July 29, 2005: There are three Middle Eastern battlegrounds for Islamic terrorists; Iraq, Israel and Saudi Arabia. This last one gets the least amount of attention, despite the fact that Saudi Arabia has been the source of most of the money, ideology and people dedicated to Islamic terrorism. Since the invasion of Iraq, the Islamic radicals in Saudi Arabia have been at war with their own government. A two decade truce is over, and now the battle is to the death. Well, a temporary death. The al Saud family had to go through this in the 1930s, when the more radical Islamic warriors in the kingdom decided to carry their jihad to neighboring countries. Does this sound familiar? The king, and founder, of the recently established Saudi Arabia, realized that this would only mean trouble for his newly minted kingdom. So the king hit back hard, and kept killing the Islamic radicals until the survivors convinced him that there would be no more trouble. It was forty years before Islamic radicals felt strong enough to take on the king once more. They lost again, but instead of stamping out (ie, killing) most of the Islamic radicals, the new king (son of the old king) made a deal with them. The Islamic radicals could freely teach their hatred in the kingdomâs schools, and support Islamic radicalism overseas. But they had to keep the peace at home. That truce lasted until 2003. Now itâs back to the 1930s way of doing things.
The Saudis have killed or captured nearly all the Islamic radical leadership. The âmost wantedâ list is now largely composed of second string terrorists. But the Islamic radicals are not destroyed yet. The fighting in Iraq has created some new, and more experienced, Saudi Islamic terrorists. While several thousand Saudis have gone to Iraq, most have either died as suicide bombers, been killed by more experienced American troops, or come home discouraged (at the fact that most of the people killed, by terrorist attacks, in Iraq, have been Iraqi civilians.) But hundreds of hardened, experienced, and still bloody minded Saudi Islamic terrorists have returned from Iraq. These guys are out for blood, and are willing to die for the cause.
But it gets worse.
Another new development, since the 1930s, is the number of Moslems entering the kingdom each year on pilgrimage (Hadj) to the Moslem holy places. Thatâs over three million foreigners entering the kingdom in a short period of time each year. There has always been a problem with some of them illegally staying on. Some of the Islamic terrorists already killed or arrested in the kingdom have been such men. It is feared there will be more, no matter how carefully Saudi security people scrutinizes the arriving pilgrims.
The Saudi royal family know that this is a fight to the death. The 1980s compromise didnât work, and this time around the battle has gone old school. But with a lot of new technology. The United States is providing a lot of technical help in the battle. Indirectly, the Saudis are even getting help from Israel, which has supplied the U.S. with many new ideas, and equipment, for fighting terrorism. The war on terror does indeed make strange bedfellows.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/29/2005 10:15 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"The Saudi royal family know that this is a fight to the death..."
#3
This is definitely a "Wish they could both lose" situation.
Posted by: Carl in N.H. ||
07/29/2005 12:04 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Unless the Saudis forget the lesson of the "1908 compormise" that you can't buy off the Jihadis, it's better for them to win. Get the terrorists first, then worry about the princes.
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/29/2005 12:28 Comments ||
Top||
#5
the royal family now consists of many subclans which are not too friendly with each other
this provides many little niches for terrorists
Such as the two "princes" who died in mysterious circumstances in the year after 9/11. One of them died of exposure in the desert, the other died in a single-car accident on the way to the first's funeral.
Both were later tied to al-Qaeda funding.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/29/2005 12:58 Comments ||
Top||
LONDON, July 29 (UPI) -- The innocent Brazilian man shot to death by police on suspicion of being a suicide bomber was in Britain on forged documents, the Home Office said. Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, was shot eight times by plainclothes officers at Stockwell underground station last week. He had been followed after emerging from an apartment block linked to the July 21 bomb attempts by an address found in one of the rucksacks used. Challenged by officers as he entered the station, he reportedly jumped the ticket barrier and ran onto a waiting train, where he was pinned to the floor and shot.
His family denied initial reports suggesting his visa had expired, and said he would not have run when challenged. However, the Home Office confirmed Thursday night de Menezes' student visa expired more than two years ago. In a carefully worded statement, officials suggested the residency stamp in his passport was not genuine.
"We have seen a copy of Mr. de Menezes's passport containing a stamp apparently giving him indefinite leave to remain in the U.K.," a spokesman said. "On investigation, this stamp was not one that was in use by the Immigration and Nationality Directorate on the date given."
Posted by: Steve ||
07/29/2005 10:01 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Am I supposed to be surprised?
Oh, and where did those other 3 shots come from?
I kept hearing that he was shot 5 times not 8.
#4
He would not have run when challenged because he had a "student" visa expired two years ago? A keen student of electrical engineering working on an independent study project that actually paid more than a stipend? Uh, staying as an illegal working as an electrician and carrying forged papers would mean party over would it not. No asylum to claim. It's a crime involving lying and sure as hell he'd run. He was already "running" from the authorities before the day of the incident. It's a shame he made the fatal mistake of playing rabbit at the wrong time and with the wrong folks but he's no pure as the wind driven snow innocent. He made a very large contribution to his own demise.
#5
"innocent Brazilian man... Challenged by officers as he entered the station, he reportedly jumped the ticket barrier and ran... visa expired more than two years ago... residency stamp in his passport was not genuine..."
He wasn't a terrorist, but he wasn't an innocent man either.
Posted by: Neutron Tom ||
07/29/2005 11:11 Comments ||
Top||
#6
One very interesting question is: from whom did he get his forged papers, and when?
Be interesting to see if they trace back to the Islamacist network -- which might be the only connection he had to them, if that much, apart from living in the same apartment block.
Posted by: too true ||
07/29/2005 11:54 Comments ||
Top||
#7
wach lhr's motives tt.
no evedense thes guy hadder do anytheeng with islam.
#11
Me, I think that he's really William F Buckley.
Certainly would be an effective disguise.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/29/2005 15:28 Comments ||
Top||
#12
I always figured Buclee for a poeser
Posted by: WIlliam Staffair the Elder ||
07/29/2005 16:55 Comments ||
Top||
#13
#1 Sky News reported seven shots to the head and one to the shoulder. We had quite a discussion about Menezes when that was posted here on the 25th.
#2 & #3 The guy was Roman Catholic. Link to story on funeral Mass here.
#14
"The innocent Brazilian" was not innocent, according to the article. So why call him "innocent"?
It doesn't make sense for him to dress and run like that; he could not be afraid of having his ID checked since he had a (decently) faked visa stamp in it -- unless there's something else he was worried about...
I still suspect the denial of any connection to the Moslem terrorists was hasty. After all, none of the failed bombers had been arrested at that time. The police could not have certainty of no connection.
And TGA, are you here? You shouldn't believe everything Jack Straw says.
A leading British Muslim scholar has said that Muslim women living in the European country, where Muslims have been suffering mounting abuse and harassment since the July 7 London attacks, can take off their hijab. "I have issued a fatwa that Muslim women in Britain have an Islamic right to take off their hijab at this point of time if attacked or fearing to be attacked," Dr. Zaki Badawi, the Dean of the Muslim College in London, told IslamOnline.net over the phone from the British capital.
Badawi said they have registered more than 15,00 assault against hijab-clad women during the past three days only, in addition to a flood of threat letters. He asserted that in Islam hijab is originally meant to identify Muslim women, so that they might not be attacked or harassed. The scholar cited the Qurâanic verse which reads: "O Prophet! Tell thy wives and thy daughters and the women of the believers to draw their cloaks close round them (when they go abroad). That will be better, so that they may be recognized and not annoyed. Allah is ever Forgiving, Merciful." (Al-Ahzab: 59)
"If hijab becomes a reason of harm for Muslim women in Britain at this time, then I tell them to take it off so that they would not be recognized and consequently attacked," said Egyptian-born Badawi. "Muslims (in Britain) are scared and each feels he/she is a suspect. The picture is, indeed, gloomy and we are trying all we can to address it."
I think this is a great idea. Now when the neighborhood thug boyz Committee for the Protection of Virtue comes by, Fatimah can tell them that she's just protecting herself from harm by wearing that halter top and short shorts combo.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
oh the irony. This whole rage against the infidel doesn't seem to be going so well. Now the Muslim women are being freed from the custom of wearing a hijab, thanks to jihad.
#2
Be free, my sistas!
I hate these and I'll bet Muslim women hate them, too!
(The way they hit womens' foreheads really make them look ugly and oafish.)
Burn your hijabs, chadors and burkas and not your bras!
#3
This bastard just admitted that his muslim (thug rape) gangs have had a "islamic right" to rape and harrass non Hijab wearing women (infidel women.) Wake up europe here are your rapists right here. Cast these lying bastards out to where they come from.
Luis Alberto Moreno, Colombia's ambassador to the US, was on Wednesday elected president of the Inter-American Development Bank, the region's main development institution, signalling a victory for Colombia and the US.
Mr Moreno was the favourite candidate to replace Enrique Iglesias, the Uruguayan who resigned in May after 17 years at the helm of the bank. Candidates from five countries ran for the job.
They included Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, Peru's finance minister; Jose Rojas, a former Venezuelan finance minister; and Mario Alonso, Nicaragua's central bank president.
The result is a blow to Brazil, whose representative was João Sayad, a vice-president at the bank. Mr Sayad's chances appear to have been complicated by the simmering political crisis in Brazil.
But Mr Moreno also had the advantage of full political backing from the US, which is the largest shareholder in the bank with about 30 per cent.
To be elected, a candidate must secure both a majority based on voting power, which is derived from share size, and an absolute majority among the bank's 28 regional members.
Mr Moreno won 60 per cent of the shareholder vote and 20 country votes. Mr Sayad received seven country votes. Uruguay and Paraguay, which frequently back Brazil, voted for Mr Moreno.
The IADB disburses over $5bn in loans every year.
Mr Moreno, 52, will begin his five-year term on October 1.
The election of Mr Moreno, as the US-preferred candidate, is a symbolic victory for Washington, which has experienced a decline in its influence in the region. This year the US backed two candidates from El Salvador and Mexico for the position of secretary-general of the Organisation of American States, both of whom failed. Mr Moreno is well known on the Washington political and diplomatic circuit, and he is widely seen as a highly competent operator.
As Bogotá's ambassador to the US since 1998, Mr Moreno is credited with successfully lobbying Congress to approve Plan Colombia, the $3.5bn package of US counter-narcotics and military aid.
