Anti-Chechen Pogrom Rages in Russian Town

RIAN.ru reports that days of violence have driven Chechens from the Karelian town of Kondopoga following a double killing:

Violence shook the town of Kondopoga over the weekend after two people were killed earlier in the week in an apparent brawl at a restaurant allegedly owned by Chechens. Hundreds of locals gathered on Saturday to demand the expulsion of North Caucasus natives before a mob torched the restaurant and ransacked a marketplace.

Viktoria Veber, the head of Karelia's Islamic Enlightenment organization, said about 50 Chechens, mainly women and children, who were being housed at a tourist resort near the republic's capital, Petrozavodsk, had no money to pay for food and housing, with private entrepreneurs paying for them.

Veber said the refugees would not return to Kondopoga until they received guarantees of their safety. Most of them are relatives of Chechens detained on suspicion of killing two local residents, which triggered riots in the 35,000-city.

Christopher Hitchens on Niger, Uranium, and Saddam Hussein

On Slate, Hitchens has more to say about Niger's uranium business:

This is not the only such contact or approach that has been uncovered from the Niger end. Iraq had lots of off-the-record cash and lots of off-the-record cheap oil. What did Niger have to offer in return? (Remember that Joseph Wilson was recommended by his wife to investigate these people mainly on the grounds that he was so friendly with them!)

At a minimum, this would suggest that the Blair and Bush administrations were quite right to view the Iraq-Niger relationship with concern. At a maximum, it would suggest that the Niger connection was a great deal more significant—and more dangerous—than anyone has even suspected. (The A.Q. Khan network was not exposed until after Muammar Qaddafi's capitulation and the opening of the Libyan stockpiles, which in turn did not occur until after Saddam Hussein had been overthrown.)

In any conflict of evidence or interpretation between Rolf Ekeus and Wissam Zahawie, there cannot be a person living who would prefer Zahawie's word. In any evaluation of the Wilson visit to Niger, it must indeed be acknowledged that he found nothing—but only because he had neither the ability nor the intention to do so. This was yet another CIA "intelligence failure" in the making, and it follows that those who asked searching questions about the agency's role were doing exactly the right thing.

Bye, Bye, Blair...

Tony Blair has announced that he will step down as British prime minister, according to Reuters. What will he do next?

Here's a suggestion--Secretary-General of the United Nations...

Newt Gingrich: How Bush Resembles Lincoln

From today's Wall Street Journal, a reminder that Newt Gingrich is a trained historian. Unstated subtext: Rumsfeld resembles McClellan....

In April of 1861, in response to the firing on Fort Sumter, President Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to serve for 90 days. Lincoln had greatly underestimated the challenge of preserving the Union. No one imagined that what would become the Civil War would last four years and take the lives of 620,000 Americans.

By the summer of 1862, with thousands of Americans already dead or wounded and the hopes of a quick resolution to the war all but abandoned, three political factions had emerged. There were those who thought the war was too hard and would have accepted defeat by negotiating the end of the United States by allowing the South to secede. Second were those who urged staying the course by muddling through with a cautious military policy and a desire to be "moderate and reasonable" about Southern property rights, including slavery.

We see these first two factions today. The Kerry-Gore-Pelosi-Lamont bloc declares the war too hard, the world too dangerous. They try to find some explainable way to avoid reality while advocating return to "normalcy," and promoting a policy of weakness and withdrawal abroad.

Most government officials constitute the second wing, which argues the system is doing the best it can and that we have to "stay the course"--no matter how unproductive. But, after being exposed in the failed response to Hurricane Katrina, it will become increasingly difficult for this wing to keep explaining the continuing failures of the system.

Just consider the following: Osama bin Laden is still at large. Afghanistan is still insecure. Iraq is still violent. North Korea and Iran are still building nuclear weapons and missiles. Terrorist recruiting is still occurring in the U.S., Canada, Great Britain and across the planet.

By late summer, 1862, Lincoln agonizingly concluded that a third faction had the right strategy for victory. This group's strategy demanded reorganizing everything as needed, intensifying the war, and bringing the full might of the industrial North to bear until the war was won.

The first and greatest lesson of the last five years parallels what Lincoln came to understand. The dangers are greater, the enemy is more determined, and victory will be substantially harder than we had expected in the early days after the initial attack. Despite how painful it would prove to be, Lincoln chose the road to victory. President Bush today finds himself in precisely the same dilemma Lincoln faced 144 years ago. With American survival at stake, he also must choose. His strategies are not wrong, but they are failing. And they are failing for three reasons.

Ann Coulter on Joe Wilson

Ann Coulter argues that Scooter Libby fell into Patrick Fitzgerald's "perjury trap." But why did Judy Miller go to jail? Something about this story remains unexplained...

