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Obama Rejected Tough Options For Countering Chinese Cyber Attacks Two Years Ago

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Photo Credit: Charles Dharapak

President Obama two years ago rejected a series of tough actions against China, including counter-cyber attacks and economic sanctions, for Beijing’s aggressive campaign of cyber espionage against the U.S. government and private businesses networks, according to administration officials.

Meanwhile, China recently issued a veiled threat to the United States about U.S. accusations of Chinese military cyber espionage. China told U.S. officials that continued U.S. public accusations of cyber espionage would render future bilateral discussions unproductive during recent U.S.-China talks following the release of a security firm’s report linking the Chinese military to cyber spying.

On plans to deter Chinese cyber attacks, senior administration officials turned down a series of tough options designed to dissuade China from further attacks that were developed over a three-month period beginning in August 2011.
According to administration officials familiar with internal discussions, the options were dismissed as too disruptive of U.S.-China relations.

The president’s closest advisers feared that taking action would potentially undermine U.S. relations with China, a major economic trading partner that currently has holdings of $1.2 trillion in Treasury debt, the officials told the Free Beacon. Government security and military officials under the White House Interagency Policy Committee, a working group directly supporting the National Security Council, developed the options.

The committee is made up of representatives from the Pentagon, intelligence community, law enforcement, homeland security, and foreign affairs agencies.

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Marine Corps Rapid-Response Team Ordered To Africa To Thwart Another Benghazi Attack

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U.S. Marine CorpsU.S. Africa Command will get a new Marine Corps rapid response force as part of a plan to beef up its crisis response capabilities.

More Leathernecks will be at the ready after the military was unable to get timely aid to Benghazi, Libya last year, during a terror attack that killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and members of his security detail.

Gen. Carter Ham, Africom’s commander, told Congress this week about the planned new force, Stars and Stripes reported Friday.

“The Marine Corps have proposed a new … Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force specifically tailored for crisis response in Africa,” he told the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The force had not yet been formally approved, he said, but added, “we think that that will be available in the relatively near future.”

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Russians Conduct Huge Nuke Drill

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Photo Credit: APRussian nuclear forces conducted a major exercise last month that tested the transport of both strategic and tactical nuclear weapons near Europe, according to United States officials.

The exercise raised concerns inside the Pentagon and with the U.S. European Command because it was the largest exercise of its kind in 20 years and involved heightened alert status of Russian nuclear forces. The nuclear drills were part of other military maneuvers in Russia carried out between Feb. 17 and Feb. 21.

The exercises followed a recent surge in Russian strategic bomber flights that include a recent circling of the U.S. Pacific island of Guam by two Tu-95 Bear bomber and simulated bombing runs by Tu-95s against Alaska and California in June and July.

Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Wesley P. Miller sought to play down the nuclear exercise but declined to comment on the movement of nuclear weapons and whether nuclear forces went on a heightened state of alert. “We don’t comment on intelligence matters,” he said. Miller said the nuclear forces maneuvers were “nothing to be concerned about because the Russians, like us, have routine exercises and inspections.”

However, a U.S. official said the exercise was a concern within the U.S. national security community because of the scale of the exercise and the number of weapons being moved. “Certainly it’s a concern when you have this kind of exercise going on,” this official said.

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Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner

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Photo Credit: du.eduA Chinese general who once threatened to use nuclear weapons against hundreds of U.S. cities will visit the Pentagon this week as part of a U.S.-China military exchange program.

Maj. Gen. Zhu Chenghu, who is head of China’s National Defense University, will take part in a “familiarization exchange,” Maj. Catherine Wilkinson, a Pentagon spokeswoman, told the Free Beacon.

“The delegation will visit Hawaii and D.C.,” she said. “A military delegation from the U.S. Pacific Command will visit China later this year for a reciprocal exchange.”

Zhu will lead a group of 10 senior colonels from all branches of the Chinese military, Wilkinson said. She declined to provide the names of the officers.

Zhu is best known for inflammatory comments made to two foreign news reporters in 2005 when he said China would use nuclear weapons against the United States in any conflict over Taiwan. A State Department spokesman at the time called the comments “highly irresponsible.”

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China Defence Budget To Rise 10.7% In 2013

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Photo Credit: APChina’s defence budget is set to rise 10.7 percent this year, state media said on Tuesday as the national parliament’s annual gathering opens, a slight drop from a 11.2 percent increase in 2012.

“China plans to raise its defence budget by 10.7 percent to 720.2 billion yuan” ($115.7 billion) in 2013, the Xinhua news agency said, citing a budget report that will be reviewed by the National People’s Congress (NPC), the national legislature.

China’s military budgets have risen steadily in recent years along with the country’s booming economic growth, and experts say the actual totals are usually substantially higher than the publicly announced figures.