Such was Mr Moreno's perceived value that Alvaro Uribe, Colombia's current president, retained him as ambassador in Washington after Mr Moreno had served as Colombia's most important diplomat during the previous government.
As head of the IADB, Mr Moreno's primary task will be to select, back and finance development projects in a region that is marked by poverty and a highly unequal distribution of income.
I seldom post links to my own blogs, but this story is not getting coverage in the MSM and has a direct bearing on the future security of our borders, I fear.
A move by Venezuela's Hugo Chavez to limit the currency reserves the Venezuelan central bank can maintain may seem like an esoteric topic, but in actuality it is one part of a massive power grab by Chavez, who seeks to spread his influence across Latin America. As the Financial Times notes:
Venezuela will divert as much as $17bn this year and next from its oil export income bonanza into an opaque parallel budget for "development" projects, mostly elsewhere in Latin America, economists said yesterday.
Legislators loyal to President Hugo Chávez approved a law last week that sets a ceiling on the international reserves that can be held by Venezuela's central bank (BCV). The reserves currently stand at $30bn (â¬25bn, £17bn). "Excess" foreign earnings in the world's fifth- largest oil exporter must now be deposited into a special fund called Fonden.
The fund is expected to receive its first deposit of $6bn in the next few weeks, and because oil prices are forecast to remain high during the next two years, it is likely to be topped up with about $1bn per month.
But the money will be spent largely at the president's discretion, fuelling doubts about the transparency of public finances.
That is an understatement.
More at the link, or just go read the FT article and then google "Chavez" and "television / TV" for more on his recent moves.
Posted by: Robin Burk ||
07/29/2005 20:23 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Is it the nature of a dictator to be myopic? They never see the train until it is 2 feet from them.
A court found 13 individuals accused of an attack in Ingushetia in June 2004 guilty Thursday.
Ten of the accused were found guilty of terrorism and direct involvement in the attack, and six were found guilty of involvement with illegal armed units, and also with attacks on police. Two defendants were found guilty of murdering civilians.
On Tuesday, August 2, the court will consider the jury's verdict.
The jury reached a verdict on Wednesday, but due to the working day being over, the announcement of the verdict was moved to Thursday.
According to the prosecution, the accused "acted in cooperation with armed units created with the goal of using force to detach the Chechen Republic and other parts of the north Caucasus region from the Russian Federation, that is, with the aim of changing the constitutional setup and damaging the territorial values of the Russian Federation."
Investigations showed that the attack was organized by the militant Shamil Basayev.
As a result of the attack on an Ingushetia town in June 2004, 78 people were killed, the majority of whom were law enforcement officers, and 113 were wounded.
Two of the defense lawyers partially admitted the guilt of the defendants in one minor episode, saying that their involvement was not premeditated. Against the more serious allegations, they upheld the innocence of the defendants.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:53 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
Russian Deputy Prosecutor General Nikolai Shepel said Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev's claim that he was not involved in last year's school siege in the North Ossetia town of Beslan was a lie.
"Terrorist Basayev's statement that denies his involvement in the death of hundreds of children in Beslan is a total lie. His guilt in numerous crimes, including the death of Beslan children, has been fully confirmed by both the materials from the criminal cases and the testimony given by guerrillas, including Nurpasha Kulayev, the only [Beslan] raid participant who survived" the operation conducted by special forces to release the hostages, Shepel said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:52 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
Certain political forces in Europe and the U.S. are attempting to use Basayev and other terrorist leaders to destabilize the situation in Russia, Chairman of the Chechen State Council Taus Dzhabrailov said, commenting on an interview with Basayev that aired on the U.S. TV network ABC.
"The West refuses to draw parallels between the terrorist acts in the U.S., Great Britain, and Russia," he said. "Western politicians attempt to find different explanations and definitions for the terrorist acts in Russia, stating that the fight against terrorism must be put within certain margins. However, if the blasts destroy subway stations or buildings in Europe or the U.S., they unanimously call them acts of terror committed by international terrorists."
"Basayev serves the enemies of Russia, and those forces in the West that used to play Maskhadov's card do not hesitate to cooperate with this international terrorist today," the Chechen official said.
According to Dzhabrailov, the goal of Basayev and his followers is to "destroy Russia."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:51 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
Russia summoned Washingtonâs envoy on Friday to protest a US television channelâs airing of an interview with a Chechen rebel leader that threatened to add to strains between the two countries.
In the interview, broadcast by ABC on Thursday night, warlord Shamil Basayev accused Russia of killing thousands of civilians and defended his own raids -- the bloodiest of the 10-year Chechen war -- as part of a struggle for independence.
âWe invited the deputy chief of mission to express our views over the broadcasting of an interview with a terrorist ... We expressed our strong indignation,â a Foreign Ministry spokesman said.
âThe TV channel has shown outrageous neglect of the standards of responsible journalism and general human values.â
Russia accuses him of links to Osama bin Ladenâs Al Qaeda movement and says the Chechen war is part of the global struggle against terrorism.
It is quick to criticise any Western sympathy for the Chechen cause as proof of âdouble standardsâ in the fight, and has previously slammed the United States and Britain for refusing to extradite rebels.
âThese notorious double standards and double approaches continue to exist ... Undoubtedly, this sours our cooperation (with the United States) and gives a boost to terrorist activists,â Anatoly Safonov, President Vladimir Putinâs special representative for the war against terrorism, told Interfax news agency.
âThis is the reaction not just of the Foreign Ministry but of any Russian citizen. Not long ago, our American colleagues asked why there was so much anti-Americanism in the Russian press. These publications are the reactions of our people, who have suffered such losses in Beslan and in Moscow.â
Earlier this year, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made unusually pointed criticism of Russian democracy, saying the Kremlin had too strong a grip on power and blocked a free press.
Basayev happily admitted he was a terrorist in the ABC interview, but said the Russians were worse. âIf they are the keepers of constitutional order, if they are anti-terrorists then I spit on all these agreements and nice words,â he said.
Chechnyaâs pro-Moscow government, which is accused of collaborating with the enemy by Basayev and the other rebels, said the United States should have known better than to broadcast an interview with the rebel leader.
âI was shocked when I found out that a channel in a country mourning thousands of terrorist victims, should give airtime to one of the worldâs most famous terrorists,â Moscow-backed President Alu Alkhanov told RIA Novosti news agency.
The US embassy declined to comment on the foreign ministryâs summoning of Deputy Chief of Mission Daniel Russell. There is currently no US ambassador in Moscow because former envoy Alexander Vershbow has only just left his post.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:32 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
how mnay times has russia stabbed us in the back?
#2
Doesn't excuse the free air time afforded a mass murdering sociopath who wants the any publicity is good publicity attention. They couldn't find any better to fill the time?
#4
Is anyone suprised? This is their (Basayev's) way of repaying ABC's for its (ABC's) staunch support -- even though the that russian school terrorist hostange-taking raping and murdering crisis.....
He gives ABC a 'scoop' and ABC gives him open air-time and easy questions....
#5
true kat but if ABC can find this man why can't russian authorities? Also russia ia still selling alot of arms too our enemies who are murderers too. I also agree most news orgs should be run out town except fox news. Sorry if i'm not making sense my meds are kickin in about this time
#6
Maybe russia should go crying to china, they might have some sympathy for them. Otherwise they'll have to look in the dictionary between shit and syphilis, thats where they'll find their sympathy.
SEOUL When the two Koreans met in China in 1999, it was a bonding at first sight: one was a missionary from South Korea who saw God's work in helping North Korean refugees, and the other was a fugitive from North Korea who was tortured so badly he could hardly walk more than 10 minutes at a time.
Today the North Korean, Pack Kwang Il, strides along Seoul's streets wearing polished leather shoes and toting a cellphone. Speaking with vigor and humor, he shows no sign of the torture that almost killed him.
But inside, Pack, 31, still has to live with his nightmares of guilt and horror.
"It breaks my heart," the missionary, Kim Sung Ho, 49, said, fighting back tears. "Maybe if I didn't help him come to South Korea, he might not be suffering the pain he suffers now."
The story of the two Koreans is a chronicle of those who escape one of the world's most brutal dictatorships and those who help them.
As they put it, the psychological burden they share is a "Korean tragedy," a pain that will haunt numerous North Korean defectors as long as the regime in the North considers them the enemy and has no qualms about punishing their families - as it did with Pack's family in the North.
"I don't blame Reverend Kim for anything. I did what I chose to do," Pack said.
In North Korea, Pack's family belonged to a privileged class in Hamheung, a city near the country's central eastern coast. A graduate of an elite college, Pack worked as a high school teacher, inculcating pupils with a version of Korean history heavy with Communist propaganda.
After school, however, he had a secret and illegal hobby: listening to South Korean radio and watching Hong Kong movies - even Rambo and James Bond films, which the North Korean authorities blame for spreading "abnormality, degeneration, violence and corrupt sex culture."
"At night I listened to the South Korean radio under two layers of blanket and often fell asleep with the earphones still on," Pack said. "I liked South Korean pop songs."
In North Korea, all radio sets came with fixed channels that received only government broadcasts, but as the food crisis in the mid-1990s forced North Korea to relax its border controls, radio sets and videotapes were smuggled from China.
Pack's uncles living in Japan brought cash, videotapes and outside news.
"Unlike other North Koreans, our family didn't worry about food," Pack said. "I was rich enough to develop a curiosity about the outside world."
In September 1998, Pack paid $120 for a set of videocassettes that contained a popular South Korean TV drama.
He lent it to a friend, who circulated the tapes. The secret police soon were on the case, which had all the elements of a grave political crime.
Pack fled to China in October, but within nine days, he was arrested by the Chinese police and repatriated. He ended up in an internment camp where North Korean authorities interrogated and tortured those who escaped to China, an act considered a betrayal of the "socialist paradise."
"They tied me down and forced me to drink dirty water until my belly swelled like a tadpole," Pack said. "They placed a wooden plank on my belly and stood on it to make me vomit."
The torturers had a name for the exercise: "deflating" an enemy of the state.
Women who got raped while in China and became pregnant were accused of bringing in "foreign seeds" - another crime in a country ruled with a nationalistic fervor bordering on xenophobia.
"The soldiers made the women bend over, raced and jumped on their backs, as if jumping on horseback, to force abortions," Pack said.
"After a while, they threw me in a shed for people who could no longer move. I defecated where I was lying or sitting," he said. "Everyday, one or two dead bodies were hauled out of that shed."
