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The program — which Woodward compares to the World War II era Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb — must remain secret for now or it would “get people killed,” Woodward said Monday on CNN’s Larry King Live.

“It is a wonderful example of American ingenuity solving a problem in war, as we often have,” Woodward said.

In “The War Within: Secret White House History 2006-2008,” Woodward disclosed the existence of secret operational capabilities developed by the military to locate, target and kill leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq and other insurgent leaders.

National security adviser Stephen Hadley, in a written statement reacting to Woodward’s book, acknowledged the new strategy. Yet he disputed Woodward’s conclusion that the “surge” of 30,000 U.S. troops into Iraq was not the primary reason for the decline in violent attacks.

In data released separately Wednesday, Japan’s current account surplus — the widest barometer of its trade with the world — fell 17.3 percent in July from a year earlier to 1.53 trillion yen ($14.3 billion) as higher oil prices pushed up the import bill.

Japan’s index for domestic corporate goods prices stood at 112.1, a result largely in line with market forecasts.

Its pace skirted a revised 7.3 percent increase in July, which marked the steepest climb since an 8.1 percent gain in January 1981. Then, as now, high oil prices were driving inflation.

Despite higher wholesale costs, companies have yet to fully pass on those increases to consumers, suggesting that consumer inflation may be headed higher. In July, the core consumer prices index excluding fresh food prices was up 2.4 percent.

Behind the corporate goods index were surging prices of petroleum and coal products, which were up 43.3 percent after a revised 44.3 percent increase in July. Iron and steel product prices climbed 28.6 percent after rising a revised 27.0 percent in July.

In a preemptive move, several of them have agreed to join the advocacy group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington in asking a federal judge to declare that Cheney’s records are covered by the Presidential Records Act of 1978 and cannot be destroyed, taken or withheld without proper review.

The group expects to file the lawsuit today in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. It will name Cheney, the executive offices of the president and vice president, and the National Archives and chief archivist Allen Weinstein as defendants.

The goal, proponents say, is to protect a treasure trove of information about national security, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, domestic wiretapping, energy policy, and other major issues that could be hidden from the public if Cheney adheres to his view that he is not part of the executive branch. Extending the argument, scholars say, Cheney could assert that he is not required to make his papers public after leaving office. Access to the documents is crucial because he is widely considered to be the most influential vice president in U.S. history, they note.

“All of us came together on 9/11 — not as Democrats or Republicans — but as Americans. In smoke-filled corridors and on the steps of the Capitol; at blood banks and at vigils — we were united as one American family,” the two senators said in a joint statement issued on Saturday.

“On Thursday, we will put aside politics and come together to renew that unity, to honor the memory of each and every American who died, and to grieve with the families and friends who lost loved ones.”

The event will mark the first time McCain, the Republican nominee, and Obama, the Democratic one, will appear together since they were nominated to run in the November 4 presidential election.

The two have rarely appeared together during the campaign. McCain had challenged Obama to a series of town hall meetings but the details could not be worked out and they were never held.

The two briefly were on the same stage at Saddleback Church in California last month but the moment lasted just long enough for a few pictures to be taken.

The two men will join on Thursday in an anniversary commemoration at Ground Zero, the site where the World Trade towers once stood.

Nearly 3,000 people died on Sept. 11 in hijacked airplanes that were crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in an Pennsylvania field.

The company has announced it is investing a seven-figure sum in “contactless payment” technology.

This allows customers to use everyday items they carry around with them – such as mobile phones, key fobs or even their eyes or fingerprints – to make payments.

It means shoppers will no longer have to rely on cards.

Barclaycard, which is part of Barclays, has already introduced a new-style cash machine in the United Arab Emirates enabling people to use their fingerprints to withdraw money and shoppers in the UK may soon be able to use the same technology.

Antony Jenkins, chief executive of Barclaycard, said: “It’s possible we’ll see an end to plastic in the next five to 10 years with new technologies to take its place emerging now. It could turn out to be one of the shortest lived payment methods in history, going from being ubiquitous to a museum piece in the same way as the video cassette.”

Barclaycard also aims to have one million customers upgraded to its contactless payment system OnePulse by the end of the year. OnePulse enables people to buy items for less than £10 by touching their card against a sensor, without even having to take it out of their wallet. It can also be used as an Oyster card on London transport.

Barclaycard said people may soon be able to hover their mobile over the price label of an item in a shop, confirm their purchase and take it away without having to go to a checkout or get a receipt.

O3b stands for “other 3 billion,” a reference to the world’s population that still can’t access the Internet. O3b, which is based in the U.K.’s Channel Islands, said construction is under way on 16 satellites that will drop the cost for ISPs and operators to provide Internet access over 3G (third-generation) and WiMax networks.

Those satellites will provide backhaul capacity, also known as “trunking,” for ISPs (Internet service providers) and operators, essentially moving large amounts of data wirelessly between points where fiber-optic cable has not been dug into the ground, said Greg Wyler, O3b’s founder and CEO.

Developed countries benefited from an explosive laying of undersea fiber cables in the late 1990s, Wyler said. But as those high-capacity networks were created, demand dropped. Many fiber companies went out of business, then their assets were bought on the cheap, fostering the subsequent boom in inexpensive broadband subscription offerings, he said.

But “the emerging markets never saw that exuberance,” Wyler said. “Usage is growing and the demand is growing, but there isn’t the infrastructure to support the demand.”

Digging trenches for fiber networks in underdeveloped countries isn’t financially feasible, so the alternative is developing a low-latency backhaul network in the sky, Wyler said. Up to 40 percent of a mobile operators’ costs are consumed building transmission capacity between its home network and thousands of transmission towers, Wyler said. Laying fiber is expensive, however.

But so is the alternative. Buying backhaul capacity from geosatellites can cost a stunning US$4,000 per megabit per month, but Wyler believes O3b will be able to offer the same capacity for $500 or less by using different, cheaper medium-earth orbit (MEO) satellites.

Geosatellites orbit the earth at an altitude of 22,500 miles, while MEO satellites are around 5,000 miles. The latency, or the time it takes for a signal to make a loop between earth and the satellite, can be upwards of 600 milliseconds for a geosatellite because it is further out. For a MEO, latency is around 120 milliseconds, close to that of a fiber network, Wyler said.

The higher latency of geosatellites doesn’t mesh well with JavaScript-heavy Web-based applications, Wyler said. In addition to snappier Web access, Internet subscribers should also see cheaper prices due to the lower cost of backhaul capacity, he said.

O3b’s service should be activated by late 2010 and provide speeds of up to 10G bps (bits per second) to other areas including Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia. O3b plans to launch 16 MEO satellites, which can send data anywhere between a 45-degree angle north to a 45-degree angle south of their orbits. The lifespan of a MEO is about 10 years to 15 years.

Among the investors and supporters are HSBC Principal Investments, a private equity provider; Liberty Global, an operator that provides phone and Internet access in 15 countries; and Google, which has supported other initiatives to broaden access to the Internet.

The three entities have collectively invested about $65 million in O3b’s project. The total cost of building and launching the satellites is expected to be around $650 million, Wyler said, with the rest of the cost financed through a debt-equity loan.