FPI Overnight Brief: August 6, 2012

Middle East/North Africa

Iran
 
Iran claimed Saturday it has successfully test-fired an upgraded version of a short-range ballistic missile with improved accuracy, increasing the Islamic Republic’s capability to strike both land and naval targets. – Associated Press
 
Syria
 
Even with fighting raging in Syria and President Bashar al-Assad digging in, the State Department and Pentagon are quietly sharpening plans to cope with a flood of refugees, help maintain basic health and municipal services, restart a shattered economy and avoid a security vacuum in the wake of Mr. Assad’s fall, administration officials say. – New York Times
 
President Bashar al-Assad fired his prime minister on Monday, Syria’s official media reported, as activists countered that he defected to neighboring Jordan in what seemed a further indication of disarray among loyalists following a series of high-level defections and a rebel bomb attack last month that killed four of the Syrian leader’s closest security aides. – New York Times
 
A group of Syrian rebels took responsibility on Sunday for the kidnapping of 48 Iranians in Damascus a day earlier, but the rebels insisted that their captives were members of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards, not religious pilgrims as Iran’s official news agency had reported. – New York Times
 
The United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly on Friday for an Arab-backed resolution that severely criticized the Syrian government, blaming it almost exclusively for the killings and other atrocities that have come to shape the 17-month-old uprising there. – New York Times
 
Two weeks after opposition fighters took control of the poor, crowded neighborhood in southwest Aleppo, Salahuddin is the battered focus of an intense fight for Syria's second city. – Los Angeles Times
 
The first explosion tore into a busy street in Damascus. The second, which occurred minutes later as neighbors rushed to help those wounded in the first, may put an end, analysts said, to the effort by Palestinians in Syria to stay out of the country’s widening conflict. – New York Times
 
Even when his country was not convulsed by war, President Bashar al-Assad of Syria rarely gave televised interviews to foreigners. His session with Barbara Walters in December was a public relations disaster. So it seemed surprising a few weeks ago when Mr. Assad granted another Westerner a face-to-face chat on camera. – New York Times
 
Bread is a mainstay of the Syrian diet — it accompanies every meal — and in a city paralyzed by two weeks of war, the bakery lines show that basic commerce has become a battleground of its own. – New York Times
 
As Syria’s civil war degenerates into a bloody sectarian showdown between the government’s Alawite-dominated troops and the Sunni Muslim majority, tensions are increasing across the border between Turkey’s Alawite minority and the Sunni Muslim majority here. – New York Times
 
Gen. Mohammed Ahmed Fares, who as part of a joint program with Russia was the first Syrian to travel into space, has fled to Turkey after defecting from the Syrian army, according to the the semi-official Turkish Anatolia news agency. – LA Times’ World Now
 
Three separate Syrian opposition groups have floated proposals for a transitional government in the past week, a sign that differences among the many factions opposing President Bashar al-Assad are deepening even as victory seems closer. - Reuters
 
The leader of Syria's main political opposition group said he was ready to negotiate with government officials whose hands are not "stained with blood", once President Bashar al-Assad and his associates leave power, according to an interview published on Sunday. - Reuters
 
Iran warned against foreign intervention in Syria on Sunday and said the conflict there could engulf Israel, Iranian media said. - Reuters
 
Sens. McCain (R-AZ), Graham (R-SC), and Lieberman (ID-CT) write: We know there are risks associated with deepening our involvement in the profoundly complex and vicious conflict in Syria. But inaction carries even greater risks for the United States — in lives lost, strategic opportunities squandered and values compromised. By continuing to sit on the sidelines of a battle that will help determine the future of the Middle East, we are jeopardizing both our national security interests and our moral standing in the world. – Washington Post
 
North Africa
 
Armed militants killed at least 15 Egyptian security forces Sunday at a checkpoint near the Israeli border and commandeered armored vehicles they later used to storm into the neighboring country, security officials said. – Washington Post
 
