Saturday, July 04, 2009
4th of July Reflection by Mark Twain
"You see, my kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to institutions or its officeholders. The country is the real thing; it is the thing to watch over and care for and be loyal to; institutions extraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out, become ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body from winter, disease, and death. To be loyal to rags, to shout for rags, to worship rags, to die for rags--that is a loyalty of unreason ...."
Honduras and the Bolivarian Revolution by Douglas Farah
Once again an outside power is meddling in the internal affairs of a small, poor Central American country and threatening military action if its preferred candidate is not restored to office. The irony is that it is not Uncle Sam interfering in Honduras-which has happened often enough-but Venezuela's Hugo Chávez, who has made a career of railing against foreign intervention. Chávez's belligerent threats of military action to restore his ally, ousted president Manuel Zelaya, to power are supported by Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega, Bolivia's Evo Morales and the Castro brothers in Cuba.
The leaders, as part of Chávez's oil-fueled regional "Bolivarian revolution," have twisted their constitutions like pretzels, run roughshod over due process, worked to silence the press, concentrated power in their own hands, and fomented violence against the legal political opposition. In addition to their current autocratic and anti-democratic governing styles, Ortega led a violent, successful revolution and Chávez led an unsuccessful military coup attempt, making their outrage over a constitutional maneuver, no matter how questionable, ring hollow.
What is more disturbing is the growing ties between the Bolivarian revolutionary states and armed groups in Latin America and across the world, their open embrace of Iran, and the teaching of terrorist methodologies pioneered by radical Islamists as official military doctrine. The sole point of convergence between the Iranian theocracy and the secular Bolivarian populists is a deep hatred for the United States and liberal democracy. Zelaya, hooked on subsidized Venezuelan oil, was following the same autocratic and anti-democratic path pioneered by Chávez and joining an alliance that has strangled democratic development wherever the Bolivarian revolution has taken root.
Zelaya's ouster is the first clear sign that there will be a reaction against the abuses and excesses of the Bolivarian model of radical populism, megalomania and violence, often called "popular democracy" and described as 21st Century socialism. The concern of Chávez and his allies have for Zelaya has much more to do with a fear that the reaction against them will grow than it does with any commitment to democracy. A successful removal of Zelaya could be a model for their own demise.
Make no mistake. Giving the military a leading role in a political drama in Honduras may be akin to giving a pyromaniac matches and can of kerosene. It can end badly. I covered Honduras for 20 years and reported extensively both on the military's egregious human rights abuses and voracious economic appetite that sucked the national coffers dry, although the troops have stayed in the barracks for more than two decades.
But look at the alternatives. Zelaya was illegally attempting the same political move successfully executed by Chávez and Morales-a constitutional change that would allow him to stay in power indefinitely-always among the first actions of the Bolivarian leaders. The nation's supreme court ruled that his attempted referendum was unconstitutional. His party broke with him, his attorney general said it was illegal and the army refused to cooperate in light of the court ruling. Yet Zelaya proceeded, after leading a crowd to burn an army installation in protest of the institution's failure to defy the supreme court decision. He was flown into exile at gunpoint and replaced by Roberto Micheletti, of his own party and head of the National Assembly. Micheletti promises to hold scheduled presidential elections this year and not be a candidate. Time will tell.
The Honduras situation leaves the United States with difficult options. How the Obama administration handles this challenge against a government that was in the process of breaching the constitutional order will have powerful repercussions across Latin America. Similar challenges could appear in Bolivia, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Ecuador as the Bolivarian governments move to consolidate their hold on power and meet resistance.
It is tempting to see the restoration of Zelaya as the democratic imperative, and most of the international community is pressing for this outcome, while not endorsing Chávez's threats of violence. The Organization of American States is set to impose a series of crippling economic sanctions if Zelaya is not allowed to return in some form. But it is worth looking further at the implications of the Boliviarian revolution writ large.
It has been almost two decades since the democratic processes began in Central America, and a few years more since South America moved from military dictatorships and coups to liberal democracies with imperfect but improving institutional processes, transparency and freedoms. I lived in Latin America during civil wars and the difficult transition from decades of brutal authoritarian regimes to the fragile democratic structures, built through sweat and blood.
These still-fragile democracies are now in danger of being choked by the new radical populism, fueled by oil money, deep disillusionment with the corruption and mismanagement of the traditional political classes and exclusion based on race and class. The need for deep reform certainly exists. But Chávez's model is not the solution.
Reasons for deep concern about the spread of the Bolivarian revolution are far deeper than simple ideological disputes, and Zelaya's actions are only one piece of a wider pattern. The threat of Chávez and his allies goes to the heart of the region's democratic processes and institutionality. While the moves against civil society and institutions have been amply documented, the contours of the broader threat of the Bolivarian alliance and its ties to radical Islamist regimes, particularly Iran, are now clearer.
Venezuela has adopted an official military doctrine that is based on strategies Hezbollah and other radical Islamist groups are already practicing, and one embraced to a significant degree by Iran, the primary state sponsor of those groups. The embrace of this doctrine provides an important link in understanding the ties of Venezuela and its allies to Iran.
Since 2005 Chávez has rewritten Venezuela's security doctrine, replacing "imperialist" influences with a doctrine centered on asymmetrical warfare, in the belief that the primary threat to Venezuelan and Latin American security is a U.S. invasion. This doctrine is being taught by Venezuelan instructors to the militaries of Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Honduras.
One of the main books Chávez has adopted is Peripheral Warfare and Revolutionary Islam: Origins, Rules and Ethics of Asymmetrical Warfare by the Spanish politician Jorge Verstrynge. Although he is not a Muslim Verstrynge's book lauds radical Islam (as well as past terrorists like Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as Carlos the Jackal) for expanding the parameters of what irregular warfare can encompass, including the use of biological and nuclear weapons. He is particularly taken with suicide bombers, whom he praises for their willingness to die for the cause. Verstrynge has lauded Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda for creating a new type of warfare that is "de-territorialized, de-stateized and de-nationalized," a war where suicide bombers act as "atomic bombs for the poor."
Chávez invited Verstrynge to give keynote address to military leaders in a 2005 conference and ordered a special pocket size edition of the book to be printed up and distributed throughout the officer corps, to be studied cover to cover.
The fascination with asymmetrical warfare may explain why Chávez and other members of the Bolivarian axis maintain close ties to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a designated terrorist and drug trafficking organization by both the United States and the European Union. Chávez personally requested that the FARC train Venezuelan military and militias in guerrilla warfare in case of a U.S. invasion.
These actions are part of why many who viewed the Bolivarian revolutions in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Honduras with hope are now turning away in disillusionment. With more and more avenues of legitimate protest, dissent and political change cut off, there few options to return to the values so many fought for in decades past-freedom of speech, the rule of law, unfettered media, a separation of powers and chance to replace poor governments with better ones in regularly scheduled elections. Zelaya's removal was evokes old school methods and appears to be ill-considered. But the Obama administration needs to weigh the bigger picture before handing Chávez and his allies an easy victory by backing Zelaya under the illusion that such a move will bring advance democracy in Honduras or Latin America.
The leaders, as part of Chávez's oil-fueled regional "Bolivarian revolution," have twisted their constitutions like pretzels, run roughshod over due process, worked to silence the press, concentrated power in their own hands, and fomented violence against the legal political opposition. In addition to their current autocratic and anti-democratic governing styles, Ortega led a violent, successful revolution and Chávez led an unsuccessful military coup attempt, making their outrage over a constitutional maneuver, no matter how questionable, ring hollow.
What is more disturbing is the growing ties between the Bolivarian revolutionary states and armed groups in Latin America and across the world, their open embrace of Iran, and the teaching of terrorist methodologies pioneered by radical Islamists as official military doctrine. The sole point of convergence between the Iranian theocracy and the secular Bolivarian populists is a deep hatred for the United States and liberal democracy. Zelaya, hooked on subsidized Venezuelan oil, was following the same autocratic and anti-democratic path pioneered by Chávez and joining an alliance that has strangled democratic development wherever the Bolivarian revolution has taken root.
Zelaya's ouster is the first clear sign that there will be a reaction against the abuses and excesses of the Bolivarian model of radical populism, megalomania and violence, often called "popular democracy" and described as 21st Century socialism. The concern of Chávez and his allies have for Zelaya has much more to do with a fear that the reaction against them will grow than it does with any commitment to democracy. A successful removal of Zelaya could be a model for their own demise.
Make no mistake. Giving the military a leading role in a political drama in Honduras may be akin to giving a pyromaniac matches and can of kerosene. It can end badly. I covered Honduras for 20 years and reported extensively both on the military's egregious human rights abuses and voracious economic appetite that sucked the national coffers dry, although the troops have stayed in the barracks for more than two decades.
But look at the alternatives. Zelaya was illegally attempting the same political move successfully executed by Chávez and Morales-a constitutional change that would allow him to stay in power indefinitely-always among the first actions of the Bolivarian leaders. The nation's supreme court ruled that his attempted referendum was unconstitutional. His party broke with him, his attorney general said it was illegal and the army refused to cooperate in light of the court ruling. Yet Zelaya proceeded, after leading a crowd to burn an army installation in protest of the institution's failure to defy the supreme court decision. He was flown into exile at gunpoint and replaced by Roberto Micheletti, of his own party and head of the National Assembly. Micheletti promises to hold scheduled presidential elections this year and not be a candidate. Time will tell.
The Honduras situation leaves the United States with difficult options. How the Obama administration handles this challenge against a government that was in the process of breaching the constitutional order will have powerful repercussions across Latin America. Similar challenges could appear in Bolivia, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Ecuador as the Bolivarian governments move to consolidate their hold on power and meet resistance.
It is tempting to see the restoration of Zelaya as the democratic imperative, and most of the international community is pressing for this outcome, while not endorsing Chávez's threats of violence. The Organization of American States is set to impose a series of crippling economic sanctions if Zelaya is not allowed to return in some form. But it is worth looking further at the implications of the Boliviarian revolution writ large.
It has been almost two decades since the democratic processes began in Central America, and a few years more since South America moved from military dictatorships and coups to liberal democracies with imperfect but improving institutional processes, transparency and freedoms. I lived in Latin America during civil wars and the difficult transition from decades of brutal authoritarian regimes to the fragile democratic structures, built through sweat and blood.
These still-fragile democracies are now in danger of being choked by the new radical populism, fueled by oil money, deep disillusionment with the corruption and mismanagement of the traditional political classes and exclusion based on race and class. The need for deep reform certainly exists. But Chávez's model is not the solution.
Reasons for deep concern about the spread of the Bolivarian revolution are far deeper than simple ideological disputes, and Zelaya's actions are only one piece of a wider pattern. The threat of Chávez and his allies goes to the heart of the region's democratic processes and institutionality. While the moves against civil society and institutions have been amply documented, the contours of the broader threat of the Bolivarian alliance and its ties to radical Islamist regimes, particularly Iran, are now clearer.
Venezuela has adopted an official military doctrine that is based on strategies Hezbollah and other radical Islamist groups are already practicing, and one embraced to a significant degree by Iran, the primary state sponsor of those groups. The embrace of this doctrine provides an important link in understanding the ties of Venezuela and its allies to Iran.
Since 2005 Chávez has rewritten Venezuela's security doctrine, replacing "imperialist" influences with a doctrine centered on asymmetrical warfare, in the belief that the primary threat to Venezuelan and Latin American security is a U.S. invasion. This doctrine is being taught by Venezuelan instructors to the militaries of Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Honduras.
One of the main books Chávez has adopted is Peripheral Warfare and Revolutionary Islam: Origins, Rules and Ethics of Asymmetrical Warfare by the Spanish politician Jorge Verstrynge. Although he is not a Muslim Verstrynge's book lauds radical Islam (as well as past terrorists like Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as Carlos the Jackal) for expanding the parameters of what irregular warfare can encompass, including the use of biological and nuclear weapons. He is particularly taken with suicide bombers, whom he praises for their willingness to die for the cause. Verstrynge has lauded Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda for creating a new type of warfare that is "de-territorialized, de-stateized and de-nationalized," a war where suicide bombers act as "atomic bombs for the poor."
Chávez invited Verstrynge to give keynote address to military leaders in a 2005 conference and ordered a special pocket size edition of the book to be printed up and distributed throughout the officer corps, to be studied cover to cover.
The fascination with asymmetrical warfare may explain why Chávez and other members of the Bolivarian axis maintain close ties to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a designated terrorist and drug trafficking organization by both the United States and the European Union. Chávez personally requested that the FARC train Venezuelan military and militias in guerrilla warfare in case of a U.S. invasion.
These actions are part of why many who viewed the Bolivarian revolutions in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Honduras with hope are now turning away in disillusionment. With more and more avenues of legitimate protest, dissent and political change cut off, there few options to return to the values so many fought for in decades past-freedom of speech, the rule of law, unfettered media, a separation of powers and chance to replace poor governments with better ones in regularly scheduled elections. Zelaya's removal was evokes old school methods and appears to be ill-considered. But the Obama administration needs to weigh the bigger picture before handing Chávez and his allies an easy victory by backing Zelaya under the illusion that such a move will bring advance democracy in Honduras or Latin America.
Afghanistan Hopes to Gain Control of More of its Territory Before August Elections by Ben Arnoldy
With national elections less than two months away, the Afghan government is hoping to bring more areas under its control with the help of a new US-led military campaign.
The Taliban, who hold sway over large swaths of the country, could disrupt turnout among voters, calling into further question the legitimacy of an election already dogged by registration irregularities and a fractured opposition.
"In order to increase the legitimacy of the election it is [crucial] to allow people to open voting booths in every district of Afghanistan, and in Helmand most are under the control of the Taliban," says Kabul-based analyst Haroun Mir.
Nearly 4,000 US Marines and 650 Afghan troops poured into Helmand Province Tuesday in an attempt to take back the Taliban stronghold. (To read more about the offensive, click here.)
But simply securing control over every district won't solve all the problems swirling around the August 20 vote for president and provincial councils, analysts caution.