A day after Christmas in 1998, Pack was being transferred to a political prisoner camp when he jumped from the train. It took him 13 days to "walk and crawl" back across the frozen river border into China. On a freezing January night, he was found lying semiconscious on a country road by a Korean-American missionary, identified only as Reverend Cho, who was traveling in the area.
"When I saw the lights of Reverend Cho's jeep approaching, I thought it was a Chinese police car and tried to move but couldn't," Pack said. "I thought it was the end, and gave up."
While Pack was discovering the outside world on shortwave radio broadcasts and was paying heavily for it, South Korean churches, which have one of the largest and most aggressive armies of missionaries in the world, began infiltrating the tens of thousands of North Korean refugees in China.
In June 1999, Kim, who had focused his seminary studies on the persecution of Christians in North Korea, went to Hunchun, a Chinese town near the northeastern tip of North Korea, and visited a house where a missionary fed North Koreans and preached the Gospel.
"I was a sorry sight to look at," Pack said, describing his first encounter with Kim. When he sat holding a Bible, Pack tilted to the left because of a back injury from the torture.
"Call me if you need me," Kim told Pack, giving him his South Korean cellphone number, and returned to Seoul. Ten days later, Pack called - the Chinese police had broken into the safe house where he was staying. Pack managed to run away but had nowhere to go.
In the following months, Kim made several trips to China, taking food and cash to Pack.
Pack and other refugees were constantly on the run from the Chinese police. They lived in huts and caves in the hills that were hours from the nearest road. Missionaries brought food and Gospel literature.
Some missionaries believe that bringing the Gospel to North Korea is the quickest way to topple the regime.
By 2000, Chinese authorities had stepped up crackdowns on North Korean refugees, whom they consider illegal migrants.
"One day in October 2000, Pack called me and said he could no longer go on in China," Kim said. "Until then, we didn't talk about bringing him to South Korea. It was too dangerous."
In a smuggling operation financed by Kim, Pack reached South Korea in March 2001 after crossing into Vietnam and Cambodia.
"I remember the early morning of January 26, 2001, when he called me and said he was safely in Hanoi. I was praying at the time, and how happy I was!" Kim said.
In Seoul, Pack worked as a parking lot attendant and did two things that would irritate the North Korean authorities: He became a missionary himself after attending a theological school and went to rallies condemning North Korea.
Meanwhile, Kim brought more than 80 North Korean refugees to the South.
Last December, Pack traveled to China and met a hometown friend who was invited to China by a go-between. The friend brought shocking news: The North Korean authorities had learned what Pack was doing in South Korea and sent his parents into internal exile in a remote village of the North last October.
In conditions like that of a labor camp, his mother soon died, Pack confirmed from other sources from the North this year. His father, at last report, was still in the village.
His three sisters were divorced by their husbands, who were desperate to protect their families from political stigma.
"It all began with a videotape," Pack recalled. "Compared to what I have done, its consequences are too severe."
Pack, who married a church pianist in April, added, "Even my wife will not completely understand my pain when I think about my family."
South Korea went on a high alert as a suspected al-Qaida member from Pakistan sneaked into Seoul last month, police said.
The Pakistani man, 46, stayed in South Korea from June 23 to July 3 after receiving a tourist visa from the Korean Embassy in Thailand, said officials at the National Police Agency.
The man, identified only as A, is staying in Malaysia after a stopover in Thailand, an agency official said.
The South Korean police are cooperating with their Thai and Pakistani counterparts and Interpol to verify the identity of the man, the official said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:43 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"Aaaaaaaaaaaa!"
Posted by: The Fonz ||
07/29/2005 11:01 Comments ||
Top||
Following the London bombings, Italy and Denmark were named as possible targets on a Web site popular with Islamic militants. Both countries are now stepping up measures to protect against a similar attack.
On every platform of every station in Copenhagen's ultra modern metro system, police officers scrutinize passengers. Their presence on the city's transport system is designed to deter potential bombers and calm public fears.
Security services all over Denmark are working overtime to thwart those who would punish the country's alliance with US President George W. Bush, as well as what many immigrants regard as Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen's hostile right-wing government.
Further south, Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu has presented a 19-point anti-terror plan to the Italian senate. The plan foresees the speedier deportation of foreign nationals suspected of terrorism, closer surveillance of telephone and Internet traffic, wider powers for the police when carrying out raids, and compulsory submission of hair and saliva samples for DNA testing.
Clearly, neither country wants to leave anything to chance following the release of a document in the aftermath of the London bombings that specifically named the two U.S. allies as potential terrorist targets.
"We continue to warn the governments of Denmark and Italy and all crusader governments that they will receive the same punishment if they do not withdraw their troops from Iraq and Afghanistan," read the statement, published on a web site popular with Islamic militants, by a group calling itself the "Secret Organization of al Qaeda in Europe". It is the same group that claimed responsibility for the deadly bombings earlier this month on London's transport network.
"The (Italian) government is trying to strengthen the intelligence, to control some specific Muslim communities, to control the kind of teaching that is produced by some Muslim schools, and to be more attentive to signals that might come from other secret services in Europe and elsewhere," said Italian terrorism analyst Gianfranco Pasquino.
Most people in Italy fear that the country is at risk from an imminent terrorist attack. One survey completed this week said 85 percent of people thought an attack was likely in the coming weeks or months. People are modifying their habits, their movements and their holiday plans. But Pasquino says most Italians are realistic about the level of protection they can expect from their government.
"There those who believe the government is doing what it can, but many Italians believe the government isn't particularly well equipped. There are those who believe in a resigned way that there is not very much you can do about terrorism," Pasquino said.
Denmark's police commander, Per Larsen, says that while the threat of terror is present, he is concerned with keeping public hysteria at minimum.
"We have to look at what's happened in other countries and be very aware that the risk is always there. On the other hand, we still think Denmark is a very peaceful country," Larsen said. "It's important not to make the whole situation too hysterical. I don't think the danger is that big, but we can't guarantee that somewhere in the city, there isn't a crazy person or group who are convinced they're doing the right thing."
Denmark has been immune from international terrorism for the past 20 years, but according to immigration consultant Mehmet Yuksekkaya, the country does have reason to worry.
"I am certain that al Qaeda is operating in Denmark," Yuksekkaya, who has conducted a study of every mosque in greater Copenhagen, said. "And I'm convinced that their friends and relatives know what's going on, but they're turning a blind eye."
Such sentiments offend moderate Danish muslims such as Zahid Butt, who runs a Web site for Pakistanis in Denmark. He regards Yuksekkaya as a scare mongerer.
"I can't recognize that picture at all," Butt said. "If there is a problem within the Muslim community, then most of the community will react, because the problem would mean that they and their families are also at risk. It there is a threat in Denmark, then I too am threatened."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:26 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
From the Dept. of Looks Like Rain, Should I Bring My Umbrella?:
There is reportedly an organised group of dozens of Muslim extremists currently active in the Pakistani community in Antwerp. The extremists transfer hundreds of thousands of euros per year to suspicious groups or accounts in other countries. Belgian security services are concerned that the group aims to carry out terrorist attacks.
Belgian coppers on top of things, monitoring the men, the mosques, and the money...
The claims were made by daily newspaper 'Het Laatste Nieuws' on Wednesday. However, the newspaper also said co-operation between the various security services currently falls short of the mark. It means the suspects are not actually being held under surveillance.
...or not.
Could be they are like the FBI, collecting intel, collating and sorting it, but not acting on it.
The revelations stem from recent terrorism warning issued by a councilor with the Antwerp social security office OCMW, Marco Laenens. The councilor discovered that dozens of Pakistani social security recipients frequently travel back to their country of origin. The travels occur despite the fact the refugees â who have been granted asylum in Belgium â claim their safety is at threat in Pakistan.
Forehead. Keyboard. Ouch.
When Laenens was questioned by the federal police force's anti-terrorism unit on Friday 22 July, it was revealed that an investigation was launched in 1992 into the actions of Pakistani extremists in Antwerp. Authorities now hope to quickly determine whether there is a link between the Pakistani suspects and the asylum seekers receiving social security benefits.
But let's not rush things...don't want to seem too hasty, what would the neighbors think?
The Investigation will determine if the asylum seekers have been sent to terrorist training camps.
#1
Would this be the same Belgian police force that expats are warned not to allow over their threshhold outside of normal business hours (M-F, 9a.m.-5p.m.) because it's just too risky? Or the Belgian police that were procuring for and protecting the child pornographer and molestation groups? Of course, things may have changed drastically in Brussels since we lived there in 1995-96.
Summary: (Follow link for rest)
To those who follow the politics of national security and defense, it came as no surprise recently when Senator Hillary Clinton (N.Y.) put herself in the vanguard of Democrats calling for a substantial increase in the size of the active-duty army. Hillary--the one-named superstar of Democratic politics--actually has been working hard over the past few years to burnish her credentials on these issues, particularly in regard to Iraq. She seems to grasp what many in her party still cannot: in the post-9/11 world, the job of an American president is to be a wartime commander in chief.
#2
No NO NO you mean replace 25% of the troops her husband salshed in the 90's by HALF while we were being attacked regularly overseas Somalia, Cole, Embasy bomings 2, multiple CIA killed around ME, 1st world trade, 98' punk out with N. Korea giving away Nuke reactors million in aid and oil for a usless agreement the Norks never even kept for a day, Punk out to Saddam after he told the UN to shuv it, and lets not even start on the missle cough "peacful space flight technology" Clinton approved for the Chineese who now whoops has missles accuracy years past before he took power (we will feel effect of tommorow), ect.. on and on I saw this war coming in the early 90's and was pissed at Clinton for slalshing the military when we should have been going on the offensive or at least building up for one. GRRFRRRRRRRRRR
McLEAN, Va. - A federal appeals court has reinstated a libel suit against the New York Times filed by a former Army scientist who claims one of the paper's columnists unfairly linked him to the deadly anthrax mailings in 2001.
Steven Hatfill sued the Times for a series of columns written by Nicholas Kristof that faulted the FBI for failing to thoroughly investigate Hatfill for the anthrax mailings that left five people dead. The initial columns identified Hatfill only as "Mr. Z," but subsequent columns named him after Hatfill stepped forward to deny any role in the killings. Federal authorities labeled Hatfill "a person of interest" in their investigation.
Last year, a federal judge tossed out Hatfill's lawsuit, ruling that the columns did not defame Hatfill and accurately reflected the state of the FBI's investigation.
