Republicans seized on North Korea's reported nuclear test last week as further evidence that the need for strong U.S. leadership extends beyond Iraq.

Bush's changing rhetoric reflects increasing administration efforts to tie the war, increasingly unpopular at home, with the global fight against terrorism, still the president's strongest suit politically.

"We can't tolerate a new terrorist state in the heart of the Middle East, with large oil reserves that could be used to fund its radical ambitions, or used to inflict economic damage on the West," Bush said in a news conference last week in the Rose Garden.

When no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, Bush shifted his war justification to one of liberating Iraqis from a brutal ruler.

After Saddam's capture in December 2003, the rationale became helping to spread democracy through the Middle East. Then it was confronting terrorists in Iraq "so we do not have to face them here at home," and "making America safer," themes Bush pounds today.

"We're in the ideological struggle of the 21st century," he told a California audience this month. "It's a struggle between good and evil."

Vice President Dick Cheney takes it even further: "The hopes of the civilized world ride with us," Cheney tells audiences.

Except for the weapons of mass destruction argument, there is some validity in each of Bush's shifting rationales, said Michael O'Hanlon, a foreign policy scholar at the Brookings Institution who initially supported the war effort.

"And I don't have any big problems with any of them, analytically. The problem is they can't change the realities on the ground in Iraq, which is that we're in the process of beginning to lose," O'Hanlon said. "It is taking us a long time to realize that, but the war is not headed the way it should be."

Andrew Card, Bush's first chief of staff, said Bush's evolving rhetoric, including his insistence that Iraq is a crucial part of the fight against terrorism, is part of an attempt to put the war in better perspective for Americans.

The administration recently has been "doing a much better job" in explaining the stakes, Card said in an interview. "We never said it was going to be easy. The president always told us it would be long and tough."

"I'm trying to do everything I can to remind people that the war on terror has the war in Iraq as a subset. It's critical we succeed in Iraq as part of the war on terror," said Card, who left the White House in March.

Bush at first sought to explain increasing insurgent and sectarian violence as a lead-up to Iraqi elections. But elections came and went, and a democratically elected government took over, and the sectarian violence increased.

Bush has insisted U.S. soldiers will stand down as Iraqis stand up. He has likened the war to the 20th century struggles against fascism, Nazism and communism. He has called Iraq the "central front" in a global fight against radical jihadists.

Having jettisoned most of the earlier, upbeat claims of progress, Bush these days emphasizes consequences of setting even a limited withdrawal timetable: abandonment of the Iraqi people, destabilizing the Middle East and emboldening terrorists around the world.

The more ominous and determined his words, the more skeptical the American public appears, polls show, both on the war itself and over whether it is part of the larger fight against terrorism, as the administration insists.

Bush's approval rating, reflected by AP-Ipsos polls, has slid from the mid 60s at the outset of the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 to the high 30s now. There were light jumps upward after the December 2003 capture of Saddam, Bush's re-election in November 2004 and each of three series of aggressive speeches over the past year. Those gains tended to vanish quickly.

With the war intruding on the fall elections, both parties have stepped up their rhetoric.

Republicans, who are also reeling from the congressional page scandal, are casting Democrats as seeking to "cut and run" and appease terrorists.

Democrats accuse Bush of failed leadership with his "stay the course" strategy. They cite a government intelligence assessment suggesting the Iraq war has helped recruit more terrorists, and a book by journalist Bob Woodward that portrays Bush as intransigent in his defense of the Iraq war and his advisers as bitterly divided.

Democrats say Iraq has become a distraction from the war against terrorism - not a central front. But they are divided among themselves on what strategy to pursue.

Republicans, too, increasingly are growing divided as U.S. casualties rise.

"I struggle with the fact that President Bush said, 'As the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down.' But the fact is, this has not happened," said Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., a war supporter turned war skeptic.

The Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. John Warner of Virginia, said after a recent visit to Iraq that Iraq was "drifting sideways." He urged consideration of a "change of course" if the Iraq government fails to restore order over the next two or three months.

More than 2,750 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the war, most of them since Bush's May 2003 "mission accomplished" aircraft carrier speech. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have died.

