|
The Voice of the
White House
Washington
,
D.C.
,
April 12,
2008
:Much
ado in the papers about the major drug companies. We note that
certain very popular drugs made and sold by major drug companies
kill or disable too many people. Much shock and horror. Why, I do
not know. These people are friends of George W. Bush and he has made
it very plain to the Federal regulatory agencies that interfering
with his friends is not to be done.
The
drug companies can absolutely count on being supported by the
Bush-appointed judges and left alone by the regulatory people. Any
Federal employee who dares to contradict Bush is immediately fired,
as have been a number of high-ranking military leaders who wont
put up with his puerile lies.
The
Chinese, who have no problem bribing people, have whined that their
lead-tainted toys are quite safe and that their medicines, heavily
contaminated with dangerous chemical residues, are even more safe.
And because Bush is known to take bribes, they get away with it.
Woodrow
Wilson was a Democrat, a prig and an asshole but he never took
bribes. U.S. Grant had a very corrupt administration but Grant never
took a dime. Bush has been on the take since he used his family
influence to get various oil industry jobs.
The
whole family is as crooked as a Swiss mountain road and George is no
exception. Also, Georgie is a vicious little rat who loves to
torment people and if he can do this and get bribe money
for it, so much the better.
George
W. Bush is a drunk, a liar and a thief and the sooner he leaves
office, the better off for every man, woman and child in the
United States
.
Boycott
the Olympics? When he can stuff mattress covers full of hundred
dollar bills safely on Air Force One? Not bloody likely. Well, for
the trailer park trash and the Jesus freak idiots who voted for him,
I hope you swallow the wrong pill and turn a delicate shade of
blue.
Editorial
All
the Time He Needs
April 13, 2008
New
York Times
President
Bush said last week that he told his
Iraq
war commander, Gen. David
Petraeus, that hell
have all the time he needs.
We know what that means. It means that the general, like the Iraqi
government, should feel no pressure to figure a way out of this
disastrous war. It means that even after 20,000 troops come home
there will be nearly 140,000 American troops still fighting there
with no plan for further withdrawals and no plan for leading them to
victory. It means, as weve
always suspected, that Mr. Bushs
only real strategy for
Iraq
has been to hand the mess
off to his successor. Mr. Bush gave himself all the time he needs to
walk away from one of the biggest strategic failures in American
history.
General
Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the American ambassador to
Baghdad
, did not try to hide any
of that in their Stay-the-Course 2008 Tour. There were the
obligatory claims of military and political progress, but with a lot
less specificity than during Stay-the-Course 2007. Mr. Crocker did
not even bother to bring charts assessing Iraqi performance on
political benchmarks. General Petraeuss
charts showed that American troop numbers would come down to around
140,000 this summer
but showed nothing beyond that.
When
members of Congress pressed him to explain what would have to change
on the ground for him to agree to further withdrawals, the general
did not have an answer. He certainly is not getting any pressure
from the White House to come up with one. As they say in the
military, Mr. Bush is a short-timer, so why should he worry?
Whoever
wins the presidency will not have the same luxury. He or she will
have to start quickly planning for an orderly withdrawal. Even
Senator John McCain will have to realize that
America
s
forces cannot sustain this pace for much longer. Earlier this month,
The Times reported that repeated battlefield tours have so
debilitated American troops that Army leaders fear for their mental
health. Last week, Gen. Richard A. Cody, the Army vice chief of
staff, warned Congress that the demand for troops in
Iraq
and
Afghanistan
exceeds
the sustainable supply.
Mr.
Bush cut Army combat tours in
Iraq
from 15 months to 12, but
the Pentagon said that will not relieve the strains on troops and
their families or allow the
United States
to send the reinforcements
it desperately needs to
Afghanistan
.
The
faltering American economy also cannot afford this never-ending war.
Mr. Bushs
description of his latest emergency spending request as a reasonable
$108 billion
proves just how out of touch he is with fiscal reality. His attempt
to justify the overall $600 billion cost so far by comparing his war
to the cold war and the need to stop Soviet
expansion
shows that he is even more out of touch with strategic reality.
We
believe that the fight against Al Qaeda is the central battle for
this generation, but Mr. Bushs
claim that
Iraq
is the main front is
wrong. That is
Afghanistan
, and the
United States
is in real danger of
losing because Mr. Bushs
failed adventure in
Iraq
is eating up the Pentagons
resources and attention.
It
is clear that Mr. Bush has no intention of coming up with an exit
strategy, but even now there are things he could be doing to give
his successor a better shot at containing the chaos after American
troops leave.
·
Press
for Real Political Reforms
The surge was supposed to give Iraqi politicians breathing room to
make necessary political reforms. They still have not agreed on a
law to equitably divide the countrys
oil wealth, or rules for this falls
provincial elections.
The
performances in
Washington
last week merely confirmed
what the Iraqis knew: the president is just playing out his string.
Mr. Bush might have more luck telling Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki
the truth: if the Democrats win in November, the days of enabling
will certainly be over, and that is likely to happen even if the
Republicans hold the White House. If they know the Americans will
not be there to guarantee their survival,
Iraq
s
leaders might be more open to compromise.
·
Make
the Iraqis Pick Up the Check
Even some of the wars most enthusiastic G.O.P. backers on Capitol
Hill are joining the Democrats to demand that the Iraqis start
paying for military training and the fuel bill for American
soldiers. We suspect that has a lot to do with voters fury over
high gasoline prices, the mortgage crisis and the lagging economy.
The
Iraqi government is estimated to keep $27 billion in reserves in its
central bank, $30 billion more in American banks and tens of
billions of dollars elsewhere. If they have to pick up more of the
check, Iraqi leaders may be more eager to focus on political reform
and improved military training.
·
Really
Talk to the Neighbors
Mr. Bush announced that he is dispatching senior American diplomats
to the region to urge Arab states to do more to help
Iraq
, starting with reopening
their embassies in
Baghdad
. Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice will also attend a conference of neighboring states
and another aid-pledging meeting.
The
problem goes far beyond embassies and aid. Foreign fighters are not
the wars
main driver but they are a lethal problem. And once American troops
withdraw, the temptation to meddle
by
Iran
and
Syria
but also by
Turkey
and
Saudi Arabia
will be immense.
All
these countries need to understand that chaos in
Iraq
is a threat to everyone,
and there is no guarantee that it will not spill over
Iraq
s
borders. More bullying and bluster from the president is not likely
to get that message across. Nor are canned speeches at conferences.
Mr. Bush needs to send his top officials for serious one-on-one
discussions with all of
Iraq
s
neighbors, including
Iran
and
Syria
.
·
Refugees
There are now an estimated 2.4 million Iraqi refugees
mostly in
Syria
and
Jordan
and 2.7 million more Iraqis displaced within their own country. The
United States bears direct responsibility, and it needs to do a lot
more to help these people survive and find safe refuge, back in
Iraq
or in other countries. It
also needs to
humbly and urgently
ask its allies in
Europe
,
Asia
and the region for help.
Beyond
the intolerable human suffering, huge flows of refugees could spread
Iraq
s
conflict far beyond its own borders. This is not a problem that can
continue to be ignored.
·
An
Honest Assessment of
Iraq
s
Army This
White House has been spinning on
Iraq
for so long that we
suppose we should thank Mr. Maliki for his recent reality check: his
decision to send Iraqi forces into
Basra
to oust militias loyal to
the radical cleric Moktada al-Sadr.
