Pakistan Security Brief – May 10, 2012

Northern Pakistan (Photo credit: Imran…)

U.S. to deny $800 million in aid to Pakistan; Prime Minister Gilani says there is “trust deficit” between Pakistan and U.S.; ISAF in talks with Pakistan about reopening NATO supply routes; India adopts tougher stance on Siachen; Al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri gives speech on Qur’an burning in Afghanistan; Gilani denies Pakistani authorities knew of bin Laden’s presence in Pakistan; Commission investigating Bannu jailbreak implicates government officials,police and jail staff; Pakistan successfully tests short range ballistic missile; Red Cross suspends most of its work in Pakistan.

U.S.-Pakistan Relations

• On Wednesday, a U.S. House of Representatives panel moved to cut the foreign aid budget by about 9 percent, denying the $800 million that the Obama administration “requested for training and equipping Pakistan’s military in counterinsurgency tactics.”[1]
• Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani told CNN that there is a “trust deficit” between Pakistan and the U.S., which is why Pakistan is attempting to negotiate “new terms of engagement and cooperation” with the U.S. In response to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s remarks that Pakistan needs to do more to combat terrorism, Gilani said that Pakistan and its Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate were “already working” with the CIA and the U.S., and he questioned what more the U.S. wants.[2]

International Relations

• International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) Deputy Commander and British Army Lt. Gen. Adrian Bradshaw stated that the ISAF is in talks with Pakistan about reopening the NATO supply routes. The deputy commander said that even though ISAF was managing without the routes, it would be “extremely helpful” for ISAF and also financially beneficial for Pakistan if they were reopened.[3]
• British Home Secretary Theresa May and Prime Minister Gilani said on Thursday that Pakistan and the UK had a strong relationship and were working together to counter extremism and terrorism. Gilani said that the two countries were also cooperating on how to eliminate the threat of improvised explosive devices.[4]

India-Pakistan Relations

• During his third visit to the Siachen Glacier on May 3 to review the search and rescue operation at the avalanche site, Army Chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani told reporters that India had adopted a tougher stance on Siachen than in 1989. According to Kayani, India was now talking about redefining border lines and re-determining positions on the glacier.[5]

Iran Bans Banks From Sending Statements To ‘Foreign’ E-Mail Addresses

Many Iranians have complained of disruptions to Gmail and other “foreign” e-mail services in recent months.

May 08, 2012

Iran’s minister of communications and information technology, Reza Taghipour, has sent a letter to the head of the country’s Central Bank, Mahmud Bahmani, asking him to instruct banks to refrain from sending bank statements to e-mail addresses administered by foreign providers.
In his letter, Taghipour says that banned foreign e-mail providers include Yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail, and MSN.
The communications minister has called on banks to only accept national e-mail addresses from customers when they open accounts.
Taghipour has requested that banks provide access to the Internet for customers to be able to create national e-mail accounts at their premises.
The move appears to be aimed at forcing citizens to join the national e-mail system, which many Iranians have been reluctant to use.
Some Iranian websites have reported that the use of the national e-mail is obligatory for those working for the government and state institutions.

The Life of Niger Delta Militant Henry Okah

Publication: Volume: 3 Issue: 4

April 30, 2012 05:43 PM Age: 9 days

Category: Militant Leadership Monitor, Home Page, Featured, Africa

By: Mark McNamee

Henry Okah

This article is the Featured piece for the April 2012 Issue of Militant Leadership Monitor. To view the entire issue please visit mlm.jamestown.org.

Henry Emomotimi Okah was born in 1965 and raised in Ikorodu, Lagos State, although his family’s ancestral home was in Baylesa State.  The fourth child of a Navy officer, his upbringing was described by a sibling as very “British”; he attended private schools and led a relatively privileged life. He earned a bachelor’s degree in marine engineering from the Maritime Institute and, upon graduation, took a position with the Nigerian Merchant Navy. Prior to his career as an alleged rebel leader, he was a door-to-door handgun salesman in Lagos in the 1990s. Okah is believed to have begun his militancy in the late 1990s and early 2000s; in 2003 he left for South Africa where, aside from his stint in prison in Nigeria, he has remained.  Although he has denied being a rebel fighting with the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta  (MEND), Okah has admitted that he is sympathetic to the MEND cause (Mail and Guardian [Cape Town], November, 19, 2010).

