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Experts dismiss statements from group as 'posturing', amid evidence Taliban's hold on border communities has weakened

The Taliban in Pakistan have said they want to negotiate a ceasefire in a video statement by their leader, Hakemullah Mehsud.

The video, delivered to the Reuters news agency in Pakistan on Friday, is the latest in a series of statements in recent days stating that the group wants a peace deal – though they refuse to disarm.

Military and civilian authorities in Pakistan have repeatedly reached agreements with militants, most of which were shortlived. Experts dismissed the latest statements as "posturing".

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My Comment: When compared to past pictures and videos .... Hakemullah Mehsud has gotten fat. But aside from his personal health .... on the issue of a ceasefire .... I have zero reason to believe him.

Update: Taliban ready for peace talks, but won’t disarm -- Daily Times

SANAA, Yemen — In the wake of the killing of Osama bin Laden, Yemen – home to al Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula – has come close to eclipsing Pakistan as a key focus of American counter-terrorism efforts.

In 2011, then-CIA director David Petraeus characterized the group as the “most dangerous node in the global jihad” and the American government’s action has appeared to echo the rhetoric. Notably, the number of American airstrikes in Yemen, largely carried out by unmanned drones, has surged over the past year, as much as tripling in frequency in comparison with 2011.

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My Comment: Blow-black is becoming a greater concern as these drone strikes continue .... unfortunately .... for the moment Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. is right when he is saying that drone strikes are the 'least horrible' choice in places like Yemen.

CORVALLIS, Ore. — This has been an eventful month for the most famous ship name in the world — the USS Enterprise. On December 1, the U.S. Navy retired the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65) — the world's first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier — after a remarkable 51 years of service. At the same time, the Navy announced that the third Ford-class supercarrier (CVN-80), due to be completed around 2025, will be named Enterprise. And, not to be outdone, the producers of "Star Trek Into Darkness," the next Star Trek movie, released a trailer previewing the film that is set to hit the big screen in May.

So how will the new supercarrier Enterprise (CVN-80) compare to the starship Enterprise (NCC- 1701)? Foreign Policy put the question to naval analyst, former U.S. Naval War College professor, and science-fiction fan Chris Weuve:

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My Comment: A must read for Trekkie fans.

KABUL — The U.S. military is scrapping the Afghan air force’s entire fleet of Italian-made cargo planes, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

U.S. and Afghan officials told the paper that the Afghan military isn’t expected to have an independent and fully functioning air force until around 2017, well after the withdrawal of most U.S. and international troops.

On the west end of Kabul International Airport, twin-engine C-27As sit side by side, sunlight reflecting off their gray wings and the green, black, and red of the Afghan flag emblazoned on their tails. For more than a year, though, most of the planes had been little more than expensive aviation exhibitions, unable to fly due to lack of spare parts and maintenance.

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My Comment: It makes one wonder who was responsible for awarding this contract in the first place .... and why.

After decades in the trenches, a Newsweek correspondent reflects on the perils of war. By Christopher Dickey

Do you want to know what it’s like to stare in horror, and fascination, at a human head so thoroughly perforated by bullets that it’s folded in on itself like a melon rotted in the field? Or to watch, helpless, as refugee babies die of dehydration, their mouths opening and closing like fish gasping in the air? Maybe you’re interested in the taste of sweat and dirt when you’re under fire and trying to get low on the ground, and lower, impossibly low, with your face crushed against the earth.

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My Comment: Christopher Dickey has been lucky .... you can tempt fate for only so long.

As our 2013 forecast series continues, American Enterprise Institute scholar and frequent AOL contributor MacKenzie Eaglen takes a grim look at the strategic consequences of the fiscal cliff. (Click here for the full series of forecasts so far).

