Charlie Veitch Detained at Toronto International Airport
Kurt Nimmo Infowars.comJune 29, 2010

Editor’s note: An Infowars reader indicates Charlie is being held by the Toronto Police at the 51 Division. Telephone: 416-808-5108.

Dan Dicks of Press for Truth in Canada told Infowars.com this afternoon that Charlie Veitch was detained at Toronto International Airport. Veitch was scheduled to return to England after attending demonstrations against the G20 globalist confab held over the weekend.

Veitch sent an urgent text message to Dicks indicating he was detained. “They’ve got me,” Charlie said. “Get help!”

Veitch is the founder of activist group The Love Police. He produces videos of his confrontations with government officials and police.

Charlie was arrested on June 24 in Toronto for refusing to cooperate with the police after he was asked for ID. Ontario secretly passed an unprecedented regulation empowering police to arrest anyone near the G20 security zone who refused to identify themselves or agree to a police search.

Paul Joseph Watson details how protesters in Toronto during the summit were abducted off the streets and bundled into unmarked vehicles. Police have established a pattern of increasing Gestapo behavior with each passing globalist event in an obvious attempt to dissuade and frighten the opposition.

Police admit no five-metre rule existed on security fence law

Toronto police Chief Bill Blair at police headquarters at 40 College st.Blair was interviewed the day after the G20 SUmmit concluded and asked about police action and protesters during the unrest on the weekend Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail

‘I was trying to keep the criminals out,’ police chief says

Toronto — The Canadian Press Published on Tuesday, Jun. 29, 2010 11:33AM EDT Last updated on Tuesday, Jun. 29, 2010 9:27PM EDT

The expiration of the five-metre rule that had Toronto residents fearing arrest if they strayed too close to the G20 security perimeter came with a startling revelation Tuesday – it never existed.

The rule seemed straightforward when the news broke last Friday that the Ontario government made a regulatory change to a little-known act in secret.

Come within five metres of the summit security fence and you’d better have some identification or risk arrest.

The temporary regulation, which was passed in secret June 2, did decree that all streets and sidewalks inside the fence were a public work until 11:59 p.m. Monday. Under the Ontario Public Works Protection Act, that allowed police to search people trying to enter that area.

But there was no power to search people coming within five metres of the fence, said ministry spokeswoman Laura Blondeau.

“The area designated by the regulation as a public work does not extend outside the boundary of the fence,” Ms. Blondeau said.

Asked Tuesday if there actually was a five-metre rule given the ministry’s clarification, Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair smiled and said, “No, but I was trying to keep the criminals out.”

The confusion, it seems, came from the wording of the regulation.

The phrase five metres does appear, but it references land well within the fence that is neither a sidewalk nor street – land near a parking lot and land behind the Rogers Centre. A driveway below ground level in front of Union Station was also designated a public work.

Still, the misconception that any zone within five metres of the imposing steel fence – which wound its way through the downtown core – was included persisted throughout the weekend despite extensive media coverage Friday.

Neither the province nor police set the record straight. In fact, both made comments about the necessity of such powers.

The Canadian Civil Liberties Association demanded an apology from the Ontario government.

“The lack of transparency surrounding the designation of the security perimeter as a public work led to misunderstanding as to the scope of the search and seizure powers during the summit,” said association spokeswoman Nathalie Des Rosiers.

“In our view it was an inappropriate use of search and seizure powers.”

There were complaints about police engaging in arbitrary searches throughout the weekend in different areas of Toronto, even far away from the G20 security zone.

The New Democrats said Premier Dalton McGuinty and his community safety minister allowed people to misinterpret the law until the G20 was over and the regulation itself had expired.

“Mr. McGuinty’s solicitor general misled the people of Ontario and the police into believing that police had the authority to demand identification and to search people without warrants,” said NDP justice critic Peter Kormos.

Toronto lawyer Rob Kittredge, an avid photographer who works near the G20 site, said Tuesday he was handcuffed and searched by police last week for taking pictures of the security fence, from the outside.

