US Send Warships to Eastern Med

WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. Navy is sending three ships to the eastern Mediterranean Sea in a show of strength during a period of tensions with Syria and political uncertainty in Lebanon.Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters the deployment should not be viewed as threatening or in response to events in any single country in that volatile region.

“This is an area that is important to us, the eastern Med,” he said when asked about news reports of the ship movements. “It’s a group of ships that will operate in the vicinity there for a while,” adding that “it isn’t meant to send any stronger signals than that. But it does signal that we’re engaged, we’re going to be in the vicinity and that’s a very, very important part of the world.”

Another military officer, speaking on condition of anonymity because full details about the ship movements are not yet public, said a Navy guided missile destroyer, the USS Cole, was headed for patrol in the eastern Mediterranean and that the USS Nassau, an amphibious warship, would be joining it shortly. The officer said a third ship would go later, but he did not identify it by type or name.

The U.S. Sixth Fleet, whose area of operations includes the entire Mediterranean, is based at Naples, Italy.

The decision to send the ships appeared to be a not-too-subtle show of U.S. force in the region as international frustration mounts over a long political deadlock in tiny, weak Lebanon. The U.S. blames Syria for the impasse, saying Syria has never given up its ambitions to control its smaller neighbor.

The presidential election in Lebanon has been delayed 15 times. Just this week the date was pushed back to March 11.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is due to visit the Middle East next week.

Mustafa Alloush, a member of the Lebanese Parliament from the U.S.-backed majority, told the majority’s Future television that neither the government nor the anti-Syrian majority had any links to the dispatching of the Cole.

“But we remind what caused the situation to bring the American equation into the arena,” he said, blaming Syria indirectly for inviting such American intervention. “It (the deployment) could be aimed directly at Syria or a declaration by the United States of America that it could be part of this equation that could develop if conditions remain the way they are,” Alloush said.

Mullen was asked whether the deployment of the ships was linked to the timing of the Lebanese election.

“To say it’s absolutely directly tied would be incorrect, but we are certainly aware that elections out there are both important and they are due at some point in time,” he replied.

And when asked whether Syria is the reason for the deployment, he said, “It’s not specifically sent to any one country, as much as it is to the region itself.”

The Cole was rebuilt after nearly being sunk in a terrorist attack in Aden, Yemen, in October 2000. It was recommissioned in April 2002 and went on its first post-attack deployment in November 2003.

National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said the deployment of the Cole is meant as “a show of support for regional stability.” He added that President Bush is concerned about the situation in Lebanon.

The Cole, whose homeport is Norfolk, Va., is sailing to the region from Malta.

Associated Press writers Sam F. Ghattas in Beirut, Lebanon, and Deb Riechmann in Washington contributed to this report.

AP | ANNE GEARAN and ROBERT BURNS | Thursday, February 28, 2008

Afghan opium growth ‘hits new high’

The US has warned that opium production in Afghanistan reaching record levels, undermining efforts to legitimise the economy and supplying the Taliban with funds for weapons.

The US state department release its report on the issue as Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, Nato’s secretary-general, met George Bush in Washington to discuss Afghanistan.

“Narcotics production in Afghanistan hit historic highs in 2007 for the second straight year,” said the report, released on Friday.

“[The country's] drug trade is undercutting efforts to establish a stable democracy with a licit economic free market in the country.”

Last year more than 93 per cent of the world’s opium came from Afghanistan, the report said, while more than 14 per cent of Afghans were involved in poppy production in 2007, up from 12.6 per cent in 2006.

The report said 2007’s crop had an export value of about four billion dollars, more than one-third of Afghanistan’s gross domestic product (GDP).

“The Afghan government must take decisive action against poppy cultivation soon to turn back the drug threat before its further
growth and consolidation make it even more difficult to defeat,” the annual report added.

‘Long Haul’

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, secretary-general of Nato, said on Friday that the group’s forces cannot afford to lose the battle against Taliban forces in Afghanistan and will remain in the country “for the long haul”.

