UNREDACTED: The National Security Archive Blog

[Note: The wikileaks site has changed servers, so at least for the moment, use 213.251.145.96 as the host.  For example, the first link is written as:

http://cablegate.wikileaks.org/cable/2006/12/06MOSCOW12751.html

but to currently see the document go to:

213.251.145.96/cable/2006/12/06MOSCOW12751.html

I’m not going to change all the names until the dns situation is more stable.  (Thanks Froggy).]

It’s day five of the wikileaks cable dump and (as of this writing) 611 cables have been released (less than half of one percent of the total 250,000).  Below are a few of the gems that are keeping our interest piqued.  Note:  Be sure not to read these if your employer has decided to tell you that you can’t.

06MOSCOW12751 The Moscow embassy pontificates on –but does not solve– the Litvinenko assassination.

10MOSCOW317 A great read about power of Yuri Luzkov.  Be sure to catch the great prediction near the end.  (Nice work Beyrle!)

10ASTANA72 Give paragraph seven a look for a Kazakh’s critique of capitalism.

08BISHKEK1095 Imagine if Prince William and Joe Biden were ever in a room together.

09KUWAIT110 Kuwaiti Sheikh Jaber, al-Khaled al Sabah (interior minister) talks about Kuwaiti Guantanamo Detainees:  “If they are rotten, they are rotten and the best thing to do is get rid of them.  You picked them up in Afghanistan; you should drop them off in Afghanistan, in the middle of the war zone.”

08BRASILIA43 The US embassy in Brazil reports, “terrorists may exploit the favorable conditions there–lax border controls, smuggling, drug trafficking, easy access to false documents and weapons, movement of pirated goods, uncontrolled cash flows–to raise funds or arrange logistics for operations.”  (Note the substantial redactions in this cable.)

09RPODUBAI316 This cable from Dubai hints that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s popularity in the Arab world may be waning, especially among “moderate Arabs.”

10KUWAIT142 on the other hand, Kuwait “characterized Iran as the ‘beating heart’ of Islamic extremism, adding that even Palestinians now aspire to be Shi’a because they have bought Iranian ‘stories’ about Shi’a being more prepared to ‘fight to the end’ and stand up to Israel. Now Iran is trying to infiltrate Egypt, exploiting poverty there.”