RUTHFULLY YOURS

The Obama State Department is convinced that Syrian dictator Bashar Assad and his regime’s cronies are financing terrorism. How come? Well, because they conduct business in cash.

In fact, in its most recent annual report on state sponsors of terrorism, State frets “that 60 percent of all business transactions [in Syria] are conducted in cash and that nearly 80 percent of all Syrians do not use formal banking services.” This has created a “vast black market,” the components of which are exploited by “some members of the Syrian government and the business elite . . . in terrorism finance schemes.”

Interesting thing about that: There are only three countries on the list of state sponsors of terrorism — Syria, Sudan, and Iran. That last one is worth highlighting. Iran, after all, is not just the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism; it is also the world’s leading state sponsor of . . . Syria — providing it with lots of that cash the State Department is so concerned about.

Oh, I nearly forgot: Iran also happens to be the jihadist regime that President Obama just gave $1.7 billion to . . . in cash.

Or should I say, at least $1.7 billion.

It is hard to decide what is the most appalling thing about Obama’s $1.7 billion payoff to the mullahs: the ransom for the release of American hostages, which has predictably induced Tehran to take more hostages; the pallets of untraceable currency loaded on multiple planes of the national airline regularly used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to arm Assad and facilitate terror; the withdrawals from a shadowy Treasury Department fund structured in a manner designed to conceal that money was being transferred to Iran. The transaction is so shocking, one can easily forget that it is just the latest in a long series of payoffs.

CIA Director: Terrorism a ‘Distorted Interpretation of Various Religious Faiths’ By Bridget Johnson

WASHINGTON — CIA Director John Brennan said this week that terrorist groups “have been unfortunately successful in attracting individuals to their distorted ideology and distorted interpretation of various religious faiths” largely due to lacking political and economic reforms in many countries.

“There are a lot, a lot of opportunities for these terrorist groups to capitalize on those problems and issues. To me, I’d like to think that, you know, the United States has demonstrated, through the course of time, that we take very seriously the obligation and responsibilities that go along with what I refer to as American exceptionalism,” Brennan said at a Center for Strategic and International Studies forum Wednesday marking the 10th anniversary of the Justice Department’s National Security Division.

“My definition of American exceptionalism may be different than others,” he added. “I don’t think that we as people are better than others. I think that we as a country, though, have been tremendously fortunate and blessed to have the resources, the people, we’re the world’s melting pot. We are, without a doubt, the world’s superpower.”

Brennan said he wished the U.S. had “that magic wand” to resolve issues like the Syrian war.

“And despite the challenges that we still face there, good on the United States for trying… Unfortunately, there are individuals who opt for violence and militarism as a way to push forward their agendas and to try to achieve their aims, again, which are perversions of religious faiths.”

The CIA chief said President Obama is an “exceptionally quick study” and “would always want to be asking questions about what it is that we know and with a lawyer’s mind” during presidential briefings.

At the moderator’s urging, Brennan reflected on “Underwear Bomber” Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who tried to down a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. Leon Panetta was in charge of the agency at the time; Brennan was Obama’s homeland security advisor.

“I can vividly recall getting the call at home at about, I forget what it was, maybe noon or 11:00 on Christmas Day when I was preparing the Christmas dinner for my family,” Brennan said. “And all of a sudden we found out that somebody — somebody’s underwear was on fire on a plane in Detroit and there may be something to this.”

The Navy’s newest and most technologically advanced surface ship, future USS Zumwalt (DDG 1000) pulled into Naval Station Norfolk Wednesday for another port visit on the 3-month journey to its new homeport in San Diego.

Crewed by 147 Sailors, Zumwalt is the lead ship of a class of next-generation multi-mission destroyers designed to strengthen naval power. They are capable of performing critical maritime missions and enhance the Navy’s ability to provide deterrence, power projection and sea control.

Capt. James A. Kirk, Zumwalt’s commanding officer, commented on the significance of the ship’s visit to Norfolk.

“It is a great opportunity to bring Zumwalt to Norfolk, an area steeped in naval history and ever vital to the U.S. Navy,” said Kirk. “It is a chance for the Sailors of Zumwalt to show their Atlantic Coast shipmates the teamwork, technical expertise and toughness it takes to operate a Zumwalt-class destroyer.”

While in Norfolk, Zumwalt is scheduled to perform operational proficiency training, certifications and preparation for its October commissioning.

“Training is the foundation of every operation we perform in the Navy, and it is our job to ensure we use the time in Norfolk to get as much quality training as we can. Successful training pays dividends for Sailors out at sea,” said Kirk.

