An imam of the Prophetâs Mosque in Madinah yesterday lashed out against âinfidelsâ whom he accused of being bent on the destruction of Muslim societies. âThe enemies of Islam including the Jews, Christians and atheists and those who follow the Westernized and the corrupt (in Muslim) society are waging relentless campaigns against the Muslim nation,â Saleh Al-Budair said in the Friday sermon. âUsing various methods to further their aims, they want to destabilize the Muslim nation, destroying its morality, obliterating its identity and preventing it from fulfilling its message,â the imam said. That message being submit or die.
Sheikh Al-Budair said Muslims had allowed âinfidel nationsâ to take over their societies and dictate to them what they should do. âIt is extremely regrettable that many Muslims have opened their countries, their businesses, their homes and their hearts to those alien trends and handed over their societies to the infidel nations who deviated from the right path,â he told thousands of faithful who thronged the mosque complex. He said Muslims must protect the sanctity of their religion and not be carried away by âdeviant ideasâ. Instead they must stick to the Shariah. Muslims âare too honorable, noble and righteous to imitate or copy corrupt, miserable and confused infidel nations that are only concerned with pursuing their own lusts and that are ready to stake their own life in order to enjoy pleasures and delights,â the imam said. Non-Muslim translation: Freedom is sinful. It is a unholy lust.
Al-Budair warned following non-Muslim examples was the road to perdition but added Muslims, equipped with the best of teachings, were capable of fighting their enemies.
#1
maybe our infiltrated hit teams' carefully selected targets should postpone/reshuffle on Nayef - target this asshole first, just for grins?
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 20:57 Comments ||
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#2
These 'Royal' Saudi lice have been playing US & the entire world for suckers for far too long.
Let the House of Wahhabi fall and fall hard, by the very beast they created, then we run the show, not allowing one more drop of Saudi crude to be utilized for the cause of jihad.
Nine Yemeni soldiers and 46 extremists have been killed in some four days of clashes in the Saada province near the border with Saudi Arabia, the interior ministry said Friday. Dozens of soldiers and supporters of firebrand preacher Hussein Badr Eddin al-Huthi were also wounded in the fighting, which began late last Sunday in the Hidane region, some 250 kilometres (150 miles) north of Sanaa, a statement said. Forty-three extremists were captured and are being questioned, it added.
I'll have to give the Yemenis credit, once they start a operation, they don't let go.
A ministry source, meanwhile, told the state news agency SABA that the extremists "used mortars, landmines and rocket-propelled grenades against the army." "The rebels in custody are being interrogated and justice will be brought to them," the source added.
Make sure you lock the door this time.
"The deviant defiant elements who broke the law and order under Huthiâs command are accused by the government of acts of vandalism including the hoisting of the flag of another country instead of the Yemeni flag," SABA said.
Saudi flag, perhaps?
Arms and ammunition were also seized from their hideouts. "Since security and military forces cordoned off the area, a number of the surrounded surrendered," the source said.
Yemenis also seem to understand surrounding people.
Yemeni authorities accuse Huthi of stirring trouble by organising anti-US demonstrations after weekly Muslim prayers on Fridays. His supporters have been branded "outlaws ... extremists and trouble-makers", and accused of opening fire on government institutions, breaking into mosques and "roughing up students to stop them from going to school."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 10:29:21 AM ||
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The deviant defiant elements who broke the law and order
I hate to come right out and say this but, these guys really do sound like evildooers.
A member of the Saudi National Guard shot dead two colleagues amid a wave of terror attacks sweeping the country, a report said on Friday, while quoting an officer as saying the incident was âpersonalâ.
"Mahmoud, y'r a blasted infidel!"
"I take that personal, Ahmed!" [BANG!]
The incident at the guardsmenâs base in northern Riyadh has âno relation to terrorism; it is a personal issue,â the Saudi Gazette quoted the unnamed officer as saying. âMajor Abdul Rahman al-Khateeb and Lieutenant Khaled Saeed al-Joaid were killed when their colleague, Deputy Sergeant Saad Misfer al-Qahtani, entered their office with a machine-gun and allegedly shot them with 10 bullets,â the English-language daily said. Khateeb died instantly while Joaid later succumbed to his wounds in hospital. âAnother official with the National Guard, who also asked for anonymity, said that Qahtani might be under the influence of drugs,â Saudi Gazette said. Qahtani turned himself in to police and authorities launched an investigation.
"Khalid, have you determined the cause of death yet?"
"I'm still investigating, effendi!"
The motive for the crime has yet to be established, it said. The paper quoted unspecified sources as saying police found a message written by the suspected killer and addressed to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, who heads the National Guard. Saudi officials this week dismissed reports that the security services could have been infiltrated by suspected Islamist extremists.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 10:14:06 AM ||
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#2
â...no relation to terrorism; it is a personal issue,â...
"Hey, business is business. You know dat. I know dat. I shot ya 'cause it was personal. I don't like ya, so I filled ya full uh lead."
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 12:21 Comments ||
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#3
"they disparaged my moustache. What else could I do?"
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 12:34 Comments ||
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#4
They are always either "deviants" or under the influence of drugs. Never responsible for their own actions!
Do you think that the contents of the "deviant's" message will ever be known to the public? When pigs fly!
#5
Obviously Deputy Sergeant al-Qahtani read the reports that the security services "could have" been infiltrated by suspected Islamist extremists, got angry at the nuancing, and took it out on his superiors.
Britain and Ireland set a deadline Friday to revive Northern Ireland's power-sharing arrangement by September or see the six-year peace process scuttled.
Yeah, setting a deadline, that'll do it.
... and if they don't make the deadline, by golly, there's another one where that came from!
Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern could offer no signs of progress after meeting Northern Irish faction leaders in London, but said a breakthrough must come soon. "I think that there is a real recognition ... that it's time to come to the point of decision and make up our minds one way or another, so that at the end of this negotiation we either have a concluded agreement that allows everyone to move forward together or alternatively we are going to have to find a different way," Blair told reporters. "In September, if we can't find a way to make this process work ... we would then conclude that we can't really make progress in the way we've envisaged," he said.
Maybe you need a roadmap? I know where you can find one nobody's using.
"Faith, Mike! An' what kinda roadmap is this?"
"I dunno, Pat. Where's Sheboygan?"
Ahern said: "We're not there now, but we have to in September."
Or what, exactly?
"Or, um, something."
"It would be bad."
"How bad?"
"Very bad."
"As bad as crossing the beams?"
"Not that bad."
Northern Ireland's power-sharing local government, set up under the historic 1998 Good Friday peace agreement, has been suspended since October 2002. Elections since then gave victories to hard-line mainly Roman Catholic nationalists, who oppose British rule of the province, and mainly Protestant unionists, who support it. Any deal to revive devolution would involve new peace commitments and acts of disarmament from the Irish Republican Army nationalist militia, in return for the scaling back of Britain's military presence and an amnesty for guerrillas. Hard-line unionists have refused to serve in a power-sharing government alongside the IRA's political front allies, Sinn Fein.
Sniff, smells like quagmire to me. Maybe John Kerry could help, he was in Vietnam, you know.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 11:24:01 AM ||
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In September? That's a long way away. Other peace roadmaps may tempt the IRA in the summer sun. Will we see them in September? Or loose them to a summer bomb?
LONDON (AP) - U.S. plans to use a military tribunal to prosecute terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is unacceptable because it would not provide a fair trial by international standards, Britain's attorney general said. "There are certain principles on which there can be no compromise," Lord Goldsmith said in copy of a speech he planned to make to the International Criminal Law Association on Friday. "Fair trial is one of those, which is the reason we in the UK have been unable to accept that the U.S. military tribunals proposed for those detained at Guantanamo Bay offer sufficient guarantees of a fair trial in accordance with international standards."
"International standards": is that the same sort of oxymoron as "United Nations Human Rights Commission"?
Two of the four British nationals still held at Camp Delta - Feroz Abbasi of London, and Moazzam Begg of Birmingham - were among Bush's initial list of six people to be tried by the tribunal. In the past, Goldsmith and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw have said the United States should either try the British detainees at Guantanamo in accordance with international standards or return them to their homeland. Straw has said "the military commissions as presently constituted would not provide the process which we would afford British nationals."
So advise your nationals not to be taken prisoner while fighting the US in far-off lands.
The United States says the prisoners are "enemy combatants" not prisoners of war, and can be tried by military tribunals. But human rights groups wholly in thrall to the LLL have called the detentions is unlawful.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/25/2004 12:32:09 AM ||
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#1
Sometimes the Brits are woefully, well, European. We should hold our ground on this, as it is precedent setting.
Posted by: Capt America ||
06/25/2004 0:43 Comments ||
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#2
How many of the detainees are Poms? I say send the Poms to the UK and let their government deal with them. The rest get the tribunal.
#3
Earlier tis year 4 or 5 were sent back to the UK. They were completely unrepentant but Brits let them go. Want to bet the UK government now spends 1-2 million pounds a year watching these jihadis?
Posted by: ed ||
06/25/2004 2:00 Comments ||
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#4
Lol! The egalitarian Lord Goldsmith, huh? Fascinating.
#6
Moazzam Begg lost any protection afforded by the UK the moment he thought he was a hard boy and joined the Taleban. The sensible voice on the UK street is fairly pro-Gitmo.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
06/25/2004 4:13 Comments ||
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#7
Forgive my ignorance, what's a 'Pom'? Thank you.
#8
A people who have invented plenty of sports, but are unable to win in any of them.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
06/25/2004 8:52 Comments ||
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#9
Pom = Aussie name for Brits - 'Strewth! bloody whingeing poms!'
PM: Quite.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
06/25/2004 9:00 Comments ||
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#10
International Criminal Law Association.
So when the "association" meets, they sit around and discuss the fiction that is "international criminal law"?
I guess if you repeat something often enough it comes true. Or at least in LLL land it does.
Posted by: Chris W. ||
06/25/2004 11:01 Comments ||
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#11
It seems to me that Britain's AG needs to worry about his own back yard, with many people of the caliber of Hookboy running amuck. The two in gitmo will not cause the UK government any problems, and they have meals and a cot that are paid for by others. Maybe he should quit kneejerking to the LLL and take care of business in his own country, which is being infiltrated as we speak by a 5th column the size of a semi.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 12:27 Comments ||
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#12
Howard: Condolences on yesterday. That had to hurt.
Posted by: Matt ||
06/25/2004 13:37 Comments ||
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Following the execution of Korean hostage Kim Sun-il by militants in Iraq, the mosque in Hannam-dong, central Seoul, received bomb and arson threats and has been put under police guard as a potential target of attacks by angry citizens. Police built a security guard around the mosque to prevent any outrage that may be spurred by anti-Islamic feelings among Koreans. About 15 police officers are standing guard at the mosque entrance. Hwang Eui-gab, secretary general of the Korea Muslim Federation, said that he had to deal with more than 50 phone calls from angry citizens who heard about Kimâs death and some had threatened to bomb or set fire to the mosque. "One outraged citizen even called at the office and asked where he could find some Iraqi people on whom he wanted to take revenge," he said. "I explained to everybody who called that the incident has nothing to do with the mosque and our worshippers. Although I am one of millions of Koreans who are greatly saddened by the loss, I believe Muslims residing in Korea shouldnât be targets of terror in return."
The ever-popular "wudn't me" defense...
Around 100,000 foreign Muslims live in Korea and a further 35,000 Koreans follow the Muslim faith. Hwang said there are eight mosques in Korea. "I feel so terrible for what happened in Iraq," said Faruk Zunbul, a 44-year-old Muslim from Turkey. He urged Korean people not to blame his religion or its believers.
Bet he doesn't feel nearly as bad as Kim Sun-Il did. And why shouldn't anyone blame his religion or its believers? They're killing people in the name of that very religion...
"I donât think the terrorists in Iraq understood the true teachings from the Quran, which says murder is the greatest sin that men can commit.
... "if they're horribly out-numbered, like we are here in Korea"...
"Itâs never acceptable in our religion. This tragedy has nothing to do with the Islamic faith. Itâs human beings who made this disaster happen, not religion," he said.
"They just happened to be rolling their eyes and shrieking about Islam at the time..."
"But most Muslims here didnât feel in immediate danger because of Kimâs murder. "There could be a possibility (of danger caused by Koreans), but I donât think anything serious will happen," said Ali Mohammed, a Pakistani businessman in his 30s.
"I mean, these people are nowhere near as mindlessly violent as the folks back in Karachi. Of course, most of them aren't Muslims, either. Guess that could have something to do with it."
Talat, 37, a Pakistani worker at an aluminum-goods manufacturers agreed. "I feel bad about what happened to Korea. But nothing threatening has happened to us people during my one year here. Seoulâs quite a safe place," he said.
"Nothing like what you'd find in a Muslim country. I dunno what's why that is..."
Near the mosque is Itaewon, an area frequently visited by the U.S. forces in Korea and foreign residents. Asked about the death of Kim Sun-il, two female soldiers refused to comment. "We are not allowed to mention anything about this in" one of them said and hurried on her way to carry on shopping.
Following the execution of Korean hostage Kim Sun-il by militants in Iraq, the mosque in Hannam-dong, central Seoul, received bomb and arson threats and has been put under police guard as a potential target of attacks by angry citizens.
Sorry, can't help you. My sympathy meter broke a couple of years ago, and parts for repair seem to be unavailable.
The only store that carried them was located in the World Trade Center.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 18:26 Comments ||
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#4
My sympathy meter's busted, too. Would you like to share my crying towel?
Posted by: Fred ||
06/25/2004 19:52 Comments ||
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#5
Thanks, Fred, but I laid in an extra supply last year. They're special, too - made just for crocodile tears.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 20:47 Comments ||
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EFNews - see also NK threat to test a nuke post
Early Friday, China canceled a scheduled closing ceremony for the talks. A Chinese government spokesman gave no reason. "The meeting will end, but there will be no closing ceremony," said a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry office. He would give only his surname, Wang. The United States has been insisting on complete disarmament by the communist state and submitted a proposal to the conference on Wednesday outlining the benefits North Korea could receive if it complies. The senior administration official said the North Korean threat suggested that the Beijing discussions were headed toward failure.
Kim must not have gotten the Chinese memo. Time to reign in their attack poodle
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 10:07:58 AM ||
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#1
The Chinese have stipulated that the North Koreans, to avoid further embarassing statements, will be represented at all future talks by mimes.
#2
If a Nork mime was hit and killed by a falling tree in the woods, and nobody heard it, would anyone care?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 12:30 Comments ||
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#3
only the starving peasants who want that fresh bark
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 12:41 Comments ||
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#4
Early Friday, China canceled a scheduled closing ceremony for the talks.
I think you're all missing the point here. The "closing ceremony" talks are being cancelled because China readily anticipates these negotiations as being endless. How do you have a "closing ceremony" for interminable stalling?
The time has come to actively encourage South Korean and Japanese nuclear arms development. China should be made to face the dangerous and realistic consequences of proliferating nuclear technology in their neighborhood. They've been crapping on their own doorstep for far too long.
#6
The time has come to actively encourage South Korean and Japanese nuclear arms development.
Hell, give 'em some of our older warheads for cheap. Two birds can be killed with one stone that way; they get weapons to counter Kimmie's, and we in effect "reduce" the number of nukes in our inventory.
#7
The time has come to actively encourage South Korean and Japanese and Taiwanese nuclear arms development ...
Posted by: A Jackson ||
06/25/2004 23:33 Comments ||
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#8
'Detënte' is the only way to go short of total engagement. MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) will force the Norks to back down to a more conventional "in your face" confrontation; but at that point, it's a***oles & elbows anyway!
Posted by: Super Hose ||
06/25/2004 03:37 ||
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#1
Too little too late, jerky. Just hurry up and get your troops over here to give us a hand.
Posted by: Chris W. ||
06/25/2004 12:20 Comments ||
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#2
The public reaction -- of violent outrage and desire for mujihidin bloodshed -- combined with the troop deployment (even if it's in August) will suffice, thank you very much, Chris W. :-D
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
06/26/2004 10:16 Comments ||
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A teacher at an Aichi Prefecture high school has come under fire for asking students what they thought of the dispatch of the Self-Defense Forces to Iraq in a test then giving them zero if they agreed with the dispatch, it has been learned. Komeito party member Takeyuki Kojima brought attention to the controversial test question at an education committee meeting of the Aichi Prefectural assembly. The prefectural education board has acknowledged that the teacher gave students the question, and ordered the school where he works to improve its practices. Board officials said the midterm history examination in which the question was made has held last month. The teacher, who was in charge of history, made questions for his class outside the list of regular test questions, on what they thought of the Iraq war. After the test, the teacher handed out a list of sample answers and the points awarded for each one. "Vulgar answers" in which students wrote they supported the dispatch of Self-Defense Forces or found a problem with the question were marked zero. "Model answers" in which students opposed the dispatch, however, were given five points. The prefectural board of education received complaints from studentsâ caregivers after the test. The teacher subsequently promised that he would not add any marks for the questions.
Posted by: TS(vice girl) ||
06/25/2004 1:19:36 AM ||
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Being given a zero by a zero shoud be a badge of honor.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
06/25/2004 4:13 Comments ||
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#2
A wise education professor once taught that teachers should obey four rules: do not offend your students; do not offend their parents; do not offend your peers in the faculty and the administration; and above all, do not use your teaching podium as a soapbox.
Not surprisingly, those teachers who object to these rules on the grounds that it violates their "rights" are poor teachers anyway. For they never want to teach, they want a captive audience for their diatribes and rants.
They want to piss off their students and their parents because they equate anger with learning. They want to piss off their peers and administration to prove how important and valuable they think they are.
But most of all they want to force their opinions on others instead of doing their job.
Which is as unwanted, in its way, as a policeman who stops you in your car to make you listen to his political opinions.
#3
sounds like the asshat needs a sabbatical in Fallujah
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 10:43 Comments ||
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#4
do not offend your students; do not offend their parents; do not offend your peers in the faculty and the administration; and above all, do not use your teaching podium as a soapbox
I've offended plenty of students, parents and especially administration. ;)
#6
Anon, what do you expect? The Teachers Union has been ruining our public education system for years.
Its illegal to fire or even reprimand these 'preachers' thanks to the union. They have a captive audience of impressionable young minds and no accountability. Hell, here you can't even audit the school districts (its illegal!).
Here in Washington state they have an initiative now to take 1% of the sales tax for 'education' (meaning 'throw more money at the problem -- and the teachers union and the problems will magically go away!).
Throwing money at the teachers union won't fix the problem. Utterly Destroying the teachers union will fix the problem.
Dont get me wrong - unions *have* done good in the past but now most of them are parasites.
North Korea told the United States on Thursday that it would test a nuclear weapon unless Washington accepted Pyongyang's proposal for a freeze on its atomic program, a senior administration official said.
So could Japan, for that matter. And Taiwan.
Vice Foreign Minister Kim Gye Gwan spoke with Assistant Secretary of State James A. Kelly in a 2 1/2-hour private discussion in China, where a six-nation conference is being held on the long-running impasse over Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions. The senior administration official said the North Korean threat suggested that the Beijing discussions were headed toward failure. The conference ends on Friday with the issuance of a communique. There was no indication of when North Korea might carry out its reported threat to test. The United States is uncertain as to how many weapons North Korea possesses, but thinks it has at least one or two with the potential for several more. Near the end of their discussion, Kelly told Kim that there was little trust in Washington for North Korea and that Kim's statements wouldn't improve matters, the senior official said.
The NKors are still acting like little big men.
Thursday's discussion with Kim was not the first time that a North Korean diplomat issued a nuclear test threat. A similar warning came during a meeting between North Korean diplomat Ri Gun and Kelly 14 months ago, also in Beijing. During a closed plenary meeting on Thursday, North Korea demanded massive energy aid in exchange for a nuclear freeze, the Kyodo news agency of Japan reported, citing diplomatic sources. The report said Pyongyang asked for 2,000 megawatts of power per year - an estimated one-fourth of its current total consumption. In the United States, a megawatt can supply power to about 1,000 homes.
This means that the total power consumption in an average NKor home is about a 10 watt light bulb.
Boucher refused comment on the reported proposal. "The most concrete...and specific proposal on the table is that made by the United States yesterday with the support of other governments who were there," Boucher said. "We look to the North Koreans to study that proposal seriously," he said. Kim said earlier during the conference that his government has been developing nuclear weapons for protection from possible U.S. attack. "If the United States gives up its hostile policy toward us ... we are prepared to give up in a transparent way all plans related to nuclear weapons," he said. Both Japan and South Korea say they would consider giving the North fuel oil if it freezes its nuclear program as a step toward its eventual dismantling. Russia would be willing to help provide energy aid and security guarantees, said Russian envoy Alexander Alexeyev, according to the Russian news agency ITAR-Tass. The report did not say what conditions Russia might attach to that offer.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/25/2004 12:27:45 AM ||
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The NoKos are incurable a-holes. More blackmail, pehaps Mad Albright could make a cameo visit and tweek the glorious leader on the ass.
