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DECEPTION: Pakistan, the United States and the Global Nuclear Weapons Conspiracy Reviewed by Christina Lamb Times Online In the mid-1990s, I was at a wedding in Islamabad when a buzz went round about a very special guest. None of the ministers and generals present was causing the stir. Instead, holding court under an awning, was a tall man in a suit with greying hair, undistinguished yet with a superior air. “It’s AQ Khan,” somebody whispered. “The father of our bomb.” At that time, Pakistan had not yet exploded its first nuclear bomb (that came in 1998), but most Pakistanis believed they had the technology to do so. For a country with a huge inferiority complex, the idea of matching India, its far larger neighbour and rival, made Abdul Qadeer Khan eclipse even its cricket stars as a hero. Yet, since 2004, Khan has been under house arrest, forced to confess to selling nuclear know-how and parts to rogue states. Nobody seriously believed President Musharraf’s claim that Khan was ...

(CNSNews.com) – The total value of the bailouts undertaken by the federal government in 2008 now exceeds the combined cost of every major war the United States has ever engaged in , according to a comparison of war costs calculated by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) and the value of the bailouts as calculated by Bloomberg News or Bianco Research. According to CRS, all major U.S. wars (including such events as the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Civil War, the Spanish American War, World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, but not the invasion of Panama or the Kosovo War), cost a total of $7.2 trillion in inflation-adjusted 2008 dollars . According to Bloomberg , the federal government has made commitments worth a total of $8.5 trillion in the bailouts of 2008. That includes actual expenditures as well as loan and asset guarantees. Bianco Research puts the total value of the bailouts at $8.7 trillion. In this Sept. 23, 2008 file photo, the amo...

I t's a tragedy that the Israelis - a people who must understand better than almost anybody the horrors of oppression - are now acting as oppressors. As the great Jewish writer Primo Levi once remarked "Everybody has their Jews, and for the Israelis it's the Palestinians". By creating a middle Eastern version of the Warsaw ghetto they are recapitulating their own history as though they've forgotten it. And by trying to paint an equivalence between the Palestinians - with their homemade rockets and stone-throwing teenagers - and themselves - with one of the most sophisticated military machines in the world - they sacrifice all credibility. The Israelis are a gifted and resourceful people who fully deserve the right to live in peace, but who seem intent on squandering every chance to allow that to happen . It's difficult to avoid the conclusion that this conflict serves the political and economic purposes of Israel so well that they have every interest in mainta...

The Twilight Zone ' We're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area which we call the Twilight Zone.' - Rod Serling Barack Obama is the first American 'leader' to begin his administration as a lame duck . During his two year long campaign the candidate with zero experience claimed to be 'up to the job' of leading this nation. Yesterday he proved his critics were right: He is not qualified to lead anything other than a press-conference. An unforeseen global crisis has erupted in Gaza with the declaration of 'All Out WAR' on the Palestinian people; and Obama hid behind a date on the calendar when what he might have said could have altered this entire situation. When he was asked about G...

Pakistan has suspended supplies to US and Nato forces in neighbouring Afghanistan as security forces launch a major offensive against suspected pro-Taliban fighters. The Khyber Pass supply route in the troubled northwest tribal belt was closed on Tuesday, as Pakistan sent tanks, helicopter gunships and artillery units into the region . Tariq Hayat, the Khyber region's top administrator, said a curfew had been imposed in the region and the main road leading to the Afghan border had been sealed. "Supplies to Nato forces will remain suspended until we clear the area of militants and outlaws who have gone out of control," he said. Hayat confirmed Pakistani security forces had launched "an operation against militants and armed groups in Jamrud" - the gateway to the Khyber Pass. 'Giant operation' Pro-Taliban fighters have carried out a string of attacks in recent months aimed at choking off supplies transported to foreign forces in landlocked Afghani...