Richard Boegner
Articles by Richard Boegner
July 08, 2010
General David Petraeus arrived in Kabul last Friday to become Commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and of US forces in Afghanistan.
Confirmed by the Senate 99 to 0, he replaced General Stanley McChrystal, who was fired by President Obama after having criticized members of...
June 07, 2010
Staff Sergeant S., whose full identity cannot be disclosed for security reasons according to the IDF, should soon be rewarded with a medal of valor for his role in the assault on the Mavi Marmara.
He single handedly shot dead six of the nine activists killed in the Israeli raid while striving to pr...
May 27, 2010
In a commencement speech given at the United States Military Academy at West Point on May 22, President Obama concluded by telling the cadets, "I have no doubt that we will have prevailed in the struggles of our times. I have no doubt that your legacy will be an America that has emerged stronger, an...
February 27, 2010
In a speech at the National Defense University last Tuesday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates accused the Europeans of undermining NATO by refusing to devote to the organization the additional resources it needs to function efficiently and effectively, particularly in Afghanistan.
In addition, howeve...
December 03, 2009
Last Monday, in a speech on Afghanistan delivered in West Point, President Obama reaffirmed his conviction that «our security is at stake in Afghanistan and Pakistan».
As a result, he announced that he would send as quickly as possible an additional 30,000 soldiers to Afghanistan to accomplish the ...
November 27, 2009
Nicolas Sarkozy is once again on the road…
In Brazil on Thursday to meet with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, and Trinidad on Friday to attend a Commonwealth Summit at the invitation of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the French President intends to stress the paramount importance of taki...
October 22, 2009
This was not the response many were expecting.
Instead of launching an impartial investigation into the conduct of the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) during Operation Cast Lead, last winter´s onslaught on Gaza, as required by the Goldstone report, adopted by the UN Human Rights Council last week, the...
October 10, 2009
It was a sound decision.
The US and NATO have been present in Afghanistan since 2001, and yet, the situation continues to deteriorate.
The time had come to reassess the mission, clarify its goals, and devise a strategy capable of realizing these objectives. All relevant parties would be consulted:...
September 22, 2009
If no serious debate concerning Israel´s conduct during last Winter´s Operation Cast Lead is to take place in the country, it is all Mr. Goldsrone´s fault, according to David Landau ("The Gaza Report´s Wasted Opportunity", New York Times, September 20th ).
The report issued ...
July 17, 2009
Natalia Estemirova´s body was found Wednesday morning in the neighboring province of Ingushetia, her hands tied and with gunshot wounds to the chest and head.
She had been kidnapped earlier that day in Grozny, the capital of the restive province of Chechnya, where she lived and worked.
She disappe...
July 04, 2009
Wednesday, the Israeli Navy intercepted a Greek ship, the Spirit of Humanity, operated by the American aid group, the Free Gaza Movement, that set off from Cyprus and was bound for Gaza. Its cargo, immediately confiscated by the Israeli authorities, consisted of humanitarian aid, including three ton...
June 17, 2009
On Monday, Mirhossein Mousavi´s supporters descended on Enghelab (Revolution) Square, and marched for several hours to Azadi (Freedom) Square.
How many were they?
Though it is always difficult to tell, most observers believe that some 500,000 Iranians demonstrated in the streets that evenin...
May 12, 2009
Last Sunday, former vice president Cheney justified on CBS the torture of detainees by the US security establishment: "I'm convinced, absolutely convinced that we saved thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of lives...No regrets. I think it was absolutely the right thing to do".
And yet, an I...
February 02, 2009
For reasons no one has yet been able to discover, a water purification system that France donated to the people of Gaza lies stranded on the Israeli-Gaza border, lacking the necessary authorization to enter the strip. « There were a very great number of steps taken at all levels to try to get the wa...
January 20, 2009
On January 16th , two days before Israel and Hamas each declared its own cease fire, Dr Izzeldin Abuelaish lost three of his daughters, killed in an Israeli bombing raid that demolished his home. One of his nieces also died in the attack.
A Palestinian doctor who lives in Gaza, he works in an Isr...
May 12, 2007
In 1982, Jacques Attali (1), a senior adviser of French Socialist President François Mitterrand, received a message from his secretary that a young lawyer, member of the opposition conservative Gaullist party, the RPR, had called and asked to see him. His ambition was to become President of the Repu...
December 14, 2006
Firas Hasan knew that it was time to take matters into his own hands when, one day, he opened a large bag that had just been discarded onto the street by the occupants of a car swiftly driving away…
“When we opened up the sack we found Khalil’s head and chopped-up body parts inside”, he said. Khali...
December 01, 2006
When the bombs began exploding, supporters of the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr had already gathered to commemorate the death of his father, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr, in Sadr City, the Shiite stronghold named after him located in eastern Baghdad.
A much revered religious leader, he w...
November 15, 2006
“We Never Dreamed It Would Be Like This”
At a classified briefing on October 18, 2006, the United States Central Command concluded that Iraq was sliding dangerously towards “chaos” (1).
The analysis, provided by the command’s intelligence directorate, headed by Brig. Gen. John M. Custer, emp...
October 30, 2006
The raid was launched before dawn Wednesday October 25th . US-led Iraqi special forces entered Sadr City, a neighborhood northeast of Baghdad, home to some 2,5 million Shites, and stronghold of the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
Formerly known as Saddam City until the fall of Baghdad in April 2003...
October 23, 2006
A few days ago, Vice President Cheney (1) spoke to an assembly of soldiers belonging to the 101st Airborne Division who had just returned from Iraq."
“Having been on the ground”, the Vice President said, “all of you know that we’ve made progress-not easily, but steadily. And we can be confident goi...
April 24, 2006
In Iraq these days, militias seem to be everywhere.
When asked if they had any role in the sectarian attacks now so pervasive in Iraq and particularly Baghdad, Lt Colonel Chris Pease (1), deputy commander of the US military’s police training programs in eastern Baghdad replied, (We’re not stupid....
February 17, 2006
One night in Samarra last August, four gunmen stormed into Ali Nasir Jabr’s (1) house,
then shot and killed his Shiite father, mother, two brothers, and sister. Only the twelve year- old Ali managed to escape alive by fleeing the scene…
When he returned shortly after, he said, “I checked them, I...