Recent events have been dispiriting.

The United States now has about 141,000 troops in Iraq, up from about 127,000 in July. Some military experts have suggested at least one additional U.S. division, or around 20,000 troops, is needed in western Iraq alone.

Dan Benjamin, a former Middle East specialist with the National Security Council in the Clinton administration, said the administration is overemphasizing the nature of the threat in an effort to bolster support.

"I think the administration has oversold the case that Iraq could become a jihadist state," said Benjamin, now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "If the U.S. were to leave Iraq tomorrow, the result would be a bloodbath in which Sunnis and Shiites fight it out. But the jihadists would not be able to seek power."

Not all of Bush's rhetorical flourishes have had the intended consequences.

When the history of Iraq is finally written, the recent surge in sectarian violence is "going to be a comma," Bush said in several recent appearances.

Critics immediately complained that the remark appeared unsympathetic and dismissive of U.S. and Iraqi casualties, an assertion the White House disputed.

For a while last summer, Bush depicted the war as one against "Islamic fascism," borrowing a phrase from conservative commentators. The strategy backfired, further fanning anti-American sentiment across the Muslim world.

The "fascism" phrase abruptly disappeared from Bush's speeches, reportedly after he was talked out of it by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Karen Hughes, a longtime Bush confidant now with the State Department.

Hughes said she would not disclose private conversations with the president. But, she told the AP, she did not use the "fascism" phrase herself. "I use 'violent extremist,'" she said.

Setmarian's 2005 capture was reported in May of this year after the United States put a $5 million bounty on the head of the alleged founder of al Qaeda's Spanish network.

A photograph of the red-haired Setmarian has been removed from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Intelligence's most-wanted Web page.

Pakistan has not answered requests from Madrid about the whereabouts of Setmarian, wanted in Spain for allegedly training September 11 hijackers in Afghanistan and ordering Madrid commuter train attacks that killed 191 people, according to El Pais.

Spain's high court is unable to request his extradition as he has not been officially imprisoned, the newspaper reported.

Spanish high court officials were not immediately available to comment.

Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon in June complained U.S. officials were concealing information on his whereabouts.

Amnesty International has reported Setmarian's disappearance. The human rights organization says dozens of Islamic radicals captured in Pakistan are held in clandestine jails operated by the United States and other countries.

Setmarian is married to Elena Moreno, a Spanish woman who says he is held in a secret CIA jail.

"It's a cheap way of doing aerial surveillance, it's a cheap way of doing intelligence and evidence gathering. Put over an anti-social behaviour hotspot, it is quite a significant percentage cheaper than the force helicopter," said Superintendent John Myles, the joint-head of the task force.

"There may be some hurdles. The Civil Aviation Authority may say that it is a no-no, but I don't think it is at the moment," he said.

The newspaper reported that police forces in the United States have used similar drones, which cost about 16,000 pounds each, and circle areas at a height of 250 feet (76 metres), flying at about 30 miles (50 kilometres) per hour.

"The new US space policy reflects a more aggressive and unilateral stance"

The earlier statement said US operations should be "consistent with treaty obligations". In contrast, the most recent one, issued on 6 October, rejects international agreements that would limit US testing or use of military equipment in space.

The new version also uses stronger language to assert that the US can defend its spacecraft, echoing an air force push for "space superiority" made in 2004. It states the US has the right to "protect its space capabilities, respond to interference and deny, if necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities hostile to US national interests".

The document also details how the US government plans to administer the use of nuclear-powered space craft, which will be used if they "safely enable or significantly enhance space exploration or operational capabilities".

From issue 2573 of New Scientist magazine, 14 October 2006, page 7

[The contradictions in the "intelligence" was only discovered by chance, because the same barrister happened to be representing for both men. The trials are held in secret under new "terror" laws, presumably to prevent fake evidence concocted by the regime from being exposed, because there is no legitimate reason for concealing any of the information from this trial. Details of other secret trials will remain secret. The lawyers acting for the government were familiar with both sets of evidence and must have been fully aware of the contradiction.]

In a ruling produced in May, but only now made public, the judge accepted the mistake was not deliberate.

