Hatoyama, the presumed next prime minister of Japan, has made it fairly clear he will end at least one Japanese collaboration with the international community: the refueling of naval vessels in the Indian Ocean taking part in international stabilization efforts in Afghanistan. The U.S. government has repeatedly praised that effort.

Afghanistan is one of several areas in which some political analysts believe Japan may cool its cooperation with the United States. Meiji University Professor Tomohiko Taniguchi says Mr. Hatoyama's party, the DPJ, views the U.S. relationship as less central to Japanese foreign policy than the outgoing conservatives.

"It's evinced by the conviction that many DPJ politicians seem to have of the necessity to reduce the footprint of the U.S. military still further," Taniguchi said. "They're talking about reducing the amount of host-nation support budget to the United States."

Washington stations about 50,000 U.S. forces in Japan. The United States says it will not renegotiate a recently completed deal on U.S. military bases here.

Voice of America, 2/9/09

Mercenary contract extended despite civilian killings

The State Department said on Wednesday it has asked the company formerly known as Blackwater to continue providing security services to U.S. diplomats in Iraq because the company hired to replace it was not ready to take over.

Xe Services, formerly known as Blackwater, earlier this year learned its State Department contract in Iraq would not be renewed after some of its guards were accused of killing Iraqi civilians while protecting U.S. diplomats in Baghdad.

In 2007, the company's guards opened fire in Baghdad traffic, killing at least 14 unarmed Iraqi civilians in an incident that provoked outrage in Iraq and prompted its government to deny Blackwater a license.

The State Department said it had asked Blackwater to keep providing "aerial services" -- chiefly ferrying U.S. officials around on helicopters -- beyond Thursday, when this work was scheduled to end.

Reuters, 2/9/09

Arms manufactureres want more cash

Britain must step up defence spending to meet its foreign policy commitments or risk becoming a nonentity on the world stage, industry bosses warn.

"Our decline as a nation will become irreversible and we'll find ourselves with no real influence in the world," said Mike Turner, chairman of the Defence Industries Council and former chief executive of BAE Systems. "We believe urgent action is needed."

Accompanied by the current chief executive of BAE Systems, Ian King, the boss of Rolls Royce's defence business, Martin Fausset, and the UK heads of other large defence companies Thales and Finmeccanica, Mr Turner said the Government's policy of prosecuting foreign wars while reducing the proportion of gross domestic product spent on defence was becoming unsustainable.

Mr Turner called for the Government to spend another £2bn a year, on top of the £38bn already allocated to defence, to make up for spending shortfalls in recent years while the conflict in Afghanistan has escalated.

Daily Telegraph, 1/9/09

Mercenaries at all time high

Civilian contractors working for the Pentagon in Afghanistan not only outnumber the uniformed troops, according to a report by a Congressional research group, but also form the highest ratio of contractors to military personnel recorded in any war in the history of the United States.

As of March this year, contractors made up 57 percent of the Pentagon’s force in Afghanistan, and if the figure is averaged over the past two years, it is 65 percent, according to the report by the Congressional Research Service.

On a superficial level, the shift means that most of those representing the United States in the war will be wearing the scruffy cargo pants, polo shirts, baseball caps and other casual accouterments favored by overseas contractors rather than the fatigues and flight suits of the military.

More fundamentally, the contractors who are a majority of the force in what has become the most important American enterprise abroad are subject to lines of authority that are less clear-cut than they are for their military colleagues.

New York Times, 1/9/09

Escalation leads to tensions in Obama administration

The prospect that U.S. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal may ask for as many as 45,000 additional American troops in Afghanistan is fueling growing tension within President Barack Obama's administration over the U.S. commitment to the war there.

Administration officials said that amid rising violence and casualties, polls show a majority of Americans now think the war in Afghanistan isn't worth fighting. With tough battles ahead on health care, the budget and other issues, Vice President Joe Biden and other officials are increasingly anxious about how the American public would respond to sending additional troops.

The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to talk to the media, said Biden has argued that without sustained support from the American people, the U.S. can't make the long-term commitment that would be needed to stabilize Afghanistan and dismantle al-Qaida. Biden's office declined to comment.

Kansas City Star, 31/8/09

Arms finds in southern Iraq

Iraqi security forces say they have found numerous caches of new weapons in the Shi'ite south, raising the possibility that an area which has been peaceful could relapse into violence before elections next year.

The discoveries of handguns, sniper rifles, grenade launchers, silencers, automatic weapons, roadside bombs and explosives suggest a recent spike in bloodshed from bombings in Baghdad and the north may soon be mirrored in Iraq's south.

The weapons are being stockpiled by Shi'ite political rivals of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, officials believe. Some may be planning attacks across the south in order to damage Maliki's pre-election claim to having presided over a sharp drop in overall violence in Iraq, they said.

New York Times, 30/8/09

Escalating the Afghan war

A top U.S. and allied commander set the stage for a recommendation to increase the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan, calling Monday for an overhaul in strategy to help stem losses that began during the Bush administration and have accelerated in recent months.

In his report, which was prepared for military leaders, McChrystal did not specifically recommend a troop increase, instead spelling out plans to intensify development of Afghan security forces, improve the country's government and refocus economic development initiatives, according to a description by NATO officials.

But McChrystal is widely expected among military officials to seek extra troops, and experts said Monday that his assessment would almost certainly lead to such a request in coming months.

