Over the last year, when the U.S. or one of its allies was poised to take a significant military action against #Iran's regime and its proxies, strange things have happened.
Anonymous U.S. officials appeared in media outlets trying to distance Tehran from an attack. We saw this…
#10
It is hard for me to discern whether our government hates the Jews more than it hates the American people.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
10/20/2024 13:00 Comments ||
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#11
Per RedState Managing Editor Jennifer Van Laar, a U.S. intelligence source has indicated the documents in question were leaked from the Pentagon’s office of low-intensity/special operations — notably, the office where Ariane Tabatabai works. - Insty post.
I'd highly to reassign the entire office to Fort Wainwright, AK. It's just coming into its season right now.
#12
#11 is likely a result of #3-but I submit it is tiny formatting or punctuation errata that works better than content for tracking. In any event, what is done to the leaker is what matters. If you cannot severely discipline those who have access to our closest secrets, you can never be trustworthy.
[JPost] More than anything, Nasrallah’s final, fatal misstep reveals a fascinating strategic deception that had been in the works for months.
It happened in August 2006, right after the signing of the ceasefire agreement with Israel at the end of the Second Lebanon War. Hezbollah’s Secretary-General, Hassan Nasrallah, gave an interview to the Lebanese news network New TV—an interview that would be remembered for generations. Sitting comfortably in his bunker beneath the streets of Beirut’s Dahiya, the leader of the terrorist organization admitted that he and the Jihad Council, Hezbollah’s supreme body, had made a serious miscalculation.
"We did not estimate, even by one percent, that the kidnapping of IDF soldiers (Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev) would lead to a war of this magnitude with Israel," Nasrallah confessed, adding, "Had we known that the kidnapping operation would lead to such a result, we would not have undertaken it at all."
Despite this blunder, Nasrallah managed to maintain his reputation for 18 years as the Middle East’s foremost expert on Israeli society—at least until recent months. Then, the tables turned. Nasrallah, along with most members of Hezbollah’s Jihad Council, met their fate under Israeli Air Force bombs. They are no longer around to grasp, for a second time, the scale of their error. Perhaps Yahya Sinwar, eliminated this week by the IDF in Rafah after a year-long manhunt, could have enlightened them.
Hezbollah now has only a fraction of its 122mm rockets, capable of reaching Haifa, and a similar percentage of rockets that can reach Tel Aviv. It is believed that Hezbollah now holds less than a third of its stockpile of precision missiles and long-range rockets, which cover the entirety of Israel.
Following the events of October 7, Nasrallah made another poor decision—one that, two weeks ago, became clear as his last major mistake. He tied Hezbollah's fate to Hamas in Gaza and launched a war. This move speaks volumes about the mentality on the Israeli side as well. Over the past two decades, both Israel’s political leadership and the IDF General Staff hesitated to confront the Shi’ite terrorist group, often choosing to delay war or strong retaliation to attacks, even at the cost of allowing Hezbollah’s disproportionate growth and a decline in deterrence.
But more than anything, Nasrallah’s final, fatal misstep reveals a fascinating strategic deception that had been in the works for months, led by the IDF's Operations Directorate. This deception ultimately led to Israel’s official declaration: the Nasrallah era is over.
Oh, those tricksy juices! Never do they play fair with those who merely wish to murder them all.
Nasrallah’s assumption was straightforward: he believed Israel would not expand the war against Hezbollah or launch a ground maneuver in Lebanon as long as Hamas held 101 hostages in Gaza and the 162nd Division was still fighting in the Strip.
It seems Nasrallah thought that if Israel’s policy toward Hezbollah were to change, there would be clear signs, and he would notice them. He believed he could detect early indicators of a ground invasion, such as IDF preparations along the border and movements of Lebanese civilians. But the IDF, understanding his thought process, deliberately changed the sequence of actions to confuse him—a move that paid off.
