An alleged leader of the inter-district robbers was killed in an encounter between the members of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) and criminals last night at village North Bhurshi under Boalkhali upazila here. Some firearms were also recovered from the spot. The victim was identified as Jafar Meah alias Dacoit Jafar of Allapara at Koreldenga under Boalkhali upazila of the district. He was the second-in-command of Bodi Dacoit and accused in 12 cases, including murder, extortion and terrorism. Sources concerned said members of the elite police battalion, acting on a secret information, arrested Jafar from Hamjarbag area in the port city last morning.
"Stick 'em up, Jafar!"
"It's the RAB! Save me!"
Later, the RAB team took him to the RAB-7 office at Patenga for interrogation.
"He ain't so tough. Gimme a Number 4 truncheon, wouldja, Mahmoud?"
When the RAB men, depending on Jafarâs statement, going to the village home of the arrested along with him in a bid to recover firearms at around 10:00pm, a gang of armed dacoits attacked them.
"Don't take me to the abandoned warehouse at 3 in the morning and kill me!"
"Hokay. We'll take you to your village home. Howzat?"
"Ummm... Better. I guess."
"And we won't wait 'til 3 a.m. In fact, we can leave now."
The elite battalion came under the attack as soon as they were crossing village North Bhurshi under Boalkhali upazila at around 11:30pm.
"It's the RAB! Open random, poorly aimed fire!"
The RAB sources said the armed dacoits opened fire at them from their hideout in an abrupt bid to snatch the arrested criminal from RAB custody. At one stage, the RAB members, in retaliation, also fired gunshots resulting in the âcrossfireâ killing of arrested Jafar on the spot.
The other terrorists, however, could manage to escape from there after the gunfight. The RAB members recovered four SBBL guns, one LG and 10 rounds of bullet from the spot.
"Say! Haven't I seen these bullets before?"
The shutter gun must still be in the police lock-up.
Sources in the RAB said arrested Jafar was an accused in total 12 cases, including murder, extortion and terrorism. He was the second-in-command of Bodi Dakat, who was also killed in âcrossfireâ last month. "After the killing of Bodi, Jafar organised the gang and controlled the underworld of south Chittagong".
Surprisingly, Bodi's departure from this vale of tears was remarkably similar to Jafar's...
"He also committed various crimes, including inter-district dacoity in south Chittagong by his gang," the sources said, adding that Jafar was used to using illegal firearms for committing robbery.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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All right, what are SBBL and LG guns? BB and Lugar?
DHAKA - Islamic militants in Bangladesh have threatened to kill a judge and members of his family and blow up a court if the government goes ahead with plans to try suspected activists of outlawed Islamic extremist groups, media reports said on Saturday.
District Judge Mafizul Islam in the northern town of Pabna received a handwritten death threat from the banned Jamiatul Mujahedin group, the daily Bangladesh Observer said quoting local sources. The militant Islamic group has scores of activists in custody awaiting trial.
Mostly for being overly pious.
The government has blamed members of Jamiatul Mujahedin and another suspected militant organisation Jagrata Moslem Janata for a series of bomb blasts which rocked the capital Dhaka and other regional cities on August 17.
Dozens of extra policemen and paramilitary border guards have been drafted in to beef up security around district courts and the High Court following the death threat against Judge Islam. Official sources said the coalition government led by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party had drawn up charges of sedition against several detainees who would soon face trial in Pabna and other towns.
The Observer also reported that a security officer working at the national assembly was detained overnight for questioning about his alleged involvement in the August attacks, in which two people were killed and several others critically injured. Abu Taleb, who works in the security department of the assembly, reportedly admitted that he was a member of the Jamiatul Mujahedin group.
There's your inside man.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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Militants who plotted the August 17 and October 3 terror attacks, had planned to strike the key point installations in the capital including the parliament building, secretariat and airport. This was disclosed by the arrested zealots during interrogation, sources said. During interrogation yesterday Abu Taleb Ansari, Assistant Security Inspector of the parliament secretariat revealed the information, detective branch sources said.