But the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond overturned the rule Thursday on a 2-1 vote, saying that Kristof's columns, taken as a whole, might be considered defamatory. "A reasonable reader of Kristof's columns likely would conclude that Hatfill was responsible for the anthrax mailings," wrote Judge Dennis Shedd in an opinion joined by Chief Judge William Wilkins. The ruling sends the case back to U.S. District Court in Alexandria for trial.
Thomas Connolly, a lawyer for Hatfill, said that "Dr. Hatfill is pleased with the ruling and looking forward to his day in court." A physician and bioterrorism expert, Hatfill worked in the late 1990s at the Army's infectious disease laboratory at Fort Detrick, Md.
Toby Usnik, a spokesman for the Times, said the newspaper was disappointed with the decision, "but we remain confident in our case." "Mr. Kristof's columns were fair and accurate, and we continue to believe that newspapers need to be able to comment on how investigations â especially one as important as this â are being conducted."
Thursday's ruling acknowledged that Kristof's columns included assertions that Hatfill enjoys a presumption of innocence. But Kristof also included charges that Hatfill failed polygraph examinations, that bloodhounds responded to Hatfill and his apartment, and that Hatfill was a prime suspect within the biodefense community itself. "In describing all this evidence, Kristof's columns did not merely report others' suspicions of Hatfill; they actually generated suspicion by asserting facts that tend to implicate him in the anthrax murders," the ruling said.
The ruling disputed the lower court judge's assertion that the articles accurately reflected the state of the government's investigation, saying there is no evidence thus far to determine whether the columns were in sync with the FBI probe.
Circuit Judge Paul Niemeyer dissented from the decision. "Nowhere does any column accuse Dr. Hatfill of committing the murders," he wrote. "The columns' purpose was to put into operation prosecutorial machinery that would determine whether Dr. Hatfill committed the crimes."
Hatfill also has filed a defamation suit against former Attorney General John Ashcroft and other government authorities. The suit is awaiting trial.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"The columns' purpose was to put into operation prosecutorial machinery that would determine whether Dr. Hatfill committed the crimes."
Since when is that the purpose of newspaper editorials? Heck, I thought it was the government's job to "put into operation the prosecutorial machinery".
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/29/2005 7:21 Comments ||
Top||
#2
It was a NYT editorial that demanded a special prosecutor be put on the case of the Plame 'leak', that now has a NYT reporter sitting in jail. Heh.
Many service members are not well informed about their hodgepodge of pays, allowances, benefits and tax breaks, and therefore don't recognize the real worth of their compensation packages. The observation is made by the Government Accountability Office in a new report that questions the "reasonableness, appropriateness, affordability and sustainability" of military compensation.
It adds timbre to a rising chorus of warnings from defense think tanks and senior defense officials like who? Kerry? that military personnel costs are soaring and that too much money goes into deferred compensation, such as military retirement and lifetime health care, which are seen as inefficient tools to attract recruits or even to retain careerists. Anyone ask the service folks what they think? The GAO study might be viewed as timely by defense officials, who last spring formed a Defense Advisory Committee on Military Compensation to study private-sector-like changes to military pay and benefits. A draft of that report is due in September.
Last February, the Center for Strategic and Budget Assessments published a report detailing the sharp rise in military compensation since 1999 and warning of an affordability crisis. There we go! We can't afford the War on Terror! In a New York Times commentary, economist Cindy Williams of MIT's Security Studies Program argued that much of the recent spike in military compensation helps retirees and survivors but does little to attract recruits or sustain the current force.
The GAO says total annual government spending on military pay, allowances and benefits jumped 29 percent, or $35 billion, from 2000-2004. The government, it adds, spent an average of $112,000 per active-duty member last year on compensation. That average is across the force, officers and enlisted, and includes the cost of benefits to members from other departments, including Veterans Affairs, Labor and Education.
Because military compensation costs are paid by four departments, decision makers lack the "transparency" to manage them and likely are missing a trend that, in time, will squeeze budgets for other defense priorities, GAO suggests. Military pay and allowances alone are "competitive" with private sector wages, exceeding salaries or wages of 70 percent of Americans of similar age and education, GAO says. Which is why recruitment is doing so well then, right?
"While some specific skill groups could likely make considerably more in civilian jobs, such perceptions of noncompetitive compensation seem to be inaccurate in broad terms," the report says. I'm all for the men and women understanding how they are compensated. Meanwhile, military benefits remain "much greater" than those of civilian peers, it adds.
Despite the competitiveness of military compensation, GAO found in focus groups with active-duty members that many still believe benefits are eroding. Oh! Somebody did ask the troops! That perception, GAO says, "is in direct contrast to the reality that costs to compensate service members have risen dramatically in recent years and benefits are projected to rise even more dramatically in the future."
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/29/2005 16:28 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Article: Despite the competitiveness of military compensation, GAO found in focus groups with active-duty members that many still believe benefits are eroding. That perception, GAO says, "is in direct contrast to the reality that costs to compensate service members have risen dramatically in recent years and benefits are projected to rise even more dramatically in the future."
Some of this is due to aggressive lobbying by groups fronted by liberal ex-military personnel that claim their benefits are horrible and criticize the war because they really enlisted for the benefits. I keep getting e-mails from one of these groups. These guys are frustrated union organizers.
#2
Let's use those relatively cheap GAO employees to clear IED's in Iraq, and save our expensive paratroopers for real offensive operations with a better cost-benefit ratio.
Posted by: Matt ||
07/29/2005 17:20 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Over-paid and under-worked. Always seemed to describe the GAO to me.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
07/29/2005 17:47 Comments ||
Top||
#4
I think some members of the GAO needs to be reassigned to create a spreadsheet detailing Caribou guano north of the Arctic Circle --- they need to do it in person...
As I recall from my days in uniform - Uncle Sam owned my ass 24/7. I can't say that I was particularly well paid based on having to avail myself of that kind of duty. Some days (Field Problems) I was "on duty" actively "doing shit" 24 hours a day. In addition, I can't name any civilian jobs that require you to sleep in a armored box on a steel floor, have people shoot at you and/or shoot back.
Not that I'm an expert on pay or anything - but it seems to me like Blackwater Security personnel are being paid something like $200K+ dollars to do their work in Iraq for similar duties to our soldiers.
#6
Military pay and allowances alone are "competitive" with private sector wages, exceeding salaries or wages of 70 percent of Americans of similar age and education, GAO says.
The comparison should be to positions with similar duties, working conditions, and responsibilities. This results from a bunch of REMF accountants who think they are overworked if they put in a 9 hour day.
#8
The US has decided to go with a vounteer military. The proper pay amount is when you have enough people with the right skills to meet your force requirements. Supply and demand states that when demand or difficulty increases, pay must increase to match the new equilibrium point. The question is the military getting enough/just right/excess of the right people to meet its mission? Comparision with a civilian peer group is moot.
Posted by: ed ||
07/29/2005 22:16 Comments ||
Top||
#9
Maybe it will be cheaper to lose the WOT. I bet the parents of Beslan were excited about the cost-savings they enjoyed by fielding an ineffective military.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
07/29/2005 22:48 Comments ||
Top||
About four years overdue, but it's step in the right direction.Bold added for emphasis.
The nation's leading group of Islamic scholars, speaking with a single voice for the first time since Sept. 11, has issued a formal condemnation of terrorism, urging America's more than 2 million Muslims to cooperate with law enforcement agencies in ferreting out would-be terrorists. "Targeting civilians' life and property through suicide bombings or any other method of attack is haram - or forbidden - and those who commit these barbaric acts are criminals, not martyrs," read a release by the 18-member Fiqh Council of North America. The condemnation came in a fatwa, a formal opinion that carries great weight in the Islamic world when handed down by respected religious leaders.
It was immediately hailed by several national Muslim organizations, including the Islamic Society of North America.
"The difference between this and all the pronouncements you've heard in the past is these are pretty much the leading scholars in North America," said Dr. Faroque Khan, a board member of the Islamic Society of North America and past president of the Islamic Center of Long Island in Westbury. "Individually, they have all expressed their condemnation, but this is the first time they have done it as a group."
Muslim leaders have frequently expressed frustration that their repudiations of terrorism have been largely overlooked. Critics have said America's Muslims have not spoken out forcefully enough.
Yesterday, Rabbi David Saperstein of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism in Washington said the unified stance was helpful. "Ultimately, it is Muslims who are going to need to win the battle about the direction and the future of Islam," he said.
Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations, said the fatwa was inspired in part by a condemnation by leading imams in England after the July 7 London bombings that killed 56 people. So, even CAIR got on board. Amazing.
Yesterday's fatwa went further than one issued by some of England's Muslim leaders, which seemed to allow an exception for suicide bombing against an occupying power. "Suicide bombing is forbidden in Islam," said Muzammil H. Siddiqi, head of the Fiqh Council. "This is not the solution, it is not the right way of doing things. Occupation is wrong, of course, but at the same time, this is not the way." What occupation is he talking about? Iraq is a sovereign government.
#3
I will not believe these asswipes until they start handing over, by their own free will, the zelots and nutjobs that preach hate. Until they do that, they are as guilty as the zelots themselves.
#1
Cool. I want one. Just to fly. I don't need the explosives part. Really!
Posted by: Bobby ||
07/29/2005 15:28 Comments ||
Top||
#2
What sort of limitations can/do they put on purchasing these things? They're cheap enough for middle class individuals to afford. I could see private eyes wanting these for their work.
In a statement released last night, 630 WMAL president and general manager Chris Berry announced midday personality Michael Graham would be indefinitely suspended pending an internal investigation into Graham's July 25th remarks that Islam is a terrorist organization.... "... the statements that Michael Graham made on July 25 crossed the line," Berry said. "He has been suspended pending an internal investigation. We do not condone his position, and we believe his statements were irresponsible."
...
The Council on American-Islamic Relations issued a press...