Melanie Phillips on Britain's Fifth Column

From her column in the Daily Mail:

Warning bells are sounding across the Atlantic, with an article in America’s New Republic magazine claiming that Britain now poses a greater terror threat to America than Iraq, Iran or Afghanistan.

That absurd bit of hyperbole aside, the real surprise to me is that anyone is still surprised by the existence and scale of the home-grown British Islamic terrorist threat.

Three months ago, I published my book, Londonistan — which virtually the entire British publishing world had refused to touch — which warned about precisely this phenomenon.

Not only had Britain been allowed to become the hub of Al Qaeda in Europe, but the political and security establishment was still refusing to acknowledge the full dimensions of the threat. Of course, not all Muslims fit this pattern. Hundreds of thousands of British Muslims have no truck with Islamic extremism or terrorism, and across the world Muslims are numbered among its principal victims.

Nevertheless, the dismaying fact is that a horrifying number in Britain do harbour extremist views. According to a recent poll of British Muslims, no fewer than one quarter supported the London bombings in July last year. Yet even now, many in Britain still remain in a state of denial about the nature and implications of this threat. Politicians, police and security officials refuse to acknowledge that we are facing a holy war, an Islamic jihad, being waged against the West.

That doesn’t mean that all Muslims sign up to such a war; many regard it as a perversion of their faith. But the fact is that this terrorism is being perpetrated in the name of Islam and is condoned and even mandated by Islamic religious authorities.

And unless we understand that what drives people to these terrible acts is religious fanaticism — and is therefore not susceptible to reason, let alone negotiation — we cannot hope to defeat it.

A reader survey...

Who reads this blog? To find out, I've built a reader survey. If you'd like to participate, please click here. NOTE: The free survey software I'm using will only process up to 100 responses, so please take just one...

Victor Davis Hanson on Fouad Ajami

Hanson reviews The Foreigner's Gift for Commentary Magazine:

The Foreigner’s Gift is not an organized work of analysis, its arguments leading in logical progression to a solidly reasoned conclusion. Instead, it is a series of highly readable vignettes drawn from Ajami’s serial travels and reflections. Which is hardly to say that it lacks a point, or that its point is uncontroversial — far from it. Critics will surely cite Ajami’s own Shiite background as the catalyst for his professed confidence in the emergence of Iraq’s Shiites as the stewards of Iraqi democracy. But any such suggestion of a hidden agenda, or alternatively of naiveté, would be very wide of the mark.

What most characterizes Ajami is not his religious faith (if he has any in the traditional sense) but his unequalled appreciation of historical irony — the irony entailed, for example, in the fact that by taking out the single figure of Saddam Hussein we unleashed an unforeseen moral reckoning among the Arabs at large; the irony that the very vehemence of Iraq’s insurgency may in the end undo and humiliate it on its own turf, and might already have begun to do so; the irony that Shiite Iran may rue the day when its Shiite cousins in Iraq were freed by the Americans.

When it comes to ironies, Ajami is clearly bemused that an American oilman, himself the son of a President who in 1991 called for the Iraqi Shiites to rise up and overthrow a wounded Saddam Hussein, only to stand by as they were slaughtered, should have been brought to exclaim in September 2003: “Iraq as a dictatorship had great power to destabilize the Middle East. Iraq as a democracy will have great power to inspire the Middle East.” Ajami himself is not yet prepared to say that Iraq will do so — only that, with our help, it just might. He needs to be listened to very closely.

Youssef Ibrahim's Plan to Defeat Islamist Terror

From the NY Sun (ht Melanie Phillips):

1.The West needs strategies conveying to the vast majority of the world's 1.2 billion Muslims that acquiescence to jihadists and their ideologies means a rupture with Western civilization. The consequences for this should be spelled out by withholding Western commerce, the Internet, arms, machinery, and know-how — all of which still represent the bulk of progress as we define it in today's world. Imagine a ban on weapons and technology, on Microsoft and IBM, on Boeing, Ilyushin transport planes, and Airbus spares.

2. Draconian sanctions such as these should be applied in unison with Russia and China and clearly framed within the U.N. code. Islamic so-called moderate or client states including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Indonesia, among others, as well as enemies such as Iran, should be provided with a yardstick to define the dismantling of the infrastructure and software of terror at home — in mosques, in schools, in theocratic institutions, and inside government itself.

That will demand total elimination of the madrassa rote systems, the restructuring of religious teachings, and the outlawing of political groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood, which adopt religion as political vehicles.