According to his brother Charles Okah, Henry’s return to his family’s ancestral home in Bayelsa at the age of 19 was the formative experience in his turn towards militancy. Having witnessed firsthand the marked difference between his upbringing in Lagos State and the endemic poverty in the Niger Delta, he retained these images while a student and in his work after graduation (Vanguard, [Yenagoa], October 25, 2010). Building on his experience and contacts in the Navy, as well as his days as a weapons salesman, he eventually began to direct this background toward ostensibly social and economic ends in the Niger Delta.  Okah bunkered oil and sold it on the black market, using the funds derived therefrom to suffuse the region with weapons; this process eventually gave rise to a loosely organized network of armed rebels.  Over time, these previously disjointed rebels, often hired by Okah and other higher-level militants, as well as politicians, coalesced under the brand name of MEND. This moniker, in actuality, functioned as a catch-all term encompassing various militant groups within the Delta. One MEND leader, Alhaji Dokubo-Asari, noted in 2009 that MEND was created “not as an organization but as a name for the purpose of issuing unified statements” (Sahara Reporters [Lagos], January 1, 2009).

Having helped execute, supply and fund operations in the Delta region from abroad in South Africa, Okah was eventually arrested in Angola while attempting to purchase equipment and arms in September 2007. He was deported back to Nigeria in February 2008 and charged with more than 60 crimes, including treason and terrorism, both of which carry the death penalty. From early 2008, he was held in solitary confinement until his July 2009 release in accordance with an amnesty order handed down by then-President Yar’Adua.  Although initially viewed as an outsider, Okah had gained the respect of Delta militants in the 2000s, and his arrest in 2007 greatly enhanced his prestige with the fighters, bringing him an almost celebrity status within the group [1]. 

Where Do We Go From Here?

The Association of the United States Army (AUSA) emblem hangs in the Washington Convention Center in Washington D.C., on Oct 7, 2008. AUSA is a private, non-profit educational organization that supports America’s Army – Active, National Guard, Reserve, Civilians, Retirees and family members. Army photo by D. Myles Cullen (released) See more at Army.mil (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

May 3, 2012 | COL Louis H. Jordan, Jr

On January 5, 2012, the President announced new strategic guidance for the Department of Defense titled “Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for the 21st Century” to support proposed cuts in defense spending that are the result of the drawdown of U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Simultaneously, lawmakers discussed the need to cut forces and change the retirement system for our military in an effort to gain efficiencies in a sort of 21st century “peace dividend.” A key point of this leaner strategy is a move away from a focus on an era of persistent conflict, to one which emphasizes emerging challenges in the Pacific beyond the Korean peninsula.

An element of the new strategy that will have a profound effect on all of us is the abandonment of the “two war paradigm,” which formed the basis of our current force structure and is now the foundation of the “renewed” concept of Air-Sea Battle (ASB). The former was treated as a code of belief by which all budgets were developed, and the latter, a recurring theory since the days of Billy Mitchell, that suggests that machines can do all things all the time. The reality of the matter is that the “Two Major Regional Conflicts” strategy is not absolute dogma, and ASB does not obviate the need for landpower. Even though the ASB concept is not fiscally driven, it is “fiscally informed” and does fit nicely in our challenging economic situation.

So where does that leave the Army? Actually, not in such a bad place, due to the opportunity that the new strategy provides. Opportunity comes in many shapes and sizes as well as from many directions. This one is coming from the end of a long war and some fiscal realities with which we, as a nation, must soon deal.

We have been at this crossroads before. In fact, this institution, the U.S. Army War College, was established by seizing such an opportunity after the Spanish-American War to solve military failings discovered during that conflict. Opportunity was taken hold of once again at the end of World War II with the creation of the Defense Establishment in 1947 and the Department of Defense in 1949, a concept rejected by the Morrow Board a mere 22 years earlier. Ironically, the end of the Vietnam War provided another opportunity, which resulted in the development of Airland Battle Doctrine to counter the possibility of the Cold War going “hot” on the North German Plain. In each case, we were facing a changing threat and a challenging world.