Posted by: Capt America ||
06/25/2004 0:46 Comments ||
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#2
Russia would be willing to help provide energy aid and security guarantees, said Russian envoy Alexander Alexeyev, according to the Russian news agency ITAR-Tass.
Russia giving security guarantees on NK's behalf...he,he...yesterday it was Iran sticking out its tongue at us and today it's Iran's evil twin that's doing it. Then to make us feel better about this nonsense out of the woodwork pops our former enemy [whose blue eyes we should trust] to be the peace broker. This is like a Judith Viorst Terrible No Good Very Bad Day.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 0:46 Comments ||
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#3
Hey, NorKs, I got your test right here.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 0:51 Comments ||
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#4
we should call their hand and tell them go ahead test..then china's card will be called and japan will go nuke...not in the chicoms longterm interest....
Posted by: Dan ||
06/25/2004 0:53 Comments ||
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#5
During a closed plenary meeting on Thursday, North Korea demanded massive energy aid in exchange for a nuclear freeze...
This is the same thing that was proposed before, and the Norks welshed on the deal. Fooled one time shame on you. Fooled twice shame on me. Let the Chicoms or anyone else keep the Norks from going under with their own nickels.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 0:55 Comments ||
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#6
Just make sure they tell us when and where the test will be.
"Golly Kimmie, looks like you guys made a REAL nuke! We dont know how you got a 50MT Fusion yield out of a 10KT fission device. Too bad you wiped out all your research instruments and irradiated half your country..."
#7
North Korea told the United States on Thursday that it would test a nuclear weapon unless Washington accepted Pyongyang's proposal for a freeze on its atomic program, a senior administration official said.
"Freezing" the program means all of NK's facilities stay in place. Sorry buddy, no dice.
#9
this seems an obvious ploy for aid, why not compromise. let them do the testing at a place of our choosing and give them the wheat. are NK arms politically correct or should we just have it secured in a swiss safety deposit box?
#13
I echo your observation: if true, then lines / time wait will make it a non-starter... and I'll believe it when I see it.
Though I can picture mercenaries, er, excuse me bodyguard agencies set up - getting such "permits" - as long as Prince Nayef holds the franchise concession for KSA.
#15
Our tickets are for July 21st but I think there exists the possibility of moving up this date. Most families are leaving the first week of July, therefore a lot of seats might become available after that.
#16
I'd avoid doing anything on July 11. Call me superstitious, but it seems that AQ has a fondness for odd numbers and 11: 9/11: 3/11:
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 2:08 Comments ||
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#17
A4617 - Glad to hear you're so short. I dunno about empty seats, though...
I have a good friend who was up in the rarified air of NammyCo (now lolling about in decadent Asia with his wife - they left when I did, heh) and I've asked him to check with his Exec friends for a lowdown on the exodus. How bad now and any predictions they care to make. You know Nayef's statement didn't just pop out of a vacuum.
#21
Old Spook, you've made my day. Do you still have the circular slide rule weapons effects calculator that came in the back of the book? I've been away from it for awhile, but I think testing one of our old B53s set for ground burst on Kim's palace in Pyongyang might be appropriate.
#23
RWV---I have one of those handy-dandy Nuclear Blast Effects Computers, created by the Lovelace Foundation. Quite the macabre little circular slide rule. The back side is the most weird part, with red scales showing the amount of radiation and burn effects based upon calculations from the other side of the rule. I got mine from a late physicist at UW, but I have seen them on the ubiquitous EBAY.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 12:40 Comments ||
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#24
Mock my superstitious self if you want,#18, but with regards to ex-pats planning to exit Saudi Arabia, the sub-set discussion, if there is a choice on changing plane ticket dates, I'd do a pass on 7/11. Frank, however, you can still go to work because my crystal ball only works for S.A.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 12:55 Comments ||
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#25
I think the US should wait for the UN to get involved. We don't want to look like we are acting unilaterally. That would be Wrongâ¢.
Posted by: Chris W. ||
06/25/2004 13:05 Comments ||
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#26
Where exactly is he proposing to carry out this test? As malleable and expandable as it is, he is pushing even Bill Richardson's credultity. I know some previously irradiated land outside of Vegas he can use, but I don't think he can afford the rent. Anybody notice a million starving peasants with pick axes digging a big hole in NorK for an underground test? The hole will come in handy after the test to bury the same peasants who starved to death in the effort. We call that multi-tasking in the West. Did he pick up a bargain deserted island in the Pacific on e-bay recently? I did not know Marlon Brando was selling his.
#27
Heck, I figured if they're going to test it, they'll test it in South Korea. They won't have to worry about clean up then. I really like Old Spook's idea of 'boosting' their test a bit. That would be hilarious.
#30
has to be delivered by train. Next part of the scheme: how to build tracks from Pyongyang to Los Angeles....
D'oh!
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 16:04 Comments ||
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#31
My God this is frightening! 7/11. Is 7/11 the date that all the sleeper cells activate the "dirty-bomb Slurpee" from coast to coast in every 7/11 in the nation?
Saudis have donated almost $2.65 million to buy a mosque in Sydney for supporters of one of Australiaâs most hardline Islamic clerics. Saudi fundraiser Sheikh Muhammad Bin Abdullah Al-Dawish said that his campaign to raise money for the mosque had been successful after the intervention of the mufti of Saudi Arabia. Sheikh Al-Dawish told The Weekend Australian from Saudi Arabia that the mufti had "spoken to a few officials" and the money was raised. He said he did not know who was behind the mosque in Sydney and he had never visited Australia. But Muslims would always donate if they thought a mosque anywhere in the world was under threat of closure. "This is not unusual. People all through the Middle East would make donations if this happened in Canada or Australia," he said.
Articles have appeared in Arabic newspapers and websites overseas appealing for donations to help pay for the Sydney mosque, with warnings that Jews or Buddhists were trying to buy the site. Supporters of the project in Australia expressed surprise yesterday at Sheikh Al-Dawishâs comments, saying that no money had flowed through to them. Supporters of Sheikh Abdul Salam Mohammed Zoud are trying to raise funds before next monthâs settlement date for the mosque in the southwestern suburb of Belmore. Supporters paid a 10 per cent deposit for the property and two adjoining sites ahead of the auction in May. The mosque is around the corner from Sheikh Zoudâs small prayer hall, whose congregation includes Bilal Khazal, charged this month with compiling a jihad book that was likely to facilitate a terrorist act. French terror suspect Willie Brigitte was married at the prayer hall to former Australian soldier Melanie Brown before his deportation from Sydney late last year. Sheikh Zoud, who is among clerics teaching a fundamentalist form of Islam called Salafi, was unavailable for comment yesterday.
It is unclear if his growing congregation would move from the prayer hall after the settlement date to the larger mosque, which is currently closed. Supporter and Sydney-based cleric Moussaab Legha said he doubted the money for the mosque had been raised offshore because nobody from his community had heard about it. Sheikh Legha from the Voice of Islam radio station said locals were working hard to raise the money themselves. Advertisements were being played on the radio station and people were collecting donations in the streets. Sheikh Al-Dawish said he and two other clerics formed a committee in Saudi Arabia to raise the mosque money, with notices posted on Islamic websites and chatrooms. "The Islamic community is concerned about the Judaisation of the neighbourhood and a deposit has been paid in case the mosque is sold to the Jewish community," one of their notices says.
#1
The Islamic community is concerned about the Judaisation of the neighbourhood and a deposit has been paid in case the mosque is sold to the Jewish community," one of their notices says.
Oops, there goes the neighborhood "ahmed, theyre not, you know, OUR TYPE"
Is there really a neighborhood in Sydney thats going from muslim to Jewish????????
#2
"The Islamic community is concerned about the Judaisation of the neighbourhood and a deposit has been paid in case the mosque is sold to the Jewish community," one of their notices says.
How nice we have this "tude" in print. Perhaps PC thinking liberal Jews as well as the bleeding heart Christians in Australia will pay finally pay attention. We smug "civilized" Westerners can hug ourselves all we want about our marvie tolerance and belief that all cultures, all religions are equally wonderful and to be respected...and then the cold slap of the real world hits our pompous faces like a cold noodle...
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 15:54 Comments ||
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#3
bring on the pig vandalism!
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 15:58 Comments ||
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#6
Does this not dovetail nicely with the other thread concerning a mosque being vandalized? Do we not see the greater picture here? I think the locals certainly do. "The Islamic community is concerned about the Judaisation of the neighbourhood" ahhhhhhh yes the ROP...oh and the jihad book is such a nice touch. So back to the vandals - when faced with an intolerant, hostile and possibley dangerous enclave legally entrenched in one's community what is one to do? Was the only real mistake the vandals made was in targeting the wrong mosque? Harsh times, my friends.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 16:01 Comments ||
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#7
Hundreds flee burning mosque
June 25, 2004 - 6:05PM
"More than 500 people fled an Islamic mosque in Melbourne's south-east after a suspected arson attack.
Witnesses said the congregation was praying in the newly refurbished mosque at Lysterfield when fire broke out in a kitchen area about 1.30pm (AEST)."
May this Mosque will suffer the same fate as the one above.
#8
hang on. This is intolerance to be sure. But to place a deposit to prevent the sale of a mosque is within their legal rights. I know of a situation where an Orthodox synagogue passed a bylaw to prevent the sale of their building to a Reform or Conservative JEWISH congregation - I didnt like that tude, but its not justification for vandalism. Does accepting property rights make me a liberal?? (well, yeah, but in the sense that covers classical liberals, and only imperfectly covers modern liberals) So be it.
#9
property rights? What if they decide not to EVER let any Joooos in the neighborhood? Hey, it's their property, right, LH?
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 16:10 Comments ||
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#10
LH: I hear ya but this piece goes beyond property rights. What about the right to regularly suck air without the risk of being blown to chunks simply because one prays on a differnt day (if at all)?
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 16:13 Comments ||
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#11
#10 just curious are you also rex in #2
Posted by: Dan ||
06/25/2004 16:28 Comments ||
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#12
Dan: Nope. hmmmmmmm, Army of Rex. I like the sound of that.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 16:34 Comments ||
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#13
No, Rex Mundi,[#10] is king of the world, whereas I am small rex [#2]of cabbage patch ville, who is relatively new to rantburg and did not know about Big Capital Rex Mundi when I started posting. Maybe on the days Rex Mundi posts, I'll post as minime.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 16:35 Comments ||
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#14
Questions Rantburgians:
When is Howard's term up?
As long as he is there, things should remain fairly sane, shouldn't they?
#15
Liberalhawk thinks he can control their "tude" with his "tude."
"The Nazi (oops--Islamic) community is concerned about the Judaisation of the neighbourhood . . ."
they issued "warnings that Jews were trying to buy the site"
for followers of
"one of Australiaâs most hardline Islamic clerics."
Open your eyes, LH! Things don't boil over all at once--but the fire has been turned on. We can only expect them to turn it up slowly. Watch and see. What you call "intolerance" they consider their unquestionable duty to Allan--the subjucation or elimination of all infidels--especially Jews.
" . . .We smug "civilized" Westerners can hug ourselves all we want about our marvie tolerance and belief that all cultures, all religions are equally wonderful and to be respected...and then the cold slap of the real world hits our pompous faces . . ."
I think people prefer the comfort zone of denial, but thanks anyway, rex.
#16
rex: It's good to be the king, heh heh. Naaaaah...keep the rex. After the Steve thing, we're pretty good at sortin' it all out. Welcome to Rantburg.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 16:55 Comments ||
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#17
"The Islamic community is concerned about the Judaisation of the neighbourhood and a deposit has been paid in case the mosque is sold to the Jewish community," one of their notices says.
I'm kinda wondering if the mosque in question is the one in Lakemba, or is this an entirely different one?
#19
BAR: This looks to be a different mosque though incidents surrounding both sound very similar, where a member is being charged with intent to commit terrorist acts. Still...not 100% sure. Anyone else?
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 17:09 Comments ||
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#20
So, LH, are you saying you have no problem with restrictive covenants?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
06/25/2004 17:10 Comments ||
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#21
E-L
All cultures aint wonderful. 1400 year old cultures, with 2 billion members are pretty diverse. Islam has some horrors.
We WONT be stronger in fighting those horrors by giving up on the rule of law or our Western values.
But if you want to run around vandalizing mosques, I cant stop you - I think you'll play right into the other side if you do that, but I still cant stop you.
#22
"So, LH, are you saying you have no problem with restrictive covenants?"
I dont know enough of the law on that RC. In the US (and the above post is about Australia) the SCOTUS ruling nullified covenants about the sale of residential property based on the identiy of the buyer. Im not sure about limits on the sales of religious buildings to other religions - i think that would fly here.
Of course if youre suggesting that Australia SHOULD pass a law banning such covenants or discrimination in the sale of even religous building, id look sympathetically on that.
No, its vandalism I have a problem with. Im NOT justifying what the idiot Saudies are doing in this case, just saying that it doesnt justify breaking the law. You wanna take them to court, go right ahead. You can tell the difference between suing them and pouring pig fat on their mosque?
#23
Well said, Brother 'Hawk. We can fight the Islamofascists without becoming like them.
Kids, as someone 'way smarter than me once said, the Devil often sends his lies into the world in complimentary pairs, so that in recoiling from one (e.g., touchy-feely multiculturalism that lets the Islamofascists thrive among us) we might run to embrace another (e.g., vandalism).
Posted by: Mike ||
06/25/2004 17:26 Comments ||
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#24
LH, I don't think anyone here is suggesting that vandalizing mosques is a good thing [except for a few comments made in jest]. Vandalism is a criminal action and should be prosecuted. What I have said[on another thread about a mosque being vandalized] is that vandalism of a mosque should not have any highly subjective and highly group specific "hate laws" added to the criminal sentence.
IMHO, Jews and Muslims and homosexuals and females and pink skinned Albinos should not warrent any more special status and legal protections in the the eyes of the law than boring ho-hum whitey Episcopal males.
With regards to the Muslims' attitude as expressed in this particular discussion thread, yes, these Muslims are entirely within their rights to protect their property rights and protect the mosque from being bought by Jews.
However, it is instances like this that should serve as a teaching lesson for extreme liberals, Jews and Christians alike - not all cultures, not all religions are equal or worthy of slavish tolerance.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 17:38 Comments ||
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#25
LH /Mike: Good points, but there is still the question of what to do. This particular mosque will no doubt be a cancer for that community. Eventually their battle may become mine. Of course, the vandalism was more than not justified, it was ineffective.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 17:42 Comments ||
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#26
property rights? What if they decide not to EVER let any Joooos in the neighborhood? Hey, it's their property, right, LH?
If i put my house for sale and turn away, say, a black buyer, im violating the law. if, OTOH, i decide not to sell my house, BECAUSE i dont want to sell to a black, I am within my rights. Im a racist turd if i do that, but im within my rights. Its possible to be an ass within the law, Im afraid. Some of my fellow "liberals" have difficulty grasping that.
#27
what to do
1. Note the source of the money - KSA. Change KSA. Or deny them money, by changing our energy sources.
2. Propagandize THEIR kids for OUR way of life - IE tolerance. Teach them in public schools. Promote tolerance wherever possible - and make sure THEIR kids hear it, NOT JUST our kids
3. Missionize them for other religions or for atheism - but do so privately, not using the state.
4. Encourage other forms of assimilation as well - linguistic, etc.
5. Encourage other forms of Islam. But again privately.
#28
IMHO, Jews and Muslims and homosexuals and females and pink skinned Albinos should not warrent any more special status and legal protections in the the eyes of the law than boring ho-hum whitey Episcopal males.
i know of at least one jew who converted to Episcopalianism cause she thought PECUSA was more activist on gays and AIDS than Jewish synagogues.
#29
LH: In #27, your #1 is pretty much the key. Gotta change KSA. #2 prolly won't work, our public schools (at least here in Kahlyfohnya)are part of the problem. The only tolerence being taught is FOR the ROP - by mandate - besides, the kids in this mosque are most likely being educated at the mosque itself and likwise elsewhere. #4 is good, and I think it's the one they fear the most and fear it they should. Compare our immigration stats to theirs, heh heh. I like your take: base the fight in the community by the people.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 18:09 Comments ||
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#30
Hey, maybe your friend was right. #28, maybe GAY males are the new "special" flavor of the month in liberal democracies. That illustrates my point. The danger of awarding "specialness" to any group is that it is an artificial legal construct and as your friend eventually discovered, one day being female and Jewish was having the sun shine on her, and then political/demographics changed and alas, there was a new "special" liberal hobby horse hogging the sunlight and she was left in darkness, like heterosexual whitey Christian males have been for the past 25 years. It's cold in the dark, isn't it.
Propagandize THEIR kids for OUR way of life - IE tolerance. Teach them in public schools. Promote tolerance wherever possible - and make sure THEIR kids hear it, NOT JUST our kids
He, he...that's been a real successful plan in Western public schools all right...dream along with me, LH. Maybe all that "tolerance" taught in public schools is one of the reasons that OBL is so popular with zealot Muslims...tolerance for teaching Kindergarteners how to thread a condom on a banana; tolerance for families with 2 mothers and 2 fathers; tolerance for feminist Germaine Greer/Madonna/Lyndie Englund theories instilled in youthful females; tolerance for GAY-Straight Alliance to talk to Middle Schoolers about the wonders of dying of AIDS at an early age...right, those "propagandizing" efforts to spread "tolerance" have been a big hit with the Muslim world...
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 18:24 Comments ||
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An investigation by The Associated Press shows hundreds of agents from military intelligence and the CIA are tracking hundreds of suspected terrorists in Bosnia and working to shut off their funding. The Americans are working out of a well-guarded compound in a suburb of Sarajevo. One commander says Bosnia has become a way station for Islamic extremists, and a possible refuge. A senior European intelligence operative says the international undercover effort is part of an "invisible but real struggle with the bad guys" that he says could stop bombings in Europe -- or the US.
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 20:27 Comments ||
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#2
Frank, not sure -- I think in a way it's worse than that. I believe al-Qaeda had penetrated Bosnia going back to the wars there in the mid-90s, a time of much Saudi and other "charity" money flowing in, along with (IIRC) volunteers (they probably actually were, some of them anyway) from the umma -- Iran, Chechnya, Arab countries. Recall the "rendition" of some AQ suspects there a few years back -- nifty body-snatching by our side after a local official had signed off under interesting circumstances. Given the chaos and violence there for so many years, hardly surprising the insects would flock there -- but I'm not sure there's a gratitude issue (don't know, but I think AQ has had plenty of seams to work there without any popular support or knowledge).
W better fly into Incirlik, hold the talks there as well
Turkish authorities found a van full of explosives in a parking lot at Istanbulâs main airport, news reports said Friday. Reuters quoted news channel CNN-Turk as saying a remote-controlled explosive device in the same parking lot had been destroyed by a police bomb squad. Confusingly, Turkish authorities denied that any bomb had been found. "Security received a warning and closed the car park for 1Âœ hours," said an official. "At this time, they have been unable to find any explosive device." Turkeyâs largest city will host a NATO summit next week, which President Bush and leaders from 40 other countries will attend.
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 2:25:05 PM ||
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this was breaking news on Fox - prob'ly should've hit page 1 with it....D'oh!
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 14:28 Comments ||
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The relatives of Muslim men and boys massacred at Srebrenica in Bosnia by Serbian troops in 1995 have confirmed they will lodge a damages claim against the Netherlands, accusing the Dutch of failing to take adequate measures to prevent Europe's worst case of genocide since World War II. A member of the association of relatives of the Srebrenica victims said on Bosnian television on Thursday that the case will be lodged with a tribunal in The Hague on 1 July, Dutch public news service NOS reported. Dutch UN troops sent to protect the UN designated safe haven at Srebrenica during the violent break up of the former Yugoslavia surrendered without firing a shot to invading Bosnian-Serbian troops in July 1995.
Another example of your UN at work.
The Serbs then separated the Muslim men from the women and at least 7,000 men and boys were killed in a mass execution. Surviving relatives claim the Netherlands did not take adequate measures to prevent the slaughter. The Dutch Institute for War Documentation (NIOD) concluded in 2002 that the Dutch government, military officers and the United Nations were to blame for the Srebrenica tragedy. The Dutch Cabinet â under leadership of the then Prime Minister, Wim Kok â resigned in response to the report. In November 2003, a lawyer for families of the Srebrenica victims said they planned to lodge a multi-million damages suit against the Netherlands and the UN. About 8,000 relatives and survivors are represented in the case.