The assessment reflects McChrystal's belief that the U.S. and North Atlantic Treaty Organization need to adopt a counterinsurgency warfare strategy that focuses on making Afghan citizens feel safer, military officials said.

Such a strategy would rely more heavily on the presence of troops, probably requiring greater numbers than the combined U.S. and NATO force, which has passed the 100,000 mark this year. McChrystal commands the combined force.

"It cannot be done without more troops. And Gen. McChrystal will ask for them," said a former senior U.S. Defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the troop increase issue.

Los Angeles Times, 1/9/09

Karzai at odds with US over election

The recent dustup between Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai and U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke creates a dangerous roadblock to democracy in that nation.

Holbrooke, the most influential foreign diplomat in Afghanistan, met with Karzai to discuss what is obvious about recent elections: There were problems. When Holbrooke suggested a runoff election, Karzai kicked him out of the office, according to some reports.

Karzai’s supporters insist he’s collected 68 percent of the vote. But reports of voter intimidation and ballot stuffing are rampant. There were even reports that election officials who tried to stop irregularities were beaten. To many Afghans, it appears Karzai has stolen the election.

This is an extremely delicate matter for the Obama administration. Afghanistan is now President Barack Obama’s war, and he’s shown a commitment to it. But a primary selling point of continued involvement is the spread of democracy. Recent events raise questions about whether this is possible.

Kansas City Star, 30/8/09

US marines face smarter enemy in Afghanistan

After three tours in Iraq, U.S. Marine Sgt. Andre Leon was used to brutal shootouts with enemy fighters and expected more of the same in Afghanistan. Instead, what he's seen so far are anonymous attacks in the form of mines and roadside bombings — the mark of what he calls a cowardly adversary.

Taking advantage of the Afghanistan's mountainous rural landscape, the fighters often spread out their numbers, hiding in fields and planting bombs on roads, rather than taking aim at U.S. forces from snipers' nests in urban settings, as often was the case in Iraq. And they are not as bent on suicide, often retreating to fight another day.

"One thing about Afghanistan, they're not trying to go to paradise," said Sgt. Robert Warren, 26, of Peshtigo, Wis. He served a tour in both Iraq and Afghanistan before his current assignment at Combat Outpost Sharp, a Marines camp hidden in cornfields and dirt piles.

"They want to live to see tomorrow," Warren said. "They engage with us, but when they know we'll call in air support, they'll break contact with us. ... They're just as fierce, but they're smarter."

Associated Press, 29/8/09

Two thirds want British troops out of Afghanistan

Almost two-thirds of people oppose Britain’s continued deployment of troops in Afghanistan, a new poll shows. The public’s growing opposition to the conflict comes after the number of British deaths in Afghanistan rose above 200 earlier this month.

A Daily Telegraph/YouGov poll showed 62 per cent of people opposed British troops staying in Afghanistan, while 26 per cent were in favour.

Previous polls had shown that most people backed the conflict in Afghanistan, unlike the war in Iraq. They accepted the argument espoused by ministers and the opposition that it was part of the fight against terrorism that could be exported to British streets. But increasingly voters appear unwilling to accept that claim.

Daily Telegraph, 29/8/09

US says Pakistan altered missiles

The United States has accused Pakistan of illegally modifying American-made missiles to expand its capability to strike land targets, a potential threat to India, according to senior administration and Congressional officials.

The accusation comes at a particularly delicate time, when the administration is asking Congress to approve $7.5 billion in aid to Pakistan over the next five years, and when Washington is pressing a reluctant Pakistani military to focus its attentions on fighting the Taliban, rather than expanding its nuclear and conventional forces aimed at India.

While American officials say that the weapon in the latest dispute is a conventional one — based on the Harpoon antiship missiles that were sold to Pakistan by the Reagan administration as a defensive weapon in the cold war — the subtext of the argument is growing concern about the speed with which Pakistan is developing new generations of both conventional and nuclear weapons.

New York Times, 29/8/09

Britain gives Pakistan £665m

Gordon Brown and Pakistan's president Asif Ali Zardari have met in Downing Street to discuss the security situation in Afghanistan.

A Downing Street spokesman said Mr Brown "made clear his support" for Pakistan's "intensified action" against the Taliban.

Tackling extremism in its border areas was a top priority for the UK, he said. Mr Brown has said 75% of terrorist plots against Britain originate in parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan and has pledged a stronger relationship with Islamabad, working on counter-terrorism.

Speaking after Friday's meeting, a No 10 spokesman said the two leaders had "reinforced" the "strong bond" between the countries and Mr Brown had reiterated a commitment to provide £665m in support over four years for Pakistan's counter-terrorism efforts.

About half of the money would be spent in the troubled border regions with Afghanistan, he added, on improving governance, economic development and "when necessary" appropriate military pressure.

Mr Brown also pledged to provide textbooks for schoolchildren in the border areas and support 300,000 girls from poor families attending secondary school.

BBC News, 29/8/09

August is deadliest month for US in Afghanistan

August has become the deadliest month for the U.S. military in Afghanistan since the U.S. invasion after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

An American service member died in a roadside bombing in eastern Afghanistan on Friday, bringing the number of U.S. military deaths in the war-ravaged country in August to 46, according to a CNN count of military figures. That's the highest monthly toll of the nearly eight-year-long conflict, surpassing the previous high of 45 in July.

CNN, 28/8/09