We have the opportunity to reshape our Army into a force that can continue to fulfill the three roles that the American public expects from its profession of arms and to do so within the construct of the new strategy and fiscal reality. Our Army, as the Chief of Staff of the Army so clearly stated in the February 2012 edition of the Association of the United States Army News, must be able to prevent conflict, enable allies and contain enemies, and ultimately win decisively and dominantly. At the same time, our working environment is changing to one which requires land forces to accomplish many nonconventional missions. There are a number of things we can do across the force, and it really means going back to our uniquely American philosophy found in our Constitution of maintaining a navy and raising an army. The American philosophical psyche has always been shy of a large standing army. It is one of the reasons we fought our revolution. So the natural tendency is to reduce the size of the Army after the end of hostilities. Navies however, maintain free access to trade routes. The Air Force falls into a similar category as the Navy by protecting interests of commerce in and from the air. The biggest difficulty that ground forces will face in the new challenging threat environment will be “anti-access” and “area denial” or A2/AD. New threats in the cyber world will require us to look at “terrain” differently. ASB addresses A2/AD. We can re-tool the Army to take advantage of ASB in several ways.

Yemen Crisis Situation Reports: Update 138

The unfolding terrorist plot is a reminder that al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which has a sanctuary in Yemen, remains determined to attack the United States. Though targeted strikes have killed key AQAP leaders, the strikes have not fully disrupted its external operations. AQAP has benefitted from the successes of its insurgent arm, Ansar al Sharia, which is fighting to regain control of territory in the south.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) attempted to attack the United States. U.S. officials reported that a plot to detonate a bomb aboard a U.S.-bound airplane has been thwarted. The explosive device, seized in the last ten days outside of Yemen, is a more sophisticated version of the 2009 underwear bomb built by AQAP’s top bomb maker, Ibrahim al Asiri. Authorities allegedly detected the plot in April.

Ansar al Sharia militants are contesting the Yemeni military’s control of territory in Abyan governorate, despite reports that Yemeni troops had secured areas of Zinjibar. Militants attacked an army base southwest of Zinjibar Monday morning, killing at least 20 Yemeni soldiers and injuring dozens more. The militants also captured over two dozen troops. Two months ago, an attack killed over 100 soldiers. Last Thursday, Ansar al Sharia attacked a Yemeni military position near Bajdar, outside of Zinjibar. Clashes are also occurring outside of Lawder in Abyan, where militants continue to attack Yemeni army positions.

An airstrike reportedly killed AQAP operative Fahd al Quso Sunday. Quso, who was connected to the USS Cole bombing, was killed in Wadi Rafad in Shabwah governorate along with his companion, Nasser Lakdam. Ansar al Sharia confirmed Quso’s death. Popular Resistance Committees of civilian pro-government fighters reportedly killed AQAP member Bassam al Sayed in the Radfan area of Lahij governorate on May 7. Yemeni airstrikes have targeted militant positions in Lawder in Abyan governorate, killing five militants Saturday. Airstrikes also reportedly targeted militant positions Jaar on May 2 and in Mudia in Abyan on April 26.

Bin Laden documents at a glance

 (US Military Academy at West Point/ Associated Press ) – This handout document provided by the U.S. Military Academy at West Point shows page three , of four, of a handwritten document by Osama bin Laden. Letters from Osama bin Laden’s last hideaway, released by U.S. officials intent on discrediting his terror organization, portray a network weak, inept and under siege _ and its leader seemingly near wit’s end about the passing of his global jihad’s glory days.

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• CAPTION
• FULLSCREEN

By Associated Press, Published: May 4

U.S. officials Thursday released a small sampling of the documents captured when U.S. special operations forces killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden last year in Pakistan. Some highlights:

ATTACK AMERICA: Bin Laden wanted al-Qaida to focus on the U.S. and not waste time and resources attacking other enemies such as Britain or trying to overthrow governments in the Muslim world.

Gallery

Images after Osama bin Laden’s death: As the anniversary of the May 2, 2011, death of Osama bin Laden approaches, here are images showing the compound where he was killed as well as Americans’ reactions to the news.

