In tandem with the White House's war effort, the Department of Homeland Security's crackdown on Arabs and Muslims has shifted into high gear in recent days.

As the Village Voice's James Ridgeway reports, the Department has ordered the detention of all asylum seekers from more than 30 countries on Tuesday. This provision of the new and Orwellian-sounding "Operation Liberty Shield" has prompted an outcry from human rights groups around the world, who note that enemy agents would be unlikely to subject themselves to the routine scrutiny that accompanies asylum applications. The government insists the detentions are merely temporary; an ACLU spokesman, however, pointed out the basic injustice -- not to mention illogic -- of the policy:

"'a woman from Afghanistan facing persecution on account of her gender...would be mandatorily imprisoned under this policy. And she would be occupying a place in prison that could be given to someone who poses a real threat,' Edgar claims."

The wholesale round-up of Iraqis already in the US appears imminent too, as the FBI finalizes its plans to question and possibly detain some 10,000 Iraqi nationals. The Bureau's list of suspects is long: students, defectors, permanent residents, visitors and even some naturalized citizens will all be questioned closely. And as CBS News reports, the rationale -- at least in the government's view -- is clear: "It's all part of the bureau's plan to shake up the American Iraqi community in the hopes of shaking out the few Iraqis they suspect may be planted here to carry out attacks."

Mindful of the mass detentions of Japanese Americans during World War Two, perhaps, the pundits at TalkLeft see the moves as the next step toward that shameful end.

"It looks to us like we're getting one step closer to detention camps ... What will they do with the ones that don't answer questions to their satisfaction? We'll take an educated guess and say they're headed to Guantanamo."

Meanwhile, the first trial of alleged terrorists caught since Sept. 11 is getting underway in Detroit. According to the Detroit News's David Shepardson, Joel Kurth and Ronald J. Hansen, however, it hardly appears to be a slam-dunk case, and defense lawyers are complaining that the heavy security and pervasive secrecy surrounding the trial have made their clients look guilty before the arguments even begin. Indeed, if the government is laying it on thick, that may be because there is a lot riding on the case. Here, for the first time, the Washington Post's Dan Eggen and Allan Lengel write, the Justice Department's claims of success in rooting out terror in the heartland get their first airing in court.

"'This case is going to be very closely watched both locally and nationally,' said David Moran, a law professor at Wayne State University. 'If the government is not able to convince a jury that these men were an actual terror cell, that will have real impact...If it can't actually produce the goods here, the government's credibility will be hurt nationwide.'"

HEALTH
The Last War's Lasting Ills

As thousands of US troops prepare for war in Iraq, Pentagon officials at home know in advance that a certain percentage of soldiers will return with mysterious chronic illnesses. Indeed, Alice Dembner reports in the Boston Globe that the famed "Gulf War syndrome" still persists among thousands of veterans of the first Gulf War, and authorities are as clueless as ever about cause and treatment.

According to Dembner, more than 100,000 of the 700,000 US troops used in the previous war now suffer from "a constellation of ailments that scientists have been unable to trace to any specific cause, despite hundreds of millions of dollars spent on studies." While some officials argue that the conditions were onset largely due to stress and war-time psychological factors, many veterans' advocates disagree, citing a well-documented case in which troops were exposed to chemical weapons.

For the newest batch of soldiers, Dembner notes, "the risk of exposure in the impending Iraq war is very similar," despite new precautions by the Pentagon. "For those who do return sick, the prospects for treatment are bleak," suggests Dembner.

And, just yesterday ended the long case of one Gulf War veteran, Louis Jones Jr., who was executed in Indiana for a murder and rape committed in 1995, writes Chuck Haga in the Mineapolis Star Tribune. Jones' attorneys sought clemency because Jones was among the 130,000 soldiers that the Pentagon acknowledges were exposed to "low levels of nerve gas" in March of 1991. The defense argued that Jones was severely brain damaged as a result of the exposure. Attorney Timothy Floyd calls it

"a cruel irony that on the day when we mobilize for another war in Iraq, the life of...a consummate soldier was ended at the hands of the government he served" because of "an act that might not have occurred but for his service as a soldier."

"If you return from the Gulf damaged," adds Floyd, "the U.S. government will not take responsibility for that damage and may not even acknowledge it."

POLITICS
Cuba's Diplomatic Revolution?

In response to chief American diplomat James Cason's meetings with political dissidents, the Cuban government has vowed to restrict the travel freedoms of US diplomats, reports The Associated Press. In retaliation, the US has put its own checks on Cuban diplomats in Washington. The tensions between the two nations have already enforced strict boundaries on diplomatic travel -- in both countries, travel outside of a 700 kilometer (434-mile) area required government notification. But Cuban officials will now require government approval, not just notification.

Cason's meetings with political dissidents have been far from covert -- last October, in fact, he treated a meeting of US newspaper editors with a surprise visit from prominent critics of Cuban leader Fidel Castro, reported Bill Sternberg of USA Today. In addition, Cason allegedly lead diplomats in an effort to distribute radios programmed to an anti-Castro station to Cuban citizens, reported Reuters' Andrew Cawthorne last April. And Cuban officials, despite the US's assertion that Cason is simply engaging in regular diplomatic relations, are exasperated with what Castro is calling "a shameless and defiant provocation," the AP reports.

But the concurrent arrest of some of Cuba's most revolutionary dissidents has raised suspicions. While another AP story quotes a statement from Cuban officials that no country "has the right to organize, finance and serve as a center for subverting the constitutional order," it also notes that US State Department Richard Boucher believes the arrests and diplomatic restraints are part of an effort to silence a growing opposition movement. Apparently, even after forty years, the Cuban and American governments just can't agree to disagree.