Voter enthusiasm has weakened after opposition candidates failed to form a strong alliance to challenge incumbent President Hamid Karzai, says Mr. Mir. He also notes that securing more voting stations in Helmand will probably further benefit Mr. Karzai, given the ethnic and tribal ties he has there.
And voters deciding whether to head to the polls will not only be weighing their personal safety, but the legitimacy of the government itself, says Nick Grono, an Afghanistan expert with the International Crisis Group (ICG) in Brussels.
Democracy's green shoots?
Some analysts see positive glimmers in the voter registration results. Some 4 million Afghans added their names to the voting rolls in a voter registration drive that began last year, far exceeding expectations given the deteriorating security situation.
"It does give some hope," says Col. Christopher Langton, a retired British Army officer and Afghanistan expert. "But one has to balance that by saying registration isn't voting."
Registrars went out to people to help them sign up; voting requires people to go somewhere on their own, says Colonel Langton.
Also tempering optimism about the registration: In some provinces, registration tallies exceed the recorded population. In a report last month, the ICG called on the election commission to perform extra audits in areas showing registration irregularities, as well as in regions too insecure for independent election observers.
"There are indicators that these elections will be problematic, and security will be an issue that will effect everything from turnout to just the legitimacy of the process," says Mr. Grono.
NATO's strategy for providing election security doesn't differ much from the last presidential election in 2005, says Langton. The focus will be on securing routes for people to get to the polls, as well as beefing up security around the polling stations themselves. "It's going to be very manpower intensive," he says.
The numbers of capable Afghan security forces to help in this process are lagging, notes the ICG report. Estimates for actual police on the ground range from 35,000 to 55,000, and "police actions have failed to gain citizens' trust and have even actively undermined support for the administration because of the abuse of authority," the report reads.
Start of the surge
US President Barack Obama has ordered an additional 21,000 forces to Afghanistan to provide better security for the population and training for the local military and police. Today's operation marks the first large-scale use of the additional US manpower.
Showing that the US can take and hold some of the districts lost to the Taliban will help. The United Nations Assistance Mission to Afghanistan estimated in December that the government had no control of 10 districts out of 398 total and had problems accessing another 165. Mir puts the number of lost districts at 34.
"If [NATO] can secure areas in another 20 districts for the credibility of the election, it will be good," Mir says. More secure districts mean more districts with independent monitors. "Some of the candidates will come out and accuse the winner of fraud," he says. "But this is Afghanistan. You cannot control and monitor 100 percent."
The Taliban, who hold sway over large swaths of the country, could disrupt turnout among voters, calling into further question the legitimacy of an election already dogged by registration irregularities and a fractured opposition.
"In order to increase the legitimacy of the election it is [crucial] to allow people to open voting booths in every district of Afghanistan, and in Helmand most are under the control of the Taliban," says Kabul-based analyst Haroun Mir.
Nearly 4,000 US Marines and 650 Afghan troops poured into Helmand Province Tuesday in an attempt to take back the Taliban stronghold. (To read more about the offensive, click here.)
But simply securing control over every district won't solve all the problems swirling around the August 20 vote for president and provincial councils, analysts caution.
Voter enthusiasm has weakened after opposition candidates failed to form a strong alliance to challenge incumbent President Hamid Karzai, says Mr. Mir. He also notes that securing more voting stations in Helmand will probably further benefit Mr. Karzai, given the ethnic and tribal ties he has there.
And voters deciding whether to head to the polls will not only be weighing their personal safety, but the legitimacy of the government itself, says Nick Grono, an Afghanistan expert with the International Crisis Group (ICG) in Brussels.
Democracy's green shoots?
Some analysts see positive glimmers in the voter registration results. Some 4 million Afghans added their names to the voting rolls in a voter registration drive that began last year, far exceeding expectations given the deteriorating security situation.
"It does give some hope," says Col. Christopher Langton, a retired British Army officer and Afghanistan expert. "But one has to balance that by saying registration isn't voting."
Registrars went out to people to help them sign up; voting requires people to go somewhere on their own, says Colonel Langton.
Also tempering optimism about the registration: In some provinces, registration tallies exceed the recorded population. In a report last month, the ICG called on the election commission to perform extra audits in areas showing registration irregularities, as well as in regions too insecure for independent election observers.
"There are indicators that these elections will be problematic, and security will be an issue that will effect everything from turnout to just the legitimacy of the process," says Mr. Grono.
NATO's strategy for providing election security doesn't differ much from the last presidential election in 2005, says Langton. The focus will be on securing routes for people to get to the polls, as well as beefing up security around the polling stations themselves. "It's going to be very manpower intensive," he says.
The numbers of capable Afghan security forces to help in this process are lagging, notes the ICG report. Estimates for actual police on the ground range from 35,000 to 55,000, and "police actions have failed to gain citizens' trust and have even actively undermined support for the administration because of the abuse of authority," the report reads.
Start of the surge
US President Barack Obama has ordered an additional 21,000 forces to Afghanistan to provide better security for the population and training for the local military and police. Today's operation marks the first large-scale use of the additional US manpower.
Showing that the US can take and hold some of the districts lost to the Taliban will help. The United Nations Assistance Mission to Afghanistan estimated in December that the government had no control of 10 districts out of 398 total and had problems accessing another 165. Mir puts the number of lost districts at 34.
"If [NATO] can secure areas in another 20 districts for the credibility of the election, it will be good," Mir says. More secure districts mean more districts with independent monitors. "Some of the candidates will come out and accuse the winner of fraud," he says. "But this is Afghanistan. You cannot control and monitor 100 percent."
Friday, July 03, 2009
Cybersecurity Plan to Involve NSA, Telecoms by Ellen Nakashima
The Obama administration will proceed with a Bush-era plan to use National Security Agency assistance in screening government computer traffic on private-sector networks, with AT&T as the likely test site, according to three current and former government officials.
President Obama said in May that government efforts to protect computer systems from attack would not involve "monitoring private-sector networks or Internet traffic," and Department of Homeland Security officials say the new program will scrutinize only data going to or from government systems.
But the program has provoked debate within DHS, the officials said, because of uncertainty about whether private data can be shielded from unauthorized scrutiny, how much of a role NSA should play and whether the agency's involvement in warrantless wiretapping during George W. Bush's presidency would draw controversy. Each time a private citizen visited a "dot-gov" Web site or sent an e-mail to a civilian government employee, that action would be screened for potential harm to the network.
"We absolutely intend to use the technical resources, the substantial ones, that NSA has. But . . . they will be guided, led and in a sense directed by the people we have at the Department of Homeland Security," the department's secretary, Janet Napolitano, told reporters in a discussion about cybersecurity efforts.
Under a classified pilot program approved during the Bush administration, NSA data and hardware would be used to protect the networks of some civilian government agencies. Part of an initiative known as Einstein 3, the plan called for telecommunications companies to route the Internet traffic of civilian agencies through a monitoring box that would search for and block computer codes designed to penetrate or otherwise compromise networks.
AT&T, the world's largest telecommunications firm, was the Bush administration's choice to participate in the test, which has been delayed for months as the Obama administration determines what elements to preserve, former government officials said. The pilot program was to have begun in February.
"To be clear, Einstein 3 development is proceeding," DHS spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said. "We are moving forward in a way that protects privacy and civil liberties."
AT&T officials declined to comment.
A DHS official said the delay occurred because the original timeline "did not take into account all that was required to ensure the exercise would provide the data needed."
The program is the most controversial element of the $17 billion cybersecurity initiative the Bush administration started in January 2008. Einstein 3 is crucial, advocates say, in an era in which hackers have compromised computer systems at the Commerce and State departments and have taken military jet data from a defense contractor.
The NSA declined to comment on Einstein 3, but a spokeswoman said the agency would help DHS in "any way possible, including technical support," as it seeks to protect government networks.
The internal controversy reflects the central tension in the debate over how best to defend the nation's mostly private system of computer networks. The techniques that work best, experts say, require the automated scrutiny of e-mail and other electronic communications content -- something that commercial providers already do.
Proponents of involving the government said such efforts should harness the NSA's resources, especially its database of computer codes, or signatures, that have been linked to cyberattacks or known adversaries. The NSA has compiled the cache by, for example, electronically observing hackers trying to gain access to U.S. military systems, the officials said.
"That's the secret sauce," one official said. "It's the stuff they have that the private sector doesn't."
But it is also the prospect of NSA involvement in cybersecurity that fuels concerns about unwarranted government snooping into private communication.
"The bitter battles over privacy and NSA's role in domestic wiretapping hang over cybersecurity like a toxic cloud," said Stewart A. Baker, who was assistant secretary of homeland security under Bush.
AT&T was sued over its role in aiding the Bush-era counterterrorism program to intercept Americans' e-mails and phone calls without a warrant. It is seeking legal assurance that it will not be sued for participating in the pilot program. That legal certification has been held up for several months as DHS prepares a contract, several current and former officials said.
Einstein's promise, they said, is that it can more effectively detect malicious activity and disable intrusions before harm is done to civilian government networks.
"Intrusion detection is like a cop with a radar gun on a highway who catches you speeding or drunk and phones ahead to somebody at the other end," Michael Chertoff, former homeland security secretary, said in a recent interview. "Einstein 3 is a cop who actually arrests you and pulls you off the road when he sees you driving drunk."
The pilot program has two goals. The first is to prove that the telecommunications firm can route only traffic destined for federal civilian agencies through the monitoring system. The second is to test whether the technology can work effectively on civilian government networks. The sensor box would scan e-mail messages and other content just before they enter the civilian agency networks.
The classified NSA system, known as Tutelage, has the ability to decide how to handle malicious intrusions -- to block them or watch them closely to better assess the threat, sources said. It is currently used to defend military networks.
The database for the program would also contain feeds from commercial firms and DHS's U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team, administration officials said.
"We're looking for malicious content, not a love note to someone with a dot-gov e-mail address," a senior Bush administration official said. "What we're interested in is finding the code, the thing that will do the network harm, not reading the e-mail itself."
Ari Schwartz, a vice president of the Center for Democracy and Technology, was among a group of privacy advocates given a classified briefing in March on the Einstein program. The advocates wanted to ensure that officials had a plan to protect privacy and civil liberties, including shielding such personally identifying data as Internet protocol addresses.
"We came away saying they have a lot of work in front of them to get this done right," Schwartz said. "We're looking forward to their next steps."
Bush administration lawyers determined last year that DHS had the legal authority to conduct the Einstein program, and could do so in compliance with existing wiretap and privacy laws, as long as appropriate policies were in place.
Last fall, plans for the pilot were proceeding, former officials said. But in the Bush administration's final weeks, AT&T lawyers raised concerns about legal liability, they said. Then-Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey was willing to give AT&T written assurance that it would bear no liability for participating in the program, but both AT&T and the Justice Department agreed that the new administration should issue the certification, they said.
"They just wanted to make sure the certification would not be reversed by the next administration," a Bush administration official said.
In hindsight, Baker said, the Bush White House's decision to classify so much of its initiative was a mistake.
"It meant that the problem was not well understood," said Baker, who was NSA general counsel in the Clinton administration. "The solution was veiled in secrecy in a way that allowed people outside to be suspicious, so anybody who mistrusted the intelligence community could just assume that it was because they were doing something that they shouldn't be doing."
President Obama said in May that government efforts to protect computer systems from attack would not involve "monitoring private-sector networks or Internet traffic," and Department of Homeland Security officials say the new program will scrutinize only data going to or from government systems.
But the program has provoked debate within DHS, the officials said, because of uncertainty about whether private data can be shielded from unauthorized scrutiny, how much of a role NSA should play and whether the agency's involvement in warrantless wiretapping during George W. Bush's presidency would draw controversy. Each time a private citizen visited a "dot-gov" Web site or sent an e-mail to a civilian government employee, that action would be screened for potential harm to the network.
"We absolutely intend to use the technical resources, the substantial ones, that NSA has. But . . . they will be guided, led and in a sense directed by the people we have at the Department of Homeland Security," the department's secretary, Janet Napolitano, told reporters in a discussion about cybersecurity efforts.
Under a classified pilot program approved during the Bush administration, NSA data and hardware would be used to protect the networks of some civilian government agencies. Part of an initiative known as Einstein 3, the plan called for telecommunications companies to route the Internet traffic of civilian agencies through a monitoring box that would search for and block computer codes designed to penetrate or otherwise compromise networks.
AT&T, the world's largest telecommunications firm, was the Bush administration's choice to participate in the test, which has been delayed for months as the Obama administration determines what elements to preserve, former government officials said. The pilot program was to have begun in February.
"To be clear, Einstein 3 development is proceeding," DHS spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said. "We are moving forward in a way that protects privacy and civil liberties."
AT&T officials declined to comment.
A DHS official said the delay occurred because the original timeline "did not take into account all that was required to ensure the exercise would provide the data needed."
The program is the most controversial element of the $17 billion cybersecurity initiative the Bush administration started in January 2008. Einstein 3 is crucial, advocates say, in an era in which hackers have compromised computer systems at the Commerce and State departments and have taken military jet data from a defense contractor.
The NSA declined to comment on Einstein 3, but a spokeswoman said the agency would help DHS in "any way possible, including technical support," as it seeks to protect government networks.
The internal controversy reflects the central tension in the debate over how best to defend the nation's mostly private system of computer networks. The techniques that work best, experts say, require the automated scrutiny of e-mail and other electronic communications content -- something that commercial providers already do.
Proponents of involving the government said such efforts should harness the NSA's resources, especially its database of computer codes, or signatures, that have been linked to cyberattacks or known adversaries. The NSA has compiled the cache by, for example, electronically observing hackers trying to gain access to U.S. military systems, the officials said.
"That's the secret sauce," one official said. "It's the stuff they have that the private sector doesn't."
But it is also the prospect of NSA involvement in cybersecurity that fuels concerns about unwarranted government snooping into private communication.
"The bitter battles over privacy and NSA's role in domestic wiretapping hang over cybersecurity like a toxic cloud," said Stewart A. Baker, who was assistant secretary of homeland security under Bush.