The web site at which you can call or email WMAL is
http://www.wmal.com/contactus.asp
the phone number for programming is:
Programming: 202-895-2327
I dispense with the traditional greeting normally extended to Muslims as your behaviour over and over again demonstrates that you are NOT acting to the benefit of the Muslim community but rather as an arm of the American fascist/racist government. âŠ
Instead of pushing the Zionist agenda on the Muslims via puppet imams at mosques, conferences, condemnation of the Islamic resistance and now a commercial which puts blame on the Muslims for defending their political and religious rights. What a wicked you do by negating the teachings of Islam regarding Jihad and fostering guilt in Muslims for abiding by the injunction of Quran and Sunnah to go to Jihad against the enemies of the Muslim nation and religion. âŠ
Muslims have the obligation to go to Jihad and to retaliate upon their enemies and there is no guilt in doing what ALLAH has ordered. No Muslim should be misguided and made to believe that retaliation for the atrocities committed by the non-Muslims upon Muslims is to be tolerated. No Muslim should go against his brother/sister jihadi in order to appease the non-Muslim governments of the world. No Muslim owes any apologies to any non-Muslim nation and no Muslim needs to be feeling bad for the crimes that are carried out by the Bush and Blair bastards under the guise of the Mujahideen. âŠ
ALLAH's curse is upon you for your treason against the Muslim religion and people. REPENT before it is too late !
STOP POISONING THE MINDS OF THE MUSLIMS WITH YOUR CORRUPTED VERSION OF ISLAM THAT ONLY SERVES THE INTERESTS OF ZIONISTS !
Very truly yours,
Shayhka Maulani Aeisha Muhammad
Religious deception is a relatively sophisticated operation and some people just don't get it. Of course CAIR will cite this to show how moderate they are.
FORT STEWART, Ga. -- An Army mechanic who refused to go to Iraq while he sought conscientious objector status was acquitted of desertion Thursday but found guilty of a lesser charge and sentenced to 15 months behind bars.
Sgt. Kevin Benderman, 40, also was given a dishonorable discharge and a reduction in rank to private on the charge of missing movement. If he had been found guilty of desertion, he could have faced five years in prison.
Benderman failed to deploy with his 3rd Infantry Division unit in January, 10 days after he told Fort Stewart commanders he was seeking a discharge as a conscientious objector. He has previously said he refused to deploy to Iraq after his first combat tour during the 2003 invasion made him opposed to war.
He enlisted, got to the rank of sargeant, went to Iraq, and then decided to be a C.O.?
Benderman's company commander and direct supervisor in the division's 3rd Forward Support Battalion flew to Fort Stewart from Iraq to testify Thursday that the soldier disobeyed orders to deploy and demoralized his fellow troops after they left without him. "He got what he deserved," said Capt. Gary Rowely said during a court-martial that lasted less than three hours. "He's doing 15 months; we're serving 12 months in Iraq."
But Benderman said he didn't mean for his actions to hurt his comrades. "I am not against soldiers," he said. "I don't care what anyone says. Though some might take my actions as being against soldiers, I want everyone to be home and safe and raising their families. I don't want anyone to be hurt in a combat zone."
William Cassara, Benderman's civilian defense attorney, argued that Benderman believed he had been excused from deploying so he could work on his objector application. "I think the sentence was overly harsh," said Cassara, who said the soldier would get an automatic appeal.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
...Here's where this idiot lost me.
The DoD has a policy in place if you decide that you don't want to play any more and I saw it used twenty years ago, and in ODS as well. I'm willing to believe that someone can see the Great Light, and that's fine.
BUT - and IIRC, that jackass Paredes did the same thing - you are not allowed to just opt out of the game. You have to go with your unit, and then they decide what to do.
A true CO would have gone. This guy didn't. He simply decided that he did'nt want to play anymore, and figured that claiming CO status was his best bet. Well, fine. He can be the prom queen at Leavenworth for the next 15 months.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
07/29/2005 7:07 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Desmond Doss - I never knew about him. Thanks for the link.
He set the bar.
SSGT Benderman was just looking for a quick way out because he found out that war sucks. Well wih that dishonorable following him around, life's going to suck for a lot longer for him.
The Sunni and Shiite spiritual authorities in Lebanon denounced yesterday a statement by an Islamist group threatening to assassinate nine Lebanese Shiite leaders. A joint statement by the Sunni and Shiite religious authorities in Lebanon warned that the alleged threat âis based on lies aimed at stirring confusionâ. A previously unknown Islamist group â Al-Qaeda in the Levant â threatened to murder nine prominent Shiite officials in Lebanon, calling them âenemies of Islam collaborating with the enemyâ.
The statement signed by the grand Sunni mufti of Lebanon, Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Kabbani, and the acting president of the Shiite Higher Islamic Council, Sheikh Abdel Amir Kabalan, said the threat sought to âinstigate sectarian strife in Lebanon, and harm religious and national Islamic authoritiesâ. The Sunni-Shiite statement called on Lebanese in general and Muslims in particular to national and Islamic unity and to âshunâ calls to sectarian violence. The death threat faxed to the seat of the Shiite religious authority in Lebanon said targets would include Parliamentary Speaker Nabih Berri and a several leaders of the militant Hezbollah movement. Lebanese security sources said an investigation was underway to determine those behind the fax.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
Lebanon's new government defended Hizbollah guerrillas' right to resist Israel and promised solid ties with Syria, policies that parliament began debating on Thursday. Lebanon's first government since Syrian troops withdrew in April is expected to win a confidence vote at the end of the policy debate, which could stretch until Friday or Saturday. More than 30 out of 128 deputies are scheduled to speak.
Oh, be still, my beating heart! 128 speeches...
Prime Minister-elect Fouad Siniora pledged a broad programme of economic reform in a speech to parliament and said Lebanon would work toward solid and balanced ties with Syria. He promised to resolve a border crisis with Syria that has slowed Lebanese exports to Arab countries through its only open land border almost to a standstill.
The issue of Hizbollah's weapons is one of the biggest challenges that will face Lebanon in the coming months. Siniora said the government would defend Lebanon's right to resistance, the term usually used for Shi'ite Muslim Hizbollah, whose attacks helped end the Jewish state's 22-year occupation of south Lebanon in 2000. "The government considers the resistance a natural and honest expression of the Lebanese people's national rights to liberate their land and defend their honour against Israeli aggression and threats," he told parliament. But Siniora, finance minister under slain former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, did not mention U.N. resolution 1559, which demands that militias disarm. Syria's withdrawal fulfilled its other main requirement. "The government affirms its respect for international law, good ties to international legitimacy and respect for its resolutions within the framework of sovereignty, solidarity and national unity," he said.
Hizbollah was the only Lebanese group to keep its arms after the 1975-1990 civil war. The United States brands Hizbollah a terrorist group and wants it to give up its weapons. Hizbollah has a ministerial post in the new cabinet for the first time, though its overall make-up reflects elections that last month swept an anti-Syrian majority into parliament for the first time since the end of the civil war. The new government has 15 ministers allied to an anti-Syrian bloc led by the slain Hariri's son, Saad, and five loyal to the pro-Syrian Shi'ite coalition that includes Hizbollah.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
#3
I'm with Mo, grab all you can, while you can. There isn't much future in suicide bombing anyway. The pay has never been that great, but the early retirement benefits are out of this world.
WND. Treat as something in between factual and NYT/CBS. EFL. Preview isn't working right now, so I'm flying blind here.
While refusing to dialogue with his most vocal Islamic critics, U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo met with a select group of Muslims to clarify his remarks about threatening to target holy sites in response to a terrorist nuclear attack.
The Colorado Republican was visited Wednesday by a three-member delegation from the Free Muslims Coalition, a group urging mainstream Muslims to take a stronger stand against terrorists. Also known as the Sisyphus Coalition.
The coalition's president, Kamal Nawash, told the Rocky Mountain News after the meeting, "To the extent anyone was insulted by his comments, [Tancredo] said he's sorry about that."
"It confirmed what we always believed. He's a great guy ⊠and he has no animosity toward Muslims," said Nawash, a Republican and former state Senate candidate in Virginia. "If they want to talk to mainstream, moderate Muslims, this is the organization to talk to," Corey Saylor, government affairs director for CAIR, told the Denver paper. You're supposed to put a "beverage alert" in front of statements like that, Corey.
"We work regularly with government officials. We've trained FBI members [in sensitivity to Muslims]. I don't think you can get more mainstream than that," Saylor said. I agree.
But Tancredo spokesman Will Adams declared CAIR will not be included in any future meetings. "We don't think they represent moderate Muslims," he said. There's the rub. Mainstream and Moderate are two completely different classes.
CAIR is urging the Republican Party to repudiate Tancredo's remarks. Satan is urging the Pope to repudiate God.
Adams said the congressman did not offer any new apologies in his meeting with the Free Muslims Coalition but simply reiterated that he had no intent to offend innocent Muslims. Both of them.
Nawash said he thought Tancredo's comments were taken out of context. Hey, it works for the Imams and Mullahs.
"I told him, if I were in his place as a congressman who cares about his people here, innocent people who may be killed by terrorist attack ⊠I'd say the same," said Mansour, a Muslim scholar and imam. Why don't you start posting on Rantburg? I mean that. We could use some Muslims like you here.
The U.S. Embassy in Bangladesh called his remarks "offensive to the United States government and to the American people."
Ohfergawdsake.
Tell the RAB that the US Embassy has a cache of shutter guns.
#1
But Tancredo spokesman Will Adams declared CAIR will not be included in any future meetings.
"We don't think they represent moderate Muslims," he said.
Finally, a congressman that has the balls to tell the truth! CAIR is a terrorist organization.
#2
"We don't think they represent moderate Muslims," he said. There's the rub. Mainstream and Moderate are two completely different classes.
Loving it...
Mr. Tancredo-no backtracking, no apology to anyone is necessary. Your vision was clear. In fact, one counter should handle it nicely for you:
If jihadis nuking America doesn't justify targeted nuclear retaliation by America, what would? Is the person testing Mr. Tancredo really saying that there is never an instance when America's nuclear threat can be called upon?
Thursday's religious edict condemning terrorism was authored and issued by the Fiqh Council of North America, an association of Muslim jurists who interpret Islamic law. The edict was signed by 18 council scholars. The Fiqh Council of North America traces its origins to the early 1960s and the Religious Affairs Committee of the Muslim Students Association (MSA) of the United States and Canada, according to the council's website. This Religious Affairs Committee evolved into the Fiqh Committee of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), which was founded in 1980.
The MSA itself was an American outreach project of Pakistan's Jamaat-i-Islami (JI), an anti-Western fundamentalist group that calls Osama bin Laden a hero of the Islamic world. JI's president, Qazi Hussein Ahmed, has called the United States a "world terrorist" and advocated "martyrdom operations" in Iraq, Israel, Chechnya and Kashmir.
JI also boasts of maintaining "close brotherly relations" with and "practical links" to Hamas, a frequent sponsor of suicide bombings in Israel.
