NightWatch

For the Night of 19 August 2009

South Korea: The space authority aborted the launch of the South’s first space launch vehicle seven minutes before the planned liftoff, The Associated Press reported. A Science Ministry spokesman did not give a reason for the cancellation, but the New York Times reported a problem in the automatic launch sequence. The mission is postponed, at this point, rather than scrubbed. The launch window is open until 26 August, according to the official closure area announcement.

Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance. The South Korean army plans to increase its ability to monitor North Korean military bases by developing drones that can fly at least 6.2 miles above the ground and take both daytime and nighttime aerial photos, an official said, Yonhap reported Aug. 19. The drones are to be called "Aerostats," and though they will not cover North Korea completely, they will allow the South Korean military to identify targets in areas and conditions that existing equipment cannot. Aerostats should be developed by 2011, a source said.

The ability of aerostats to track almost continuously and accurately all North Korean Corps commanders and senior officials in Pyongyang as High Value Targets -- not to omit military movements of all kinds, missiles sites and so on -- should revolutionize targeting on the peninsula. The possibilities are almost endless. In that rigidly structured system, decapitation could be crippling.

North Korea-South Korea: Update. “Upon authorization of Kim Cho'ng-il, Chairman of the DPRK National Defence Commission, a special envoy group led by Kim Ki-nam, Secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea, will visit Seoul from August 21 to 22 to mourn over the death of ex-President Kim Dae-jung," the Korean Central News Agency reported in a one-sentence dispatch from Pyongyang.

Yonhap reported North Korea sent a letter to the Kim Dae Jung Peace Center stating that it will send a five-member delegation on a two-day trip for the funeral, and its members will include a secretary of the North's Workers' Party central committee and a department director. A Unification Ministry spokeswoman said that the Seoul government has "received no such information yet from North Korea."

North Korea-US: North Korea demanded today that the United States engage in a bilateral dialogue for a breakthrough in the stalled six-party nuclear negotiations, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson said. Minister Kim Myong-gil, a diplomat with the North's mission to the United Nations in New York, met Richardson in Santa Fe to deliver the demand, said the governor, who has visited Pyongyang several times in the past decades as a troubleshooter. In the 1990s, he successfully negotiated the release of two American citizens held in North Korea.

"They're sending signals that they're ready to resume a dialogue," Richardson said in an interview with MSNBC soon after his three-hour meeting with Kim and another diplomat, Paek Jong-ho, at his mansion in Santa Fe. "I'm not negotiating, but they are telling me things that they are prepared to do. And I'm going to pass them on."

This is the Clinton-era redux. The North Koreans could not travel outside New York without the permission of the State Department, which implies that the Administration concurred in this contact with Governor Richardson. A preliminary bilateral dialogue has begun.

Pakistan: Pakistani Taliban commander Maulvi Faqeer (Faqir) Mohammad said today (19 August) he will take over as the acting leader of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) because TTP chief Baitullah Mehsud is ill, not dead, the BBC reported. He said that the TTP's new chief spokesman would be Muslim Khan, following the arrest of spokesman Maulvi Umar.

Maulvi Faqeer also reportedly plans to recommend that the name Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan be changed to Tehrik-i-Ittehad Taliban. Tehrik i Taliban Pakistan means the Pakistan Students Movement. Tehrik-i-Ittehad Taliban translates roughly as the Students Unity Movement. Name changes are always a prima facie sign of leadership change and usually portend policy changes.

Note: Some analysts and analyses point to the fractiousness of the Pakistani Taliban as a sign of progress. Perhaps but many analysts seem to forget that when Musharraf was a General as well as President, these fractious Pakistani tribal fighters, whose fractiousness is such a comfort today, stalemated the Pakistan Army in the tribal agencies. The recent large scale army operations were in Swat and adjacent districts of NorthWest Frontier Province, not in the tribal agencies.

Baitullah Mehsud’s death is likely to make Pakistan safer for politicians and foreigners, but its effect on Afghanistan or on security in the tribal agencies is likely to be limited, depending on the policy changes Faqir Mohammad makes. For example, if Faqir were to place the movement under the guidance of the Quetta Shura, to achieve the unified movement that Mullah Omar seeks, the consequences for US forces in Afghanistan might be worse than those from having two separate Taliban movements. Stay tuned.