Ansari, who hails from Gaibandha district, has been serving the parliament secretariat for the last five years. He was arrested by the detective branch of police on Wednesday night from his Green Road staff quarter residence. Abu Taleb alias Babul Ansari, a security official of the Jatiya Sangsad, who was arrested on charge of his alleged link with the JMB, was placed on a seven-day remand for interrogation. It is learnt that the militants who were arrested from Jhenidah in connection with the August 17 synchronised blasts, disclosed the name of Ansari claiming that he was their âown manâ at parliament. Following their confessional statement police arrested Ansari, who during interrogation reportedly confessed to his link with the Jamaatul Mujahideen, the banned militant outfit which plotted the terror attacks, sources said.
Police also came to know from other arrested zealots that top militant leaders frequented Ansariâs residence and the plan to set off bombs in the capital was made at his house. Ansariâs arrest, however, stunned his colleagues at parliament and many could not believe it. "I read it in newspapers today (Friday). I knew him as a very simple man and I never imagined that he could be involved with any extremist groups," a member of parliament security staff told The Independent yesterday. He said that there were two types of security personnel in the parliament. The armed personnel are deployed here on deputation from the armed forces and there are civil security forces who are appointed by the parliament secretariat. Ansari belonged to the civil security staff, he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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Must be hard to get an entire parlament inside one man.
Need to work on the headlines.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/09/2005 10:44 Comments ||
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Taking them from the source is part of the charm.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 11:03 Comments ||
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Gotcha, sorry Fred, should have known.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/09/2005 11:44 Comments ||
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The headline now reads "Militants plotted to strike at JS, Sectt" and mentions nothing about a "Parliament Inside Man." They must have changed shift.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/09/2005 11:52 Comments ||
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I've gone ahead and given Bangla its own category...
The Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) detained an assistant teacher of Battali Shah Majidia Nurani Madrassa in Lohagara upazila here Thursday night in connection with bomb attacks on two local courts on October 3. Teacher Mohammad Asadullah was arrested following information given by Laltu Bepari and Shahadat Hossain who were caught red-handed on October 3 while hurling bombs at two local courts hiding the explosives in book covers.
"Stick 'em up, Mo!"
"It's the RAB! Save me!"
Laltu and Shahadat, placed on a 10-day police remand the next day, were being sent Friday night to capital Dhaka for questioning by the joint interrogation cell (JIC). As per the statement of Asadullah, RAB members nabbed two other menâAbu Sadat Sayem alias Sayem Chowdhury from Rumaliachhara in Coxâs Bazar and Abu Raihan from Feni â on Thursday night. RAB sources said all the arrested are members of the JMBâs hit squads. RAB said Asadullah, a member of Nezam-e-Islam party, was engaged in militancy along with teaching for the last three years.
"Asadullah! What are we gonna do with you?"
Sayem Chowdhury trained militants for the last two years after launching an institution named âCoxâs Bazar Saikat Beyamagarâ. Sayem and Asadullah, also believed to have been involved in the August 17 blasts across the country, will be produced before a court Saturday seeking remand for them.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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AL-QAEDA terrorists planned to hijack a passenger jet from eastern Europe and fly it into a packed terminal at Heathrow airport, killing hundreds of people, security sources have revealed.
The plot, which was taken so seriously that ministers considered shutting down the airport, helps to resolve the long-standing mystery of why Tony Blair ordered armoured vehicles and hundreds of troops to be sent to Heathrow in 2003.
It has now emerged that MI5 received detailed intelligence in February 2003 about a two-pronged plan to target Britain because of its decision to send troops in support of Americaâs invasion of Iraq.
The second element of the operation, inspired by Osama Bin Laden, involved a mortar attack on a departing passenger plane. It was organised by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the Al-Qaeda operations chief and mastermind of the September 11 attacks, the sources said.
Details of the plot have been provided by British sources after the White House issued a list of 10 Al-Qaeda plots foiled by America and its partners, including Britain.
Referring to what it called âthe Heathrow airport plotâ, the White House said that America and several partners had âdisrupted a plot to attack Heathrow airport using hijacked commercial airlinersâ.
At the time cabinet ministers, including David Blunkett, then home secretary, said they could not divulge the nature of the threat but insisted that it was ârealâ. This weekend security sources gave fresh details of what they described as a double plot to kill hundreds of Heathrow passengers and punish Blair for Britainâs role in Iraq.