Mr. Kittredge said he knows his rights – or at least thought he did in this case – and always politely refuses to comply with police demands for identification if he feels they have no grounds.

“They told me that I did in fact have an obligation to answer their questions and provide identification and cited the Public Works Protection Act,” said Mr. Kittredge.

“They explained they had the right to ask me the purpose of my being there, they had the right to ask my name and demand identification and my address.”

Mr. McGuinty still hasn’t explained why cabinet passed the regulation change in secret, and then kept it secret.

“They knew that this was going to be a live issue and that people were going to be getting legal advice and that chances are if they didn’t publicize it, the legal advice would be wrong and misleading,” said lawyer Jonathan Dawe, who has argued cases before the Supreme Court of Canada on the scope of police powers.

“As a matter of basic fairness people should be told in advance what they’re doing that constitutes an offence.”

Opposition Leader Tim Hudak said Mr. McGuinty “should have been more honest” about the regulation change.

“I think if this was known to the general public ahead of time the vast majority of Ontario residents would have understood the need,” said Mr. Hudak.

OBAMA VISIT: Local company has portable restroom facilities for the president

Published: Tue, May 18, 2010 @ 10:49 a.m.

NORTH LIMA — When Air Force One touches down in Vienna today, Mobile Restroom Suites of North Lima will be providing restroom facilities for President Barack Obama.

The president is traveling to V&M Star of Youngstown to speak to workers on jobs and the economy.

White House staff on Friday contacted the operations manager and minority business owner of Portable Restroom Trailers to provide upscale mobile restroom trailer facilities for the president and his entourage. Mobile Restroom Suites offers complete privacy without side-by-side stalls to ensure the safety of the president.

The restroom trailers feature granite-look counter tops, stainless steel sinks, full vanity mirrors and lighting. Each trailer comes complete with hand towels, soaps, and supplies. All have china flushable facilities. The 8-by-12-foot trailer was to be delivered today to the V&M Star location for Obama’s arrival.

Portable Restroom Suites also has provided mobile restroom facilities for Denzel Washington at an Ohio movie production location.

OBAMA VISIT: Local company has portable restroom facilities for the president

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Published: Tue, May 18, 2010 @ 10:49 a.m.

NORTH LIMA — When Air Force One touches down in Vienna today, Mobile Restroom Suites of North Lima will be providing restroom facilities for President Barack Obama.

The president is traveling to V&M Star of Youngstown to speak to workers on jobs and the economy.

White House staff on Friday contacted the operations manager and minority business owner of Portable Restroom Trailers to provide upscale mobile restroom trailer facilities for the president and his entourage. Mobile Restroom Suites offers complete privacy without side-by-side stalls to ensure the safety of the president.

The restroom trailers feature granite-look counter tops, stainless steel sinks, full vanity mirrors and lighting. Each trailer comes complete with hand towels, soaps, and supplies. All have china flushable facilities. The 8-by-12-foot trailer was to be delivered today to the V&M Star location for Obama’s arrival.

Portable Restroom Suites also has provided mobile restroom facilities for Denzel Washington at an Ohio movie production location.

Your request is being pr

Paul Krassner Posted: July 6, 2006 09:54 PM

Excrement In the News

Paul Krassner

There were a couple of scatological incidents reported over the 4th of July holidays.

From NPR News:

"Bird droppings could be a threat to the shuttle re-entry."

And from the WayneMadsenReport.com:

"Even Bush's crap is classified top secret. According to our Austrian sources, Austrian newspapers are currently abuzz with special security details of George W. Bush's recent trip to Vienna. Although the heavy-handed Gestapo-like security measures meted out to Viennese home owners, business proprietors, and pedestrians by US Secret Service agents and local police before and during Bush's visit received widespread Austrian media attention, it was White House 'toilet security' (TOILSEC), which has Austrians talking the most. The White House flew in a special portable toilet to Vienna for Bush's personal use during his visit. The Bush White House is so concerned about Bush's security, the veil of secrecy extends over the president's bodily excretions. The special port-a-john captured Bush's feces and urine and flew the waste material back to the United States in the event some enterprising foreign intelligence agency conducted a sewage pipe operation designed to trap and examine Bush's waste material. One can only wonder why the White House is taking such extraordinary security measures for the presidential poop.