In recent months, Nasrallah seemed unfazed by the reduced fighting in Gaza and unconvinced by the Israeli government's threats and senior IDF officials' warnings to stop rocket fire on Israel’s home front. What sealed his fate was his speech about a "war of attrition" against Israel.
Like the rest of the IDF General Staff, the Operations Directorate was caught off guard on October 7 and shared in the historic and bitter failure. But this time, they were ready with a detailed, creative operational plan, which included several "ladders" for Nasrallah to climb down from his position. During critical moments, senior General Staff officers exchanged meaningful glances, knowing: if Nasrallah didn’t internalize Israel’s resolve, the IDF's actions against Hezbollah would escalate, leading to increasingly painful blows.
The guiding principle was to proceed gradually but to skillfully expose Hezbollah’s most sensitive areas and destroy them. Security officials explained that such a revolutionary plan required out-of-the-box thinking, relying on high-quality intelligence from the Intelligence Directorate, the precision and timing of the Air Force, and synchronizing all these components with the "war clock" overseen by the Operations Directorate
The framework, objectives, and thresholds for the operation were set by the head of the Operations Directorate, Maj.-Gen. Oded Basiuk. The responsibility for ensuring the synchronization and accuracy of various strikes was given to Brig.-Gen. R., head of the Attack Division, one of the Air Force’s most experienced fighter pilots. He had previously commanded a fighter squadron and the Fire Center of the Southern Command and had been marked early in his career as a future general.
In the IDF’s target bank were several critical clusters for attack: Hezbollah’s senior leadership, top commanders and field leaders, the organization’s weapons arsenal—particularly its strategic systems—terror infrastructure such as launch sites, warehouses, and command centers, and finally, intelligence and command and control sites. Thus, the operation unfolded, blow after blow:
THE DEADLY DOMINO AGAINST HEZBOLLAH
July 30: The operation began with the assassination of Fuad Shukr, also known as Al-Hajj Mohsen—Hezbollah’s de facto chief of staff and member of the Jihad Council, responsible for the organization's strategic systems and its precision missile project. His elimination in Dahiya, Beirut, marked a turning point.
August 25: A broad preemptive strike took place, severely degrading Hezbollah's capabilities in a short period, destroying launchers aimed at central Israel. This attack was made possible by high-quality intelligence from the Intelligence Directorate and precision execution by the Air Force, with seamless coordination through the Operations Directorate’s Attack Division.
September 5: Daily waves of attacks began, targeting hundreds of Hezbollah’s rocket launchers. A critical mass was building, while Hezbollah was left confused and struggling to form a coherent picture of the IDF’s true intentions.
September 17-18: Two dramatic strikes, attributed to Israel, took place. One involved "beepers" exploding in the hands, pockets, and faces of Hezbollah operatives. A similar attack targeted their radios, turning them into bombs in an instant. This neutralized thousands of Hezbollah operatives and left hundreds of commanders blinded.
September 20: The IDF eliminated Ibrahim Aqil, Hezbollah's head of operations and de facto chief of staff after Shukr’s assassination. Several senior members of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force were also killed in the strike.
September 23: Operation Northern Arrows was launched across Lebanon, which the IDF General Staff described as a groundbreaking campaign. So far, the IDF has demonstrated intelligence and aerial superiority, but the Attack Division faced significant challenges in synchronizing such a massive operation. During one dramatic strike, Hezbollah was bombarded from the air for 15 continuous hours, targeting strategic capabilities such as surface-to-surface missiles, surface-to-air missiles, anti-ship missiles, and drones.
September 27: In a targeted killing that shook the Middle East, Israel settled the score with Hassan Nasrallah and other top Hezbollah leaders. Nasrallah, who failed to grasp Israel's accumulated achievements and insisted on pushing forward, met his end.
Despite these heavy blows, and perhaps because of them, Hezbollah did not remain idle. In response, it expanded its rocket range and drone operations to the Haifa area and, after a period of adjustment, began focusing its efforts on central Israel. At the same time, the impact of the strikes could not be denied: a turning point in the war forced Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah to refine their arms smuggling routes to Beirut.