Speaking after talks with George Bush, the US president, Scheffer said the force was “fighting terrorism” and “prevailing” in the battle.

Bush said that the United States remained “committed” to Afghanistan and to a strategy “helps folks in Afghanistan realise security, at the same time, economic prosperity and political progress”.

About 43,000 soldiers from 26 countries are currently serving under Nato in Afghanistan.

Additional troops

The International Security Assistance Force (Isaf), serving under a United Nations mandate, has grown from 16,000 to 43,000 troops, of whom about one-third are from the US.

US officials and Isaf commanders have been urging the deployment of an additional 7,500 troops in the country.

However several Nato countries have been wary of public sentiment against such moves, particularly in sending forces to Afghanistan’s dangerous southern provinces.

Robert Gates, the US defence secretary, caused controversy earlier this month after telling the US senate armed services committee that the reluctance of some Nato allies to send troops was threatening efforts to combat the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Al Jazeera | Friday, February 29, 2008

Kosovo overseers say no split, no separate police

VIENNA, Feb 28 (Reuters) - The newly formed International Steering Group (ISG) that will monitor Kosovo’s progress after its declaration of independence on Thursday rejected partition or separate security institutions in the new country.Serbia’s former province seceded on Feb 17. The Serbian government has vowed never to accept the secession and to extend its authority over Serb areas in the territory’s north.

“There will be no partition of the country. That is not foreseen and that is not the intention of this group,” said ISG head Pieter Feith, who is also the EU civilian representative.

A European Union mission that is taking over supervision of Kosovo from the United Nations pulled out of the north over a week ago for security reasons, after mobs attacked embassies in Belgrade and burned down border posts in north Kosovo.

Analysts say that the violent protests, and signs that Belgrade is consolidating its rule, point to a deepening ethnic divide that could lead the new republic to a de facto partition between Serb north and Albanian south.

Dozens of Serb policemen have also failed to report for duty in an eastern region while a Serb minister said Belgrade planned to have its own police service in Serb towns in Kosovo.

Feith said he was not aware of Kosovo police not performing their duties or Serb police being present in Kosovo at this time.

“We will not admit any parallel security institution to manifest itself on the territory of Kosovo,” he told a news conference following the ISG’s first meeting.

Feith said the ISG would also demand that international peacekeepers and police be deployed throughout the territory of Kosovo and have freedom of movement.

The ISG is made up of 15 countries that have recognised Kosovo and want to play a part in its development, among them the United States, Germany, France and Britain.

It aims to implement a plan drawn up by United Nations special envoy Martti Ahtisaari for Kosovo’s future path, including links between the Serb minority and Serbia, protection of religious monuments, minority rights and decentralisation. (Editing by Dominic Evans)

Reuters | Karin Strohecker | Thursday, February 28, 2008

DF kills 20 Palestinians, including 6 children, in Gaza and West Bank

At least 18 Palestinians, including five boys under the age of 16 and a 6-month-old baby, were killed in the Gaza Strip and two in the West Bank on Thursday during fighting with Israeli forces. Meanwhile, militants in Gaza continued to fire rockets at southern Israel, striking as far north as Ashkelon.The targets of Thursday’s air strikes included a police roadblock 150 meters from the Gaza City home of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, in what appeared to be a message to Hamas.

The deaths come a day after IDF troops killed 12 Palestinians in Gaza fighting and an Israeli college student was killed in a Qassam rocket strike outside Sderot. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed that Israel’s response to the deadly barrage of Qassam rockets would be particularly harsh.

In the West Bank, IDF troops conducting arrests of terror suspects shot and killed a militant from the PRC and a member of the Fatah-linked Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades in the Balata refugee camp, on the outskirts of Nablus.

Palestinian officials said one person was killed and four others were wounded in the attack near Haniyeh’s home, which took place a day after the IAF targeted Haniyeh’s empty office. Haniyeh - who has been in hiding for several weeks, fearing Israeli assassination - was not believed to be in the area. Israel has threatened to begin targeting Hamas leaders because of the ongoing rocket fire from Gaza.

