Photo, above:  In the old days, before Erdogan:  F-14B VF-32 at Incirlik AB in Turkey, Operation Northern Watch. See Hour 2, Block A, and Hour 3, Block A.

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Co-host: Thaddeus McCotter, WJR, The Great Voice of the Great Lakes and author, Liberty Risen.

Hour One

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 1, Block A: Thomas Joscelyn, Long War Journal senior editor, & Bill Roggio, Long War Journal and FDD, in re: Taliban assault Camp Bastion, storm foreign guest house in Kabul  November 29, 2014  The Taliban and Afghan security forces have been fighting inside Camp Bastion for three days. Hostages may have been taken in the attack in Kabul.    Jihadists tout training camps for children in Iraq and Syria  November 27, 2014   The Islamic State, the Al Nusrah Front, the Islamic Front, and Junud al Sham have been showcasing camps in Iraq and Syria that are used to indoctrinate and train children to wage jihad.     Pakistan condemns drone strike that targeted 'good Taliban' and foreign fighters  November 26, 2014   Members of the Haqqani Network, the Hafiz Gul Bahadar Group, and "Uzbeks" are reported to have been killed in an attack in the Shawal Valley.    AQAP publishes biography of American jihadist Samir Khan  November 25, 2014   Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula released a biography of American AQAP operative and Inspire Magazine founder Samir Khan, who was killed in a US drone strike on Sept. 30, 2011.    Haqqani Network launched suicide attack at soccer game, Afghan intel claims  November 24, 2014   The accusation is made as the US has extended the combat mission in Afghanistan for one year.    More jihadist training camps identified in Iraq and Syria  November 23, 2014   Four new training camps in Iraq and Syria, three of them operated by the Islamic State, have been identified, including one used by a so-called jihadist "special forces" unit. The Long War Journal has identified 46 jihadist training camps in Iraq and Syria.    Ex-Gitmo 'poet' now recruiting for the Islamic State in Afghanistan and Pakistan  November 22, 2014  Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost was once held at Guantanamo. Today, he is recruiting for the Islamic State in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Dost claims he had a vision at Guantanamo predicting the coming caliphate.   5 transferred Gitmo detainees served al Qaeda, leaked files allege  November 21, 2014  The Defense Department announced the transfer of five Guantanamo detainees yesterday. According to leaked threat assessments prepared by Joint Task Force Guantanamo, all five served al Qaeda. (1 of 2)

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 1, Block B: Thomas Joscelyn, Long War Journal senior editor, & Bill Roggio, Long War Journal and FDD (2 of 2).

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 1, Block C: Michael Auslin, Director of Japan Studies, AEI, in re:   Welcome to Feb 2017.  Mrs Clinton is president.  PLA takes Quemoy & Matzu ("Kinmen"); with no response from the White House, South Korea and Japan join in treaty, Japan takes the Senkakus.  Still, no WH response.  Everyone shocked.

Your move. 

..  ..  .. 

This is from Bret Stephens's new book, America in Retreat.  It's a credible war-game.  Problem: US has bilateral plans with one country at a time – but no discussions all together. US has foreborne to hold such a meeting out of fear of upsetting China!

We're starting to look at the possibility of an all-out cyberattack, one that takes down networks for days.   DoD says plainly that it’s unprepared for this type of action.  Our best chance of holding China back is by sanctions and selling bonds [?], as China is more dependent on us at present than we are on them.  US is overall so unprepared for Chinese invasions that, should the event occur, the US is likely to be immobile rather than take an unexpected move.  Australia launching its first helo carrier – nascence of a regional response.  These carriers are very large – enough for F35 STOLs that the US is building.  This is all new – none of these c0untries has projected power the way the US does, so the next years will be a learning process.  Expect errors – e.g., the two subs that managed to collide in the Indian Ocean. 

Japans past may be problematic, esp in Korea, for example – and Tokyos failure to come to grips with its past (not clear that Shinzo Abe will); but in face of China's aggression Vietnam, Philippines, et al., will have to turn to Japan.  Role of India in a potential new alliance? It’s a bright light for democracies; all regional nations want to be friends with it, even including Mainland China. 

–– Btw – in Bret Stephens's scenario, by Dec 2019, Iran and Byelorus have collapsed and the UN is seeking a ceasefire.

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 1, Block D:  Gordon Chang, Forbes.com, in re:  The govt pepper spray in Hong Kong is not good for students, and if students ratchet up their protest they'll lose some public support; however, it's good news that Joshua Wong, student leader, has begun a hunger strike to oblige Beijing to discuss the Joint Declaration of 1984, which requires actual democracy in HK elections.  Meanwhile, Beijing refused entry to several British legislators who are by treaty allowed to visit Hong Kong.  Taiwan: PM resigns after losing election –he was inordinately kowtowing to Beijing, now repudiated by the electorate. Ma Ying-jeoun inadvertently made it worse for Beijing htan he had to. KMT [KuoMinTang, pron Gwoh-Min-Dah-ng] lost the Taipei mayoralty. Unheard of.   China's recent record of honoring written obligations is atrocious.