It
was not a pretty sight. One thousand Iraqi soldiers and police
officers refused to fight or deserted their posts. The battle ended
with no winner and only after the Iranians helped broker a
cease-fire. President Bush and General Petraeus owe the country a
rigorous and honest assessment of the American training program,
starting with what went wrong in
Basra
. What needs to be changed
now to increase the chances that the Iraqi Army will eventually be
able to fight its own battles? How long, realistically, will it take
for that to happen?
Mr.
Bushs
capacity for denial is limitless. Perhaps he believes that the next
president will continue this misadventure without any end in mind,
let alone in sight. Even then he owes it to his successor to use his
remaining nine months in office to try to address
Iraq
s
myriad problems. That will not excuse Mr. Bushs
serial failures. But it may increase the chances for the inevitable
withdrawal to be as orderly as possible.
Mr.
Bush has all the time he needs, but
Iraq
s
suffering civilians do not, and neither do its masses of refugees,
the bloodied and strained
United States
armed forces, or the
American public.
US
GIs in
Iraq
Suffer Worst Week of '08
April 12, 2008
by
Robert H. Reid
Associated
Press
BAGHDAD
- A roadside bomb killed an
American soldier in
Baghdad
on Saturday, capping the
bloodiest week for
U.S.
troops in
Iraq
this year. Clashes
persisted in Shiite areas, even as the biggest Shiite militia sought
to rein in its fighters.
At
least 13 Shiite militants were killed in the latest clashes in
Baghdad
's militia stronghold of
Sadr
City
, the
U.S.
military said. Iraqi police
said seven civilians also died in fighting, which erupted Friday
night and tapered off Saturday.
The
U.S.
military said the American
soldier was killed in a blast Saturday morning in northwestern
Baghdad
but did not say whether
Shiite militiamen were responsible.
The
death raised to at least 19 the number of American troopers killed
in
Iraq
since last Sunday.
American
casualties have risen with an outbreak of fighting in
Baghdad
between
U.S.
and Iraqi forces and the
largest Shiite militia - the Mahdi Army of anti-American cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr.
Al-Sadr,
who is believed to be in Iran, repeated on Saturday his demand for
American soldiers to leave the country and urged his fighters not to
target fellow Iraqis "unless they are helping the (U.S.)
occupation."
Al-Sadr
also blamed the Americans and their Iraqi allies for the
assassination Friday of one of his top aides,
Riyadh
al-Nouri, director of his
office in the Shiite holy city of
Najaf
.
Gunmen
ambushed al-Nouri as he was returning home from Friday prayers, and
al-Sadr followers shouted anti-American slogans at his funeral in
Najaf.
Despite
the strident rhetoric, however, there were signs that al-Sadr was
trying to calm his militia to avoid all-out war with the Americans.
Al-Sadr is also under pressure from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki,
also a Shiite, to disband the Mahdi Army or face a ban from
politics.
Sadrist
officials told The Associated Press they had received orders from
their headquarters in Najaf to avoid confrontations with Iraqi and
U.S.
forces unless the Americans
try to move deep into
Sadr
City
, which has been under siege
for two weeks.
The
officials said the Sadrist leadership was concerned that the ongoing
clashes were turning into a war of attrition that was weakening the
movement and undermining support within its Shiite power base.
The
officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not
supposed to discuss policy with outsiders.
In
a move to bolster its image among
Sadr
City
residents, the government
Saturday lifted a ban on entering and leaving the district, home to
some 2.5 million people. Police announced that one of the entrances
had been opened to motor traffic.
Army
patrols warned residents through loudspeakers to keep off the
streets, saying the rebels had planted roadside bombs which needed
to be cleared by the security forces.
Elsewhere,
Iraqi soldiers acting on tips from detained Shiite militiamen found
14 bodies that had been buried in a field south of
Baghdad
, officials said Saturday.
It was the second discovery this week of mass graves in the area,
raising to 45 the number of bodies located there.
The
victims are believed to have been killed more than a year ago as
part of a cycle of retaliatory violence between Shiites and Sunnis
that has since ebbed.
Recent
clashes in the
Baghdad
area have severely strained
a unilateral truce which al-Sadr imposed on the Mahdi Army last
August. He ordered the standdown to allow time to reorganize the
force and purge criminal factions that had tarnished the image of
his movement.
U.S.
officials have acknowledged
that al-Sadr's truce, along with the Sunni Arab revolt against al-Qaida,
had played a major role in reducing American and Iraqi deaths,
especially in the
Baghdad
area.
With
renewed Shiite militia fighting,
Baghdad
is now accounting for a
growing number of American casualties.
Last
month, 61 percent of the
U.S.
military deaths occurred in
Baghdad
, compared with 28 percent
in February and 47 percent in April, 2007, according to figures
compiled by The Associated Press.
Fighting
in
Baghdad
broke out following last
month's ill-prepared Iraqi government offensive against Shiite
militias and criminal gangs in the southern city of
Basra
.
The
offensive stalled in the face of fierce resistance by the militias,
whose allies in the capital showered rockets and mortars on the
U.S.-controlled Green Zone.
Although
fighting has eased in
Basra
,
U.S.
and Iraqi troops have been
pressing militias in
Baghdad
's
Sadr
City
to drive them beyond rocket
range to the Green Zone.
Associated
Press reporter Sameer N. Yacoub in
Baghdad
and
the AP's
News
Research
Center
in
New
York
contributed to this report.
Military
Personnel Account for 20% of
U.S.
Suicides
April
10, 2008
by
Tom Randall and Rob Waters
Bloomberg
Current
and former military personnel accounted for about 20 percent of
U.S.
suicides in 2005, according to a government study.
About
1,821 current or former soldiers committed suicide in 16 states in
2005, the most recent year of available data, according to the
report published today by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention. Almost half were diagnosed with depression and a third
left suicide notes.
A
rise in suicides among soldiers serving in the military has alarmed
Pentagon planners and members of Congress as the war in
Iraq
enters its sixth year. An Army report produced last year found the
rate of suicides among soldiers deployed in
Iraq
from 2003 to 2006 was almost 40 percent higher than the military's
average suicide rate. An update of the Army's Mental Health Advisory
Team report released in March found suicide rates for soldiers in
2007 remained ``above normal Army rates.''
`The
frequency and the length of deployments are stretching people to the
limit and they can't tolerate it, Charles Figley, a psychologist
who directs the Traumatology Institute at
Florida
State
University
,
said in a telephone interview today. ``They're taking risks, taking
alcohol and taking their own lives because they want to extinguish
their pain.
While
38 percent of the soldiers who took their own lives had a diagnosed
mental health condition, only 27 percent were receiving mental
health care, according to the CDC report.
30,000
Suicides
Each
year 30,000 Americans commit suicide, according to the CDC. Suicide
is the second-leading cause of death for people ages 25 to 34, after
accidental injury, according to today's report, the first from an
electronic tracking system meant to help researchers better
understand and prevent violent death. The
U.S.
plans to expand the system to all states, the CDC said.
Suicide
accounted for about 56.1 percent of the 15,495 reported violent
deaths in the 16 states. Fewer military suicide victims were
receiving mental health care than non-military victims, the report
said. Violent deaths in the report were caused by intentional use of
force or unintended use of a gun.
About
three-quarters of all suicides recorded by the CDC took place in a
house or apartment. Most victims killed themselves with a gun,
followed by poisoning and strangulation, according to the study.
