And in the specific case of Bull, he was in the midst of revealing when he turned up dead, the beneficiaries of "commissions," many of the recipients being high level politicians in Washington and London.

Even though observers close to Dr. Kelly and Bull have so solid evidence they were killed, it's interesting to note that most of the pair's damaging information has been redacted from official records, silenced by corrupted courts or kept from public view through a compliant press.

But whatever the sad case may be, it's obvious these "dirty politicians," doing the devil's handy work are hiding "something big and play for keeps."

And it's obvious from the results of the "killing fields" in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, they function only for power and profit with absolutely no conscience, not only killing innocents on the battlefield but killing-off those who get too close to exposing their "dirty games," as these killer-crooks live under the devilish credo of "what's one more drop of blood matter when the whole world is painted a bloody red anyway."

However, for the public record and for the world to know, there is a bulk of evidence showing these "masters of evil" not only include those Middle East leaders in collusion with the West, but those in power in Washington and London. Although some evidence has come forward, much of the incriminating files and documentation have been fiercely protected to this day, as these devilish politicians know all too well that the rancid odor of warm blood and rotting body parts from the illegal arms trade follows curious path right into 10 Downing Street and 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

The Arming of Iraq and Iran

As Saddam Hussein sits rotting in a Baghdad jail awaiting a hangman's noose, the last thing Prime Minister Tony Blair and President George W. Bush wants is for Hussein to spill the beans, tell the truth and talk.

They want him out of the picture since he could add even more damaging information to the solid body of evidence that over the period of 1982-90 Iraq and Iran were supplied by the U.S. and UK with WMD, including biological cultures and chemical precursors of nerve gases and radioactive material, including caesium-137.

John J. Drewe in 2003, noted the UK and U.S. were the major suppliers of these weapons and that details of the underlying contracts with overseas companies like Allivane International Limited and Astra Holdings PLC, pinning officials to the illegal sales, were beginning to surface in the 1980's, but have since been forgotten, as politicians have been mostly successful in quieting whistleblowers, bribing the courts and controlling the media.

One example Drewe calls attention to, saying it reveals only the tip of the iceberg of how UK/U.S. politicians profited, points to the fact how UK officials denied in 1992 awarding Iraq billions of Pounds of export credits to purchase weapons. But in February 2003 the government was caught lying when certain relevant paper, perhaps inadvertently declassified, disclosed some of the truth behind the illegal arms deals with Iran and Iraq.

An important aside also surfaced in 1999 in the UK saying that Drewe had spent over 18 months in custody awaiting trial. He was later sentenced to six years in prison for art fraud after having his assets frozen and deprived sufficient access to counsel, according to legal observers.

Back then, sketchy reports surfaced and it was alleged that there was an arms scandal behind the art fraud case, which eventually silenced Drewe. Throughout the case, Drewe claimed that he had been set up as fall guy for a widespread conspiracy that included Scotland Yard, the Ministry of Defense and the governments of at least seven nations he helped broker between British weapons manufacturers and Iran, Iraq

As is usual in such cases, the news media jumped to the defense of the State, presenting Drewe in a bad light. However, despite the bad press, he had his vocal supporters.

Gerald James, former Astra chairman, who avoided a long prison sentence in the Matrix Churchill arms-related case by showing that he had acted with the approval of the Ministry of Defense, offered evidence for three hours in Drewe's defense. Geoffrey Scriven also offered to give evidence that the Lord Chancellor secretly briefed judges and the courts have been corrupted regarding the Drewe matter.

And while the legal tensions mounted, the government back then quickly denied Drewe and other whistle blower allegations that Allivane International Limited ever existed, although records clearly showed it was formed in 1982 and traded until 1988.

Drewe also presented documentary evidence proving the existence and that Allivane was a front for British Special Intelligence Services, exporting arms to both Iraq and Iran. The company was also mentioned in the Scott report, most of which suppressed by the government.

Why Did UK and U.S. Partner-Up?