AT&T was sued over its role in aiding the Bush-era counterterrorism program to intercept Americans' e-mails and phone calls without a warrant. It is seeking legal assurance that it will not be sued for participating in the pilot program. That legal certification has been held up for several months as DHS prepares a contract, several current and former officials said.
Einstein's promise, they said, is that it can more effectively detect malicious activity and disable intrusions before harm is done to civilian government networks.
"Intrusion detection is like a cop with a radar gun on a highway who catches you speeding or drunk and phones ahead to somebody at the other end," Michael Chertoff, former homeland security secretary, said in a recent interview. "Einstein 3 is a cop who actually arrests you and pulls you off the road when he sees you driving drunk."
The pilot program has two goals. The first is to prove that the telecommunications firm can route only traffic destined for federal civilian agencies through the monitoring system. The second is to test whether the technology can work effectively on civilian government networks. The sensor box would scan e-mail messages and other content just before they enter the civilian agency networks.
The classified NSA system, known as Tutelage, has the ability to decide how to handle malicious intrusions -- to block them or watch them closely to better assess the threat, sources said. It is currently used to defend military networks.
The database for the program would also contain feeds from commercial firms and DHS's U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team, administration officials said.
"We're looking for malicious content, not a love note to someone with a dot-gov e-mail address," a senior Bush administration official said. "What we're interested in is finding the code, the thing that will do the network harm, not reading the e-mail itself."
Ari Schwartz, a vice president of the Center for Democracy and Technology, was among a group of privacy advocates given a classified briefing in March on the Einstein program. The advocates wanted to ensure that officials had a plan to protect privacy and civil liberties, including shielding such personally identifying data as Internet protocol addresses.
"We came away saying they have a lot of work in front of them to get this done right," Schwartz said. "We're looking forward to their next steps."
Bush administration lawyers determined last year that DHS had the legal authority to conduct the Einstein program, and could do so in compliance with existing wiretap and privacy laws, as long as appropriate policies were in place.
Last fall, plans for the pilot were proceeding, former officials said. But in the Bush administration's final weeks, AT&T lawyers raised concerns about legal liability, they said. Then-Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey was willing to give AT&T written assurance that it would bear no liability for participating in the program, but both AT&T and the Justice Department agreed that the new administration should issue the certification, they said.
"They just wanted to make sure the certification would not be reversed by the next administration," a Bush administration official said.
In hindsight, Baker said, the Bush White House's decision to classify so much of its initiative was a mistake.
"It meant that the problem was not well understood," said Baker, who was NSA general counsel in the Clinton administration. "The solution was veiled in secrecy in a way that allowed people outside to be suspicious, so anybody who mistrusted the intelligence community could just assume that it was because they were doing something that they shouldn't be doing."
Pentagon’s Robo-Hummingbird Flies Like the Real Thing by Noah Shachtman
Military-backed researchers have built a tiny drone that looks and flies like a hummingbird, flapping its little robotic wings to stay in the air. So far, the mock bird, built for Pentagon mad-science division Darpa, has only stayed aloft for 20 seconds at a time. But that short flight was enough to show the potential of a whole new class of miniature spies, inspired by nature. Darpa just handed AeroVironment, makers of the winged “nano air vehicle,” another $2.1 million to build a hummingbot 2.0.
Ultimately, DARPA program manager Todd Hylton says in a statement, he’d like see “an approximately 10-gram aircraft that can hover for extended periods, can fly at forward speeds up to 10 meters per second, can withstand 2.5-meter-per-second wind gusts.” He also wants the nano air vehicle to operate inside buildings, and be controllable from up to a kilometer away.
AeroVironment, for its part, doesn’t just want its little drone to fly like a bird. The company wants the thing to look like one, too:
Thursday, July 02, 2009
Designation of Kata'ib Hizballah as a Foreign Terrorist Organization
On June 24, 2009 Deputy Secretary of State James B. Steinberg designated Kata’ib Hizballah (KH) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) under Section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, as amended (INA). Deputy Secretary Steinberg also designated KH under section 1(b) of Executive Order 13224, as amended. Kata’ib Hizballah is an Iraqi terrorist organization responsible for numerous terrorist acts against Iraqi, U.S., and other targets in Iraq since 2007. The Department of State took these actions in consultation with the Attorney General, the Secretary of the Treasury, and other relevant U.S. agencies.
These designations play a critical role in our fight against terrorism and are an effective means of curtailing support for terrorist activities and pressuring groups to get out of the terrorism business. The consequences of these designations include a prohibition against U.S. persons providing material support or resources to, or engaging in other transactions with KH, and the freezing of all property and interests in property of the organization that are in the United States, or come within the United States, or the control of U.S. persons.
Kata’ib Hizballah is a radical Shia Islamist group with an anti-Western establishment and jihadist ideology that has conducted attacks against Iraqi, U.S, and Coalition targets in Iraq. Kata’ib Hizballah has ideological ties to Lebanese Hizballah and gained notoriety in 2007 with attacks on U.S. and Coalition forces designed to undermine the establishment of a democratic, viable Iraqi state. The organization has been responsible for numerous violent terrorist attacks since 2007, including improvised explosive device bombings, rocket propelled grenade attacks, and sniper operations. Kata’ib Hizballah also targeted the International Zone in Baghdad in a November 29, 2008 rocket attack that killed two UN workers. In addition, KH has threatened the lives of Iraqi politicians and civilians that support the legitimate political process in Iraq.
The Department of Treasury has also designated Kata’ib Hizballah under Executive Order 13438.
These designations play a critical role in our fight against terrorism and are an effective means of curtailing support for terrorist activities and pressuring groups to get out of the terrorism business. The consequences of these designations include a prohibition against U.S. persons providing material support or resources to, or engaging in other transactions with KH, and the freezing of all property and interests in property of the organization that are in the United States, or come within the United States, or the control of U.S. persons.
Kata’ib Hizballah is a radical Shia Islamist group with an anti-Western establishment and jihadist ideology that has conducted attacks against Iraqi, U.S, and Coalition targets in Iraq. Kata’ib Hizballah has ideological ties to Lebanese Hizballah and gained notoriety in 2007 with attacks on U.S. and Coalition forces designed to undermine the establishment of a democratic, viable Iraqi state. The organization has been responsible for numerous violent terrorist attacks since 2007, including improvised explosive device bombings, rocket propelled grenade attacks, and sniper operations. Kata’ib Hizballah also targeted the International Zone in Baghdad in a November 29, 2008 rocket attack that killed two UN workers. In addition, KH has threatened the lives of Iraqi politicians and civilians that support the legitimate political process in Iraq.
The Department of Treasury has also designated Kata’ib Hizballah under Executive Order 13438.
Shaykh Abu Musab Abdul Wadood, Commander of Al-Qaeda’s Committee in the Islamic Maghreb: "France: The Mother of All Evils" Released on: 28 June 2009
[This document is the translation of an official Arabic-language communiqué obtained by NEFA investigators and translated into English on behalf of the NEFA TerrorWatch subscription service. This translation is provided for educational and informational purposes only. For more information on Al-Qaida’s Committee in the Islamic Maghreb and its involvement in recent terror attacks, see the NEFA report “Two Decades of Jihad in Algeria: the GIA, GSPC and Al-Qaida.”
“Praise is to Allah, the Almighty and the end is for the pious, and there is no transgression except upon the oppressors, and peace and blessings of Allah upon the Prophet, his family, companions and those who follow their steps until the Day of Judgement, to proceed.”
“Allah the almighty says, “Say: "O ye People of the Book! Why obstruct ye those who believe, from the path of Allah, Seeking to make it crooked, while ye were yourselves witnesses (to Allah's Covenant)? but Allah is not unmindful of all that ye do. O ye who believe! If ye listen to a faction among the People of the Book, they would (indeed) render you apostates after ye have believed!” (Surah Al Imran, Verse 99-100)
“A few years back, France waged a fierce war, on our daughters who wore Hijab, and now today again it is gathering its forces and collecting all its organisation and arranging its ranks to fight a new blatant war on our sisters wearing Niqab.”
“The French are committing all these oppressions at a time when we find their women pouring into our countries and filling up its beaches and roads while they are dressed, in naked clothes, in an open challenge to the emotions of Muslims and an open mocking of the teachings of our Islamic religion, and their customs and traditions.”
“And this by Allah is the height of extremism and racism and the most apparent form of religious terrorism and incitation to hate.”
“For yesterday, it was Hijab and today it is Niqab and then tomorrow perhaps their sinful hands will reach forward to the obligation of prayer, fasting and Hajj.”
“And we are quite sure that this enmity that is apparent in the hearts of the French politicians against Islam and its people will continue, instead, it will spread and will change forms, and that’s why we call on all the Muslims to combat this enmity with a greater enmity and to meet the care of France to oppress our believing sisters on their religion, with greater care of holding on to the religious teachings of Islam, both small and big, obligatory and recommended.”
“As for us-the Mujahideen in the land of Islamic Maghreb then we have taken an oath to Allah, not to keep quiet on these provocative oppressions, and we will avenge for the honours of our sisters, and daughters, on France and its interests in every way we can, in every place we can and at every time we can, until France stops its oppression and stupidity and stops its oppression and its insolence.”
“Praise is to Allah, the Almighty and the end is for the pious, and there is no transgression except upon the oppressors, and peace and blessings of Allah upon the Prophet, his family, companions and those who follow their steps until the Day of Judgement, to proceed.”
“Allah the almighty says, “Say: "O ye People of the Book! Why obstruct ye those who believe, from the path of Allah, Seeking to make it crooked, while ye were yourselves witnesses (to Allah's Covenant)? but Allah is not unmindful of all that ye do. O ye who believe! If ye listen to a faction among the People of the Book, they would (indeed) render you apostates after ye have believed!” (Surah Al Imran, Verse 99-100)
“A few years back, France waged a fierce war, on our daughters who wore Hijab, and now today again it is gathering its forces and collecting all its organisation and arranging its ranks to fight a new blatant war on our sisters wearing Niqab.”
“The French are committing all these oppressions at a time when we find their women pouring into our countries and filling up its beaches and roads while they are dressed, in naked clothes, in an open challenge to the emotions of Muslims and an open mocking of the teachings of our Islamic religion, and their customs and traditions.”
“And this by Allah is the height of extremism and racism and the most apparent form of religious terrorism and incitation to hate.”
“For yesterday, it was Hijab and today it is Niqab and then tomorrow perhaps their sinful hands will reach forward to the obligation of prayer, fasting and Hajj.”
“And we are quite sure that this enmity that is apparent in the hearts of the French politicians against Islam and its people will continue, instead, it will spread and will change forms, and that’s why we call on all the Muslims to combat this enmity with a greater enmity and to meet the care of France to oppress our believing sisters on their religion, with greater care of holding on to the religious teachings of Islam, both small and big, obligatory and recommended.”
“As for us-the Mujahideen in the land of Islamic Maghreb then we have taken an oath to Allah, not to keep quiet on these provocative oppressions, and we will avenge for the honours of our sisters, and daughters, on France and its interests in every way we can, in every place we can and at every time we can, until France stops its oppression and stupidity and stops its oppression and its insolence.”
U.S. Takes Aim at Cyberwarfare by Shaun Waterman
The Pentagon's decision last week to establish a unified cybercommand to defend the military's computer networks and attack those of U.S. enemies raises at least as many questions as it answers, analysts and experts in the field say.
"How does it fit into the strategic goals of defending our economy and our way of life?" asked Marcus Sachs, who helped set up the U.S. military's first cyberwarfare unit in 1998.
"How will it relate to other government agencies?" asked Mr. Sachs, who is now director of the Internet Storm Center, a volunteer warning and analysis service that works with Internet service providers to counter such threats as computer viruses.
In a memo to military leaders last week, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates ordered U.S. Strategic Command -- the military entity in charge of U.S. nuclear and space weapons -- to set up the new cybercommand by October this year and to have it fully functioning by October 2010.
However, he also ordered Pentagon policy chief Michele A. Flournoy to lead a "review of policy and strategy to develop a comprehensive approach to [Department of Defense] cyberspace operations."
According to a National Research Council study of cyberwarfare published this year, "an unclassified and authoritative statement of joint [military] doctrine for the use of computer network attack is unavailable and it is fair to say that current doctrine on this matter is still evolving."
Officials say that such questions are acute because of the difficulty in identifying cyberattackers who can strike anonymously using networks of home computers infected by specially designed viruses and in distinguishing between acts of vandalism, crime and war in cyberspace.
"How can we deter and prevent attacks" in cyberspace? asked Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III at a talk last week. "Deterrence is predicated on the assumption that you know the identity of your adversary, but that is rarely the case in cyberspace, where it is so easy for an attacker to hide."
Mr. Sachs told The Washington Times that the questions of how to respond to cyberattacks were thrown into sharp relief by events in Estonia in 2007 and Georgia last year. Both countries were subjected to cyberattacks on their infrastructure originating in Russia, but Moscow denied any role, and it is not clear to what extent the attacks -- largely carried out by nationalistic hacker gangs -- might have been inspired or coordinated by the Russian government.
"What would happen and who would be responsible [for responding] if that kind of attack was carried out against the United States?" Mr. Sachs asked. "All these questions are unanswered."
When it comes to offensive operations in cyberspace, the questions become even harder to answer, he said.
"We really haven't tested the rules [that] apply to warfare in the physical world" in cyberspace, Mr. Sachs said. He gave as an example the requirement under the Geneva Conventions that all combatants be readily identifiable.
"What does that mean in cyberspace? Should we put a special header on packets" -- the tiny digital messages that make up Internet traffic -- "saying, 'This is a U.S. Air Force attack packet'? ... We need to start thinking about these questions," he said.
"We need to have a public debate, not a classified conversation," he added, noting that U.S. policy on the use of other unconventional armaments like nuclear weapons had been publicly debated even while the exact capabilities and technical details of the bombs themselves remained secret.
In last week's memo, Mr. Gates called for an "implementation plan" for setting up the new command that would "delineate [its] mission, roles and responsibilities" and its "command and control, reporting and support relationships with combatant commands, [military] services and U.S. government department and agencies."
This last point is key because of the complicated jigsaw of authorities and responsibilities than different U.S. agencies have in relation to military, government and private-sector computer networks.