About 62 percent had alcohol in their blood.
Men
were 3.4 times more likely than women to die violently. American
Indians and blacks had the highest rates among ethnicities, the CDC
said.
A
separate study last year found that combat veterans were twice as
likely to take their own lives as people who hadn't been in battle.
That study, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community
Health, looked at 320,000 men who had served in the military from
1917 to 1994.
To
contact the reporters on this story: Tom Randall in
New
York
at trandall6@bloomberg.net; Rob Waters in
San
Francisco
at rwaters5@bloomberg.net.
The Collapsing
U.S.
Economy
You
Thought You Had an Equity Line
April 13,
2008
by
Gretchen Morgenson
New
York Times
It
was the nations lending institutions and mortgage originators
that got us into this credit mess, but it is consumers, taxpayers
and those companies shareholders who will end up shouldering most
of the costs.
The
latest example of this is in the mass freezing of home equity lines
of credit going on across the country. Reeling from losses on their
wretched loan decisions of recent years, lenders are preventing
borrowers with pristine credit and significant equity in their homes
from tapping into credit lines that they paid dearly to secure.
In
the last 30 days, lenders have sent several hundred thousand letters
advising borrowers that their home equity lines of credit are
frozen, estimated Michael A. Kratzer, president of FeeDisclosure.com,
a Web site intended to help consumers reduce fees on home loans.
Major
lenders
including Washington
Mutual, IndyMac Bank and the Greenpoint Mortgage Unit of Capital
One
say that declining property values are prompting the decisions to
cut off credit.
Banks
have the right, of course, to rescind these credit lines at any time
under the terms of the contracts they struck with borrowers. And as
home prices have tumbled in many parts of the country, banks are
undoubtedly trying to protect themselves from exposure to additional
losses.
But
these actions are being taken even in areas where property prices
are rising, Mr. Kratzer said. Whats
worse, the letters provide no explanation for how the lenders
determined that the property values underlying the equity lines had
fallen.
Frozen
home equity lines will surely intensify the consumer spending
downturn and put added pressure on an already weak economy. Indeed,
on Friday, consumer confidence as measured by the University of Michigan plummeted to its lowest level since
1982. The drop was attributed mostly to higher fuel and food costs,
but consumers
views on their current and expected personal financial situations
dropped to their lowest readings since November 1982 and April 1980,
respectively.
One
especially exasperating aspect of now-you-see-them, now-you-dont
equity lines is that borrowers are not receiving refunds for fees
they paid to secure the credit in the first place.
These
fees can be significant, Mr. Kratzer said: on a $50,000 line, for
example, fees of $1,500 are common. If the line is being frozen at,
say, $25,000, why shouldnt
the borrower be entitled to receive a refund of $750?
Borrowers
who have an excellent credit score may also find that status hurt
when a home equity line is frozen. That is because when a lender
suddenly caps a $50,000 line at $25,000, the borrower will appear to
have tapped the entire amount of the loan, a factor that can reduce
a persons
credit score. Never mind that, based on the original amount of the
credit line, the borrower is using only half of it.
Ronald
Martin, 31, a
United States
naval
aviator deployed in
Iraq
, received
one of these letters recently from IndyMac Bank. We
regret to inform you that your IndyMac Bank Home Equity account has
been temporarily frozen,
the letter began.
Mr.
Martins
wife, Leigh Anne, a substitute teacher who lives in their
Camarillo
,
Calif.
, home, said
the notice surprised her because she and her husband have excellent
credit scores and have not even tapped the IndyMac line. While home
values in the Martins
neighborhood have fallen, the couple are not underwater on their
mortgage, which was taken out in spring 2005.
You
paid to use that equity line and now they are saying you cant
use it,
Mrs. Martin said. Weve
never been late on our mortgage. We have a good savings account. We
pay every bill we ever had on time
what did we do wrong?
The
IndyMac letter said the Martins
credit was being suspended because the
value of the dwelling has declined significantly below its appraised
value used at origination.
IndyMac said it would re-evaluate the property value each quarter
and, if it improved, the freeze would be lifted.
Officials
representing IndyMac declined to comment.
Sara
Gaugl, a Washington Mutual spokeswoman, said the bank actively
manages the amount of credit it extends to customers. We
have a process in place for customers who wish to appeal a credit
line decrease decision,
she said. We
also will continue to assist homeowners who may have unique or
special situations.
Mr.
Kratzer, who has recently fielded calls and e-mail messages from
more than 500 borrowers in straits similar to the Martins,
said lenders who were reining in credit should provide an
explanation of how they determined that property values associated
with the lines had declined sharply.
How
are lenders arriving at the new loan-to-value ratios?
Mr. Kratzer asked. When
you secure a loan or home equity line, a full appraisal is generally
required. But these processes arent
being used when the lender calculates a new value to reduce an
existing credit line.
Mr.
Kratzer said he had heard from frozen-out borrowers in 11
metropolitan areas where the median home price actually increased in
the last quarter of 2007, the most recent figures available from the
National
Association of Realtors. They include
Yakima
,
Wash.
;
Appleton
,
Wis.
;
Raleigh-Cary
,
N.C.
; and
Champaign-Urbana
,
Ill.
Borrowers in
areas where prices remained flat have also contacted him.
Are
they applying blanket values to ZIP codes, neighborhoods or entire
regions?
Mr. Kratzer said. Were
all left to wonder about the process.
Luckily
for the Martins, they are not in need of additional credit on their
IndyMac line. But other borrowers who have contacted Mr. Kratzer say
they are in the middle of home improvement projects that they can no
longer finance, or have college tuition bills that they were going
to pay using the credit lines. Now they cant.
Medical
expenses, another reason that borrowers tap their equity lines, are
also posing problems for some homeowners.
And
small-business owners who use home equity lines to bridge cash-flow
gaps throughout the year are also being stricken by these curbs, Mr.
Kratzer said. He has also heard from people who paid down some of
their home equity lines, expecting to be able to draw on them again.
Now they are out of luck.
In
a perfect world, lenders would fully disclose the process and
criteria used to make these valuations and decisions,
Mr. Kratzer said. These
borrowers have a solid payment history, good credit scores and
plenty of equity to satisfy most of the lenders
loan-to-value formulas. Instead, the banks are just shutting them
off.
China
vs. US
The
New Chinese E-spionage Threat
April
10, 2008
by
Brian Grow, Keith Epstein and Chi-Chu Tschang
BusinessWeek
A
BusinessWeek probe of rising attacks on
America
's
most sensitive computer networks uncovers startling security gaps
The
e-mail message addressed to a Booz Allen Hamilton executive was
mundane- a shopping list sent over by the Pentagon of weaponry
India
wanted to buy. But the missive turned out to be a brilliant fake.
Lurking beneath the description of aircraft, engines, and radar
equipment was an insidious piece of computer code known as
"Poison Ivy" designed to suck sensitive data out of the $4
billion consulting firm's computer network.
The
Pentagon hadn't sent the e-mail at all. Its origin is unknown, but
the message traveled through
Korea
on its way to Booz Allen. Its authors knew enough about the
"sender" and "recipient" to craft a message
unlikely to arouse suspicion. Had the Booz Allen executive clicked
on the attachment, his every keystroke would have been reported back
to a mysterious master at the Internet address
cybersyndrome.3322.org, which is registered through an obscure
company headquartered on the banks of
China
's
Yangtze
River
.
