Friday News Roundup - International
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-11-02/friday-news-roundup-international
The U.S. shifts support to front-line Syrian opposition groups. Ongoing disputes over the Benghazi, Libya, attack. And Russia expands its treason law. Diane and guests discuss the week’s top international stories, what happened and why.
Guests
David Ignatius
columnist for The Washington Post and contributor to the “Post Partisan” blog on washingtonpost.com. His latest book is titled "Bloodmoney: A Novel of Espionage."
Susan Glasser
editor-in-chief of Foreign Policy magazine.
David Sanger
chief Washington correspondent for The New York Times and author of "Confront and Conceal: Obama's Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power."
Comments
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Despite cutting edge technology US military remains biggest fossil fuel consumer on Earth. No Justice: No Peace: No (stable) Climate.
(Fracking makes everyone thirsty.)
Air Force proves ineffective against Superstorms and Hunger Revolutions.
It will be interesting to see if this latest report by CBS is addressed this hour, excerpt:
"CBS News has learned that during the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Mission in Benghazi, the Obama Administration did not convene its top interagency counterterrorism resource: the Counterterrorism Security Group, (CSG).
"The CSG is the one group that's supposed to know what resources every agency has. They know of multiple options and have the ability to coordinate counterterrorism assets across all the agencies," a high-ranking government official told CBS News. "They were not allowed to do their job. They were not called upon."
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57544026/sources-key-task-force-not-...
De oppresso liber.
Interesting someone from NYTimes is on. The 'Grey Lady' has been MIA on this story, very disappointing. Washington Post has been much better.
The CIA account David Ignatius speaks of (and wrote of yesterday) is helpful, but it leads to new questions and contradicts earlier reports allegedly from people on the ground. In particular the report of Woods having a ground laser designator on the mortar emplacement.
Also, we do not yet know what happened at Sigonella Naval Air Station Italy, in particular with the launch of the second Predator after the first UAV ran low on fuel, also reportedly unarmed. Why unarmed when CIA people in Benghazi were requesting tactical air support? What about reports of a Delta team moving to Sigonella from elsewhere in Europe but not being released? GEN Carter Ham's reported desire to help?
Most obviously no discussion of what was happening in the White House situation room. We know this event overlapped with Obama's trip to Las Vegas, so maybe he was not physically there, but he would have been in contact. If he had delegated authority on Benghazi to someone else, to whom, and what were the instructions?
Some of this is out of CIA's lane, DOD issues. SECDEF could probably answer most of the questions. So could people in AFRICOM. With less than a week before the election, doubt anyone excepts Panetta to say much.
SFV: I'm sure you and Blackwater will go over there and sort things out.
We never lost an ambassador while Blackwater was providing security.
The main stream media has dragged it's feet on this topic from the start, covering Romney's inconsequential comments after 9/11/12 for three days while asking nothing from Obama for weeks. My opinion is it's just too little too late to make the difference it should make in this election. D.R. is pleased!
Fox News is so far out front on all of this. No matter what these twits say on this those Seals were denied help and told to stand down. They had laser sighting weapons waiting for the Spector gunships to arrive. They never came. The whole thing lasted at least seven hours. The ambassador died of suffocation from smoke inhalation. They never caught him. They killed him with smoke and fire. The arrival of air weapons and a timely explosion in the street could have saved lives. These 'twits' as I say haven't done any work on this for a month and a half and are now blowing smoke for just a few more days. We need to stop the funding for this charade. That should be job one for the new broom. Then they can babble on happily with a steady stream of privately funded twaddle.
So you buy the AmWay?
Empire is a pyramid scheme.
Why are the unhinged rantings of Glenn Beck being addressed as if they had a shred of merit ?
shakazlu- Right "explosions save lives". I gotta remember that one.
(If you smoke my Ambassador I'm gonna get a big old drone chasin' yo' ass.) Can't you see how childish faux expertise looks? (Drones are an illegal and foolish weapons that lead to ubiquitous insecurity. Any nut can obtain and fly RC craft. (Are you stocking your Chrismas stocking with ammo?) Maybe the FBI will bring you a present.
Seems your psychedelic mushrooms have come in well this year.
Why no discussion of the latest report from CBS? Was this show taped yesterday?
