Operations
Defense Policy / Programs
Defense Industry
Other Conflicts
News Reports

Current Operations

• Serbia and Montenegro: Belgrade Offers Washington Soldiers For Afghanistan RFE/RL 08 Oct 2003 -- Four years after the NATO-led war on Yugoslavia, Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic is offering to send Serbian soldiers to serve in missions abroad under U.S. command. Western media are now reporting that the offer has been accepted and that a Serbian unit will likely be deployed in Afghanistan next spring.
• Afghanistan: Karzai Says New Constitution To Be Released Within 10 Days RFE/RL 08 Oct 2003 -- Afghan Transitional Administration Chairman Hamid Karzai said today that the country's new constitution will be released to the public within 10 days.
• Afghanistan Progressing on Gender Issues, Official Says Washington File 08 Oct 2003 -- The youngest of Afghanistan's ministries, the Ministry of Women's Affairs, is making steady progress toward introducing gender issues into all aspects of the country's social and political systems, the ministry's head says.
• Soldiers complete projects in Ethiopia Army News Service 08 Oct 2003-- A new school and clinic constructed on the Horn of Africa by U.S. Army troops marked the 100-year anniversary of diplomatic relations between the United States and Ethiopia.

Defense Policy / Programs

• Warfighters reach back to Langley AFPN 08 Oct 2003-- Each day during Operation Iraqi Freedom, Airman 1st Class Jamie O'Connell would drive home from Langley Air Force Base after fighting the war in Iraq, and with traffic, it took her about 15 minutes.
• Essex Amphibious Ready Group tests flexibility and versatility 7th Fleet Release 08 Oct 2003-- The USS Essex (LHD 2) Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) tested its flexibility and versatility Sept. 25-30 while off the coast of Okinawa, successfully completing the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) Special Operations Capable Certification Exercise (SOCEX). It was the first time in recent memory the Essex ARG conducted a SOCEX with a two-ship ARG configuration.
• Transformation hits Army infrastructure Army News Service 08 Oct 2003-- "You cannot transform the Army without transforming infrastructure," Ray Dubois told a standing-room-only forum Oct. 6.
• Forging the 'Cold Steel' of BLT 1/6 Marine Corps News 08 Oct 2003-- The grunts of C Co., Battalion Landing Team 1st Bn., 6th Marines (BLT 1/6) are waiting for a ride. Heavily armed and sweating in their ballistic vests and helmets, their faces streaked with green and black pain, the Marines keep a watchful eye open for the aircraft that will lift them out of battle.
• 31st MEU, Filipino Marines exchange tactics Marine Corps News 08 Oct 2003-- Three task-organized infantry companies from the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, Battalion Landing Team, 3rd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment landed ashore here for the first time, Sept. 15, to conduct Amphibious Ready Group Exercise- Republic of the Philippines 03-1.
• Rice Defends Pre-emption as Security Policy AFPS 08 Oct 2003 -- The president's national security adviser defended the national security strategy of pre-emption and said that discoveries in Iraq show it was the right tack to take.
• Wolfowitz Asserts Value of Ground Forces, Touts Their Role in Joint Operations AFPS 08 Oct 2003 -- Ground forces are an important part of the Defense Department's plans in transforming itself to meet 21st century challenges, the department's deputy secretary asserted here.
• Dynamic Response '07 Successful Says Rumsfeld AFPS 08 Oct 2003 -- Dynamic Response '07, a study seminar to explore what transformation means for the alliance and how the NATO Response Force could be used in future crises and conflicts, was a success, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said here today.

• Poland: Defense Ministry Spokesman Resigns Over Missile Row RFE/RL 08 Oct 2003 -- Poland's Defense Ministry spokesman has resigned after triggering a diplomatic row by saying French-made missiles found in Iraq were manufactured in 2003.

• Transcript: Press Conference with Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and NATO Secretary -General Lord Robertson 08 Oct 2003 -- The theme of the seminar today was transformation, and the vehicle for addressing it was NATO's new Response Force. Defense ministers and senior officials, both civil and military, were presented with a complex scenario set in 2007, which drew out the implications of transformation and examined how the NATO Response Force might operate in a fictional crisis. The scenario involved a NATO stabilization operation in a fictitious partner country, and a parallel and linked terrorist threat involving chemical and biological weapons; not a likely eventuality, but by no means an impossible one, either.
• Transcript: Background Briefing on Informal NATO Ministerial 08 Oct 2003 -- " First of all, we have new missions. The old mission was to defend Europe from a Soviet attack, or in the nineties, it was the Balkans. The new mission is you have to go outside of Europe to defend Europe and North America. That's why we have new missions in the east, and NATO is looking east and expanding east."
• Rumsfeld: Colorado Seminar Providing Key NATO Defense Insights Washington File 08 Oct 2003 -- NATO country ministers of defense, chiefs of defense and NATO ambassadors gathered October 8 to examine for the first time how the new NATO Response Force (NRF) might deal with future asymmetric threats such as terrorism and weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
• Berlin yet to receive firm`s request to sell arms to UAE, S Arabia IRNA 08 Oct 2003 -- The German government said Wednesday it has not received any formal petition for an arms export permit after the press reported on final talks between German defense firm Rheinmetall and Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to sell anti-ABC weapons reconaissance tanks and anti-aircraft systems.
• CONGO: ICRC trains some 1,500 military officers in IHL IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has trained some 1,500 military officers in International Humanitarian Law (IHL) in the Republic of Congo, the organisation announced on Tuesday.
• State Department Briefing, October 8, 2003 Washington File 08 Oct 2003 -- Iraq/Turkey, Iraq, Palestinians, Syria, Greece, Burma, Liberia, Vietnam, Malaysia