Zumwalt departed Newport, R.I., Monday following a weekend of visits from students of several Navy schools, including the Naval War College, and distinguished government and military visitors.

“Our first ever port visit was to Newport, or the U.S. Navy’s surface warfare center of gravity, where we were able to host tours and give our schoolhouse surface warfare officers and other distinguished guests a look at the future of the surface fleet,” said Kirk.

USS Zumwalt will be formally commissioned during Fleet Week Maryland in Baltimore, Oct. 15.

Last week North Korea conducted its fifth nuclear test, this one a 10-kiloton, miniaturized warhead that can be put on a missile. If North Korean claims are true, this successful test, along with the 20 long-range missile tests conducted this year, shows that a rogue thug state is on the brink of being able to send a nuclear-tipped missile as far as Chicago. President Obama responded with the usual empty diplomatic bluster, threatening “additional significant steps, including new sanctions to demonstrate to North Korea that there are consequences to its unlawful and dangerous actions.” Once again, the magical thinking of international diplomacy puts our national interests and security in mortal danger.

We’re well beyond a century’s worth of the delusional idealism of what historian Corelli Barnett calls “moralizing internationalism.” This is the notion that non-violent diplomatic “engagement,” economic sanctions, and transnational covenants and institutions like the U.N. can deter or stop aggression without a credible threat to use force.

A particularly surreal version of this stubborn belief appeared in early 1914, in the British National Peace Council Peace Yearbook:

Peace, the babe of the nineteenth century, is the strong youth of the twentieth century; for War, the product of anarchy and fear, is passing away under the growing and persistent pressure of world organization, economic necessity, human intercourse, and that change of spirit, that social sense and newer aspect of worldwide life which is the insistent note, the Zeitgeist of the age.

A few months later the world exploded into the gruesome carnage wrought by trench warfare, machine guns, poison gas, and a billion artillery shells fired. Despite that horrific lesson, the victors, still in thrall to the same internationalist delusions, created the League of Nations. The League spent twenty years in diplomatic chatter, feeble sanctions, and feckless appeasement that culminated in 60 million dead in World War II. Followed, of course by the creation of the U.N., yet another feckless and corrupt manifestation of historical amnesia.

Seventy years later we still haven’t learned anything. The history of the West’s attempts to keep North Korea from acquiring a nuclear weapon is a depressing chronicle of diplomatic failure. Consider just two years of that history:

The Obama administration finally admitted that, in addition to the $400 million in foreign currency secretly flown to Iran on January 17, 2016, it also sent Iran two more planeloads of $1.3 billion in cash over the following 19 days.

Since these payments coincided with the release of four Americans illegally held by Iran, they have been widely condemned as ransom. The Obama administration disputes this and claims that the payments were to settle a U.S. debt to Iran incurred during the rule of the Shah. However, after initially insisting there was no link between the $400 million payment and the release of the Americans, the administration said on August 18 that it delayed this payment as leverage to ensure that Iran would release the U.S. prisoners.

The additional payments were an open secret in Washington ever since an August 22 New York Sun article by Claudia Rosett revealed 13 transfers of $99,999,999.99 from the Treasury Department to the State Department’s “Judgment Fund” (a fund used to resolve foreign claims) on January 19, 2016, to pay an undisclosed foreign claim. Rosett wrote that the State Department acknowledged in letters to Congress in March that the United States paid $1.3 billion out of the Judgment Fund to Iran as interest on the $400 million payment but did not explain how this money was paid.

The administration continues to peddle the preposterous claim that that the $1.7 billion payment was not linked to the prisoner release and was paid to resolve a dispute pending before the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal at The Hague. Obama administration officials maintain that this payment may have saved the U.S. taxpayer billions because the court was likely to order the United States to pay a much larger settlement. These claims are so ridiculous that even liberal late-night host Stephen Colbert mocked the administration for making them, saying that “a lot of people are saying this sounds like ransom because they know what the word ‘ransom’ means.”

Many Republican Congressmen insist that these payments set a dangerous precedent of normalizing the payment of ransoms to a state sponsor of terror. Senator Marco Rubio yesterday introduced the “No Ransom Act” to prohibit the federal government from paying ransom to Iran. The bill would also stop any further payments to Iran from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Judgment Fund until Iran returns the ransom money it received and pays the American victims of Iranian terrorism what they are owed, a sum estimated to be $53 billion. Rubio’s bill is co-sponsored by Republicans senators Cornyn, Kirk, Ayotte, Barrasso, Capito, Scott, Burr, Johnson, Fischer, Cotton, Perdue, Collins, Isakson, Risch, and Heller. Congressman Mike Pompeo introduced the same bill in the House and will be joined by many GOP co-sponsors.