Meanwhile, the military officer in command of the Dutch troops at Srebrenica, Commander Thom Karremans, gave testimony to the UN Tribunal in The Hague on Thursday about the tasks of the Dutchbat troops and what they could have reasonably achieved in the enclave. Karremans primarily criticised the United Nations for failing to demilitarise the region and disarm Muslim fighters. But he also said he did not know if Muslim fighters used the designated safe zone as a base to carry out bloody attacks on Serbians in the vicinity. He also said that accused war crimes fugitive Ratko Mladic gave him a vague answer when he asked him in 1995 if he would leave the enclave in peace if it was demilitarised. But in 1996, Karremans said that Mladic gave him a definite answer of "yes".
Must have had his fingers crossed.
Worst of all, Karremans had no honor. He didn't fight, he didn't stand up for anything, just gathered his troops and went home. I simply can't see a US Marine officer doing such a thing.
Mladic was the leader of the Bosnian-Serb troops which overran Srebrenica and is one of 14 people the UN Tribunal has indicted in relation to the massacre.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 9:57:53 AM ||
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#1
Talk about self-destructive. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that nobody will even bother to send peacekeepers, who at the very least, can witness the slaughter.
I agree that the Dutch response was horrific, yet, these lawsuits will only assure that next time they won't be there to watch.
Maybe it's good. This whole peace-keeping thing has always been a wishful thinking sham.
#5
I agree that they (Peace Keepers) are mostly useless. The Dutch did not have a strong enough force to stop the Serbs nor was there a Quick Reaction Force to call for help (Dutch problem). This is an example of another NATO country that canât live up to its responsibilities. This was why the U.S. intervened (in force) and once again saved Europe from itself. Not the French, Germans, or Russians the U.S. had to send troops and equipment to stop a third-rate tyrant from killing his neighbors (in Europe). The Dutch never should have been there and it was NATOs fault for putting them in that position. Wonder how the EU is doing on their âJoint Military Forceâ and how affective will that be?
#7
If the ICC gets too frisky with too many nations, the nations will just pull their share off the money tree and the ICC or whatever tribnal will be like a crab shell without any meat.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 12:46 Comments ||
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#8
It's funny in a way. The Europeans say that they won't fight an "aggressive" war like Iraq but that they will fight to prevent genocide. In Srebrenica, their stated goal, their most dearly held belief was put to the test and they failed to act on it. They wouldn't shed blood to save the lives of innocents.
If I was an Islamist, I would fill four or five freighters with Jihadis. I'd fill the decks with women and children and sail them into Marseilles or Amsterdam. Then I'd march to city hall and declare the Caliphate of ____. You know what, I don't think that the Euros would do anything. I really don't.
#13
Clinton and General Clarke were certainly far more successful than the Dutch in protecting the Muslims...so much so that now the Muslims are doing back to the Serbs what was done to them...fyi this mutual internecine slaughter had been going on for hundreds of years before communism put a temporary lid on it]Anyways, now that the Serbs have had their butts kicked by us, I read that the region has become a nice safe haven for Muslim jihadists in training.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 16:25 Comments ||
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#14
Anyways, now that the Serbs have had their butts kicked by us, I read that the region has become a nice safe haven for Muslim jihadists in training.
And look at what thanks we get from the Muslims for it.
#15
To substantiate my point in #13, everyone should read the new article posting by T.S. vicegirl entitled: "US, European intelligence agencies hunt for terrorists in Bosnia" Bosnia has become a way station for Islamic extremists, and a possible refuge
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 17:14 Comments ||
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#16
#12 Shipman - I'll be danged. Didn't know you meant the name you post with. :-p
I'd never heard of it, & I lived in the VA mountains for 15 years. (Escaped after high school, thank the C&O Railroad!) I had to look it up on Mapquest.
I'm from further west.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 18:12 Comments ||
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The person behind a blast on a city bus in Istanbul was a 29-year-old woman who had been wanted by the police for involvement in acts by an illegal leftist organization, Istanbul Governor Muammer Guler said. Guler told a press conference on Friday that they had identified the person as Semiran Polat, born in 1975 in Mazgirt town of southeastern province of Tunceli. Polat who had been wanted by the police for for some time was carrying a false identification card bearing the name ''Behice Catalcam'' born in 1979 in Yatagan town of Mugla, Guler said. In the blast that happened on a city bus at about 3 p.m. on Thursday when it stopped at traffic lights in front of Turkish aid organization Kizilay (Red Crescent) Blood Center in Fatih district of Istanbul, two innocent women and a 65-year-old man were killed along with the bomber and 21 passengers were wounded, he said. ''It has been proven that Semiran Polat who was carrying the sound bomb was a suspect of bombing of a military bus in Halkali district of Istanbul on August 6, 2003 with a remote-controlled explosive and leaving two time bombs at Justice and Development Party (AK Party) headquarters in Istanbul on August 21, 2003,'' he said.
Sound bomb aka percussion bomb. Blast only device designed to make a lot of noise, but little damage unless confined. Used by left wing groups in Turkey, several went off in closed banks last week.
Guler added that investigation had been under way.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 9:50:27 AM ||
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Security is being stepped up in Turkey after a bomb attack left four dead days before a Nato summit of world leaders. Police are said to be carrying out random checks in shopping centres, bus and train stations ahead of the talks. The White House has said the attacks will not affect the schedule of US President George W Bush, who is among 50 leaders due to attend on Monday. Istanbul's governor has identified the bomber, who died, as a 29-year-old woman with links to a hard-left group. Istanbul governor Muammer Guler said the bomb on the bus was being carried by Semiran Polat, 29, from the mainly Kurdish south-eastern province of Tunceli. He said she was understood to have been wanted for activities within an "illegal leftist organisation". "We know this organisation," he said. "We will make a statement once we get confirmation of our investigation."
"Hand me the #3 truncheon, please."
The device is believed to have exploded at the wrong time in the wrong place.
It went off on Ms. Polat's lap.
"It is understood that the target was neither the bus not the passengers aboard," Mr Guler said. Turkish police have arrested three suspects, two men and a woman, who were believed to have been on board the bus when the explosion occurred, the state-run Anatolia news agency reported.
On their way to plant the bomb, most likely.
The device in Ankara exploded near the hotel where Mr Bush is due to stay on Saturday. Two people were injured. A small radical Marxist group, MLFP-FESK, later said they placed a parcel bomb outside the Hilton Hotel, private NTV television reported. No-one has admitted responsibility for the Istanbul attack.
Maybe cuz they got blown up first?
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 9:25:29 AM ||
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Posted by: Howard UK ||
06/25/2004 04:33 ||
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#1
One of the most interesting anti-terror developments is the rise of modern art that has actual security value. For example, the would-be suicide car bomber may now have to surmount an 18-step staircase, a "pond" that doubles as a moat, a grove of trees that provides no direct "line of movement" towards the target, and a "split-in-half obsidian canoe" that doubles as an anti-ram barrier ...
How's that sound?
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
06/25/2004 5:30 Comments ||
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#2
I don't care, Edward!
All I know is that the Leaning Tower has stood for over 500 years and must continue to!
(I actually climbed up the thing in 1979--unforgettable!)
Posted by: Jen ||
06/25/2004 6:26 Comments ||
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#3
... and soon to go the way of the Bamiyan Stone Buddhas in Afghanistan.
Investigators have concluded that Switzerland was likely used as a base for financing and logistical support for the Sept. 11 attacks by al-Qaeda, the countryâs attorney general said Thursday. Federal Prosecutor Valentin Roschacher said authorities plan to begin court proceedings in the coming weeks in three terror cases, capping investigations started four days after the 2001 suicide hijackings in New York and Washington. A special task force initially was charged with investigating Mohammed Atta, the alleged leader of the hijackers. Atta reportedly spent several hours in Zurich in July 2001 en route from Miami to Madrid, Spain. But the scope of the investigation widened. The task force also focused on officials of the now-defunct Al-Taqwa Management Organization, a Swiss-based firm that went into liquidation in December 2001.
The U.S. government says Al-Taqwa helped fund Osama bin Ladenâs terrorist network. The company was founded in 1988 and run from Lugano by its Egyptian-born managing director, Youssef M. Nada, and his Syrian-born associate, Ali Himat. Swiss authorities blocked the accounts of the company and the personal accounts of board members, while neighboring Liechtenstein froze the accounts of an affiliate firm. Company officials have repeatedly denied links to terrorism, and accused Swiss authorities of taking part in a U.S.-led anti-Muslim campaign. "I have nothing to do with terrorism. I have nothing to do with violence," Nada said in an interview late Thursday with Swiss public radio. "If they say I am Islamist, yes, I am. If they say I am an activist, yes I am. But I am against terrorism and violence," he said, adding that bin Ladenâs acts were "against humanity."
"No, no! Certainly not!"
Another investigation focused on a Saudi businessman with ties to Switzerland and the United States who allegedly acted as an al-Qaeda contact. The unidentified man, a former president of the Muwafaq charitable foundation, is believed to have used Swiss accounts to transfer millions of Swiss francs to individuals tied to al-Qaeda. Prosecutors said Swiss authorities have frozen around $20 million in a Geneva bank as a result of their investigation. The man has denied any links with terrorists, officials said.
"Lies! All lies!"
A third inquiry centered on the alleged ties of Swiss-based militants to a series of bombings on foreignersâ residential compounds in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in May 2003.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 12:18:17 AM ||
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20 million frozen?!?!? Bullshit!! Frozen how? Like there is no back door to these accounts?!? PAAALLLLLEEEEEEZZZZZEEEEE!!
Swiss Authorities..... what a joke!!
I am telling you this country needs to be put on notice!!
This shit hole little county has no loyalty to anything except MONEY! We should have a few missles point at this shit hole!
There is probably just as much money flowing out of this shit hole as there is in SA.
#2
Hey Long Hair, I'm with you on this. These nazi colaberating bastards are mafia with chocolate suits.
They have been at this crap for way to long. A sort of blind eye to the rogue. Russian mafia, isalmic mafia, you name it. Chinese mafia, mafia mafia, and poor punks die.
But conected folk cluck cluck. Blow those fuckers away! Then lets see how it plays out. But, to bad, money has to be served! Swiss, you banking asses. Fuck DT spokes, no more!
A National Guardsman accused of trying to help terrorists did not enter a plea Friday at his arraignment in military court. Ryan G. Anderson, 26, also declined to say whether he wanted to be tried by a jury or a judge during his court-martial, which is set to begin Aug. 16. Anderson, a Muslim convert, is a member of the 81st Armor Brigade. He was arrested at his apartment in February and charged with five counts of trying to provide the al-Qaida terrorist network with information about U.S. troop strength, tactics, and methods for killing American soldiers. Andersonâs lawyer asked the government to pay for a psychologist to help him prepare his case. Judge Col. Debra Boudreau denied the request, saying the defense was free to pay for one on its own. Anderson could face life in prison if convicted.
A Lebanese national with ties to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the most wanted terrorist in Iraq, was picked up in Minnesota and charged Friday in a New York court with lying to the FBI about his ties to terrorists, Fox News has learned. According to a federal complaint obtained by Fox, Mohamad Kamal Elzahabi, attended jihad training camps in Afghanistan in 1988 and â89, where he first met Zarqawi â who is believed to be directing the current attacks against U.S. and coalition troops in Iraq. Officials say that more serious charges, such as material support to terrorism, may follow. The court papers allege that Elzahabi admitted to personally knowing two of Al Qaeda's (search) most prominent leaders, Abu Zubaida and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, described as the mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks. Investigators with the FBI's joint terrorism task force say Elzahabi ran a shipping business from New York City and lied about knowing whether his company sent portable field radios and walkie talkies to fighters in Afghanistan.
#1
What could a Lebanese national POSSIBLE want in Minnesota? I had to read that twice "to go figure"! That's like the old Black Panther party in the 60's congregating in Nome Alaska for a revival meeting?!
A US citizen of Iranian origin was arrested after trying to take a loaded gun and a knife onto a plane bound for Washington DC, police said on Friday. Ali Reza Khatami, 65, a retired construction business owner who has lived in the United States for 40 years, was arrested on Thursday at John Wayne Airport in Orange County, southern California. Police said baggage scanners found a .38 caliber gun and a 6-inch knife in his carry-on bag. It was not clear why Khatami had the weapons in his baggage, but police said the man had no apparent links with any extremist groups. "He does not appear on any terrorist watch list," said Orange County Sheriffâs spokesman Jim Amormino. Khatami is being held in custody and is expected to be charged with a firearms offense.
The FBI warned law enforcement agencies of the potential for floating explosive devices â otherwise known as terrorist improvised mines â according to the weekly bulletin issued by the agency and obtained by FOX News. The FBI also included a list of potential indicators relating to planning a floating bomb or terrorist mine attacks:
â Reports of launching or retrieving boats from unusually remote areas
â Reports involve aircraft dropping objects at night near harbors, ports or commercial airways
â Reports of abandoned small boats found adrift near sensitive sights
â Reports or incidents of unusual or unidentified floating objects near vessels or in harbors, ports or commercial waterways
â Evidence suggesting trends or patterns in terrorist-related hoaxes or threat reporting dealing with mines or floating IEDds
â Reports of suspicious requests for hydrographic charts associated with naval or commercial port facilities
â Reports of attempts to purchase or steal large magnets, large styrofoam blocks, large diameter PVC pipe, empty compressed gas cylinders or watertight storage drums.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
06/25/2004 6:23:57 PM ||
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#4
ya know? If you're crapping C-4, you probably oughta get off whatever diet you're on?
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 20:47 Comments ||
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#5
when we were on the brink of war w/ soddoms iraq, back in April 2003, fox was running exclusives saying that soddom had imported to the U.S. drone planes that would disperse chem, bio, or dirty nuke parts. Parts is Parts. turns out soddom didn't quite have that reach, or it didn't get off the ground, or fox was just plain wrong. So take Fox w/ a grain of salt. Fox doesn't have to compete with rumor monger drudge if they don't want to.
Posted by: Annie War ||
06/25/2004 21:16 Comments ||
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#6
Hmmmm - I don't recall them being importedinto the US... do you have information that should be turned over to our Dept of Painful Informational Removal Via Pliars Homeland Security, Annie? IP tracking will be fine, thx, we'll they'll be in touch :-)
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 22:43 Comments ||
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#7
Good point, Annie. I will only watch CNN and BBC from now on. I promise to be more trusting and less vigilant in the future.
The Clinton administration talked about firm evidence linking Saddam Husseinâs regime to Osama bin Ladenâs al Qaeda network years before President Bush made the same statements. In fact, during President Clintonâs eight years in office, there were at least two official pronouncements of an alarming alliance between Baghdad and al Qaeda. One came from William S. Cohen, Mr. Clintonâs defense secretary. He cited an al Qaeda-Baghdad link to justify the bombing of a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan. Mr. Bush cited the linkage, in part, to justify invading Iraq and ousting Saddam. He said he could not take the risk of Iraqâs weapons falling into bin Ladenâs hands.
The other pronouncement is contained in a Justice Department indictment on Nov. 4, 1998, charging bin Laden with murder in the bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa. The indictment disclosed a close relationship between al Qaeda and Saddamâs regime, which included specialists on chemical weapons and all types of bombs, including truck bombs, a favorite weapon of terrorists. The 1998 indictment said: "Al Qaeda also forged alliances with the National Islamic Front in the Sudan and with the government of Iran and its associated terrorist group Hezbollah for the purpose of working together against their perceived common enemies in the West, particularly the United States. In addition, al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the government of Iraq."
Shortly after the embassy bombings, Mr. Clinton ordered air strikes on al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan and on the Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan. To justify the Sudanese plant as a target, Clinton aides said it was involved in the production of deadly VX nerve gas. Officials further determined that bin Laden owned a stake in the operation and that its manager had traveled to Baghdad to learn bomb-making techniques from Saddamâs weapons scientists. Mr. Cohen elaborated in March in testimony before the September 11 commission. He testified that "bin Laden had been living [at the plant], that he had, in fact, money that he had put into this military industrial corporation, that the owner of the plant had traveled to Baghdad to meet with the father of the VX program." He said that if the plant had been allowed to produce VX that was used to kill thousands of Americans, people would have asked him, " âYou had a manager that went to Baghdad; you had Osama bin Laden, who had funded, at least the corporation, and you had traces of [VX precursor] and you did what? And you did nothing?â Is that a responsible activity on the part of the secretary of defense?"
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 10:05:00 AM ||
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Hey! The dem's got the lie out there and the sheep are happy to accept it. "Bush Lied". Don't bother me with the corrections printed in 6 pt. font at the bottom of page A21.
The media no longer concerns itself with the truth, but rather it only finds new ways to spin the truth to favor of the Democratic party. They report and it gives the Bush haters the official quotes they need in order to believe in and parrot the lie.
#6
... "before President Bush made the same statements."
President Bush has never, ever stated publicly that there was a link btw alqida and soddom insane vis a vis the attacks of 9/11.
In fact when asked roughly a week after 9/11 if there was a connection btwn soddoms iraq and the attacks he said "we have found no evidence linking Iraq and the attacks" , at a cabinet meeting w/ the cameras rolling -much to my (for one's) dissapointment.
I don't see that tape rolling in heavy rotation.
"The Clinton administration talked about firm evidence linking Saddam Husseinâs regime to Osama bin Ladenâs al Qaeda network years before President Bush made the same statements."
The Lying Liberal Media is trying to confuse the issue of whether the link between soddom and alquda (in general) is applicable to the Attacks on this Nation Sept. 11 (the specific): The Sept. 11 Commision has reported none of the evidence collected from the Feb. 29, 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, if even to provide some context concerning America as a target, or the relationship btwn soddom's iraq and that attack. There's even more evidence there, than is so far publicly known concerning 9/11.
Posted by: Annie War ||
06/25/2004 21:04 Comments ||
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Heh, indeed. Plus you can arm your P-3 with Mavericks or the Stand-off Land Attack variant (SLAM) of the Harpoon. Guaranteed to add sparkle and excitment to any event!
A North Carolina college student who hid box cutters on airplanes to expose weaknesses in airline security was sentenced Thursday to two years supervised probation and a $500 fine. Nathaniel Heatwole of Damascus, Md., a student at Guilford College in Greensboro, N.C., also must serve 100 hours of community service and reimburse his parents for up to $500 in legal expenses after sentencing in U.S. District Court. Heatwole, 21, told Judge Paul Grimm that his intentions were "positive and constructive." He said he never meant to embarrass the Transportation Safety Administration or put anyone in any danger.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
06/25/2004 03:03 ||
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EFL -snip- intro included an excerpt of a Clinton/Couric interview. Masochists are invited to peruse the link.
But in the spring of 1998, Clintonâs Justice Department issued an indictment of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, prominently citing the terrorist groupâs agreement to collaborate with Iraq on weapons of mass destruction. "Al-Qaida reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al-Qaida would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al-Qaida would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq." Steven F. Hayes, author of "The Connection: How al Qaedaâs Collaboration with Saddam Hussein Has Endangered America," quotes an official familiar with the deliberations who says the inclusion of the Iraq-al-Qaida connection in the indictment was "not an afterthought." "It couldnât have gotten into the indictment unless someone was willing to testify to it under oath," the official said. -snip-
Posted by: Super Hose ||
06/25/2004 3:56:07 AM ||
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Well obviously Clinton was Lying!!! It's all about OOOOOil.
This was the biggest cash cow in the history of the world," says one of the insiders familiar with the $10 billion U.N. oil-for-food scandal. "Everybody â traders, contractors, banks, inspectors â was milking it. It was supposed to buy food with the money from oil that the U.N. allowed Saddam to sell, but less than half went for that. Perfume, limos, a shipment of 1,500 Ping-Pong tables, for Godâs sake." Another whistle-blower, often on the "graveyard shift" of round-the-clock operations at the U.N.âs New York Office of the Iraq Program, explains the workings of the historic rip-off:
Well-connected international traders â called "the usual suspects" by low-level U.N. staff, who knew they often fronted for sellers of luxury products â would make their deals, including kickbacks, in Baghdad. Letters of credit, as many as 150 a day, would be issued in New York by the U.N.âs favorite bank, BNP Paribas. But before the sellers, called "beneficiaries," could be paid (at Saddamâs request, in euros, harder to trace than dollars) the bank required a C.O.A., "Confirmation of Arrival," from the U.N.âs contracted inspector, Cotecna of Switzerland. "The key was Cotecna," says my graveyard source. "Ships were lined up at the port of Umm Qasr, stacks of containers already onshore waiting for inspection. You wonât believe the grease being paid. The usual suspects got preferential treatment when the U.N. bosses in New York called the BNP bank to get Cotecna to issue a C.O.A. to release the money."