"There are so many stakeholder organizations and individuals in the cyberdomain it is difficult to know exactly where to start the collaboration, information sharing, and integration" needed, said Larry McKee, a computer-security specialist and longtime adviser to U.S. Strategic Command and the U.S. Air Force.
"What's the long-term vision here?" asked Mr. Sachs. "Is it a small elite organization just focused on the military networks, or will it have a broader, almost National Guard-like mission to protect the nation's critical infrastructure?"
Defense officials have been keen to stress that the new command will be focused on defending military networks' ".mil" domain and that its establishment does not represent any attempt by the Pentagon to carve out a larger role for itself in defending the nation's civilian-owned and -operated computer systems.
"Responsibility for protecting federal civilian networks would remain with the Department of Homeland Security," Mr. Lynn said last week. "Likewise, responsibility for protecting private-sector networks would remain with the private sector."
However, some privacy and civil liberties advocates have nonetheless expressed concerns about the role of the military and in particular the secretive National Security Agency in the cyberarena.
The new cybercommand will be headed by the director of the NSA, and Mr. Gates said he would recommend that the current incumbent of that job, Lt. Gen. Keith B. Alexander, be nominated to the new role.
Gen. Alexander is already in charge of the Joint Functional Component Command Network Warfare, the part of Strategic Command responsible for offensive cyberoperations.
"Many of the resources to be managed by cybercommand are already under Gen. Alexander's control," said Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute, an industry nonprofit that does research and education on computer security.
"The new piece is that military resources currently outside of Strategic Command can now be mobilized," Mr. Paller said. "The action-oriented resource base [of the new command] is much larger."
However, Mr. Paller said leveraging those resources also required better partnership between the military and the private sector. A key problem for civilians engaged in trying to defend U.S. networks against cyber attacks, he said, was that they do not have access to the military's latest, best information about attackers and the methods they are using.
Mr. Paller pointed out that the vast majority of the thousands of cyber attacks against U.S. military computers are carried out across civilian networks like the Internet, mostly managed by seven or eight large private-sector companies.
Currently, he said, because the network managers of those firms don't have security clearances, "the military can't share intelligence about the latest threat signatures" with them, making it much harder for them to spot attacks in progress.
Gen. Alexander told a symposium of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association last week that the military will have to give network operations people the security clearances they need, so they can understand the nature of the threats.
Granting such clearances to "a very small set of people" would "radically improve our capabilities to defend" against cyberattacks, Mr. Paller said.
Still, many - and not just privacy and civil liberties mavens - remain unconvinced about the likely performance of the NSA, and by extension the new cybercommand, in this crucial area of partnership.
"While NSA has improved in both areas since Sept. 11, neither collaboration nor information sharing [is] exactly NSA core competencies," Mr. McKee said.
"How does it fit into the strategic goals of defending our economy and our way of life?" asked Marcus Sachs, who helped set up the U.S. military's first cyberwarfare unit in 1998.
"How will it relate to other government agencies?" asked Mr. Sachs, who is now director of the Internet Storm Center, a volunteer warning and analysis service that works with Internet service providers to counter such threats as computer viruses.
In a memo to military leaders last week, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates ordered U.S. Strategic Command -- the military entity in charge of U.S. nuclear and space weapons -- to set up the new cybercommand by October this year and to have it fully functioning by October 2010.
However, he also ordered Pentagon policy chief Michele A. Flournoy to lead a "review of policy and strategy to develop a comprehensive approach to [Department of Defense] cyberspace operations."
According to a National Research Council study of cyberwarfare published this year, "an unclassified and authoritative statement of joint [military] doctrine for the use of computer network attack is unavailable and it is fair to say that current doctrine on this matter is still evolving."
Officials say that such questions are acute because of the difficulty in identifying cyberattackers who can strike anonymously using networks of home computers infected by specially designed viruses and in distinguishing between acts of vandalism, crime and war in cyberspace.
"How can we deter and prevent attacks" in cyberspace? asked Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III at a talk last week. "Deterrence is predicated on the assumption that you know the identity of your adversary, but that is rarely the case in cyberspace, where it is so easy for an attacker to hide."
Mr. Sachs told The Washington Times that the questions of how to respond to cyberattacks were thrown into sharp relief by events in Estonia in 2007 and Georgia last year. Both countries were subjected to cyberattacks on their infrastructure originating in Russia, but Moscow denied any role, and it is not clear to what extent the attacks -- largely carried out by nationalistic hacker gangs -- might have been inspired or coordinated by the Russian government.
"What would happen and who would be responsible [for responding] if that kind of attack was carried out against the United States?" Mr. Sachs asked. "All these questions are unanswered."
When it comes to offensive operations in cyberspace, the questions become even harder to answer, he said.
"We really haven't tested the rules [that] apply to warfare in the physical world" in cyberspace, Mr. Sachs said. He gave as an example the requirement under the Geneva Conventions that all combatants be readily identifiable.
"What does that mean in cyberspace? Should we put a special header on packets" -- the tiny digital messages that make up Internet traffic -- "saying, 'This is a U.S. Air Force attack packet'? ... We need to start thinking about these questions," he said.
"We need to have a public debate, not a classified conversation," he added, noting that U.S. policy on the use of other unconventional armaments like nuclear weapons had been publicly debated even while the exact capabilities and technical details of the bombs themselves remained secret.
In last week's memo, Mr. Gates called for an "implementation plan" for setting up the new command that would "delineate [its] mission, roles and responsibilities" and its "command and control, reporting and support relationships with combatant commands, [military] services and U.S. government department and agencies."
This last point is key because of the complicated jigsaw of authorities and responsibilities than different U.S. agencies have in relation to military, government and private-sector computer networks.
"There are so many stakeholder organizations and individuals in the cyberdomain it is difficult to know exactly where to start the collaboration, information sharing, and integration" needed, said Larry McKee, a computer-security specialist and longtime adviser to U.S. Strategic Command and the U.S. Air Force.
"What's the long-term vision here?" asked Mr. Sachs. "Is it a small elite organization just focused on the military networks, or will it have a broader, almost National Guard-like mission to protect the nation's critical infrastructure?"
Defense officials have been keen to stress that the new command will be focused on defending military networks' ".mil" domain and that its establishment does not represent any attempt by the Pentagon to carve out a larger role for itself in defending the nation's civilian-owned and -operated computer systems.
"Responsibility for protecting federal civilian networks would remain with the Department of Homeland Security," Mr. Lynn said last week. "Likewise, responsibility for protecting private-sector networks would remain with the private sector."
However, some privacy and civil liberties advocates have nonetheless expressed concerns about the role of the military and in particular the secretive National Security Agency in the cyberarena.
The new cybercommand will be headed by the director of the NSA, and Mr. Gates said he would recommend that the current incumbent of that job, Lt. Gen. Keith B. Alexander, be nominated to the new role.
Gen. Alexander is already in charge of the Joint Functional Component Command Network Warfare, the part of Strategic Command responsible for offensive cyberoperations.
"Many of the resources to be managed by cybercommand are already under Gen. Alexander's control," said Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute, an industry nonprofit that does research and education on computer security.
"The new piece is that military resources currently outside of Strategic Command can now be mobilized," Mr. Paller said. "The action-oriented resource base [of the new command] is much larger."
However, Mr. Paller said leveraging those resources also required better partnership between the military and the private sector. A key problem for civilians engaged in trying to defend U.S. networks against cyber attacks, he said, was that they do not have access to the military's latest, best information about attackers and the methods they are using.
Mr. Paller pointed out that the vast majority of the thousands of cyber attacks against U.S. military computers are carried out across civilian networks like the Internet, mostly managed by seven or eight large private-sector companies.
Currently, he said, because the network managers of those firms don't have security clearances, "the military can't share intelligence about the latest threat signatures" with them, making it much harder for them to spot attacks in progress.
Gen. Alexander told a symposium of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association last week that the military will have to give network operations people the security clearances they need, so they can understand the nature of the threats.
Granting such clearances to "a very small set of people" would "radically improve our capabilities to defend" against cyberattacks, Mr. Paller said.
Still, many - and not just privacy and civil liberties mavens - remain unconvinced about the likely performance of the NSA, and by extension the new cybercommand, in this crucial area of partnership.
"While NSA has improved in both areas since Sept. 11, neither collaboration nor information sharing [is] exactly NSA core competencies," Mr. McKee said.
A fireside chat with Apple’s Jonathan Ive by Philip Elmer-DeWitt
Jonathan Ive, the reclusive designer of the iMac, iPod, PowerBook G4, MacBook and iPhone, made a rare public appearance Tuesday night at London’s Royal College of Art, where he was the guest of honor and featured speaker at an “Innovation Night” dinner.
The event was by invitation only, but one of the attendees was the BBC’s Rory Cellan-Jones, who filed an appreciative report on the Beeb’s dot.life site.
“What emerged,” writes Cellan-Jones, “were some fascinating insights into the culture of Apple and the craft of industrial design. Ive was insistent that the key to Apple’s success was that it was not driven by money – a claim that may raise eyebrows amongst shareholders and customers – but by a complete focus on delivering just a few desirable and useful products.’For a large multi-billion dollar company we don’t actually make many different products,’ he explained. ‘We’re so focused, we’re very clear about our goals.’ “
The format of the talk was a fireside chat with Sir Christopher Frayling, Rector of the Royal College. Among the highlights:
“We don’t do focus groups,” Ive said firmly when asked how Apple (AAPL) decided what products to build. He explained that focus groups resulted in bland products designed not to offend anyone. (To which Sir Christopher added Henry Ford’s famous line that if he’d asked his customers what they wanted, they would have demanded a faster horse.)
Ive stressed the physicality of design — “from the Apple design workshop full of machines, throwing off a lot of noise and dust,” writes Cellan-Jones, “to visits to Japanese aluminium craftsmen to learn how that material could be crafted into a laptop casing. Yes, of course he and his team use all the latest computer-aided design tools — but he also likes to knock out a physical prototype and feel the weight of it in his hand.”
Ive told the story of how, as a young boy, he had taken apart an alarm clock and discovered inside the spare outer casing “an entire watch factory.”
“Extraordinary complexity wrapped in a simple, functional, touchable, beautiful case,” concludes Celan-Jones.
“That seems to be the Apple design ethic.”
Got it in one.
The event was by invitation only, but one of the attendees was the BBC’s Rory Cellan-Jones, who filed an appreciative report on the Beeb’s dot.life site.
“What emerged,” writes Cellan-Jones, “were some fascinating insights into the culture of Apple and the craft of industrial design. Ive was insistent that the key to Apple’s success was that it was not driven by money – a claim that may raise eyebrows amongst shareholders and customers – but by a complete focus on delivering just a few desirable and useful products.’For a large multi-billion dollar company we don’t actually make many different products,’ he explained. ‘We’re so focused, we’re very clear about our goals.’ “
The format of the talk was a fireside chat with Sir Christopher Frayling, Rector of the Royal College. Among the highlights:
“We don’t do focus groups,” Ive said firmly when asked how Apple (AAPL) decided what products to build. He explained that focus groups resulted in bland products designed not to offend anyone. (To which Sir Christopher added Henry Ford’s famous line that if he’d asked his customers what they wanted, they would have demanded a faster horse.)
Ive stressed the physicality of design — “from the Apple design workshop full of machines, throwing off a lot of noise and dust,” writes Cellan-Jones, “to visits to Japanese aluminium craftsmen to learn how that material could be crafted into a laptop casing. Yes, of course he and his team use all the latest computer-aided design tools — but he also likes to knock out a physical prototype and feel the weight of it in his hand.”
Ive told the story of how, as a young boy, he had taken apart an alarm clock and discovered inside the spare outer casing “an entire watch factory.”
“Extraordinary complexity wrapped in a simple, functional, touchable, beautiful case,” concludes Celan-Jones.
“That seems to be the Apple design ethic.”
Got it in one.
Future iPhone Features (Apple Patent Reviews for July 2009)
Haptic Tactile Feedback
Perhaps most interesting amongst the patent applications is the acknowledgement by Apple that despite the many advantages of the iPhone's multi-touch screen, a lack of tactile feedback remains its biggest disadvantage:
However, one of a touchscreen's biggest advantages (i.e., the ability to utilize the same physical space for different functions) is also one of a touchscreen's biggest disadvantages. When the user is unable to view the display (because the user is occupied with other tasks), the user can only feel the smooth hard surface of the touchscreen, regardless of the shape, size and location of the virtual buttons and/or other display elements. This makes it difficult for users to find icons, hyperlinks, textboxes or other user-selectable input elements that are being displayed, if any are even being displayed, without looking at the display.
The proposed solution is the adoption of "haptic" display technologies which allow for some tactile feedback from touch screen displays. Apple proposes including a grid of piezoelectronic actuators that can be activated on command. By fluctuating the frequency of these actuators, the user will "feel" different surfaces as their finger moves across it. As an example, a display could include a virtual click wheel which vibrates at a different frequency as the center. Users could easily sense the difference and use the click wheel without having to look at it.
Haptic technology has started gaining adoption in other mobile phones and there had been some talk that Apple might have been looking to adopt it.
Fingerprint Identification as an Input Method
Intriguing patent application suggests the detection of a user's individual fingerprints as an input method. Fingerprints have already been used in computers for security purposes, but Apple's research involves the use of fingerprint patterns to actually identify distinct fingers. This could then be used to produce specific functions depending on which finger is being used. As shown in the table below, an index finger press might perform one action (PLAY/STOP) while a middle finger press could fast forward.
RFID Reader
Notable application also covers the dual use of a touch screen as an RFID reader. RFID tags are small circuits that can be embedded in objects for identification using a special reader. Apple suggests that the an RFID antenna can be placed in the touch sensor panel itself, allowing it to also be used as a RFID reader. As RFID tags become more prevalent, this could add a very useful function to future touch screen devices.