Hour Two

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 2, Block A:  John Fund, National Review Online, in re: Ferguson, Missouri.  Pres Obama. The beer summit in response to the flap with Skip Gates in Cambridge: learned that Pres Obama will inject himself into local law-enforcement issues prematurely. Next: we have no SecDef currently.  Political reporters suggest that Pres Obama is considering asking for no-fly zone out of Incirlik, in Turkey.  This would serve to support Assad against the Syrian "rebels" – al Qaeda and its cohort. Running things from the White House, with a broken bureaucracy – not new;  few remaining candidates for a job that will be micromanaged by the WH; one hopes that Ash Carter will be invited and accept to be SecDef.  Running a no-fly zone over Turkey is highly dangerous, War.  Need the full weight of the Cabinet to formulate and maintain policy "Need all hands on deck as you sail these stormy seas."  Pres Obama is his own Sec Def and his own governor of Missouri. 

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 2, Block B: John Fund, National Review Online, in re:  the Republican side of the Congress: Dems expect that the president's immigration order will be [fought over], leading to, for example, a new shutdown.   Messrs Fund and McCotter do not think so.  It’s taken six years for the GOP to realize that this administration never acts n good faith; result is trench warfare for the next two years – lobbing lawsuits and accusations back and forth like artillery shells.   A good partisan doesn’t lead his party to defeat in the last (quarter); you have to respect your opponent enough to understand him. This president seems to understand only cursorily what the GOP wants to accomplish and why.  Chuck Todd says: Sen Obama consulted with past Republicans, was friends with Tom Coburn. Bring in David Gergen?  What a curious and irrelevant artifact he is.   Today is not a 1940s industrial society; Pres Obama is arguing a retreat from the expanding horizons of the Twenty-first Century.

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 2, Block C: Tunku Varadarajan, Hoover, in re: Russia will host the World Cup in 2018, has committed billions on stadia and transport – which it doesn't have right now as the ruble is in almost-free-fall; and Russia has misbehaved so the World Cup should be withdrawn. 

Take the Cup away from Russia now, and we will have the time for countries to bid afresh for 2018. Let the process be transparent and clean, worthy of a sport that has a greater, more passionate, following worldwide than any other. And let us be sure, also, that the Picasso goes back to the Hermitage Museum. Putin can keep his painting. But he can’t be allowed to keep the World Cup. [more]

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 2, Block D: Murad Ismael, Sinjar Mountain Crisis Group, in re:   Yazidis caught in their tens of thousands atop the mountain and encircled by a restive ISIS since August 7.  Females, as well as young and old men, are training to defends themselves.  The situation on the mountain has slightly improved as ISIS has diminished by a tiny  number of daily attacks.  Mountain is 75 km long, 35 km wide; it's bare, few trees. Is set up adequately for defense – ISIL comes from below. Kursi Valley, in the middle of the mountain, goes down to a village.  Yazidis  have been persecuted in Iraq for a long time.  Yazidis were part of a coalition fighting ISIL; Yazidis and Kurds have had a strained relations for four months, as Kurds declined to help the Yazidis were in the direst of straits.   Yazidis have no problem with some Kurdish groups, - specifically, the PKK and its subgroup YPP.  From weeks ago, many Yazidi women and children – 5,000 people - were abducted by ISIL and brutalized and gang-raped.  Many of them have been transferred to other places in the last three days; we have completely lost communication as ISIL has sealed off our children and sisters.  We're extremely concerned. [more]

Hour Three

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 3, Block A:  Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re: Pres Obama is weighing establishing a no-fly zone in Turkey, putatively against Assad's forces: [see Hour Two, Block A].  Political reporters suggest that Pres Obama is considering asking for no-fly zone out of Incirlik, in Turkey.  This would serve to support Assad is it bombs the Syrian "rebels" – al Qaeda and its cohort. Running things from the White House, with a broken bureaucracy is not new;  few remaining candidates for a job that will be micromanaged by the WH; one hopes that Ash Carter will be invited and accept to be SecDef.  Running a no-fly zone over Turkey is highly dangerous.  War.  Need the full weight of the Cabinet to formulate and maintain policy. "Need all hands on deck as you sail these stormy seas." Today, Iranian planes bombed inside Iraq, which it could not do without US approval.  The US has long been denied access to Incirlik. Bombing ISIS in Iraq requires active coordination with Teheran.  Iranians brag that their borders now extend to the Mediterranean; speak of extending to Rome and Mecca, and across North Africa.  Teheran speaks of vanquishing the Crusaders [you, dear reader].  ISIS-type language being used by many groups. 