Behind the legal wrangling and government whitewashing, the motive behind selling weapons to the Middle East is simple: war is a profitable game. And the means to distribute, of course, is to then create a system complex, undetectable companies to first manufacture the weapons, then get them safely to the Middle East without UN detection and then, of course, repay politicians through handsome "commissions" with laundered money transferred secretly under the financial radar screen.

But how and why did the U.S. and UK partner-up to make this happen back in the early 1980's?

The plan, according to Drewe and others, originated in Washington as a joint UK/U.S. venture. On Dec. 17, 1983, information surfaced that Donald Rumsfeld delivered a letter from President Ronald Reagan to Saddam Hussein in Baghdad, as an agreement was reached between the two countries whereby Iraq would be supplied with munitions, including biological chemical and WMD, as well as being provided with loans from a U.S. bank.

To verify this trip, Howard Teicher, advisor to the U.S. National Security Council on the Middle East (1982-87), accompanied Rumsfeld and filed a subsequent 1995 affidavit swearing to the trip and the American deal to sell weapons to Iraq.

However, Rumsfeld and Reagan, two of the alleged private beneficiaries of the illegal weapon sales, had a problem. They had a big problem since UN arms embargoes were rigorously being enforced in the U.S., unlike in Europe.

So to avoid public scrutiny, they had to figure out a way to provide an alternative route for the illegal export of American munitions. To reach this diabolical end, the U.S. then set up a number of "front" companies" in Europe, in coordination with the CIA, MI6 and the UK's DTI and Foreign Office.

One such "front company," according to financial researchers silenced by the compliant press, crooked courts and bogus national security claims, was Allivane International Limited, which in 1983 received start-up money in the form of a grant from the British government. Contracts were then awarded to Allivane that in turn supplied Iraq with vast quantities of ammunition and weaponry conveniently manufactured in the U.S.

Drewe and several other financial researchers pointed out around this time a British arms company, Astra Holdings plc, grew as it was awarded lucrative contracts by the American government through the British embassy in Washington.

He added that between 1985 and 1990 Astra was the subcontractor to Allivane for the supply of GB Pounds billions-worth of munitions to both Iraq and Iran.

"Astra was then one of the UK arms companies targeted for destruction as the Iran-Iraq war ended," wrote Drewe in a report that has never surfaced in the mainstream press or in official proceedings concerning the illegal arms sales. Atsra records also show its board was compromised by Stefan Kock, a support agent for both the Security and Intelligence Services (MI6), in his capacity as consultant for the Midland Bank. He orchestrated the supply of armaments through "front" companies in deals of which the board remained ignorant, and which did not appear on the Astra books.

Drewe continued:

"The existing paper trail demonstrates that consignments of munitions, chemicals and radioactive material were sent from America to the Faldingworth depot of Astra Defence Systems, and then on to destinations such as the Al Fao organisation in Baghdad. Gerald James, the former chairman of Astra Holdings, obtained the labels marked Al Fao, with evidence of instructions from Rexon that they should be removed before the shipment left Faldingworth.

"All the Astra files, appropriated in seventeen raids by the Ministry of Defense Police and DTI personnel on the offices of the former chairman, Gerald James, are held secret by the DTI. They show huge "commissions" paid on these off-balance-sheet deals, their amounts and their recipients.

"These files are among a body of documentation which is being fiercely protected by government officials, to this day, from every attempt to bring them into public scrutiny. The government is succeeding in its efforts only because it has the benefit of collusion by the courts. This did emerge in the Scott report. Although the courts were aware that those being prosecuted of breaching the arms embargo were doing so on the instructions of the government, they allowed this information to be withheld "in the public interest".

Former Astra Chairman Speaks Out Backing Drewe: Why Is Nobody Listening?

Before dissecting the complex interrelationships among the "front companies," the many political and private players on both sides of the Atlantic, including the Bush family, Rumsfeld, Reagan, former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, her many level officials, Kock's vital role as MI6 infiltrator and overseer, the suppression of the infamous but little known Scott Report, the role of Peter Levine as former British defense official made chairman of Lloyd's of London, it's wise to look at the public statement made by former Astra Holdings PLC Chairman from 1980-90, Gerald Reaveley James, head of the company which became a leading ammunition and weapons manufacture and supplier to Iraq and Iran.