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's recent travels to Tunisia, Egypt, Israel and Jordan underscored the practical limits of U.S. military power in the region at a time when the threats from Iran's nuclear ambitions and Syria's disintegrating regime could rapidly, and with little predictability, destabilize the always fragile Middle East. – CNN’s Security Clearance
 
Yemen
 
The death toll from a suspected al-Qaida suicide bombing in southern Yemen rose to 45 Sunday, officials said, in the latest attack against militias allied with the army. – Associated Press
 
Gulf States
 
The foreign ministers of six Gulf Arab countries will meet in September to discuss a plan for closer integration of the mostly Sunni Muslim monarchies, Saudi Arabia's English-language Arab News reported on Sunday. - Reuters
 
Initial findings of a probe into a group plotting "crimes against state security" in the United Arab Emirates have confirmed links with suspicious foreign parties, the Attorney General said on Sunday - Reuters
 
David Ignatius writes: By appointing Prince Bandar bin Sultan as its new intelligence chief, Saudi Arabia has installed what looks like a war cabinet at a time of rising tensions with Iran and growing internal dissent from its Shiite minority. – Washington Post
 
Iraq
 
Seven months after the last U.S. troops left their country, Iraqis are surprisingly optimistic about the future, given the horrors of war they have endured for nearly a decade…But every step forward is weighed down by continued bloodshed, brutality and corruption. – Washington Post
 
A group of al Qaeda prisoners was caught trying to tunnel out of Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, an official said on Sunday, after the militants said they would step up their fight against the government. - Reuters
 
Israel
 
Israel on Sunday barred the delegations of five countries from attending a diplomatic conference in Ramallah, in the West Bank, upending plans by the Palestinian president to announce his intention to renew the Palestinians’ bid this September for enhanced status in the United Nations. – New York Times
 
The Palestinian Authority said Saturday it plans to apply in September to become a United Nations non-member state. – LA Times’ World Now
 
As visiting U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta was engaging in high-profile attempts to placate Israel anxieties over a nuclearizing Iran, his acquisition chief was working under the radar here all week on a package of programs to bolster Israel’s military edge. – Defense News
 
Israel is upgrading its Arrow II ballistic missile shield in a U.S.-backed "race" against Iran, Syria and other regional enemies, a senior Israeli defense official said on Sunday. - Reuters
 
Turkey
 
The Turkish military has retired all 40 generals and admirals currently on trial on charges of plotting to overthrow the Muslim-led government, Turkish officials said Saturday, in the latest move by the government to tame the once indomitable army. – New York Times
 
Turkey’s security forces have killed as many as 115 Kurdish rebels during a major security offensive over the past two weeks, the country’s interior minister said Sunday. – Associated Press

Return to Top

Asia

Afghanistan
 
The parliament on Saturday ordered Afghan President Hamid Karzai to replace the country's defense and interior ministers, dealing his administration a harsh blow as it struggles to show its readiness to take over security responsibilities before the planned U.S. troop withdrawal in 2014. – Los Angeles Times
 
President Hamid Karzai moved quickly on Sunday to confirm Parliament’s decision to dismiss two senior security ministers the day before, but he reassured the Western allies that he would avoid a vacuum in the two ministries charged with fighting the war and organizing the transition to Afghan control. – New York Times
 
As the war here draws to a close and the American military begins to reduce its forces, it also has to send back most of its equipment, an immense logistics effort already under way and spanning half the globe. – New York Times
 
At least nine Afghans and perhaps many more were forced out of their homes in rural Afghanistan and executed in what Afghan officials called an act of revenge by one ethnic group against another, underscoring the long shadow cast by the country’s ethnic hatreds. – New York Times
 
The Taliban made a show of force across a province of northeastern Afghanistan on Friday, Afghan officials said, attacking dozens of government installations but causing relatively few deaths or injuries. – New York Times
 
With an important milestone approaching next month – when the last of the 30,000 “surge” troops will exit the country – U.S. military commanders are indicating their desire to keep as many of the remaining troops in Afghanistan for as long as possible. – National Journal
 