The MSA created the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) and the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), to accommodate graduate students and other non-students. In 1986 the Fiqh Council changed its name to the Fiqh Council of North America. The Council continues as an affiliate of ISNA, advising and educating its members and officials on matters related to the application of Shariah (Islamic law) in their lives. (ISNA is one of 25 Muslim organizations under federal investigation. Although it has been criticized for having formed a legal defense fund for Hamas leader Abu Marzook, the organization insists it is "moderate" "mainstream.") Terrorism analysts have previously been skeptical of fatwas such as the one issued Thursday, citing the changing positions of Islamic scholars on the subject. The Middle East Quarterly has reported Islamic leaders sometimes bend to government pressure to issue appeasing statements.
One of the most influential scholars in the Islamic world, Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, has previously declared that any fatwa disallowing suicide bombings lacked any authority. Al-Qaradawi explained why there were contradicting fatwas on this subject in comments made to Al-Istiqlal, the newspaper of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. "The fatwas that were made against these heroes, in which they were labeled 'terrorists', were not issued by authoritative religious sources," Al-Qaradawi stated, "but rather by a group of people who are alien to the Shari'a and the religion. "They probably serve the regimes or are agents of the police," he added.
[Translation: Middle East Research Institute, May 2, 2001]
Posted by: Steve ||
07/29/2005 09:54 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
All right. Where is that picture from? I'm thinking I-25 in New Mexico?
#2
Read the headline, Jack. The pic was taken in Bin Laden Alley, which has links to Arafat Memorial Tunnel between Gaza and Egypt which is run by a fatwa-authoring group. After all, the sign in the pic says, "beware of snakes". I mean c'mon, really, it's just common sense.
The FBI plans to open two offices in West Africa early next year, a region where South American drug cartels, international diamond smugglers and Islamic extremists are all thought to be operating.
The U.S. law enforcement agency, one of whose main priorities is protecting the United States from terrorist attacks, will set up offices in Senegal's capital Dakar and one in Freetown, Sierra Leone, an FBI spokesman in Washington said.
Security analysts say the main concerns in the vast region are pockets of Islamic militants in and around the Sahara desert and organised crime groups dealing in drugs, human trafficking and money laundering along the West African coast.
"The failure by some states in the region to enforce law and order coupled with a culture of impunity facilitates criminal transactions," Antonio Mazzitelli, head of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime in West and Central Africa, told Reuters.
"These conditions can easily be exploited by terrorist groups looking for safe havens and logistics bases," he said.
One of Washington's main fears in the Sahel region, the arid band of savannah on the Sahara's southern fringe, is the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), an Algerian militant group which has pledged allegiance to al Qaeda.
The GSPC, created in 1998 to overthrow the ruling authorities in Algeria and set up a purist Islamic state, is increasingly setting its sights on foreign targets after being weakened by security forces in its homeland, analysts say.
"They certainly have an anti-Western focus and they are in western Europe and sharing ideologies with al Qaeda," said Sara Daly, an analyst at the RAND Corporation which conducts studies on a range of issues for the Pentagon.
Christophe Chaboud, head of the French Anti-Terrorism Coordination Unit, told Le Monde this month the GSPC had asked Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, head of al Qaeda's Iraq wing, for support and that the group posed a direct threat to France.
"They are trying to develop regionally, in sub-Saharan Africa, but also in France. Any wish to externalise jihad on their part risks materialising on our territory," he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:55 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
At least seven people from France have been killed in Iraq and elsewhere fighting for al-Qaeda, the French interior minister has told a newspaper. "At least seven people from France have died... fighting for al-Qaeda's cause, some in suicide attacks," Nicolas Sarkozy told Le Parisien. Another 10 are in Iraq, Pakistan, Syria and Afghanistan, he said. Nicolas Sarkozy also said the surveillance of flights to those countries would be reinforced. These, he said, are considered stopovers for Europeans heading to Iraq to join militant groups.
In early June, French police detained two men believed to have recruited volunteer fighters to be deployed in Iraq. One of them, 39-year-old Said al-Maghrebi, had reportedly trained with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and had been sought by French police for months. Another alleged recruiter of jihadists, Farid Benyettou, was arrested in France in January. US authorities believe that a large number of attacks in Iraq are carried out by foreign fighters, some of them recruited in western countries.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/29/2005 09:24 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
So sometimes Frenchmen do fight (though on the other side)? (No doubt immigrants or second generation, so maybe they haven't become fully French yet.)
#2
" These, he said, are considered stopovers for Europeans heading to Iraq to join militant groups."
They forget those men arent europians,not in my book at least.
If you immigrate to Germany or France or where ever,
get a citisenship and barely speak the languge ,
hate the people who took you in
and want to impose sharia laws ,
and want everone to walk talk and act as you do or in otherwods the "Convert or die" islamofascist ideology.
Then i would prefer that they stay in their country.
From Jihad Unspun, an article titled "Islam and Revolution," written by "The Street Mimbar." This is the third of a three-part series. The first two parts were summarized here.
.... And every time the revolutionary determination went into a higher gear, the anti-Islamic forces stepped up their dual stick and carrot approach. One of the carrots some Islamists are nibbling on today is a formula for sharing power. This is not new! What is new is the departure from the Prophetâs policy. ....
Some present day Muslims would celebrate for such an opportunity. Their argument would go as follows: Islam is intrinsically superior to the other ideologies and systems. The people are in dire need of Islam and they know it not. Some people are even Muslims and the only thing lacking in their lives is the implementation of the Islamic penal code and law. If we are given the opportunity to present people with the excellent qualities of Islam, then we should do so, because once they have tasted Islam, they will not settle for anything less.
This abridged argument contains at least a couple of fallacies. First of all, it accepts the good faith of Taghut, and it assumes that Taghut is going to honour its word. So there is an element of reliance upon Taghut to establish Islam. The other false assumption is that Islam is capable of winning over adherents who will en masse make a difference simply by granting Islam a stage appearance. ....
Muhammadâs lifelong struggle to destroy Taghut in the sphere of reality has to be resuscitated. Absolutely no-one in the history of mankind demolished in so short a period of time as many Taghuts as did this unique revolutionary. When we review twenty-three years of liberation and revolution led by Muhammed, we cannot but submit to the fact that this revolutionary was inspired by revelation. Virtually alone, and unsupported by any secular power, he managed to cause a radical change in the spiritual, social, economic, military, political and cultural activities of man. He was a revolutionary against the contorted concepts ....
Today there are heated debates in certain Islamic circles pertaining to the Islamic legality of revolutionary change in the regimes and dictatorships that have come into existence in Muslim lands. Menacingly, these establishmentarian-sponsored Islamists donât favour a rupture with the Taghuti system. But, as a matter of Prophetic revolutionary discipline, we do not have a choice but to take issue with the established Taghuts, especially those that are mattressed by the affluence of petro-riches while their brothers and sisters in Islam and humanity are subjected to a general condition of oppression and injustice throughout Asia, Africa and the World at large. ....
And, there are other hadiths from the Prophet (alaih salaam), that demand and suggest rebellion against the established Taghuts travelling in our Muslim lands. Today, there is no excuse, nor alibi for the Muslims to ignore or neglect this effort that belongs to the Muslim Ummah, and the mustadafin (oppressed peoples) of Allahâs creation. Striving to achieve an Islamic Revolution is an embodiment of the revolutionary impulse of Muhammed (alaih salaam).
It has become obvious, even to non-Muslims, that the super and regional powers, (the US, the SU, Britain, France, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the Zionist occupiers of Palestine, Egypt, and virtually all the Taghuts in the world,) are involved directly more than indirectly against the revolutionary stance of certain Muslims, but let not the sons of the Islamic Movement take the side of the kuffaar as some moderates would like us to see.
Throughout this khutbah, I tried to demonstrate the affinity between Islam and revolution. It should be clear by now, that the two are synonymous and inseparable. Whoever the implementers of the Prophets revolutionary concepts are, be they the Ulema, the combatants, and the oppressed and committed sons of the Islamic Revolution, they are on the side of Allahâs Messengers .... if the leaders of Islamic associations, parties, organisations and local movements want to take the side of this historic procession, then the only step they have to take is the revolutionary march into the future as is outlined in the Qurâan, implemented by the Prophet and preserved by the Mujahideen.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
07/29/2005 07:10 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
I think it is the third Jihad Unspun article today and we are only at the beginning of the day for Rantburg (whose main activity is correlated with US day time). Enough is enough.
#4
Is a Taghut a fancy racist name for those not Arab and Moslem?
Would the Dafur hardboys be Taghut?
Where is Jihad Unspun located?
When will all associated with Jihad Unspun be sent to GitMo or better yet dropped into Great White infested waters from a hellicopter at a decent altitude?
Steve Emerson does what he does soooo well: expose Islamic terrorism to the light of day.
This morning a group of American Islamic leaders held a press conference to announce a fatwa, or Islamic religious ruling, against âterrorism and extremism.â An organization called the Fiqh Council of North America (FCNA) issued the fatwa, and the Council on American - Islamic Relations (CAIR) organized the press conference, stating that several major U.S. Muslim groups endorsed the fatwa.
In fact, the fatwa is bogus. Nowhere does it condemn the Islamic extremism ideology that has spawned Islamic terrorism. It does not renounce nor even acknowledge the existence of an Islamic jihadist culture that has permeated mosques and young Muslims around the world. It does not renounce Jihad let alone admit that it has been used to justify Islamic terrorist acts. It does not condemn by name any Islamic group or leader. In short, it is a fake fatwa designed merely to deceive the American public into believing that these groups are moderate. In fact, officials of both organizations have been directly linked to and associated with Islamic terrorist groups and Islamic extremist organizations. One of them is an unindicted co-conspirator in a current terrorist case; another previous member was a financier to Al-Qaeda.
I spoke with Judea Pearl, father of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl who told me that the fatwa was âvacuous because it does not name the perpetrators of Islamic terrorist theologies and leaders of Islamic movements like Yousef Al Qaradawi, Osama Bin Laden, Ayman Al Zawahari, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, etc.â Pearl told me that these groups are âtrying to perpetrate a deception on the American public.â
Officials of both groups have been linked to various terrorist organizations:
The Chairman of the Fiqh Council, Taha Jaber Al-Alwani, is an unindicted co-conspirator in the case against Sami al-Arian, the alleged North American leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, whose trial began in June 2005 in Tampa, Florida. Mr. Alwani has been named in court documents as an official of several entities in northern Virginia suspected of being connected to terrorist financing. Documents released in the Al Arian trial show that Alwani funded the Islamic Jihad front groups in Tampa.