Much of James' statements regarding the Scott Report and the corrupt British legal system have never been adequately reported by the compliant press or followed up by investigators, as it appears to have fallen into the same "deep black hole" where Dr. Kelly and Bull's illegal arms sales information has also been laid to rest.

Before reading James's lengthy comments, remember the Scott Report he refers to has for the most part been suppressed from the public record, as well as the MI6 and CIA role in overseeing the illegal arms deals and the money trail leading back to the U.S. and UK politicians who put the whole devious plan together.

Although James's statements, made as an invited guest and speaker at a UK conference of the Environmental Law Center, are lengthy and only one man's recollection and experience, they are left with only a few insignificant deletions for clarity due to the past suppression of information on this aspect of the sale of arms to Iran and Iraq and his role as Chairman of the company in the middle of the illegal deals.

A more in depth look story of Astra can be found in James' little known book, published in the UK by Little Brown, called "In the Public Interest."

Here are his statements:

"I am reminded of the very appropriate quote from Edmund Burke (1729-97) "It is necessary only for the good man to do nothing for evil to triumph."

"The Astra case and my case reflect much that has been to the fore in recent years in not only scandals around arms companies like Astra, Matrix Churchill, Ordtec, Forgemasters, Walter Somers, Ferranti and other companies like Polly Peck, BCCI and Maxwell but also in the Scott Inquiry, the BSE Inquiry and the Lloyds of London affair and other scandals. The underlying problem is secret unaccountable government which bypasses Parliament and how the law is administered in the UK, gives aid and succor to such a state of affairs. The most common device is the concealment of evidence and manipulation of cases. There is a tendency when challenged for those in authority to talk of conspiracy theories. My experience is that those who do so are usually part of the conspiracy.

"My company Astra gave rise to much of the circumstances which created the Scott Inquiry, the Supergun revelations (we reported it first), the Aitken affair, the murder of Gerald Bull in Brussels in March 1990 and much else.

"Until March 1990 and between 1980 and 1990 I was chairman of Astra Holdings PLC ("Astra") which became a leading ammunition and weapons manufacturer. By the late 1980's Astra had factories in the United States (9), Canada (2), Belgium (5), United Kingdom (5) and administrative headquarters in Washington Dc, Brussels and London and employed 4,000 personnel.

"Astra became involved in covert weapons and ammunitions operations organised by MI5 and MI6 and the CIA, the MOD, DOD, FCO and the State Department and the DTI. To such an extent was Astra involved with its principal subsidiaries, Walters, Accudyne, Kilgore USA PRB Belgium, BMARC UK; in the covert trade manipulations of Foreign Policy. In 1989/90, following a reappraisal of Foreign Policy in the light of the demise of the Cold War and changing circumstances in the Middle East, where it became apparent the US, UK and EEC had transferred Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical weapons technology as well as conventional weapons to countries like Iran and Iraq, and the discovery Pakistan had the atomic bomb, the whole covert network was reorganized.

"This involved the collapsing of companies like Astra, Ferranti/ISC, Polly Peck, BCCI, Maxwell Group etc and the prosecution of lesser fry Companies and their directors ~ companies like Matrix Churchill, BNJ, Ordtec, Euromac, SRC, Forgemasters, Walter Somers are examples. The directors of Astra were to a large extent ignorant of the full range of covert activities carried out in their name but aware of some of these activities and the likely destination of their goods. As however all operations were sanctioned by the DTI, MOD, FCO, and in the U.S. by the DOD and the State Department and in Belgium by the Belgian Government, not too many questions were raised initially.

