G.I. Combat [WORK]

Turner Broadcast's GameTap advances onto the battle field with the introduction of thirteen combat games to its catalog of more than 750 titles. Among the array of popular titles being announced is the stellar "Soldiers: Heroes of War II." According to GameRankings.com, this title exceeded an 80% rating by the majority of leading video game publications who reviewed it.

G.I. Combat

G.I. combat: Episode 1, Battle of Normandy (PC): Join the allied forces as they uproot the German stronghold to capture Normandy. G.I. Combat makes you the company commander in one of the deadliest battles of the war.

About 2 percent of American soldiers killed in Iraq have been women. Is that figure now high enough to officially proclaim that women are effectively serving in direct land combat, and should be allowed to do so by law?

Many female GIs say they're already in combat whenever they're being shot at or bombed by terrorists - even in mess halls. And some Army planners wonder whether the current scramble to find more male recruits means women will be needed in go-get-'em offensive operations soon.

Step by step, both the Pentagon and American society are inching toward supporting women in combat. In 1994, after women showed skills as good as or better than men in the Navy and Air Force during the Gulf War, the Clinton administration adjusted Pentagon policy to allow them to serve in combat aircraft and on ships. But the prohibition on "collocation" remains for the foxhole and the kicking-down-doors kind of combat on land.

Some military brass worry that public support for a war will erode if women are shown dying in combat. Others say male soldiers wouldn't be as effective or safe if serving alongside women. And some critics say that since it is women, after all, who bear children, they should be excused from combat.

Standards for strength or endurance should not be lowered to allow them into combat. But information on women's roles in Iraq should be collected to see if they react as men do when put in harm's way. And the military can also study whether women bring certain skills to the battlefield that men don't.

Good afternoon. Let me begin by thanking NDU and Dr. John Reichart for the opportunity to participate in this week's symposium on "Building International Partnerships to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction." Upon assuming office, President Bush identified weapons of mass destruction proliferation as a major security threat of the 21st century requiring a new, comprehensive strategy. Under President Bush's direction, the United States embarked on a new, comprehensive approach to dealing with the evolving threat posed by WMD proliferation. The result has been that the United States, working in concert with the international community, has reformed and re-invigorated existing tools and has developed a number of new tools to combat the spread of WMD. The WMD threat is real and our actions to combat it must be comprehensive and relentless. We have had some significant recent successes in our efforts to combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, most notably the decision by Libya to give up its weapons of mass destruction programs, and the detection and ongoing dismantlement of the A.Q. Khan nuclear black-market, but the actions of Iran and North Korea, as well as terrorists, to acquire nuclear weapons present the international community with some of the most difficult - and most dangerous -- security challenges the world has ever faced. This symposium rightly emphasizes the importance of building international partnerships to combat the spread of WMD. What I would like to do now is to describe in detail some of the new efforts the United States, in concert with our international partners, has developed in the past five years to combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction: the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism (GI), Missile Defense (MD), the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP), and new financial measures undertaken to deny proliferators the means to do business. Collectively, these initiative demonstrate the breadth, and the international nature, of the tools we must use -- political, economic, intelligence, financial, military, science and technology -- to combat today's WMD threats. The Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) President Bush launched the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) in May 2003 as a cooperative, international effort whose goal is to halt the proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction. PSI creates a common framework for like-minded nations, to work together to halt the trafficking in WMD and their means of delivery, including through interdicting WMD-related proliferation shipments. The United States has worked with PSI partners in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Its successes include, for example, the blocking of some exports to Iran of controlled equipment relating to its missile programs, dual-use goods, and heavy water. PSI began with 11 nations, but today more than 80 countries on six continents have endorsed the PSI Statement of Interdiction Principles. States' actions are governed by their national legal authorities and are fully consistent with international laws and frameworks. PSI created the first global exercise program, with more than 25 exercises to date, testing and expanding national capabilities of participants to undertake interdictions by air, land, and sea. Participation in PSI also provides an effective means for countries to implement their obligations with key UN Security Council Resolutions such as UNSCR 1540 and UN resolutions 1718, 1737 and 1747, which deal with the nuclear and missile programs of North Korea and Iran.

The Global Initiative marks a new leadership effort by President Bush, in partnership with Russian President Putin, to combat the threat of nuclear terrorism. The Initiative also marks the beginning of a more strategic approach to combating the threat of WMD terrorism on a global basis, by bringing together the combined expertise from both the terrorism and WMD combating communities. Presidents Bush and Putin launched this initiative when they met in St. Petersburg last July 2006, on the eve of the G8 Summit. Similar to the flexible nature of the PSI, the goal of the Global Initiative is to establish a partnership among nations committed to developing their individual and collective capabilities to detect and defeat an extremely dangerous threat we face - nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists. Designing a new foundation against the threat of nuclear terrorism demands a sustained commitment to cooperation with international partners. In this spirit, partner nations of the Global Initiative gathered in Rabat, Morocco last October to establish a Statement of Principles for the work of the Initiative. By agreeing to and endorsing the Statement of Principles, all partners committed themselves to: 1. Strengthen nuclear material accounting, control, and physical protection; 2. Enhance the security of civilian nuclear facilities; 3. Research and develop national detection capabilities that are interoperable; 4. Enhance search, confiscation, and safe control capabilities; 5. Deny safe haven and financial resources to those facilitating nuclear terrorism; 6. Ensure adequate civil and criminal legal frameworks to deter nuclear terrorism; 7. Improve response, investigation, and mitigation capabilities; and 8. Promote information sharing among participants, while protecting confidentiality.