One said that an Al-Qaeda cell had been spotted carrying out reconnaissance at an airport in eastern Europe, possibly in Poland, Latvia or Estonia.
The source said: âThe idea was to hijack the plane from somewhere that didnât have the same level of security as airports in western Europe. The plan was to fly it into a terminal at Heathrow where there would be a lot of fatalities.â
The decision to send Scimitar armoured vehicles and 450 troops from the Household Cavalry and the Grenadier Guards was the first time since 1994 â when the IRA had tried to mortar the runway â that the army had been deployed on home security duties.
Blair was accused of staging a stunt to boost support for the invasion of Iraq. Although the troop deployment was largely symbolic, security would have been tightened up at East European airports, and, since 9/11, RAF fighter jets have been on standby to shoot down hijacked passenger planes.
Ministers could not disclose the nature of the threat for fear of compromising intelligence sources. The only explanation until now was that the troop deployment had been intended to thwart a possible mortar attack on a departing plane.
The new disclosures make it clear that this was just a part of a âtwin trackâ Al-Qaeda plan to take the worldâs busiest international airport out of operation.
Scotland Yard sources previously linked Andrew Rowe to that plot. He was a âdedicated jihadistâ and Muslim convert who was jailed last month at the Old Bailey for terrorist offences. Rowe was arrested on a coach inside the Channel tunnel and was found to be carrying coded instructions on how to fire mortars. He was sentenced to 15 years after being convicted of two offences of having articles for use in terrorism.
Until his capture two years ago, Mohammed was a central figure in Al-Qaedaâs war on the West. He was inspired by the 1993 attempt to blow up the World Trade Center in New York. Mohammed conceived the September 11 plot, which he described as âfar more successful than we had ever imaginedâ.
Last year The Sunday Times obtained transcripts of Mohammedâs interrogation in the months after his capture in Pakistan in 2003. They show that the original plan for September 11 envisaged the hijacking of 10 planes, which were to be crashed into targets on the east and west coasts of America.
In the interrogation, Mohammed also referred to an unspecified plot against Heathrow designed to punish Blair, whom he said Bin Laden called his âprincipal enemyâ.
He told his interrogators that Al-Qaeda operatives had been given money and told to begin surveillance of Heathrow, assessing its weak points and finding locations from which planes could be shot down.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/09/2005 00:26 ||
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The plot, which was taken so seriously that ministers considered shutting down the airport,
Gawd, the ineptnes of government flacks.
Like they just say "The Airport is Closed" and flights "Into" the terminal can't happen.
I don't remember seeing any flight plan "Into" the World Trade Towers? Do you?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/09/2005 10:49 Comments ||
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But if the terminal's empty a lot fewer people get killed.
#3
True, but the whole idea is shock, terror and publicity, otherwise the plot to crash airliners into the Eiffel Tower would never have been planned.
Few people there, but destroying a national symbol is a goal all in itself.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/09/2005 10:59 Comments ||
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I wish good luck to someone who would try to do something funny from Estonia: shades of the Soviet era ,security is much tighter than in Western airports. For instance in 2000, they already had computer-assisted passenger recognition well before in Paris.
Nothing's slipping through the Estonian airport, although it has less to do with Soviet "efficiency" and more to do with Scandinavian computer-tech geekness.
Although, having been through the airports in Riga, Vilnius, and Warsaw, I wonder.
But if I'm flying in Zoo-ropa, these are my personal least-favorite Eastern-European airlines (or cities), for security reasons (what I've experienced in their hubs, and what I evaluate my risk factor at):
Air Baltic (Riga, Latvia)
Lufthansa(Germany)
SAS (Stockholm)
I feel good flying on FinnAir, Estonian Air, and Polish Air (distant third).
LONDON: British police arrested 10 men in three different parts of the country on Saturday as part of an investigation into suspected international terrorism, a police statement said. âThree men were arrested in the Croydon area of south London, four in Wolverhampton and three in Derby,â Londonâs Scotland Yard police service said. It said the investigation was separate from the probe into Julyâs London bomb attacks.