“Even though we have the chance to attack the British, we should not waste our effort to do so but concentrate on defeating America, which will lead to defeating the others, God willing,” reads one letter, which scholars believe was written by bin Laden or a top deputy. “We want to cut this tree at the root. The problem is that our strength is limited, so our best way to cut the tree is to concentrate on sawing the trunk of the tree.”

FEAR OF DRONES: The CIA’s unmanned aircraft had al-Qaida looking toward the sky. In one letter, bin Laden suggested getting most of al-Qaida’s members out of Waziristan, the lawless frontier area along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border that has been beset by U.S. drone airstrikes.

“The brothers who can keep a low profile and take the necessary precautions should stay, but move to new houses on a cloudy day” when visibility for U.S. drones is reduced, bin Laden wrote.

He also encouraged al-Qaida’s leaders to stay far from their troops to reduce the likelihood of being killed.

ON THE U.S. MEDIA: Like any public figures, bin Laden and his advisers were mindful of the media. Adam Gadahn, one of bin Laden’s spokesmen, provided a summary of his view of U.S. TV cable news.

“From the professional point of view, they are all on one level except (Fox News) channel which falls into the abyss as you know, and lacks neutrality too,” he wrote.

CNN seemed to be closely collaborating with the U.S. government, but its Arabic version was better, Gadahn wrote.

News of Terrorism and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict(April 11-17, 2012)

 

Rocket fire from the Gaza Strip targeting Israel’s south continues. This past week two rockets hit open areas in the western Negev. In the Jordan Valley, a Palestinian with carrying seven improvised IEDs was detained at a checkpoint in the Jordan Valley. A group of Palestinian and left-wing European pro-Palestinian activists biking through the Jordan Valley clashed with IDF soldiers. A YouTube video showed an IDF officer striking a Danish activist with his rifle butt. The officer was immediately relieved of his command, until a full-scale investigation had been undertaken. The heads of the Israeli government and army, including the prime minister, strongly denounced the officer’s behavior. The fly-in of anti-Israel activists intended as a provocation for the State of Israel was conducted without exceptional incident. There were limited public disturbances at the Ben-Gurion International Airport. In several European countries (most prominently in France), activists who had been prevented from boarding a plane to Israel held protests. The number of activists who reached Ben-Gurion Airport was small (78), far below the organizers’ expectations and declarations.

 

Rocket Fire Targeting the Western Negev

Rocket fire from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory continues. On the night of April 15 two rockets fell in open areas in the western Negev. There were no casualties.

Rockets Fired into Israeli Territory ¹

Note: The figures for March 2012 include 50 rockets intercepted and destroyed by the Iron Dome aerial defense system during the most recent round of escalation. In April 2012 three rockets were fired at Israel’s southernmost city of Eilat.

The Situation on the Ground

This past week the IDF carried out routine counterterrorist activities, detaining Palestinians suspected of terrorist activities and confiscating weapons. The security forces also dealt with local riots during which stones and Molotov cocktails were thrown at them. 

Violent Clash in the Jordan Valley

On April 14 a group of approximately 250 Palestinians and pro-Palestinian left-wing activists from Europe, held a biking event through the Jordan Valley. They began near Jericho and their final destination was the region of Jiftlik in Samaria. They were detained by IDF soldiers on the Jordanian Valley road near the village of Uja and a clash broke out.

An Internet video showed an Israeli officer employing violence and striking a left-wing Danish activist with the butt of his M-16. The IDF Spokesman stated emphatically that it was a grave act which violated IDF values and that there was no justification for violence. However, the Spokesman noted that the video did not show the entire incident, in which behind the twenty-odd leftist and anarchist activists there were 200 Palestinians who tried to switch to the main Jordan Valley road and block it (Interview with the IDF Spokesman on Israeli Channel 2 radio, April 16, 2012).

The officer was immediately relieved of his command until “a thorough investigation can be conducted.” In addition, the Military Advocate General ordered an internal military police investigation, according to whose findings it will be decided whether or not to prosecute the officer (IDF Spokesman’s Website, April 16, 2012). Senior Israeli political and military figures, among them the prime minister, defense minister and IDF chief of staff, strongly denounced the officer’s behavior, emphasizing that it violated IDF values and did not reflect the ethical conduct of IDF soldiers and officers.