Four Palestinians were killed in separate IAF attacks on an electric company vehicle in Khan Yunis that Israel said was carrying militants, and a truck said to be carrying canned beverages. The men who were pulled out of the charred vehicle were wearing military-style uniform, witnesses said, and the Israel Defense Forces said the truck was laden with rockets ready for launching.

Five children - all under the age of 16 and three from the same family - were killed in an IAF strike in Jabalya, a refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, Palestinian sources said. Witnesses said the children were playing soccer when the missile struck.

At least five Hamas militants, including the son of a senior Hamas lawmaker, Khalil al-Haya, and two PRC militants were killed in several attacks in northern Gaza and Gaza City. Al-Haya is one of Hamas’ top figures in Gaza, and has himself escaped assassination attempts, including an IAF strike that killed his brother last year. Hamas said his son had commanded a rocket-launching squad in northern Gaza.

Visiting the morgue at Gaza City’s Shifa hospital Thursday, al-Haya said he was proud that his son had lost his life for the Hamas cause, like many of his relatives.

“I thank God for this gift, he said. This is the 10th member of my family to receive the honor of martyrdom.”

Overnight, IAF jets blasted a government building in Gaza. Palestinian health officials said a 6-month-old baby was killed in the attack, and 30 people were wounded.

Witnesses said the building was empty. The IDF said all targets that were attacked were centers of terrorist activity.

Palestinian militants fired some 30 Qassam rockets at southern Israel on Thursday, lightly wounding two people. Militants also launched 11 Grad rockets at Ashkelon, one of which scored a direct hit on a home in the port town. Several people were treated for shock.

Haaretz | Friday, February 29, 2008

Eat insects to beat world hunger, UN scientists say

Chiang Mai (AsiaNews/Agencies) - “I definitely think they can assist,” said German biologist V.B. Meyer-Rochow, who regularly eats insects and wore a T-shirt with a harlequin longhorn beetle to an UN-sponsored workshop this month on promoting bugs as a food source. Almost 40 scientists from 15 countries gathered in the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai, home to several dozen restaurants serving insects and other bugs.Some of their proposals are really odd, literally out of this world. A Japanese scientist in fact proposed setting up bug farms on spacecrafts to feed astronauts, noting that it would be more practical than raising cows or pigs. Irreproachable as far as scientific solutions go.

According to estimates by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, some 1,400 species of insects and worms are eaten in almost 90 countries in Africa, Latin America and Asia.

“In certain places with certain cultures with a certain level of acceptance, insects can very well be seen as part of the solution” to hunger, said Patrick Durst, a senior forestry officer at the FAO in Bangkok.

Insects in many countries could serve as supplement to the food that aid agencies already provide. Transportation infrastructures could be improved elsewhere. But the main problem against acceptance is cultural since in many places the small invertebrates are not very appetising.

Despite the great enthusiasm surrounding the rediscovery of bugs as a food supplement, Tina van den Briel, senior nutritionist at the World Food Programme, the UN agency that provides food in emergencies, expressed doubt that they could benefit large, vulnerable populations. Most bugs are seasonal and have a short shelf life, she said.

Scepticism and doubts aside, quite a few scientists believe that larvae, crickets and worms have great potential and that they are “really good”. Remember: If you trust before you try, you may repent before you die.

Asia News | Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Disturbing New Photos From Abu Ghraib

As an expert witness in the defense of an Abu Ghraib guard who was court-martialed, psychologist Philip Zimbardo had access to many of the images of abuse that were taken by the guards themselves. For a presentation at the TED conference in Monterey, California, Zimbardo assembled some of these pictures into a short video. Wired.com obtained the video from Zimbardo’s talk, and is publishing some of the stills from that video here. Many of the images are explicit and gruesome, depicting nudity, degradation, simulated sex acts and guards posing with decaying corpses. Viewer discretion is advised.