Politics. Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani's government will not pursue a trial of former military President Pervez Musharraf for high treason, Dawn.com reported Aug. 19. "We should do what is doable," he said.

Actually, according to the Daily Times which quoted the Prime Minister, Gilani repeated his insistence on a consensus resolution of the National Assembly as a condition for a government case against Musharraf. Since Gilani’s Pakistan Peoples Party has a plurality, there will be no consensus resolution and, thus, no military action to replace the Gilani administration and the National Assembly. Such action is certain were Musharraf ever brought to trial, regardless of his crimes.

Afghanistan: 20 August is election day.

Iraq: Agence France-Presse reported the casualty toll from today’s bombings in Baghdad as 95 dead and nearly 600 injured. The attacks coincided with the sixth anniversary of the suicide bombing at the United Nations compound in Baghdad that killed 22 people, including Sergio Vieira de Mello, the United Nations’ coordinator for Iraq.

Russia-Israel: Russian President Medvedev told Israeli President Peres on 18 August that Russia will review a decision to sell Iran S-300 anti-aircraft missiles, Haaretz reported. Peres asked Moscow not to carry out the deal, saying that it would upset the "delicate balance" of power in the region. Peres added that Israel has proof Russian military hardware reaches militant groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, which receive them from Iran and Syria.

President Peres told reporters via video link from Sochi, "President Medvedev gave a promise he will reconsider the sales of S-300s because it affects the delicate balance which exists in the Middle East."

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A Russian official familiar with the talks confirmed that Peres raised the issue, "but no specific contracts or obligations of Russian organizations concerning supplies to Iran of military equipment came under discussion on the presidential level," the official said. "While raising the issue, (Peres) underlined that Israel has no military plans against that country. In particular, he said Israel is not planning any strikes on the territory of Iran," he said on condition of not being further identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Russia has signed a contract to supply the powerful S-300 missiles to Iran, but has dragged its feet on delivering them, according to The Associated Press. "President Medvedev told me that Russia will not support an Iranian nuclear bomb under all circumstances," Peres said. "But he also mentioned that the Russian appreciation of what's taking place in Iran is different from the American one."

The most important line of the conflicting reports is Peres’ admission that the Russian appreciation of what’s taking place in Iran differs from the American appreciation. In the Russian appreciation, a sale of the S-300 would actually stabilize security because it would deter an Israeli attack. In light of Israeli pressure, the Russians might be justified in driving a harder bargain with Iran.

Russia-US: Update. A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman confirmed on 19 August that an agreement between Russia and the United States to allow U.S. military transit through Russian territory en route to Afghanistan will become effective on 6 September, RIA Novosti reported. But the spokesman said the agreement would formally enter force once it is ratified by the Russian parliament; until then its implementation would only be provisional. He added that the United States has not yet specified "transit parameters or plans."

Russia-Venezuela: For the record. Russia has supplied more than 50 helicopters to Venezuela and infrastructure for their repair and maintenance has begun, Tass reported today, citing a senior official of Russian state arms exporter Rosoboronexport. More than 50 Mi-17, Mi-26 and Mi-35M helicopters have been supplied to Venezuela.

Saudi Arabia: Authorities in the Kingdom arrested 43 Saudis and one foreigner who formed "a core" of Qaida operatives that was recruiting and indoctrinating others to carry out attacks, Interior Ministry spokesman General Mansur al-Turki told media. In a statement on state news agency, Turki said the group "includes a number of the theorists and believers of the deviant ideology and supporters of its criminal acts."

Police also seized around 70 machineguns, 376 electronic detonation devices and more than 31,000 rounds of ammunition in three caches in a Riyadh residence and desert hideouts near Riyadh and in the Qassim region north of the capital, the Ministry said.

Some members of the group had received arms and explosives training both abroad and inside the Kingdom. "These people have links to the original Al-Qaida organization," Turki said. "I would describe them like a base. They actually work in the area, recruiting young people, giving young people the ideology of Al-Qaida and financing terrorism in the kingdom," he added.

Turki said those arrested were plotting attacks that would be carried out by others. "These people do have a plan, but they don't themselves directly execute the plans," he said.

This is tonight’s good news.

Honduras: Too good to omit. Interim government President Micheletti in an interview with La Prensa described Hugo Chavez as a crazy man who fights with his own shadow. Ex-president Zelaya complained that the US is not doing enough to restore him to office.

End of NightWatch for 19 August.