Working on the next one, rather than concentrating everything on the last one. Good move.
âAt approximately 4 am (0300 GMT) today police executed warrants at three residential addresses, making a total of 10 arrests, all on suspicion of the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism under the Terrorism Act 2000,â police said. âThe arrests were made as the result of an intelligence led investigation involving police and the Security Service (more commonly known as MI5),â the statement said. It did not say what sort of group the police were investigating. Police were still searching the three locations raided, the statement said.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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It was not the outcome the Foreign Office had been planning. When it was announced early last week that a senior British diplomat in Baghdad was flying back to London to give a briefing on Iraq's constitutional referendum, the general expectation in Whitehall was that the following day's headlines would focus exclusively on whether sufficient numbers of Iraqis would turn out to validate the exercise.
Imagine the surprise, then, of Jack Straw and his officials the following morning when they opened their newspapers to discover that the future constitutional arrangements for Iraq had been completely superseded by official British confirmation that Iran's Revolutionary Guards were behind the deadly attacks that have recently claimed the lives of eight British soldiers.
For the past two years it has been a Foreign Office mantra that not a word should be uttered that could in any way be construed as criticising the Iranian government. Having voiced his last-minute opposition to the invasion of Iraq, Mr Straw had taken it upon himself to find a "negotiated solution" to the West's stand-off with Teheran over its clandestine nuclear programme as an alternative to military confrontation. Indeed, when The Sunday Telegraph two weeks ago revealed that agents working for the Revolutionary Guards had linked up with the Iraqi groups responsible for the attacks on British troops, the Foreign Office continued to insist that there was no firm evidence.
But now the cat is out of the bag. Not realising the sensitivity that Mr Straw attaches to Britain's dealings with Teheran, the unfortunate diplomat unwittingly strayed from his referendum brief and started laying into the Iranians with a gusto not seen in the British diplomatic service for decades. The Iranians, said the diplomat, were colluding with Sunni Muslim insurgent groups in southern Iraq. They were providing them with deadly terrorist technology that has been perfected by the Iranian-funded Hizbollah militia in southern Lebanon against the Israeli army. And their motivation was to deter Britain from insisting that Teheran abandon its controversial nuclear programme. "It would be entirely natural that they would want to send a message 'don't mess with us'. It would not be outside the policy parameters of Teheran." This is diplomat-speak for, if Britain wants to confront Iran over its nuclear weapons programme, then Iran feels entitled to blow up young British soldiers.
The off-message tone of the unnamed diplomat's comments sent shock-waves through the oak-panelled walls of the Foreign Office. "It was all very amusing," said one official. "For years diplomats have been under strict instructions not to say anything in public that might upset the Iranians. And then someone gives it to them straight between the eyes." Perversely, this undiplomatic bout of straight-talking may turn out to have done Mr Straw and the Foreign Office an enormous favour. By baldly stating what the Iranians are really up to in southern Iraq, the diplomat has freed his employers from the obligation of persisting with the charade of constructive engagement with a regime whose only interest in construction appears to be directed at building an atom bomb.
More at Link
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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cut off his MM pension, did they?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/09/2005 0:01 Comments ||
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This is a good thing. Not that it will make a lick of difference. There are plenty of closet Galloway and and visible Livingstone fans and supporters in Labor.
#11
I doubt this senior British diplomat's "slip" was truly accidental. The timing was just too good. It was a convenient way publicize Iran's meddling without having it sound like a declaration of war.
#14
There are a series of fault lines in north-central Iran that, if hit in the right place by a 1MT burrowing nuke, would destroy the entire country - not to mention seriously damaging parts of Iraq, Afghanistan, and the former Soviet republics to the north. It might be a nice idea to let Tehran know we have that information, and the technology to make it happen.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
10/09/2005 16:24 Comments ||
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"Halliburton Tectonic Services Division, how may I direct you call?"
Special forces stormed a house in a Russian region bordering Chechnya on Sunday, killing five militants, local news agencies reported.
Interfax said shots and explosions could be heard in central Makhachkala, capital of the Dagestan region, after gunmen returned fire during the raid, killing two police.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/09/2005 16:21 ||
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On a damp, gray day in March 2004, the Dutch traffic police stopped a Belgian driver for a broken headlight and accidentally stumbled onto a major investigation of Islamic radicals.