"Absent coordination from Counterterrorism Security Group, a senior U.S. counterterrorism official says the response to the crisis became more confused. The official says the FBI received a call during the attack representing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and requesting agents be deployed. But he and his colleagues agreed the agents "would not make any difference without security and other enablers to get them in the country and synch their efforts with military and diplomatic efforts to maximize their success."
"Another senior counter terrorism official says a hostage rescue team was alternately asked to get ready and then stand down throughout the night, as officials seemed unable to make up their minds."
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57544026/sources-key-task-force-not-...
The picture emerging is one of no one being in command in Washington, or even trying to really understand what was happening. Just lower level people watching helplessly while their colleagues died. This is _not_ how the US military and intelligence communities normally operate.
Any assertion of "fact" coming from Glen Beck should be regarded with the utmost suspicion. He is even more factually challenged than Donald Chump if that's possible.
pp-See Paul Laffoley interview at Radiorbit with Mike Hagen.
Psylibum may be your best remedy. WTC contained the spores of its own destruction.
Innocence of Muslims film underwritten by Romney campaign explains nothing.
Man Who Knew Too Little with Bill Murray explains everything.
Lady Caller: Why Are We Doin' It? Answer: Profits for the 1%.
Andrew Bacevich says Empire is nearly over because our war machine has run out of gas. (TOTN Thursday) See also John Perkins' "Confessions of an Economic Hitman"
Romnesia means austerity has hit the Homeland.
It horrifies me every time I hear your panel discuss Putin's presidency. It sounds eerily reminiscent of what Henry Kissinger said when the Chilean electorate voted in a Socialist government.
~ "I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to
the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the
Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.”
As a Colombian national, it appears to me that U.S. Interventionism has lead to more harm than good over the past fifty years. Despite the election irregularities that occurred during the last Russian Presidential election, Vladimir Putin was championed by the majority of the electorate. And, is the legitimate President of Russia.
This fact maybe inconvenient to the U.S. but, unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, Washington can not pick the president of Russia.
debray: The downside of Putin is very much like the downside of a more assertive Obama: Bad news for Oligarchs, but at the price of human rights.
debray: Yours is the most insightful and accurate international post this Friday.
Everytime I listen to discussion about our foreign policy it seems the guest and listeners talk of our involvement in a country or with a country in context of a bubble. I once heard a lengthy discussion on NPR of our foreign policy as it relates to current events over the spectrum of decades. It brought to light how we seem to often be robbing peter to pay paul and it offered me a perspective that is unsurpassed with these discussion held in isolation. I would love to have that perspective revisited when a discussion of foreign policy is engaged on air.
jamysal: Yep, you're right, foreign conquests on the screen are about as real as the jewelry channel to butts on the couch. (Only 5 more minutes on this offering) A parody of 1984?
Imagine the CIA and NSA not sharing all their information with either Fox News or CBS........mind boggling that the news agencies lag behind the facts on the ground!
I guess that might come under the heading of "need to know".
Notice that CNN and ABC and NBC and AP and MSNBC were covering the tragedy on the east coast for days; meanwhile Beck and Fox et al cookie cutter conservatives were following the Benghazi situation. It is always special that the "Breaking News" on Neil Cavuto's pseudo-financial reports are 99.9% devoted to politics and any potential slip domestic or foreign that the administration might be accused of.
We learned long ago that any network run by Roger Ailes would become a house organ for the GOP.......it was Richard Nixon's fondest wish now in full incarnation.
E.g. Romney's premature and inaccurate assessment of the initial State Dept. communique re: Benghazi is oh so similar to his slipshod conclusions about Chrysler moving all of Jeep production to China.
it would be interesting to know what the reactivity of the CSG is: how fast it could have convened and made recommendations as to courses of action. It is also interesting that members of the CSG were involved in the initial response, but apparently did not suggest activation of the CSG: why not?
In addition, some of the assets available to the CSG, such as the FEST (foreign emergency support team), were not deployed: why not? If they are ready to deploy within 4 hours of notification, would they have gotten anywhere in time to do anything? Or would they have least been able to prepare the way for the FBI investigation team to arrive a bit earlier than they eventually did, more than 3 weeks later?
these questions are always easy to ask from the armchair, and hindsight is always 20/8 (the theoretical limit of human vision: much better than 'normal' 20/20).
but this kind of analysis is useful as a way to improve things before the next time.
yeah: democracy in other countries is OK as long as it creates a government that is friendly to us.
one of our problems is that we can't even be sure that our own democratic process will give us leadership that will be friendly to the United States.