"In the past, similar operations were conducted against foreign leaders to determine their medical condition. However, these intelligence operations were directed against dictators in countries where even the medical conditions of the top political leaders were considered 'state secrets.' The Israeli Mossad conducted one such operation against Syrian President Hafez Assad when he visited Amman, Jordan in Feb. 1999 for the funeral of King Hussein. The Mossad and its Jordanian counterpart installed a special toilet in Assad's hotel room that led not to a pipe but to a specimen canister. Assad suffered from diabetes and cancer and the operation was designed to discover the actual medical condition of the ailing leader. During Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev's visit to Washington in 1987, the CIA reportedly placed a special trap under a sewage tank to collect the Soviet leader's bodily waste for analysis. More recently, the CIA was reported to have collected waste samples from Ugandan President-dictator Yoweri Museveni's toilet when he visited Washington.

"Even Bush's toilet paper was flown in from the U.S. Air Base at Ramstein, Germany. In addition, Bush's food was flown in from the United States and tested with special chemicals before he ate it. Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, who was shot by a firing squad in 1989, was the last major European leader to constantly use a food tester. The last frequent state visitor to Vienna, who always relied on a food tester, was Adolf Hitler."

Goldman ordered to pay $20.6M to hedge fund creditors for $400M fraud

AFP

AFP/Getty Images/File – Stock prices whiz by on a ticker near the Goldman Sachs booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange

WASHINGTON (AFP) – US investment giant Goldman Sachs has been ordered to pay 20.6 million dollars to the creditors of the collapsed hedge fund Bayou Group for ignoring signs of fraud, according to the arbitration panel's decision revealed Saturday.

The financial regulator FINRA approved the claimant's assertion that Goldman Sachs allowed the trades made by Bayou before it collapsed in 2005, and allowed "fraud, failure to investigate the fraud, and fraudulent transfers," said the ruling issued Thursday.

Bayou CEO Samuel Israel at the time of fund's collapse is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence after admitting to misleading investors over the value of Bayou's funds, defrauding the clients out of over 400 million dollars.

It is the largest ever arbitration award levied against Goldman Sachs, the Wall Street Journal said.

"Through either gross negligence or a willful choice to ignore the signs of fraud, (Goldman) failed to diligently investigate the red flags it was made aware of, to contact Bayou's auditors... or to alert the appropriate authorities," said lawyers for the creditors' committee, the Journal reported.

Dwellings for low paid 'uninhabitable'

Deborah Gough
June 27, 2010 - 3:00AM

MANY privately owned rental properties targeting low-income earners in Melbourne and Geelong are unsafe or uninhabitable, a Victorian Council of Social Service report has found.

A third of the properties surveyed had no electrical safety switch, one in five had significant mould problems and one in 10 had no heating.

Of the 116 ''affordable'' rental properties inspected in the survey, one in 10 was found to be uninhabitable.

However, the VCOSS report, Decent Not Dodgy, found that 40 per cent of the problems affecting most premises could be fixed for less than $100.

More than half of the residences needed only two repairs or additions to make them into decent dwellings.

The report looked at affordable housing in Melbourne and Geelong, using ''secret shopper'' volunteers to check the standards of properties advertised for rent.

They assessed studio apartments and one-bedroom units up to the value of $150 a week and houses with three bedrooms or more attracting weekly rents of up to $400.

The report said 70 per cent of renters are on low incomes. Yet the survey found that 41 per cent of properties had no low-flow shower head, which are free under a state government swap program and would help to cut residents' water bills.