The
U.S.
government, and its sprawl of defense contractors, have been the
victims of an unprecedented rash of similar cyber attacks over the
last two years, say current and former
U.S.
government officials. "It's espionage on a massive scale,"
says Paul B. Kurtz, a former high-ranking national security
official. Government agencies reported 12,986 cyber security
incidents to the U.S. Homeland Security Dept. last fiscal year,
triple the number from two years earlier. Incursions on the
military's networks were up 55% last year, says Lieutenant General
Charles E. Croom, head of the Pentagon's Joint Task Force for Global
Network Operations. Private targets like Booz Allen are just as
vulnerable and pose just as much potential security risk. "They
have our information on their networks. They're building our weapon
systems. You wouldn't want that in enemy hands," Croom says.
Cyber attackers "are not denying, disrupting, or destroying
operations-yet. But that doesnt mean they dont have the
capability.
A
MONSTER
When
the deluge began in 2006, officials scurried to come up with
software "patches," "wraps," and other bits of
triage. The effort got serious last summer when top military brass
discreetly summoned the chief executives or their representatives
from the 20 largest
U.S.
defense contractors to the Pentagon for a "threat
briefing." BusinessWeek has learned the
U.S.
government has launched a classified operation called Byzantine
Foothold to detect, track, and disarm intrusions on the government's
most critical networks. And President George W. Bush on Jan. 8
quietly signed an order known as the Cyber Initiative to overhaul
U.S.
cyber defenses, at an eventual cost in the tens of billions of
dollars, and establishing 12 distinct goals, according to people
briefed on its contents. One goal in particular illustrates the
urgency and scope of the problem: By June all government agencies
must cut the number of communication channels, or ports, through
which their networks connect to the Internet from more than 4,000 to
fewer than 100. On Apr. 8, Homeland Security Dept. Secretary Michael
Chertoff called the President's order a cyber security
"Manhattan Project."
But
many security experts worry the Internet has become too unwieldy to
be tamed. New exploits appear every day, each seemingly more
sophisticated than the previous one. The Defense Dept., whose
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) developed the Internet in
the 1960s, is beginning to think it created a monster. "You
don't need an Army, a Navy, an Air Force to beat the
U.S.
,"
says General William T. Lord, commander of the Air Force Cyber
Command, a unit formed in November, 2006, to upgrade Air Force
computer defenses. "You can be a peer force for the price of
the PC on my desk." Military officials have long believed that
"it's cheaper, and we kill stuff faster, when we use the
Internet to enable high-tech warfare," says a top adviser to
the
U.S.
military on the overhaul of its computer security strategy.
"Now they're saying, Oh, shit.'"
Adding
to
Washington
's
anxiety, current and former
U.S.
government officials say many of the new attackers are trained
professionals backed by foreign governments. "The new breed of
threat that has evolved is nation-state-sponsored stuff," says
Amit Yoran, a former director of Homeland Security's National Cyber
Security Div. Adds one of the nation's most senior military
officers: "We've got to figure out how to get at it before our
regrets exceed our ability to react."
The
military and intelligence communities have alleged that the People's
Republic of
China
is the
U.S.
's
biggest cyber menace. "In the past year, numerous computer
networks around the world, including those owned by the
U.S.
government, were subject to intrusions that appear to have
originated within the PRC," reads the Pentagon's annual report
to Congress on Chinese military power, released on Mar. 3. The
preamble of Bush's Cyber Initiative focuses attention on
China
as well.
Wang
Baodong, a spokesman for the Chinese government at its embassy in
Washington
,
says "anti-China forces" are behind the allegations.
Assertions by
U.S.
officials and others of cyber intrusions sponsored or encouraged by
China
are unwarranted, he wrote in an Apr. 9 e-mail response to questions
from BusinessWeek. "The Chinese government always opposes and
forbids any cyber crimes including hacking' that undermine the
security of computer networks," says Wang.
China
itself, he adds, is a victim, "frequently intruded and attacked
by hackers from certain countries."
Because
the Web allows digital spies and thieves to mask their identities,
conceal their physical locations, and bounce malicious code to and
fro, it's frequently impossible to pinpoint specific attackers.
Network security professionals call this digital masquerade ball
"the attribution problem."
A
CREDIBLE MESSAGE
In
written responses to questions from BusinessWeek, officials in the
office of National Intelligence Director J. Michael McConnell, a
leading proponent of boosting government cyber security, would not
comment "on specific code-word programs" such as Byzantine
Foothold, nor on "specific intrusions or possible
victims." But the department says that "computer
intrusions have been successful against a wide range of government
and corporate networks across the critical infrastructure and
defense industrial base." The White House declined to address
the contents of the Cyber Initiative, citing its classified nature.
The
e-mail aimed at Booz Allen, obtained by BusinessWeek and traced back
to an Internet address in
China
,
paints a vivid picture of the alarming new capabilities of
America
's
cyber enemies. On
Sept.
5, 2007
,
at
08:22:21
Eastern time, an e-mail message appeared to be sent to John F.
"Jack" Mulhern, vice-president for international military
assistance programs at Booz Allen. In the high-tech world of weapons
sales, Mulhern's specialty, the e-mail looked authentic enough.
"Integrate
U.S.
,
Russian, and Indian weapons and avionics," the e-mail noted,
describing the Indian government's expectations for its fighter
jets. "Source code given to
India
for indigenous computer upgrade capability." Such lingo could
easily be understood by Mulhern. The 62-year-old former U.S. Naval
officer and 33-year veteran of Booz Allen's military consulting
business is an expert in helping to sell
U.S.
weapons to foreign governments.
The
e-mail was more convincing because of its apparent sender: Stephen
J. Moree, a civilian who works for a group that reports to the
office of Air Force Secretary Michael W. Wynne. Among its duties,
Moree's unit evaluates the security of selling
U.S.
military aircraft to other countries. There would be little reason
to suspect anything seriously amiss in Moree's passing along the
highly technical document with "India MRCA Request for
Proposal" in the subject line. The Indian government had just
released the request a week earlier, on Aug. 28, and the language in
the e-mail closely tracked the request. Making the message appear
more credible still: It referred to upcoming Air Force communiquιs
and a "Teaming Meeting" to discuss the deal.
But
the missive from Moree to Jack Mulhern was a fake. An analysis of
the e-mail's path and attachment, conducted for BusinessWeek by
three cyber security specialists, shows it was sent by an unknown
attacker, bounced through an Internet address in
South
Korea
,
was relayed through a Yahoo! (YHOO) server in
New
York
,
and finally made its way toward Mulherns Booz Allen in-box. The
analysis also shows the code- known as malware, for malicious
software- tracks keystrokes on the computers of people who open it.
A separate program disables security measures such as password
protection on Microsoft (MSFT) Access database files, a program
often used by large organizations such as the
U.S.
defense industry to manage big batches of data.
AN
E-MAIL'S JOURNEY
While
hardly the most sophisticated technique used by electronic thieves
these days, "if you have any kind of sensitive documents on
Access databases, this code
is getting in there and getting them out," says a senior
executive at a leading cyber security firm that analyzed the e-mail.
(The person requested anonymity because his firm provides security
consulting to
U.S.
military departments, defense contractors, and financial
institutions.) Commercial computer security firms have dubbed the
malicious code "Poison Ivy."