• NSPD-23, signed by President Bush in December 2001, instructed the Defense Department to develop and field missile defenses capable of defending not only the United States and our military forces overseas, but also friends and allies. It is critically important to U.S. foreign policy interests to assure allies and friends that ballistic missile threats will not deter the U.S. from fulfilling its security commitments, nor allow aggressors the means to undermine the cohesiveness and political stability of our coalitions or alliances. A wide range of missile defense-related efforts are currently underway with foreign governments as well as with foreign industry. Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) The U.S. Secretary of Energy announced the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) in February last year. Under GNEP, the United States, in partnership with other nations with advanced nuclear technology, will accelerate the development of new technologies to recycle nuclear power reactor spent fuel without separating plutonium. The goals of GNEP are twofold: (1) to expand the global use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes in a safe and secure manner -- and in a way that supports economic development in a more "environmentally-friendly" way than fossil fuels; and (2) to reduce the risk of nuclear weapons proliferation that might otherwise result from an expansion of nuclear power. GNEP, as well nearer-term initiatives regarding nuclear fuel supply address, and seek to resolve, a conundrum that the world has faced since the dawn of the nuclear age over a half-century ago, that is, how to balance and utilize the peaceful potential of the atom while simultaneously containing and preventing its exploitation and proliferation in weapons of mass destruction. International cooperation is clearly essential to the success of this effort. Initial consultations on international cooperation were held last year with five potential partners -- Russia, France, Japan, China, and the United Kingdom. On the margins of the 2006 G-8 Summit, Presidents Putin and Bush noted the commonality of views on the essential role of nuclear energy in promoting energy security and took positive note of GNEP and of President Putin's initiative for international fuel centers. The U.S. and Russian governments are in discussions about further nuclear energy cooperation right now. Initial international reaction to GNEP from other states has been positive. Japan has issued a strongly positive public statement, and we have held several rounds of detailed discussions on research cooperation with Japan and France. China has indicated its clear interest in GNEP, as well. We have also had detailed discussions with Canada and South Korea and are discussing possible projects with them. A related initiative is President Bush's proposal, announced here at NDU in February 2004, for a ban on transfers of enrichment and reprocessing technologies to additional states. The U.S. believes that assurances of reliable access to nuclear fuel are important to reduce interest in acquisition of ENR technology. We have worked with other supplier states to put forward a concept for a fuel supply back-up mechanism at the IAEA, and are working with others to develop this and other mutually supportive proposals for assuring reliable access to nuclear fuel for countries that choose not develop indigenous enrichment and reprocessing. We will be working with the Congress as well on a number of bills that seek to support these efforts. Financial Measures In the past few years, the Bush Administration increasingly has used financial tools to support our counterproliferation efforts. The international community is becoming increasingly sophisticated in how it applies financial and other economic defensive measures to combat international security threats. This new era requires that governments and private sectors work together in close collaboration along with international partners to proactively identify threats to international security and ensure that such threats are effectively isolated. Our diplomacy is targeted at augmenting this collaboration and ensuring that the international commercial and financial system does not wittingly or unwittingly support proliferation networks. Key among our tools is Executive Order 13382, entitled "Blocking Property of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferators and Their Supporters", which the President issued in June 2005. E.O. 13382 is designed to freeze proliferators' assets that come under U.S. jurisdiction and to deny proliferators access to the U.S. financial system in order to prevent their exploitation of U.S. financial institutions and structures. To date, the designation of more than 30 entities and two individuals, including in Iran, North Korea, and Syria, has had the effect of impeding these proliferators' access to international financial markets. U.S. efforts have been greatly enhanced through multilateral actions to similarly freeze the assets of Iranian proliferators and require financial institutions not to support North Korean proliferation activities. While the United States has the authority to take actions unilaterally with significant impact, an important element of our effort has been to broaden and deepen international cooperation to strengthen the impact of our actions. Key to this effort is the work we have done to multilaterlize these efforts through the UN Security Council Resolution and bilateral diplomacy. UN Security Council Resolution 1540, adopted in 2004, creates broad Chapter VII legally binding requirements on all states to criminalize the proliferation of WMD, including the financing of proliferation.

• UN Security Council Resolutions 1695 and 1718, adopted in 2006, prohibit states from supporting North Korea proliferation and provides a process for designating specific entities for an asset freeze.

• UN Security Council Resolutions 1737 and 1747, adopted in 2006 and 2007, specifically designates 50 entities and individuals and requires nations to freeze their assets.

As part of our diplomacy we have worked with Treasury to engage foreign governments and private firms, reminding them of the financial and reputational risks of doing business with Iran. When possible, we have shared information with governments of proliferation-related transactions to ensure financial institutions have a full understanding of the activities of their customers. This has yielded results. Many responsible financial institutions have decided on their own, as a result of our continued diplomacy and exposure of North Korean and Iranian entities involved in proliferation illicit behavior, to cease business dealings with these entities. 041b061a72