Palestinian Carrying IEDs Detained at Checkpoint in the Jordan Valley

On April 11, IDF military police detained a Palestinian at the Beqa’ot checkpoint in the Jordan Valley. He was found to be carrying seven improvised IEDs, three knives and bullets. He was transferred to the security forces for questioning (IDF Spokesman’s Website, April 11, 2012).

Note: Three months ago two similar events occurred at the same crossing. In the first, a Palestinian terrorist operative armed with a pipe bomb advanced toward an IDF force shouting “Allahu akbar.” When he ignored their orders to halt, they opened fire and killed him. In the second, the IDF opened fire at a Palestinian who tried to stab a soldier at the roadblock. The Palestinian was critically wounded and died as he was being taken to the hospital for treatment (IDF Spokesman’s Website, April 11, 2012).

Temporary Easing of the Fuel Crisis

Recently there was a temporary easing in the fuel crisis in the Gaza Strip following a delivery of diesel fuel from Israel to the Gaza Strip power plant, in accordance with an agreement reached between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority. That resulted in an improvement in the supply of electricity to the Gazan population and an increase in the number of vehicles on the road. However, the boat bringing fuel from Qatar, which was supposed to help relieve the crisis, has not yet arrived.²

The power plant in the Gaza Strip, which has received fuel to manufacture electricity
(Gazayouth.net website)

Article in Egyptian Daily Newspaper Strongly Attacks Hamas

Following the Gaza Strip fuel crisis and Hamas’ accusations that Egypt is responsible it, on April 16 the Egyptian daily Al-Masri Al-Yawm published an article entitled “Egypt and Hamas’ faulty judgment.” The article, written by Dr. Tareq Fahmi, head of the Israeli studies department at the National Center for Middle Eastern Studies,³ strongly attacked Hamas for trying to make Egypt responsible for its own crises (the fuel crisis and the crisis in the negotiations with Fatah). According to the article, among other things:

• Hamas is of the opinion that after the Muslim Brotherhood achieved political power, it would be easy to deliver merchandise through the Rafah crossing or the smuggling tunnels, “with all the achievements and profit involved.” Hamas behaves “as though the lands of Egypt had turned into the private property of the Hamas movement.” However, said the article, Hamas has forgotten the existence of Egypt’s “red lines” of national security.

• There has been, according to the article, a “security problem” in the Gaza Strip, the result of “the strategic expansion of the Palestinian factions,” which do as they please in the Sinai Peninsula. The Palestinian factions [i.e., the terrorist organizations] carry out “illegal activities” [i.e., terrorist activity] which threaten Egyptian national security. As a result, there is concern [in Egypt] that “in the future Israel’s activities will be directed against the Sinai Peninsula and not the Gaza Strip.”

• Hamas seeks to involve Egypt in a confrontation with Israel, since the “illegal activities” [i.e., terrorist attacks] provide Israel with an excuse to reoccupy the Sinai Peninsula to turn it into a buffer zone to protect its security. Hamas may think that the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood to power has created an opportunity for a war between Egypt and Israel, but the cost to Egypt of such a war would be very high.

In our assessment, the article was written as part of an exchange of blows in the media between Egypt and Hamas, caused by the fuel crisis in the Gaza Strip. However, it is also possible that it expresses genuine, if covert, Egyptian discontent at the way Hamas behaves towards Egypt and the attempts of the Palestinian terrorist organizations to gain a foothold in the Sinai Peninsula and turn it into a focal point for terrorist activity against Israel.