But
the malware attached to the fake Air Force e-mail has a more
devious- and worrisome- capability. Known as a remote administration
tool, or RAT, it gives the attacker control over the
"host" PC, capturing screen shots and perusing files. It
lurks in the background of Microsoft Internet Explorer browsers
while users surf the Web. Then it phones home to its
"master" at an Internet address currently registered under
the name cybersyndrome.3322.org.
The
digital trail to cybersyndrome.3322.org, followed by analysts at
BusinessWeek's request, leads to one of
China
's
largest free domain-name-registration and e-mail services. Called
3322.org, it is registered to a company called Bentium in the city
of
Changzhou
,
an industry hub outside
Shanghai
.
A range of security experts say that 3322.org provides names for
computers and servers that act as the command and control centers
for more than 10,000 pieces of malicious code launched at government
and corporate networks in recent years. Many of those PCs are in
China
;
the rest could be anywhere.
The
founder of 3322.org, a 37-year-old technology entrepreneur named
Peng Yong, says his company merely allows users to register domain
names. "As for what our users do, we cannot completely control
it," says Peng. The bottom line: If Poison Ivy infected Jack
Mulhern's computer at Booz Allen, any secrets inside could be seen
in
China
.
And if it spread to other computers, as malware often does, the
infection opens windows on potentially sensitive information there,
too.
It's
not clear whether Mulhern received the e-mail, but the address was
accurate. Informed by BusinessWeek on Mar. 20 of the fake message,
Booz Allen spokesman George Farrar says the company launched a
search to find it. As of Apr. 9, says Farrar, the company had not
discovered the e-mail or Poison Ivy in Booz Allen's networks. Farrar
says Booz Allen computer security executives examined the PCs of
Mulhern and an assistant who received his e-mail. "We take this
very seriously," says Farrar. (Mulhern, who retired in March,
did not respond to e-mailed requests for comment and declined a
request, through Booz Allen, for an interview.)
Air
Force officials referred requests for comment to U.S. Defense
Secretary Robert M. Gates' office. In an e-mailed response to
BusinessWeek, Gates' office acknowledges being the target of cyber
attacks from "a variety of state and non-state-sponsored
organizations to gain unauthorized access to, or otherwise degrade, Defense
Dept.
information systems." But the Pentagon declined to discuss the
attempted Booz Allen break-in. The Air Force, meanwhile, would not
make Stephen Moree available for comment.
The
bogus e-mail, however, seemed to cause a stir inside the Air Force,
correspondence reviewed by BusinessWeek shows. On Sept. 4, defense
analyst James Mulvenon also received the message with Moree and
Mulhern's names on it. Security experts believe Mulvenon's e-mail
address was secretly included in the "blind copy" line of
a version of the message. Mulvenon is director of the Center for
Intelligence Research & Analysis and a leading consultant to
U.S.
defense and intelligence agencies on
China
's
military and cyber strategy. He maintains an Excel spreadsheet of
suspect e-mails, malicious code, and hacker groups and passes them
along to the authorities. Suspicious of the note when he received
it, Mulvenon replied to Moree the next day. Was the e-mail "
India
spam?" Mulvenon asked.
"I
apologizethis
e-mail was sent in errorplease
delete," Moree responded a few hours later.
"No
worries," typed Mulvenon. "I have been getting a lot of
trojaned Access databases from
China
lately and just wanted to make sure."
Interesting-
our network folks are looking into some kind of malicious intent
behind this e-mail snafu,wrote Moree. Neither the Air Force nor
the Defense Dept. would confirm to BusinessWeek whether an
investigation was conducted. A Pentagon spokesman says that its
procedure is to refer attacks to law enforcement or
counterintelligence agencies. He would not disclose which, if any,
is investigating the Air Force e-mail.
DIGITAL
INTRUDERS
By
itself, the bid to steal digital secrets from Booz Allen might be
deeply troubling. But Poison Ivy is part of a new type of digital
intruder rendering traditional defenses-firewalls and updated
antivirus softwear virtually useless. Sophisticated hackers, say
Pentagon officials, are developing new ways to creep into computer
networks sometimes before those vulnerabilities are known. "The
offense has a big advantage over the defense right now," says
Colonel Ward E. Heinke, director of the
Air
Force
Network
Operations
Center
at Barksdale Air Force Base. Only 11 of the top 34 antivirus
software programs identified Poison Ivy when it was first tested on
behalf of BusinessWeek in February. Malware-sniffing software from
several top security firms found "no virus" in the
India
fighter-jet e-mail, the analysis showed.
Over
the past two years thousands of highly customized e-mails akin to
Stephen Moree's have landed in the laptops and PCs of U.S.
government workers and defense contracting executives. According to
sources familiar with the matter, the attacks targeted sensitive
information on the networks of at least seven agencies- the Defense,
State, Energy, Commerce, Health & Human Services, Agriculture,
and Treasury departments- and also defense contractors Boeing (BA),
Lockheed Martin, General Electric (GE),
Raytheon
(RTW), and General Dynamics (GD), say current and former government
network security experts. Laura Keehner, a spokeswoman for the
Homeland Security Dept., which coordinates protection of government
computers, declined to comment on specific intrusions. In written
responses to questions from BusinessWeek, Keehner says: "We are
aware of and have defended against malicious cyber activity directed
at the U.S. Government over the past few years. We take these
threats seriously and continue to remain concerned that this
activity is growing more sophisticated, more targeted, and more
prevalent." Spokesmen for Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon,
General Dynamics, and General Electric declined to comment. Several
cited policies of not discussing security-related matters.
The
rash of computer infections is the subject of Byzantine Foothold,
the classified operation designed to root out the perpetrators and
protect systems in the future, according to three people familiar
with the matter. In some cases, the governments own cyber
security experts are engaged in hack backs - following the
malicious code to peer into the hackers' own computer systems.
BusinessWeek has learned that a classified document called an
intelligence community assessment, or
ICA
,
details the Byzantine intrusions and assigns each a unique
Byzantine-related name. The
ICA
has circulated in recent months among selected officials at
U.S.
intelligence agencies, the Pentagon, and cyber security consultants
acting as outside reviewers. Until December, details of the
ICA
's
contents had not even been shared with congressional intelligence
committees.
Now,
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman John D. Rockefeller (D-W.
Va.
)
is said to be discreetly informing fellow senators of the Byzantine
operation, in part to win their support for needed appropriations,
many of which are part of classified "black" budgets kept
off official government books. Rockefeller declined to comment. In
January a Senate Intelligence Committee staffer urged his boss,
Missouri Republican Christopher "Kit" Bond, the
committee's vice-chairman, to supplement closed-door testimony and
classified documents with a viewing of the movie Die Hard 4 on a
flight the senator made to
New
Zealand
.
In the film, cyber terrorists breach FBI networks, purloin financial
data, and bring car traffic to a halt in
Washington
.
Hollywood
,
says Bond, doesn't exaggerate as much as people might think. "I
can't discuss classified matters," he cautions. "But the
movie illustrates the potential impact of a cyber conflict. Except
for a few things, let me just tell you: It's credible."
"Phishing,"
one technique used in many attacks, allows cyber spies to steal
information by posing as a trustworthy entity in an online
communication. The term was coined in the mid-1990s when hackers
began "fishing" for information (and tweaked the
spelling). The e-mail attacks on government agencies and defense
contractors, called "spear-phish" because they target
specific individuals, are the Web version of laser-guided missiles.
Spear-phish creators gather information about people's jobs and
social networks, often from publicly available information and data
stolen from other infected computers, and then trick them into
opening an e-mail.