"However, in late 1988 and 1989 it became clear to me as Chairmen that the clandestine operations far exceeded anything remotely sanctioned by the full Board and I set out to investigate in depth. I became aware that certain plants were used to secretly store and ship goods; that monies were being transferred to other operations without book records or board approval in secret commission payments; that our paper work and parallel bank accounts were being used to process arms shipments from major UK defense companies like British Aerospace, Royal Ordnance, GEC Marconi, Thorn EMI etc. A leading British Defence Journalist wrote a report which was largely kept secret which indicated 100m was stolen from the Export Credit Guarantee Department ("ECGD") in a fictitious subcontract for propellant which BMARC, an Astra subsidiary, had secretly obtained in 1998 from Royal Ordnance.

"I also became concerned about payments to and business with MI6/CIA front company Allivane which had occurred between 1983 and 1988 via Astra. Is also became clear that all our main operations were involved in covert operations in the USA, Belgium and the UK, and that Astra, when it acquired these companies, had inherited a hard core of MI6, MI5, DIA agents who operated behind the back of the original directors and who treated them as "useful idiots".

"All our main companies were involved with Space Research Corporation ("SRC") and the late Dr Gerald Bull who was behind the Supergun and other secret projects which Astra companies were also involved in. In 1989 I realized we had a hugely dangerous individual on our main Board and the BMARC Board who was an MI6 agent.

"This individual, Stepahnus Adolphus Kock had high level political connections to Thatcher, Hesletine, Younger, Hanley, etc as well as MI5 and MI6 connections. It is now clear to me that he was involved in the murder of Dr Gerald Bull in Brussels on 22nd march 1990 and Jonathan Moyle in Santiago, Chile on 31st March 1990. BMARC was the only company outside the Atomic Weapons research Establishment and Government Arms depots with the capability to store nuclear bombs like Redbeard and WE177.

"By early 1990 my probing had become a major problem and a plot was hatched to remove me as Chairman shortly before the Supergun and other revelations and Bull's murder. A new dummy board was formed in reality by Kock with two MI6/MI5 stooges ran the company into the ground over the next two years. In order to explain away the destruction of the company with a 350m order book and a market capitalization of 120m desperate attempts were made to find evidence of malpractice by the original directors. Gumbley, my Managing Director, who had been with Bull until an hour before he was shot had discussed with Bull suing UK Government and senior civil servants using Bull's extensive knowledge of high level corruption and illegal operations.

"It had been agreed I would return with Gumbley to agree with lawyers how to proceed a week later. I had discussed such matters with Bull some six months previous but no further action had been taken. Gumbley was immediately framed up for corrupting an MOD official and jailed for 9 months and after desperately trying to find something on me and failing, Kock and MI6/MI5 decided to institute through Peter Lilley and the DTI a DTI Inquiry. Lilley was Secretary of state at the DTI at the time.

"The DTI Inquiry lasted three years and cost 2.5m plus (as much as the Scott Inquiry). The announcement of the Inquiry and the misleading press statements issued by the DTI and Government ensured the downfall of Astra. Crooks and MI5, MI6, agents or informers were put in charge of Astra, including Kock, Roy Barber FCA and Tony McCann. Barber and McCann whose managerial and industrial competence and experience were negligible paid themselves 330,000 and 280,000 respectively. Barber took 100,000 in the first month. Barber's annual payment was more than I received in salary and expenses as Chairman over ten years while I built the company. PRB was sold off immediately for 3m to avoid embarrassing revelations. MI5, MI6 and MOD police and Customs launched 17 raids on Astra premises in order to steal any sales and other documentation incriminating Government.

"No new orders were obtained in spite of the Gulf War and the company ran on the 350m order book we had left for two years, before it was put into receivership on 2nd February 1992 on the eve of me giving evidence to the House of Commons Trade and Industry Select Committee re Supergun, Project Babylon and arms to Iraq (and Iran etc). Press coverage was hue and adverse. This facilitated, as clearly city interests like Banks and Astra's main shareholders 3i, Prudential and Clerical and medical cooperated with Government for their own interest and purposes against the interests of smaller shareholders ( a parallel with Lloyds techniques).