Iran News Round Up April 16, 2012

Revolutionary Guards (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A selection of the latest news stories and editorials published in Iranian news outlets, compiled by Ali Alfoneh, Ahmad Majidyar and Michael Rubin (E) = Article in English

Politics

• Gholam-Hossein Elham, Islamic Steadfastness Front co-founder, says the Supreme Leader appointed some individuals to the Expediency Council just to keep them employed. He continued: “In the Expediency Council, appointment of individuals is also based on some kind of expediency… Reappointment of Mr. Hashemi [Rafsanjani] is what the Leader found more expedient than his replacement, but it is clear that the Council has lost its effectiveness… which may be due to its vengeful and harsh behavior towards the cabinet…”

Diplomacy

• The United Arab Emirates withdraws its ambassador from Tehran following Ahmadinejad’s visit to Abu-Musa island, which the UAE claims as its territory.
  • Jomhouri-ye Eslami editorializes: “We found it necessary to recommend the Sheikhs of the Emirates know their limits… Reacting to the Iranian president’s visit to the Iranian island of Abu-Musa, the foreign minister of the Emirates did not even observe politeness in his words and used expressions outside the diplomatic norms like primitive Arabs… Statements made by the foreign minister of the Sheikhdom of the Emirates, should they not be due to his ignorance, may have a dangerous background. And one can see the hands of colonial powers and Zionist provocations behind it… We recommend the Sheikhs of the Emirates not to ignite the wood which would start the hell in the region which the Zionists and colonial Western powers desire.”
• Farzad Esmaeili, Air Defense Commander:
  • “The Air Defense Force… is the first line of defense in the face of any aerial threat of the enemy. By using the entire potentials of the armed forces… and by establishing a command and control system, it safeguards Iran’s air territory… Divided into air defense zones, it is tactical and self-reliant in most areas in Iran. It reports to the Army, but has a centralized command structure utilizing the air defense units of the Army and the [Revolutionary] Guards…”
• [E] Chairman of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi on Monday rejected a recent offer made by the US for the resumption of ties and direct negotiations between Tehran and Washington.

Military and Security

• Khatam al-Anbia Construction Base of the Revolutionary Guards is granted a no-bidding $17 billion Haraz Dam project. The handover takes place as a Chinese company pulls out of the project.
• [E] Lieutenant Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Brigadier General Hossein Salami announced that the IRGC plans to stage several war games in different regions of the country in the current Iranian year (started on March 20).

Nuclear Issue

• Negotiations in Istanbul between Iran and the 5 1 Group:
  • Said Jalili, Supreme National Security Council secretary, defends the Islamic Republic’s record of negotiations with the 5 1 Group:
    • “We believe the positions of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the behavior of the Islamic Republic of Iran provides a great opportunity for cooperation in nuclear issues. The fatwa [religious edict] of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution against nuclear arms and considering them haram [religiously impermissible] is a great opportunity to move on and to disarm…”
    • “We have always cooperated with the nuclear inspectors… and it is not that the NPT demands unhindered access to all sites…”
    • “You know that the IAEA general secretary has, in 25 reports, announced that Iran has not deviated from its peaceful nuclear goals. This was also announced by the United States intelligence agencies…”

A Tormenting in Moscow

Why is Russia harassing President Obama’s new ambassador? BY LEON ARON | APRIL 12, 2012

Russians are known for their warm welcomes, rolling out the red carpet for honored guests and ensconcing them in bear hugs, complete with three hearty kisses on the cheeks. Perhaps the new U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul didn’t quite expect the same gracious reception given the frosty relationship between Washington and Moscow these days, but his first few months on the job have been unusual, if not downright hostile, a lot more Cold War than Russian Reset. Upon arriving in Moscow, the ambassador greeted his guests with an effervescent — even hokey — YouTube video introducing himself, a longtime student of and friend to Russia. In response, he was met with an Arctic propaganda blast reminiscent of the early 1980s, and harassment likely without precedent for U.S. ambassadors — either in the Soviet Union or in post-Soviet Russia.

The Obama administration has since complained to the Russian government about the harassment of McFaul. “Everywhere I go,” McFaul tweeted, “[the Gazprom-owned national television network] NTV is there. Wonder who gives them my calendar. They wouldn’t tell me. Wonder what laws are here for such things.” By crowding the U.S. ambassador and filming his comings and goings, NTV reporters act not unlike former KGB myrmidons, clearly seeking to intimidate not only McFaul but even more so his Russia interlocutors, whom they try to intercept and “interview.” It wouldn’t be the first time that the Kremlin has successfully snooped into the affairs of the U.S. Embassy — in fact, there’s a long tradition of mutual suspicion and spycraft between these old adversaries, but the host government sharing his open schedule with flunkies just to intimidate the ambassador seems a new low in what was hoped to have been a new period of mutual respect and good relations.