Perhaps most interesting amongst the patent applications is the acknowledgement by Apple that despite the many advantages of the iPhone's multi-touch screen, a lack of tactile feedback remains its biggest disadvantage:
However, one of a touchscreen's biggest advantages (i.e., the ability to utilize the same physical space for different functions) is also one of a touchscreen's biggest disadvantages. When the user is unable to view the display (because the user is occupied with other tasks), the user can only feel the smooth hard surface of the touchscreen, regardless of the shape, size and location of the virtual buttons and/or other display elements. This makes it difficult for users to find icons, hyperlinks, textboxes or other user-selectable input elements that are being displayed, if any are even being displayed, without looking at the display.
The proposed solution is the adoption of "haptic" display technologies which allow for some tactile feedback from touch screen displays. Apple proposes including a grid of piezoelectronic actuators that can be activated on command. By fluctuating the frequency of these actuators, the user will "feel" different surfaces as their finger moves across it. As an example, a display could include a virtual click wheel which vibrates at a different frequency as the center. Users could easily sense the difference and use the click wheel without having to look at it.
Haptic technology has started gaining adoption in other mobile phones and there had been some talk that Apple might have been looking to adopt it.
Fingerprint Identification as an Input Method
Intriguing patent application suggests the detection of a user's individual fingerprints as an input method. Fingerprints have already been used in computers for security purposes, but Apple's research involves the use of fingerprint patterns to actually identify distinct fingers. This could then be used to produce specific functions depending on which finger is being used. As shown in the table below, an index finger press might perform one action (PLAY/STOP) while a middle finger press could fast forward.
RFID Reader
Notable application also covers the dual use of a touch screen as an RFID reader. RFID tags are small circuits that can be embedded in objects for identification using a special reader. Apple suggests that the an RFID antenna can be placed in the touch sensor panel itself, allowing it to also be used as a RFID reader. As RFID tags become more prevalent, this could add a very useful function to future touch screen devices.
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
Novel Approach Taken with Colorado Girl's Rare Disease by Kim Christiansen
Your child is dying. She has a genetic disease. She needs a bone-marrow transplant to save her life. You want more children. You can't take the risk of having any more children the natural way, so you consider your options.
So begins the story of one Colorado family, Jack and Lisa Nash and their daughter Molly.
Almost nine years ago, their story made headlines around the world and led to stories in Newsweek and BBC News. Their story became a seed for a book by author Jodi Picoult.
A film adaptation of her novel "My Sister's Keeper" comes to theaters this weekend. The story is fiction and offers a far different outcome than what happened for the Nashes. Still, the Nash family is growing accustomed to the attention.
"We did something so new and so cutting edge that it's always going to be this way forever, and as the kids get older, they're going to have to learn how to deal with it," Lisa Nash said.
When Molly was very young, she was diagnosed with Fanconi anemia. Her parents were told she likely would not live beyond age 7. For a time, the Nashes made the decision to postpone expanding their family for fear they would have another child with the same disease.
They turned to in-vitro fertilization and preimplantation genetic diagnosis. This procedure involves testing one cell of each days-old embryo, screening for Fanconi anemia and then finding the best bone marrow match for Molly.
"Everything was a miracle," said Dr. William Schoolcraft with the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine.
"After four failed cycles, to have just one embryo that we could transfer and have that embryo implant, with 100 percent success, have the pregnancy go full term and have the stem-cell transplant in Minnesota . . . for Molly to survive and thrive, it's a fairy tale ending, it really is."
The cord blood cells from Molly's brother, Adam, gave Molly new life. The cord blood is what remains in the placenta and umbilical cord after birth and is rich with adult blood stem cells. In a successful transplant, those cells take root and produce blood cells and bone marrow.
"Nobody ever touched Adam. We recycled Adam's cord blood, and his cord blood that he no longer needed saved Molly's life," Lisa said.
The Nash story raised many ethical questions and led to fierce debate about genetic screening and concerns about so-called designer babies.
"I think people have looked at this technology and said, Will there be a slippery slope? Will people take this and use it to pick eye color or intelligence? The reality is we are using this just to rule out lethal diseases, so we're only testing for diseases that would be fatal to an offspring, and I think in that context it's very appropriate," Schoolcraft said.
Today, Molly is 14, Adam is 9 and their younger sister, Delaine (also conceived through in-vitro), is 6.
Molly is not disease-free; she is diabetic, deaf in one ear and has thyroid issues. "I'm happy that I'm alive," Molly said.
At some point, Lisa said, she expects she'll see "My Sister's Keeper." She views it as just entertainment, because the real story is their story, and it has a happy ending.
Lisa says she'll never forget what her grandmother told her when Molly was very young: Molly has a purpose. Lisa considers her grandmother a wise woman, and added, "Look at what Molly's taught the world, one little girl, look at what Molly's taught the world."
So begins the story of one Colorado family, Jack and Lisa Nash and their daughter Molly.
Almost nine years ago, their story made headlines around the world and led to stories in Newsweek and BBC News. Their story became a seed for a book by author Jodi Picoult.
A film adaptation of her novel "My Sister's Keeper" comes to theaters this weekend. The story is fiction and offers a far different outcome than what happened for the Nashes. Still, the Nash family is growing accustomed to the attention.
"We did something so new and so cutting edge that it's always going to be this way forever, and as the kids get older, they're going to have to learn how to deal with it," Lisa Nash said.
When Molly was very young, she was diagnosed with Fanconi anemia. Her parents were told she likely would not live beyond age 7. For a time, the Nashes made the decision to postpone expanding their family for fear they would have another child with the same disease.
They turned to in-vitro fertilization and preimplantation genetic diagnosis. This procedure involves testing one cell of each days-old embryo, screening for Fanconi anemia and then finding the best bone marrow match for Molly.
"Everything was a miracle," said Dr. William Schoolcraft with the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine.
"After four failed cycles, to have just one embryo that we could transfer and have that embryo implant, with 100 percent success, have the pregnancy go full term and have the stem-cell transplant in Minnesota . . . for Molly to survive and thrive, it's a fairy tale ending, it really is."
The cord blood cells from Molly's brother, Adam, gave Molly new life. The cord blood is what remains in the placenta and umbilical cord after birth and is rich with adult blood stem cells. In a successful transplant, those cells take root and produce blood cells and bone marrow.
"Nobody ever touched Adam. We recycled Adam's cord blood, and his cord blood that he no longer needed saved Molly's life," Lisa said.
The Nash story raised many ethical questions and led to fierce debate about genetic screening and concerns about so-called designer babies.
"I think people have looked at this technology and said, Will there be a slippery slope? Will people take this and use it to pick eye color or intelligence? The reality is we are using this just to rule out lethal diseases, so we're only testing for diseases that would be fatal to an offspring, and I think in that context it's very appropriate," Schoolcraft said.
Today, Molly is 14, Adam is 9 and their younger sister, Delaine (also conceived through in-vitro), is 6.
Molly is not disease-free; she is diabetic, deaf in one ear and has thyroid issues. "I'm happy that I'm alive," Molly said.
At some point, Lisa said, she expects she'll see "My Sister's Keeper." She views it as just entertainment, because the real story is their story, and it has a happy ending.
Lisa says she'll never forget what her grandmother told her when Molly was very young: Molly has a purpose. Lisa considers her grandmother a wise woman, and added, "Look at what Molly's taught the world, one little girl, look at what Molly's taught the world."
Is this What's in the Next iPhone OS 3.1 Update?
The list:
- Voice Control now works over Bluetooth
- Updated AT&T profile to 4.2 (MMS is now enabled)
- Improvements to OpenGL and Quartz
- iPhone vibrates when moving icons
- Non-destructive video editing
- APIs to allow third party apps to access videos and edit them
- Updated modem firmware to 5.08.01
No firm date for the update.
- Voice Control now works over Bluetooth
- Updated AT&T profile to 4.2 (MMS is now enabled)
- Improvements to OpenGL and Quartz
- iPhone vibrates when moving icons
- Non-destructive video editing
- APIs to allow third party apps to access videos and edit them
- Updated modem firmware to 5.08.01
No firm date for the update.
The Bolivarian-Islamist Narrative in Latin America and its Dangers by Douglas Farah
Yesterday I participated in a Hudson Institute event on Populism, Islamism and "Indigenism" versus Democracy in Latin America. What came into focus there was the joint narrative of the Bolivarian populist governments (Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua) and radical Islamists, led by Iran.
It is hard, on the surface, to imagine what a secular revolution that allows women on the beach in bikinis, salsa music, racy soap operas and rum has in common with a theocracy that tolerates none of those things and believes that divine law should rule the world.
One of the primary unifying threads in the joint narrative is the utopian vision that a human system can be devised that will bring justice and peace. Hence, from this vision, both groups construct a narrative of heroic battling against the earthly forces of evil and corruption, and both have chosen the United States as its primary enemy, followed closely by other liberal democracies that, in their view, have failed to live up to the utopian ideals.
This is where, as I have written about before, the joint fascination with asymmetrical warfare and its desirability meshes with the larger story line. Both sides view themselves as small powers taking on vast world powers, a David and Goliath narrative that imbues a sense of inevitable ultimate victory with the need to find the weapons that will lead to the defeat of enemy.
The keynote speaker at the Hudson event, Spanish parliamentarian Gustavo de Arístegui, has written that those in this alliance, whether secular or religious, view themselves as "legitimate soldiers in an heroic battle within the context of an asymmetrical war of liberation. It is a theory that justifies any kind of violence, including terrorism, if it is used against the most powerful countries, the repressive forces of the West."
This view of the heroism of the actions is in part what gives such a dangerously romantic view of suicide bombings, as espoused in the book Chavez has adopted as official military doctrine: Peripheral Warfare and Revolutionary Islam: Origins, Rules and Ethics of Asymmetrical Warfare (Guerra Periferica y el Islam
Revolucionario: Orígenes, Reglas y Ética de la Guerra Asimétrica) by the Spanish politician and ideologue Jorge Verstrynge. I have written about that more extensively in a previous post.
There is little doubt that this tactical alliance would shatter if either side were to gain significant ground. The Islamists have shown, particularly in the Iranian revolution that was viewed initially by many as triumph of secular, reformist forces, that it will eat the young revolutionaries for lunch.
But for now, the common view of the struggle against the West, bound by a narrative both can offer as an explanation for their actions, is sufficient. The common enemy is there, and the weapons for the struggle can be obtained.
One of the dangers of this narrative is not just the seduction it holds for messianic leaders like Chavez in Venezuela and Ahmadinejad in Iran, but the lure it holds for non-state armed groups like the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), who increasingly find themselves isolated and without a coherent reason to continue the revolution.
Chavez's willingness to embrace and help write this narrative means that he has shared with his allies in the FARC, and why his pro forma protestations of not supporting the revolutionary cause are meaningless, and will remain so. The FARC needs to articulate a reason for its continuation in the armed struggle. The narrative not only offers that, but well-trained allies (Hezbollah particularly) who can help them advance once a common agenda is established. And that is truly alarming.
It is hard, on the surface, to imagine what a secular revolution that allows women on the beach in bikinis, salsa music, racy soap operas and rum has in common with a theocracy that tolerates none of those things and believes that divine law should rule the world.
One of the primary unifying threads in the joint narrative is the utopian vision that a human system can be devised that will bring justice and peace. Hence, from this vision, both groups construct a narrative of heroic battling against the earthly forces of evil and corruption, and both have chosen the United States as its primary enemy, followed closely by other liberal democracies that, in their view, have failed to live up to the utopian ideals.
This is where, as I have written about before, the joint fascination with asymmetrical warfare and its desirability meshes with the larger story line. Both sides view themselves as small powers taking on vast world powers, a David and Goliath narrative that imbues a sense of inevitable ultimate victory with the need to find the weapons that will lead to the defeat of enemy.
The keynote speaker at the Hudson event, Spanish parliamentarian Gustavo de Arístegui, has written that those in this alliance, whether secular or religious, view themselves as "legitimate soldiers in an heroic battle within the context of an asymmetrical war of liberation. It is a theory that justifies any kind of violence, including terrorism, if it is used against the most powerful countries, the repressive forces of the West."
This view of the heroism of the actions is in part what gives such a dangerously romantic view of suicide bombings, as espoused in the book Chavez has adopted as official military doctrine: Peripheral Warfare and Revolutionary Islam: Origins, Rules and Ethics of Asymmetrical Warfare (Guerra Periferica y el Islam
Revolucionario: Orígenes, Reglas y Ética de la Guerra Asimétrica) by the Spanish politician and ideologue Jorge Verstrynge. I have written about that more extensively in a previous post.
There is little doubt that this tactical alliance would shatter if either side were to gain significant ground. The Islamists have shown, particularly in the Iranian revolution that was viewed initially by many as triumph of secular, reformist forces, that it will eat the young revolutionaries for lunch.
But for now, the common view of the struggle against the West, bound by a narrative both can offer as an explanation for their actions, is sufficient. The common enemy is there, and the weapons for the struggle can be obtained.
One of the dangers of this narrative is not just the seduction it holds for messianic leaders like Chavez in Venezuela and Ahmadinejad in Iran, but the lure it holds for non-state armed groups like the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), who increasingly find themselves isolated and without a coherent reason to continue the revolution.
Chavez's willingness to embrace and help write this narrative means that he has shared with his allies in the FARC, and why his pro forma protestations of not supporting the revolutionary cause are meaningless, and will remain so. The FARC needs to articulate a reason for its continuation in the armed struggle. The narrative not only offers that, but well-trained allies (Hezbollah particularly) who can help them advance once a common agenda is established. And that is truly alarming.
Sakhr Software Acquires Dial Directions: Launches First Real-Time, Spoken Arabic Translation on iPhone and Blackberry
Sakhr Software, a global leader in advanced Arabic speech and language solutions, today announced that it has acquired Dial Directions, a leading provider of voice-entry technology for mobile devices and services. With Dial Directions’ network-based speech recognition technology and mobile applications expertise, Sakhr Software is set to deliver a new wave of technologies to enable real-time speech to speech translation for Arabic.