According to Israeli estimates, Hezbollah now has only a fraction of its 122mm rockets, capable of reaching Haifa, and a similar percentage of rockets that can reach Tel Aviv. It is believed that Hezbollah now holds less than a third of its stockpile of precision missiles and long-range rockets, which cover the entirety of Israel.
Security officials praised the multi-stage plan of the Operations Directorate, which prevented Nasrallah from predicting where the next blow would come from or estimating its scale. This element of surprise allowed Israel to achieve significant progress against the terrorist organization, which now feels exposed and hunted.
That’s because it is exposed and hunted.
Above all, the plan deprived Nasrallah of the ability to detect early signs of what was coming. As one security official put it, "Hezbollah can still challenge the IDF and Israel’s home front, given the organization’s 30-year buildup, but it’s too late for Nasrallah to understand what we’ve done. Out of the 12 members of the Jihad Council, only two remain."
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/20/2024 00:00 ||
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[IsraelTimes] As tensions with Tehran escalate, Alma Center pundits urge drying up the supply of weapons to Shiite terror group; warn that terrorists could lay hands on Assad’s chemical arsenal
In early September, Israeli special forces reportedly carried out a raid on a weapons facility in the Masyaf area in northwestern Syria, killing at least 14 people and wounding 43.
According to international media and unconfirmed Hebrew-language reports, the operation was particularly daring. Security sources quoted by Greek Middle East expert Eva Koulouriotis state that Israeli helicopters reportedly did not land but instead hovered above the target as special forces rappelled down ropes, landed on the ground, seized equipment and documents and destroyed the structure.
The site had been targeted various times in the past. The Masyaf area houses facilities of the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Center, known by its French acronym CERS (Centre d’études et de recherches scientifiques), which has branches throughout Syria.
Israeli experts say the CERS network was converted into a military structure in the hands of Iran. The Masyaf area in particular hosts six sites of CERS’s Institute 4000, which focuses on the development and production of the precision middle-range projectiles used by Hezbollah.
In a position paper published in March, the Israeli Alma Research and Education Center, a nonprofit funded by private donations that focuses on security on Israel’s northern border, recommended a wide-scale strike on all CERS facilities in Syria. In a recent interview with The Times of Israel, Tal Beeri, the director of Alma’s Research Department, who served for decades in IDF intelligence units, reiterated the advice, in light of the ground offensive the IDF has launched in Leb ...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers... , and escalating tensions with Tehran.
The CERS network officially serves as Syria’s national military industry apparatus, and employs around 20,000 people among researchers, engineers and military officers in at least 18 facilities spread throughout the country, according to the Alma Center.
The specialized CERS Institute 4000 produces UAVs, bombs and propellant fuels, and also works to upgrade the military capabilities of other Iran-backed militias in Syria and Lebanon, Alma wrote in a recent report.
In recent years, Iran ...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate JewsZionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol... has reportedly extended its control over CERS and Institute 4000 in particular, with the dual goals of developing a better arsenal for its proxies and significantly shortening the weapons supply chain to Hezbollah.
"Delivering missiles by land from Iran through Iraq and Syria can take days, and the deliveries are exposed to Israeli Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... s on the way," said Beeri. "By sea, the shipping takes 11 days, and by air, the amounts that can be sent are limited."
"CERS has become a strategic asset for Tehran, as it saves the logistical effort of transferring weapons from Iran. In addition, Iran sees it as a ’growth engine’ for the development and production of weapons such as precision missiles and drones for Hezbollah and militias in Syria," Beeri said.
The March position paper recommended a wide-scale strike on all Syria-based CERS facilities because such an attack would "greatly affect Hezbollah’s efforts to recover, rearm and restore its military capabilities," Beeri said.
