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| Axis of Evil |
| Turkey, Jordan Are (partway) Back on Track |
| 2003-01-27 |
| From DEBKA (slogan:"When we're wrong, we're really wrong, when we're right, we're two weeks ahead of the news curve!") While still holding out on permission for a full-scale, 80,000-strong US invasion force to be stationed in Turkey, the Gul government has ceded part of America’s requirements. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military and Turkish sources say Ankara will make bases available for the landing of 25-30,000 US troops for the first stage of the war, turning a blind eye to up to 40,000, while also permitting US invasion troops the limited use of Turkish air and naval bases and civilian airports, including Istanbul’s international airport. Wouldn't want to use the civilian airfields, the Turks want to limit exposure of our forces, makes it easier to deny how many are there. Jordan’s king Abdullah II this week lifted the restrictions he abruptly clamped down on the movements of American troops in the kingdom, their use of Jordanian bases as launching pads to invade Iraq and strike at the western bases from which Scud missiles were fired against Israel in 1991. He also renewed permission for US warplanes to reach Iraq via Jordanian airspace and gave the nod for Israeli air force flights through Jordanian skies, provided they were coordinated with the US and Jordanian authorities. Jordanian overflight rights means carriers in eastern Med can hit western Iraqi desert areas quicker. I figured we would get these from Jordan. According to our sources, General Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint US Chiefs of Staff, obtained Turkey’s concessions in the few hours he spent in Incirlik and Ankara Sunday, January 19. Defining their accord as a military document, the Myers and the Turks agreed to set aside Turkey’s territorial claims in the two northern Iraqi oil cities Kirkuk and Mosul until a later stage. Soon after Myers departed Ankara, American sources made it clear that the United States fully intended taking over Iraq’s oil fields, administering them in the long term and using Iraqi oil revenues to partly defray the costs of conducting war and maintaining a long-term military occupation of Iraq. According to DEBKAfile’s Washington sources, the war bill which, unlike Gulf War I, America will carry more or less single-handed, is estimated at $130 billion, while maintaining app. 70,000 US troops in the country to protect the oil fields and maintain Iraq’s post-war stability could run to another $10-12 billion a year. To raise this cash, the United States plans to increase Iraq’s oil output from 1.6 million to 6.5 million barrels per day, necessitating further heavy outlay for renovating the badly run down Iraqi oil production equipment. At the same time, the long-term, military-backed control over Iraq’s oil resources – on the spot rather than from outside the region – will make America the leading strategic-political-military force in the Middle East and Persian Gulf as well giving Washington a controlling interest in the global oil market. In consideration of Washington’s regional design, the Gul government in Ankara decided that its wisest course at this stage would be to shelve its two-century- old claim to Iraqi oil fields for the time being. The US controling the oil fields means the Kurds don't get them. That's what Turkey was afraid of. The key clauses in the US-Turkish military agreement are: 1. Turkish passage for one light US division of no more than 15,000 troops to transit into northern Iraq - conditional on a US pledge to end the military campaign against Saddam Hussein within days. Agreed. 2. Shortly before the invasion, Turkey will allow US troops to land at Turkish air and naval bases and go into action in Iraq. Just-in-time deployment, they'll arrive after air strikes start and move up to the front. Fits the DenBeste theory. 3. In the first stage of the US offensive, the Turkish government and high command will bring the Turkish forces who drove into northern Iraq last month back to their bases. Pull them back to their bases in Iraq? Be less chance of friendly fire mistakes that way. They will stay there until a new US-Turkish accord is negotiated to formalize Turkey’s standing in Iraq. DEBKA-Net-Weekly had earlier reported Turkish troops as having taken up strategic positions along main roads. Road guides? The Turkish government and high command undertook not to exploit the US campaign to grab positions in northern Iraq. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military and intelligence sources note that, through this provision, General Myers lifted the Turkish military threat hanging over Kurdistan. The Kurds can have a part in a federated Iraq, but not a state of their own. This keeps the Turks happy. The carrot Myers proffered the Gul government, according to DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s sources in Washington, was an undertaking on behalf of President George W. Bush of US generosity in providing Turkey with post-war economic aid in return for responding to US demands for bases. The American general also held out possible US concessions to Turkey in the bargaining over the shape of the government administrations in northern Iraq and the Turkmen region. And cheap oil! Myers’ mission effectively ended the US-Turkish crisis that threatened US war plans in northern Iraq. According to the latest information, units of the 4th US Infantry Division, the whole of which was first tasked for the southern front, are now being shipped to Turkish bases for the jump into the northern oilfields together with 101st Airborne Division detachments. They must mean 'jump off for', not 'jump into' when talking about the 4th ID. The 101st may air assault the northern fields and the 4th drives down to meet them. These partial reversions by Turkey and Jordan to their first commitments, salvaged key elements of the original US blueprint for the war on Iraq, permitting a return to the three-way split of combat strength between the northern, western and southern sectors. If true, and I do mean, IF, this would be a big deal. