In yet another example of the change in the Bush Administration's direction in the Middle East, the US Commerce Department, at the express orders of Secretary of State Condaleeza Rice issued a special export license to Cisco Systems to ship routers, switches and other high-tech equipment with military applications to Syria. The routers, switches and other hi-tech items are usable for missile radar and other weaponry as well as for early warning apparatus and intelligence surveillance.
The Bush Administration also instructed its UN Ambassador not to veto a United Nations program that would supply the Assad regime with sophisticated surveillance equipment and computers to monitor its borders....again technology with military applications.
All of this, by the way, is in violation of the America's own sanctions on dealing with Syria.
It's interesting to me that the license was first issued back on November 17th, well after the September 6th Israeli strike on a Syrian nuclear facility the Bush Administration was informed by the Israelis about back in July of this year. You will also remember that Condaleeza Rice was instrumental in delaying the Israelis from taking out the site, and attempted to have them forgo the strike altogether.
This clearly indicates to me that the Bush Administration had the new arrangement with Syria and Iran, the knowledge of the highly flawed NIE and the Middle East's New Order planned out well in advance.
And that they were committed enough to the arrangement so that the last thing they wanted was the Israelis messing it up over any silly concerns about the Assad regime having access to nuclear weapons!
The deal's a simple and obvious one one, at least as far as the Syrians are concerned; Assad has been stopping the flow of arms, explosives, money and al Queda fighters from places like Saudi Arabia into Iraq. In exchange, the US is willing to hang the Siniora government in Lebanon out to dry and let Syria and Hezbollah take over again, forget about the Assad regime's assassinations in Lebanon and its support for Islamic terrorism and pressure Israel to give up the strategic Golan Heights.
And of course, allow shipments like this one..which will make it harder for Israel (or the US, for that matter) to take out any Syrian or Iranian military facilities in the future, and will also undoubtedly improve the missile and radar technology available to Hezbollah and Hamas.
This shameful and hypocritical betrayal will not go unnoticed by our friends or our enemies, and there will be a high price to pay for it in the future.
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5 comments:
I hope those routers and things have CIA back-doors, there is no other excuse for this betrayal.
Is it really feasible to control the distribution of items as ubiquitous as Cisco routers ?
Sandy, I doubt it, unfortunately. This is a `realist' quid pro quo betrayal of the worst order, and it will be seen so in th eregion.
Anonymous It is indeed feasible, and a s a matter of fact we've done it for quite some time.
Cisco by law would even need an `end user' certificate if they exported these items to a third country - France, for example - who later was exporting them somewhere else.
Lying and cheating do of course occur, but this was a special export license given directly to Cisco to a state that the US government has justly accused of financing and supporting Islamist terrorism.
Regards,
ff
One only needs to read the post below to understand why the US has been forced into this position. In any event, it should be abundantly clear by now that the US has no desire to control the Middle East. I already knew this but it should be obvious to everyone now.
In addition, it seems unlikely that the US government could control the distribution of something like Cisco routers. The only way to do it would be to prohibit Cisco from selling routers to anyone in a foreign country. Even if this is done, a US buyer could distribute them to a foreign country. There would be nothing the US government could do. If the US government tried to exert pressure on another country not to distribute this type of technology to another country, there would be sever reprecussions for the US. Other countries would retaliate by witholding valuable resources and services from the US. In addition to this, the US would have no support in the media or from "allies." Even if the distribution of Cisco routers and other equipment could be withheld from Syria, they can likely get comparable technolgy from Russia, China, or perhaps even India. If not, they can always manufacture their own.
In the final analysis, the US is largely finished as a major power. At this time, there is virtually nothing the US can do for Lebanon. There likely never was. The US never had support from "allies" and the US lacks sufficent power.
I doubt "back doors" are feasible. The Syrians and their allies in Russia would no likely be aware of them and they would very quickly disabled. Furthermore, the actions would be exposed in the main stream news media far and wide and the US would be held in even more contempt than it already is.
Apparently what a leading Communist once said about Capitalists may be true. I think to roughly paraphrase he said the following, "we will buy the rope from the Capitalist that we will hang him with." By selling their technology to Syria, Cisco and others have greatly undermined their own security. All of this was done for short term gain. This is a very stupid decision on the part of Cisco and the US government.
Of course, Syria likely could have gotten comparable technology from either Russia or China or they could have manufactured it in their own country. This still does not excuse the actions of Cisco execuctives or the US government. This is a very stupid decision and perhaps even an evil one. These people should be held accountable. If someone wanted to pursure it, this might even be still more grounds for impeachment of President Bush.
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