A fresh Pentagon intelligence report exposes China’s covert
cooperation with Libya in developing long-range missiles.
The latest evidence was contained in a top-secret report sent June 9
by National Security Agency Director Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden to top
administration officials. The NSA report reveals that the director of
Libya’s Al-Fatah missile program is planning to travel to China later
this month or next, according to intelligence officials who have seen
it.
The Libyan will go to the University of Aeronautics and Astronautics
in Beijing, China’s premier training center for missile scientists and
technicians. That’s where China is training Libyan missile specialists.
The report is the latest in a series of intelligence reports on the
growing cooperation between China and Libya on missile development.
and that Libyan technicians would be sent to China for missile training.
The latest report is more bad news for the Clinton White House.
National Security Adviser Sandy Berger had been lobbying furiously to
block a bill sponsored by Sen. Fred Thompson, R-Tenn. His bill would
punish China with sanctions for its ongoing missile and weapons
technology sales to rogue states. Mr. Berger insists China’s record on
dangerous weapons sales is improving. But numerous intelligence reports
indicate that’s not true.
Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright told a Senate hearing in
April that the United States formally protested the China-Libya missile
cooperation. She commented after the missile sharing was reported by The
Washington Times.
Security push
The Pentagon is further distancing itself from its export security
office — literally.
Defense Department insiders complain their bosses have reduced the
influence of the Technology Security Directorate because bureaucrats
there opposed technology transfers to China.
Now, the office that oversees transfers of advanced computers and
satellite gadgets is being moved further away. It’s been ordered to
relocate to Alexandria from Army-Navy Drive, which is a short walk to
the Pentagon.
The directorate was one of the lone administration voices that
objected to the Commerce Department approving high-tech equipment sales
to communist China.
“I think it’s a scorched earth policy toward export controls,” said
a Pentagon official. “It stands in the way of trade. National security
or any other kind of security never really scored high with this
administration as an issue of concern.”
The change of address is effective Dec. 17. The Pentagon defends the
move, saying all units of the Technology Security branch will now be
under one roof.
Clark snubbed
In Washington, political signals are ubiquitous, whether sent by
politicians or military leaders.
Army Gen. Henry H. Shelton, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, sent his a week ago by skipping the retirement ceremony for Gen.
Wesley Clark, former NATO supreme commander. The chairman’s absence was
viewed as a final indignity for the military officer many considered the
hero of NATO’s air war against Yugoslavia last year.
Gen. Shelton lives down the street from Fort Meyer’s Summerall Field,
the parade ground where the ceremony was held. His spokesman said he was
on vacation and unable to attend.
The chairman’s absence is the latest in a string of official dumping
on Gen. Clark. The first was the unceremonious notification by cellular
telephone July 30 in Latvia that Gen. Clark was being replaced a few
months before his term ended. Before the four-star general could call
back to lobby for keeping the NATO command, he was called by a
Washington Post reporter. The reporter said he had been given an
“official leak” on Gen. Clark’s pending retirement.
Defense Secretary William S. Cohen did attend the retirement
ceremony. But the secretary offered a kind of snub of his own. He
surprised the assembled brass and guests by not offering any words on
Gen. Clark closing out a long military career.
The first Green Beret
He planned in North Africa the first U.S. combat assault using
paratroopers. He is revered as the “Father of the Green Berets.” Gen.
Henry Shelton, a career commando and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, still calls him “sir.”
The career of retired Army Lt. Gen. William P. Yarborough received
official recognition recently at a ceremony in Tampa, Fla., home to U.S.
Special Operations Command. Hosted by Gen. Peter Schoomaker, who heads
the command, the fete featured laudatory speeches, a collage of
photographs of Gen. Yarborough’s career and a biographical handout
extolling his commitment to Army special forces. Gen. Yarborough
received the “Col. Arthur ‘Bull’ Simons Award,” named after another
special operations legend.
One photo showed the honoree in the first official wearing of the
Green Beret as he greeted President John Kennedy, a big booster of
unconventional warfare.
“His vision of (special forces) continues to guide our community,”
the handout said. “He is, in so many ways, the father of modern special
operations.”
A key period in his career was his command in 1961-65 of U.S. Army
Special Warfare Center and Special Warfare School, a center later named
after President Kennedy.
“During these years, he oversaw the unprecedented growth of special
forces and psychological warfare units, a response to the Vietnam War,”
the text stated. “He provided the intellectual leadership for the
development of counterinsurgency tactics and doctrine. …”
A 1936 West Point graduate, Gen. Yarborough, 88, retired in 1971. He
lives today in North Carolina, not far from Fort Bragg, home to Army
Special Operations Command and the elite Delta Force counter-terrorism
unit.
We reached Gen. Yarborough by phone, where he told us he’s not big on
self-promotion or talking to what he called “the fourth estate.”
Asked why he is still revered today in commando country, Gen.
Yarborough
answered, “If I am, it is because I was onboard when presidential
interest and
the confluence of world events made special forces appropriate to look
at.”
While molding special forces, Gen. Yarborough recalls, he stayed in
frequent phone contact with Gen. Ted Clifton, an old friend and
Kennedy’s military aide.
“Clifton, while the president was shaving in the morning, would read
him the
daily reports and I knew how the president felt about special forces and
special operations through Clifton,” Gen. Yarborough said.