DEVIOUS
SCRIPT
Spear-phish
tap into a cyber espionage tactic that security experts call
"Net reconnaissance." In the attempted attack on Booz
Allen, attackers had plenty of information about Moree: his full
name, title (Northeast Asia Branch Chief), job responsibilities, and
e-mail address. Net reconnaissance can be surprisingly simple, often
starting with a Google (GOOG) search. (A lookup of the Air Force's
Pentagon e-mail address on Apr. 9, for instance, retrieved 8,680
e-mail addresses for current or former Air Force personnel and
departments.) The information is woven into a fake e-mail with a
link to an infected Web site or containing an attached document. All
attackers have to do is hit their send button. Once the e-mail is
opened, intruders are automatically ushered inside the walled
perimeter of computer networks- and malicious codes such as Poison
Ivy can take over.
By
mid-2007 analysts at the National Security Agency began to discern a
pattern: personalized e-mails with corrupted attachments such as
PowerPoint presentations, Word documents, and Access database files
had been turning up on computers connected to the networks of
numerous agencies and defense contractors.
A
previously undisclosed breach in the autumn of 2005 at the American
Enterprise Institutea
conservative think tank whose former officials and corporate
executive board members are closely connected to the Bush
Administrationproved
so nettlesome that the White House shut off aides' access to the Web
site for more than six months, says a cyber security specialist
familiar with the incident. The Defense Dept. shut the door for even
longer. Computer security investigators, one of whom spoke with
BusinessWeek, identified the culprit: a few lines of Java script
buried in AEI's home page, www.aei.org, that activated as soon as
someone visited the site. The script secretly redirected the user's
computer to another server that attempted to load malware. The
malware, in turn, sent information from the visitor's hard drive to
a server in
China
.
But the security specialist says cyber sleuths couldn't get rid of
the intruder.
After
each deletion, the furtive code would reappear. AEI says otherwiseexcept
for a brief accidental recurrence caused by its own network
personnel in August, 2007, the devious Java script did not return
and was not difficult to eradicate.
The
government has yet to disclose the breaches related to Byzantine
Foothold. BusinessWeek has learned that intruders managed to worm
into the State Dept.'s highly sensitive Bureau of Intelligence &
Research, a key channel between the work of intelligence agencies
and the rest of the government. The breach posed a risk to CIA
operatives in embassies around the globe, say several network
security specialists familiar with the effort to cope with what
became seen as an internal crisis. Teams worked around-the-clock in
search of malware, they say, calling the White House regularly with
updates.
The
attack began in May, 2006, when an unwitting employee in the State
Dept.'s East Asia Pacific region clicked on an attachment in a
seemingly authentic e-mail. Malicious code was embedded in the Word
document, a congressional speech, and opened a Trojan "back
door" for the code's creators to peer inside the State Dept.'s
innermost networks. Soon, cyber security engineers began spotting
more intrusions in State Dept. computers across the globe. The
malware took advantage of previously unknown vulnerabilities in the
Microsoft operating system. Unable to develop a patch quickly
enough, engineers watched helplessly as streams of State Dept. data
slipped through the back door and into the Internet ether. Although
they were unable to fix the vulnerability, specialists came up with
a temporary scheme to block further infections. They also yanked
connections to the Internet.
One
member of the emergency team summoned to the scene recalls that each
time cyber security professionals thought they had eliminated the
source of a "beacon" reporting back to its master, another
popped up. He compared the effort to the arcade game Whack-A-Mole.
The State Dept. says it eradicated the infection, but only after
sanitizing scores of infected computers and servers and changing
passwords. Microsoft's own patch, meanwhile, was not deployed until
August, 2006, three months after the infection. A Microsoft
spokeswoman declined to comment on the episode, but said:
"Microsoft has, for several years, taken a comprehensive
approach to help protect people online."
There
is little doubt among senior
U.S.
officials about where the trail of the recent wave of attacks leads.
"The Byzantine series tracks back to
China
,"
says Air Force Colonel Heinke. More than a dozen current and former
U.S.
military, cyber security, and intelligence officials interviewed by
BusinessWeek say
China
is the biggest emerging adversary- and not just clubs of rogue or
enterprising hackers who happen to be Chinese. O. Sami Saydjari, a
former National Security Agency executive and now president of
computer security firm Cyber Defense Agency, says the Chinese
People's Liberation Army, one of the world's largest military
forces, with an annual budget of $57 billion, has "tens of
thousands" of trainees launching attacks on U.S. computer
networks. Those figures could not be independently confirmed by
BusinessWeek. Other experts provide lower estimates and note that
even one hacker can do a lot of damage. Says Saydjari: "We have
to look at this as equivalent to the launch of a Chinese
Sputnik."
China
vigorously disputes the spying allegation and says its military
posture is purely defensive.
Hints
of the perils perceived within
America
's
corridors of power have been slipping out in recent months. In Feb.
27 testimony before the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee,
National Intelligence Director McConnell echoed the view that the
threat comes from
China
.
He told Congress he worries less about people capturing information
than altering it. "If someone has the ability to enter
information in systems, they can destroy data. And the destroyed
data could be something like money supply, electric-power
distribution, transportation sequencing, and that sort of
thing." His conclusion: "The federal government is not
well-protected and the private sector is not well-protected."
Worries
about China-sponsored Internet attacks spread last year to
Germany
,
France
,
and
Britain
.
British domestic intelligence agency MI5 had seen enough evidence of
intrusion and theft of corporate secrets by allegedly
state-sponsored Chinese hackers by November, 2007, that the agency's
director general, Jonathan Evans, sent an unusual letter of warning
to 300 corporations, accounting firms, and law firms- and a list of
network security specialists to help block computer intrusions. Some
recipients of the MI5 letter hired Peter Yapp, a leading security
consultant with London-based Control Risks. "People treat this
like it's just another hacker story, and it is almost
unbelievable," says Yapp. "There's a James Bond element to
it. Too many people think, It's not going to happen to me.' But it
has."
Identifying
the thieves slipping their malware through the digital gates can be
tricky. Some computer security specialists doubt
China
's
government is involved in cyber attacks on
U.S.
defense targets. Peter Sommer, an information systems security
specialist at the London School of Economics who helps companies
secure networks, says: "I suspect if it's an official part of
the Chinese government, you wouldn't be spotting it."
A
range of attacks in the past two years on U.S. and foreign
government entities, defense contractors, and corporate networks
have been traced to Internet addresses registered through Chinese
domain name services such as 3322.org, run by Peng Yong. In late
March, BusinessWeek interviewed Peng in an apartment on the 14th
floor of the gray-tiled residential building that houses the
five-person office for 3322.org in
Changzhou
.
Peng says he started 3322.org in 2001 with $14,000 of his own money
so the growing ranks of
China
's
Net surfers could register Web sites and distribute data. "We
felt that this business would be very popular, especially as
broadband, fiber-optic cables, data
transmission technology
ADSL, these ways of getting on the Internet took off," says
Peng (translated by BusinessWeek from Mandarin), who drives a black
Lexus IS300 bought last year.
His
3322.org has indeed become a hit. Peng says the service has
registered more than 1 million domain names, charging $14 per year
for "top-level" names ending in .com, .org, or .net. But
cyber security experts and the Homeland Security Dept.'s U.S.