Links to Pics

Wired | February 28, 2008

Billboard Liberation Front

The Billboard Liberation Front today announced a major new advertising improvement campaign executed on behalf of clients AT&T and the National Security Agency. Focusing on billboards in the San Francisco area, this improvement action is designed to promote and celebrate the innovative collaboration of these two global communications giants.”This campaign is an extraordinary rendition of a public-private partnership,” observed BLF spokesperson Blank DeCoverly. “These two titans of telecom have a long and intimate relationship, dating back to the age of the telegraph. In these dark days of Terrorism, that should be a comfort to every law-abiding citizen with nothing to hide.”

AT&T initially downplayed its heroic efforts in the War on Terror, preferring to serve in silence behind the scenes. “But then we realized we had a PR win on our hands,” noted AT&T V.P. of Homeland Security James Croppy. “Not only were we helping NSA cut through the cumbersome red tape of the FISA system, we were also helping our customers by handing over their e-mails and phone records to the government. Modern life is so hectic - who has time to cc the feds on every message? It’s a great example of how we anticipate our customers’ needs and act on them. And, it should be pointed out, we offered this service free of charge.”

Commenting on the action, and responding to questions about pending privacy litigation and the stalled Congressional effort to shield the telecoms from these lawsuits, NSA spokesperson [REDACTED] remarked: “[REDACTED] we [REDACTED] condone [REDACTED] warrantless [REDACTED], [REDACTED] SIGINT intercepts, [REDACTED] torture [REDACTED] information retrieval by [REDACTED] means necessary.”

“It’s a win-win-win situation,” noted the BLF’s DeCoverly. “NSA gets the data it needs to keep America safe, telecom customers get free services, and AT&T makes a fortune. That kind of cooperation between the public and private sectors should serve as a model to all of us, and a harbinger of things to come.”

Come see the improvement at 14th St. and Valencia St. in San Francisco.

The BLF (www.billboardliberation.com) has been improving outdoor advertising since 1977. Prior campaigns have included work for Exxon, R.J. Reynolds, and Apple Computers.

AT&T (www.att.com) is America’s favorite telecommunications trust. Based in San Antonio, Texas, it has over 300,000 employees and annual revenues of $117 Billion.

NSA (www.nsa.gov) is the largest intelligence organization in the world. Headquartered at Fort Meade, Maryland, its budget, personnel, products, and services are all classified.

Blank DeCoverly
BLF Minister of Propaganda

War costs estimated to exceed $3 trillion

Long-term factors pushfigure toward $7 trillion

WASHINGTON - When U.S. troops invaded Iraq in March 2003, the Bush administration predicted that the war would be self-financing, and rebuilding the nation would cost less than $2 billion.

Coming up on the five-year anniversary of the invasion, a new estimate from a Nobel laureate puts the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at more than $3 trillion.

That estimate from Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz also serves as the title of his new book, “The Three Trillion Dollar War,” which will hit store shelves Friday.

The book, co-authored with Harvard University professor Linda Bilmes, builds on previous research published in January 2006. The two argued then and now that the cost to America of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is wildly underestimated.

When other factors are added - such as interest on debt, future borrowing for war expenses, continued military presence in Iraq and lifetime health care and counseling for veterans - they think that the wars’ costs range from $5 trillion to $7 trillion.

“I think we really have learned that the long-term costs of taking care of the wounded and injured in this war and the long-term costs of rebuilding the military to its previous strength is going to far eclipse the cost of waging this war,” Bilmes said in an interview.

The book and its estimates are the subject of a hearing today by the Joint Economic Committee of Congress.

The White House criticized the estimates by Stiglitz, a former chief economist of the World Bank who is now a professor at Columbia University.

“People like Joe Stiglitz lack the courage to consider the cost of doing nothing and the cost of failure. One can’t even begin to put a price tag on the cost to this nation of the attacks of 9/11,” said White House spokesman Tony Fratto, conceding that the costs of the war on terrorism are high while questioning the premise of Stiglitz’s research.