The nation is heading over the fiscal cliff, an economic triple threat -- tax hikes, spending cuts, and, soon thereafter, the debt limit -- that has been forecasted by government agencies to throw us back into recession. Fix that, and government funding may still run out in March when the current continuing resolution expires, since Congress never got around to passing the 2013 appropriations bills. Tasked with solving these successive crises is the same President and, with modest changes, the same status quo Congress that failed to fix them last year. It's exhausting, living constantly on the edge.

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My Comment: The death of the U.S. military 's long-standing 'two-war construct' was more than enough proof to me that the days of the U.S. as a super power were coming to an end. With massive budget cuts on the horizon, the question now becomes .... how much of the military is going to be left when everything is cut, and will we be able to have the resources to fight a 'one-war construct' and still be able to win.

North Korea likely engaged in a deliberate campaign of deception before a December 12 long-range missile launch, catching the United States and its Asian allies "off guard," according to a U.S. official with direct knowledge of analysis of the incident conducted by U.S. military and intelligence agencies.

The official told CNN that American and Japanese military ships and missile defenses were fully operational and protecting land, sea and airspace on December 12, but that the launch was a surprise when it actually happened.

"We had our dukes up, operationally, but we were caught off guard," the official said.

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My Comment: I was surprised by the North Korean missile launch .... but it is true .... those who are paid to observe and watch North Korea were lax on this one.

The Middle East and North Africa are teetering on the brink.

Notwithstanding sundry doomsday predictions—from the Mayans to Nostradamus and the ever-impending threat of Armageddon—we can now say with some assurance that the world did not end in 2012. The Middle East, however, continues to flirt with the apocalypse.

The revolutions, conflagrations, and confrontations now underway from the Sahara to the Hindu Kush are weakening national governments and calling into question borders that have lingered since European powers carved up the region after World War I. What is holding the map together now has more to do with fear than it does with hope, and if the old order fails, many in the Middle East suspect there may be no order left at all.

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My Comment: All of this regions tribal/sectarian/religious/political differences are coming to the forefront .... and often in a violent fashion. Will 2013 be another violent year for this region .... probably. Will it be apocalyptic .... we will soon find out.

MOSCOW — Russia has shown a burst of diplomatic energy before talks here on Saturday with the United Nations envoy on Syria, perhaps seeing a chance for a breakthrough that would temper the criticism it has drawn in the West and the Arab world during the course of the nearly two-year-old Syrian conflict.

Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, on Friday made his first overtures toward the largest exile Syrian opposition coalition, saying that he had requested a meeting with its leader, Sheik Ahmad Moaz al-Khatib. The United States, Britain and several Persian Gulf nations have recognized the coalition as the sole representative of the Syrian people, but Moscow has so far refused.

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Update: Syria opposition leader rejects Moscow invitation -- Reuters

My Comment: I am not surprised by the Syrian rebel decision to not accepts Russia's offer for talks. In their eyes they see Russia as the problem .... not the solution. For a better understanding on why the UN has failed in reconciling the different factions involved in the Syrian civil war, and why Russia is behaving in the manner that it has been since the start of the civil war, read this post.

A futuristic class of destroyers that will be homeported in San Diego reached a key development milestone earlier this month at a shipyard in Maine, where the 900-ton deckhouse of the Zumwalt was added to its hull, creating a ship that strongly resembles some of the "Ironclad" vessels of the American Civil War.

General Dynamics' Bath Iron Works (BIW) is building three of the ships -- the Zumwalt, Michael Monsoor and Lyndon B. Johnson -- in a program that represents a major technological leap for the Navy. At 610-feet, the Zumwalts will be 105 feet longer than the modern Burke-class destroyers. In fact, they'll be the largest destroyers ever built for the Navy and the first to be propelled entirely by electric drive systems. The Burkes have gas turbine engines, and the old Ironclads were steam powered.

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My Comment: Considering the fact that these destroyers cost billions .... I doubt that we are going to see many of them.

Americans are living in an Orwellian state argue Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone and historian Peter Kuznick, as they sit down with RT to discuss US foreign policy and the Obama administration’s disregard for the rule of law.