Last week, Secretary General Kofi Annan claimed that my reporting of what he told me at a luncheon was "a private conversation" (no such ground rule was set) and that "some are jumping to conclusions without facts, without evidence. It is a bit like a lynching, actually." However, my call for a Congressional subpoena to overcome his attempt to limit investigation to his internal Volcker committee has flushed out a fact not hitherto disclosed. Annanâs press aide complained to The Times that a subpoena had already been served secretly on BNP Paribas (the initials once stood for Banque Nationale de Paris) by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Although the U.N. had warned its bank, as well as Cotecna, the oil monitor Saybolt and all its other oil-for-food contractors, not to cooperate with anybody but Paul Volcker â and had blown off the House International Relations Committeeâs requests â Annanâs advisers knew it would be unseemly and foolhardy to insist that its bank fight the Senate in court.
With his subpoena and investigation thus publicly revealed by the U.N., Chairman Norm Coleman of Minnesota, a Brooklyn-born Republican, felt free to take my call. "This is a major priority for us," he says. "Thereâs a lot of stuff to cover, a big universe of documents, and weâre being aggressive about it. Yes, Cotecna, Saybolt, all of them." He sent out four "chairmanâs letters," countersigned by the ranking Democrat, Carl Levin, in early June. One was to the U.S. State Department for the minutes of the "661 committee" meetings at the U.N., which reviewed oil-for-food contracts (though not yet for copies of the contracts themselves). Another to the Government Accounting Office, which had first estimated the skimming at $10 billion. Another to Paul Bremer in Baghdad for copies of documents being turned over to the interim government â and the Senate still awaits a response; apparently the White House doesnât want to offend the U.N. Finally, a friendly letter to Annan about the subpoena that would require his bank to open its letter-of-credit files.
Now letâs review the investigative bidding. The Senate seems serious; though Coleman is a freshman, the subcommittee staff is experienced and nonpartisan. The House is doing what it can. The U.N. allocated $4 million to Volcker, but he hasnât yet submitted a budget or announced a staff. The New York Fed defers to its old boss, and the New York State Banking Department is overdrawn. But since this involves possible fraud, bribery and larceny on a grand scale, where is law enforcement? Interesting: the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, David Kelley, served subpoenas last week on Exxon Mobil, ChevronTexaco and Valero about Iraqi oil purchases. That deals with the income side of the scandal, the money for Iraq (less kickbacks) supposedly to buy food. I suspect Kelley was moved to empanel a grand jury by probable competition from the Manhattan district attorney, Robert Morganthau, on the scandalâs payoff side. These two offices compete, and Morganthauâs office has expertise on global banking.
Without imputing wrongdoing to any individual, I suggest investigators supplement their document search by talking to people who should be in the know. At the U.N., these include Benon Sevanâs deputy, Teklay Afeworki, and at the bank, Pierre Veyres and Eva Millas-Russo. But defenders of U.N. malfeasance can take heart. In a counterattack, our global servants hired an accountant to warn of "fraudulent acts" by the U.S. after it took over the U.N.âs mismanaged Iraqi oil account. Now, that will get media coverage.
Posted by: tipper ||
06/25/2004 1:18:10 AM ||
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Another to Paul Bremer in Baghdad for copies of documents being turned over to the interim government â and the Senate still awaits a response; apparently the White House doesnât want to offend the U.N.
I do not like this foot dragging by Bremer and the WH one bit. These stalling tactics for whatever reason makes the US look bad to the Iraqis, too.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 2:38 Comments ||
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MORE than 40 members of the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) regional terror network linked to Al-Qaeda are believed to be hiding in the southern Philippines, Defense Secretary Eduardo Ermita said Thursday. Ermita told local journalists that the information came from intelligence assets who had personally guided some of the militants from the trading center of Davao City to the jungles elsewhere in the southern island of Mindanao. "We know they have and continue to operate here in the Philippines," Ermita remarked, referring to the JI, regarded as the Southeast Asian chapter of the Al-Qaeda network.
He added that the government was still looking into the alleged flow of funds from Al-Qaeda and local Muslim separatist rebels. "We have reports that local commanders of the (Muslim separatist) Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) continue to allow and as a matter of fact tolerate the stay of Abu Sayyaf members including Jemaah Islamiyah trainers in their camps," in the mountains of Mindanao, Ermita added. Ermita said the government was still pressing the MILF to abide by a commitment not to shelter foreign militants or the Abu Sayyaf, a local Muslim group known mainly for kidnapping foreigners and Christians in the south. He conceded it was difficult to stop the entry of foreign militants like JI members because they could easily mix with the large numbers of Filipinos who travel illegally between Malaysia and the Philippines to find work.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 11:55:19 AM ||
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LA Times=subscription, blah blah. EFL:
International investigators are examining whether Syria acquired nuclear technology and expertise through the black market network operated by rogue Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, according to a U.S. official and Western diplomats. Intelligence reports found that Khan and some associates visited Syria in the late 1990s and later held clandestine meetings with Syrian nuclear officials in Iran, said Western diplomats from a U.S. ally. Concerns were heightened after an experimental U.S. electronic eavesdropping device recently picked up signals indicating that Syria was operating centrifuges, which enrich uranium for possible use in nuclear weapons.
Being able to plant them right on Syria's eastern border helps reception. Bwahahaha!
Khan, who helped Pakistan develop its nuclear arsenal, has admitted selling advanced centrifuge technology and expertise to Iran, Libya and North Korea over two decades. The extent of his ring's operations remains unknown, but diplomats said that if Syria has centrifuges they would undoubtedly have come from Khan's network.
Unless they bought them from their friends the Chinese.
Inspectors from the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, are investigating whether sales were made to other countries as they reconstruct what officials consider the worst nuclear proliferation network in history. A senior European diplomat familiar with the IAEA inquiry said Syria was on the list of suspected customers, but he said the agency has not found evidence that Khan visited Syria or sold technology to it.
Did you look for any?
The Syrian representative to the IAEA in Vienna did not respond to written questions submitted on Tuesday. In the past, Syrian officials have dismissed accusations that the country is pursuing nuclear weapons. The IAEA declined to comment and a spokeswoman for the State Department said, "We are unable to comment on any of these questions, because they are all of an intelligence nature."
And the last place you'd expect to find intelligence is the State Department.
Other Western diplomats and some U.S. officials cautioned that the information linking Syria to Khan's network is not conclusive. Even if Khan had contact with Syria, they said there is no evidence that Damascus bought centrifuges or other nuclear technology from him. Since admitting his dealings with some countries earlier this year, Khan has been cooperating with Pakistani authorities, who are sharing some information with the IAEA and U.S. A senior U.S. official said Khan has not denied contacts with other governments, though the official said the Pakistani scientist said sales were made only to Iran, Libya and North Korea. Khan's network involved middlemen and suppliers in Europe, Southeast Asia and the Middle East. The network offered advanced centrifuge machines, components and designs as well as training for operating the machines. Libya also acquired blueprints for a nuclear bomb.
Krazy Khan's One Stop Nuke Shop.
The ring operated for more than a decade before it was exposed earlier this year when Libya turned over Pakistani-supplied centrifuge components and related documents as part of an agreement to abandon its nuclear weapons program brokered by the U.S. and Britain. Even before the scope of Khan's operations became public, the Central Intelligence Agency had raised alarms about Syria's interest in nuclear weapons and hinted at its possible efforts to acquire technology on the black market. "Broader access to foreign expertise provides opportunities to expand its indigenous capabilities and we are looking at Syrian nuclear intentions with growing concern," said an unclassified report submitted to Congress by the CIA in mid-2003. Syria maintains one of the Middle East's largest arsenals of ballistic missiles, developed in cooperation with North Korea and other countries.
What, you can't spell China?
Analysts also believe Syria possesses chemical and biological weapons.
You mean the stuff Saddam hid there?
The information about its possible nuclear ambitions is more vague. The Western diplomats who described the links between Syria and Khan's network said the Pakistani scientist gave several lectures on nuclear materials in late 1997 and early 1998 in Damascus. Beginning in 2001, they said, Khan's meetings with the Syrians were held in Iran because of Syria's concerns that its contacts with the Pakistani scientist would be exposed. They said three scientists from Khan's research laboratory in Pakistan accompanied him. The diplomats said the meetings were part of a program intended to help Syria develop nuclear weapons. The diplomats spoke on the condition that neither they nor their country of origin be identified because of the sensitive nature of the information and the means used to gather it.
Or the fact nobody would believe you because you're jewish? Oops, sorry.
Centrifuges spin at enormous speeds to transform uranium gas into enriched uranium for reactors or bombs. Thousands of machines are necessary to produce large amounts of enriched uranium, but even a small number would give off a distinct signal, experts said.
Like a low level hum, maybe?
The senior U.S. official, who also insisted on anonymity because of the nature of the information, said an experimental electronic monitoring device had picked up the distinctive pattern of centrifuges operating in Syria in recent months. The official declined to provide any details and said the U.S. has only suspicions that the technology came from Khan's network. Reuters news agency reported in early May that the U.S. had information that Syria was operating centrifuges. But the report said there was a division within the Bush administration over the accuracy of the information. Some administration officials have pushed for tough action against Syria because of its ties to extremists and likely pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. Other officials have argued for a softer course because Damascus has cooperated on terrorism issues.
I think they are cooperating more with the terrorists than with us. But, that's just me.
Under pressure from Congress, President Bush applied economic sanctions on Syria on May 11 because of what he said was its support of terrorism and interference in U.S. efforts to create stability in Iraq.
Yeah, that's right, Congress made him do it.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 3:12:58 PM ||
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for subscription, reg passwords, see bugmenot.com
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 16:07 Comments ||
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#2
Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 16:09 Comments ||
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#3
Yep, we're gonna have to send to boys to take care of Syria too. By then we'll be better at the occupation phase, and the Dems won't have to be hysterical as long. I'm worried about their collective blood pressure.
Posted by: Rock ||
06/25/2004 16:26 Comments ||
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#4
Under pressure from Congress, President Bush applied economic sanctions on Syria on May 11...
Yeah, that's it, it was Congress who pressed...Bush was trying to set up a free trade agreement with Syria.
#5
Let the Israelis handle the occupation, Reduced domestic discord from Donks, they're closer, know the terrain better, more of them speak the language, their PR wouldn't be any worse and it would be a warning to the Egyptians et al of what could happen to unruly neighbors. And it would be a lot of fun to watch.
Pass the popcorn, please.
Posted by: Mr. Davis ||
06/25/2004 16:38 Comments ||
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#6
I always knew he escaped the Genesis Planet explosion....superior intellect and all...
A Lebanese national with ties to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (search), the most wanted terrorist in Iraq, was picked up in Minnesota and charged Friday in a New York court with lying to the FBI about his ties to terrorists, Fox News has learned.
According to a federal complaint obtained by Fox, Mohamad Kamal Elzahabi (search), attended jihad training camps in Afghanistan in 1988 and â89, where he first met Zarqawi â who is believed to be directing the current attacks against U.S. and coalition troops in IraQ.
Officials say that more serious charges, such as material support to terrorism, may follow.
The court papers allege that Elzahabi admitted to personally knowing two of Al Qaedaâs (search) most prominent leaders, Abu Zubaida and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (search), described as the mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks.
Investigators with the FBIâs joint terrorism task force say Elzahabi ran a shipping business from New York City and lied about knowing whether his company sent portable field radios and walkie talkies to fighters in Afghanistan.
Elzahabi, 41, has been in federal custody as a material witness since May. The charges he faced Friday are part of an international terrorism investigation.
Additionally, there is a potential link to Zacarias Moussaoui (search), the man often referred to as the 20th hijacker in the Sept. 11 plot.
Posted by: Mr. Davis ||
06/25/2004 9:46:54 PM ||
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Another example of Ashcroft's evil FBI racially profiling an innocent brown man just because of his skin color.... and religion... and ethnicity... and terrorist friends...
What's that? Lying to the FBI about helping Afghani freedom fighters resist the occupation of their beloved homeland? Why would that be a crime?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 22:15 Comments ||
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#2
"Elzahabi admitted to personally knowing two of Al Qaedaâs most prominent leaders, Abu Zubaida and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed "
"Guilty your honor"
"Apply the truncheons"
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 22:47 Comments ||
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Iraqi Security Forces secured the Sheikh Fatih police station in southwestern Mosul after terrorists attempted to take it over at about 11:20 a.m., June 24. Anti-Iraqi forces were shooting from the Mohammed Nuri Mosque across the street from the police station. Coalition forces moved to the site to support the Iraqi Security Forces and were fired upon from the mosque as well. Iraqi Security and Coalition forces returned fire on the terrorists in the mosque. At about 1 p.m., Coalition forces reported that Iraqi Security Forces and Soldiers from 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment took back the Sheikh Fatih police station from the anti-Iraqi forces. Iraqi National Guard soldiers secured the mosque as well. There was no word on casualties at the time.
Looks like the Iraqi forces are beginning to fight back.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 2:45:54 PM ||
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Iraqi National Guard soldiers secured the mosque as well.
#2
They're starting to get the idea that they will have to defend their freedom through use of arms if need be, (and the need is definitely there). Hopefully they can get enough training soon enough to out-gun the terrorists. Anyone know anything about the training they're getting (or have)?
#3
Mosul, Mosul...why does that city ring bells...isn't Mosul in Kurdistan?...so "Iraqi" forces fighting back are probably Kurds.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 15:02 Comments ||
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#4
No, rex, Mosul isn't in Kurdistan. Real close to Kurdistan, but not actually in it. It's mostly Sunni, although it's outside of the Triangle proper. Mosul was under control of the Hussein regime prior to the war.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
06/25/2004 15:11 Comments ||
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#5
Wasn't Mosul the subject of an article a few days back about Kurds moving back into areas from which Saddam had ejected them during his "Arabization" effort? In any event this is good news. I suspect that the Iraqis will be a lot less worried about bullet holes in the mosques after 30 June than we are now.
#6
And Mosul was re-taken from Hussein by the Kurds, #4. http://www.krg.org/docs/reports-papers/mcDowall-turkey-mosul-kirkuk-apr03.asp"Turkish tensions over Mosul and Kirkuk" 11 April 2003 IWPR (Institute for War and Peace Reporting)By David McDowall
Kurdish advances into key oil cities have raised alarms in Ankara over a possible Kurdish political entity in Iraq. Turkey announced yesterday that it has sent some 15 military observers to monitor developments in northern Iraq after Kurdish forces, in coordination with the Americans, took control of key oil towns there.
With Kirkuk and now Mosul "liberated" by Kurdish forces, Turkey is getting increasingly tense over the Kurdish role in the war in Iraq...
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 15:24 Comments ||
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#7
Turkey is getting increasingly tense over the Kurdish role in the war in Iraq...
Awwww, ain't that just too bad.
Talk to the tail.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 15:28 Comments ||
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#8
Good one, #7. Yes, even the dolts in Ankara recognize and appreciate albeit in a warped fashion the extraordinary role of the Kurds in this Iraq War. Too bad that the WH and State Dept. are fuzzy on how terrific the Kurds have been as allies. The coalition countries who sent a few thousand or a few hundred soldiers or peacekeepers as the case may be have each been rewarded handsomely and been praised in various WH press conferences, but nary a word about the courage and stand up braveness of the Kurds who have been there for our GI's from Day 01 and have lost lives for allying themselves with us. Find me a speech where GWB or Bremer or Powell have specifically honored the Kurds. The fact that the US taxpayer has only had to pay for 300 American GI's to supervise the Kurds in Kurdistan whereas we pay for 130,000 GI's to babysit the Sunnis and Shiites has never ever been mentioned. The fact that not one GI has lost his life at the hands of a Kurd is never praised. The fact that the State Dept. careerist Bremer kisses the bottoms of various mullahs and Sunnis 24/7 and ignores the pleas of Kurdish allies makes me sick to my stomach. The first successful training of police whatever you call them by Americans was with the Kurds. Duh. Of course it would be Kurds who are attacking terrorists in a mosque, why would we even think otherwise???? Kurds are nominal Sunnis. They could give 2 hoots about the alleged sacredness of mosque if it's clear the mosque is a terrorist hide out.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 15:44 Comments ||
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#9
The Kurds are good people. That's one reason why the Air Force spent so much time and treasure protecting them with Operation Northern Watch. The Gulf War never really stopped for the Air Force, Operation Northern Watch and Operation Southern Watch exacted a toll on people and equipment. Operation Iraqi Freedom just let them take the bombers downtown.
#10
Are you saying that the Kurds are just paying us back a debt for keeping them alive after Gulf War I? I'm not clear about what point you are making, #9. If in fact payback of "debt" is what you are implying, then somebody should remind the Shiite mullahs about the debt they owe us for Operation Southern Watch, yes???
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 16:31 Comments ||
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#11
Rex, I agree that the Kurds deserve our thanks, respect and admiration. However, as RWV pointed out, we had their backs for a long time since the "end" of GW I. State, Bremer, et al. can't, for political purposes relating to Turkey and the rest of Iraq, perform a Lewinsky on the Kurds. [A Lewinsky? You mean design a line of high end hand bags? - ed.] Haven't you heard that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. At the present time, we have to pay more attention to the Sunnis and Shiites. The Kurds understand this. That's why they only groused a little bit when Allawi and al-Yawar were named by the Governing Council. The best thing we can do for the Kurds is make sure that nobody pushes them around and that they get first dibs on reconstruction money since much of what they deserved under oil-for-food was diverted by Saddam.
Posted by: Tibor ||
06/25/2004 16:35 Comments ||
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United States must modernize its fighter jets to maintain air supremacy, a top Air Force general said Wednesday citing the success of advanced Russian-made jets against American planes in a recent exercise as signaling an erosion of its overwhelming advantage. Gen. Hal Hornburg, head of U.S. Air Combat Command, said a U.S. air-to-air exercise with the Indian Air Force in February, in which India used Russian jets to defeat aging American F-15Cs, revealed "that we may not be as far ahead of the rest of the world as we once thought we were."
F-15C began production in 1979, USAF got 409 of them.
Defense experts in both the United States and Europe, however, have said it is unlikely that America -- with vast spending power and a major industrial base -- would lose its dominance in military technology.
If they cut the F-22 we will.
U.S. defense officials have said Indian SU-30, Mig-27 and older MiG-21 jets, some armed with Russian-made AA-10 air-to-air missiles, got the best of F-15s based in Alaska in exercise "Cope India" high over northern India.
The big advantage we've had against Arab flown Russian aircraft have been in the training and tactics area. We can't count on future adversaries being that way.
Hornburg said in an interview with military writers the air maneuvers emphasized his service's push for expensive, stealthy new F/A-22 "Raptors" being built by Lockheed Martin Corp. and F-35 Joint Strike Fighters being designed by Lockheed with input from allies.
Good planes don't come cheap.
He declined to discuss classified results of the exercise but said, "Something like Cope India, when we find that some of our advantages aren't as great as we thought they might be, leads me to remind people that we need to modernize our air-to-air capability." Hornburg added, "We have been saying for a long time that we need newer fighters to do more things," and that the Indian exercise could be a "wake-up call" for Washington. Russia's Sukhoi aviation works and the Moscow Air Production Organization company have been designing and building increasingly advanced fighters such as the MiG-29 in recent years. India, China and other countries are buying the warplanes -- some with contracts for co-production.
And they, as well as the Russians, will sell to anyone with cash.
France and Sweden also build advanced combat planes and a consortium of four European countries, including Britain, are producing the Eurofighter "Typhoon" jet.
Which is having it's own problems.
"I see air forces across the spectrum and across the world becoming better and better as each year passes. That just means that we have to do the same thing," said Hornburg. "With air superiority, everything is possible. Without it, hardly anything's possible" he added. "People jump to the conclusion that it is ours just because we go. And that's blatantly false."
No US ground troops have been attacked from the air since the Korean War. The last US Navy ship hit was by a Iraqi plane with a Exocet during the Iran-Iraq War. We need not Air Superiority, but Air Supremacy. We have it now, let's keep it that way.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/25/2004 11:56:28 AM ||
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Posted by: Mr. Davis ||
06/25/2004 12:39 Comments ||
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#3
it is time for another massive increase in procurements as we saw in the early 80's. the platforms being used currently date from this period and if we do not make an effort now 10 years from now our military will be in terrible shape.
Posted by: Dan ||
06/25/2004 12:54 Comments ||
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#4
Think we can thank a veracity challenged, recent book tour promoter for this situation?
#5
And good luck if Kerry gets elected. We'll be lucky to have an operational wing of biplanes.
Posted by: Matt ||
06/25/2004 13:08 Comments ||
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#6
Man I have only been out of the Air Force for five years and they already lost Air Supremacy! Don't make me hae to go back in and get this squared away! Fear not people they are always working on new planes and gadgets to put put us on top. FYI the F-16 is not altitude fighter, that is why we have the F-15. I have seen one swat a MiG-29 from the sky over Bosnia and the MiG pilot never knew what hit him. (High altitiude intercept)
#8
CrazyFool wrote: "If Kerry had his way we already would have given away air supremacy..."
No, we would just be asked to share it with our NATO and "fraudulaent coalition" allies rather than bear the burden of it ourselves.