“It is also an investment in the future safety and security of Americans and our vital national interests. $3 trillion? What price does Joe Stiglitz put on attacks on the homeland that have already been prevented? Or doesn’t his slide rule work that way?”

Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., a decorated Marine Corps colonel and Vietnam veteran, welcomed the effort by Stiglitz and Bilmes to quantify the ways in which the wars will cost taxpayers. “It’s astounding that here we are about to mark the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, and this administration still refuses to acknowledge the long-term costs of the war in Iraq,” he said.

By any estimate, the Bush administration’s predictions in March 2003 of a self-financing war have proved drastically inaccurate. Stiglitz cites operational spending to date of $646 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and, working off estimates from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, presumes that spending on these wars over the next decade probably will amount to $913 billion more.

Pentagon officials had no immediate comment on Stiglitz’s book or his estimates.

Stiglitz and Bilmes first estimated war costs of $1 trillion in January 2006. Their research proved controversial and sparked debate about the costs of replacing equipment used by the armed forces and National Guard units.

In the new book, they offer a figure of $404 billion for replacing equipment, planes and tanks and bringing military hardware back from Iraq and Afghanistan.

In an interview, Stiglitz said too much of the public debate had been over the wars’ operational costs while the real budget strains would show up only years from now.

“The peak expenditures are way out,” he said, noting that the peak expenditures for World War II veterans came in 1993.

The pair estimated that future medical, disability and Social Security costs for veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan range from a best-case $422 billion to what they call a more probable long-term expense of $717 billion.

It’s why their book calls for creating a Veterans Benefits Trust Fund to set aside money in a “lock box” to pay for future health care needs of Iraq and Afghanistan vets. Although veterans’ health care amounts to a future promise, they said, it isn’t an entitlement and instead is funded through discretionary spending.

In the future, funding for vets will compete with other government programs.

“We should not have an unfunded entitlement program like this,” Stiglitz said. “This is more like deferred compensation . . . We require corporations to put money away, but we don’t require the government to put money away, and we should be doing that . . . so when the focus turns away to some other problem, veterans aren’t [shortchanged].”

McClatchy Newspapers | Kevin G. Hall | Thursday, February 28, 2008

Record-high ratio of Americans in prison

For the first time in history, more than one in every 100 American adults is in jail or prison, according to a new report tracking the surge in inmate population and urging states to rein in corrections costs with alternative sentencing programs.The report, released Thursday by the Pew Center on the States, said the 50 states spent more than $49 billion on corrections last year, up from less than $11 billion 20 years earlier. The rate of increase for prison costs was six times greater than for higher education spending, the report said.

Using updated state-by-state data, the report said 2,319,258 adults were held in U.S. prisons or jails at the start of 2008 - one out of every 99.1 adults, and more than any other country in the world.

The steadily growing inmate population “is saddling cash-strapped states with soaring costs they can ill afford and failing to have a clear impact either on recidivism or overall crime,” said the report.

Susan Urahn, managing director of the Pew Center on the States, said budget woes are prompting officials in many states to consider new, cost-saving corrections policies that might have been shunned in the recent past for fear of appearing soft in crime.

“We’re seeing more and more states being creative because of tight budgets,” she said in an interview. “They want to be tough on crime, they want to be a law-and-order state - but they also want to save money, and they want to be effective.”

The report cited Kansas and Texas as states which have acted decisively to slow the growth of their inmate population. Their actions include greater use of community supervision for low-risk offenders and employing sanctions other than reimprisonment for ex-offenders who commit technical violations of parole and probation rules.

“The new approach, born of bipartisan leadership, is allowing the two states to ensure they have enough prison beds for violent offenders while helping less dangerous lawbreakers become productive, taxpaying citizens,” the report said.

While many state governments have shown bipartisan interest in curbing prison growth, there also are persistent calls to proceed cautiously.

“We need to be smarter,” said David Muhlhausen, a criminal justice expert with the conservative Heritage Foundation. “We’re not incarcerating all the people who commit serious crimes - but we’re also probably incarcerating people who don’t need to be.”