WASHINGTON—Two American surveillance aircraft flying in what U.S. officials said was international airspace near Iran were threatened by Iranian air defense stations over the weekend, and were told by the Iranians to alter their course or face fire.

The two U.S. Navy surveillance aircraft were challenged by Iranian military officials on Sept. 10 as they flew over the Strait of Hormuz on routine patrols, U.S. officials said.

Using ground-to-air communications, officials at the Iranian air defense station told the crews they were flying near Iranian airspace and that if they didn’t change their course quickly they risked being fired upon, according to a spokesman for U.S. Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain, Cmdr. Bill Urban.

“We will fire Iranian missile,” was one of the transmissions from the ground, he said. Both the American planes were threatened in three separate radio calls, Cmdr. Urban said in a statement.

U.S. aircraft replied that they were coalition aircraft conducting routine operations in international airspace and they continued their mission.

Iranian government spokesman Mohammad-Bagher Nobakht said Tuesday that he wasn’t aware of the incident, but that it was Iran’s policy to protect its borders and warn against any potential intrusion.

“As soon as any flying object wants to come close, warnings are given,” he said.

Officials at Iran’s U.N. mission didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The military said the interaction with the Iranians was considered unprofessional because of the threat the officials made, but it wasn’t considered unsafe because the surface-to-air weapons that would have been used by the Iranians couldn’t have reached either plane, Cmdr. Urban said. CONTINUE AT SITE

Deterrence is a nation’s ability to discourage aggressors by instilling in them a credible fear of punishment far greater than any perceived gain that could be achieved by an attack.

Deterrence is quite different from deference, which is a courteous accommodation to the will of another, often one deemed superior.

Deterrence is ultimately enhanced by the possession of overwhelming military force, but it is unfortunately not thereby ensured.

France, the Low Countries, and the British expeditionary force had a combined larger army, more tanks and comparable air forces, when Germany nevertheless attacked in surprise fashion and destroyed them in six weeks in May and June 1940. What the Allies lacked were not the guns and soldiers but the credibility that they would use them with dispatch, skill, and determination.

Unfortunately, after eight years, Obama and his staff seem still confused over what deterrence is. The president believes that calm can be maintained through either apology and assurances or occasional tough but empty rhetoric — apparently on the premise that because the United States has overwhelming military force, aggressors would never logically cross it.

In contrast, the Neanderthals of the world assume that U.S. force is now becoming irrelevant and that the president is entirely predictable: occasionally eager to compromise and lecture, usually full of braggadocio, and always without credible follow-up. To be blunt and cruel, they find Obama the proverbial freshman loudmouth whom bullying seniors for sport enjoy separating from his lunch money.

Beware the next five months, perhaps our most dangerous period since the lame-duck Carter presidency of 1980.

The host Chinese rudely first ignored and then insulted the presidential entourage when it landed for the G-20 summit. The Chinese wish to remind us that they have established a global precedent that any nation can build an artificial island in the middle of commercial routes and thereby declare that new sovereign air and sea territorial rights emanate from it. They also remind the world of that achievement by juvenile taunts to a visiting American retinue. Does anyone think that one such island will not soon lead to an entire archipelago — or that a peaceful world can operate on such laws of the jungle?

We’ve enabled political correctness to decide our anti-terrorism strategy.
Fifteen years after 9/11, we show no official signs of caring to defeat Islamic terror.

Yesterday was the fifteenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that murdered 2,977 Americans. We have been at war since October of that year when we first struck the Taliban in Afghanistan after President Bush gave them the choice between surrendering Osama bin Laden and war.

In those fifteen years of war, we haven’t achieved victory over Islamic terrorism in Iraq, Afghanistan, or anywhere else. The threats of al-Qaeda, ISIS, and the other terrorist networks remain almost undiminished. Ayman al-Zawahiri, who succeeded bin Laden as leader of al-Qaeda, used the anniversary of 9/11 to issue more threats.

Where have we gone wrong?

We began with President Bush’s address to Congress on September 20, 2001. He said, “Those who harbor terrorists, or who finance them, are going to pay a price. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

But it quickly became clear that the president wasn’t willing to enforce that choice against Saudi Arabia, which has funded terrorism around the world, or against any nation other than Afghanistan or Iraq that harbored and funded terrorists. Mr. Bush led us into a confrontation-cum-engagement strategy that existed until Mr. Obama became president, when the confrontation part of the strategy was eliminated.