Another past trustee of the Fiqh Council, Abdurrahman Alamoudi, is serving a 23-year prison sentence for illegal financial dealings with Libya and immigration fraud, has admitted to his part in a plot to assassinate the Saudi Crown Prince, and has vocally announced his support for the terrorist groups Hamas and Hezbollah. Additionally Alamoudi was just named by Treasury as having been a financier for Al Qaeda.
In 1998, Fiqh Council member Sheikh Muhammad al-Hanooti, gave a speech calling for jihad against the United States and the United Kingdom, saying that âAllah will curse the Americans and Britishâ and âAllah, the curse of Allah will become true on the infidel Jews and on the tyrannical Americans.â Additionally, Hanooti is strongly linked to Hamas, having served on the board of the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP). A 2002 INS memo extensively documented IAPâs support for HAMAS and noted that the âfacts strongly suggestâ that IAP is âpart of HAMASâ propaganda apparatus.â
On October 28, 2000, Muzammil Siddiqui, the President of FCNA, at a rally in Lafayette Park in Washington D.C., said, âAmerica has to learn -- if you remain on the side of injustice, the wrath of God will come!"
In the past 4 years, several CAIR officials have been convicted of or charged with various terrorism-related offenses.
CAIR has championed and defended officials of Islamic terrorist groups including Hamas leader Musa Abu Marzook, Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami al-Arian, Palestinian Islamic Jihad fundraiser Fawaz Damra, and the radical Egyptian cleric Wagdy Ghoneim.
CAIR has repeatedly attacked the prosecutions of Islamic terrorists arrested and/or convicted since 9-11 and has attacked the governmentâs freezing of Islamic terrorist fronts as part of a âwar against Islamâ by the United States.
CAIR has led protests against the deportation of radical Islamic clerics who have called for Jihad or who have been fundraisers for Hamas.
CAIR has asserted that the indictment of Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami al-Arian on conspiracy to murder more than 100 people was âpolitically motivatedâ and instigated by âthe attack dogs of the pro-Israeli lobby.
CAIR has been named as a defendant in a civil lawsuit filed by the family of former FBI official John OâNeill, who was killed on 9-11.
One of the signatories to todayâs fatwa is Fawaz Damra who was convicted of immigration fraud related to his ties to Palestinian Islamic Jihad and denaturalized. He is currently awaiting a deportation hearing.
Another signatory, the Muslim American Society, is a front for the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States and whose publications have repeatedly supported suicide bombings.
For a comprehensive background paper on the links to Islamic terrorist and extremist groups, please click here. More taqiya & kitman from the apologists.
#3
I think the problem has been said more succinctly a number of times.
Basically, denouncing terrorism isn't much good unless you also denounce terrorists and those who raise funds for terrorism and those who apologize for terrorism (do I smell CAIR here).
#4
The fact that it only took about four years to get this fatwa together tells you everything you need to know. Might they be a little twitchy about the ramifications of resident boomers striking here? Slipspeak weasels will point to their great if extremely late fatwa as proof they're nice live and let live folks just like the rest of us despite prior contradictory statements.
#7
At what point do we just start announcing that good things things happened because of help from the Islamic community (even if not true) to sew dissention amung the ranks of the villianous.
Saying religion of Peace hasn't helped. Let's start hinting that CAIR gave us actionable knowledge that led to the arrest and conviction of such and such. Or instead of Cair list a specific. Make them out to be a hero. See how/if they deny they helped. See if they get whacked by their Jihadist 'friends' for helping the man.
#9
Heard an interview with one of those US-Moslem "holy men" this morning. It was great.
He evaded all questions. In particular, when asked whether he thought it was legitimate to be worried about Moslem terrorists being inspired by the Koran --and also asked how he would argue that their interpretation of the Koran is wrong-- his answer was sheer taqiya:
- imagine a suicide bomber in a mosque, how horrible THAT is
- some people use holy verses out of context in ALL RELIGIONS
In other words, he doesn't care about non-Moslem victims, and he has no specific argument against Moslem terrorists who are inspired by the Koran.
I wish the journalist had asked him to explain the concept of taqiya. Then jihad, Then sharia. Then apostates. The ugly, murderous nature of Islam (submission) is slowly bubbling up to the surface in Western culture.
So far, 23 people are believed to be involved with the suspected terror network the Hofstadgroep. Most are in jail. One is Mohammed B, convicted this week of murdering filmmaker Theo van Gogh. He and 11 others face criminal proceedings...
This is a nice primer from Expatica on the alleged members of Holland's most notorious terror cell. Note: Hofstadgroep roughly translates as "Center City Group" and is based in The Hague. Also, Expatica has that annoying Euro habit of only using last initials, and I didn't feel like looking them up. Sorry.
In a shocking set of revelations, the Netherlandsâ daily, De Telegraaf, has reported that Mohammed Bouyeri and his associates in the Hofstadgroep used radical Islamism to hide the fact that their group was actually a âsexual cult.â In a report titled âPreaching and Porno,â the paper went on to recount the story of the Islamist âlover boysâ who clothed their lurid sexual preferences in the garb of religious extremism.
The group was inclined to a vast array of depraved activities, not the least disturbing of which was the sexual abuse of young women. The group also reportedly had a penchant for marrying young women, most of whom were native Dutch and had converted to Islam. Bouyeri and his co-religionists would use them as âporn princesses,â before abandoning them after two weeks.
WASHINGTON - A US general in Iraq complained to superiors that his soldiers lack precision weapons to avoid using excessive force when protecting convoys, The Washington Times said on Thursday quoting a secret memo.
Brigadier General Joseph Chavez said laser-guided pistols, for example, could be used instead of the heavy weapons mounted on Humvees to ensure proportional force is used in response to attacks. âWhile defending combat logistics convoys, soldiers manning heavy crew-served weapons in turrets of gun trucks are challenged to use the appropriate elevation of force toward hostile acts,â he wrote in the memo.
Chavez commands an Army National Guard brigade that guards convoys moving in and out of Camp Anaconda, a sprawling logistics base near Balad, north of Baghdad, that serves as the supply hub for US troops in Iraq.
Although the March 15 secret memo does not mention any unwanted civilian deaths by Chavezâ troops while defending military convoys, it suggests strongly such incidents have taken place. âPreviously, reports indicated that excessive use of force, to include unauthorized deadly force, was employed by some convoy escorts,â Chaves wrote to the commander of all multinational forces in Iraq.
He said there was little time for soldiers in Humvee turrets responding to hostile fire to leave their M-2 machine guns and MK-19 grenade launchers for lighter, more precise weapons stored inside the vehicle. âThe speed of our convoys and oncoming threats allow no time for soldiers to alternately reach down to grab an M-16 or M-4 [rifles] in order to ensure that proportionate force is utilized to ensure innocent civilians are not engaged,â Chavez said.
He suggested his soldiers be equipped with hip holsters to give them quick access to laser-guided pistols, which would also provide an additional benefit. âA soldier wielding a pistol is viewed by local nationals as a token of authority,â he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
KhaleejTimes. "Secret" memo. Right.
Sidearms with "la-zers" huh. Hmmm. Okay - there's something there, I guess. Dunno if I'd characterize it the way the article does, however. This storyline might be a tad dizzy. Anyway, Googling to find out more, what I located is this pic of the Gen (3rd pic down, the guy on the right - duh) and this hit piece by Scott Gold of the El Lay Times - which is all over the BDS hate blogs at the moment. About 2/3 of the way down you find out where Chavez comes in, and what the bruhaha is really about:
"Hubbard, the officer at Fort Bliss, also said conditions at Dona Ana are designed to mirror the harsh and often thankless assignments the soldiers will take on in Iraq. That was an initiative launched by Brig. Gen. Joseph Chavez, commander of the 29th Separate Infantry Brigade, which includes the 184th regiment. The program has resulted in everything from an alcohol ban to armed guards at the entrance to Dona Ana, Hubbard said."
So the General is a big bad mean guy and some Guard cheesedicks are having a meltdown for the reporter buying the beer. Okay. Next.
#3
Although the March 15 secret memo does not mention any unwanted civilian deaths by Chavezâ troops while defending military convoys, it suggests strongly such incidents have taken place. âPreviously, reports indicated that excessive use of force, to include unauthorized deadly force, was employed by some convoy escorts,â Chaves wrote to the commander of all multinational forces in Iraq.
Ah. The modern press.
Although the papers don't mention reporters fellating jihadis in the field, they strongly suggest such incidents have taken place.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
07/29/2005 7:19 Comments ||
Top||
#4
My good friend staff Sgt Harvey was a convoy escort. Any time they were fired on they first determined where it was comming from and how bad it was. A lot of times they were fired on by scumbags standing in the middle of a bunch of kids or grown civilians. They didn't fire back. When possible, they fired everything they had. This is a war, bugwits, not a paintball fight. The object is to kill the othe guy and the best way to accomplish that is to blow the living shit out of everything that moves when the shooting starts. Youd don't stop to try to decide what weapon to use, you use what's in your hand. If you hesitate, you are DEAD! Laser guided pistols? There are pistols with lasers on them to help in aiming but they are not laser guided. a laser guided bullet would be really something. If someone is shooting at me with an RPG or an Ak the last thing I want is a pistol. I might as well just throw it at them. This had to be written by someone who has no idea what combat is really like. It ain't the movies where the hero can shoot the balls off a nat at 100 feet using a 38 special. I qualified as Expert with a 45 and that is only good for about 30 feet. Weinerheads!
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
07/29/2005 7:42 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Whatever happened to the concept of overwhelming force?
#7
Actually, does anyone have an idea just why Brig. Gen. Chavez asserts that a pistol is seen by locals as a status symbol of authority in a soldier's hands? This actually interests me.
I don't know about the "propriety" of underbarrel lasers, but reportedly (StrategyPage) they provided a measure of deterrent effect when their target could see the red dot on the torso.
I am skeptical about the holster recommendation though - more excuse for companies to "glut-glut-glut" and raise costs when soldiers and Marines can (hopefully) get themselves civilian hip-belt or drop-leg thigh holsters.
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
07/29/2005 9:04 Comments ||
Top||
#8
In situations like what'soing on over there give me a shoulder holster. Much better than a hip or thigh. try it sometime.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
07/29/2005 9:27 Comments ||
Top||
#9
Shoulder rigs are fine when you are standing.
