Campaign for the Accountability of American Bases

Space.com
By Stephen Clark
February 6, 2011

A trailblazing payload for the National Reconnaissance Office successfully rocketed into orbit on a Minotaur 1 booster Sunday, beginning a secret mission testing new ways to collect intelligence from space.

The mission was codenamed NROL-66 in the agency’s rocket acquisition naming system. The payload is also called RPP, which is short for Rapid Pathfinder Program. …

An NRO spokesperson disclosed before launch the payload will demonstrate better ways for U.S. government satellites to gather intelligence. …

The Minotaur launcher blasted off at 4:26 a.m. local time (7:26 a.m. EST; 1226 GMT) from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The launch was delayed from Saturday by a transmitter glitch in the Air Force’s network of tracking and communications equipment. …

The Minotaur 1’s next flight is scheduled from Wallops Island, Va., in May with a satellite for the Pentagon’s Operationally Responsive Space program. Called ORS 1, the spacecraft will carry an electro-optical and infrared sensor to supply battlefield intelligence to U.S. Central Command. …

Read in full: www.space.com/10773-secret-spy-satellite-rocket-launches.html

Press TV
February 5, 2011

American officials suggest that tens of thousands of US troops in Iraq may extend their stay in the country well beyond the 2011withdrawal deadline.

US Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey said on Friday that more US military forces may be needed to counter what he called “threats to Iraq’s stability, [and they] will remain in 2012.”

The prospects of a longer US military stay in Iraq contradict the clauses of a 2008 agreement between Baghdad and Washington.

The agreement established that US combat forces would withdraw from Iraqi cities by June 30, 2009, and that all US forces would be completely out of Iraq by December 31, 2011.

The Iraqi government initially intended to hold a popular vote on the agreement but later succumbed to US bully-tactics and accepted the agreement.

Since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, more than 1,300,000 people have been killed in Iraq, 4.7 million displaced, 5 million children orphaned — nearly half of the country’s children — and the health status has deteriorated to a level not seen since the 1950s.

www.presstv.ir/detail/163839.html

Reuters
By Jane Sutton
January 4, 2011

The Afghan prisoner who died at the Guantanamo detention camp this week had quit the Taliban forces because he considered them corrupt, and he was never “in any way” an enemy of the United States, the man’s lawyer said on Friday.

Awal Malim Gul, 48, collapsed and died on Tuesday after using an exercise machine at the prison camp on the Guantanamo Bay U.S. naval base in Cuba. The U.S. military said the death appeared to have been from natural causes but results from an autopsy would not be released at this time because they are part of an ongoing investigation.

Gul’s body was flown to a U.S. military base in Afghanistan on Friday and will be turned over to the Afghan government and then to his family, a military spokeswoman said.

In an announcement of the death, the U.S. military said Gul was a Taliban commander who operated an al Qaeda guest house and admitted providing operational aid to Osama bin Laden.

Gul’s lawyer, federal public defender Matthew Dodge, called those assertions “outrageous.”

“The government has never provided any evidence at all to support this slander. Neither Mr. Gul nor any credible witness has ever said such things,” said Dodge, who represented Gul in a U.S. district court case in Washington challenging his detention. …

www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/05/idINIndia-54671620110205

Washington Post
By Walter Pincus
January 30, 2011

Iraq’s security forces are confronting significant problems as the U.S. military prepares to withdraw from that country by the end of this year, according to a new report by a top oversight official.

Though advances continue to be made, corruption, lack of capacity to handle logistics and an absence of realistic planning threaten to undermine the security infrastructure and equipment introduced into Iraq by U.S.-led forces, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, Stuart W. Bowen Jr., says in the office’s latest quarterly report, released Sunday.

Since 2003, the United States has provided $58 billion for reconstruction in Iraq, the report says. Of that, almost $20 billion went to supporting Iraq’s security forces, in which nearly 800,000 personnel now serve in the military and police units.

Iraqi military forces are considered capable of counterinsurgency, and checkpoints in Baghdad are being dismantled amid a recent decline in violent incidents. Nonetheless, “insurgents continued to wage a campaign of intimidation and assassination against certain GOI [government of Iraq] military and civilian personnel this quarter, killing or attempting to kill several dozen officials,” the report says. …

Read on: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/29/AR2011012904353.html

NTI: Global Security Newswire
January 26, 2011

Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov today said the nation would move ahead with preparations to build its own antimissile defenses, RIA Novosti reported …

“As far as our missile defense system is concerned, we have been developing it and will be further developing it,” the defense chief told the upper house of the Russian parliament, which today voted to approve the New START nuclear arms pact with the United States …

Previous reports said Moscow was aiming for an “impenetrable” missile defense system by 2020.