Computer Emergency Readiness Team (CERT) say that 3322.org is a hit
with another group: hackers. That's because 3322.org and five sister
sites controlled by Peng are dynamic DNS providers. Like an Internet
phone book, dynamic DNS assigns names for the digits that mark a
computer's location on the Web. For example, 3322.org is the
registrar for the name cybersyndrome.3322.org at Internet address
61.234.4.28, the China-based computer that was contacted by the
malicious code in the attempted Booz Allen attack, according to
analyses reviewed by BusinessWeek. "Hackers started using sites
like 3322.org so that the malware phones home to the specific name.
The reason? It is relatively difficult to have Internet
addresses
taken down in
China
,"
says Maarten van Horenbeeck, a Belgium-based intrusion analyst for
the SANS Internet Storm Center, a cyber threat monitoring group.
TARGET:
PRIVATE SECTOR
Peng's
3322.org and sister sites have become a source of concern to the
U.S.
government and private firms. Cyber security firm Team Cymru sent a
confidential report, reviewed by BusinessWeek, to clients on Mar. 7
that illustrates how 3322.org has enabled many recent attacks. In
early March, the report says, Team Cymru received "a spoofed
e-mail message from a
U.S.
military entity, and the PowerPoint attachment had a malware widget
embedded in it." The e-mail was a spear-phish. The computer
that controlled the malicious code in the PowerPoint? Cybersyndrome
,3322.org- the same China-registered computer in the attempted
attack on Booz Allen. Although the cybersyndrome Internet address
may not be located in
China
,
the top five computers communicating directly with it were- and four
were registered with a large state-owned Internet service provider,
according to the report.
A
person familiar with Team Cymru's research says the company has
10,710 distinct malware samples that communicate to masters
registered through 3322.org. Other groups reporting attacks from
computers hosted by 3322.org include activist group Students for a
Free Tibet, the European Parliament, and U.S. Bancorp (USB),
according to security reports. Team Cymru declined to comment. The
U.S.
government has pinpointed Peng's services as a problem, too. In a
Nov.
28, 2007
,
confidential report from Homeland Security's U.S. CERT obtained by
BusinessWeek,
"Cyber
Incidents Suspected of Impacting Private Sector Networks," the
federal cyber watchdog warned
U.S.
corporate information technology staff to update security software
to block Internet traffic from a dozen Web addresses after spear-phishing
attacks. "The level of sophistication and scope of these cyber
security incidents indicates they are coordinated and targeted at
private-sector systems," says the report. Among the sites
named: Peng's 3322.org, as well as his 8800.org, 9966.org, and
8866.org. Homeland Security and U.S. CERT declined to discuss the
report.
Peng
says he has no idea hackers are using his service to send and
control malicious code. "Are there a lot?" he says when
asked why so many hackers use 3322.org. He says his business is not
responsible for cyber attacks on
U.S.
computers. "It's like we have paved a road and what sort of car
users
drive on it is their own business," says Peng, who adds that he
spends most of his time these days developing Internet telephony for
his new software firm, Bitcomm Software Tech Co. Peng says he was
not aware that several of his Web sites and Internet addresses
registered through them were named in the U.S. CERT report. On Apr.
7, he said he planned to shut the sites down and contact the
U.S.
agency. Asked by BusinessWeek to check his database for the person
who registered the computer at the domain name
cybersyndrome.3322.org, Peng says it is registered to Gansu Railway
Communications, a regional telecom subsidiary of
China
's
Railways Ministry. Peng declined to provide the name of the
registrant, citing a confidentiality agreement. "You can go
through the police to find out the user information," says Peng.
U.S.
cyber security experts say it's doubtful that the Chinese government
would allow the high volume of attacks on
U.S.
entities from China-based computers if it didn't want them to
happen. "
China
has one of the best-controlled Internets in the world. Anything that
happens on their Internet requires permission," says Cyber
Defense Group's Saydjari. The Chinese government spokesman declined
to answer specific questions from BusinessWeek about 3322.org.
But
Peng says he can do little if hackers exploit his goodwill- and
there hasnt been much incentive from the Chinese government for
him to get tough. "Normally, we take care of these problems by
shutting them down," says Peng. "Because our laws do not
have an extremely clear method to handle this problem, sometimes we
are helpless to stop their services." And so, it seems thus
far, is the
U.S.
government.
Grow
is a correspondent in BusinessWeek's
Atlanta
bureau . Epstein is a correspondent in BusinessWeek's
Washington
bureau. Tschang is a correspondent in BusinessWeek's
Beijing
bureau.
US
candidates ride the
China
bogey
April 12, 2008
by
Dmitry Shlapentokh
Asia
Times
In
the recent in the speeches of some candidates in the
United States
presidential campaign,
China
emerged in a way almost as the
replacement of the
USSR
of the old days.
It
became the dreadful "evil empire", the major enemy of the
US
in the long run. Still, there is
a difference. While the
USSR
had threatened the
US
with its missiles,
China
poses a threat by its huge
reserves of US dollars.
Elaborating
on this threat, Senator Hillary Clinton provided a scenario in which
China
could hamper the
US
's foreign policy. She presented
the hypothetical picture of
China
invading
Taiwan
and the
US
contemplating moving its fleet to
protect the island. Atthe same time,
China
would threaten to dump its huge
holdings of US dollars and thereby wreck the
US
economy. And this,
Clinton
stated, might, indeed, prevent
the
US
from acting as it should.
Clinton
was not wrong, not just in
elaborating on a possible scenario but in another important aspect:
in the present world, economic power - in the case of
China
, a huge currency reserve could
indeed be used as a direct weapon. And
Clinton
's call to stop this situation is
pretty much justifiable. However, the point is that she provided no
concrete plan on how to do this. She provided no plan on how the
US
would end the flow of dollars
abroad and no plan on how the dollars already in the hands of
foreign powers could be brought back to the
US
without damaging the American
economy.
The
continuing
US
trade deficit with
China
is one of the major reasons for
the continuous flow of dollars out of the country; and here the
inefficiency of the
US
economy is a key. These
statements could well be challenged; and those who point to the low
cost of Chinese goods vis a vis
US
goods usually underscore the
lower cost of Chinese labor.
This
argument does not hold, and some historical examples could well
illustrate this point. Nineteenth-century British workers definitely
did not live well. Still, the wages of Indian workers were much
lower than in
UK
and the cost of shipping cloth to
India
by sailing ships was expensive
and time-consuming. Yet, as Marx stated, the plains of
India
"became white with the bones
of the starving Indian weavers" who could not compete with
British goods. If the situation with US goods is different than it
was for the British, it is not because of the cheapness of Chinese
labor but because of the basic inefficiency of the
US
s social and economic
arrangements. There are a variety of manifestations of this
inefficiency.
Of
prime significance are the layers of often absolutely useless but
lavishly paid bureaucracy that are often seen as the way of
"improvement". Their stress is on advertising, on the way
to sell things - from goods to education - not on actually improving
the products. In fact advertising, financial speculation and similar
activities themselves become not just a "product" but the
major "products" of the US economy, duly recorded by
statistics that for years have boasted about the "high"
economic growth of the US. This was already the case during Bill
Clinton's presidency, the golden era to which Hillary Clinton
appeals.
It
is the arrangement of insurance companies, doctors and the drug
industry that makes the American medical service not just of dubious
quality but extremely expensive. It is also the arrangement of
US
education, in particular of
higher education, where the escalating cost has not led to visible
improvement in teaching and research; in fact, quite a few Americans
receive payment for supposed research without publishing for years.