"Kock had a cover as a consultant in Midland Bank's secret arms department, Midland and Industrial Trade Services ("MITS"). This was staffed by ex service officers, MI5, MI6, agents and intelligence affiliated bankers. Midland with the Bank of Boston were Astra's main bankers and dominated by MI6 CIA agents. Kock was also said to be head of Group 13, the Government's assassination and dirty tricks squad according to Richard John Rainey Unwin, a close associate of Knock himself who was a contract MI6 agent and Consultant to Astra. Kock and Unwin, with Martin Laing Construction, negotiated the 2bn Malaysian defence deal before George Younger, the Defense Secretary even knew of it.

"The MOD police arrested several of my colleagues, framed Grumbley up. I was subjected to harassment, burglaries; I was arrested by Customs, investigated by the Inland Revenue, subjected to surveillance, threats, bugging, telephone tapping (all documented), a DTI Inquiry which lasted 3 years and a DTI prosecution which lasted 4 years. In addition I had to give copious evidence to the Scott Inquiry over 4 years, 2 DTI Select Committees, Foreign Affairs Select Committee, Defense Select Committee, Public Accounts Select Committee, Public Services Select committee, Police (SOI), a huge law suit in the United States (Dooley case). My family suffered considerably, my two eldest sons army careers suffered, my youngest son's education because of adverse publicity, my brother was killed in an accident never satisfactory explained which could have been intended for me.

In the course of my own experiences I took considerable note and interest in parallel cases like Matrix Churchill, Ordtec, Euromac, Atlantic Commercial, BNJ, SRC, Forgemasters, Walter Somers, Polly Peck, Foxley Ferranti/ISC, BCCI, Maxwell etc. All these cases and others and the Astra case involved the gross abuse of power by Government and its agencies and servants, concealment of key evidence, intimidation, threats, false and selective prosecutions, manipulation of evidence, perversion of the course of justice. It has also been clearly demonstrated that there is no separation of powers within the United Kingdom. Key legal appointments like Lord Chancellor and attorney General, Solicitor General are wholly political.

"It has also been clearly demonstrated that Parliament has no control of knowledge of events and that a vast apparatus of permanent unelected Government exists. This permanent Government consists of senior civil servants, intelligence and security officers, key figures in certain city and financial institutions (including Lloyds of London), key industrialists and directors of major monopolistic companies, senior politicians. The Lord Chancellors Office which is responsible for the appointment of Judges, Clerks of the House of Commons select Committees and approval of Chairmen of such committees and the approval of the Queen's Counsel, holds a total control of the legal administrative framework and has strong connections to the security and intelligence services.

"We have seen from the arms to Iran, Iraq affairs, the Sandline affair and other scandals that politicians and Parliament have little or no control and are more like players in a pantomime put on for the general public and gullible public.

"Secrecy breeds corruption, secrecy is power, information is power particularly confidential information. There is no accountability and the calibre of MP deteriorates with each Parliament. The young politician with no experience outside is naive and powerless and many now have a blind loyalty to their party. Ironically the hereditary peers of the House of Lords provided one of the last vestiges of honesty and independence now largely destroyed by self-important and self-deluding figures like Blair and Baroness Jay.

"It has never been more vital for people to challenge the views of politicians and opinion formers. We live in an age where much if not most of the media is controlled. The legal mechanism and Judges and the court system need to be beyond reproach. Sadly they are not and the chronicle of abuse and manipulation of cases is appalling. Judges are not independent in most government related cases and are no different to salaried and pensioned civil servants. The independence of the Judiciary is an allusion fostered by the Judiciary. Too often a Judicial Inquiry is a system for cover up and concealment. Too often the courts are influenced by political considerations as in the Scott Inquiry and the recent Lloyds of London case. Perhaps with pressure this can be changed."

Editor's Note: Read Part II Part IIIhttp://www.arcticbeacon.com/1-Feb-2006.html and Part IV

The Iranian leadership's obvious confidence in its ability to deter the US, Britain and Israel seems to rest on mainly four assumptions. Iran is militarily much stronger than Iraq, much larger, its terrain more difficult, its society more cohesive - thus more difficult to defeat, to occupy and to pacify. In addition, President Mahmud Ahmadinejad seems to take particular comfort from the widely anticipated wave of popular outrage and anti-Western attacks in the wider Middle East if Iran should be attacked.