Posted by: Tibor ||
06/25/2004 13:42 Comments ||
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#9
USAF is great in Command and Control (Awacs with datalinks ) and in training. Machine wise isnt superior exept for radar quality, Russian missiles have more guidance options and russian planes are beter in some situations, technologically Russian and Rafale French planes have for exemple infra red anti air sensors ,US dont have, also helmet mounted sights in Russian planes would beat any US fighter in short range(exept the Israeli ones that have their HMS). The US military procurememnt is bloated with too much rules that seems a court case.
#11
I do not recall where I saw the article detailing the particulars of the Cope India exercise, but, it was something like 10 to 12 Indians against 4 American fighters at once.
I would hardly call the outcome balanced. Seems to me that in a real fight things might be different. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.
#12
The f-15 airframe when built in the 70's was 15 years ahead of anything else. The electronics it had and has been updated with was also years ahead. The missile systems were pretty far ahead also. Mixed with a awacs we had the best radar/jamming.
Now 15 years later the SU-30 have matched and surpassed the f-15 in performance (as the eurofighter is also supposed to). The electronics are still superiour but many customers are upgrading Russian planes with Western technology which in many cases matches our stuff. Missile technology has in some areas passed us (the aa-10 and the the Israeli missiles for example). Newer russian Anti-Aircraft systems are designed to shoot down Awacs now and other countries are starting to purchase Awacs style systems and foreign radars are getting better (pleny of opportunity to test again US equipment in the past few years).
It seems to me we do need the Raptor. It re-ups the performance gap (vectored thrust, super-cruise, etc), adds new electronics that are light years ahead of everything else available, and matches up new missile systems (like the aim-9x) to give us a advantage in those areas also. Plus reports seem to add that the raptor almost acts as its own Awacs plus is stealthy seems to give us exactly what we had in the 70's when we originally built the f-15, a plane that pushes 15 years ahead of everybody else. If I remember the original F-15 was extremely expensive at the time and the same "it is not needed" arguements were being made. The dang plane is done and lets start using it for goodness sakes. The enemy has shown many times the ability to catch up and in some cases pass us (the Mig-15 for example).
Posted by: Patrick ||
06/25/2004 14:55 Comments ||
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#13
Being here in Atlanta (home of Lockheed Martin and the building of the F-22), there was an article in the Atlanta paper on May 30 about the F-22 and "cost overruns" and how much the plane was eating up in R&D costs. However, the Pentagon has gone to asking the pilots who've actually flown it to start politicking for the $ to buy some. To a man, each guy says this plane beats the S*it out of anything else WE have, much less what the Ruskies/Frenchies have! Wish I could link to the article, but couldn't find it. Anyways, here's a clip I'm typing from it:
""This airplane kicks the crap out of everything we've got right now," says Lt. Col. Mike Stapleton, an F-15 Eagle pilot and F/A-22 flight instructor. "I don't think any [adversary] is going to get close enough to see us for the next 10, 20 or 30 years.".....""When we go out and fly against F-15s, it's a complete mismatch," Stapleton says of the top fighter for the past 30 years. "The first thing the F-15 pilots hear is 'Fight's on.' The next thing they hear is, 'You're all dead.' "The F/A-22 isn't the kind of plane that's going to win 51 to 49. It's going to be 100 to nothing. The last thing in the world we want is a fair fight."
The article goes on to say "In one recent war game, a lone Raptor was pitted against five front-line F-15s. The Raptor was invisible to the F-15 pilots and their powerful radar. But the F-15s were easy prey for the Raptor, and it quickly aimed missiles at all of them without the F-15 pilots knowing they were being hunted. 'It was all over in three minutes,' says Stapleton....The feat is especially impressive since F-15s have a perfect record in actual combat since they went into service in the 1970s." According to the article, the first squadron of F/A-22s is supposed to go into service in Dec. 2005. The jets can fly higher, faster and further than other fighters.
Posted by: BA ||
06/25/2004 15:01 Comments ||
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#14
Do you realize that the main flight computer of an F15-E Strike Eagle is a computer comparable to an 8086? My brother is a WSO on one. They are finally starting to upgrade, to a 386-equivalent processor. Also, I've asked him about the Raptor. He's been on the receiving end of a butt whooping courtesy of the F22. They will own the sky.
#15
Most of these air-to-air exercises are dominated by rules of engagement set to insure safety and to maximize training. There is a story, probably apocryphal, about RED FLAG out at Nellis. Some ANG F-106s were being matched against F-15s. In strict dogfighting terms, this is no contest since the 106 was designed to intercept Russian bombers and the F-15 for air-to-air combat. However, one of the F-106 pilots, tired of being beat up on a daily basis, got the instrumentation guys to load his plane with its normal complement of weapons. The F-106 carried two AIR-2 Genie air to air rockets with 1.5 kiloton nuke warheads so they could sweep the skies clean of formations of Russian bombers. At the beginning of the next days training, the F-15s are coming in from the North looking for their afternoon sport and expecting to embarass the less maneuverable 106's. Over the radio is heard the dauntless 106 pilot saying "Fox 1" followed shortly thereafter by the exercise controller saying, "All aircraft north of line X are destroyed. Exercise terminated. Return to base." This was followed by a period of intense sputtering and disbelief from the Eagle jock and a very professional silence from the interceptor pilots. The moral of the story is that in real combat the winners set the ROE.
#16
The F-106 carried two AIR-2 Genie air to air rockets with 1.5 kiloton nuke warheads so they could sweep the skies clean of formations of Russian bombers. At the beginning of the next days training, the F-15s are coming in from the North looking for their afternoon sport and expecting to embarass the less maneuverable 106's. Over the radio is heard the dauntless 106 pilot saying "Fox 1" followed shortly thereafter by the exercise controller saying, "All aircraft north of line X are destroyed. Exercise terminated
Yes! By heavens that's a tale to listen to on about 6 levels!
But remember our adversaries would never think to do such a thing!
#18
"I don't think any [adversary] is going to get close enough to see us for the next 10, 20 or 30 years."
So the Russians and Indians or Chinese will not be able to make a low cost, highvolume UCAV that is equal to the F-22 in every dimension until 2035? I wouldn't be my country's security on that. I'd like to understand why, if the choice is getting to the next generation 10 years sooner or the F-22, we shouldn't get to the future ASAP and let the F-35 bridge the gap. The Russians are cleaning their act up and when they start to joint venture with the Indians or Chinese, we'll see real competition in volume.
Posted by: Mr. Davis ||
06/25/2004 16:34 Comments ||
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#19
I'm all for getting new planes and all, but even if the Russians created FireFox and started selling it, few countries could afford them, and fewer still could afford (or even take seriously) the amount of training required to have a first rate airforce. The only countries that would be a risk are either allies, or China. China, even with crappy old planes, is a problem no matter what.
Am I missing something? Does anyone expect us to get into a shooting war with our allies, France, Russia or India? Does anyone expect some third world country will suddenly start respecting the concepts of maintainance and training?
#20
Do you really want to assume that Russia, China and India will remain so far behind economically that they can't afford an Air Force? I'd rather see them go German, so rich they don't mind letting us defend them cuz it isn't worth the cost to catch up. This means truly high tech weaponry like UCAVs.
Posted by: Mr. Davis ||
06/25/2004 16:44 Comments ||
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#21
hell, I'd sell 'em the tech....with some..er...backdoors
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 16:50 Comments ||
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#22
Do you honestly think Russia, and India could catch up economically, build a scary airforce and become enemies, and then catch us by surprise in doing so? Do you really think the US would simply wait until we had a confirmed and obvious enemy before building up our own air force again?
I'm all for purchasing newer and advanced planes, but this scare tactic of losing air superiority is unreal. This lose air supiority seems to indicate the US will be deaf dumb and blind until one day we wake up to find Russia, China or India is wealthy, has bought up advanced planes and trained thousands of pilots, and then become an overt enemy. Then we suddenly wake up and go wow, we blew it? Not likely.
How do you become good at basketball? By playing lots of basketball...
I'm sceptical in these areas, when someone says - well if our adversaries ever gets around to building such and such, then we'll pull our expertise out of mothballing and go and whip up a vastly superior answer. Best to play to win - keep ahead and stay there...
Posted by: Mark O ||
06/25/2004 18:04 Comments ||
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#24
me grunt.
me say war on ground. me say trying to prop up russia or china as near or peer competitor wrong. me say 200-300 million price tag per plane to much. me say recapitalize the a-10 fleet, expand AC-130's, UCAVs etc. me say expand into near space dominance and strike. me say fighter jock need more porn....getting rocks at mach 2 to expensive now.
me say winning fight in "non-intergrating gap" more important than imagining peer competitor.
me want up armored hummvees.
me want RFI set.
me want gun shields.
me want US industrial base focused on grunt on ground. not air marshalls in pentagon.
me tired from thinking to much.
me say hooah!!!!!!!!!!
#25
At this point in time, the most advanced fighters in China's air force are counter-balanced by the F-16 variants and derivatives in Tawain's air force; and I doubt that India is going be a formal enemy any time in the foreseeable future. Russia will take a couple of decades to even get what planes they now have up to snuff. That makes the F-22 expensive but tolerable; however the JSF needs to die, white elephant and black hole for money at this point in time.
#26
As far as #24's points go, I disagree with an up-armoured Jeep : M113 Galvin with 4 pindle points and gun shields for M240 LMG is a much better patrolling choice. Make sure that the Galvin is an -A3 or -A4 with the German-style external fuel tanks, the "rubber band" urban track replacements, and the Israeli-style fixed overhead cover on the body - replacing the old top hatch - and the Galvin is a much safer and deadly urban patrol vehicle. Plus, with the Commando turret for the Vehicle Commander, it has the necessary reach : 20mm main gun with dual feed, .50 cal aux gun, and M240 hatch gun. It is also much more resistant to IEDs.
#27
Strategy page has article on exercise(mis-called F-15s as F-14s in title-bad editor,bad.)Gave equal performance to US and Russian AAMs that prob not realistic.F-22 is needed.
I have repeatedly dissed F-35.I think it needs to be killed.Here is some info you can draw your own conclusions from:
1)Two project managers just fired.
2)F-16 and F-35 share same engine.Empty F-16 under 20,000lbs.Empty USAF F-35(proposed at 22,500lbs.)now has target empty weight of 27,400lbs.,but is coming in at 1400 lbs. over that.This means F-35 is 50% heavier than F-16 w/same power,giving far inferior performance in air combat manuevering.
3)Australian Aviation did comparison of F-22 and F-35 for Australian needs.Pointed out F-35 wing is optimized for strike mission,not ACM.F-35 nose smaller,so not able to carry as large a radar.Finally,the F-35 was not designed to be as stealthy as F-22.
4)Who knows when it will fly.Already production pushed back to 2007,w/USAF hinting it might wait til 2010 for F-35s.Contributing to delay,weight problem so severe,they are redesigning interior of a/c,so not sure when design finalized.
5)Cost.For an inexpensive fighter,this program is g**awful costly.Latest program estimates of $245billion for full buy of 3,000 F-35s=$80+mil/aircraft.(Includes r$d,not cost rise if program delays continue.)The UK is looking at up to $1.77billion for 150 F-35s(better than $100mil/aircraft-Bulldog,think you all will go for that?)
Posted by: Stephen ||
06/25/2004 19:25 Comments ||
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#28
This exercise has the hallmarks of a sandbag to get publicity for the F22 whose program is in political trouble. From http://www.defensetech.org/:
Now, granted, the Indians had the Americans outnumbered: usually 10 or 12 to 4,
USAF pilots were flying "Red Air" -- meaning they were simulating the (presumably worse) tactics and (presumably lower) capabilities of enemy flyers.
That said, I still think the F22 is needed now since the Sukhois are better airframes, can be very formidable with avionics upgrades, and seem to be sold to anyone with the cash.
Posted by: ed ||
06/25/2004 19:29 Comments ||
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#30
In the mid-80s I was program manager for software we exported to Israel for the Lavi fighter program. Think: updated F16, more maneuverable, updated avionics and fly-by-wire systems.
The Lavi was cancelled when Congress got seriously annoyed that the Israelis wanted to export it despite the agreement that they got our technology for their use only.
#31
Correction, the sale to China was in Dec 2002.
Don't get complacent about the ability of China or Russia to rearm, or to field a smaller force that could make things hard for us in a crisis.
OTOH, I can indeed spell UCAV and think that's where a lot of money will go. The general quoted does sound like he's doing care and feeding of his pet rock (Raptor) ... and that's not a bad thing. We need advocates for a variety of systems to make their cases.
Wretchard, writing on his Belmont Club blog. Slightly EFLâd.
Abu Musab al-Zarqawiâs oath to fight "until Islamic rule is back on earth" -- besides being historically wrong, as it never was -- and his vow to kill the Shiâite President of the interim Iraqi government, can be more accurately understood as a desire to fight for leadership of the Sunni triangle. . . . From the looks of it, Zarqawi has brought in the Al Qaeda first team to derail the June 30 turnover to Shiâite Iyad Allawi. But although he has quality, for his fighters are far better than Moqtada Al-Sadrâs rabble, he has forgotten that the April upsurge of violence, which some had breathlessly hoped would signal the downfall of the US in Iraq, was only made possible by Teheranâs decision to unleash simultaneous unrest in the south, in the hopes that a desperate America would pay any price for relief. But after the US calmly beat back both attacks, grinding Sadr down to a powder, it was no longer faced with a two-front war. There is now no way that the Shiâites will allow the Sunni-backed Zarqawi to call the shots. The Sunni Saddam had lorded it over them once before; and neither the Kurds nor the Shiâites will so easily let that happen again. A more attainable goal will be to prevent the emergence of any independent Sunni figure in the new government. Zaraqawiâs methods are nothing if brutal. His elite forces have killed 66 Iraqis and 3 Americans in the Sunni triangle in the last 24 hours, a reminder that any Sunni who breaks with him should prepare to die. . . .
Although both the Sunnis, the Shiâites and the other interests like France, possibly fronted by the UN may form occasional tactical coalitions against America, their interests fundamentally conflict. Like bank robbers squabbling over the loot, they may decide to jointly resist the police but will knife each other at the earliest opportunity once the coast is clear. Only America can play the lone hand. Some observers believe that both Washington and Teheran are clearing the decks for final showdown over Iraq once the two weaker players are ousted from the game. Clearly the Shiâite-Iranian theater is the decisive area of operations. The Sunni Triangle, however disgustingly Zarqawiâs elite fighters behave, is the secondary front.
As an aside, one might remark on the extremity of the Jihadi effort in Iraq. They are sending their best team, the team that harried the IDF out of Lebanon to no good effect. US forces have quietly become very efficient, with chemical test kits to screen suspects for explosive residue, aircraft which electronically detonate IEDs, a steady drumbeat of raids on explosives factories and other operational advances. The enemy is still able to kill Americans, but not in any decisive numbers. But how will America use its capability to achieve a strategic result? The answer to that question will not be revealed until after the November Presidential election if George Bush is re-elected: whether America will go West to Syria and Lebanon or move its sights squarely on Teheran. . . . The week leading up to the formal transfer of power to the Iraqi interim government will be punctuated by heavy yet pointless violence. The event is as unstoppable as the Overlord invasion, Zarqawi or no. The enemy had better prepare his fallback position and prepare for the next phase of the campaign.
Posted by: Mike ||
06/25/2004 12:20:03 PM ||
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On Tuesday Arabia TV news channel demonstrated a video footage showing how people of Ingushetia were welcoming Ingushetian and Chechen troops (Mujahideen), who carried out an armed raid deep inside the rears of the Russian army early morning of June 22 and attacked Russian positions in several cities and villages of Republic of Ingushetia. This report came from ASN News. The video shows how several dozen of Ingushetian people were hugging with armed men in camouflage uniforms, and nobody was surprised or especially indignant about it. Cheers âGod is Great!â (âAllah Akbarâ!) and «Death to Kafirs (infidels)!» were heard on the footage as well. Arabia TV channel did not report where this footage came from. The footage also had the time and date it was filmed: 9:30 â 9:36 PM, June 21, 2004. Presumably, it was filmed in the city of Nazran, but some locals were heard as saying, «Karabulak will be clean!»
Okay. No infidels in Karabulak, then...
The video footage showed several dead bodies with Russian police uniforms on. Arabiaâs commentator pointed out that the Mujahideen filmed in that footage were all Europeans. They all had blond or light hair and Caucasian appearance. Nevertheless, Russia is still trying to present the situation like some foreign mercenaries were allegedly taking part in this combat operation in Ingushetia. Thus, FSB (KGB) spokesman told journalists that Arabs, Pakistanis, Algerians and Chechens were in these units of Mujahideen.
Just not on that tape...
But these claims that the invadersâ command has been making are not taken seriously. Moreover, locals and Ingushetian journalists reported that most of the fighters were certainly ethnic Ingushetians. Ingushetia.ru edition, whose reporter was in the middle of the events and had contacts with the fighters, says that the backbone of the troops that attacked the invadersâ positions consisted of Ingushetian natives. During the attack on the headquarters of pro-Moscow Ingushetian police (Interior Ministry), Ingushetian troops posted mobile squads in the blocks adjacent to the battle scene. The locals had a chance to talk to some of them. One of the Mujahideen even told that it was them, the Ingushetians, who persuaded Chechen Commander Shamil Basayev to carry out this operation in order to teach a lesson to pro-Russian power structures of Ingushetia, to the Russian police, to the FSB (KGB) and to other secret services guilty of extrajudicial executions and kidnappings in Ingushetia. «âŠwhen my brother was kidnapped, and I hadnât been able to find his body or his whereabouts, I went to the mountains to Shamil Basayev. There are hundreds of people like me. And mainly Ingushetians are the ones fighting here», a fighter said.
Russian claims about civilian casualties have never been confirmed either. The locals said that the marketâs director was reported dead. He was mistaken for a pro-Moscow police officer, since he had a police holster with a handgun in it. A UN employee was reported killed in crossfire and two unknown men in civilian clothes, who have still not been identified. As far as FSB claims go that a pregnant woman was allegedly shot and an ambulance car allegedly destroyed, these allegations have never been confirmed either and turned out to be an invention by Russian propagandists, just as it was expected. At the same time it looks like the information is being confirmed that some civilians were injured by shattered glass, stray bullets and shrapnel. Tuesday night Russian side released the report that 10 civilians, 47 police officers, invadersâ soldiers and FSB agents were dead and at least 200 people wounded. The Command of Ingushetian Armed Forces reported that 150 to 200 enemy soldiers and policemen were killed and at least 300 wounded. Besides, Ingushetian Armed Forces have issued a strong statement that no civilian facilities or civilians were attacked.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 11:53:36 AM ||
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Two US marines were killed and another one wounded during an operation in violence-plagued eastern Afghanistan, the military said in Kabul today. The clash was in Kunar, a province on the border with Pakistan, late last night, military spokesman Dave Dyer said. The wounded marine was in stable condition. None of the soldiers was identified. âTwo marines were killed and one was wounded during an operation northeast of Asadabad,â the provincial capital, Dyer said in a brief statement. The chief of Kunar police, Matiullah Safi, said American warplanes had flown over Asadabad, where the US military has a base. He said helicopters bombarded a mountain about four miles away, but he had not heard of any casualties from fighting or of any rebel attack against the base.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 11:45:52 AM ||
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Iraqi fighters from Falluja, their faces hidden behind checkered cloths, denied in a taped message Friday that suspected al Qaeda operative Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was holed up in Iraqâs most rebellious city. "The American invader forces claim that Zarqawi, and with him a group of Arab fighters, are in our city," a masked man read from a piece of paper. "We know that this talk about Zarqawi and the fighters is a game the American invader forces are playing to strike Islam and Muslims in the city of mosques, steadfast Falluja." On the tape, five men holding a rocket-propelled grenade launcher and machine gun said local fighters were defending their hometown -- sometimes known as the "city of mosques."
On Friday, U.S. forces again bombed houses in the city, residents said, causing damage but no deaths. At the same time, insurgents attacked a U.S. military convoy southwest of Falluja and fought a short firefight with troops, witnesses said. One guerrilla was killed in the fighting. It was not immediately clear if U.S. forces sustained casualties. Scores of black-clad gunmen, some claiming loyalty to Zarqawi, attacked a police station and other government buildings in Baquba, northwest of Baghdad, in a dawn assault. Iraqâs interim national security minister said Thursday Iraqi officials had good intelligence on Zarqawi, who this week threatened to assassinate Iraqâs prime minister, and plan to pursue him after the formal transfer of power next week.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 10:09:33 AM ||
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#1
this would seem to confirm Zarq IS in Fallujah, no?