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Obama Not Bluffing Over Iran Military Threat, Biden Tells AIPAC

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Photo Credit: Chip SomodevillaBarack Obama’s threats to use military force to prevent Iran securing a nuclear weapon are more than idle bluffs, vice-president Joe Biden told the biggest pro-Israeli lobbying group Aipac on Monday.

Biden said that while the US preferred a diplomatic solution to the standoff with Iran, a military option remained on the table.

“The president of the United States cannot, and does not, bluff. President Barack Obama is not bluffing,” Biden told the audience in Washington. Israel is seeking assurances of support from the US, should it decide to launch air strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities.

There has been scepticism about Obama’s commitment to a military option against Iran, given the administration’s general unwillingness to be drawn into new conflicts after the experience of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Some observers feel that Obama’s threat is aimed purely at putting pressure on Iran to resolve the standoff diplomatically and not embark on another conflict.

Pro-Israel supporters of the military option, speaking at Aipac’s annual conference, attempted to counter Obama’s reticence by insisting the military option would only require an overnight air strike, rather than a prolonged conflict.

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Beijing Preparing for War?

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Photo Credit: APUnited States intelligence agencies recently detected China’s military shifting road-mobile ballistic missiles closer to its southern coast near the disputed Senkaku Islands amid growing tensions between Beijing and Japan over the islands dispute.

U.S. defense officials said the movements are being watched closely as China’s military is also holding large-scale military exercises that some fear could be a trigger for a conflict with Japan that could involve U.S. forces. The officials did not provide details of the missile movements that were tracked by U.S. aircraft, ship-based, and satellite surveillance systems in the region.

Disclosure of the missile movements comes as White House national security adviser Tom Donilon on Monday met in Seoul with China’s state councilor Liu Yandong. The two were in South Korea to attend the inauguration of South Korean President Park Geun-hye.

Tensions remain high between Japan and China over Tokyo’s nationalization last year of several uninhabited islands between Okinawa and Taiwan called the Senkakus. China claims the islands as its territory. At issue are large undersea oil and gas deposits sought by both energy-poor countries.

The officials confirmed the missile movements near the provinces of Zhejiang and Fujian after Chinese press outlets first reported them.

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US Special Forces Ordered To Leave Critical Afghanistan Province

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Photo Credit: ReutersThe troops were given a fortnight to leave the strategically critical Wardak province, south west of the capital, in a move likely to trigger another confrontation with Nato commanders.

Aimal Faizi, the Afghan president’s spokesman, said the national security council ordered the expulsion after complaints that “armed groups known as special forces” were committing murder, torture and kidnap.

“The US special forces and illegal armed groups created by them are causing insecurity, instability, and harass local people,” he said. He appeared to pin the blame on Afghan fighters or militiamen recruited by and working with the Americans, but held the US forces responsible.

“These belong to the US special forces,” he said.

In one case nine people went missing after an operation and in another a young student was taken from his home and found dead two days later, with his throat cut.
The surprise announcement appeared to blindside Nato headquarters in Kabul and struck directly at troops who have long been a cornerstone of coalition strategy.

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Commander In Chief Wages War On The Moral Law

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Photo Credit: Gary CameronThe ultimate purpose of the U.S. military is simple: Defend the God-given liberty of Americans. Yet today we have a president who is using his power as commander in chief to wage war against the moral truth that makes liberty possible.

Last week, outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta executed a directive from President Obama that requires the military to treat cohabitating homosexuals as if they were married couples.

Panetta did so in a memorandum he sent to the secretaries of the military departments and to the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness.

“At the direction of the president, the department has conducted a careful and deliberative review of the benefits currently provided to the families of service members,” Panetta wrote. “We have now identified additional family member and dependent benefits that we can lawfully provide to same-sex domestic partners of Military Service members and their children through changes in Department of Defense policies and regulations.”

“These benefits shall be extended to the same-sex domestic partners and, where applicable, children of same-sex domestic partners, once the service member and their same-sex domestic partner have signed a declaration attesting to the existence of their committed relationship,” said Panetta.

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China’s Hack Attack Revealed China’s Military Linked To Cyber Espionage

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Photo Credit: APA secret Chinese military unit is the major player in cyber espionage against an array of computer networks around the world, according to an intelligence report by a cyber security firm.

“Our research and observations indicate that the Communist Party of China is tasking the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to commit systematic cyber espionage and data theft against organizations around the world,” the report by the security firm Mandiant said.

Mandiant conducts cyber threat analyses for both government and industry clients. A threat intelligence report produced in 2010 by the company was unable to confirm Chinese military involvement in widespread cyber attacks that were suspected as originating in China. “Now, three years later, we have the evidence required to change our assessment,” the report said.

“The details we have analyzed during hundreds of investigations convince us that the groups conducting these activities are based primarily in China and that the Chinese government is aware of them.”

Rep. Mike Rogers (R., Mich.), chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said the Chinese government plays a direct role in cyber theft that is “rampant,” and a problem growing “exponentially.”

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