Seventeen per cent did not have a deadlock fitted to the external door.

Both the shower head and lock problems could be fixed at no or low cost to the owners, acting VCOSS chief executive officer Carolyn Atkins said

The report, due for release tomorrow, found that in a further 12 per cent of properties two or more changes could bring a house or flat up to a liveable standard. However, 9 per cent of properties required significant expense to make them habitable.

Ms Atkins said the organisation was campaigning for new minimum standards and that the survey showed rents would have no cause to go up if regulations were introduced because most repairs cost so little.

She said that properties should be secure, heated and safe, but under the Residential Tenancies Act they were only required to be clean.

Ms Atkins said decent housing was a basic human right and regulations similar to those in Britain, Canada and the US should be introduced here.

''It is unacceptable in a First World country,'' she said.

VCOSS has suggested minimum standards should include that properties be damp-free, weatherproof, insulated, ventilated, connected to hot and cold running water, and with a fixed heater and cooking facilities.

Ms Atkins said renters could save $363 a year if a gas heater and ceiling insulation were installed and a further $336 a year if the property switched from electric to gas hot water heating.

Kildonan UnitingCare operates an energy program to help renters reduce their energy costs. Its program manager, Karl Barratt, said some renters were paying $1500 for their winter energy bill because they had inefficient electrical heating and hot water services.

The VCOSS report criticised rental property managers, saying 68 per cent did not know whether the property was insulated, while others did not know what type of hot water system a property had or whether there was a safety switch.

Asked about regulations governing rental property standards, a state government spokeswoman said it had committed to reviewing standards in the Victorian Integrated Housing Strategy.

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/dwellings-for-low-paid-uninhabitable-20100626-zb1i.html

Winter's chill means a big comeback for swine flu

Stephen Cauchi
June 27, 2010 - 3:00AM

WE'VE just had the coldest morning, the shortest day, and the gloomiest month in Melbourne. But take heart: compared with last year, this winter won't be the worst for flu, with medical experts predicting a quiet and slow start to the flu season.

However, the downside is the pandemic ''swine'' strain of influenza will be the predominant form of the infectious disease, likely to account for up to nine out of 10 cases of flu this year.

Amid an average start to winter, in terms of temperature and rainfall, there were only 884 cases of flu diagnosed nationally this year to June 11, according to the federal Health Department. The figure was 3611 last year, to June 16, driven largely by the low levels of immunity to swine flu.

''We're having a quiet and slow start to the flu season this year,'' said Australian Medical Association vice-president Steve Hambleton. ''This time last year the H1N1 strain was ramping up very quickly.''

He expected swine flu to account for up to nine out of 10 cases of flu in 2010, with seasonal strains - H3N2 and influenza B - accounting for the rest.

According to the Health Department, 9.2 per cent of flu diagnoses this year were definitely swine flu, while 75.7 were most probably swine flu. Only 10.4 per cent were seasonal strains - the types of flu suffered by most people in Australia, before swine flu hit last year.

Dr Hambleton said he expected fewer swine flu cases this winter. ''We now have a significant number of Australians who are actually immune, either because they got the disease last year or because they have been vaccinated,'' he said.

''We're in a very different position to where we were last year where no one had immunity, apart from those over 65 who seem to have residual immunity … We're expecting a lot less.''

Victoria has had an average start to winter, in terms of temperature and rainfall, according to the Bureau of Meteorology. And the state can expect more of the same next month.

Last Tuesday morning was Melbourne's coldest this year, dropping to 3.6 degrees. Appropriately, the chill came the morning after the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, and June was the month with the fewest hours of sunshine.

Mr Hambleton urged all Victorians at risk of getting flu to be vaccinated. ''We know that the vaccination for the population is safe and we should encourage its use, because we do know that there are people who will get pandemic flu who will end up in hospital in intensive care.''