The Kremlin is in discussions with NATO on potential collaboration for a missile defense shield intended to safeguard the European continent from potential short- and medium range missile strikes from the Middle East. Russia has warned it would withdraw from the negotiations if it feels it is not being treated as an equal partner …

http://globalsecuritynewswire.org/gsn/nw_20110126_1141.php

Washington Post
By Walter Pincus
January 24, 2011

More than $11 billion in U.S. funding to construct and maintain bases for rapidly expanding Afghan security forces is at “risk of being wasted” because the military has no comprehensive plan for the program, according to government investigators.

Only about one-quarter of the nearly 900 construction projects scheduled for completion by the end of fiscal 2012 has even been started, Arnold Field, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, or SIGAR, said in testimony Monday.

The Obama administration’s strategy for the withdrawal of all U.S. combat troops by the end of 2014 depends on the development of Afghanistan’s own security forces. End-strength goals for the army and police have tripled from 132,000 in 2006 to a projected 400,000 over the next few years.

About $8 billion remains of the total $11.4 billion requested for the construction program. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, one of four Defense Department agencies who manage reconstruction projects in Afghanistan, has requested expedited funding for the security force projects.

The construction of bases, training camps and headquarters for the Afghan forces is a little-discussed part of the coalition’s plans to secure the country. …

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/24/AR2011012405784.html

Spero News
January 17, 2011

The United States is working on re-establishing its military bases in the Philippines, a Filipino bishop said today.

“I have an apprehension that the United States military bases will return,” said Bishop Dinualdo Gutierrez of the diocese of Marbel in southern Philippines.

“You know why? Everything is there in General Santos City. They have a nice airport – 3.2 km entry point and 400 hectares of land area – it would take in the biggest plane,” the bishop told Church-run Radio Veritas 846 in an interview. …”

The Philippine Senate voted in 1991 to kick out the US military bases in the country. The US was ready to contest the decision but the eruption of Mount Pinatubo which devastated the US military base in Zambales province forced them to decide to quickly move out.

However, the US maintains its military presence in the Philippines under the Visiting Forces Agreement signed during the administration of Joseph Estrada. Under the agreement, US and local soldiers conduct regular war games in many parts of the country.

Read more: www.speroforum.com

New York Times
By Martin Fackler and Elisabeth Bumiller
January 13, 2011

TOKYO — Striking a conciliatory tone on an issue that has divided Japan and the United States, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Thursday that the Obama administration would follow Tokyo’s lead in working to relocate an American air base on Okinawa.

During talks with Japanese leaders in Tokyo, Mr. Gates said he also discussed a sophisticated new antimissile system that the United States is jointly developing with the Japanese, and the two nations’ response to North Korea’s recent military provocations against the South.

But a top item on the agenda was the relocation of the United States Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, an emotional issue here that drove an uncharacteristic wedge between the allies last year when the prime minister at the time, Yukio Hatoyama, wavered on whether to keep the base on Okinawa.

While the two nations finally agreed in May to relocate the noisy helicopter base to a less populated part of Okinawa by 2014, local resistance has made that time frame look increasingly unrealistic. …

On Thursday, Mr. Gates said the administration did not want the Futenma issue to overshadow the countries’ overall security alliance, which last year reached its 50th anniversary. He signaled that the United States was willing to be flexible in allowing Tokyo to resolve the domestic political resistance to the relocation plan. …

Read on: www.nytimes.com/2011/01/14/world/asia/14military.html

Washington Post
By Aaron C. Davis
January 12, 2011

BAGHDAD – Despite Iraqi leaders’ insistence that the United States meet its end-of-2011 deadline for withdrawing all troops, the contours of a large and lasting American presence here are starting to take shape.

Although a troop extension could still be negotiated, the politics of Iraq’s new government make that increasingly unlikely, and the Obama administration has shown little interest in pushing the point.

Instead, planning is underway to turn over to the State Department some of the most prominent symbols of the U.S. role in the war – including several major bases and a significant portion of the Green Zone.

The department would use the bases to house a force of private security contractors and support staff that it expects to triple in size, to between 7,000 and 8,000, U.S. officials said.

Ongoing negotiations between the United States and Iraq will determine the number of contractors and bases, as well as the number of uniformed military personnel the United States hopes to keep here to continue training Iraqi security forces, the officials said. …

Read on: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/12/AR2011011204225.html

al.com (Blog)
By Shelly Haskins, The Huntsville Times
January 6, 2011

Ahead of Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ announcement of up to $178 billion in cuts in military spending, U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions joined a democrat and an independent senator today in asking Gates not to cut missile defense.

Gates briefed key lawmakers and reporters this afternoon on his plans for defense spending cuts, which add $78 billion to the already anticipated $100 billion in cuts. …

“We write to urge you as you work toward improving efficiencies within the Department to take no action that would impair the development of the missile defense architecture as outlined by the Missile Defense Agency in the FY11-15 Future Years Defense Plan,” the senators wrote. “Such reductions would be inconsistent with the President’s support for missile defense as outlined in his December 18, 2010, letter to Senators (Harry) Reid and (Mitch) McConnell during debate on the new START treaty …”

http://blog.al.com/breaking/2011/01/sen_jeff_sessions_asks_defense.html