#9
body of Skorean was dumped in Baghdad; it would have been risky to transport body from Fallujah, also since nothing suspicious was seen before or after dumping they must have enough Zarqawi operatives in Baghdad to scout places out to avoid being seen
also, it is more convenient to make beheading videotapes and transfer files in Baghdad because of more telecom capacity and less chance of a large chunk file being identified
#11
Did Zarqawi do the SKor himself? I don't recall that being the case as with Berg....
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 13:43 Comments ||
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#12
mhw, isn't fallujah only 20 or 30 miles from Baghdad? I've driven farther than that to go to Crate 'n' Barrel. Also, has it been claimed that Zarqawi himself beheaded the South Korean? Since that guy had been kidnapped in Fallujah, he could well have been transferred to Baghdad days before the beheading or it could have been carried out somewhere between the two cities.
Posted by: Tibor ||
06/25/2004 13:46 Comments ||
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#13
tibor
yes, it could have gone down as you indicate
however, to get out of Fallujah you have to go thru at least one checkpoint; some are staffed with animals or devices that could detect a decaying body in a cartrunks; why risk that
also, even if Z didn't do the beheading himself there is a good chance he was physically present
#17
The important thing for coalition forces is to keep Zharqawi on the defensive---always on the defensive. We have to keep the momentum of the attacks up. That will force the enemy to do desperate things and that is when the enemy makes mistakes. Zarqawi is trying to make this into Tet. He is using up assets in this fight like Jack the bear. We will not play the Win the Battle lose the war like in Tet. We will attrit him. And the media will wring their hands and cry oh woe, but our service men and women will be getting the job done.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 15:32 Comments ||
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#18
He ain't here either. Matter of fact don't know him or his fambily. He maybe gone to Georgia.
Pakistani intelligence agents have arrested two men on suspicion of links with the Al Qaeda terror network, intelligence officials said yesterday. The men were arrested in the northwestern city of Chitral near the Afghan border, officials said. They gave the menâs names as Abdur Rahman alias Abu Obaida, and Suleman Tahir. Rahman was described as an Arab, but his nationality wasnât given. The other suspect is a Pakistani. The intelligence officials said the suspects were being questioned in Peshawar, the capital of Pakistanâs North West Frontier Province.
Meanwhile, Pakistani forces continued to search houses in a remote tribal area near the Afghan border for foreign fighters as the latest militant attack left seven police officers injured, officials said. The predawn rocket and grenade attack was in the town of Dera Ismail Khan, which borders the tribal district of South Waziristan, scene of an ongoing military campaign to capture of kill suspected foreign Al Qaeda fighters. One of the injured policemen was in serious condition in the hospital, the townâs deputy inspector general of police Habibur Rehman said. "We believe the attack was in retaliation for the operation in neighbouring South Waziristan tribal belt," he said.
Holmes! How do you do it?
Pakistani troops along with tribal forces meanwhile conducted a house to house search in the Shakai valley near South Waziristanâs main town Wana for the fourth day but found neither any fugitives nor weapons, officials said. The search operation followed a massive air and ground offensive in the valley earlier this month. Pakistanâs military launched a five-day operation in the mountainous Shakai valley, 25km northeast of Wana to destroy several Al Qaeda hideouts. The operation was in response to an attack by militants on a military post on June 9 which left 14 security personnel dead.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 10:06:12 AM ||
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U.S.-led coalition military forces struck a suspected terrorist safehouse in Fallujah on Friday, hoping to cripple Abu Musab al-Zarqawiâs terror network. cripple? Kill.Them.
"We conducted another attack against the Zarqawi network today: coalition forces conducted another strike on a known Zarqawi network safe house in Southeastern Fallujah, based on multiple confirmations of Iraqi and Coalition intelligence," a senior coalition military official said. "This operation employed precision weapons to target and destroy the safe house," the official said. As many as 25 people were in the house at the time but it was not clear how many were killed or wounded. Earlier Friday in Fallujah, explosions and gunfire rocked the turbulent city for a second day Friday, after coordinated attacks in other Iraqi cities killed about 100 people less than a week before Iraqâs new government takes power. seems they donât like the handover
U.S. tanks and armored vehicles maneuvered on the highway near the edges of the city, firing in several directions, while armed men in an eastern suburb returned fire, witnesses said. Seven people have died in two days of exchanges there, hospital officials said. Hours later, a roadside bomb exploded in a residential neighborhood in Baghdad, killing one Iraqi policeman and wounding another, police said. The attacks on security forces fit a pattern of violence that targeted several cities on Thursday, when insurgents set off car bombs and seized police stations in an offensive aimed at creating chaos just days before the handover of power to a new Iraqi government. U.S. and Iraqi forces regained control in heavy fighting, but the dayâs violence killed about 100 people, most of them Iraqi civilians.
Al-Zarqawiâs terror network claimed responsibility for the attacks Thursday. A large number were killed in simultaneous car bombings in the northern city of Mosul, but some also died as U.S. troops battled the guerrillas. Three U.S. soldiers were among the dead. At least 320 people were wounded, including 12 Americans. As the situation worsened, Iraqâs interim vice president warned that a drastic deterioration in the countryâs security could lead to emergency laws or martial law, however undesirable such measures may be in a democratic society. "Announcing emergency laws or martial law depends on the nature of the situation. In normal situations, there is clearly no need for that (step)," Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a Shiite and member of the Islamic Dawa Party, told The Associated Press in an interview late Thursday. "But in cases of excess challenges, emergency laws have their place," he said, adding that any such laws would fall within a "democratic framework that respects the rights of Iraqis."
Iraqâs new leaders have recently begun to suggest the possibility of at least some form of martial law in some hotspots around the country as a way of stemming the tide of violence. It is unclear, however, whether U.S. officials would go along with the idea. A U.N. Security Council resolution approved this month gives the United States a primary security role in Iraq even after the transfer of sovereignty Wednesday. American forces set up checkpoints around Iraq on Thursday to intercept weapons, guerrillas and bombs. They fear that al-Zarqawi plans a string of car bombings in Baghdad, said Col. Michael Formica, commander of the 1st Cavalry Divisionâs 2nd Brigade. good assumption
"There is clearly a transnational threat, as represented by al-Zarqawi, and that threat appears â based on what weâve seen in Fallujah and Mosul today â to want to bring the attack to Baghdad," Formica said Thursday. A large number of the dead from Thursdayâs attacks were killed in simultaneous car bombings in the northern city of Mosul, but some also died as U.S. troops battled the guerrillas. "We underestimated the nature of the insurgency that we might face during this period, and so the insurgency that we are looking at now ... has become a serious problem for us," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told the British Broadcast Corp.
The assaults were launched in the morning on Thursday, when black-clad guerrillas attacked police stations and government complexes in Baghdad, Baqouba, Mosul, Ramadi and Mahaweel. The heaviest fighting was in Baqouba, northeast of the capital, where guerrillas shot their way into a government office complex, seized two police stations and destroyed the home of the provincial police chief. The stations were recaptured Thursday afternoon, Maj. Neal OâBrien of the 1st Infantry Division said Friday. Two American soldiers died in the Baqouba fighting, the 1st Infantry Division said. Insurgents also attacked a police station in a Baqouba suburb late Thursday, killing three officers and injuring one, said Dr. Nassir Jawad, who is in charge of the Baqouba morgue. Isolated skirmishes were also reported nearby into Thursday evening, OâBrien said Friday.
Al-Zarqawiâs followers claimed responsibility for Thursdayâs attacks in a statement posted on an Islamic Web site often used by his Tawhid and Jihad movement. The statement said the "occupation troops and apostates" â meaning Iraqi police â "were overwhelmed with shock and confusion." Al-Zarqawi earlier claimed responsibility for the kidnappings and beheadings of American businessman Nicholas Berg and South Korean hostage Kim Sun-il, and an audiotape released Wednesday purporting to be by al-Zarqawi threatened to kill Iraqâs prime minister. Analysis of the tape showed it likely was al-Zarqawiâs voice, a CIA official said Thursday. American and Iraqi officials insisted the transfer of power would proceed as planned June 30. On Thursday, the coalition turned over the last 11 government ministries to Iraqi officials. During the handover ceremony, interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said the attacks were "only acts of disturbances conducted by cowards" meant "to foil the democratic process."
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 10:01:30 AM ||
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#1
I think al-Zarqawi's in Baghdad, not in Fallujah but he has some key goons there.
#2
"In Baghdad, insurgents attacked four Iraqi police stations using mortars, hand grenades and assault rifles on Wednesday and Thursday.[b] Police fought back[/b], and defended the stations [b]with minimal assistance from coalition forces[/b], a U.S. statement said. "
The militia of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has declared a unilateral cease-fire with U.S. forces in the Baghdad district of Sadr City and has offered to help police ensure safety in the area, a statement said Friday.
The cease-fire went into effect Thursday and was "obligatory on all al-Mahdi army's heroes," according to the statement, issued by the central committee of al-Sadr's al-Mahdi Army and distributed in the Shiite district.
The declaration said the cease-fire was called to show al-Sadr's interest in preventing "terrorists and saboteurs" from "causing overwhelming chaos or security disorder."
#5
Where is the F*****g Fallujah Brigade? Have they fallen off the earth? Abducted by aliens? Gone over to the other side? Dropped into the dustbin of discarded ideas? I haven't seen a word in print on these bozos and their moustachioed general in over a month. Will the new Iraqi government disband these useless fools or send the real army in to kill them?
#6
I just saw on cnn.com that coalition officials claimed that the latest Fallujah strike just missed Zarqawi. I am cautiously optimistic about the likelihood of his death in the near term.
As for the Fallujah Brigade, who cares? All along I suspected that the USMC was going to have to finish the job.
Seeing pictures on cnn.com of "insurgents" in Fallujah, I had a question. Is there such a thing as a high-altitude sniper rifle? It seems to me that a helicopter could hover over an area where there is ground fighting, identify targets based on GPS coordinates provided from the ground using thermal imaging at night or hi res cameras during the day, and drop miniature bombs (in the form of .50 cal shells) on the bad guys. The chopper would have to be high enough to protect it from RPG and high-powered rifle fire, and would have to shoot and scoot to avoid SAMs, but it otherwise seems doable. The weapon wouldn't even have to be manually fired -- I suspect we could develop a stabilized platform like the Abrahms uses. Does this seem like something that could be done with off-the-shelf technology or am I just talking out of my @ss?
Posted by: Tibor ||
06/25/2004 14:15 Comments ||
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"We underestimated the nature of the insurgency that we might face during this period, and so the insurgency that we are looking at now ... has become a serious problem for us," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told the British Broadcast Corp.
Thank you Powell for encouraging them. Would you like to be bitch-slapped by Rumsfeld now or after dinner?
Posted by: Charles ||
06/25/2004 15:17 Comments ||
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At this point, no matter where Zarqawi is, with the continuing 20 to 1 ratio kill in effect, his leutenants will definitley be crapping bricks, crying out for some sort of 'truce' in the interim. See, they want to fight 'like a man', not die, burnt to a crisp in a corner basement while taking a piss, waiting for instructions!
Posted by: Super Hose ||
06/25/2004 03:46 ||
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#1
Last fall, when Fox broke the story of the Saddam torture videos, the Times ran all of five paragraphs back on Page A-14 with a small picture â versus, so far, 181 stories on Abu Ghraib, more than 40 on the front page.
And people wonder why so many in the world hate us. It's the biased media, stupid.
...In the last week, the Marines conducted a number of operations to include a raid on a particular mosque. The amount of planning that goes into a raid such as this is extensive. You would be amazed at how much we study the proper approach, not just tactically but culturally. Every effort is made not to overly offend those Iraqis who are not targets of the action itself. The second and third order of effects of missions are considered by the most talented and experienced operators and commanders. If I had to categorize the operation, I would say that without sacrificing speed and security, Marines are very vigilant about displaying the proper amount of "respect" in and around the target. I mention this because we absolutely 100% know that mosques are used to plan insurgent attacks, used as terrorists meeting places, used to store weapons, used to hide hostages, and used to spread hate and lies. Of course not all mosques are nefarious, but a significant percentage in the area where our Marines operate seem to be. Even with this in mind, as mentioned above, every effort is made during planning and execution not to trespass on the cultural importance of mosques. Once the mission is complete, additional efforts are made to explain to the locals what we did and why we did it.
During raid on this particular mosque, a large amount of enemy propaganda along with weapons and a detonator for an improvised explosive device was found among the suspected insurgents. The detonator belonged to an explosive charge that was placed in the ground approximately 250 meters from the mosque on the road leading up to it. The propaganda can be best categorized as hateful (believe it or not there were even hand bills about the Marine eating spiders).
Instead of describing more about this target, I wanted to share some observations about how the Marine Sergeants make these kind of operations go. On this particular mission, try and imagine the Sergeantâs thinking as he has just spent hours/days in preparation for the operation, stressing to his Marines the sensitive nature of what they are going to do and all the doâs and donâts on objective. Once he finally gets his Marines on the objective, he is non-stop positioning and repositioning the men, keeping civilians at arms length, watching the detainees and coordinating his tasks under the search, knowing that one small mistake could get someone killed or will at least be fodder for the insurgents continued message of fear and hate. ....
Posted by: Super Hose ||
06/25/2004 3:43:10 AM ||
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Good operation, but I'm not sure I like the idea of the Marines being this "sensitive."
Posted by: Matt ||
06/25/2004 11:29 Comments ||
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They're only sensitive until someone gives them a reason not to be. "No better friend, no worse enemy."
#3
we absolutely 100% know that mosques are used to plan insurgent attacks, used as terrorists meeting places, used to store weapons, used to hide hostages, and used to spread hate and lies.
Considering the cheapness and small size of digital cameras now, why are they not being used by the military by the thousands to document these kind of things? Muslims keep saying that no Muslim would ever do this or ever do that. We should be able to show anybody thousands of hours of documentary evidence to the contrary.
Aside from some grassroots efforts from the troops themselves, it seems like the psychological side to the WOT is being completly ignored. I don't understand that at all.
EFL
The U.S. expert heading the weapons hunt in Iraq yesterday said heâs worried that terrorists like Abu Musab al-Zarqawi are trying to get chemical weapons to use against U.S. troops. "We want to follow that very, very closely. I mean, this is one bad actor [Zarqawi]. And if he gets his hands on it, heâll use it," Charles Duelfer, a former U.N. weapons inspector, told Fox News Channel. But...there...are...no...WMDâs...in... Duelfer also said his team has now found 10 or 12 chemical-weapon rounds armed with sarin and mustard gas. Until now, only a few chemical rounds had been reported. Emphasis added.
Posted by: Dragon Fly ||
06/25/2004 7:08:46 AM ||
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This is where the goal posts get moved back. OK...so there havn'e been any stockpiles found....so Bush LIED!
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
06/25/2004 10:35 Comments ||
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Don't be naive. The goalposts were taken down, put on a truck and sent to the landfill.
EFL
The Air Force announced Thursday that it will dismiss all charges against an Illinois Air National Guard fighter pilot who accidentally dropped a 500-pound, laser-guided bomb that killed four Canadians in Afghanistan in 2002. Maj. Harry Schmidt has accepted an Air Force offer to face administrative punishment in exchange for dismissal of four counts of dereliction of duty, the Air Force said.
Posted by: Dragon Fly ||
06/25/2004 6:59:15 AM ||
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From The Washington Post
The company commander of the U.S. soldiers charged with abusing detainees at Abu Ghraib prison testified Thursday that the top military intelligence commander at the prison was present the night a detainee died during an interrogation and that efforts were made to conceal the details of the detaineeâs death. Capt. Donald J. Reese, commander of the 372nd Military Police Company, said he was summoned one night in November to a shower room in a cellblock at the prison, where he discovered the body of a bloodied detainee on the floor. A group of intelligence personnel was standing around the body, discussing what to do, and Col. Thomas M. Pappas, commander of military intelligence at the prison, was among them, Reese said.
Reese said an Army colonel named Jordan sent a soldier to the prison mess hall for ice to preserve the body overnight. Lt. Col. Steven L. Jordan was head of the interrogation center at the prison, but it was unclear whether he was the officer to whom Reese referred. No medics were called, Reese said, and the detaineeâs identification was never recorded. Reese testified that he heard Pappas say at one point, "Iâm not going down for this alone." An autopsy the next day determined that the manâs death was caused by a blood clot resulting from a blow to the head, and the body subsequently was hooked up to an intravenous drip, as if the detainee was still alive, and taken out of the prison, Reese recalled. There is no known record of what happened to the body after that. ....
During an earlier hearing for another soldier in the 372nd, Spec. Jason A. Kenner testified that a Navy SEAL team and officers from other government agencies -- referred to as OGA, a common designation for CIA operatives -- brought the detainee in alive with a bag over his head. Kenner said he later saw that the man had been severely beaten on his face. Intelligence officers took the detainee to a shower room used for interrogations, Kenner said, and shackled him to a wall. "About an hour later, he died on them," Kenner testified. "They decided to put him on ice. There was a battle between [OGA] and MI [military intelligence] as to who was going to take care of the body. A couple days later, he was finally disposed of." ....
Reese said military intelligence clearly controlled the cellblock where Harman and other members of her military police platoon worked the night shift. "My MPs, they were directed by the MI people for what they wanted and how they wanted it," he said. ....
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
06/25/2004 6:31:02 AM ||
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#1
this was a bad business. hard to claim high moral ground if you beat prisoners to death. i feel they shamed the army and made the rest of the good GIs jobs a lot harder.
mortal blow to homefront psychology - deserved or not - US troops have a reputation for not caring about human rights. Annoying because 99.9% of the time they are above board, clean as. This 0.1% have just tarnished the other 99.9% in the minds of the masses all over the world.
And in a democracy it matters what the masses think.
how could they have been so stupid... to take TROPHY PICTURES into the bargain!
I really hope it was an aberration and that it doesn't come out that it was actually sanctioned at the highest levels. warzone or not, HOW you conduct yourself is as important as reaching your objective.
#2
Sounds like the people involved are being charged. What's your beef, Mikey?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
06/25/2004 8:19 Comments ||
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Spot on, Anon1--and with the anti-Bush frenzy in the media, that 0.1% is all we're going to hear about until Joe Average thinks it represents the 99.9% as well. *sigh*
Posted by: Dar ||
06/25/2004 9:35 Comments ||
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Anon1, I think you may be conflating different incidents here. Sounds like the SEALs brought in a prisoner who was badly banged up. He subsequently died. Exactly how he got banged up is unknown. You can't leap from that to an assertion of a prison policy to "beat prisoners to death". (Though I'm sure plenty will.) This is a war folks. Operators don't read bad guys their miranda rights and bring them in with velvet handcuffs. Their job is to kill, not detain. No one should be surprised if they bring in someone who is looking worse for wear and tear.
As for the MP staff taking trophy photos with the corpse, that's just plain wrong and is being dealt with. I don't see any news here.
#5
Joe Average could care less what happens to Iraqi POW's. Joe Average sees Iraqi POW's as the enemy. Joe Average knows that war is brutal and nasty. Joe Average's main concern about this war is body bag counts and it doesn't matter what color panties or other "brutality" that is alleged about our GI's, the only thing Joe Average cares about is how many GI's are killed in a war that Joe Average is having less and less certainty should have been started in the first place. Kapeesh? The WH, the MSM, and some of you are worried about "fair play" in war and Joe Average has far more common sense, he is more pragmatic.
If George Bush loses the election because of the Iraq War[btw, polls show him leading Kerry by 7 points this week because the economy is picking up]it's not going to be because of POW abuse. It will be because of a)the Iraqi's actions-their lack of gratitude and support of what we have done for them and b) because Joe Average has zero interest in this experimental theory of solving terrorism by playing Johnny Appleseed with democracy thruout the hellholes of the world and getting American boys killed and maimed in the process.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 12:40 Comments ||
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EFL. From the South Asia Analysis Group
On June 22,2004, over 200 well-armed persons simultaneously raided three towns in the Ingushetia Republic of Russia, adjoining Chechnya, and attacked police stations, government buildings and checkpoints with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades. The Russian and the local security forces were totally taken by surprise. Ninety-five persons were killed, the majority of them members of the security forces and other Government officials, including the local Interior Minister. This is not the first act of jihadi terrorism in the Republic, but this is the first one to have seen the Chechens and the Ingush operating jointly against the Russians. Past attacks were carried out mostly by Chechen terrorist groups with no active involvement by the Ingush, who were more spectators than participants. However, Russian official spokesmen have denied the participation of the Ingush and have alleged that the attacks were carried out by a mixed force of Chechens, Arabs from West Asia, Algerians and Pakistanis. Since 1999, there has been considerable involvement of Arabs of Chechen origin from West Asia in acts of terrorism in the Caucasus, but the Russian authorities do not make a distinction between Arabs of Chechen origin and other Arabs . The terrorists involved in the raids of June 22 operated more like a guerilla army than a group of terrorists. They launched lightning strikes, killed many, held control of the towns for a few hours and then quickly melted away, after having demonstrated to the local people their capability to strike at will and the inability of the Government security forces to anticipate and thwart their attacks.