Australia's chief medical officer, Jim Bishop, is continuing to recommend that vaccination for seasonal flu strains be suspended for children under five. The recommendation follows reports of children in Western Australia experiencing fever with convulsions after having the vaccine. However, Dr Bishop has stated that the swine flu vaccine is acceptable for children under five, saying this month that ''the swine flu vaccine Panvax has been shown to be safe and effective in young children and is freely available''.

Dr Hambleton said there could be a rise in children under five getting seasonal flu.

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/winters-chill-means-a-big-comeback-for-swine-flu-20100626-zb23.html

Families left out as singles sublet public housing

Maris Beck
June 27, 2010 - 3:00AM

A SHORTAGE of single-bedroom housing commission flats has meant two and three-bedroom units are being rented to singles and couples, some of whom are then subletting rooms, in breach of Office of Housing rules.

Meanwhile, families needing several bedrooms are left waiting, sometimes for years, for appropriate accommodation to become available, a public housing tenants association spokesman said.

Residents at the Fitzroy commission flats say the state government has failed to crack down on the subletting practice, despite repeated requests.

The president of the residents association at the Fitzroy commission flats, Frank Lin, said he knew of about 20 residents in the towers who sublet their rooms. The going rate, he said, was $80 a week.

A government spokesman confirmed that some single people or couples lived in two or three-bedroom flats and were not required to share with flatmates. But it is against the Office of Housing's rules for residents to own other properties or sublet rooms.

However, Mr Lin said it was easy for people to make money from subletting because the office was not proactive and did not investigate effectively.

He said in most cases where residents rented out spare rooms, they simply told authorities they were living with relatives, if they were asked - despite in some instances not even speaking the same language.

Mr Lin also said he knew of residents who had applied for and been granted public housing even though they already had somewhere to live, and then rented out the extra accommodation.

Residents have written to the Office of Housing, and the issue has been raised at meetings with Department of Human Services employees, he said.

State Minister for Housing Richard Wynne denied the practice was widespread, but said offenders would be evicted.

''There is no evidence of systematic subletting,'' he said. ''When there is evidence, we will take action through VCAT to have offenders evicted. We encourage anyone with allegations to contact the Office of Housing.''

But Mr Lin said he did not know of anyone who had been caught for the practice. In Mr Lin's office the desks are piled high with application forms. Many people, he said, would wait years to get a place in public housing, or gave up on the process altogether.

''That is very bad. The management of the housing, the Minister of Housing, is very … bureaucratic.''

A resident of the flats for 20 years, Kim Go Wong, said that where she used to live in Hong Kong, the authorities were much more effective. She said through a translator: ''They have very close details of the tenants … so if someone new came to live in the house, they will investigate. But, no, not here.''

Toby Archer, a policy worker at the Tenants Union of Victoria, said he had heard allegations about subletting, but did not think it was widespread. He said residents sometimes had grudges against each other and made unfounded allegations.

A spokesman for the Department of Human Services, Brendan Ryan, said the department had applied to VCAT about three suspected cases of subletting, but he did not know the outcome of the cases.

''Our practice shows subletting is not a common practice on housing estates,'' he said. ''When we become aware of subletting we can and do take action.''

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/families-left-out-as-singles-sublet-public-housing-20100626-zb21.html

LOVE POLICE'S CHARLIE VEITH RELEASED AFTER 20HR INTERROGATION

Charlie Veitch of the Love Police was released after a 2o hr interrogation for asking questions and failing to show his ID to Police.

G20: Activists Arrested, Denied Entry into Canada

Kurt Nimmo
Prison Planet.com
Friday, June 25, 2010

Dan Dicks of Press for Truth reports this morning that Charlie Veitch of The Love Police was arrested yesterday in Toronto for refusing to cooperate with the police.

“While using his megaphone to inform the people of Toronto about G20 related issues we were surrounded by police who demanded our identification. When Charlie stated that he wishes to remain anonymous he was immediately detained and placed under arrest. The officer stated that Charlie was being detained under the ‘public works protection act’ for failing to identify himself,” writes Dicks.