All
of these arrangements make US goods and services (such as education)
not just extremely expensive but of dubious quality. The recent
purchase of planes by the US Department of Defense, not from Boeing
but from a European firm, is telling. The Pentagon clearly
understands that giving preference to foreign firms for the major
purchase of high-tech equipment would lead to public outcry and that
the dollar-euro ratio would make the purchase prohibitively
expensive.
Still,
the purchase was made, indicating that overall quality is so high
that it overrode all other considerations. It is inconceivable to
assume that with such a low quality of overall products and their
high cost, the
US
could avoid trade difficulties
and increasing reliance on foreign loans.
Moreover,
the
US
could hardly induce foreign
governments to reduce their holdings of
US
currency without much damage to
US dollars. Indeed, even if the
US
would reduce its borrowing, it
still would be influenced by huge numbers of dollars in the hands of
foreign governments, so called "sovereign funds".
To
start with, the
US
needs to induce the foreign
holders of dollars to buy US products. Buying US products would keep
the value of the dollar higher and would prevent foreign buyers from
accumulating too much
US
currency. Still, the
US
usually could offer little to
foreign buyers, outside of a few strategically important
US
corporations or companies still
attractive to
China
- the major holder of US dollars
- and other non-friendly governments. Yet the
US
government makes it hard for
China
to buy them.
The
logic here is simple: control over the major "command
highs" of the American economy would increasingly lead to
economic and then political control over the
US
by foreign entities. In fact, in
the past, the
US
and other Western powers did
precisely that in the
Third World
: control formally independent
governments through control over the nation's economy. This was
often called "neo-colonialism".
The
US
still could extricate itself from
a "neo-colonialist" or decaying scenario; but this would
require such a dramatic intervention of the state in its social and
economic fabric that it would entail something similar to the
"New Deal", which, at close inspection, is quite similar
to what was done in Nazi Germany or fascist
Italy
.
This
alternative hardly pleases the majority of the
US
electorate. And this is the
reason why both Clinton and Barack Obama, with all of their
rhetoric, avoid naming the problems - the inefficiency of the entire
system and the structural similarities in the economic performance
of all segments of society - and pointing to tough medicine. They
still, as
Clinton
's speech so indicated, prefer to
talk tough but be "quite responsible" in action. Until, of
course, the acute economic and social pain will compel the leader -
whoever he or she may be or what philosophy he or she would preach -
to walk the walk.
Dmitry
Shlapentokh, PhD, is associate professor of history, College of
Liberal Arts and Sciences,
Indiana
University
South Bend
. He is author of
East Against West: The First Encounter - The Life of Themistocles, 2005.
Tibet
Chinese
president says
Tibet
not human rights
issue
April
12, 2008
AFP
BOAO,
China (AFP) - - Chinese President Hu Jintao Saturday defended the
Tibet crackdown and said the problem was a separatist issue and not
related to human rights.
"Our conflict with the Dalai clique is
not an ethnic problem, not a religious problem, nor a human rights
problem," Hu told visiting Australian Prime Minister Kevin
Rudd, according to Xinhua news agency.
"It is a problem either to safeguard
national unification or to split the motherland," Hu said.
Hu was speaking after a clampdown on
protests which began last month left about 150 people dead,
according to exiled to Tibetan leaders.
China
says Tibetan "rioters" killed 18 civilians and two
policemen.
"No responsible government will sit
idle for such crimes, which gravely encroach human rights, gravely
disrupt social order and gravely jeopardize the life and property
security of the masses," Hu said.
The rare unrest has thrown an unwelcome
spotlight on
China
ahead of this year's Beijing Olympics with protesters disrupting the
European and US legs of the ceremonial torch relay this week.
China
's communist rulers vehemently deny they are responsible for
religious and cultural repression in
Tibet
, and insist their control of the remote region has benefited its
devoutly Buddhist people.
Dont Know Much About Tibetan History?
April 13,
2008
by
Elliot Sperling
New
York Times
For
many Tibetans, the case for the historical independence of their
land is unequivocal. They assert that
Tibet
has always been and by
rights now ought to be an independent country.
China
s
assertions are equally unequivocal:
Tibet
became a part of
China
during Mongol rule and its
status as a part of
China
has never changed. Both of
these assertions are at odds with
Tibet
s
history.
The
Tibetan view holds that
Tibet
was never subject to
foreign rule after it emerged in the mid-seventh century as a
dynamic power holding sway over an Inner Asian empire. These
Tibetans say the appearance of subjugation to the Mongol rulers of
the Yuan Dynasty in the 13th and 14th centuries, and to the Manchu
rulers of Chinas
Qing Dynasty from the 18th century until the 20th century, is due to
a modern, largely Western misunderstanding of the personal relations
among the Yuan and Qing emperors and the pre-eminent lamas of Tibet.
In this view, the lamas simply served as spiritual mentors to the
emperors, with no compromise of
Tibet
s
independent status.
In
China
s
view, the Western misunderstandings are about the nature of
China
: Western critics dont
understand that
China
has a history of thousands
of years as a unified multinational state; all of its nationalities
are Chinese. The Mongols, who entered
China
as conquerers, are claimed
as Chinese, and their subjugation of
Tibet
is claimed as a Chinese
subjugation.
Here
are the facts. The claim that
Tibet
entertained only personal
relations with
China
at the leadership level is
easily rebutted. Administrative records and dynastic histories
outline the governing structures of Mongol and Manchu rule. These
make it clear that
Tibet
was subject to rules, laws
and decisions made by the Yuan and Qing rulers.
Tibet
was not independent during
these two periods. One of the Tibetan cabinet ministers summoned to
Beijing
at the end of the 18th
century describes himself unambiguously in his memoirs as a subject
of the Manchu emperor.
But
although
Tibet
did submit to the Mongol
and Manchu Empires, neither attached
Tibet
to
China
. The same documentary
record that shows Tibetan subjugation to the Mongols and Manchus
also shows that
China
s
intervening Ming Dynasty (which ruled from 1368 to 1644) had no
control over
Tibet
. This is problematic,
given
China
s
insistence that Chinese sovereignty was exercised in an unbroken
line from the 13th century onward.
The
idea that
Tibet
became part of
China
in the 13th century is a
very recent construction. In the early part of the 20th century,
Chinese writers generally dated the annexation of
Tibet
to the 18th century. They
described
Tibet
s
status under the Qing with a term that designates a feudal
dependency,
not an integral part of a country. And thats
because
Tibet
was ruled as such, within
the empires of the Mongols and the Manchus. When the Qing dynasty
collapsed in 1911,
Tibet
became independent once
more.
From
1912 until the founding of the Peoples
Republic of
China
in 1949, no Chinese
government exercised control over what is today
China
s
Tibet Autonomous Region. The Dalai Lamas
government alone ruled the land until 1951.
Marxist
China adopted the linguistic sleight of hand that asserts it has
always been a unitary multinational country, not the hub of empires.
There is now firm insistence that Han,
actually one of several ethnonyms for Chinese,
refers to only one of the Chinese nationalities. This was a
conscious decision of those who constructed 20th-century Chinese
identity. (It stands in contrast to the Russian decision to use a
political term, Soviet,
for the peoples of the
Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics
.)
There
is something less to the arguments of both sides, but the argument
on the Chinese side is weaker.
Tibet
was not Chinese
until Mao Zedongs
armies marched in and made it so.
Elliot
Sperling is the director of the Tibetan Studies program at
Indiana
University
s
department of
Central Eurasia
Studies.
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