But Mr Justice Newman went on to say the "administration of justice is put at risk" if such failures occur.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of human rights group Liberty, said: "Our worst fear has been realised when the government submits flawed secret intelligence to a commission, which will determine if people are to be returned to countries where they may face torture.

"The home secretary has a duty to explain why the commission was misled, and how this can possibly be prevented under these shadowy arrangements in the future."

'Steps taken'

The home office said the judge's comments had been noted and steps were being taken to ensure such an error could not occur again.

"The secretary of state and security service note the constructive comments made by Siac in its judgment concerning the methodology and approach which should be taken when preparing evidence," a spokesman said.

"We accept their recommendations and are taking this forward with independent counsel who acts for the secretary of state in these cases.

"Siac with the assistance of the special advocates, has identified an oversight in the secretary of state's disclosure process in this case.

"That this resulted from an error is accepted and steps are being taken to ensure that this does not occur again."

Siac is the venue of appeal for foreign nationals facing detention, deportation or exclusion from the UK on grounds of national security.

Its hearings and rulings are never fully made public because they include testimony from members of the secret security services, which the government says it cannot divulge.

Outgoing Secretary-General Kofi Annan got the job because he agreed to play by those rules and did such an admirable job of it he (and the UN) won a Nobel Peace prize in 2001 as a reward for keeping his head down and doing what he was told but not as disingenuously announced at the award ceremony for "their work for a better organized and more peaceful world." Annan never achieved or worked for peace anywhere, nor would a true airing of his legacy show much more accomplished than he knew who the "management" was, and he showed up every day to serve that "higher authority" and its agenda of exploitative war and colonization.

The result is a 10 year record of failing to fulfill the mandate he was sworn to uphold: "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war; to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights; to establish conditions (promoting) justice....equal rights of men and women (in all nations)....(respect for) international law....promote social progress....to ensure....armed force shall not be used" and much more. Kofi Annan failed on all counts, and he'll leave his UN post shortly with little to boast about except a Nobel award so richly undeserved.

Annan's tenure is a shameless and dismal record of failure:

-- He never condemned or acted to end the devastating economic sanctions against the Iraqi people that killed up to 1.5 million defenseless men, women and children.

-- He never used his high-profile job to denounce the US criminal war waged there since March, 2003, based on lies and now known to have likely killed another 655,000 or more of them.

-- He failed to speak out forcefully against or do anything to prevent that war or the equally brutal and unjustifiable one waged against Afghanistan.

-- He's been appallingly silent in the run-up to a potential Middle East apocalypse if the US and/or Israel go ahead with their plans to attack Iran and use nuclear weapons to do it.

-- He never used his sworn power and influence to uphold the oath he took to work for peace and protest Israel's genocidal wars on Palestine and Lebanon against defenseless civilians there when the prestige of his office alone might have been enough to stop or at least mitigate them.

-- He acted irresponsibly during the three failed US-instigated and funded coup attempts against democratically elected President Hugo Chavez failing in his obligation to denounce them.

-- The Ghanaian-born Annan tenure showed a disturbing indifference to the pain and suffering of his own people throughout the continent of his birth. He chose instead to be a dutiful agent of the Global North and its corporate predators and conspiratorially allowed them to ravage Africa's vastness for its resource riches including in Dhafur where control of its oil and other valuable resources and the US's interest in them is central to understanding what this conflict is all about.

-- He allowed Blue Helmet stormtrooper thuggery in places like Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo and what now is likely ahead for South Lebanon following Israel's summer aggression there. He dispatched UN so-called peacekeepers to these conflict zones as de facto paramilitary enforcers for the US and Israeli imperial agendas of plunder and exploitation, not with any intent or interest to keep the peace or promote the public welfare.

-- Kofi Annan will leave his post with a single notable achievement: a clear shameless record of having pledged fealty to the Bush crime syndicate making him a willing and willful co-conspirator in its reign of terror for world dominance.