Charlie Veitch produces videos of his confrontations with government officials and police. His Love Police blog is popular. Veitch appeared on the Alex Jones Show on May 20, 2010.

“The province has secretly passed an unprecedented regulation that empowers police to arrest anyone near the G20 security zone who refuses to identify themselves or agree to a police search,” the Toronto Star reports today. “The regulation was made under Ontario’s Public Works Protection Act and was not debated in the Legislature. According to a provincial spokesperson, the cabinet action came in response to an ‘extraordinary request’ by Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair, who wanted additional policing powers shortly after learning the G20 was coming to Toronto.”

Read Dan’s account of the incident here.

Call the Toronto Police to find out Charlie’s status. The number is: 1-416-808-5100 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 1-416-808-5100 end_of_the_skype_highlighting. The G8-G20 has it own police force and they can be reached at: 1-888-446-4047 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 1-888-446-4047 end_of_the_skype_highlighting.

We Are Change founder Luke Rudkowski and fellow activists were denied access into Canada. In a telephone interview with Infowars.com, Luke said he was detained for nearly five hours by Homeland Security and Canadian Customs police on the border in Buffalo, New York. Agents went through his car and laptop looking for anything to arrest and detain the activists. After the Canadians denied Luke, Kelly, and Matt entry into the country, Homeland Security on the American side of the border questioned them once again.

In 2006, Alex Jones was detained for 15 hours by Canadian immigration on orders of the Bilderberg Group. “Customs openly told Alex as soon as they brought him into custody that the Bilderberg Group was aware of his arrival and that this was the reason for his detainment. All three members of the team were instantly detained despite going through different immigration desks,” Paul Joseph Watson wrote for Prison Planet on June 8, 2006.

No anti-virus software? No internet connection

• By Andrew Ramadge, Technology Reporter
• From:news.com.au
• June 22, 2010 10:29am
• 473 comments

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A parliamentary committee has come up with some big ideas for combating cyber crime.

• Radical ideas to fight cyber criminals
• 'Make anti-virus software mandatory'
• More: Technology news and reviews
  

AUSTRALIANS would be forced to install anti-virus and firewall software on their computers before being allowed to connect to the internet under a new plan to fight cyber crime.

And if their computer did get infected, internet service providers like Telstra and Optus could cut off their connection until the problem was resolved.

Those are two of the recommendations to come from a year-long inquiry into cyber crime by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Communications.

Results of the inquiry, titled Hackers, Fraudsters and Botnets: Tackling the Problem of Cyber Crime, were released last night in a 260-page report.

In her foreword, committee chair Belinda Neal said cyber crime had turned into a "sophisticated underground economy".

"In the past decade, cyber crime has grown from the nuisance of the cyber smart hacker into an organised transnational crime committed for vast profit and often with devastating consequences for its victims," Ms Neal said.

It also heard the problem was costing Australian businesses as much as $649 million a year.During its inquiry the committee heard a growing number of Australians were being targeted by cyber criminals and that increasing internet speeds were likely to make the situation worse.

The committee looked at several different examples of cyber crime, including hacking, phishing, malware and botnets.

Among its final 34 recommendations were:

— The creation of an around-the-clock cyber crime helpline.

— Changes to the law to make unauthorised installation of software illegal.

— Companies who release IT products with security vulnerabilities should be open to claims for compensation by consumers.

Another of its recommendations was to create a new "e-security code of practice" that would define the responsibilities of internet service providers and their customers.

The code of practice would see companies like Telstra give their customers security advice when they signed up and inform them if their computer ever appeared to be compromised.

For their part, customers would have to install anti-virus and firewall software before their connection was activated and endeavour to keep the software up-to-date.

If a customer's computer was infected by malware, the service provider could introduce gradual restrictions and eventually cut off their internet connection entirely until the machine was "remediated".