Today, Iranian plane bombed inside Iraq.  US will us its air force to fight Assad – thereby helping ISIS and al Qaeda.  Today commemorates the Jewish naqba – 850,000 Jews fled in terror and in large numbers from the Arab world.  They were persecuted, beaten, had their land confiscated and fled from lands where they had lived for more than a thousand years. Al-Banna said; If the Jewish state becomes a fact, we'll drive the Jews into the sea.  The Grand Mufti said that his collaboration with Hitler depended on extirpating Jews – in Egypt, Libya Syria, Iraq.   More than $6 billion in Jewish assets were taken. 

Alois Brunner, Eichmann's key assistant, died in Syria, possibly in 20010. He deported about 130,000 Jews from many countries, incl Greece; annihilated them in concentration camps.  He escaped in the 1950s using a Red Cross passport, became Hafez al Assad's personal assistant; is said to have die in his nineties and be buried in Syria France indicted him – he was in charge of he transfer camp from Vichy France to concentration camps; a vicious killer, vise Assad pere in torture and other horrible things. Reminds one of Churchill's remark, that he saw von Ribbentrop in London at a dinner before the war– "That was the last I saw of him before he was hanged."

Alois Brunner, most-wanted Nazi, died 'unrepentant' in Syria | The Times of Israel   SS captain Alois Brunner, described by Eichmann as his “best man,” was responsible for the deportation of 128,500 Jews to the death camps. After the war in the 1950s, Brunner fled to Syria where he reportedly served as a government adviser to president Hafez Assad and is thought to have instructed the regime on torture tactics. He survived two Mossad assassination attempts, and went to his grave utterly “unrepentant,” according to Nazi-hunter Efraim Zuroff. “We have received information from a former German secret service agent who had served in the Middle East who said that Brunner was dead and buried in Damascus,” Zuroff told The Sunday Express on Sunday.

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 3, Block B: Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re:  At the ECOSOC hall in the UN, a meeting marking the expulsion of the Jews by the Arab states.  Bibi Netanyahu (need 61 seats or more to get a veto-proof majority) – has built a coalition encompassing both left and right. Next election to be in 2015. If a govt doesn't pass a budget within three months there have to be new elections; his coalition partner, the finance minister, refused to OK a budget.  Mr Lapeed is Finance Minister, was a TV personality, started a party which now is less powerful than before.  Mr Lapeed is inexperienced, support is dwindling for him. (Imagine David Letterman as Secretary of the Treasury.) Bibi gave him a list of demands; one was to quit outside sniping and bring disagreements inside govt for discussion.  In Israel, you're elected by a party list, and the one with 61 votes get a nod by the PM to form a govt . Jonathan Pollard – thirty years in prison, he was denied parole. Many senior Americans, including past directors of the CIA and high political figures, have protested and written to say that this is a vast miscarriage of justice.   ISIS in France, Bulgaria, everywhere; North Africa, Philippines.  Hamas wants to go with ISIS but Iran has forbidden it. 

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 3, Block C: Sheelah Kolhatkar, Bloomberg View, in re:  VIDEO GAME AVENGER – one woman's crusade to vaporize gaming's grossest trolls.

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 3, Block D: Josh Rogin, Bloomberg View, in re: Will U.S. and Turkey Create a Syria No-Fly Zone?

Hour Four

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 4, Block A:  Steven Greenhouse, NYT, in re: WalMart and protestors

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 4, Block B:  Michael Ledeen, FDD, in re: No fun in the caliphate; just the end of the world.

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 4, Block C:  Adam Bryant, NYT Corner Office , in re: Four executive women discuss the challenges they've faced at work over the years and the advice they'd give to other women about surviving and thriving in the workplace. ". . . I went back to four women I'd interviewed previously to conduct a second conversation about the headwinds they've faced in the context of work and the pointers they’d offer to other women. I decided to steer clear of questions about 'work-life balance' . . .  many of the women I’ve interviewed have told me they've grown weary of discussing it. Featured in the series are:  Dara Richardson-Heron, M.D. - Chief executive of the Y.W.C.A. USA  Video.  Sharon Napier - Chief executive of Partners + Napier, an ad agency. Jody Greenstone Miller - Chief executive of the Business Talent Group – "Companies that create a flexible work environment for their employees will have a huge competitive advantage," says Jody Greenstone Miller. Video.  Jenny Ming - Chief executive of Charlotte Russe, a clothing chain.

Monday  1 December  2014  / Hour 4, Block D:   Joe Berger, NYT, in re:  The first installment "Living City: A Tale of Two Bridges” compares the decision to replace the 60-year-old Tappan Zee Bridge connecting Westchester and Rockland counties with the decision to renovate the Brooklyn Bridge, a span that's now 131 years old.