Defense Industry

• BAE SYSTEMS To Provide Power Management Subsystem For Multifunction Army Vehicle BAE Systems 08 Oct 2003 -- BAE Systems Power Systems will develop the power management subsystem for the U.S. Armys Multifunction Utility/Logistics Equipment vehicle, or MULE. Lockheed Martin is developing the MULE under the Armys Future Combat Systems (FCS) program and has selected BAE Systems as the propulsion and power subsystem integrator.
• General Dynamics Teams With Denel for Artillery Solutions General Dynamics 08 Oct 2003 -- General Dynamics Land Systems, a business unit of General Dynamics (NYSE: GD), has signed a teaming agreement with Denel of South Africa to jointly customize and market more lethal, long-range and lightweight 105-mm artillery systems for domestic and international customers.
• Northrop Grumman to Offer UAV Customers One-Stop Solutions Northrop Grumman 08 Oct 2003 -- In a move that aligns a successful acquisition strategy with increasing customer demand for mission-ready unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems, Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) today announced that its Advanced Tactical C4I (ATC4I) organization, which produces the U.S. Army's RQ-5 Hunter UAV, will become a part of the company's Unmanned Systems unit in San Diego.

Other Conflicts

• DAILY PRESS BRIEFING BY THE OFFICES OF THE SPOKESMAN FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL AND THE SPOKESWOMAN FOR THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY PRESIDENT United Nations 08 Oct 2003
• Kosovo: UN envoy welcomes upcoming Pristina-Belgrade talks in Vienna UN News Centre 08 Oct 2003 -- The head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo has labelled the next week's talks between leaders of Belgrade and Pristina governments as the only way to solve outstanding problems.

• Secretary-General welcomes peace accord in Burundi UN News Centre 08 Oct 2003 -- United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today welcomed the signing of an agreement aimed at ending a 10-year civil war in Burundi.
• BURUNDI: Defuse land time bomb, ICG urges Bujumbura IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- The International Crisis Group (ICG), a conflict prevention think tank, has urged the transitional government in Burundi and the international community to prioritise the issue of land for hundreds of thousands of refugees due to return following Wednesday's power sharing agreement between the government and the main rebel group in the country.
• BURUNDI: Government, rebel group sign ceasefire implementation deal IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- Burundi President Domitien Ndayizeye and Pierre Nkurunziza, the leader of the country's largest rebel faction, signed an agreement on Wednesday to implement a ceasefire deal reached in December 2002.
• UN troops heading out to troubled regions of Democratic Republic of Congo UN News Centre 08 Oct 2003 -- The head of the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) said today that UN troops will begin to fan out next week from their base in the north-eastern town of Bunia to increase military presence in the area where 65 persons were massacred Sunday.
• DRC: IRIN interview with MONUC chief on latest Ituri massacre IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- William Swing, the UN Secretary-General's special representative to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and head of the UN peacekeeping mission in the country, known as MONUC, spoke to IRIN on Wednesday on the most recent massacre in the troubled northeastern district of Ituri.
• DRC: IRIN interview with Belgian Foreign Minister Louis Michel IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- A Belgian government delegation began a tour of the Great Lakes region of Africa on Sunday in Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
• SUDAN: Darfur refugees "invisible", says NGO IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- Tens of thousands of people who have fled from Darfur in western Sudan to neighbouring Chad are "invisible" to the humanitarian community, receiving practically no assistance, according to Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF).
• DRC-UGANDA: Kampala will stay out of Congo, Museveni declares IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni declared on Wednesday that his country would not be drawn back into conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), regardless of whichever Ugandan rebels were using instability in the country's eastern provinces as a cloak for their activities.
• COTE D'IVOIRE: Army says rebels are threatening peace process IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- Cote d'Ivoire's national army has called on rebels who control the north of the country to stop a boycott of peace-building efforts and abandon "all belligerent acts", saying the rebels were threatening peace and unity in the war-torn West African nation.

News Reports

• SHAPE News Morning Update SHAPE 08 Oct 2003 -- NATO ministers face unprecedented crisis exercise to improve response to terrorist threats / NATO holds first "dirty bomb" drill in Romania / Top UN official sends invitations for Kosovo-Serbia talks / NATO seeks to widen Afghan mission before winter / Turkish parliament votes to allow troops to Iraq, but Iraq council is against move / NATO delegation arrives in Russia for air crew survival courses
• SHAPE News Summary & Analysis SHAPE 08 Oct 2003 -- Afghanistan welcomes NATO move to expand peacekeeping force / Rumsfeld recasts himself as NATO believer

• House Committee Approves Imposing Sanctions on Syria Washington File 08 Oct 2003 -- The House of Representatives' International Relations Committee overwhelmingly approved legislation October 8 that would impose limited sanctions against Syria.
• ASEAN BURMA RIGHTS VOA 08 Oct 2003-- The annual meeting of the leaders from the Association of South East Asian Nations, or ASEAN, has disappointed the hopes of human rights campaigners by failing to censure member-nation Burma
• CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: Former ruling party apologises to nation IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- The former ruling party in the Central African Republic (CAR), the Mouvement de liberation du peuple centrafricain (MLPC) of former President Ange-Felix Patasse, has apologised to the nation for its mismanagement between 1993 and 2003.
• RWANDA: Kagame party tops list of new MPs IRIN 08 Oct 2003 -- President Paul Kagame's political party, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), tops the list of the new Members of Parliament read out on Tuesday by National Electoral Commission President Chrysologue Karanga, the Rwanda News Agency (RNA) reported.
• Boeing Awarded $9.2 Million to Process Radar Data from Space Shuttle Endeavour Boeing 08 Oct 2003 -- Boeing [NYSE:BA] has received $9.2 million in follow-on orders from the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) to produce a digital topographic model of the Earth from radar data collected by the space shuttle Endeavour.