According to the report, the inmate population increased last year in 36 states and the federal prison system.

The largest percentage increase - 12 percent - was in Kentucky, where Gov. Steve Beshear highlighted the cost of corrections in his budget speech last month. He noted that the state’s crime rate had increased only about 3 percent in the past 30 years, while the state’s inmate population has increased by 600 percent.

The Pew report was compiled by the Center on the State’s Public Safety Performance Project, which is working directly with 13 states on developing programs to divert offenders from prison without jeopardizing public safety.

“For all the money spent on corrections today, there hasn’t been a clear and convincing return for public safety,” said the project’s director, Adam Gelb. “More and more states are beginning to rethink their reliance on prisons for lower-level offenders and finding strategies that are tough on crime without being so tough on taxpayers.”

The report said prison growth and higher incarceration rates do not reflect a parallel increase in crime or in the nation’s overall population. Instead, it said, more people are behind bars mainly because of tough sentencing measures, such as “three-strikes” laws, that result in longer prison stays.

“For some groups, the incarceration numbers are especially startling,” the report said. “While one in 30 men between the ages of 20 and 34 is behind bars, for black males in that age group the figure is one in nine.”

The nationwide figures, as of Jan. 1, include 1,596,127 people in state and federal prisons and 723,131 in local jails - a total 2,319,258 out of almost 230 million American adults.

The report said the United States is the world’s incarceration leader, far ahead of more populous China with 1.5 million people behind bars. It said the U.S. also is the leader in inmates per capita (750 per 100,000 people), ahead of Russia (628 per 100,000) and other former Soviet bloc nations which make up the rest of the Top 10.

___

On the Net:

http://www.pewcenteronthestates.org.

AP | DAVID CRARY | Thursday, February 28, 2008

Air Force Blocks Access to Many Blogs

The Air Force is tightening restrictions on which blogs its troops can read, cutting off access to just about any independent site with the word “blog” in its web address. It’s the latest move in a larger struggle within the military over the value — and hazards — of the sites.  At least one senior Air Force official calls the squeeze so “utterly stupid, it makes me want to scream.”Until recently, each major command of the Air Force had some control over what sites their troops could visit, the Air Force Times reports. Then the Air Force Network Operations Center, under the service’s new “Cyber Command,” took over.

AFNOC has imposed bans on all sites with “blog” in their URLs, thus cutting off any sites hosted by Blogspot. Other blogs, and sites in general, are blocked based on content reviews performed at the base, command and AFNOC level …

The idea isn’t to keep airmen in the dark — they can still access news sources that are “primary, official-use sources,” said Maj. Henry Schott, A5 for Air Force Network Operations. “Basically … if it’s a place like The New York Times, an established, reputable media outlet, then it’s fairly cut and dry that that’s a good source, an authorized source,” he said …

AFNOC blocks sites by using Blue Coat software, which categorizes sites based on their content and allows users to block sub-categories as they choose.

“Often, we block first and then review exceptions,” said Tech. Sgt. Christopher DeWitt, a Cyber Command spokesman.

As a result, airmen posting online have cited instances of seemingly innocuous sites — such as educational databases and some work-related sites — getting wrapped up in broad proxy filters.

“A couple of years back, I fought this issue concerning the Counterterrorism Blog,” one Air Force officer tells Danger Room. “An AF [Air Force] professional education course website recommended it as a great source for daily worldwide CT [counterterrorism] news.  However it had been banned, because it called itself a blog. And as we all know, all blogs are bad!”

He’s joking, of course. But blogs and social networking sites have faced all sorts of restrictions on military networks, for all sorts of reasons. MySpace and YouTube are officially banned, for eating up too much bandwidth. Stringent regulations, read literally, require Army officers to review each and every item one of his soldiers puts online, in case they leak secrets. And in televised commercials, screensavers and fliers, troops are told that blogging is a major security risk — even though official sites have proven to leak many, many more secrets. Now there’s the Air Force’s argument, that blogs aren’t legitimate media outlets — and therefore, shouldn’t be read at work.