­Both argue that Obama is a wolf in sheep’s clothing and that people have forgiven him a lot because of the “nightmare of the Bush presidency that preceded him.”

“He has taken all the Bush changes he basically put them into the establishment, he has codified them,” Stone told RT. “It is an Orwellian state. It might not be oppressive on the surface, but there is no place to hide. Some part of you is going to end up in the database somewhere.”


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My Comment: That's his opinion .... what's mine .... I grew up in the Soviet Union so I know what it's like to live in an Orwellian state .... and the U.S. is not there (yet). But it is true that the U.S. of today is not the U.S. that I first got to know in the 1980s .... and sadly .... I suspect that I will recognize it even less in the next decade or two.

A group of U.S. Navy personnel involved in the humanitarian effort after Japan's March 2011 earthquake and tsunami have filed a lawsuit against the Tokyo Electric Power Co. for more than $200 million in compensation, punitive damages and future medical costs for exposure to radiation that leaked from the damaged Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant at the time.

The plaintiffs include eight troops serving on the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier — one of whom was pregnant at the time of the alleged exposure — and her daughter.

They charge that the utility, known as TEPCO, "knowingly and negligently caused, permitted and allowed misleading information concerning the true condition of the (plant) to be disseminated to the public, including the U.S. Navy Department," according to the complaint filed on Dec. 21 in a U.S. federal court in San Diego.

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8 US sailors sue Japanese utility over radiation exposure from nuclear reactor breakdown -- Washington Post/AP
U.S. sailors sue Tokyo co. over radiation -- Air Force Times
US Navy sailors sue Japan's TEPCO over radiation -- AFP
U.S. sailors sue Tepco over radiation -- UPI
US sailors sue operator of Fukushima nuclear plant -- The Australian
US sailors sue Japanese utility over radiation exposure -- Stars and Stripes
Japan's Tepco sued by US sailors over radiation -- BBC
US Navy sailors sue Japan for lying about Fukushima radiation -- RT

WASHINGTON (CBS DC) – American soldier suicides continue to outnumber combat-related deaths in 2012, and the trajectory for soldier suicides continues to get worse.

Statistics released by the Department of the Army show that through November potentially 303 active-duty, Reserve and National Guard soldiers committed suicide. As of Dec. 7, Stars and Stripes reports that 212 soldiers have died in combat-related deaths in Afghanistan.

The Army set a grim new record of 177 potential active-duty cases with 2012 coming to a close on Tuesday – 64 of these cases remain under investigation, 113 have been confirmed.

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Update #1: More soldier suicides than combat deaths in 2012 -- Stars and Stripes
Update #2: Soldier suicides outnumber combat deaths -- Salon

My Comment: And this trend shows no signs of slowing down.

Update #3: It appears that Israel has the same problem.

ens of thousands of Iraqis have taken to the streets in a Sunni-dominated western province, the latest in a series of demonstrations against the country's Shi'ite-led government.

The protesters blockaded a main highway Friday in Anbar province west of the capital, Baghdad, holding placards and chanting slogans against the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Protests were also reported in the northern Sunni towns of Tikrit, Mosul and Samarra.

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Iraqi Sunnis stage big anti-government rallies -- Reuters
Tens of thousands of Iraqi Sunnis rally, intensifying pressure on Shiite-led government -- Washington Post/AP
Iraq Sunni protests in Anbar against Nouri al-Maliki -- BBC
Maliki angry as protesters block Iraq highway -- AFP
Wave Of Sunni Demonstrations Sweeps Iraq -- Radio Free Europe
Iraq mass protests mount pressure on Maliki -- Al Jazeera
Mass anti-government protests in Iraq -- Deutsche Welle
Protests Flare in Iraq's Anbar Province -- Wall Street Journal
Iraq protests signal growing tension between Sunni and Shia communities -- The Guardian
Patience wearing thin among Iraq's Sunnis -- Irish Times

Iran’s naval forces started a six- day military exercise around the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for 20 percent of the world’s traded oil, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

The drill, which covers a large area extending to the Sea of Oman and the north of the Indian Ocean, is aimed at “displaying the readiness of armed and naval forces to defend Iran’s waterway and national interests,” Iranian Navy Commander Habibollah Sayari said today according to IRNA. The exercise will involve testing defensive and missile systems, combat vessels and submarines, Sayari said on Dec. 25.