Moreover, the economic costs of a war against Iran in terms of the price of oil and the interruption of the Iranian supply would propel the world economy into a tailspin. And finally, Iranian leaders seem to accept at face value the US moans over its overstretched military forces and the demoralization of US forces in Iraq.

Certainly, Iranian misconceptions are helped mightily by the defeatism of the Western debate about such a war. "No good options" has become something like the consensus view: an airborne and special forces "surgical strike" (as well as a massive attack) against the Iranian nuclear industry and military targets could at best delay its nuclear program and will be followed by retaliation in Iraq, Lebanon etc; a ground attack is out of the question because most of deployable US ground forces are desperately busy in Iraq.

If such things could be planned, one might be persuaded to consider this debate as an aspect of strategic deception. In fact, the US and British forces in Iraq and in the Persian Gulf as well as the forces in Afghanistan are quite able to redeploy on short notice, for example during the days of an initial air campaign against Iran for large-scale operations against the remaining Iranian forces and can be reinforced during the war. The US military infrastructure at the borders of Iran has a very substantial capability to deal with surge requirements.

The somewhat standard scenario for this war - as indicated by Chinese and Russian war games - has the following features:

An initial Israeli air attack against some Iranian nuclear targets, command and control targets and Shahab missile sites. Iran retaliates with its remaining missiles, tries to close the Gulf, attacks US naval assets and American and British forces in Iraq. If Iranian missiles have chemical warheads (in fact or presumed), the US will immediately use nuclear weapons to destroy the Iranian military and industrial infrastructure. If not, an air campaign of up to two weeks will prepare the ground campaign for the occupation of the Iranian oil and gas fields.

Mass mobilization in Iraq against US-British forces will be at most a nuisance - easily suppressed by the ruthless employment of massive firepower. And Israel will use the opportunity to deal with Syria and South Lebanon, and possibly with its Palestinian problem.

The character of this war will be completely different from the Iraq war. No show-casing of democracy, no "nation-building", no journalists, no Red Cross - but the kind of war the United States would have fought in North Vietnam if it had not had to reckon with the Soviet Union and China.

Paul Levian is a former German intelligence officer.

Rasmussen, who is one of George W. Bush's leading supporters in the war in Iraq (Denmark has sent several hundreds troops), governs with the support of the neo-fascist, xenophobic, and inappropriately-named Danish "People's Party." After riots in Arhus, Denmark (at the same time as the arson attacks spread across France, Belgium, and a few German cities), other newspapers in the West began publishing the same cartoons. Danish embassies in Damascus and Beirut have now been set on fire and tensions (and terrorist alerts) have been raised in many countries where the cartoons have been republished. Coffee mugs, T-shirts, and key chains are now being sold on the Internet depicting the offensive images. Cui bono? Who benefits? These tactics, of course, are very convenient for the neo-cons.

Neo-con media outlets such as The New York Sun, Fox News, and others are having a field day with the Muslim riots that have spread around the world in protest over the cartoons just as they had with the French "Muslim" arson attacks. Two New Zealand papers -- The Dominion Post in Wellington and The Press in Christchurch, have published their own controversial cartoons of Mohammed. The papers are owned by Australia's Fairfax Group, which also owns Melbourne's Age, and which was once financially connected to indicted neo-con Lord Conrad Black's scandal-ridden Hollinger publishing empire, which also includes arch neo-con Richard Perle. The Fairfax Group generally adheres to the neo-con corporatist party line.

The neo-cons ignore and even relish in the offensive nature of the inflammatory cartoons depicting Mohammed as a bomb throwing terrorist and pedophile. Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell have made similar comments about the Prophet that Muslims consider blasphemous. What would the neo-cons say if newspapers published cartoons showing a shady looking Moses stealing gold and silver artifacts from the Pharaoh's palace before high tailing it across the Red Sea in the middle of the night? Or a wine-drunk Jesus cavorting with prostitutes in the red light district of Jerusalem? There is no doubt that rabbis and evangelical preachers would be calling for the heads of the offending cartoonists and editors. They've done so for far less.