Local communities in eastern Afghanistan tired of both Taliban harassment and government inaction are increasingly mounting spontaneous campaigns of resistance against insurgents who burn down schools, shut health clinics and threaten the local population. – USA Today
 
An Associated Press reporter and photographer recently spent two weeks with four different units in provinces where the Taliban is strong, and heard of equipment shortages, rifles that jam, and fears that once the U.S. and NATO aircraft are gone, remote and important outposts will become inaccessible and have to close. – Associated Press
 
One of the Afghan war’s great ironies is that both NATO and the Taliban rely on the convoys to fuel their operations — a recipe for seemingly endless conflict. – Associated Press
 
Rajiv Chandrasekaran writes: They may not agree on much, but when it comes to the decade-old conflict, [President Obama and Mitt Romney] have adopted the same strategy on the stump: Say as little as possible — sometimes not a word — and quickly change the subject. – Washington Post
 
Jackson Diehl writes: [T]his may be the first presidential campaign in U.S. history in which an ongoing war fails to produce a significant debate. Explicitly or implicitly, the candidates have successfully encouraged much of the media to accept the following conventional wisdom: The war is a failure but is winding down; U.S. combat troops will be out by the end of 2014; and Obama and Romney agree on the strategy. – Washington Post
 
Ronald Neumann writes: In foreign assistance, we are often tied in knots trying to avoid failure through detailed studies while trying to move quickly. This is particularly true in crises, when time for leisurely study doesn’t exist. We desperately need a bureaucratic culture that seeks out and rewards innovation and experimentation. Yes, some ideas may truly be stupid. Many others, like many small-business start-ups, will look like good ideas and fail for any number of reasons. – Washington Post
 
Pakistan
 
U.S. and Pakistani officials are considering joint counterterrorism campaigns in Afghanistan and Pakistan, say officials familiar with the proposals, in what would mark an upturn in cooperation after more than a year of rancorous relations. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
A major Uzbek militant group closely allied with Al Qaeda announced Saturday that its leader had been killed in an American drone strike in Pakistan’s tribal belt, along the Afghan border. – New York Times
 
The Pakistani Supreme Court on Friday struck down a controversial law that critics contend was enacted solely to shield the new prime minister from suffering the same fate as his predecessor, who was ousted for failing to resurrect a longstanding graft case against President Asif Ali Zardari. – LA Times’ World Now
 
The Haqqani network, a notorious militant group responsible for the deaths of U.S. service members in Afghanistan, has evolved from a politically inspired insurgent group into a "sophisticated and diversified mafia-type network" that finances itself through kidnapping, extortion, and the lucrative rare-earth metal trade, a new report says. – CNN’s Security Clearance
 
Pakistan's interior minister has said elements of the Afghan government are likely supporting a senior Pakistani Taliban leader who is fighting to topple the Islamabad government, accusations which could further raise tensions over cross-border raids by militants. - Reuters
 
Josh Rogin reports: Pakistan watchers were scratching their heads Thursday night when the Senate failed to confirm President Barack Obama's nominee to be the next ambassador to Pakistan, Rick Olson. On Friday, The Cable confirmed that Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) objected to the nomination, pushing off Olson's confirmation until at least September. – The Cable
 
China
 
The murder trial of Gu Kailai, the wife of the deposed Chinese political leader Bo Xilai, will begin [this] week in eastern Anhui Province, according to a person close to the case. – New York Times
 
As the murder trial of the century prepares to open in China, skepticism reigns about the likelihood of fairness, especially for Zhang, the most obscure figure in the melodrama consuming China. – Los Angeles Times
 
China's top leaders appear to have gathered for a summer conclave to hammer out major decisions for the world's No. 2 economy amid a political scandal and a sensitive once-a-decade leadership transition. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
Chinese government authorities have detained nearly 2,000 people as part of a nationwide crackdown on the sale of fake or counterfeit drugs and health care products, according to a report on Sunday from Xinhua, the official news agency. – New York Times
 