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Iran: Navy Begins War Games Near Vital Waterway -- New York Times
Iran starts navy drills in Strait of Hormuz: IRNA -- Reuters
Iran starts war games in Strait of Hormuz -- Al Jazeera
Iran starts naval drill, prepares to confront Western threats -- RT
Iran Starts 6-Day Naval Drills -- RIA Novosti
Iran navy launches 6-day massive exercises: report -- Xinhuanet
Iran begins naval war games in Strait of Hormuz -- The National
Iran launches a massive naval drill -- Press TV (Iran)

From Turkey to Congo, next year's wars threaten global stability.

Every year, around the world, old conflicts worsen, new ones emerge and, occasionally, some situations improve. There is no shortage of storm clouds looming over 2013: Once again, hotspots old and new will present a challenge to the security of people across the globe.

There is, of course, an arbitrariness to most lists -- and this list of crises to watch out for in 2013 is no different. One person's priority might well be another's sideshow, one analyst's early warning cry is another's fear-mongering. In some situations -- Central Asia, perhaps -- preventive action has genuine meaning: The collapse into chaos has yet to happen. More complicated is anticipating when it will happen, what will trigger it, and how bad it will be. In others -- Syria, obviously -- the catastrophe is already upon us, so the very notion of prevention can seem absurd. It has no meaning save in the sense of preventing the nightmare from worsening or spreading.

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My Comment: This is my must read post for today.

The government of the Central African Republic and rebels have agreed to hold talks after weeks of clashes.

A regional delegation said no pre-conditions had been set for the talks which will be held in Libreville, capital of neighbouring Gabon.

The announcement comes after government troops and rebel fighters clashed in the central town of Bambari on Friday.

Rapid gains by the Seleka rebels have raised fears that CAR's capital Bangui could fall within a few days.

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Fresh fighting in C. African Republic as crisis grows -- AFP
Central African Republic’s neighbors agree to send military contingent to troubled country -- Washington Post/AP
AU Ready to Increase Military Presence in CAR -- Voice of America
Residents flee Bangui as rebels pause for talks -- Reuters
Diplomats Make Last Ditch Effort to Talk With CAR Rebels -- Voice of America
Central African Republic rebels advance as US embassy shuts -- The Guardian
U.S. diplomats leave Central African Republic amid unrest -- CNN
US embassy evacuated as rebels surge in Central African Republic -- Christian Science Monitor

Spending the day with friends who are visiting from out of town (i.e. shopping, eating, drinking, the usual Holiday cheer). Regular blogging will return early this evening.

As the old year dies, AOL Defense has asked its expert Board of Contributors to look ahead at the next (click here for the whole 2013 forecast series). Today we hear from Col. (retired) Douglas Macgregor, a decorated combat veteran of the first Gulf War, prolific author, and a passionate skeptic of conventional strategic wisdom.

In his book Only the Paranoid Survive, Andrew Grove describes a strategic inflection point as a point in time when the balance of forces shifts from the old structure and the old ways of competing to ones. As Grove writes, successful business structures adapt and thrive. Archaic structures that fail to adapt, decline and die.

What Grove describes is precisely what the incoming Secretary of Defense and his (or her) team must do in the opening months of 2013: Recognize we've passed a strategic inflection point and adapt the armed forces to new realities, fiscal and military, while extracting real $ savings in the process. After all, if businesses can do it, so can the American defense establishment, right? Actually, it's not so easy.

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My Comment: This is one of my 'must read' posts for today.