The driver was Khalid Bouloudo, a Belgian-born sometime baker and former Ford automobile factory worker. During a routine check, his name turned up on an Interpol watchlist, for an international arrest warrant from Morocco charging him with links to a Moroccan-based terrorist organization and involvement in suicide bombings in Casablanca in 2003.
The random arrest set into motion a cascade of events that underscores the extent of the radicalization of young Muslims throughout Europe - and a rapidly expanding and home-grown terrorist threat.
The case suggests connections to individuals and groups that have provided support to criminal and even terrorist operations in a number of other countries. This wide distribution of terrorist sympathizers and supporters has presented even small countries like Belgium with difficult law enforcement problems, forcing them to employ new investigative methods and pass tougher laws.
For more than a year, Belgian counterterrorism police had been gathering information about Mr. Bouloudo and his contacts in an investigation code-named Operation Asparagus, after the plump white asparagus grown in the eastern border area where they lived. His arrest abruptly cut short the operation.
Fearing that Mr. Bouloudo's contacts would go underground or try to flee, counterterrorism forces immediately launched a series of raids throughout the country, dismantling over the next few months what they believe was a sophisticated network that supported the terror bombings in Casablanca and in Madrid in 2004 and that is also suspected of trying to recruit fighters for the insurgency in Iraq.
Next month, the case of the Asparagus 18, as the suspects might be called, finally goes to trial in Brussels. For the first time, Belgian prosecutors will be using an antiterrorism law that came into effect at the end of 2003 that specifically criminalizes a terrorist act and association with terrorists and imposes a prison sentence of up to 20 years.
More at link
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 20:00 ||
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New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said on Sunday authorities were investigating the possibility that a plotter in a planned attack on the city's subway was in the United States.
Asked on Fox News Sunday whether a suspected plotter had made it into the United States, Kelly said: "That's certainly part of the investigation, yes."
He said operations were continuing outside the United States to learn more about the suspected plot, and that people were being interrogated.
The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security sent a bulletin to New York City officials on Thursday that warned a team of "terrorist operatives" planned to set off remote-controlled bombs hidden in briefcases or baby strollers in the subway on Sunday.
"A team of terrorist operatives, some of whom may travel to or who may be in the New York City area, may attempt to execute an attack on the New York City subway on or about October 9, 2005," the joint FBI/Homeland Security bulletin said.
Federal authorities "have doubts about the credibility of the threat" and passed it along "to provide increased awareness out of an abundance of caution," the bulletin said.
The threat alert was based on an uncorroborated claim to Iraqi authorities that prompted raids by U.S. and Iraqi forces and resulted in two suspects being taken into custody in Iraq, U.S. officials told Reuters.
A third was being sought, and the New York Times reported that he had been detained, also in Iraq.
Kelly said New York would remain in a heightened state of alert until U.S. intelligence authorities in Iraq can pin down the credibility of the threat.
"Operations are going on overseas that we believe will give us a better sense of the credibility of this threat in the short term. We'll be governed to a large extent as to what comes to use from the intelligence community overseas." Kelly said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/09/2005 13:46 ||
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Most likely. Weren't calls from the London Underground bombers made to an mosque in NYC?
Posted by: ed ||
10/09/2005 14:26 Comments ||
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London Bombers Have Ties to United States One of the bombers in last week's attacks made a direct phone call to a suspected recruiter for an extremist group in New York.
Authorities told ABC News that records show Mohammed Sidique Khan, the eldest of the bombers now believed to be the field commander of the attacks, had called a person who is associated with the Islamic Center, a mosque in Queens, N.Y. Yet, a member of that mosque claimed they had no knowledge of the phone call.
In addition to Khan, two other men linked to the London bombings also had direct ties with the United States.
Posted by: ed ||
10/09/2005 14:51 Comments ||
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I hope the person contacted in NY wasn't Imam Siraj Wahhaj of Masjid as-Taqwa, an unindicted conspirator in the 1990 WTC case. He is scheduled to speak at the "Mother Mosque" in Cedar Rapids for Ramadan. After 9-1-1, a master forger who had shared an apartment in Chicago with one of the terrorists previously was arrested and has cooperated, but his visitors at his local rental were never found or identified. Of course, he'll probably pass through Chicago on his flight in....
