The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) on Monday released a 96-page Request for Proposals governing its Strenghtening Rule of Law in Haiti initiative. The document, according to USAID, "outlines a new five year USAID project to partner with the Government of Haiti to build a fair and effective justice system [and] outlines a strategic vision that can inform short-term development assistance choices while building institutions, a culture of service delivery, and respect for the rule of law over time."

Evidence linking Cuban exile Luis Posada Carriles to the 1976 bombing of a Cuban civilian airliner was "more than sufficient" grounds to have detained the suspected terrorist under the Patriot Act, National Security Archive Senior Analyst Peter Kornbluh testified before a House subcommittee yesterday (11/15). “The United States now finds itself in the frankly inexplicable position of having not one but both men who our own intelligence agencies identified as responsible for bringing down a civilian airliner living free and unfettered lives in Florida,” Kornbluh told the panel.

Kornbluh's testimony -- as well as five declassified documents that include a CIA intelligence report on Posada Carriles and alleged co-conspirator Orlando Bosch -- are now available for download via the National Security Archive website.

The U.S. Army Space & Missile Defense Command last month jointly awarded a $15 billion "counter-narcoterrorism" contract to a group of private U.S. defense behemoths that include Blackwater, a company currently under investigation for alleged arms smuggling and for killing Iraqi civilians. This intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaisance-related R&D support contract includes a wide-range of tasks, including the provision of air crew training to Colombian forces and "strategic public relations support" to Colombian government officials.

For the full story, go to The Peacock Report, where the article originally appeared.

The U.S. State Dept. recently began arranging for the "swift delivery" of many dozens of .223 caliber sniper rifles to Bogota, according to a contracting document dated Aug. 17. This request for quotes (RFQ), located through a routine search of the FedBizOpps database, specifically seeks prices for 115 of the rifles and an equal number of sniper stands, or bipods. The new weapons must be manufactured in the U.S., the document says. Bids submitted on this RFQ are due Aug. 28.

Such contracting documents typically indicate the recipient of the weapons purchase, such as the Colombian National Police or Army. In this case, however, State did not designate who will receive the equipment. Consequently, it remains unclear whether the sniper rifles are for Colombian or U.S. forces. No further information is available.

It should be noted that .223 caliber rifle is the same type of weapon that Gulf War veteran John Lee Muhammed and his co-assassin John Malvo used to terrorize the Washington, D.C. region in 2002. Muhammed and Malvo killed 10 people and wounded three in those attacks.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is recruiting a "country representative" to oversee its Venezuelan Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI), whose purported aim is to "strengthen independent civil society" groups while preserving "the basic rights and democratic space that still exist in Venezuela."

Although it's unclear whether this is a newly created position or an existing slot, the overall OTI program has been operating via the U.S. Embassy in Caracas since 2002. USAID describes OTI in official literature as a critical aspect "of a larger U.S. government effort to promote democratic stability in Venezuela."

The U.S. Embassy in Bogota is arranging the delivery of mobile helicopter-landing pads to Colombia, where the units will be made available for the on-demand deployment and landing of military attack choppers, a new contracting document shows.

The blame-game has begun over this week's deadly collapse of the Interstate 35 bridge in Minnesota. Pundits and analysts are posing questions such as "Is the federal government doing enough to maintain the nation's bridges and highways?" More specific to Narcosphere readers, I pose an additional question: if indeed there are such structural shortcomings in the national infrastructure of the United States, why then are U.S. taxpayers being fleeced to help upgrade Mexico's highways and ports? The answer, of course, is that such subsidies enable U.S.-based multinationals to simultaneously siphon the U.S. Treasury -- and hence the pockets of U.S. citizens -- to more effectively exploit the Mexican labor pool.

As I reported here and via ThePeacockReport.com, the U.S. Trade & Development Agency (USTDA) last year began financing several "feasibility studies" leading toward the eventual financing of projects to modernize Mexican transportation and shipping networks. The goals of these endeavors were to ease the shipment of goods in and out of Mexico, as well as to ameliorate the flight of companies from Mexico to Asia, where even cheaper labor could be found, believe it or not. It's time for policymakers and the mainstream media to take a closer look at this theft by the USTDA. See U.S. Developing Port & Highway Master Plan for another look at this questionable initiative.

While the following "discovery" admittedly is low on the breaking-news food chain, I find it somewhat interesting that U.S. Customs & Border Protection this week issued a call to potential vendors capable of cranking out 25,000 t-shirts replete with an unspecified "race car shape" color image, presumably representative of the duties of this Department of Homeland Security unit.

My question for readers is this: do you think this mystery race-car image will entail a driver running over and smashing illegal immigrants? Or, do you envision -- as I do, dare I say -- the image of a U.S. Chamber of Commerce-sponsored racing vehicle, speeding past (or perhaps even picking up and giving a ride to) aliens en route to distant restaurants, farms, or landscaping companies on behalf of corporate Chamber members seeking a pool of cheap labor arguably at the expense of U.S.-born workers?

Assessing the "psychology of traitors" is among the numerous areas of expertise that the Pentagon's Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) unit hopes to instill in its investigators and polygraph examiners. CIFA is soliciting private-sector help in jointly developing advanced training in this and other areas in the so-called "science of the psycho physiological detection of deception (PDD)," according to a planning document that The Peacock Report (TPR) recently located.

(Co-publisher's note: To read this article in its entirety, please go to TPR, where the piece originally appeared. Before doing so, some food for thought for potential discussion of the matter here at the Narcosphere: How likely is it that critics of so-called "Drug War" policy might fit the bill of "traitors" in eyes of the U.S. government?)

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) "culture" and "counterterrorism (CT) targeting methods and practices" are the focus of training that a Northern Virginia contractor was slated to begin providing this month to the elite U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), recently located procurement-documents show. According to a "sources sought" notice that The Peacock Report obtained via a routine search of the FedBizOpps database, USSOCOM had intended to award a sole-source contract for the classes to SpecTal, a  Reston, Va.-based consulting firm composed of ex-CIA, FBI, Dept. of Defense, State Dept., and other former federal employees.

To read the entirety of this article, go to ThePeacockReport.com.