But if you are crawling, or down in cover, then you need a top-draw leg holster.
Plus the thigh (flap) holster is much more secure than a shoulder rig for CQB, and it works better than a conventional shoulder rig does with full body armor.
Don't get me wrong - I wore a shoulder rig for years (still have one for concealed carry, along with a waist paddle holster), and they are great, but given the tactical realities they aren't the best way, unless there is a way to build the holders into the load bearing vests, like we had when I was in helicopter crew - carried a revolver to avoid FOD.
Thigh holsters are the way to go for almost all tactical troops.
#10
OS, I forgot about the body armour. when I was in, there was none.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
07/29/2005 10:48 Comments ||
Top||
#11
A college buddy spent 2.5 years in the Mekong delta on a 4 man kill team. There the average firefight lasted 3 to 6 seconds. No time for aiming... so ... he just carried two sawed-off 8-gauges. On incomming fire he would just respond to each side off the trail.
Since he lived to tell - it seems like a good strategy.
Samew here - when I was in uniform, we had a lot of half-assed flak vests mainly for artillery fragments, nothing like the good ballistic stuff they have now. Thats why few people wore it in the first trip over to the sandbox back in 90-1. Especially crews (as opposed to infantry).
And I would think that they should design the covers for these to a holster for the pistol - cant be a high one becasue you cant reach and cross draw when you are prone. Cant be front of the vest (like the aircrew ones) because you may be prone. Can't be at the waist because that soudl stick out and get caugt on crap (like door frames when entering rooms tactically). So it woudl have to be on the side, not high, not on the waist, not protruding. That means maybe a mount right on the kidneys for same-side draw as long as you can flex your arm fully. Or else, a drop holster on the thigh: the very thing that was designed to meet those tactical criteria.
One thing I do laugh about is the "laser guided pistols". Red dot aiming systems are a waste of money, they only give away your target, and in dust/smoke, a conventional laser draws a line straight back to your position.
Somone who wrote this has apparently been watching too much US TV.
#16
Go head and shoot quail with a cannon EVERY time
Sure. Don't mind the women and kids being held hostage, that the insurgents are hiding behind/among -- they just up the demand for water and power in the country anyway.
Nitwit.
Posted by: too true ||
07/29/2005 11:59 Comments ||
Top||
#17
Sure. Don't mind the women and kids being held hostage, that the insurgents are hiding behind/among -- they just up the demand for water and power in the country anyway.
Jeez I didn't know that happened in every single circumstance, thank goodness your smart enough for the both of us tt.
Asswipe.
You resort to name calling awfully quick tt.
#18
That was quick TT. Overwhelming immediate force is a battle winner. If that means an automatic shotgun with the quail on the groud in a baited field... so be it.
#19
I never have heard this crap about a pistol, sounds kinda ludicrous to me.
Although there is supposedly such a thing as a laser guided bullet, they are not currently in operational use in any unclassified manner that I've ever heard of, although that means nothing, nor are they reportedly being produced for anything smaller than a 50 cal. Works like a laser paint guided JDAM. for 50 cal sniper setups.
Although it would be a great idea to do such a thing. Imagine interfacing that with UAV and satellite imagery and network battle system for enemy/friendly identification and projectile guidance. You could theoretically lay out a well directed spray with confidence of much less collateral damage to the bystander and much higher damage to target.
However, Iraqis are scared shitless of being shot with a shotgun. Evidently shotguns are thought of as a weapon with which to kill dogs and if you are shot with a shotgun you have essentially died like a dog.
So naturally the 12 guage is preferred by many on the ground. However, it ain't a guided weapon and it aint worth shit past 30 ft. So, what logic is there in using a pistol?
Shipman, there's a good reason our Army carefully trains soldiers and commanders re: the use of proportional force in SASO (stability and sustainment operations).
I've talked with a lot of combat-experienced officers. Can't say many have expressed a desire for rules of engagement that call for massive force against insurgents hiding in a crowd of women and kids. Nor would they want to command units of soldiers who were eager to fire this way. And you can be very sure we are not training our officers to engage in indiscriminate overwhelming force under circumstances where the collateral casualties are likely to be very high. If we had, Baghdad would have been a smoking hole in March 2003, with the remaining Sunni triangle towns following shortly thereafter.
Not everything is solved by overwhelming force. In Iraq we have multiple objectives, some of which are NOT military. Worth keeping in mind, because our Army does every day.
While it might be frustrating for us to watch, it is the professional discipline of our armed forces that makes them both effective and a good representative of our democracy abroad.
#21
The Military is not sutied for a law enforcement mode. The objectives and responses are different. This just points it out. I would opt for shot guns which they have, in a mix in the arms carried. A 9mm Bretta with a laser is not going to do the job. A 40 cal or larger.
#22
What is said about someone who brings a knife pistol to a firefight? If they need to quickly shoulder their personal arms, why not add a secure mount (i.e. gunrack) and straps for their M4s on top of their humvees?
Posted by: ed ||
07/29/2005 14:06 Comments ||
Top||
#23
I will stand partially corrected, given the nation building.... but.
Not everything is solved by overwhelming force
Name a war that was lost with the above.? :)
#25
Exactly right regarding the military SPoD. Its purpose is to protect and defend the U.S. Period.
I say that given our experience in Iraq, I would have to agree with the sentiment expressed here a few days ago, I don't recall by who - but the next time we deploy it ought to be for the sole purpose of blowing things up and killing a-holes.
If we don't like how they have re-constituted and handle themselves post conflict, we reserve the right to blow their ass up again.
They want to see God, I'm all for sending them.
Afghanistan is in âpretty good shapeâ for upcoming legislative elections despite continuing violence and a major protest outside the main US military base, the presidentâs chief of staff said. More than 800 people have been killed since March in a wave of attacks in Afghanistan, particularly in its southern and eastern provinces bordering Pakistan. Officials have warned the violence could intensify before the Sept. 18 polls. âThe world knows that the future of Afghanistan depends on these elections,â President Hamid Karzaiâs chief of staff, Jawed Ludin, said Wednesday. âIn fact, weâre in pretty good shape, given Afghanistan as a whole.â
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
Posted by: Fred ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[0 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has called for an extraordinary Arab summit to be held in Sharm al-Shaikh..."
Extraordinary? Because of the rubble and body parts? If they were to increase the frequency of their summitry any more, they'd all die of nosebleeds...
The Palestinian Authority was said to have pledged to stop funding insurgency groups.
Good idea. They're kidnapping your guys, shooting them dead in the streets, and they're engaged in a power struggle with the Paleo Authority. Somehow giving them money doesn't sound like a great idea.
U.S. officials said PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has assured the Bush administration that he would block funding to such insurgency groups as the ruling Fatah movement and Hamas. Abbas was said to have pledged to block such funding after the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank in August 2005.
On the other hand, my confidence in Paleopledges is right up there with my confidence that Ted Kennedy's a great statesman...
Treasury Undersecretary Stuart Levey told the Senate Banking Committee on July 13 that Palestinian charities have been abused to support such insurgency groups as Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Levey said the administration has been cooperating with the PA to develop channels for donors to provide humanitarian aid not subverted by Hamas or other insurgency groups. Levey said Hamas has received less money from sources outside of Israel and the PA. He said Gulf Cooperation Council states have limited funding to Palestinian insurgency groups.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/29/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Of course they are cutting funding to Hamas. Why? Because Hamas is a political rival of al-Fatah. Principle has nothing to do with this policy.
Posted by: Vlad the Muslim Impaler ||
07/29/2005 1:59 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Of course they are cutting funding to Hamas. Why? Because Hamas is a political rival of al-Fatah. Principle has nothing to do with this policy.
Posted by: Vlad the Muslim Impaler ||
07/29/2005 1:59 Comments ||
Top||
#3
They coulda done this years ago. palis never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. so how are they gonna screw this one up, too?
this has NOTHING to do with peace, and EVERYTHING to do with politics and power. Which is why they DON'T have peace, and DO have politics.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
A leading British Muslim scholar has said that Muslim women living in the European country, where Muslims have been suffering mounting abuse and harassment since the July 7 London attacks, can take off their hijab. "I have issued a fatwa that Muslim women in Britain have an Islamic right to take off their hijab at this point of time if attacked or fearing to be attacked," Dr. Zaki Badawi, the Dean of the Muslim College in London, told IslamOnline.net over the phone from the British capital.
In a statement released last night, 630 WMAL president and general manager Chris Berry announced midday personality Michael Graham would be indefinitely suspended pending an internal investigation into Graham's July 25th remarks that Islam is a terrorist organization.... "... the statements that 
The Sunni and Shiite spiritual authorities in Lebanon denounced yesterday a statement by an Islamist group threatening to assassinate nine Lebanese Shiite leaders. A joint statement by the Sunni and Shiite religious authorities in Lebanon warned that the alleged threat âis based on lies aimed at stirring confusionâ. A previously unknown Islamist group â Al-Qaeda in the Levant â threatened to murder nine prominent Shiite officials in Lebanon, calling them âenemies of Islam collaborating with the enemyâ.
United States brands Hizbollah a terrorist group and wants it to give up its weapons. Hizbollah has a ministerial post in the new cabinet for the first time, though its overall make-up reflects elections that last month swept an anti-Syrian majority into parliament for the first time since the end of the civil war. The new government has 15 ministers allied to an anti-Syrian bloc led by the slain Hariri's son, Saad, and five loyal to the pro-Syrian Shi'ite coalition that includes Hizbollah.
Thursday's religious edict condemning terrorism was authored and issued by the 
At least seven people from France have been killed in Iraq and elsewhere fighting for al-Qaeda, the French interior minister has told a newspaper. "At least seven people from France have died... fighting for al-Qaeda's cause, some in suicide attacks," 
Afghanistan is in âpretty good shapeâ for upcoming legislative elections despite continuing violence and a major protest outside the main US military base, the presidentâs chief of staff said. More than 800 people have been killed since March in a wave of attacks in Afghanistan, particularly in its southern and eastern provinces bordering Pakistan. Officials have warned the violence could intensify before the Sept. 18 polls. âThe world knows that the future of Afghanistan depends on these elections,â President Hamid Karzaiâs chief of staff, Jawed Ludin, said Wednesday. âIn fact, weâre in pretty good shape, given Afghanistan as a whole.â
The Palestinian Authority was said to have pledged to stop funding insurgency groups.