They stormed the insurgent-ridden city of Fallujah, returned home, and now are back in Iraq's most troubled province all in 10 months time. Some prefer this hectic pace.
"I didn't join the Marine Corps just to stand around," said Lance Cpl. Giovanni Perez of Los Angeles.
But for others, the demands of the overstretched U.S. military are just too much, regardless of the bonuses being dangled before them to re-enlist.
"I get out of the Marine Corps in seven months and I can't wait," Cpl. Daniel Trigg of Olympia, Wash., said while guarding a mosque where a large cache of insurgent weapons was being removed.
Trigg is on his third tour in Iraq in three years. His last tour had him in the southern city of Najaf, where U.S. troops fought fierce battles with Shiite Muslim militiamen last year.
For Lance Cpl. James Whelan of Kalamazoo, Mich., coming back is worth it. "As long as we clean up our mess and get this country back up on its feet," he said, leaning against a palm tree and scanning a thicket of grass. Just 20, he also is on his third tour in Iraq.
Their unit, the 3rd Battalion, 1st Regiment from Camp Pendleton, Calif., is one of three Marine battalions sent to Iraq three times.
Last November it joined in the battle for Fallujah, where several of its Marines were killed and dozens earned Purple Hearts while clearing out insurgents. Now it is in trying to tame Anbar Province's Sunni Arab cities in the west that previously had no U.S. or Iraqi security forces.
The task is not easy. The unit they replaced suffered 48 deaths during a seven-month tour, and letters posted on a mosque by a former Iraqi policeman begging for forgiveness from al-Qaida members indicates the difficulty of rebuilding a local security force.
Marines note the war, at least in this region, has evolved since their last tour. Insurgents are now hiding instead of controlling entire neighborhoods.
Some Marines say this is a more challenging task than simply using the military's superior arsenal against gun-toting insurgents holed up in homes.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/09/2005 16:20 ||
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*knock-knock*
"Candygram"
"Achmed? Did you order a candygram?"
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/09/2005 17:27 Comments ||
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> Trigg is on his third tour in Iraq in three years.
WOT? Screw the MSM, this is what's gonna lose us this war. Are we THAT overstretched?
#3
No, it's that we have a very rapid rotation policy. Call it "home leave". It recognizes the fact that units, as well as individuals, do a lot better with naval-length tours than with long deployments.
There are all sorts of other benefits to the military. First and foremost, the quality of training skyrockets, with combat expert NCOs using real world "there I was" examples for the trainees. Nothing quite concentrates the mind like knowing you could be shipped out, but your morale is raised in knowing that they want you as prepared as possible.
By helping to keep the home situation stable, it also boosts morale. Problems are either "in the window" in which one spouse has to handle them, or "outside the window", in which the other spouse will be back to help.
Units get thoroughly refurbished back at home, and a lot of their problems get ironed out as well. Problems that cannot be adequately addressed at the front, but there are just far more resources to deal with back in the States.
R&D has been on a binge. In the history of the world there has never been so much face-to-face imput from the battlefield soldier to R&D, straight from the horse's mouth, as it were. It has caused generations of tech procurement in months, rather than years or decades. Some systems that were novel at the beginning of the war are already in their 7th fielded generation!, and under constant, blistering critique and demand for improvements and additions.
Oh, certainly it is a strain on the soldiers, but not a great a strain if they were deployed only once for a year or eighteen months. It also gives plenty of opportunity to wean out those individuals who either have had enough, were not cut out for the life, or just need to be removed from the front for their own good.
#4
Right MM, just like WWII when you deployed and didn't return to the states for years. Father had the pleasent opportunity to visit Tarawa, Saipan, and Tinian islands before a wound sent him back stateside. Think his unit took more casualties. Were we stretched that thin then too?
The government on Sunday urged Iraqis to vote in next week's constitutional referendum, condemning insurgent groups for demanding a boycott and for killing scores of civilians in an effort to wreck the ballot.