3. In the West itself, the last vestiges of tolerance toward Islamic fundamentalism must be removed. Laws targeting extremist speech, Islamic dress, storefront unregulated mosques, and the traffic of immigrant Muslims who do not speak the language nor share the values of freedom must surface in the legal codes of America, Europe, and Australia. The West must clearly process the fact that it is facing an existential threat to its core values, and it cannot be shy about installing tools of war in its democratic practices.

Lest anyone think this is much ado about little, five years ago on one of America's darkest days when airplanes were crashed into the World Trade Center, it seemed that only a few hundred jihadists were aiming to make a point.

How to Bomb Tehran

Writing in the American Thinker J.R. Dunn says it may be time to bomb Tehran--without killing anyone:

* The Biggest Bang—Which brings us to our final possibility, which can be carried out as the last action short of open war. This would involve setting off a low-yield nuclear warhead 50,000 feet over Tehran. At that altitude, a bomb of precise power would break every window in the city, blind a few unfortunates, but kill no one. This may seem a drastic proposal, but in a climate where even gentle souls like Michael Coren are suggesting far worse, ‘drastic’ is a matter of debate.

A nuclear explosion is the most foreboding sight in nature it is possible to witness and survive. Many eyewitnesses of atmospheric bomb tests speak of the almost unreasoning terror that the sight creates. During the 1960s, an Air Force officer suggested that a single exception be made to the atmospheric test ban treaty: that a single bomb be set off annually with the leaders of all major powers present. “Once they see it, they will never forget it.”

That’s the problem with the ayatollahs and their servants – they haven’t seen it. A single example of what their longed-for toy actually is might concentrate their minds wonderfully. It might also result in every bearded man in Tehran being strung up by a terrified citizenry. And if it doesn’t work? If the ayatollahs remain defiant? We set off another one 45,000 feet above Qum. Repeat as many times as necessary. Anything is better than genocide.

Taliban-Al Qaeda Win in Waziristan

Michelle Malkin is not pleased with the latest news on Bill Roggio's blog from Pakistan's Afghan border. Apparently, it's just become the Islamic Emirate of Waziristan after an agreement with the Pakistani government. That's where Bin Laden supposedly lives.

Roggio say that makes Waziristan the new home base of Al Qaeda:

While this is not reported in the media, the “Taliban commanders” in attendance include none other than Jalaluddin Haqqani, military commander of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and Tahir Yuldashev, the commander of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. The New York Times does place Haqqani and Yuldashev in the Waziristan region. Both men are deeply in bed with al-Qaeda, and it is useless at this point in time to make distinctions between al-Qaeda, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan , the Taliban and Pakistan jihadi groups like Lashkar-Toiba. Syed Saleem Shahzad indicates other known Taliban commanders were present at the meeting; "At the gathering, mujahideen leader Maulana Sadiq Noor and a representative of Gul Badar (chief of the Pakistani Taliban in North Waziristan), as well as other members of the mujahideen shura (council), were seated on a stage while the leaders of the JUI-F [the political party of Pakistani opposition leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman and only party in North and South Waziristan] delivered the speeches." Note that while unstated, Haqqani and Yuldashev also sit on the Mujahideen Shura.

Quinnipiac Poll: Americans Want Giuliani

Thanks to a short item in The American Thinker today that led me to Qunnipiac University's polling site, I've learned that the Israelis are not the only ones who like Hizzoner. So far, he leads every other candidate listed in the Quinnipiac Poll, too:

Among Republican voters, 46 percent would like to see former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani nominated to run for President in 2008, followed by 25 percent who back Arizona Sen. John McCain, with no other GOP contender breaking 7 percent.

New York Sen. Hillary Clinton is the choice of 44 percent of Florida Democrats, followed by former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards with 17 percent, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry at 10 percent and Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden at 8 percent.

On head-to-head matchups, Giuliani leads Clinton 49 - 42 percent, while McCain tops the Democrat 48 - 42 percent.

Israeli Experts Back Giuliani for US President

According to Haaretz. They gave him a score of 8.75 out of a possible 10. Of course, as readers of this blog surely realize, I would like to call Hizzoner "Mr. President" someday, too--but can he win American as well as Israeli support in 2008? Interestingly, Hillary Clinton is the highest-ranked Democrat, with a score of 7.63 (tied with Senator John McCain).

King Rat (1965)

What a movie: slow-moving, stark, depressing, haunting, thought-provoking. It's about what it takes to survive, about the struggle in each person between good and evil, about war and peace, POW camps, the Japanese occupation of Asia, the A-bomb--and Anglo-American relations, as well.

The cast of this adaptation of James Clavell's autobiographical 1962 novel makes the film worth watching just for the acting: George Segal is King Rat, the American black-marketeer, a US Army corporal who runs the rackets in a Singapore POW camp; James Fox is Marlowe, a sarong-wearing British officer who falls under his spell. Supporting cast reads like the Masterpiece Theatre stock company--John Mills, Leonard Rossiter, Denholm Elliott.