China unveiled its first stealth fighter, the twin-engine J-20 Black Eagle, built by the Chengdu Aircraft Co. (CAC), in January 2011. CAC and SAC were in competition for a requirement for a fifth-generation fighter for the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) and PLA Navy (PLAN). With the unveiling of the J-20, it was assumed CAC had won the competition. However, the sighting of the J-21 raises questions. – Defense News
 
East Asia
 
In a notable role reversal, China is emerging as a major investor in Japan—a diminished status for the island-nation that is inflaming old animosities between two wary neighbors. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
A court in Mongolia sentenced former President Enkhbayar Nambar to four years in prison on corruption charges in a move that could add to political uncertainty in the resource-rich nation. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
The World Food Program is dispatching emergency help to North Korea after devastating flooding that has killed scores of people and left nearly 63,000 homeless. The emergency aid will provide flood victims with 400 grams of maize per day for two weeks, the United Nations agency said. – LA Times’ World Now
 
Mongolia presents the U.S. with a unique geopolitical opportunity to manage the renaissance of Chinese primacy in Central Asia. Mongolia’s history and geography bind it to China and Russia, and this makes it an essential strategic partner for those wanting to hedge against the influence of either or both. – Defense News
 
The United States on Aug. 3 said it would delay flights of its Osprey aircraft in Japan until it wins the confidence of its close ally in the wake of protests by residents concerned over crashes. - AFP
 
The Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, co-founded by Chan-mo Park, is teaching dozens of North Koreans the skills of a modern market economy, something the impoverished state has managed for decades to avoid. - Reuters
 
India
 
India's massive electricity blackouts this past week served as a reminder that recent government reforms of the power sector have failed to attract sufficient private investment to modernize the nation's ramshackle infrastructure. – Wall Street Journal
 
Gah, a farming community of 300 squat, mud-brick homes about 60 miles southwest of Islamabad, is remarkable only as the birthplace of Manmohan Singh, the prime minister of India. Last month Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari invited Singh to visit Gah in the latest round of so-called “soft diplomacy” between the nuclear-armed countries. – Washington Post
 
Southeast Asia
 
The suspension last week of a prominent Yangon-based newsweekly has raised new questions about Myanmar's commitment to press freedom. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
China summoned a U.S. diplomat to refute a State Department accusation that Beijing is hampering diplomatic efforts to defuse long-simmering tensions over the disputed South China Sea. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
China's state-run media ramped up condemnation of the United States on Monday over tensions in the South China Sea, with the Communist Party's top newspaper telling Washington to "Shut up" and charging it with "fanning flames" of division in the region. - Reuters

Return to Top

Security

Defense
 
The July 8 roadside explosion that killed six Army soldiers in Afghanistan has analysts worried that the Taliban are turning to bigger homemade bombs to take down the best armored U.S. vehicles. What is particularly troubling to the military is that the enemy was able to penetrate the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle, whose V-shaped hull disperses a blast away from the troops inside. – Washington Times
 
The defense spending bill passed by the Senate Appropriations Committee [Friday] keeps Block 30 Global Hawk drones flying, instead of letting them be warehoused as the Air Force had planned, a congressional source confirmed to AOL Defense. – AOL Defense
 
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) implored President Obama on Sunday to work with lawmakers seeking to avert potentially devastating automatic defense cuts set for the first of the year, calling the sequester “the dumbest” idea. – Hill Tube
 
Vice President Joe Biden pledged to fight for veterans' benefits and blamed looming sequestration cuts on House Republicans in an address to the Disabled American Veterans national convention in Nevada on Saturday. – The Hill’s On the Money
 
Cybersecurity
 
Editorial: Perhaps Democrats figure they'll be able to blame Republicans for any damage if there is a major cyber attack before the election. But it's the White House that has walked away from a potential bipartisan compromise. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Return to Top

Russia/Europe

Russia
 
Aleksandr Y. Lebedev, a prominent banker and newspaper magnate who has supported the political opposition, announced on Friday that police and regulatory checks had become so intense that he would sell all of his Russia-based assets. – New York Times
 