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s sources in Washington and Amman attribute King Abdullah’s change of heart to the quieting of his acute eve-of-war jitters by renewed American guarantees to protect his kingdom and the reaffirmation of Israeli defense pledges. Jordan’s towns teem with Iraqi intelligence agents, whose subversive activities against the throne, hand in glove with dissident Palestinians and pro-Al Qaeda extremists, are intensifying as the war approaches. Too true. Look for a roundup, just prior to kickoff. On Thursday, January 23, Jordan requested the sale of an American air defense system to tighten control over Jordanian airspace and protection against foreign intervention. Having Jordan back on track prompted sighs of relief among war planners in Washington. The provision of bases in Jordan is essential for the occupation of western Iraq and eviction of the Iraqi military presence in the first stage of the anti-Saddam offensive. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military sources note that the capture of Baghdad and Saddam’s power base of Tikrit would be feasible without the use of bases in Turkey, but extremely difficult without Jordanian forward bases for flushing Iraqi forces out of western Iraq. Iraqi units, especially the ones stationed at the H2 and H3 base complexes, are armed with a large quantity of long-range surface-to-surface missiles, some with chemical or biological warheads. They could inflict grave damage on the American advance on Baghdad and Tikrit if they remained to the rear of that advance, as well as threatening Israel. H2 and H3 will most likely vanish at zero hour plus .01. From Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon, the monarch also received reaffirmation through secret emissaries of Israel’s guarantee to defend Hashemite rule in Jordan, according to DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s sources in Washington and Jerusalem. This guarantee is embodied in the Jordan-Israel 1994 peace treaty and reinforced in secret bilateral military and intelligence pacts. OK, you've been helping, and your wife's a hottie. But Abdullah made an additional, surprising request: Access to Israeli television, as soon as the threat from Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction has passed, for a personal message of peace and conciliation between the Arab nation and the Jewish State. The responses in Jerusalem and Washington are not known, but have probably been deferred until after Israel’s general election next Tuesday, January 28. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s political sources interpret this as a move by the Jordanian monarch to set himself up as the senior Arab arbiter of the destiny of the Palestinians after Saddam’s passing further diminishes his long-time ally, Yasser Arafat. Abdullah cherishes hopes of reclaiming the authority over the West Bank and Arab Jerusalem, which his father, Hussein, forfeited by losing the 1967 war. Hummm, he would like the land back, and the palo's will be looking for new management.... |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #7 The problem with that is that the practice introduces infidel blood into the "pure Arab" dynasty. How you gonna be a master race, when your blood's been diluted? I'm surprised the Arab Street® has put up with it... |
| Posted by: Fred 2003-01-28 07:43:06 |
| #6 A buddy of mine went to boarding school in New England with Abdullah and said that he was a pretty regular guy and a very decent wrestler, sports-wise. Guys like him, we can only hope, will be the salvation of these Middle East Goofocracies. Also, I agree that the Jordanian Royal Family knows how to select 'Babe-a-lonians'. |
| Posted by: JDB 2003-01-28 03:54:57 |
| #5 Apropos of not much, there was a glorious AP color photo of Queen Noor when she was here while her husband was dying. She was out for a jog, in spandex, from behind. I felt kinda bad about liking it so much. I couldn't find it online and lost the paper original, alas ... |
| Posted by: Dan Hartung 2003-01-28 01:22:18 |
| #4 Okay, first of all, anyone have a link on the lovely Queen Rania? I can't imagine that Israel would give east Jerusalem back to Abdullah, and Abdullah would be assasinated within days if he took back most of the West Bank but failed to get the Dome of the Rock back into exclusively Muslim hands. Don't think this is going to happen, though I'm comfortable with the idea that Israel prefers Abdullah to some crazed Paleo usurping the throne. Finally, how are we going to deduct expenses from the Iraqi oil trust without the rest of the world, including the NYT and WaPo, seriously pissed? That would seem to confirm all the bleating about "it's the oil." Strikes me that any assessment would have to be modest, and then what's the point? |
| Posted by: Steve White 2003-01-28 00:54:59 |
| #3 >> Hmm... Letting Jordan retake West Bank might not be the worst among all alternatives,but Abdullah might want to watch what he is getting himself into.His dad almost got himself killed in the 70's for thinking he could get along with Arafat and his thugs.<< And his grandfather, for whom he is named, did get himself assassinated at Al-Aqsa because he was too willing to make peace with the Jews. As the Arab rulers go, Abdullah's a long way from being the worst of them, to be sure. Datum: Jordan is the ONLY Arab - let alone Muslim - nation that I know of in which the female royals (e.g., the truly scrumptious Queen Rania) are given a genuinely prominent public role. Not to mention the high visibility of Queen Mother Noor, Abdullah's stepmother and another hottie (his birth mother, Queen Alia, yet another blonde beauty, died tragically in a helo accident in 1977) - and Noor, nee Lisa Halaby, is an American by birth (her father was JFK's FAA chief and CEO of Pan Am). Abdullah thinks very highly of Noor, else why would he have styled her Queen Mother? And more than that, where else in the Muslim world could such an event have taken place? |
| Posted by: Joe 2003-01-27 17:40:46 |
| #2 I can't figure why Jordan would want it. I thought the Israelis were keeping it because they couldn't give it back... But since Bush is on record as favoring a Paleostinian state, it'd kind of have to be on the West Bank, unless they walled off Gaza and called that Paleostine. |
| Posted by: Fred 2003-01-27 16:36:07 |
| #1 Hmm... Letting Jordan retake West Bank might not be the worst among all alternatives,but Abdullah might want to watch what he is getting himself into.His dad almost got himself killed in the 70's for thinking he could get along with Arafat and his thugs. |
| Posted by: El Id 2003-01-27 16:12:32 |