It makes you think, it makes you feel, and it sticks with you for a long time afterwards. (Not suitable for children or the squeamish, since the film's POWs eat rats and a dog).

Conservation Finance

I came across this blog while researching NGOs. Conservation Finance has interesting posts about ecology, development, and the economics of international aid programs. It's worth a look...

Daniel Pipes to Bin Laden: "Nuts!"

Well, he said it a little more long-windedly than America's soldiers fighting the Battle of the Bulge during WWII--but Daniel Pipes has just rejected Bin Laden's invitation to surrender, switch sides, and join his jihad against America:

So, Al-Qaeda wants me and my "sword" (a reference, presumably, to my computer keyboard) to join its efforts. My response to Gadahn:

I note your offer for me to change sides in the current war. But I am faithful to my own religion, to my own country, and to my civilization. I will do my part to defeat radical, totalitarian Islam and to usher in the emergence of a modern, moderate, and good-neighborly Islam in its place.

Uzbek Independence Day

It was celebrated on September 1st. Here's a link to an interesting holiday-themed article from the Escape Artist.

Christopher Hitchens on Richard Armitage, Joseph Wilson & Valerie Plame

I don't know how he does it. He churns out long such articles overnight. He must never sleep. Here's Christopher Hitchens take in Slate on the end of a Washington scandal:

I had a feeling that I might slightly regret the title ("Case Closed") of my July 25 column on the Niger uranium story. I have now presented thousands of words of evidence and argument to the effect that, yes, the Saddam Hussein regime did send an important Iraqi nuclear diplomat to Niger in early 1999. And I have not so far received any rebuttal from any source on this crucial point of contention. But there was always another layer to the Joseph Wilson fantasy. Easy enough as it was to prove that he had completely missed the West African evidence that was staring him in the face, there remained the charge that his nonreport on a real threat had led to a government-sponsored vendetta against him and his wife, Valerie Plame.

In his July 12 column in the Washington Post, Robert Novak had already partly exposed this paranoid myth by stating plainly that nobody had leaked anything, or outed anyone, to him. On the contrary, it was he who approached sources within the administration and the CIA and not the other way around. But now we have the final word on who did disclose the name and occupation of Valerie Plame, and it turns out to be someone whose opposition to the Bush policy in Iraq has—like Robert Novak's—long been a byword in Washington. It is particularly satisfying that this admission comes from two of the journalists—Michael Isikoff and David Corn—who did the most to get the story wrong in the first place and the most to keep it going long beyond the span of its natural life.

As most of us have long suspected, the man who told Novak about Valerie Plame was Richard Armitage, Colin Powell's deputy at the State Department and, with his boss, an assiduous underminer of the president's war policy. (His and Powell's—and George Tenet's—fingerprints are all over Bob Woodward's "insider" accounts of post-9/11 policy planning, which helps clear up another nonmystery: Woodward's revelation several months ago that he had known all along about the Wilson-Plame connection and considered it to be no big deal.)

Swedish Recipes

While we're doing more cheerful links, here's Anne's Food, featuring recipes from Stockholm...

Russian Blog Saves Lives

Here's a nice story, for a change, about how weblogs are helping to save lives in Russia:

She is one of the most popular users of the LiveJournal, or JJ in Russian abbreviation. Almost 3,500 people are permanent readers of her Internet Diary. Olga went into charity about two years ago. The same LiveJournal encouraged her to go for it.

"The first case started with a request, which I came across in the LiveJournal. A single mother with four children needed money urgently. A fund-raising campaign was a huge success. Later on, another user of LiveJournal needed money, and we collected it for him, too. This is how it all started. After some time, we gained a reputation, and more users," Olga recalls.

A year ago, Vladik Kuzmin, a small boy with a cancerous tumor from Khabarovsk appeared in her life. Olga does not remember exactly how his parents contacted her. But this is not so important after all. Raising solid funds started with his case. During his short life the boy went through several operations in Russia, but to no avail. Russian doctors acknowledged that his tumor was inoperable, but their Japanese colleagues volunteered to try and save the boy. But they asked for about $300,000. Olga started her search for money. But she soon found out that the whole sum was not necessary. German doctors learnt about Vladik from the Internet, through the same LiveJournal, and said that the treatment would be by an order less. Volunteers contacted the hospital, prepared the required papers, and in late August Vladik went through a successful operation, and will soon return home. The Internet community has saved his life.

"The expenses for Vladik's treatment were brought down from $300,000 to $35,000. We collected even more than needed. All in all, we raised about $75,000 to help Vladik and other children. And this is just through my modest blog.