Moses: "I grabbed ten of the Pharaoh's best urns. I have a list here." Jesus: "I've got the wine. Where are the Jerusalem girls?" See why Muslims are so outraged by unflattering cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed? The neo-cons relish in constant religious warfare, which they have now re-coined "the Long War."

With so many hotheads in the three Abrahamic tradition religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), such inflammatory speech is like yelling fire in a crowded movie theater. The Danish Prime Minister is wrong when he states that the offensive cartoons are protected speech. He would certainly not defend someone who yelled fire in a crowded Copenhagen theater. And struggling Danish farmers, bakers, and fishermen will now pay the price for the boycott of Danish exports by Muslim countries. Lego stockholders will suffer from a boycott of the toy company's products.

But Rasmussen, like Sarkozy, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Netanyahu, Jack Straw, and Australia's John Howard, is marching to the martial music of the neo-cons. They are the shock troops for the Clash of Civilizations, Project for a New American Century, The Long War, A Clean Break, and all the other neo-con plots, conspiracies, and contrivances. It's clearly time to investigate the neo-cons, their networks, their funding sources, their media ownership and investments, their doctrines, their false flag terrorist operations, and their political contributions. Just as Islamist terrorists, they should be rounded up as dangerous members of society and detained until they no longer pose a threat to public safety and the global commonwealth.

Rose traveled to Philadelphia in October 2004 to visit Daniel Pipes, the Neo-Con ideologue who says the only path to Middle East peace will come through a total Israeli military victory. Rose then penned a positive article about Pipes, who compares "militant Islam" with fascism and communism.

In April 2003, President George W. Bush nominated the rabid anti-Muslim Pipes to the board of the United States Institute of Peace, a congressionally sponsored think tank dedicated to "the peaceful resolution of international conflicts."

Ministers from 17 Muslim nations condemned the publication of the cartoons as an egregious "offence to Islam" and called on the Danish government to ensure that it would not be repeated.

When the Danish government, which supports the "war on terror" with more than 500 troops in Iraq, refused to issue an apology for the offensive cartoons, Muslim consumers across the Middle East began a boycott of Danish products.

Within days the boycott had severely affected Danish exporters and the politicians in Copenhagen scrambled to undo the damage. Arla Foods, a large Danish-Swedish dairy company, was badly hit by the boycott. The company, which had annual sales of some $480 million in the Middle East, saw its sales in the region plummet to nil as Muslim shopkeepers pulled Danish products off the shelves.

"We have taken 40 years to build up a very big business in the Middle East, and we've seen it come to a complete stop in five days," company spokeswoman Astrid Gade Niels told the BBC.

"Our sales in the Middle East have come to a complete stop - in all countries in the region," she said. "We have found ourselves in the middle of a game that we have no part in."

As the boycott damaged Danish business and a bomb scare closed the office of his newspaper, Rose continued to defend his decision to commission and publish the offensive cartoons. "We stand by the publication of these 12 cartoons," he said.

Asked if he would have done it knowing what the reaction would be, Rose said: "That is a hypothetical question. I would say that I do not regret having commissioned those cartoons and I think asking me that question is like asking a rape victim if she regrets wearing a short skirt Friday night at the discotheque."

The dangerous "game" that was started by the Danish editor has now been picked up by at least 7 newspapers across Europe. Supposedly in support of the Danes, papers in France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland simultaneously reprinted the cartoons on February 1. The timing suggests that this response was coordinated by a hidden hand.

In Paris, for example, Arnaud Levy, editor-in-chief of the financially-strapped France-Soir, chose to print all 12 of the offensive cartoons. Asked if there had been coordination between European editors about the simultaneous publication of the cartoons, Levy said, "Absolutely not."