Some of US taxpayers’ money leaks to Taliban – report

Published 22 June, 2010, 20:31 Edited 23 June, 2010, 11:43

US taxpayer dollars are finding their way to the pockets of the Taliban, according to a new 75-page congressional report about the military's use of Afghan security firms.

The American military hires trucking companies to deliver supplies to their bases in Afghanistan and leaves it up to the companies to protect themselves. The truckers then pay local security companies or warlords to escort their trucks.The firms are used to ensure the safe passage of supply convoys. If the US doesn’t pay up, almost without fail the convoy gets attacked.

Some of the trucking companies believe the gunmen they hired for protection may have been paying to Taliban not to attack them.

James Denselow, a writer on Middle East politics, believes that the Americans are trapped in Afghanistan.

“Afghanistan is a logistical nightmare for the Americans, it's a landlocked country and 80 percent of American supplies have to go in by land in trucks. And the need for it is huge, they have about a 100,000 soldiers who consume a vast amount of fuel and ammunition each day,” Denselow told RT

Brian Becker, director of the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition, believes that the report will weaken the already frail position of the government concerning the war.

“There is such fragile support – if “support” is the word at all – for the US/NATO war in Afghanistan that something like this can have a very destabilizing effect for the administration’s efforts to maintain some semblance of support from the broader public,”Becker told RT. “I think we see now that the US government is – as it did in Iraq but perhaps for similar and somewhat different reasons – paying or providing funds for those that they are supposedly at war with, the insurgent forces. And I think the political fall out both in the left and the right in the United States is great because there is opposition across the political spectrum to the war in Afghanistan and as you know, that support internationally is withering as we speak.”

Representative John Tierney, who chairs the congressional committee which carried out the investigation, said its findings raise key questions about how US strategy in Afghanistan should continue.

“We need to have people have confidence in the Afghan government, which means there has to be far less corruption,” Tierney told RT. “One, that people can trust on that basis to the extent that throwing all of this international money into the situation without having the oversight… There is really no other alternative – you either change your strategy or you certainly change the way that you approach it currently.”

US mulled North Korea nuclear strike in 1969: documents

Wed Jun 23, 3:21 pm ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States studied a plan for a nuclear strike on North Korea in 1969 but advisers to then-president Richard Nixon concluded it was best to remain calm, declassified documentsshowed Wednesday.

The documents, obtained by the National Security Archive at George Washington University, foreshadow present-day US frustration on how to handle Pyongyang following its nuclear tests and the sinking of a South Korean ship.

In 1969, North Korea shot down a US spy aircraft over the Sea of Japan (East Sea), killing the 31 personnel on board.

Despite US outrage, the new Nixon administration chose not to retaliate other than to order a continuation of flights and go ahead with naval exercises.

The documents, released after requests under the Freedom of Information Act, showed that the administration nonetheless charted out a series of options that included conventional and nuclear attacks.

In one contingency plan codenamed "Freedom Drop," the United States would use tactical nuclear weapons to destroy military command centers, airfields andnaval bases in North Korea.

Civilian casualties "would range from approximately 100 to several thousand," said a classified memorandum by then-defense secretary Melvin Laird prepared forHenry Kissinger, who was Nixon's national security adviser.

There is no indication that the administration seriously considered a nuclear strike. The document stated that the United States could use one nuclear option if North Korea launched an air attack on the South.

In a document recounting a White House meeting, Kissinger is quoted as saying that his initial reactions to the spy plane incident "were probably naive" and that it was most crucial to prevent a "counter blow" from Pyongyang.

"The need is to look determined and, if the object is to prevent counter-responses, the action taken should be (a) powerful blow," Kissinger said.

"If a similar situation were to arise today, (Nixon) would probably either do nothing or select an option toward the extreme of the range of possibilities," Kissinger said.

The United States this week marks the 60th anniversary of the Korean War, which ended with an armistice and the peninsula still divided.

Since the conflict, the United States has repeatedly -- and sometimes begrudgingly -- relied on carrot-and-stick diplomacy with North Korea, concluding it was the only realistic option.