"These insurgents are like rats spreading plague among the people," said Laith Kuba, the main Iraqi government spokesman. "Rats are very small, but the disease they spread is horrible. Iraq should bet rid of these dirty rats," he said at a news conference in Baghdad.
Kuba said a successful boycott would weaken Iraq and delay its efforts to rebuild, and that "the killing of innocent civilians is now the nation's No. 1 challenge."
Sunni-led insurgent groups are trying to reduce turnout in the referendum with a wave of attacks, and at least 311 people have died in the last two weeks in homicide bombings, roadside bombs, drive-by shootings and the assassination of people who had been kidnapped.
That death toll includes two U.S. soldiers who were killed Saturday in fighting in western Iraq, which brought to eight the number of American fatalities in a series of offensives the military has launched to put down militants before the Oct. 15 vote, especially in Iraq's western province of Anbar, the heartland of the insurgency.
Kuba also expressed concern that more than 500 corpses have been found in Iraq since its interim government was formed April 28. He said Shiites and Sunnis have been both been the victims of such attacks, and he blamed them on insurgents who have infiltrated, or disguised themselves as, Iraqi security forces, and undisciplined Iraqi policemen or soldiers.
The Iraqi and U.S. governments are working hard to get the constitution approved, but Kuba said even minority Sunnis who oppose the draft document should benefit from Iraq's democratic reforms by going to polling stations and voting "no."
Minority Sunni Arabs are gearing up their campaign to defeat the measure at the polls. The referendum has divided Iraqis, with leaders of the Shiite Muslim majority and Kurds supporting the constitution and Sunni Arabs opposing it, saying it will fragment Iraq.
Sunnis can defeat the charter if they garner a two-thirds "no" vote in any three of Iraq's 18 provinces. The Sunnis have a majority in four provinces.
Iraq on Saturday announced a curfew, weapons ban, border closings and other security measures to clamp down ahead of the referendum and to prevent insurgent attacks.
Iraqi officials are distributing 5 million copies of the constitution to the public ahead of the vote, often leaving them at small shops in cities and towns that act as ration centers where most Iraqis get government-subsidized food.
But some shops were refusing to participate, fearing attacks by insurgents.
In Baqouba, a city 60 kilometers (35 miles) northeast of Baghdad, police and soldiers began distributing tens of thousands of copies of the constitution at schools and bus stations Sunday, said official Hafiz Abdel-Aziz. "We decided not to distribute them through food ration agents for security reasons," he said in an interview with The Associated Press.
The same fears were prompting officials to distribute tens of thousands of copies of the document at schools, mosques and government buildings in the northern province of Kirkuk.
On Sunday, three Iraqi contractors and government bodyguard were killed by insurgent gunmen in three separate attacks in the cities of Baghdad, Beiji and Mosul, police said.
In southern city of Basra, a homicide car bomb killed two people â and woman and a child â and wounded three Iraqis, police said.
It exploded early Sunday morning outside a three-story apartment building used by the Iranian-backed Badr Brigade (search), a Shiite militia linked to one of the main parties in the Iraqi government. Iraqis who were present but escaped injury included former Basra Gov. Hassan al-Rashid, a senior local leader of the brigade, said police Capt. Mushtak Kadim.
The Badr Brigade is the military wing of the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq (search), or SCIRI, the largest Shiite party in the Iraqi government.
It was not immediately known who had carried out the attack in Basra (search), a mostly Shiite city where the majority of Britain's 8,500 forces are based.
Despite earlier claims that British soldiers had created much better security in southern Iraq than other areas of the country beset by Sunni-led insurgent groups, Shiite militias appear to have been growing in power in the mostly Shiite region, infiltrating police forces and local political organizations, and allegedly attacking British and U.S. forces.
The Guardian, a British newspaper, quoted Basra's police chief, Hassan al-Sade, in May as saying that the militias had become the "real power" in Basra and that he trusted only 25 percent of his own police force.
This summer, Al Qaeda in Iraq, the militant group led by Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, threatened in an audiotape to unveil a new unit to eradicate the Badr Brigade.
But fighting also has occurred in this region between the Badr Brigade and other Shiite militias, including the al-Mahdhi (search) militia, which is associated with the firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Another Shiite power is the Fadila Party (search), which won tenuous control of the provincial government this year from SCIRI after allying with smaller parties.