It is always sad and maddening to hear about insults to human dignity by paid propagandists and thugs of authoritarian regimes. Yet the hounding of McFaul is particularly bizarre. Not only is he a brilliant scholar, the author of hundreds of articles and several books on Russia, and one of the most popular professors at Stanford University, but McFaul is widely regarded as a man of profound intellectual and personal integrity. In at least 20 years that I’ve known and deeply admired Mike, I’ve met no one who did not hold him in highest esteem, even those who disagreed with him professionally.

A native of Montana and a Californian by professional choice, Mike epitomizes America’s democratic spirit, free inquiry, unfettered debate, and respect for the right to question authority. He is also a sparkling, often ebullient conversationalist. Anyone who spends even a few minutes in his company finds his discourse utterly infectious.

That he is a Russian speaker and, with his shock of blond hair, Hollywood-handsome, does not hurt him a bit among Russian television viewers — not to mention his legion of longtime admirers among pro-democracy experts and intelligentsia. It is all of this — but particularly the last bit — that makes McFaul such a stark and embossing contrast to the intellectual grayness of Putinism, the vulgarity of its propaganda, and the pettiness of its cat-and-mouse games with intellectuals and pro-democracy opposition.

From the start of his ambassadorship a few months ago, McFaul seemed determined to treat Russia as a normal country: he proclaimed himself willing to speak to anyone – even his detractors. “I respect press right to go anywhere & ask any questions,” he tweeted of NTV, even as he wondered whether “they have a right to read my email and listen to my phone?”

But there is more to it than that. McFaul was among the key architects of the reset in the U.S.-Russian relations. Whatever this effort has or has not achieved and whatever built-in flaws handicapped the reset from the beginning, there is little doubt about McFaul’s sincerity, good faith, and passionate commitment that the effort would make both countries more secure and prosperous. Among other things, he worked tirelessly on the New START nuclear arms treaty and helped to secure Russia’s entry in the World Trade Organization.

Latin Leaders Behaving Badly

The buildup to this weekend’s sixth Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, has been rife with drama. Ecuador’s left-wing president, Rafael Correa, announced that he will skip the 34-country conference because it excludes Cuba, which does not belong to the Organization of American States (membership requirement: democracy). The presidents of El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua sparred publicly with the president of Guatemala over a drug legalization proposal. And not to be outdone, Cuba’s Fidel Castro ridiculed U.S. President Barack Obama‘s reported plan to wear a guayabera — a light tropical dress shirt originating in Cuba — at the summit.

Yet for all the hoopla, the summit will likely produce little of substance. There are already reports that officials will sidestep hot-button issues such as drug policy and the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands. In fact, this is in keeping with the way these gatherings typically play out in Latin America, a land in which a dizzying array of acronymed intergovernmental organizations host an endless but ultimately empty parade of summits.

Sure, there have been some successes. The inaugural Summit of the Americas in 1994 marked a high point of goodwill between the United States and Latin American countries (Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez and his like-minded allies had yet to assume power) and launched a proposal — never realized — for a free-trade bloc stretching from “Alaska to Argentina.” The third Summit of the Americas in 2001 produced the Inter-American Democratic Charter, which emphasized the importance of democratic institutions in the Americas.

But the summits are more often remembered for temper tantrums and mischievous antics by government leaders — with Chávez in particular at the center of many of the tempests. If past Latin American summits are any guide, we should expect some serious sparks to fly in Cartagena. Here are some of the least auspicious moments from summits past.

THE NO-SHOW

What: Ibero-American Summit

When: 2011

Where: Asunción, Paraguay

Meltdown: The annual gathering of leaders from the Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking nations of Europe and the Americas was marred by the absence of several heads of state, including Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff and Argentina’s Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who claimed they had to prepare for an upcoming — and implicitly more important — G-20 summit in France.

The poor attendance — and surely the optics of their king and prime minister mingling with lower level officials — enraged Spanish news outlets, which deemed the summit a demoralizing failure. “The summit has become redundant for Latin American powers, who already have their own voice in other, more global forums,” La Voz de Galicia lamented.