Some 200 Taliban militants destroyed more than 160 Humvees and trucks bound for NATO forces in Afghanistan Dec. 7 in a pre-dawn raid on the terminal where they were parked in Peshawar, Pakistan. The war material was offloaded for transit to Afghanistan at the Pakistani port of Karachi. Meanwhile, the Pentagon reveals that most of the additional US troops arriving in Afghanistan early next year will be deployed near the capital, Kabul—in what the New York Times calls "a measure of how precarious the war effort has become."

India was planning a military strike over the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan's High Commissioner to London Wajid Shamsul Hassan told the BBC, saying New Delhi intended "to teach Pakistan a lesson." The network quoted the official saying, "This is what we were told by our friends that there could possibly be a quick strike at some of the areas they suspect to be the training camps, an air raid or something of that sort." India has made no comment on Hassan's remarks. (Press TV, Dec. 7)

Iraqi security guards opened fire when a riot broke out Dec. 3 among 1,000 Asian migrant workers protesting poor treatment in Baghdad. The men work for Najlaa International Catering Services, a subcontractor to Houston-based KBR. The top US Defense Department contractor in Iraq, KBR is already the target of federal lawsuits over alleged human trafficking and other wrongdoing.

Shades of 1936—already. From AP, Dec. 7:

CHICAGO — Workers who got three days' notice that their factory was shutting its doors have occupied the building and say they won't go home without assurances they'll get severance and vacation pay.

Last weekend, presumed neo-Nazis firebombed the Cyclops autonomous social center in the Stockholm district of Högdalen, burning the building down. Two days later, on Dec. 1, presumed right-wing militants poured in gasoline through the mail slot into the apartment of a young couple and their child, and set it on fire. The couple are active in the anarcho-syndicalist Swedish Central Workers' Organization (Sveriges Arbetares Central Organisation-SAC), and had recently been "exposed" on the Swedish neo-Nazi website Info-14. All three survived, by climbing down from the balcony of their thrid-floor apartment. (Anarkisterna, Stockholm, Dec. 3)

 AA youth uprising spread in Greece for a second day Dec. 7, with thousands battling police in Athens and Thessaloniki, despite the arrest of two officers over the killing of a 15-year-old boy. At least 34 have been injured and 13 detained in street clashes. Protests erupted after Alexandros Grigoropoulos was shot in Athens' left-wing enclave of Exarchia after the boy allegedly tried to throw a firebomb at a patrol car. As soon as news of his death in a local hospital was confirmed, hundreds of youths in Exarchia began attacking police cars with stones and firebombs, burning dozens of cars and smashing shop windows. Police responded with tear gas, but the uprising quickly spread to Thessaloniki and the resort islands of Crete and Corfu. Tourist zones have been evacuated and streets closed to all traffic. (AlJazeera, Dec. 8)

As Americans mark the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, an imbroglio breaks out in Japan over World War II revisionism and calls for rearmament. Japan's former air force chief Gen. Toshio Tamogami, forced into retirement for denying the empire's wartime aggression, wasted no time in making even more controversial comments. "I think there should be debate about this, because nuclear deterrence would be enhanced as a result," the former head of the Air Self Defense Force told reporters Dec. 1 at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Tokyo. Tamogami said that if Japan had had nuclear weapons in 1945, it should have retaliated in kind for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. "Once you have been hit with something, then there is no choice but to hit back with it," he said.

Colombia recalled its top diplomat in Venezuela's second largest city last week after President Hugo Chávez threatened to expel the official for allegedly expressing support for his political opponents. Chávez criticized Colombia's consul in Maracaibo, Carlos Galvis, for privately welcoming the opposition victory in Zulia state, which borders Colombia, in the recent gubernatorial elections. In a secretly recorded telephone conversation broadcast on state TV, Galvis called the opposition's electoral gains "very good news." Chávez demanded Colombia recall Galvis, adding, "If not, I'll expel him."