For nearly two decades, Sakhr Software has been pioneering and developing the world’s richest knowledge base for Arabic natural language processing (NLP). Sakhr Software has delivered many industry firsts for Arabic NLP, including Optical Character Recognition (OCR), Machine Translation (MT), and search and information mining. More than 100 customers, including the U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the U.S. Department of Justice, use Sakhr Software’s technology to address Arabic language needs. By delivering industry-leading and proven products, Sakhr Software has achieved outstanding financial performance, generating more than $25 million in profits since 2007. The acquisition of Dial Directions will further expand Sakhr’s technology portfolio and market leadership in Arabic language and speech solutions.
"Sakhr’s mission is to develop technology to enable communication across the Arabic language barrier,” said Steve Skancke, president, Sakhr Software USA. “At Dial Directions we found exceptional talent and unique technology, accelerating Sakhr’s ability to develop and deliver the most advanced solutions for our customers and partners.”
"BBN tapped Sakhr Software USA to participate in DARPA's GALE project, because we believe that Sakhr has one of the most advanced Arabic NLP technologies," remarked Dr. John Makhoul, chief scientist, BBN Technologies. "Sakhr's Arabic expertise has been important in helping BBN push the state of the art and achieve the highest accuracy levels for automatic translation from Arabic to English year after year. We are looking forward to what ground-breaking advances Sakhr will bring to our team in the future."
In 2008, Sakhr Software USA and Dial Directions partnered together to develop language application technology for mobile, cloud-computing environments. The companies collaborated to develop a first of its kind open speech-to-speech mobile translation application for the U.S. government and business customers. The solution enables English and Arabic speakers to speak their native language, hear the audio translation, and read the text translation – all with an iPhone or Blackberry.
“I’ve seen Sakhr’s speech to speech mobile translator on the iPhone in action, and it could be a game-changer,” said Hythem El-Nazer, senior vice president, Boston-based TA Associates, a global, leading private equity investor in technology, media, and telecommunications. “Instant, open speech translation on a mobile phone hasn’t been done before now, because it’s simply really hard to do. The accuracy of Sakhr’s NLP combined with Dial Directions’ mobile technology creates a new paradigm for speech to speech translation.”
“We built a strong working relationship with Sakhr while jointly developing the mobile speech to speech translation product,” said Adeeb Shanaa, chief executive officer, Dial Directions. “Through the process it became very clear to us that Sakhr is uniquely positioned to meet growing worldwide market demand for Arabic language. We are proud to now be part of Sakhr, and look forward to continue delivering groundbreaking technology to solve real-world problems.”
All Dial Directions employees have joined Sakhr. The combined company has 200 employees, and will be led by Mr. Shanaa as chief executive officer. Fahad Al Sharekh, Sakhr’s previous chief executive, has become Chairman and remains actively involved in developing strategic partnerships for the company. Sakhr’s management team will be based in Silicon Valley and Washington, DC, with an offshore development office in the Middle East. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
For nearly two decades, Sakhr Software has been pioneering and developing the world’s richest knowledge base for Arabic natural language processing (NLP). Sakhr Software has delivered many industry firsts for Arabic NLP, including Optical Character Recognition (OCR), Machine Translation (MT), and search and information mining. More than 100 customers, including the U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the U.S. Department of Justice, use Sakhr Software’s technology to address Arabic language needs. By delivering industry-leading and proven products, Sakhr Software has achieved outstanding financial performance, generating more than $25 million in profits since 2007. The acquisition of Dial Directions will further expand Sakhr’s technology portfolio and market leadership in Arabic language and speech solutions.
"Sakhr’s mission is to develop technology to enable communication across the Arabic language barrier,” said Steve Skancke, president, Sakhr Software USA. “At Dial Directions we found exceptional talent and unique technology, accelerating Sakhr’s ability to develop and deliver the most advanced solutions for our customers and partners.”
"BBN tapped Sakhr Software USA to participate in DARPA's GALE project, because we believe that Sakhr has one of the most advanced Arabic NLP technologies," remarked Dr. John Makhoul, chief scientist, BBN Technologies. "Sakhr's Arabic expertise has been important in helping BBN push the state of the art and achieve the highest accuracy levels for automatic translation from Arabic to English year after year. We are looking forward to what ground-breaking advances Sakhr will bring to our team in the future."
In 2008, Sakhr Software USA and Dial Directions partnered together to develop language application technology for mobile, cloud-computing environments. The companies collaborated to develop a first of its kind open speech-to-speech mobile translation application for the U.S. government and business customers. The solution enables English and Arabic speakers to speak their native language, hear the audio translation, and read the text translation – all with an iPhone or Blackberry.
“I’ve seen Sakhr’s speech to speech mobile translator on the iPhone in action, and it could be a game-changer,” said Hythem El-Nazer, senior vice president, Boston-based TA Associates, a global, leading private equity investor in technology, media, and telecommunications. “Instant, open speech translation on a mobile phone hasn’t been done before now, because it’s simply really hard to do. The accuracy of Sakhr’s NLP combined with Dial Directions’ mobile technology creates a new paradigm for speech to speech translation.”
“We built a strong working relationship with Sakhr while jointly developing the mobile speech to speech translation product,” said Adeeb Shanaa, chief executive officer, Dial Directions. “Through the process it became very clear to us that Sakhr is uniquely positioned to meet growing worldwide market demand for Arabic language. We are proud to now be part of Sakhr, and look forward to continue delivering groundbreaking technology to solve real-world problems.”
All Dial Directions employees have joined Sakhr. The combined company has 200 employees, and will be led by Mr. Shanaa as chief executive officer. Fahad Al Sharekh, Sakhr’s previous chief executive, has become Chairman and remains actively involved in developing strategic partnerships for the company. Sakhr’s management team will be based in Silicon Valley and Washington, DC, with an offshore development office in the Middle East. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Pakistan Focuses on Islamic Extremism by Ahmed Rashid
Has the Pakistani government, after years of vacillation, finally gotten serious about eliminating the Taliban threat? Maybe.
For the first time since 9/11, Pakistan's army has begun a decisive military offensive to drive the Pakistani Taliban and other extremist groups out of South Waziristan, one of the seven tribal agencies that border Afghanistan.
This offensive follows a successful eight-week campaign to drive the Pakistani Taliban from the Swat Valley, where the army claims to have killed 1,500 militants and lost 134 officers and soldiers.
But it remains to be seen whether the government will be able to overturn the army's longtime support for the Taliban.
I recently interviewed dozens of refugees from the Swat fighting who have swamped this small town in the North-West Frontier Province. Many said they will not return home until the army has removed the Taliban there.
"We watched the army play games for two years, allowing the Taliban to take over the valley, allowing their radio stations to broadcast hate, allowing them to terrorize us," a man from Mingora in the Swat district, told me. "We will go back when the leaders of the Taliban are dead."
The Swat refugees are worried because the government is pressuring them to return home even though not a single Taliban leader was killed in the offensive -- they all managed to escape.
On June 15, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, who leads the army, declared unequivocally that the Taliban chiefs were "not fighting for Islam" and "must be eliminated."
The army has now deployed in South Waziristan, where Baitullah Mehsud, head of the Pakistani Taliban's ruling council, along with Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders are believed to be hiding.
This is hopeful news. But the army will have to take a different path than in the past. Since 2005, the army and its intelligence services have periodically launched offensives against the Taliban along the Afghan border, only to pull back, holding talks and conducting cease-fires.
In the North-West Frontier Province, in the autonomous tribal agencies known as the Federal Administered Tribal Agencies, or FATA, the army has failed to protect pro-government tribal elders and chiefs. More than 300 were executed by the Taliban and Al Qaeda, while hundreds more fled the region with their families. Just recently, a tribal leader who had switched sides from the Taliban to the government was shot dead by the Taliban.
The disappearance of that traditional leadership, which supported Islamic moderation, tribal culture and the code of the Pashtuns, allowed the Taliban to extend its writ over the whole region. Protecting the population, especially those loyal to the government, is the very first lesson in counterinsurgency, but the army failed to apply it in FATA. It cannot afford to make the same mistake in South Waziristan.
The army's offensive in the FATA region is crucial to global security because the area is home to Al Qaeda and numerous allied groups. But it will not be easy. The rugged, mountainous region lacks infrastructure and is now in the hands of the Taliban. The army's paramilitary troops have never won a decisive victory there.
This time, regular troops will be involved too, and U.S. forces on the Afghan side will provide a blocking force to prevent the Taliban from escaping into Afghanistan. But the Taliban and its allies are expected to create a distraction by opening new fronts in Punjab and intensifying suicide-bombing campaigns in Pakistani cities.
A key determiner of success will be the army's attitude toward the Afghan Taliban. After the Taliban was stripped of power in Afghanistan in 2001, the former military regime of President Pervez Musharraf gave refuge to the Afghan Taliban leadership and thousands of fighters. Using bases, recruitment and logistics in Pakistan, they revived their movement in Afghanistan in 2003 and today control much of southern and eastern Afghanistan.
Despite the presence of about 100,000 U.S. and NATO troops, Taliban attacks in Afghanistan have soared by 59% in the first five months of this year compared with the same period last year. In a single week in mid-June, there were more than 400 Taliban attacks -- the largest number ever.
Eliminating the Taliban threat will involve a battle of wills. If the U.S. or NATO falters at this critical juncture, it will be a signal for the Afghan population that the Taliban is winning and that Western forces want out.
In the end, though, it is Pakistan that must commit to eliminating Afghan Taliban leaders who continue living in Pakistan. Destroying their facilities in Pakistan, enforcing a cease-fire during the elections and pressuring them into talks with the Kabul government are just some of the steps that Islamabad can take.
For the army and the fragile civilian government of President Asif Zardari, international support is crucial. So is greater maturity by India, which must revive stalled peace talks with Pakistan on the disputed territory of Kashmir, because reducing the threat along the Indo-Pakistan border would allow Pakistani troops to more fully focus on the Taliban.
The Pakistani public, army and government have suddenly awakened to the Taliban threat. That is a crucial first step. But it will need strong international support to effectively respond.
For the first time since 9/11, Pakistan's army has begun a decisive military offensive to drive the Pakistani Taliban and other extremist groups out of South Waziristan, one of the seven tribal agencies that border Afghanistan.
This offensive follows a successful eight-week campaign to drive the Pakistani Taliban from the Swat Valley, where the army claims to have killed 1,500 militants and lost 134 officers and soldiers.
But it remains to be seen whether the government will be able to overturn the army's longtime support for the Taliban.
I recently interviewed dozens of refugees from the Swat fighting who have swamped this small town in the North-West Frontier Province. Many said they will not return home until the army has removed the Taliban there.
"We watched the army play games for two years, allowing the Taliban to take over the valley, allowing their radio stations to broadcast hate, allowing them to terrorize us," a man from Mingora in the Swat district, told me. "We will go back when the leaders of the Taliban are dead."
The Swat refugees are worried because the government is pressuring them to return home even though not a single Taliban leader was killed in the offensive -- they all managed to escape.
On June 15, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, who leads the army, declared unequivocally that the Taliban chiefs were "not fighting for Islam" and "must be eliminated."
The army has now deployed in South Waziristan, where Baitullah Mehsud, head of the Pakistani Taliban's ruling council, along with Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders are believed to be hiding.
This is hopeful news. But the army will have to take a different path than in the past. Since 2005, the army and its intelligence services have periodically launched offensives against the Taliban along the Afghan border, only to pull back, holding talks and conducting cease-fires.
In the North-West Frontier Province, in the autonomous tribal agencies known as the Federal Administered Tribal Agencies, or FATA, the army has failed to protect pro-government tribal elders and chiefs. More than 300 were executed by the Taliban and Al Qaeda, while hundreds more fled the region with their families. Just recently, a tribal leader who had switched sides from the Taliban to the government was shot dead by the Taliban.
The disappearance of that traditional leadership, which supported Islamic moderation, tribal culture and the code of the Pashtuns, allowed the Taliban to extend its writ over the whole region. Protecting the population, especially those loyal to the government, is the very first lesson in counterinsurgency, but the army failed to apply it in FATA. It cannot afford to make the same mistake in South Waziristan.
The army's offensive in the FATA region is crucial to global security because the area is home to Al Qaeda and numerous allied groups. But it will not be easy. The rugged, mountainous region lacks infrastructure and is now in the hands of the Taliban. The army's paramilitary troops have never won a decisive victory there.
This time, regular troops will be involved too, and U.S. forces on the Afghan side will provide a blocking force to prevent the Taliban from escaping into Afghanistan. But the Taliban and its allies are expected to create a distraction by opening new fronts in Punjab and intensifying suicide-bombing campaigns in Pakistani cities.
A key determiner of success will be the army's attitude toward the Afghan Taliban. After the Taliban was stripped of power in Afghanistan in 2001, the former military regime of President Pervez Musharraf gave refuge to the Afghan Taliban leadership and thousands of fighters. Using bases, recruitment and logistics in Pakistan, they revived their movement in Afghanistan in 2003 and today control much of southern and eastern Afghanistan.
Despite the presence of about 100,000 U.S. and NATO troops, Taliban attacks in Afghanistan have soared by 59% in the first five months of this year compared with the same period last year. In a single week in mid-June, there were more than 400 Taliban attacks -- the largest number ever.
Eliminating the Taliban threat will involve a battle of wills. If the U.S. or NATO falters at this critical juncture, it will be a signal for the Afghan population that the Taliban is winning and that Western forces want out.
In the end, though, it is Pakistan that must commit to eliminating Afghan Taliban leaders who continue living in Pakistan. Destroying their facilities in Pakistan, enforcing a cease-fire during the elections and pressuring them into talks with the Kabul government are just some of the steps that Islamabad can take.
For the army and the fragile civilian government of President Asif Zardari, international support is crucial. So is greater maturity by India, which must revive stalled peace talks with Pakistan on the disputed territory of Kashmir, because reducing the threat along the Indo-Pakistan border would allow Pakistani troops to more fully focus on the Taliban.
The Pakistani public, army and government have suddenly awakened to the Taliban threat. That is a crucial first step. But it will need strong international support to effectively respond.
US seeks European funds, troops for Afghanistan by Patrick Rahir Patrick Rahir
Europe must commit more funds and troops to stabilise Afghanistan after the August presidential elections, the US envoy to NATO Ivo Daalder said Wednesday.