On June 24, suicide bombers and armed groups launched well-cordinated and fierce attacks in five Iraqi cities---Mosul, Baquba, Ramadi, Falluja and Baghdad-- killing over 100 persons---62 in Mosul and 40 in the remaining four cities. While the American troops and the Iraqi security forces collaborating with them were prepared for an increase in acts of terrorism by the foreign terrorists and in violence by the Iraqi resistance fighters before the hand-over of limited sovereignty to an American and UN backed Iraqi regime on June 30,2004, the intensity of the attacks, their spread over a wide geographical area and the co-ordination displayed by the attackers---whether terrorists or resistance fighters---took them totally by surprise. There is no question of any linkage between the terrorist incidents of June 22 in Ingushetia and those of June 24 in Iraq. And yet, one has to underline certain common features of the prevailing situation in the Caucasus and Iraq, if one were to have a clear understanding of the state of jihadi terrorism in the world today. The most noticeable common feature is the seemingly inexhaustible availability of suicide car bombers in the Caucusus and Iraq for operations against the Russians and the Americans respectively. In the Caucasus, practically all the suicide bombers have been Chechens, either of Russia or from West Asia. Oral evidence from sources in Pakistan continues to indicate that the foreign terrorists operating in Iraq, from whose ranks the suicide bombers come, are mainly the Chechens of Afghan vintage, the majority of them Arabs of Chechen origin, who had come to Afghanistan in the 1980s to fight against the Soviet troops. After the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1988-89, they stayed behind and joined the various Pakistani jihadi organisations, Gulbuddin Heckmatyarâs Hizbe Islami and the Taliban when it was formed in 1994. While many of these Chechens went to Chechnya post-1994 to fight against the Russians, the others stayed behind in Afghanistan and fought against the Northern Alliance till October 2001. Since February last year, these Chechens, many of them of Saudi and Jordanian origin, have been moving to Saudi Arabia and Iraq in small groups to join in the jihad against the Saudi regime and the US-led coalition in Iraq.
When Osama bin Laden formed his Al Qaeda after the Afghan war against the Soviets, he kept it confined to Arabs of non-Chechen origin in order to ensure his own security and kept out of it the Arabs of Chechen origin because many of them had relatives in the West Asian security forces, particularly in Jordan. He feared that including them in Al Qaeda might enable these security forces to penetrate it. These Arab dregs of Chechen origin consequently joined the various Pakistani jihadi organisations and other organisations such as the Jamaat al-Tawhid waâl-Jihad [Unity and Jihad Group] of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, which has claimed responsibility for many of the acts of terrorism in Iraq. While the US and other Western intelligence agencies have paid considerable attention to identifying the Arab leaders and other members of Al Qaeda and smoking them out, similar attention has not been paid to identifying the Chechen elements and neutralising them. Western sympathy for the independence movement in the Caucasus is coming in the way of the Western countries acting with equal determination against the Chechen terrorists, whether they are operating in the Caucasus, in the tribal areas of Pakistan or elsewhere. Russian evidence on the involvement of foreign terrorists in the Caucasus and of Chechen terrorists outside Russia is sought to be dismissed lightly just as they were dismissing lightly in the past Indian evidence of Pakistani involvement in international jihadi terrorism.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
06/25/2004 5:20:22 AM ||
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"arabs of chechen origin" exiles like the Circassians?
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
06/25/2004 9:35 Comments ||
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side note - while in some parts of the mideast, the circassians seem to have assimilated as Arabs, the Circassians in Israel have, IIUC, largely adopted the Hebrew language - going farther in "Israelization" even then the Druze.
Coalition troops in Iraq have come face-to-face with the reasons why Arab countries have a hard time establishing democracies. In Iraq, a large portion of the population follows a very different reality than actually exists. This makes it difficult for any government to make decisions on the basis of facts. Instead, many imaginary items have to be dealt with. For example, before Saddam was overthrown, many Iraqis believed that all their woes were the result of foreign plots and conspiracies, as well as Saddams greedy and vicious rule. After Saddam was toppled, many Iraqis expected everything to magically get better immediately. American civil affairs troops were perplexed at this attitude, and still have a hard time dealing with it. As a result of that attitude, still widely held, many Iraqis believe America is needlessly punishing Iraq for some mysterious reasons. Iraqi-Americans, acting as translators for civil affairs units, could only shrug their shoulders when asked to explain these attitudes. Arabs who immigrate to the West quickly adapt to the local logic, but still maintain their ability to deal with the very flexible reality practiced back home. While the United States recognizes belief in UFOs and secret committees (Jewish, WASP or Bavarian) that actually control the world, as fringe opinions, not to be taken seriously, in the Arab world, such "fringe thinking" is much more mainstream. Arab rulers have to deal with this, even though they can meet with Western counterparts, shrug their shoulders and quip, "thatâs what my people believe and I have to deal with it."
The prevalence of fantasy, as an alternative to reality, in Iraq is aided by foreign opponents to the overthrow of Saddam by American invasion. While many countries in the Middle East and Europe were glad to see Saddam go, they did not like seeing it done via American troops. As a result, the Arab and European media demonize anything American troops do in Iraq, and feed this biased coverage back to Iraqis who accept it as fact. In the long run, Iraqis will look back on those al Jazeera screeds and say, "how silly, how could anyone believe such foolishness?" But itâs 2004, not 2014, and most Iraqis do believe that American troops are spending most of their time committing atrocities and doing nothing to protect Iraqis from terrorists and criminals.
Yet American troops and Iraqi police can still work together, right next to Iraqis holding newspapers full of stories denying such cooperation exists. American troops get used to going through neighborhoods where they always get friendly waves, except on the day after Al Jazeera ran some fantasy about imagined American atrocities, when all the troops get are angry stares. The next day, the smiles are back. But on the day after al Jazeera, or even a local newspaper, has run with some imaginative lies, some Iraqis can go beyond hard stares, and go up on the roof and open up with an AK-47. Usually, these guys donât hit anything. But often, American troops fire back with much more deadly effect. The bereaved family, of course, blames the Americans.
So, in addition to the terrorists, Baath Party diehards and plain old gangsters, American troops have to deal with popular alternate realities. Like the civil affairs people, most troops quickly adapt. Iraqi inability to face the world as logically as Americans is just another problem, like clearing out the roadside bombs and snipers before you move through a town. But lies are weapons, often deadly weapons, and American soldiers die because of them.
Posted by: tipper ||
06/25/2004 1:36:25 AM ||
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#1
I still do not understand why the US did not from, the beginning, banned arab tv coverage. They would have screeched at the beginning but by now, they would have gone to show other massacres or Koran recital competitions.
Muslims in the Middle East have problems with logic and therefore problem separating truths from fabrications. There are still people here that will tell you, that the first Gulf War was created by EXXON and the rulers of Kuwait. The plan was to take over Iraq but Saddam found out and decided to put a stop to it. So the invasion of Kuwait by the Iraqis was in self-defence. See, it all makes sense to them.
#2
I don't undestand it either. But I think the DOD has made a note. Ignorant peple are easily lead. they have no stone to lay as their foundation, other than the one that has been laid for them.
Hollywood has been absent in this war. Way to go Hollywood/. You have talent beyond most of the world and you waste it making Shrek 2.
#3
Al Jazeera is not the only hate-America spin master - what about our own NYT?
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 2:28 Comments ||
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Think a moment what that would do. Before you do anything, you ahve to think about what you want to achieve and whether what you are going to do will bring that about. Would banning Arab TV help, or hurt US efforts?
Imagine the outrage as we, a nation that claims to believe in a free press, censor such outside media? Ultimately I think it would backfire badly, and make things worse off than what we have now.
Posted by: Ben ||
06/25/2004 3:43 Comments ||
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the press has done a pretty effective job of hanging itself. Does anyone, except the true-believers of the left - believe what they say anymore? I've noticed the NYT doing lots of advertising here lately - I'm guessing sales are down. Giving them more rope is probably a good idea for free speech in the long run. It's just that in the short run, we need to do a better job - both here and in Iraq - of assuring that real news has adequate outlets.
As for Iraqi alternate realities - I'm not so sure it's much different here in the US.
#8
Understanding cultural difference is paramount to the success of the mission.
For example, if you try to transplant democracy onto a culture that lacks the ideological underpinnings of elementary critical thinking skills, willingness to separate mosque and state, respect for the rule of law, respect and tolerance for the different views of others and a willingness to peacefully abide by the rules even when their own favoured party/policy loses at the polls will not work.
The truth is, this is a shame-honour culture that for a generation has lived with a repressive thugocracy. They deeply respect the rule of the strongest thug on the block and have no idea how to interact en masse in anything approaching a western democracy.
Ultimately attempts to transplant a western-style democracy here are doomed to failure without massive and ongoing repression plus psyops until new cultural norms can be learnt.
Japan and Germany did it post WW2 but they were DEFEATED cultures and had no choice but to face cultural change, as there was a true occupation force with a soldier on every corner to impose it.
The Iraqi people don't feel defeated one little bit. The war was designed to decapitate Saddam's regime without hurting them and well they know it.
They are in no mood to change their ways.
Their culture produced a thugocracy with a tyranny of the biggest thug.
That's exactly what will happen again as soon as the Americans leave unless they devote the time, energy and resources to preventing this.
But unfortunately I think that process would require the scale of attention that Germany/Japan did post-WW2 and for that there is not the political will on the homefront. It may be that the administration and those who truly understand have the will and the balls to do it but unfortunately in a democracy it is the media and the masses that ultimately get to decide and THEY don't have the stomach for the repression that would be necessary for a good outcome. It was hard enough just removing Saddam, and the brouhaha over Abu Ghraib: can you imagine what they'd be like with a TRUE occupation? One that was actually repressive and lasted more than 5 years? That cost a lot of money? This is what I think Iraq needs to become a functioning modern democracy.
Daniel Pipes thinks the best the US can do is to instal a forward-thinking, democratically minded chief thug in power who can edge the people along to democracy slowly.
But who would fit that bill? And wouldn't they just give in to the temptation to be the biggest thug on the block after all?
The greatest victory in Iraq WOULD be a functioning, free, economically successful, western-style democracy that kept the best of Iraqi culture and threw out the junk that didn't work, a la Japan/Germany post WW2.
That would go a long way towards winning the WOT as other Arabs would look to Iraq as a beacon of success, an indicator of how they can maintain their honour and pride and still succeed.
Moderate Muslims/Arabs would look to this as a new option and hopefully throw out the Islamofascist route in favour of the good example oof the Iraqi model. The threat of a good example is a powerful tool in an ideological war (which tthe WOT is) and the Islamofascists know it, hence their desire to derail this possibility in Iraq as much as possible.
I think that might have been the original desire of US policy makers in Iraq, but once again the lack of cultural understanding has made them err.
They thought it would be much easier than it really is because they underestimated the extent to which cultural change would be necessary.
and cultural change is the hardest nut to crack.
I am sad because i think it was a marvellous opportunity, and I don't blame the US because they tried their best with the tools they had available.
But I truly think they are doomed to failure as far as creating a democratic Iraq goes because they are unable to win the cultural wars with the resources they have allocated, particularly considering that with the next election there is a risk of a new POTUS who may just remove the troops altogether.
My fear is that Iraq will become the only thing worse than a tyranical secular thugocracy: an Iranian-style Theocracy.
In that case it may have been better not to go there at all.
#11
the good Tipper, not the one married to the insane ex-VP
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/25/2004 13:45 Comments ||
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...before Saddam was overthrown, many Iraqis believed that all their woes were the result of foreign plots and conspiracies, as well as Saddams greedy and vicious rule...As a result of that attitude, still widely held, many Iraqis believe America is needlessly punishing Iraq for some mysterious reasons...Iraqi-Americans, acting as translators for civil affairs units, could only shrug their shoulders when asked to explain these attitudes...
Addressed this earlier...when a culture's main source of education is gossip, "the prevalence of fantasy" is not such a big surprise. Iraqis have been terrorized away from gathering facts and arriving at logical conclusions in that country for the last 10 years. This is one more reason why any videos of Saddam's torture of Iraqis must come to light--the Iraqis themselves need to get an accurate picture of what Saddam did; this may help them to decide whether Operation Freedom was worth their sacrifices or not.
With respect to why Iraqis feel the way they do despite the facts, I would certainly add that the anti-war media has helped them along in their magical thinking.
U.S. Army officials plan to file negligent-homicide and manslaughter charges against two Fort Carson-based military intelligence officers who allegedly suffocated an Iraqi general during an interrogation in November, The Denver Post has learned. Two other enlisted soldiers face dereliction-of-duty charges in the fatal interrogation, according to a Pentagon document obtained by the newspaper. Prosecution of the two officers would mark the first time service members involved in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts have faced homicide-related charges in connection with the abuse of prisoners of war. Military experts say it could be the first such action in recent history. A decision on the case has moved slowly because the soldiers' commander, Col. David Teeples of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, has "been reluctant to pursue charges" while military lawyers have favored prosecution, according to a Department of Defense source.
Very long, rest at the link.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/25/2004 12:42:23 AM ||
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No Olympican pig piles, but how about photos?
Posted by: Capt America ||
06/25/2004 0:47 Comments ||
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Col. David Teeples of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, has "been reluctant to pursue charges" while military lawyers have favored prosecution
And why are we not surprised that JAG is lining up against our enlisted men? We have JAG because... military lawyers are known for their valour??their desire to take a bullet for God and country?? No, we have lawyers so our soldiers can be betrayed, and I'll bet we pay JAG lawyers far better than we pay the men who actually protect and defend us. This stinks.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 0:54 Comments ||
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Argh; don't mind I temper the sentiment, rex? I don't like JAG or NCIS either, but excuse me if I'm not exactly happy to hear that a higher-up who could've squealed was instead snuffed. (Well, unless he already did.)
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
06/25/2004 3:29 Comments ||
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Your point is well taken, #3, except that I am not sure how much intelligence an Iraqi General would provide that we did not already know as of November 2003. But it's this that caught my eye and made me rant against JAG: Military experts say it could be the first such action [homicide charges for POW abuse]in recent history.
War is brutal. Bad things happen...even death. What with the Abu Prison bruhaha, you'd think that JAG might put aside their noble high minded attorney principles[cough, cough] and do what's best for America, perhaps lodge a less severe complaint like involuntary manslaughter or assault with a deadly weapon. Lawyers are typically liberals and I suspect this has some personal goal in mind, like to help put a Democrat lawwwyerrrr in the Oval Office, do you think, maybe???
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 3:52 Comments ||
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#5
Eheheheh long known. >_>
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
06/25/2004 5:27 Comments ||
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Contacts between Iraqi intelligence agents and Osama bin Laden when he was in Sudan in the mid-1990âs were part of a broad effort by Baghdad to work with organizations opposing the Saudi ruling family, according to a newly disclosed document obtained by the Americans in Iraq. American officials described the document as an internal report by the Iraqi intelligence service detailing efforts to seek cooperation with several Saudi opposition groups, including Mr. bin Ladenâs organization, before Al Qaeda had become a full-fledged terrorist organization. He was based in Sudan from 1992 to 1996, when that country forced him to leave and he took refuge in Afghanistan. The document states that Iraq agreed to rebroadcast anti-Saudi propaganda, and that a request from Mr. bin Laden to begin joint operations against foreign forces in Saudi Arabia went unanswered. There is no further indication of collaboration. Last week, the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks addressed the known contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda, which have been cited by the White House as evidence of a close relationship between the two. The commission concluded that the contacts had not demonstrated "a collaborative relationship" between Iraq and Al Qaeda. The Bush administration responded that there was considerable evidence of ties.
Again the Commission is deliberately mis-quoted.
The new document, which appears to have circulated only since April, was provided to The New York Times several weeks ago, before the commissionâs report was released. Since obtaining the document, The Times has interviewed several military, intelligence and United States government officials in Washington and Baghdad to determine that the government considered it authentic. The Americans confirmed that they had obtained the document from the Iraqi National Congress, as part of a trove that the group gathered after the fall of Saddam Husseinâs government last year. The Defense Intelligence Agency paid the Iraqi National Congress for documents and other information until recently, when the group and its leader, Ahmad Chalabi, fell out of favor in Washington.
Some of the intelligence provided by the group is now wholly discredited, although officials have called some of the documents it helped to obtain useful. A translation of the new Iraqi document was reviewed by a Pentagon working group in the spring, officials said. It included senior analysts from the militaryâs Joint Staff, the Defense Intelligence Agency and a joint intelligence task force that specialized in counterterrorism issues, they said. The task force concluded that the document "appeared authentic," and that it "corroborates and expands on previous reporting" about contacts between Iraqi intelligence and Mr. bin Laden in Sudan, according to the task forceâs analysis. It is not known whether some on the task force held dissenting opinions about the documentâs veracity.
At the time of the contacts described in the Iraqi document, Mr. bin Laden was little known beyond the world of national security experts. It is now thought that his associates bombed a hotel in Yemen used by American troops bound for Somalia in 1992. Intelligence officials also believe he played a role in training Somali fighters who battled Army Rangers and Special Operations forces in Mogadishu during the "Black Hawk Down" battle of 1993. The document, which asserts that Mr. bin Laden "was approached by our side," states that Mr. bin Laden previously "had some reservations about being labeled an Iraqi operative," but was now willing to meet in Sudan, and that "presidential approval" was granted to the Iraqi security service to proceed. At the meeting, Mr. bin Laden requested that sermons of an anti-Saudi cleric be rebroadcast in Iraq. That request, the document states, was approved by Baghdad. Mr. bin Laden "also requested joint operations against foreign forces" based in Saudi Arabia, where the American presence has been a rallying cry for Islamic militants who oppose American troops in the land of the Muslim pilgrimage sites of Mecca and Medina. But the document contains no statement of response by the Iraqi leadership under Mr. Hussein to the request for joint operations, and there is no indication of discussions about attacks on the United States or the use of unconventional weapons.
The document is of interest to American officials as a detailed, if limited, snapshot of communications between Iraqi intelligence and Mr. bin Laden, but this view ends with Mr. bin Ladenâs departure from Sudan. At that point, Iraqi intelligence officers began "seeking other channels through which to handle the relationship, in light of his current location," the document states. Members of the Pentagon task force that reviewed the document said it described no formal alliance being reached between Mr. bin Laden and Iraqi intelligence. The Iraqi document itself states that "cooperation between the two organizations should be allowed to develop freely through discussion and agreement." The document provides evidence of communications between Mr. bin Laden and Iraqi intelligence, similar to that described in the Sept. 11 staff report released last week. "A senior Iraqi intelligence officer reportedly made three visits to Sudan," it said, "finally meeting bin Laden in 1994. Bin Laden is said to have requested space to establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring weapons, but Iraq apparently never responded."
It is not clear whether the commission knew of this document. After its report was released, Mr. Cheney said he might have been privy to more information than the commission had; it is not known whether any further information has changed hands. A spokesman for the Sept. 11 commission declined to say whether it had seen the Iraqi document, saying its policy was to confine itself to making half-assed statements not to discuss its sources. The Iraqi document states that Mr. bin Ladenâs organization in Sudan was called "The Advice and Reform Commission." The Iraqis were cued to make their approach to Mr. bin Laden in 1994 after a Sudanese official visited Uday Hussein, the leaderâs son, as well as the director of Iraqi intelligence, and indicated that Mr. bin Laden was willing to meet in Sudan. A former director of operations for Iraqi intelligence Directorate 4 met with Mr. bin Laden on Feb. 19, 1995, the document states.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 12:22:57 AM ||
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#1
As the article says, this document provides a "snapshot". The cautious assumption would be that a set of snapshots only reveals the tip of the iceberg. Given the possible consequences, the worst case would have to be assumed, that there was a real possibility of AQ getting access to Iraqi weapons technology. That is a major reason we went to war, and Al Gore can go **** himself.
#2
I'm sure the Nere-do-wells will point out that this info came from Chalabi and the INC.
However, I'd like to point out that this and the 12 plus WMD shells are just the start of the trickle that will come out between now and the Nov. election.
A large majority of Iraqis say they have confidence in the new interim government of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi that is set to assume political power on Wednesday, according to a poll commissioned by U.S. officials in Iraq. The results are a significant victory for the United States but not and the United Nations. Together they negotiated with squabbling Iraqi factions in an attempt to cobble together a viable government that balanced disparate ethnic and religious groups. The first survey since the new government was announced by U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi about three weeks ago showed that 68 percent of Iraqis have confidence in their new leaders. The numbers are in stark contrast to widespread disillusionment with the previous Iraqi Governing Council, which was made up of 25 members picked by the United States and which served as the Iraqi partner to the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority. Only 28 percent of Iraqis backed the council when it was dissolved last month, according to a similar poll in May.