But this view isn’t universally held in the military. Many believe blogs to be a valuable source of information — and a way for ordinary troops to shape opinions, at home and abroad. Gen. David Petraeus, who heads the U.S. effort in Iraq, has commended military bloggers. Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV, who replaced Petraeus as the head of the Combined Arms Center and Fort Leavenworth, recently wrote (in a blog post, no less) that soldiers should be encouraged to “get onto blogs and [s]end their YouTube videos to their friends and family.”

Within the Air Force, there’s also a strong contingent that wants to see open access to the sites — and is mortified by the AFNOC’s restrictions. “When I hear stuff this utterly stupid, it makes me want to scream…. Piles of torn out hair are accumulating around my desk as we speak,” one senior Air Force official writes in an e-mail. “I’m certain that by blocking blogs for official use, our airmen will never, ever be able to read them on their own home computers, so we have indeed saved them from a contaminating influence. Sorry, didn’t mean to drip sarcasm on your rug.”

One of the blogs banned is In From the Cold, which examines military, intelligence and political affairs from a largely right-of-center perspective. It’s written by “Nathan Hale,” the pseudonym for a former journalist and Air Force intelligence officer, who spent more than two decades in the service. He tells Danger Room, “If knowledge and information are power — and no one disputes that — then why not trust your people and empower them to explore all sides of issues affecting the service, air power and national security?”

Obviously, DoD [Department of Defense] can decide what internet content should be filtered — they spent billions on the IT architecture and billions more to maintain it. But if it’s a matter of “ensuring worker productivity” and deterring “wasteful surfing of the internet,” does it really make sense to block relatively small blogs (that just happen to focus on military and security issues), while allowing everyone to access ESPN or FoxSports?  Wonder how much work time will be lost on filling out “March Madness” brackets, versus reading a military or intelligence blog? 
 
In short, there doesn’t seem to be any consistency in the current DoD policy.  And that’s no surprise.  A few months ago, a senior Pentagon P.A. [public affairs] official told me that his service had no plans to engage the blogosphere, because their studies showed that “people don’t rely on blogs for news and information.” And he said it with a straight face. 

The Air Force recently launched an $81 million marketing campaign to convince lawmakers and average citizens of its relevance in today’s fights. By making it harder for troops to blog, an Air Force officer says, the service had undermined “some of their most credible advocates.”

“The Air Force isn’t getting the planes that they want because they are incapable of communicating their usefulness and applicability in this new war. Because Air Force officers talk more like corporate bureaucrats than cocky war fighters, no one is inspired or convinced of their pressing (and quite legitimate) need to modernize the force,” he adds.  “Air Force bloggers spoke the lingo of someone heavily invested in the fight, because they operate outside the survival-minded careerist world of public affairs, with many of them penning blog posts from theater.”
Perhaps, says retired Air Force Col. Tom Ehrhard, who’s now a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. But there are legitimate security reasons why blogs need to be restricted. Adversaries may be using blogs to take advantage of airmen, he notes.

It is increasingly clear that active exploitation could take advantage of airmen and civilians who want to inform and correct the often outrageous, false assertions on these blogs. In doing so, it is easy for well-meaning insiders to violate operational security (OPSEC) tenets, either directly or tangentially. We are in a different world today when it comes to sensitive military information, and foreign intelligence operatives surely understand this and will exploit it. As a former member of Strategic Air Command, where OPSEC was (rightly) an obsession, this has been obvious to me for some time in reading aerospace-oriented blogs. This policy strikes me as a timely reminder to Air Force professionals that they should be on guard when blogging, because someone is watching.

UPDATE: I’m getting a lot of conflicting data about exactly which blogs are blocked, and which ones aren’t.   Shoot me a note if you’re currently in the Air Force, and would like to help set me straight.  All off-the-record, naturally.

Wired | Noah Shachtman | Wednesday, February 27, 2008

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