A day after President Vladimir V. Putin appeared to urge leniency in the trial of three young women who staged a “punk prayer” in Moscow’s main church, the prosecution rested its case after showing the judge the dark blue balaclavas that the band members wore during demonstrations. – New York Times
 
A self-described guerrilla fighter urging strict adherence to Islamic law has claimed responsibility for the killing last month of one Muslim leader and the attempted murder of another, in Tatarstan, a region in central Russia that prides itself on a tradition of religious tolerance. – New York Times
 
A member of a Kremlin-sponsored civic chamber will ask state prosecutors to investigate racially tinged statements made by the governor of the Krasnodar region, a close ally of President Vladimir V. Putin, to see if the remarks violate Russian law on incitement of ethnic hatred. – New York Times
 
Three young women from the punk band…could face sentence this week in a trial over their "protest prayer" in a church that has transfixed Russia and opened President Vladimir Putin to new accusations of a crackdown on dissent. - Reuters
 
Spain
 
A Spanish judge on Sunday charged two Russian men suspected of plotting a terror attack in Spain or elsewhere in Europe with belonging to a terror group and of possessing explosives. – Associated Press

Return to Top

Americas

United States of America
 
In a time of deep deficits and tight budgets, President Obama says the Defense Department cannot be entirely spared the scalpel. But Mitt Romney, his likely opponent in November’s election, says the U.S. must spend more on the Pentagon now because it will pay off with a stronger economy in the long run. – Washington Times
 
Eli Lake and Dan Ephron report: Casino tycoon Sheldon Adelson, a major contributor to Mitt Romney’s election effort, is pressing the Republican nominee to come out for the release of Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard, a major Republican donor and associates of Adelson and Romney tell The Daily Beast. – The Daily Beast
 
Sohrab Ahmari interviews Martin Peretz: Since selling The New Republic to Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes in 2011, however, Mr. Peretz, now 73, has emerged as a vociferous critic of Barack Obama and much of the Democratic foreign-policy establishment. His break with the president he campaigned for in 2008 has been sharp and painful. The Obama administration's worldview, he now thinks, represents a radical departure from the "healthily hard-ass" foreign policy he has long championed on the left. – Wall Street Journal

Venezuela
 
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez shot back Friday at his rival's plan to stop preferential oil deals with other countries by saying such a measure would mean an end to the social programs enjoyed by the poor enacted during his 13-year tenure. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Return to Top

Africa

Mali
 
[T]he young men (and a few women) in these haphazard citizen militias, poised at the edge of the de facto front line with the Islamists, have something the regular Malian Army here appears to lack: a fierce will to undo the jihadist conquest of northern Mali that has alarmed governments across the world, spurred threats of a regional intervention force and imposed a repressive regimen of public beatings, whippings and even stonings on the local people. – New York Times
 
East Africa
 
Make lasting peace and an oil deal with Sudan, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told South Sudan’s president, Salva Kiir, one day after a United Nations deadline for the countries to make progress toward resolving their bitter differences. Sanctions on both are possible if fighting continues. – Washington Post
 
The recently agreed deal between oil-producing South Sudan and Sudan, which was expected to allow the resumption of vital oil shipments through Sudanese pipelines and ports, is under threat because of lingering tensions along the two nations' common border, officials said Sunday. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
 
The notorious militia headed by Joseph Kony that has kidnapped hundreds of children and forced them to fight and serve as sex slaves must be stopped, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday in Uganda. – LA Times’ World Now
 
Looking ahead to Kenya’s national vote in March, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday warned leaders and citizens in the East African nation not to repeat the deadly violence that plunged the country into chaos after disputed presidential elections five years ago. – Associated Press

Return to Top

Ideas

Henry Kissinger writes: Progress toward a world order embracing participatory governance and international cooperation requires the fortitude to work through intermediate stages. It also requires that the various aspirants to a new order in the Middle East recognize that our contribution to their efforts will be measured by their compatibility with our interests and values. For this, the realism and idealism we now treat as incompatible need to be reconciled. – Washington Post