"The US is doing its part -- Europe and Germany can and should do more," Daalder told a conference on transatlantic relations in Berlin.
"Additional troops (sent to Afghanistan to provide security during the elections) must stay after the elections."
Daalder said the United States estimated 17 billion dollars was needed to train and equip the Afghan army and two billion dollars per year to sustain it.
"There is no way Afghanistan can pay for its force," he said, noting that the Afghan government had taken in about 750 million dollars in revenues last year.
He said the United States would pay 5.5 billion dollars this year and 7.5 billion dollars next year but said it was crucial that Europe make up the difference.
"This is a weakness in our effort that we cannot afford," he said, adding that more training for Afghan police was also essential.
Daalder noted that the United States had consulted with European allies "for two months" in redefining its strategy in Afghanistan and incorporated several of their demands including a stronger focus on reconstruction and diplomacy.
He said it was now up to the allies to reciprocate by stepping up to the plate.
The German government's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Bernd Muetzelburg, acknowledged at the conference that Europe had a bigger role to play but that financial constraints made this difficult to realise.
"Obviously the Europeans will have to do more," he said. "In this financial crisis it is not going to be easy."
Between 8,000 and 10,000 international troops are to join the around 60,000-strong NATO-led military force in Afghanistan for August 20 presidential elections, the alliance has said.
NATO recently launched an anti-insurgent drive to dislodge Taliban militants from their strongholds ahead of the polls.
The insurgency has gained pace in recent weeks, raising fears for the security of Afghanistan's second ever presidential ballot.
There are about 90,000 foreign troops -- mostly from the United States -- stationed in Afghanistan to battle the Taliban and help train Afghan forces.
The polls, for president and provincial councils, are seen as a test of international efforts to help spread democracy in Afghanistan, but they come as Taliban-led violence has reached record highs there.
Thousands of mostly US troops are moving in to provide security for the elections and to reinforce the turbulent south, a Taliban stronghold.
In remarks published Wednesday, NATO's outgoing top commander, General John Craddock, had a few parting shots for Europe as he formally handed over his post, criticising the continent's engagement in Afghanistan.
The US general told Germany's Stuttgarter Zeitung that European leaders often used critical public opinion "as an excuse not to forge ahead" in hotspots such as Afghanistan.
Taking aim in particular at Germany's mandate in Afghanistan which places restrictions on the use of military force, Craddock said: "Unfortunately we have far too many limitations in Afghanistan," in remarks published in German.
He said the debate over the use of military force was often driven by opinion polls among voters "regardless of whether they are informed or not."
"The US is doing its part -- Europe and Germany can and should do more," Daalder told a conference on transatlantic relations in Berlin.
"Additional troops (sent to Afghanistan to provide security during the elections) must stay after the elections."
Daalder said the United States estimated 17 billion dollars was needed to train and equip the Afghan army and two billion dollars per year to sustain it.
"There is no way Afghanistan can pay for its force," he said, noting that the Afghan government had taken in about 750 million dollars in revenues last year.
He said the United States would pay 5.5 billion dollars this year and 7.5 billion dollars next year but said it was crucial that Europe make up the difference.
"This is a weakness in our effort that we cannot afford," he said, adding that more training for Afghan police was also essential.
Daalder noted that the United States had consulted with European allies "for two months" in redefining its strategy in Afghanistan and incorporated several of their demands including a stronger focus on reconstruction and diplomacy.
He said it was now up to the allies to reciprocate by stepping up to the plate.
The German government's special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Bernd Muetzelburg, acknowledged at the conference that Europe had a bigger role to play but that financial constraints made this difficult to realise.
"Obviously the Europeans will have to do more," he said. "In this financial crisis it is not going to be easy."
Between 8,000 and 10,000 international troops are to join the around 60,000-strong NATO-led military force in Afghanistan for August 20 presidential elections, the alliance has said.
NATO recently launched an anti-insurgent drive to dislodge Taliban militants from their strongholds ahead of the polls.
The insurgency has gained pace in recent weeks, raising fears for the security of Afghanistan's second ever presidential ballot.
There are about 90,000 foreign troops -- mostly from the United States -- stationed in Afghanistan to battle the Taliban and help train Afghan forces.
The polls, for president and provincial councils, are seen as a test of international efforts to help spread democracy in Afghanistan, but they come as Taliban-led violence has reached record highs there.
Thousands of mostly US troops are moving in to provide security for the elections and to reinforce the turbulent south, a Taliban stronghold.
In remarks published Wednesday, NATO's outgoing top commander, General John Craddock, had a few parting shots for Europe as he formally handed over his post, criticising the continent's engagement in Afghanistan.
The US general told Germany's Stuttgarter Zeitung that European leaders often used critical public opinion "as an excuse not to forge ahead" in hotspots such as Afghanistan.
Taking aim in particular at Germany's mandate in Afghanistan which places restrictions on the use of military force, Craddock said: "Unfortunately we have far too many limitations in Afghanistan," in remarks published in German.
He said the debate over the use of military force was often driven by opinion polls among voters "regardless of whether they are informed or not."
Monday, June 29, 2009
Obama and Cyber Defense (Private Sector + Public Sector + Military Sector) by L. Gordon Crovitz
In a Monty Python skit from 1970, the Vercotti brothers, wearing Mafia suits and dark glasses, approach a colonel in a British military barracks. "You've got a nice army base here, Colonel," says Luigi Vercotti. "We wouldn't want anything to happen to it." Dino explains, "My brother and I have got a little proposition for you, Colonel," and Luigi elaborates, "We can guarantee you that not a single armored division will get done over for 15 bob a week."
If the idea of the military having to pay protection money to the mob seems silly, imagine what Monty Python could do with last week's White House decision on security. It announced a new "Cyber Command" to protect information infrastructure, but stipulated that the military is allowed to protect only itself, not the civilian Internet or other key communications networks. When President Barack Obama announced the plan, he stressed that it "will not -- I repeat -- will not -- include monitoring private-sector networks or Internet traffic." It's like telling the military if there's another 9/11 to protect the Pentagon but not the World Trade Center.
The announcement shows that our political system is still ambivalent about how to defend communications networks such as the Internet. We expect privacy, but we know that intrusive techniques are required to protect the system from cyber attacks. How to balance privacy with preventing attacks that would undermine the system altogether?
It's an open secret that the National Security Agency (NSA) must operate through civilian networks inside the U.S. in order to prevent millions of cyber attacks every year by foreign governments, terror groups and hackers. Likewise, the NSA must follow leads through computer networks that run through innocent countries. "How do you understand sovereignty in the cyber domain?" asked James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in a recent speech. "It doesn't tend to pay a lot of attention to geographic borders."
The risks are real. Cyber attacks on Estonia and Georgia by Russia in recent years forced government, banking, media and other Web sites offline. In the U.S., the public Web, air-traffic control systems and telecommunications services have all been attacked. Congressional offices have been told that China has broken into their computers. Both China and Russia were caught having infiltrated the U.S. electric-power grid, leaving behind software code to be used to disrupt the system. The risk of attacks to create massive power outages is so serious that the best option could be unplugging the U.S. power grid from the Internet.
The military is far ahead of civilian agencies such as Homeland Security and is now focused on cyber offense as well as defense. Cyberspace, says Gen. Kevin P. Chilton, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, is the new "domain," joining the traditional domains of air, land and sea. Each is a focus for both defense and attack. The U.S., a decade behind China, is now officially focused on using cyber warfare offensively as well as defensively.
The U.S. is an inventive nation, so we'll get to the right answer on security if we ask the right questions. What if the only way the military can block a cyber attack is to monitor domestic use of the Web, since foreigners use the Web to launch cyber attacks? What is a "reasonable" search in a virtual world such as a global communication network? What's the proper response to cyber attacks?
If cyber war is a new form of war, wouldn't most Americans adjust their expectations of reasonable privacy to permit the Pentagon to intrude to some degree on their communications, if this is necessary to prevent great harm and if rules protecting anonymity can be established? Finally, wouldn't it be better for politicians to encourage a frank discussion about these issues before a significant attack occurs instead of pretending there are no trade-offs?
Only the NSA, which operates within the Defense Department, has the expertise to protect all U.S. networks. It has somehow found ways to mine needed data despite pre-Web rules that restrict its activities domestically. But the question remains: How can the military get enough access to private, domestic networks to protect them while still ensuring as much privacy as possible? One logical approach is for Homeland Security to delegate domestic defense to the NSA, but for the domestic agency to maintain enough responsibility to have political accountability if privacy rights get violated in the process.
We'll look back on the current era, with the military constrained from defending vital domestic interests, as an artifact of an era when it was easy to point to what was foreign and what was domestic. In the digital world, as the cyber threat shows, physical distinctions such as political borders are unhelpful and can be dangerously confusing.
If the idea of the military having to pay protection money to the mob seems silly, imagine what Monty Python could do with last week's White House decision on security. It announced a new "Cyber Command" to protect information infrastructure, but stipulated that the military is allowed to protect only itself, not the civilian Internet or other key communications networks. When President Barack Obama announced the plan, he stressed that it "will not -- I repeat -- will not -- include monitoring private-sector networks or Internet traffic." It's like telling the military if there's another 9/11 to protect the Pentagon but not the World Trade Center.
The announcement shows that our political system is still ambivalent about how to defend communications networks such as the Internet. We expect privacy, but we know that intrusive techniques are required to protect the system from cyber attacks. How to balance privacy with preventing attacks that would undermine the system altogether?
It's an open secret that the National Security Agency (NSA) must operate through civilian networks inside the U.S. in order to prevent millions of cyber attacks every year by foreign governments, terror groups and hackers. Likewise, the NSA must follow leads through computer networks that run through innocent countries. "How do you understand sovereignty in the cyber domain?" asked James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in a recent speech. "It doesn't tend to pay a lot of attention to geographic borders."
The risks are real. Cyber attacks on Estonia and Georgia by Russia in recent years forced government, banking, media and other Web sites offline. In the U.S., the public Web, air-traffic control systems and telecommunications services have all been attacked. Congressional offices have been told that China has broken into their computers. Both China and Russia were caught having infiltrated the U.S. electric-power grid, leaving behind software code to be used to disrupt the system. The risk of attacks to create massive power outages is so serious that the best option could be unplugging the U.S. power grid from the Internet.
The military is far ahead of civilian agencies such as Homeland Security and is now focused on cyber offense as well as defense. Cyberspace, says Gen. Kevin P. Chilton, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, is the new "domain," joining the traditional domains of air, land and sea. Each is a focus for both defense and attack. The U.S., a decade behind China, is now officially focused on using cyber warfare offensively as well as defensively.
The U.S. is an inventive nation, so we'll get to the right answer on security if we ask the right questions. What if the only way the military can block a cyber attack is to monitor domestic use of the Web, since foreigners use the Web to launch cyber attacks? What is a "reasonable" search in a virtual world such as a global communication network? What's the proper response to cyber attacks?
If cyber war is a new form of war, wouldn't most Americans adjust their expectations of reasonable privacy to permit the Pentagon to intrude to some degree on their communications, if this is necessary to prevent great harm and if rules protecting anonymity can be established? Finally, wouldn't it be better for politicians to encourage a frank discussion about these issues before a significant attack occurs instead of pretending there are no trade-offs?
Only the NSA, which operates within the Defense Department, has the expertise to protect all U.S. networks. It has somehow found ways to mine needed data despite pre-Web rules that restrict its activities domestically. But the question remains: How can the military get enough access to private, domestic networks to protect them while still ensuring as much privacy as possible? One logical approach is for Homeland Security to delegate domestic defense to the NSA, but for the domestic agency to maintain enough responsibility to have political accountability if privacy rights get violated in the process.
We'll look back on the current era, with the military constrained from defending vital domestic interests, as an artifact of an era when it was easy to point to what was foreign and what was domestic. In the digital world, as the cyber threat shows, physical distinctions such as political borders are unhelpful and can be dangerously confusing.
Reform Needs Healthy Life Incentives by Scott E. Harrington
Much of the debate over health-care reform has focused on whether there should be a government insurance plan to compete with private plans. This focus is understandable given the stakes. Because equal competition between a public insurer and private plans is impossible, public coverage would crowd out private coverage and make a public, single-payer system inevitable.
Another important issue is the scope of regulation that will likely apply to private health plans regardless of whether a public plan is created.
Given budgetary and affordability concerns, the insurance market proposals by House Democrats and Sens. Edward Kennedy and Chris Dodd would permit some variation among plan benefits and cost-sharing provisions, such as deductibles and coinsurance percentages. The proposals otherwise would impose a regulatory straightjacket that would put upward pressure on health costs, thus undermining a major reform objective and creating additional pressure for government-mandated cost controls. Whether legislation being developed by Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus will go as far isn't clear.
The House Democrat and Kennedy-Dodd proposals do all they can to prevent health-insurance premium rates and coverage terms from reflecting the health status -- and thus health-related behavior -- of any insured person. Health status would not be permitted to affect coverage decisions, terms or pricing. Age-related variation in premium rates would also be significantly constrained in relation to risk.
Benefit design and marketing of coverage would be regulated in an attempt to keep insurers from rewarding healthier people. Retrospective "risk adjustment" would be employed to reallocate funds from insurers that experience lower medical costs to those with higher costs. If an insurer were to attract relatively more healthy people -- or keep more people healthy -- it would run the risk of paying some or all of the gains to competitors.
The proposals' strong aversion to having insurance rates or coverage terms related to health status reflects the view that either the need for health care is immune from individual control, or that a person should not be financially responsible for behavior that contributes to poor health, or both. These views are difficult to reconcile with the consensus that unhealthy behavior contributes significantly to obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer, and thus accounts for a substantial proportion of health-care costs.
Regulation that seeks to divorce insurance rates and coverage terms from health status would deter potential innovation that might provide meaningful financial incentives for healthy behavior and lower costs.
Incentives for healthy behavior have traditionally been weak under employer-sponsored health insurance, in part due to federal and state regulation that constrains the ability to reward healthy behavior. Turnover among employees and policy holders also reduces incentives to make long-term investments to promote healthy behavior.