This is a man who agreed to his marching orders before showing up for work, understood who's in charge and did his job to please the "management." He's now wrapping up his tenure, will leave shortly with a disgraceful record of mission unaccomplished and is preparing for the arrival of the new man just elected to replace him. People of conscience won't miss him. The Secretary-General-elect will have to work for the same "management" and understands he'll have to serve by its same set of rules. To get the top job, he, like Kofi Annan, had to have agreed in advance to go along with them to get along, but if he does it he, too, will violate the letter and spirit of the Charter all Secretaries-General are sword to uphold.

Since he hasn't yet arrived, it's premature to judge him, but it's fair to say Ban Ki-Moon never would have been South Korea's Minister of Foreign Affairs if he hadn't been respectful of the country that's occupied his for over half a century and still has enough clout to dictate who gets the most important jobs there affecting South Korean - US relations. Still, the new man on the job will be interesting to watch. In his former capacity, he's at times been a critic of US policy toward the peninsula and even went so far as to rebuke Condoleezza Rice's Senate confirmation hearing statement calling North Korea an "outpost of tryanny." He used diplomatic language, of course, only saying her comment "would never help create an atmosphere of dialogue."

In the aftermath of North Korea's presumed underground nuclear test this month and the economic and political sanctions (with no authorization for force) just imposed against the DPRK, it will bear watching how firm the new Secretary-General will be urging peaceful diplomacy instead of the usual US blunderbuss harshness demanding repressive sanctions with enough latitude to lead to war which often is the Bush administration's prime agenda in the first place. It will also be interesting to see how the new UN chief handles the continuing confrontation between the US and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. With the December presidential election fast approaching and a fourth US attempt to oust and assassinate Chavez likely moving toward implementation around the electoral period, will this UN leader act any differently than his predecessor.

Venezuelan Foreign Vice-Minister for North America, Jorge Valero, expressed a tone of optimism saying while still in his South Korean post, Ban Ki-Moon wanted (and presumably still does want) a strong relationship and spirit of cooperation with the Venezuelan Mission to the UN and his country. He also acknowledged Venezuela's progressive proposals and agenda in such multilateral bodies as the Non-Aligned Movement (of 116 nations against imperialism, colonialism, aggression and occupation) and the G-77 nations (that's since grown to 132 developing member states). The Venezuelan Minister said "Ban Ki-Moon assured that he will work with Venezuela on the region's integration. Likewise, he ratified his interest in the results of the elections for a seat on the UN Security Council, where Venezuela embodies a strong contender."

A few diplomatic words prior to heading up the UN Secretariat with an obligation to fulfill the body's Charter in service to all nations is no substitute for what the new man on the job will actually do once he's there. It won't be long to find out though, and the oppressed people of the world in all its troubled spots better hope Ban Ki-Moon takes his responsibilities more seriously than his predecessor and others before him. Based on the past record of UN Secretaries-General though and the oppressive power of the US overshadowing their best intentions, it's hard to hold out much hope. Still, it will be refreshing if Ban Ki-Moon actually takes his obligation and sworn oath seriously enough to respect the rights of all nations, uses his prominent public stage as an advocate for them, and works for peace and an end to all injustice and conflicts still raging around the world. That's his mandate, and it's about time someone in this post took it seriously. Let's wish the new UN Secretary-General well and hope one day he'll be deservedly rewarded for a job well done that he actually did. The world is waiting to find out.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be contacted at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Iran has shrugged off the threat of sanctions in the past. Analysts say the world's fourth largest oil exporter, which is enjoying an oil revenue windfall, may feel it can cope with the modest penalties likely to be imposed initially.

Hosseini said Iran's proposal for other countries to invest in its nuclear program was "still on the table."

"We have received offers from the other side regarding our proposal about the consortium on uranium enrichment and we are studying the offers but we haven't made a decision about who we are going to work with," Hosseini said in comments broadcast on state TV after the initial Web site report.

He did not give further details or identify other parties.

Iran has said this would be a way for others to monitor its atomic work to prove it was peaceful.

In the Web site report, Hosseini was also quoted as saying that the United States was to blame for North Korea's decision to stage a nuclear test because of its "unilateral policies in global issues."

Iran has said it opposes atomic weapons and, in previous statements, has called for nuclear disarmament by all countries.