Furthermore, it would send a strong signal to the Islamic Theocratic Republic, as tensions escalate between Jerusalem and Tehran following the October 1 massive launch of about 200 ballistic missiles from Iran at Israel.
Beeri said it is not clear why such a large-scale preemptive attack on CERS sites has not yet been conducted, adding that some of the facilities are located underground.
The September raid of the Masyaf CERS center that many attribute to Israel was probably "significant" even though its exact scope is unknown, Beeri said. But all strikes against the weapons research and development network have been "attempts to contain the fire, not to extinguish it."
"The strikes have not undermined Tehran’s determination," he added.
The main site of Institute 4000 in the Masyaf area had already been severely damaged in an airstrike attributed to Israel in August 2022. Syrian media reported that firefighting aircraft had been scrambled to extinguish the fires in the area, which were still burning nearly two days after the attack, suggesting the presence of flammable chemicals.
Determined to pursue its use of the structure, Iran almost immediately took on the reconstruction of the site, contracting construction companies connected to its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to the Alma Center.
ASSAD’S CHEMICAL WEAPONS IN HEZBOLLAH’S HANDS
Chemical weapons are an integral part of the Syrian regime’s arsenal, even though the country committed to their destruction in 2013 by joining the Chemical Weapons Convention.
According to international reports, Assad’s army has used them against rebels in the years after its alleged disarmament, and as recently as 2018 in Douma, outside Damascus. Some of its anti-insurgency operations involved the use of the lethal Sarin nerve gas.
"We cannot exclude a scenario where these substances fall into the hands of Hezbollah. It’s not very likely but it’s possible," Beeri said. The Alma Center published a report on this scenario in August.
The use of such substances by Hezbollah is not considered probable at the current stage because their handling and storage require specific facilities and know-how.
"We know for sure that Syria has them, but we don’t know about Hezbollah," said Beeri.
However,
some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them... if the Lebanese terror group was bent on conducting chemical warfare against Israel, it would have other options.
"Chlorine, for instance, is a very primitive substance, commonly used for civilian and industrial purposes. It can be easily obtained, easily stored and inserted inside the heads of mortar shells and rockets, and it’s lethal. Even ISIS in Syria used it against Assad forces," said Beeri.
SMUGGLING ROUTES INTO LEBANON
Another way for Israel to prevent projectiles manufactured in Syria from falling into the hands of Hezbollah is to cut off the supply chain that leads into Lebanon.
To that effect, the IDF recently conducted aerial strikes against border crossings between the two countries, chief among them the Masnaa crossing, located on the highway between Beirut and Damascus, to prevent trucks from using it while still allowing displaced people fleeing Lebanon into Syria to do so. Trucks transporting bugs and gas moving about in Syria? Who knew?
On October 4, the IDF also targeted a two-mile tunnel that crossed under the border and was used to smuggle weapons to Hezbollah.
However,
some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them... the Shiite terror group still has "enormous amounts of weapons" at its disposal, stockpiled in various locations throughout Lebanon, Beeri said.
"Even Hamas ..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,... today, one year into the war, still manages to launch missiles sporadically. Even with the army inside the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... Strip, it still manages to produce some small amounts of projectiles," Beeri said.
Hezbollah entered the war with far larger stockpiles of weapons than Hamas, distributed over a much larger area than the Gaza Strip, and will be able to sustain a war of attrition with Israel for a long time.
"Even after the outbreak of the war, we know that Hezbollah continued to receive Iranian weapons. They fired brand-new Almas missiles manufactured in 2023," the expert added.
"We need to halt the supply chain in order to start to dry up the swamp of Hezbollah’s arsenal, but it will be a very long-term effort," he said.
#3
Beo is right and we knew, despite the press lies, that the weapons facilities, at least the mobile ones, were moved. I hope Israel cleans up on this before they stop. When you attack an objective you dont stop when you get to it, you fight through it and decimate any remains. Infantry 101...
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
10/20/2024 11:51 Comments ||
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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.
..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,...
