US has plan to attack Iran if needed, military chief admitsEd Pilkington in New York guardian.co.uk, Sunday 1 August 2010 Article history Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff. Photograph: Reuters   Barack Obama's main military adviser said today the US does have a plan to attack Iran should it become needed as a means of stopping the Tehran regime from acquiring nuclear weapons.Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and the country's highest ranking officer, was asked by Meet the Press on NBC whether the military had a plan to attack Iran. "We do," he replied.Mullen's comment was a rare admission on the part of any senior figure in the US government that plans have been drawn up for possible military action against Iran. The normal wording of disclaimers from those within and around the Obama administration is that "all options remain on the table".He fell far short of suggesting there was any appetite on the part of the US for taking on the leaders of Iran in open conflict. He said it was unacceptable for Iran to obtain nuclear weapons, but he said that equally he would be "extremely concerned" about the prospect of a military engagement.Striking Iran could have "unintended consequences that are difficult to predict in what is an incredibly unstable part of the world".The US approach to the threat of Iran developing the bomb, in line with that of the UK and France, has been to apply increasing pressure on Tehran through sanctions in the hope that it will bend to international will and suspend its uranium enrichment programme. "I am hopeful it works," Mullen said.The Obama administration has always stressed that a military option remains a final fall-back. As Mullen put it: "I hope we don't get to that, but it's an important option and it's one that's well understood."The UN in June imposed the toughest round of sanctions on Iran yet, targeting Iranian banks and export businesses. The move was followed by an even sterner set of restrictions from the EU, including a block on oil and gas investment in the country.Shortly after the announcement of new sanctions, Tehran responded by saying it was ready to talk again about a possible deal in which it would swap its uranium for already enriched material that could be used in a civilian energy programme but would not be capable of conversion into a nuclear weapon. The Iranian regime has always denied that it has any intentions to produce a bomb   

  An end to backyard imperialism? If Obama sticks to US condemnation of the coup in Honduras, it will be a break with history
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Grace Livingstone guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 30 June 2009 13.30 BST Article history
Early on Sunday morning, troops stormed the presidential palace of Honduras and kidnapped the president. Immediately eyes turned to the United States, which for more than a century has backed friendly dictators and cooked-up coups in Central America. The Honduran coup provides a vital test for Barack Obama, to prove that the US is no longer the "yankee imperialist" pulling the strings of despots in Latin America, an image that has resonated in the region since the 19th-century.Since independence, the military has been the most powerful force in Honduras and if the coup goes unchallenged, it will show that it still has a veto on democratically elected presidents. Historically, that military has been supported unfailingly by the US. As US under-secretary of state Robert Olds wrote in 1927: "We do control the destinies of Central America and we do so for the simple reason that the national interest absolutely dictates such a course … governments which we recognise and support stay in power, while those we do not recognise and support fail."US marines were sent to Central America over 30 times, and to Honduras seven times, between 1900 and 1934 to maintain order and quell any threat to the ruling oligarchies. With the introduction of Roosevelt's "Good Neighbour policy" in the 1930s, military intervention became less common; instead the US backed or installed "friendly dictators". In Honduras, the US smiled upon the brutal Tiburcio Carías Andino who ruled absolutely between 1931 and 1948, and a further series of military despots from 1951 to 1981.Although democracy then returned to Honduras, the Reagan government poured in military aid, turning the fragile democracy into a militarised state. Using it as a base to pursue the war against the Nicaraguan revolutionary government, the US installed garrisons, supply dumps and air bases, as well as mercenary (Contra) training camps along the borders.The US ambassador to Honduras at that time was John Negroponte, an ardent defender of the Honduran military, which was responsible for the "disappearance" of at least 184 people between 1980-92. He was one of a number of figures involved in the Iran-Contra affair who re-emerged in the George Bush administration. These old cold war warriors eyed with suspicion the new "radical populists" in Latin America, a term they used for the leftwing presidents of Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua. They were disturbed by the leftist tendencies of Honduras's Zelaya and his friendship with the Venezuela's Hugo Chávez. It is not surprising that Chávez has called for an…

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  Sandra Bullock in custody battle with porn starJohn Harlow in Los Angeles 30 CommentsRecommend? (41) America's sweetheart, the actress Sandra Bullock, is being dragged into an unpleasant legal battle to prove that she is a better parent than her husband’s former wife, the star of more than 100 pornographic movies. Bullock is backing claims by her husband Jesse James, the television celebrity, that they have made a good home for Sunny, his five-year-old daughter. His ex-wife Janine Lindemulder, 40, star of such video titles as Mrs Behavin’, Sleeping Booty and Dyke Diner, disagrees. She has just been released from a six-month prison sentence for tax evasion. When she was in jail in Oregon she reportedly sent her former husband a bitter text message that read: “U win. Sandra finally has her baby — congratulations.” The tattooed blonde remains in a halfway house in Los Angeles until the end of this year when she can seek custody of her daughter. James, 40, has launched a pre-emptive legal strike in wealthy Orange county, south of Los Angeles, where all three have beachside homes. He has asked a judge to rule on whether Lindemulder is a fit mother. “Good cause exists for the court to conduct a review to determine if [the girl] will be safe with [Lindemulder],” he said in a statement to the court. “She should be restrained from allowing the child around pornographers, drug addicts, guns and firearms, felons and other unsafe environments.” The judge is expected to rule soon on whether Lindemulder, James and Bullock will have to give evidence in person. James, a heavily tattooed motorbike mechanic who turned his business customising £60,000 bikes for sports stars into a Top Gear-style television programme, admits that he enjoys risky pursuits. These include riding with Hell’s Angels gangs and a taste for death-defying television stunts. But he says he keeps these far from his family, which includes two teenage children from an earlier marriage. Bullock denies that the couple, who married in 2005, enjoy a Hollywood lifestyle. “We do every mundane, normal thing that everyone else does. It’s about enjoying what we have,” she said. Bullock, 45, the star of Speed and Miss Congeniality who is estimated to be worth £100m, has said she wanted to have children, but her late mother persuaded her to put her career first. James married Lindemulder in 2002 in an episode of his television series Motorcycle Mania, after which she gave up her career. Lindemulder claimed to be “devastated” when he left her for Bullock while she was seven months pregnant with Sunny. She claimed the stress led her to get into trouble with her taxes. She recently told friends that she wants her child back as she rebuilds her life. Like many Californian custody cases the outcome may come down to money. James told the court he has a “very high income” while Lindemulder still has to repay £180,000 in taxes and earns £7.20 an hour as a…