Health-care reform should seek to encourage rather than discourage private innovation to provide incentives for healthy behavior. Safeway's program offering employee premium discounts related to tobacco use, weight control, blood pressure and cholesterol levels is a good example.
The Democratic proposals would retard or even strangle such innovation. Rather than strengthening incentives to invest in the long-term health of policy holders, they would make it more difficult to earn a reasonable return on such investment. They also send a message that a healthy lifestyle earns no financial reward for reducing medical expenses.
Financial incentives for healthy behavior have the potential to significantly reduce costs without reducing quality. A failure of health-care reform to permit or incorporate such incentives would make coercive government measures to control costs more likely. These controls might include limits on provider reimbursement, comparative-effectiveness or cost-benefit criteria that must be met for care to be reimbursed, or budget caps. The results would be less health -- more obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer -- and eventually less health care.
An aversion to having health-insurance rates and coverage linked to individual behavior may be on the verge of becoming national policy. If that happens, the unintended consequences could be very costly.
Another important issue is the scope of regulation that will likely apply to private health plans regardless of whether a public plan is created.
Given budgetary and affordability concerns, the insurance market proposals by House Democrats and Sens. Edward Kennedy and Chris Dodd would permit some variation among plan benefits and cost-sharing provisions, such as deductibles and coinsurance percentages. The proposals otherwise would impose a regulatory straightjacket that would put upward pressure on health costs, thus undermining a major reform objective and creating additional pressure for government-mandated cost controls. Whether legislation being developed by Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus will go as far isn't clear.
The House Democrat and Kennedy-Dodd proposals do all they can to prevent health-insurance premium rates and coverage terms from reflecting the health status -- and thus health-related behavior -- of any insured person. Health status would not be permitted to affect coverage decisions, terms or pricing. Age-related variation in premium rates would also be significantly constrained in relation to risk.
Benefit design and marketing of coverage would be regulated in an attempt to keep insurers from rewarding healthier people. Retrospective "risk adjustment" would be employed to reallocate funds from insurers that experience lower medical costs to those with higher costs. If an insurer were to attract relatively more healthy people -- or keep more people healthy -- it would run the risk of paying some or all of the gains to competitors.
The proposals' strong aversion to having insurance rates or coverage terms related to health status reflects the view that either the need for health care is immune from individual control, or that a person should not be financially responsible for behavior that contributes to poor health, or both. These views are difficult to reconcile with the consensus that unhealthy behavior contributes significantly to obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer, and thus accounts for a substantial proportion of health-care costs.
Regulation that seeks to divorce insurance rates and coverage terms from health status would deter potential innovation that might provide meaningful financial incentives for healthy behavior and lower costs.
Incentives for healthy behavior have traditionally been weak under employer-sponsored health insurance, in part due to federal and state regulation that constrains the ability to reward healthy behavior. Turnover among employees and policy holders also reduces incentives to make long-term investments to promote healthy behavior.
Health-care reform should seek to encourage rather than discourage private innovation to provide incentives for healthy behavior. Safeway's program offering employee premium discounts related to tobacco use, weight control, blood pressure and cholesterol levels is a good example.
The Democratic proposals would retard or even strangle such innovation. Rather than strengthening incentives to invest in the long-term health of policy holders, they would make it more difficult to earn a reasonable return on such investment. They also send a message that a healthy lifestyle earns no financial reward for reducing medical expenses.
Financial incentives for healthy behavior have the potential to significantly reduce costs without reducing quality. A failure of health-care reform to permit or incorporate such incentives would make coercive government measures to control costs more likely. These controls might include limits on provider reimbursement, comparative-effectiveness or cost-benefit criteria that must be met for care to be reimbursed, or budget caps. The results would be less health -- more obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer -- and eventually less health care.
An aversion to having health-insurance rates and coverage linked to individual behavior may be on the verge of becoming national policy. If that happens, the unintended consequences could be very costly.
Our Decaying Nuclear Deterrent by Jon Kyl and Richard Perle
A bipartisan congressional commission, headed by some of our most experienced national security practitioners, recently concluded that a nuclear deterrent is essential to our defense for the foreseeable future. It also recommended that urgent measures be taken to keep that deterrent safe and effective.
Unfortunately, President Barack Obama has adopted an agenda that runs counter to the commission's recommendations.
Consider the president's declaration, in a major speech this spring in Prague, of "America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons." Will such a world be peaceful and secure? It is far from self-evident.
In the nuclear-free world that ended in 1945 there was neither peace nor security. Since then there have indeed been many wars but none has come close to the carnage that occurred regularly before the development of nuclear weapons, and none has pitted nuclear powers against each other.
Consider also that while the administration accepts the urgency of halting the spread of nuclear weapons, the policies it has embraced to reach that goal are likely to make matters worse.
Thus, in his Prague speech, Mr. Obama announced that the U.S. would "immediately and aggressively" pursue ratification of the comprehensive ban on the testing of nuclear weapons. The administration believes, without evidence, that ratification of the test-ban treaty will discourage other countries from developing nuclear weapons.
Which countries does it have in mind? Iran? North Korea? Syria? Countries alarmed by the nuclear ambitions of their enemies? Allies who may one day lose confidence in our nuclear umbrella?
There are good reasons why the test-ban treaty has not been ratified. The attempt to do so in 1999 failed in the Senate, mostly out of concerns about verification -- it simply is not verifiable. It also failed because of an understandable reluctance on the part of the U.S. Senate to forgo forever a test program that could in the future be of critical importance for our defense and the defense of our allies.
Robert Gates, who is now Mr. Obama's own secretary of defense, warned in a speech last October that in the absence of a nuclear modernization program, even the most modest of which Congress has repeatedly declined to fund, "[a]t a certain point, it will become impossible to keep extending the life of our arsenal, especially in light of our testing moratorium." Suppose future problems in our nuclear arsenal emerge that cannot be solved without testing? Would our predicament discourage nuclear proliferation -- or stimulate it?
For the foreseeable future, the U.S. and many of our allies rely on our nuclear deterrent. And as long as the U.S. possesses nuclear weapons, they must be -- as Mr. Obama recognized in Prague -- "safe, secure and effective." Yet his proposed 2010 budget fails to take the necessary steps to do that.
Those steps have been studied extensively by the Perry-Schlesinger Commission (named for co-chairmen William Perry, secretary of defense under President Bill Clinton, and James R. Schlesinger, secretary of defense under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford). Its consensus report, released in May, makes numerous recommendations to increase the funding for, and improve the effectiveness of, the deteriorating nuclear weapons laboratory complex (e.g., the Los Alamos facility in New Mexico, the Pantex plant in Texas, and the dangerously neglected Y-12 plant in Tennessee) that has become the soft underbelly of our deterrent force.
The commission also assessed the nuclear weapons infrastructure that is essential to a safe, secure and effective deterrent and declared it "in serious need of transformation." It looked at our laboratory-based scientific and technical expertise and concluded that "the intellectual infrastructure" is in "serious trouble." A major cause is woefully inadequate funding. The commission rightly argued that we must "exercise the full range of laboratory skills, including nuclear weapon design skills . . . Skills that are not exercised will atrophy." The president and the Congress must heed these recommendations.
There are some who believe that failing to invest adequately in our nuclear deterrent will move us closer to a nuclear free world. In fact, blocking crucial modernization means unilateral disarmament by unilateral obsolescence. This unilateral disarmament will only encourage nuclear proliferation, since our allies will see the danger and our adversaries the opportunity.
By neglecting -- and in some cases even opposing -- essential modernization programs, arms-control proponents are actually undermining the prospect for further reductions of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. As our nuclear weapons stockpile ages and concern about its reliability increases, we will have to compensate by retaining more nuclear weapons than would otherwise be the case. This reality will necessarily influence future arms-control negotiations, beginning with the upcoming Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty follow-on.
For these negotiations, the Russians are insisting on a false linkage between nuclear weapons and missile defenses. They are demanding that we abandon defenses against North Korean or Iranian missiles as a condition for mutual reductions in American and Russian strategic forces. As the president cuts the budget for missile defense and cedes ground to the Russians on our planned defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, we may end up abandoning a needed defense of the U.S. and our European allies from the looming Iranian threat.
There is a fashionable notion that if only we and the Russians reduced our nuclear forces, other nations would reduce their existing arsenals or abandon plans to acquire nuclear weapons altogether. This idea, an article of faith of the "soft power" approach to halting nuclear proliferation, assumes that the nuclear ambitions of Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would be curtailed or abandoned in response to reductions in the American and Russian deterrent forces -- or that India, Pakistan or China would respond with reductions of their own.
This is dangerous, wishful thinking. If we were to approach zero nuclear weapons today, others would almost certainly try even harder to catapult to superpower status by acquiring a bomb or two. A robust American nuclear force is an essential discouragement to nuclear proliferators; a weak or uncertain force just the opposite.
George Shultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn have, on this page, endorsed the distant goal -- about which we remain skeptical -- of a nuclear-free world. But none of them argues for getting there by neglecting our present nuclear deterrent. The Perry-Schlesinger Commission has provided a path for protecting that deterrent. Congress and the president should follow it, without delay.
Unfortunately, President Barack Obama has adopted an agenda that runs counter to the commission's recommendations.
Consider the president's declaration, in a major speech this spring in Prague, of "America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons." Will such a world be peaceful and secure? It is far from self-evident.
In the nuclear-free world that ended in 1945 there was neither peace nor security. Since then there have indeed been many wars but none has come close to the carnage that occurred regularly before the development of nuclear weapons, and none has pitted nuclear powers against each other.
Consider also that while the administration accepts the urgency of halting the spread of nuclear weapons, the policies it has embraced to reach that goal are likely to make matters worse.
Thus, in his Prague speech, Mr. Obama announced that the U.S. would "immediately and aggressively" pursue ratification of the comprehensive ban on the testing of nuclear weapons. The administration believes, without evidence, that ratification of the test-ban treaty will discourage other countries from developing nuclear weapons.
Which countries does it have in mind? Iran? North Korea? Syria? Countries alarmed by the nuclear ambitions of their enemies? Allies who may one day lose confidence in our nuclear umbrella?
There are good reasons why the test-ban treaty has not been ratified. The attempt to do so in 1999 failed in the Senate, mostly out of concerns about verification -- it simply is not verifiable. It also failed because of an understandable reluctance on the part of the U.S. Senate to forgo forever a test program that could in the future be of critical importance for our defense and the defense of our allies.
Robert Gates, who is now Mr. Obama's own secretary of defense, warned in a speech last October that in the absence of a nuclear modernization program, even the most modest of which Congress has repeatedly declined to fund, "[a]t a certain point, it will become impossible to keep extending the life of our arsenal, especially in light of our testing moratorium." Suppose future problems in our nuclear arsenal emerge that cannot be solved without testing? Would our predicament discourage nuclear proliferation -- or stimulate it?
For the foreseeable future, the U.S. and many of our allies rely on our nuclear deterrent. And as long as the U.S. possesses nuclear weapons, they must be -- as Mr. Obama recognized in Prague -- "safe, secure and effective." Yet his proposed 2010 budget fails to take the necessary steps to do that.
Those steps have been studied extensively by the Perry-Schlesinger Commission (named for co-chairmen William Perry, secretary of defense under President Bill Clinton, and James R. Schlesinger, secretary of defense under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford). Its consensus report, released in May, makes numerous recommendations to increase the funding for, and improve the effectiveness of, the deteriorating nuclear weapons laboratory complex (e.g., the Los Alamos facility in New Mexico, the Pantex plant in Texas, and the dangerously neglected Y-12 plant in Tennessee) that has become the soft underbelly of our deterrent force.
The commission also assessed the nuclear weapons infrastructure that is essential to a safe, secure and effective deterrent and declared it "in serious need of transformation." It looked at our laboratory-based scientific and technical expertise and concluded that "the intellectual infrastructure" is in "serious trouble." A major cause is woefully inadequate funding. The commission rightly argued that we must "exercise the full range of laboratory skills, including nuclear weapon design skills . . . Skills that are not exercised will atrophy." The president and the Congress must heed these recommendations.
There are some who believe that failing to invest adequately in our nuclear deterrent will move us closer to a nuclear free world. In fact, blocking crucial modernization means unilateral disarmament by unilateral obsolescence. This unilateral disarmament will only encourage nuclear proliferation, since our allies will see the danger and our adversaries the opportunity.
By neglecting -- and in some cases even opposing -- essential modernization programs, arms-control proponents are actually undermining the prospect for further reductions of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. As our nuclear weapons stockpile ages and concern about its reliability increases, we will have to compensate by retaining more nuclear weapons than would otherwise be the case. This reality will necessarily influence future arms-control negotiations, beginning with the upcoming Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty follow-on.
For these negotiations, the Russians are insisting on a false linkage between nuclear weapons and missile defenses. They are demanding that we abandon defenses against North Korean or Iranian missiles as a condition for mutual reductions in American and Russian strategic forces. As the president cuts the budget for missile defense and cedes ground to the Russians on our planned defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, we may end up abandoning a needed defense of the U.S. and our European allies from the looming Iranian threat.
There is a fashionable notion that if only we and the Russians reduced our nuclear forces, other nations would reduce their existing arsenals or abandon plans to acquire nuclear weapons altogether. This idea, an article of faith of the "soft power" approach to halting nuclear proliferation, assumes that the nuclear ambitions of Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would be curtailed or abandoned in response to reductions in the American and Russian deterrent forces -- or that India, Pakistan or China would respond with reductions of their own.
This is dangerous, wishful thinking. If we were to approach zero nuclear weapons today, others would almost certainly try even harder to catapult to superpower status by acquiring a bomb or two. A robust American nuclear force is an essential discouragement to nuclear proliferators; a weak or uncertain force just the opposite.
George Shultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn have, on this page, endorsed the distant goal -- about which we remain skeptical -- of a nuclear-free world. But none of them argues for getting there by neglecting our present nuclear deterrent. The Perry-Schlesinger Commission has provided a path for protecting that deterrent. Congress and the president should follow it, without delay.
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