The previous survey, by the same independent professional polling organization, also showed widespread anger at, or disapproval of, the U.S.-led coalition that has ruled Iraq since the ouster of President Saddam Hussein. The current poll is considered a welcome sign that the new government has not been tainted by association with the United States and may have at least a honeymoon period to prove itself, U.S. officials said.
There had been particular concern in Baghdad and Washington that Allawiâs many years in exile before Hussein was ousted and his long-standing association with the CIA would undermine his credibility. But 73 percent of Iraqis polled approved of Allawi to lead the new government, 84 percent approved of President Ghazi Yawar and almost two-thirds backed the new Cabinet. These impressive showings indicate that the new leaders have support spanning ethnic and religious groups, U.S. officials said. "What comes across in the poll and what weâve sensed for a while is that Iraqis remain open-minded about the new government," a senior coalition official in Baghdad said in an interview. Four out of every five Iraqis expected that the new government will "make things better" for Iraq after the handover, with 10 percent expecting the situation to remain the same and 7 percent anticipating a decline, the poll shows. U.S. officials are particularly encouraged because the poll showed high name recognition for the new leadership, in contrast with the Democratic national ticket many members of the former council, U.S. officials said. More than 70 percent of Iraqis polled have heard or read a significant amount about the new leaders, who were named about three weeks ago. "Thatâs huge penetration -- and it happened quickly," said the coalition official, who asked for anonymity because of the rules on naming officials in Baghdad. "Itâs partly because Allawi is on all the Arab media every day talking about security. Heâs visiting sites, and there are constantly images of the prime minister tackling security, which is what Iraqis care most about right now. It resonates, and it comes across in these figures."
In a sign that Iraqis are more optimistic generally about their future after the occupation ends, two-thirds of Iraqis believed the first democratic elections for a new national assembly -- due to be held in December or January -- will be free and fair, the survey shows. Despite the growing number of attacks on Iraqi security forces, including several yesterday, public confidence in the new police and army has reached new highs, the poll shows. Seventy percent of Iraqis polled supported the new army, and 82 percent supported the police. The poll was based on more than 1,000 face-to-face interviews conducted June 9-19 in six major cities that reflect the diverse communities -- Baghdad, Basrah, Mosul, Diwaniyah, Hilla and Baqubah. The margin of error is plus or minus 4 percentage points. The survey was conducted by an independent group that is not identified by U.S. officials for security reason. The poll was paid for by the Coalition Provisional Authority to get a sense of Iraqi attitudes, U.S. officials said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 12:22:57 AM ||
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This is a golden opportunity for the new Iraqi govt to shine in the sun. All Zarkhawi can do is to kill 100 civilians and injure hundreds more. He gets a couple of coalation soldiers, but cannot put the hurt on the military. If the new govt can hold on and make some headway, it will be a great victory for the Iraqi people. It is sink or swim time for them. Zarkhawi attacking the new govt sets the Iraqi people against the terrorists. We need to back the govt up any way we can, but the Iraqis must realize that they have their dog in this fight. I am very concerned but cautiously optimistic.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 1:05 Comments ||
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#2
Like these people have any insight about sqwat. Lets be clear here. Iraqis are like a fourth grade class in water colors. It's going to be a big bloody soap opera. Lets not be to bound up in the success of a country that hates its other parts.
Jun 30th, a big deal. A very big deal. And although I wish a clean transition, not a chance. Real Politic. And put a bullet into saddams head before that becomes a CNN 24/7 item. Say it was an accident, a faux paus, sans oversight! Whatever, Bill Clinton will do something to change the news cycle.
#3
Remember, the transition has essentially already happened. Allawi, Yawar, etc. are already the public face of the Iraqi future, and have been doing the diplomatic and news circuits. June 30 (July 1, really) is just the day Allawi stands up and tells the terrorists they aren't dealing with PC-bound westerners any more...
#5
The poll was based on more than 1,000 face-to-face interviews conducted June 9-19 in six major cities that reflect the diverse communities -- Baghdad, Basrah, Mosul, Diwaniyah, Hilla and Baqubah.
IE it leaves out the Kurds, making this even better news.
#8
As I'm easily lead and very conflicted I do hope they can pull it off. But with the Iran elephant on one side and the Syrian/SA snake on the other. If it is to succeed those two pieces of fake need to be solved.
Heard an interesting interview on the Medved show a few days ago. Guys name was Mort something. He and his wife moniter Arab radio/TV. Irans push is to take over the whole swath of land from Iran to SA and punish Sunnies for the centuries of abuse by them.
He also said that they will nuke the dome in Jerusalem to end any Jewish ability to rebuild there. Putting an end to that religion(?) The Paleo's would be sacrificed to allan (the greater god, not the same god mind you)
He also said that if, get this, Christians or Jews hit mecco and mendocina first then muslims will say that their god is greater and will turn against islam. He thinks that soon the shia in SA will raise up and go for the SA royals and that the royals will be hell bent to have the GI come and fight for them.
Me thinks the royals may want to doze the two modestos and put a monkey wrench in irans plans.
Israeli-made bullets bought by the U.S. Army to plug a shortfall should be used for training only, not to fight Muslim guerrillas in Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. lawmakers told Army generals on Thursday.Since the Army has other stockpiled ammunition, "by no means, under any circumstances should a round (from Israel) be utilized," said Rep. Neil Abercrombie of Hawaii, the top Democrat on a House of Representatives Armed Services subcommittee with jurisdiction over land forces.
The Army contracted with Israel Military Industries Ltd. in December for $70 million in small-caliber ammunition. The Israeli firm was one of only two worldwide that could meet U.S. technical specifications and delivery needs, said Brig. Gen. Paul Izzo, the Armyâs program executive officer for ammunition. The other was East Alton, Illinois-based Winchester Ammunition, which also received a $70 million contract. Although the Army should not have to worry about "political correctness," Abercrombie was making a valid point about the propaganda pitfalls of using Israeli rounds in the U.S.-declared war on terror, said Rep. Curt Weldon, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the subcommittee on tactical air and land forces. "Thereâs a sensitivity that I think all of us recognize," Weldon told the Army witnesses, including Maj. Gen. Buford Blount, who led the U.S. Third Infantry Division that captured Baghdad in April 2003. "Sensitivity" while we are at war??? This is too precious. OBL is laughing, folks, because the googooheads of both political parties are micro managing battlefield conditions with "Iâm okay, youâre okay" pop psychology. I feel very badly for our GIâs and their families.
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 12:18:17 AM ||
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Is this an actual law that was passed? Or just a bunch of idiot politicians telling the Army what to do?
And I'll be calling my Representative Eric Cantor in the morning. And Senator Warner. This is shameful.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 0:25 Comments ||
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#2
Who gives a shit what bullets are used?
Maybe we can start a rumor that ours are dipped in pig fat.
Answer:
the uber sensitive googooheads who hold the purse strings at the House of Representatives Armed Services subcommittee with jurisdiction over land and tactical air forces
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 0:39 Comments ||
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#4
Politically correct bullets, how Democratic Party.
Posted by: Capt America ||
06/25/2004 0:50 Comments ||
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#5
Capt America---the politically correct bullets are called PCBs.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
06/25/2004 0:58 Comments ||
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Politically correct bullets, how Democratic Party.
Wrongo...this is a bi-partisan, shared sensitivity mindset, and aren't we conservatives happy about that? The Chairman of this subcommittee is a Republican for gosh sakes and he is quoted as supporting this googoohead nonsense. How can we win the WOT when we have morons running this country?
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 0:59 Comments ||
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#7
Laugh all you want - those casings show up in Iraq, AL Jizz puts it on the TV regionally, and all the idiot Islamicist propagandists there scream even louder about the "Zionist plots" - and move of whats left of the middle gets pulled into the Islam-o-nut faction.
#8
OldSpook has 'real politic' insight, to be sure! But god damn that shit. Jew rounds are offensive to a devout muslim. Likie muslim fears should ever be trampled apon? Those asses have been using their percieved injustices, based upon the prophi-et, may whatever be pissed upon his evil grave, as a reason for ignorant people to kill, maim, and cause havok.
Sorry, just hate the PC that is islamic understanding.
OldSpook, nothing about Zionist bullets will change anything. The die is cast, has been, you know that. Shoot a cleric, so what? Shoot a GI, so what? Shoot a apple cart vendor, so what. The die is cast, it's a blood libel.
Al Jizz, so what, they will paint the picture in their own way. Jew rounds or not.
It's that backward culture folks! It needs to be confronted.
#9
So... Was fine Damascus steel used in the blades that beheaded Berg, Johnson, Soon Il? Just wondering.
Mebbe those cartridges should be shipped over to commemorate the day when all pretense is dropped and Al Jizz & Friends are granted the correct credentials / status. Press they are not.
#10
Yep! And I don't care what they say. They could say Mexican UFO's confirmed, so what. Al Jizz says what they say to further a geo-political force. If they become a target tommorrow it's like a day to late.
#11
I really don't care what bullets are used, as long as this restriction isn't paid attention to or lifted when supplies run low.
Then again, if it means that the training rounds it replaces become COMBAT rounds ... then I'd go along with it >_>
*ducks and hopes not to die at Rantburger hands*
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
06/25/2004 3:32 Comments ||
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#12
Al-Jazeera doesn't need actual evidence. They just make stuff up. It doesn't matter if it's true or not, in the absence of news, they simply invent it.
#14
think of it this way: this is an ideological war.
We are trying to fight the Islamofascists and at the SAME TIME drive a wedge between them and the moderate muslims.
If you use israeli bullets, you give a propaganda christmas present to the Islamofascists who say to the MMs (who we need to help us fight the culture war)... "see? It's true.. it's a zionist conspiracy.. its the jooos ".
Bad for us.
If it helps further our goals to not use israeli bullets, if we have enough non-israeli bullets and we are not running out, then it would be a very closed-minded person who wanted to sacrifice tactical advantage for pride.
Yes, you DO have to be culturally sensitive if you don't want to fight a war like knuckleheads and lose. Psy-ops and cultural considerations are the MAJOR not the minor part of the WOT. The shootings and bombings are the minor part. Cultural change is the objective.
#15
I thought you were supposed to use square bullets against mooselimbs.
Posted by: Laurence of the Rats ||
06/25/2004 8:30 Comments ||
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I don't understand. Do the slugs leave Star of David-shaped holes? When you fire them, does the report sound like "chutzpah"? Or maybe, as the slug goes through the air, it whistles "Hava Nagila"?
Just how the hell is anyone supposed to know it's an Israeli bullet?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
06/25/2004 8:33 Comments ||
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The very fact that this was made public -- that Israeli bullets are being used at all -- will be enough for the arab media to pounce on.
Somebody (Paleos, Al-Jizz) somewhere has had an opportunity to pick up some Jooooo brass. All they have to do is dump a pocketful on the ground, "discover" it, and point a video camera at it. Then, Rep. Abercrumbie and the rest of the Dhimmicrats can get a bad case of the vapors and demand an investigation.
Nuts.
Posted by: Darth VAda ||
06/25/2004 8:56 Comments ||
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I don't understand.
Is this decision in order to make the Islamofascists like USA better (because we're killing them with non-Israeli bullets, they'll be grateful to us) or to like Israel better? (they will no longer seek Israel's destruction because it'll be only non-Israeli bullets that are killing them in Iraq?)
I don't think that such a war can be won unless people are willing to support it as being morally right. Everyone already knows that Israel and the USA are allies, what difference does the origin of the specific bullets make?
Screw these PC sensibilities!
The jihadis are going to say the whole WOT's a Zionist plot anyway...
Just go full metal jacket and do it!
And dip them in bacon fat just to be on the safe side!
Posted by: Jen ||
06/25/2004 9:11 Comments ||
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#21
Is this decision in order to make the Islamofascists like USA better (because we're killing them with non-Israeli bullets, they'll be grateful to us) or to like Israel better?
its not to make the jihadis we're fighting like anyone better. There ARE, however, ordinary Iraqis who are willing to give the US a chance, but who dislike Israel. If we're only going to accept allies in Iraq who are friends of Israel, that limits us to the Kurds, and handful of secularists, mainly exiles. 25% of the population tops. Instead we want the support of all who are glad to be rid of Saddam, and who fear the victory of AQ. More like 80%.
Its reality folks - the democrats AND the Republicans AND the administration understand it. And I expect Ariel Sharon and the Israeli govt understand it too. Israel looks to the US to remain firm on Arafat, on the wall, and to encourage Egypt and Jordan to help marginalize Arafat. Selling bullets is a low priority, I think.
#23
I guess they'll have to be used on the Syrians then, if fired by US Troops. They're the only bunch at the nexus: people we're likely to fire upon & who have a grasp of the reality that being killed by Israeli bullets comes with the Jooo hatred thingy and the too stupid to live thingy.
LH - Good one: "Iraqis... dislike Israel." I don't know if I would use "dislike"... a blind indoctrinated hatred, perhaps? Hard to imagine that 1 out of 100 Iraqis has ever even come into contact (knowing or not) with an Israeli, much less come to know one sufficiently to form a rational dislike, much less a dislike strong enough to extend to an entire nation.
Now if you said someone hated Americans, well now, that I can understand! Or Bush, er sorry, Shrub. No problemo. Funny, though how convoluted the rationale gets when the BushHitler thingy is in play, since there's a dicotomy of thought, a certain schizophrenic and dysfunctional aspect, and... well, nevermind, heh. Meds. Heavy meds. :-)
#24
Hard to imagine that 1 out of 100 Iraqis has ever even come into contact (knowing or not) with an Israeli
Point of historical info - i bet most of the elderly Iraqis came into contact with people who went on to become Israelis - considering the ubiquity of Iraqi Jews in the population of Israel. I once spent the Sabbath at the Tel Aviv home of a student whose dad was Iraqi, and whose mom was Polish. The Iraqi "arab" Jews were educated and anglicized - the most educated component of the Afro-asian ("oriental") jews in Israel - compared to North Africans and Yemenites. They made up like 25% of the circa 1940 population of Baghdad, IIUC. Most went to Israel, some to Hong Kong - where they kept up their Brit empire loyalties. Kurdish Jews, OTOH, were generally poor and uneducated. Poor work in Israel used to be called "avodah kurdit" before it became "avodah aravit"
#25
If you use israeli bullets, you give a propaganda christmas present to the Islamofascists who say to the MMs (who we need to help us fight the culture war)... "see? It's true.. it's a zionist conspiracy.. its the jooos ".
You know, if those "MM's" are that easily influenced by fanatical Islamic cleric retards, then it seems to me that little value is added by trying to win them over. A tenuous alliance that can possibly be broken by something as trivial as a bullet's origin simply isn't worth the effort.
Suppose a bullet chambered in some U.S. soldier's rifle came from Winchester Ammunition instead, but was put together by someone named Asher or Cohen? Then what?
Yes, you DO have to be culturally sensitive if you don't want to fight a war like knuckleheads and lose.
Yesiree! Culturally sensitive enough to let them hoodwink you.
Bush starts a "Roadmap for Peace" with his Aquaba conference and the Egyptians stymy his efforts by permitting the smuggling of explosives and arms.
They are not going to like you anyway and any excuse will do. Being PC or now CS while you are fighting a war will make you lose.
Just look back to Fallujah and being CS about your enemy has just given them more impetus to blow up Iraq.
#27
Just remembered something. Wasn't it the FBI who would not employ American Jews fluent in Arabic to work as translators so as not to inflame the Arab street their Islamic translators?
Where CS certainly hurt America.
#29
I thought this was a scrappleface thing at first. Gimme a break, doesn't matter what bullets we use imho for the reasons Aris mentioned; plus, our lads in the field need them, the taxpayers already bought them, lock & load I say. This type of sh*t is exactly the reason why I hate most politicians - making much adieu about nothing while lives are on the line. Some of these guys need to go back to shampooing their poodles.
#30
What O.S. is saying makes sense. No point in giving the enemy ammo (pun intended) to create myths that aren't useful to us.
That said, it wouldn't hurt to turn around and ask said Congress-critters why the hell they didn't ensure there were sufficient rounds in the first place.
#31
As long as we're being politically sensitive, "someone's" comment about dipping the bullets in lard has merit. Let the Jihadis know that we will kill them with "Hell bullets" contaminated with pig fat and that they will never see Paradise. The rumor that British Army cartridges were coated with pig and cow fat was enough to start the Sepoy mutiny in 1857. The actual thing ought to twist a few turbans now.
#32
No way could we use a tried and true[Sepoy mutiny 1857] weapon against Muslim jihadists. We are much too smug about our side being so civilized and sensitive to friend and foe alike to use something barbaric[albeit successful] as dipping our bullets in pig's lard. Even starting a rumor like that would tarnish our reputation as "world liberator" and image is all important in war as we all know. Regarding GI's lives, well that's a secondary priority and no doubt the families of GI's would much rather have their sons and husbands put in harm's way in a war that has no end in sight rather than besmerch their reputation and have a quick end to the enemy's violence. America will stay in Iraq as long as it takes[whatever that means???]...even though it may be 100's of years that our GI's continue to be killed and maimed in Iraq, we can hug ourselves with the knowledge that we are fighting "fair"...
Posted by: rex ||
06/25/2004 16:14 Comments ||
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#34
PRetty simple: We know that bees are pretty stupid, and we know where the bee's nests are. No sense in walking up to them and thwacking them with a stick. At least not until we have the resources to deal with the bee swarm.
The very fact that this was made public -- that Israeli bullets are being used at all -- will be enough for the arab media to pounce on.
And look who made it public. If these crapweasel politicians hadn't opened their fat yaps, how the hell would the Arabs have known?
Can you say "giving aid and comfort to the enemy"?
And I vote for Israeli bullets loaded with pig fat.
BTW, this morning I called AND e-mailed both of my Senators and my Congressman. If y'all haven't done so, it might be more effective for you to contact your own Congresscritters to express your displeasure with this crap, instead of just complaining about it here.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 18:22 Comments ||
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#36
We should be carpet bombing these sand monkey pieces of human shit with bacon bits and pork rinds.My bumper sticker says"Nobody beats America:NOBODY!":These islamomaggots should read it while my rear wheels are grinding their face into hamburger.
#39
You know, Israel freaks them out so much, let's pick 5 terrorist supporting ME nations, depopulate them and give the land to Israel. And make sure they know, after we exterminate them, the jews get their land.
Al Qaeda-connected terror chief Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (search) and other terrorists are apparently trying to recruit Iraqi weapons of mass destruction experts and resources for possible future attacks against the U.S.-led coalition, the head of the Iraq Survey Group (search) told FOX News Thursday. In an exclusive interview with FOX Newsâ Brit Hume, Charles Duelfer (search) â whose ISG is leading the hunt for weapons of mass destruction â said terrorists in Iraq are âtrying to tap into the Iraqi WMD intellectual capital.â âWhen we have investigated certain labs and contacted certain former experts in the WMD program, we have found that they are being recruited by anti-coalition groups,â Duelfer told FOX News. âThey are being paid by anti-coalition groups. Weâre seeing interest in developing chemical munitions.â The same process seems to be happening in Afghanistan, he said.
He also told Fox News that about 10 or 12 sarin and mustard gas shells have been found in various locations in Iraq. The shells are all from the first Gulf War era and thus weakened, though intelligence sources say theyâre still dangerous. Duelfer said the ISG is closely monitoring the terroristsâ solicitation of chemical weapons gurus. âWe are tracking that very carefully,â he told FOX News. âWhat we are finding is that there are some networks that are seeking to tap into this expertise and try to use it against the United States. And we are very concerned about that. That is a problem.â He sidestepped a question about whether or not terrorist cells have been successful in obtaining the information theyâre after.âIâm just going to say that weâre keeping a very close eye on some anti-regime people, and we know of course that Zarqawi has expressed an interest in chemical weapons in the past,â Duelfer said. âSo we want to follow that very closely. This is one bad apple. And if he gets his hands on it, heâll use it.â
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/25/2004 12:18:17 AM ||
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Link ||
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#1
This is an obvious lie. Everybody knows Iraq had no WMD - just ask the NYT, LA Times, BBC, Mikey Moore, the Democrats, etc. - so they couldn't have had any WMD scientists.
This is another RepublicanNazi attempt to malign that great leader Saddam Insane Hussein.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/25/2004 0:21 Comments ||
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#2
Right, now we understand what David Kaye meant by saying that they were more dangerous than what was thought, and how the "capability" to produce WMD comes into play.
Posted by: Capt America ||
06/25/2004 0:52 Comments ||
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#3
At the risk of seeming callous - if all these WMD scientists turned up dead tomorrow, the world would be a safer place.
Posted by: Ben ||
06/25/2004 3:34 Comments ||
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#5
This whole Zarqawi affair is getting to the point that should he be captured, he should IMMEDIATELY undergo whatever methods of bona fide torture that his captors can muster. The more painful and agonizing, the better.
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.