Mr. Bush made two cardinal mistakes. The first was his insistence that we could win the war without attacking the ideology of the enemy. He thus began to raise a generation of military leaders dedicated to that strategy. Thus crippled in their derivation of strategy, none of our generals has been able to produce victory.

Donald Trump’s statement that our generals have been reduced to “rubble” is unfortunate not because it is inaccurate but because of his terminology. Our generals and admirals cannot craft a strategy that leads to victory because, as I have written many times, we cannot defeat the terrorists unless we defeat them kinetically and at the same time defeat their ideology.

“I will begin by saying what everybody would like to ignore or forget but which must nevertheless be stated, namely, that we have sustained a total and unmitigated defeat.” — That was Winston Churchill’s description of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s surrender to Hitler in the Munich Agreement of 1938.

Yet Churchill’s words also apply to where the United States is today.

Our men and women in uniform have been heroic.

Many have signed up to serve again even after being wounded.

Our tactical units remain the best in the world.

Our intelligence officers and diplomats have risked their lives in service to the country.

The problem is not with the sincerity, the courage, the energy or the effort of individual Americans.

The problem has been the approach of a bipartisan Washington political elite that has squandered 15 years, thousands of lives, many thousands wounded, and trillions of dollars with no coherent strategy, no honest assessment of the challenge, and no willingness to learn from failure and develop new strategies and new institutions.

Since September 11, 2001, we have moved from righteous anger and clarity of purpose against the forces of terrorism in the immediate aftermath of the attacks to now sending $1,700,000,000 in cash to the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism.

We have watched our efforts in Iraq collapse while our efforts in Afghanistan decay.

We have seen the Middle East grow more violent, more chaotic, and more ungovernable despite 15 years of American and allied effort.

Fifteen years ago this week, terrorists killed 2,977 Americans in the worst surprise attack on our homeland since Pearl Harbor, 70 years earlier. In fact, 574 more Americans were killed on 9/11 than on December 7, 1941.

It was a huge, tragic, and deeply emotional shock. And yet the 9/11 attack was not the beginning of our war with Islamic supremacism.

By 2001, we had been at war with the Iranian dictatorship (still to this day listed by the State Department as the leading state sponsor of terrorism) for 32 years, when Iranians seized the American embassy in Tehran. Mark Bowden described the event appropriately in the title of his book, “Guests of the Ayatollah: The First Battle in America’s War with Militant Islam.”

From an American perspective, that war had continued in Lebanon in the 1980s and in Saudi Arabia, East Africa and Yemen in the 1990s.

In 2001, the terrorist war came to American soil with shocking results.

American anger was vivid and deep. President Bush reacted with powerful, clear, morally defining words.

In his address to the Joint Session of Congress, just nine days after the 9/11 attack, President Bush asserted “on September 11th, enemies of freedom committed an act of war against our country.”

President Bush described a huge goal. “Our war on terror begins with Al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped, and defeated,” he said.

President Bush described the scale of the challenge, saying, “Americans are asking: How will we fight and win this war? We will direct every resource at our command–every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence, and every necessary weapon of war– to the disruption and to the defeat of the global terror network.”

Bush went on to warn that “Americans should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have seen. …Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.”

President Bush wisely warned that “the only way to defeat terrorism as a threat to our way of life is to stop it, eliminate it, and destroy it where it grows.”

Four months later, in his 2002 State of the Union Address, President Bush described North Korea, Iran and Iraq as an “Axis of Evil”.

Bush warned that “the United States of America will not permit the world’s most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world’s most destructive weapons.” The Congress applauded.

And that was the high water mark of the response to 9/11.

Just this week, North Korea had its fifth nuclear test. Last week North Korea launched three missiles in direct violation of United Nations Resolutions.

We now know that while deceiving the Congress and the American people, the Obama Administration has sent $1,700,000,000 to what even the State Department says is the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism, the Iranian dictatorship.

Iraq, at great cost in American lives, wounds and money, has degenerated into a mess dominated by Iran and by ISIS.

How did we go from brave words to defeat, dishonesty, and humiliation?

Tragically, after heroic leadership in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 (who can forget President Bush in New York standing next to the fireman and promising that the people who attacked New York would hear from all of us?) and after delivering exactly the right words to Congress, the Bush administration failed to plan for how big, how hard, and how long the fight with Islamic supremacists would be.

Almost immediately, the lawyers began imposing rules and regulations.

It was decided not to declare war even though President Bush had described 9/11 “as an act of war” in his congressional address.

The State Department began pushing back against an honest, clear statement of who was attacking us.