The following day, Jacques Lefranc, managing editor of France-Soir, was fired by the paper's owner Raymond Lakah, an Egyptian magnate, according to employees. Chief editor Levy, however, remained on the job.

Peter Mandelson, Trade Commissioner for the European Union, strongly reprimanded the newspapers for pouring "oil on the fire" by reprinting the offensive cartoons.

Robert Ménard, secretary general of Reporters without Borders, a Paris-based media monitor, however, supported the publication of the blasphemous cartoons saying, "All countries in Europe should be behind the Danes and Danish authorities to defend the principle that a newspaper can write what it wishes to, even if it offends people.

"I understand that it may shock Muslims, but being shocked is part of the price of being informed," he told The New York Times.

However, when it comes to discussion of the Holocaust, media monitors like Ménard accept without question the government-imposed censorship laws and imprisonment of historical revisionists. At least 4 well known historians are currently in prison in Germany and Austria for writing and speaking about the Holocaust.

There is clearly a more sinister reason why the Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen refuses to issue a formal apology as demanded by Arab and Muslim governments. The hard-line position taken by Rasmussen, an ally in the "war on terror," has more to do with advancing the "clash of civilizations" than defending free speech in Europe.

It is well known that Islam is an aniconic religion which prohibits depictions of the Prophet in the same way that the Second Commandment prohibits "graven images." The European editors are certainly aware of the fact that Islam prohibits the use of icons or visual images to depict living creatures and that it is blasphemous to publish cartoons of the prophet Mohammed. Yet, they have recklessly and intentionally insulted millions of Muslims and are unwilling to apologize.

"The Danish paper set out to offend and provoke outrage in the Muslim community," a Muslim in Britain wrote to the BBC. "Muslims are able to distinguish between those who wish to debate and those who wish to insult. Trying to camouflage insults under the guise of debate or free speech fools nobody."

There is a deeper reason behind the publication of the offensive cartoons. Given the unapologetic position taken by the Danish government and the editors it appears very likely that tension with Islamic nations will increase and the international crisis will deepen. This is, after all, exactly what the global planners behind the "clash of civilizations" want.

The completely predictable reaction among Muslims sets the stage for violence and "false-flag" terror attacks as Europeans prepare to host the Olympics in Turin, Italy. The Turin-based La Stampa irresponsibly published the cartoons on Feb. 1, two days after Milan's Corriere della Sera.

The anti-Islamic cartoon scandal is no laughing matter. If and when a terror attack does occur and the cartoons and angry Muslims are blamed for being the cause, the reason they were published will become clear. Europeans will become increasingly polarized and hostility to Islam will grow.

A month ago, when I first became aware of the provocative anti-Muslim cartoons published in JP, I immediately contacted the editors and asked why they had allowed their newspaper to be dragged into such a ridiculous and provocative situation.

With Europe already involved in two Middle Eastern wars and with the political tension with Iran increasing daily, I asked the editors, "Do you truly wish to antagonize Muslims?"

"I support freedom of speech and am against self-censorship," Rose, who commissioned the cartoons, wrote in response. It was, however, clearly not simply to exercise Denmark's non-existent freedom of speech that Rose commissioned the anti-Muslim cartoons. The more sinister motive of advancing the "clash of civilizations" among Europeans was evidently behind the offensive images.

"If the issue is really one of free speech, would you publish cartoons making fun of the Jewish Holocaust?" I asked Rose and the editors. "If not, do you at least support the right of newspapers and individuals to raise historical questions about the Holocaust?"

Yet after a month of correspondence with Rose and the editors, they have completely avoided answering my questions about the Holocaust and the right of free speech for historical revisionists in Europe.

Olmert's warning came shortly after Iran announced that it had ended all voluntary cooperative measures with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), including snap checks of its nuclear sites and suspension of uranium enrichment.

The IAEA, the UN's nuclear watchdog, decided on Monday to report Iran's nuclear program to the Security Council, which might lead to sanctions.

Israel, believed to be the only nuclear power in the Mideast region, has accused Iran of secretly developing nuclear weapons under a civilian front, a charge categorically denied by Iran.