On Saturday, a delegation from the Arab League (search) arrived in Iraq to lay the groundwork for an Iraqi "reconciliation conference" it hopes to hold after the referendum vote.
It was the first time the pan-Arab organization has tried to take a direct role in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
"The situation is so tense there is a threat looming in the air about civil war that could erupt at any moment, although some people would say that it is already there," Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said in a BBC interview on Saturday.
But the organization has gotten a cold reception from some Shiite leaders in the government, resentful over perceived Arab League inaction in response to Saddam Hussein's (search) regime and what they see as the predominantly Sunni league's bias in favor of Iraq's Sunni minority.
During his news conference Sunday, Kuba urged the League to improve its relations with Iraq by following the example of the United Nations (search) and opening an office in Baghdad.
He said the League must realize that many Iraqis resent anyone who supported Saddam's regime as it killed hundreds of thousands of innocent citizens. But, Kuba said, "It is now in our interest to establish good relations with the Arab League."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/09/2005 16:11 ||
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THREE Iraqi policemen were arrested yesterday in a swoop on insurgents blamed for the deaths of eight British servicemen.
The bent cops were among 12 terrorists held in an overnight raid in Basra aimed at cutting the toll from roadside bombs.
All are suspected of orchestrating bomb attacks over the summer.
Military sources said they had also masterminded rocket-propelled grenade and sniper attacks.
The terrorists are linked to rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who is being aided by Iran ââ¬â and is said to be providing sophisticated
explosive devices.
Insurgents who have infiltrated the Iraqi police have used their positions to provide intelligence to other insurgents about the movement of British troops.
All 12 are expected to be charged with terrorism offences and handed over to the Iraqi judiciary for trial.
Detention Brigadier John Lorimer, commander of British forces, said: "The Multi-National Forces acted at short notice to arrest 12 individuals involved in terrorist activities in Basra. They are being held in detention.
"Some of the individuals we have arrested are linked to militia groups in Basra.
"We have acted against them solely because they are involved in terrorism, not because they are members of any particular political group or organisation.
"It is very concerning to us that members of Basra police are involved in terrorism. Nobody who has been involved in murdering soldiers should be allowed to hide behind a police uniform."
Some of the suspects were seized from the police building which British forces attacked last month to free two SAS soldiers who had been detained by Iraqi cops.
No shots were fired during the overnight operation, led by the Coldstream Guards battle group. A quantity of weapons was seized.
# SIX US Marines were killed by roadside bomb blasts in Iraq yesterday. In the west of the country American soldiers killed at least 29 insurgents.
A pioneering scheme to fight Islamist terror by encouraging jailed extremists to rethink their grasp of the Koran is under fire after claims that some of its "converts" have taken up arms again.
The project, launched in Yemen three years ago by an Islamic scholar, Judge Hamoud al-Hitar, has been followed closely by the British Government, which has twice invited him to lecture senior anti-terrorism officials at Scotland Yard.
The effectiveness of his technique - a theological "duel" in which he and the prisoners quote Koranic texts at each other - is in doubt, however, after reports that some al-Qaeda militants freed under the scheme have been caught fighting coalition forces in Iraq.
Among those released is the former chief bodyguard of Osama bin Laden, Nasser Al-Bahri, who has admitted that his sessions with Judge al-Hitar did nothing to diminish his belief in the leader of al-Qaeda. Instead, he suggested that many militants simply pretended to repent to gain quick release from jail.
His claims, made in a BBC documentary to be broadcast on Thursday, will give ammunition to those who doubt the possibility of re-educating extremists.
In Britain, the Metropolitan Police plans to give Muslim prisoners in London jails religious "mentors" to remind them of the values of mainstream Islam.
The Yemeni scheme was launched amid fears that al-Qaeda was attempting to turn the mountainous Arabian peninsula state into a base for terrorist attacks, aided by locals who had returned there after fighting in Afghanistan.
In October 2000 two suicide bombers blew up the American destroyer, USS Cole, in Yemen's main port, Aden, killing 17 American sailors. Other smaller scale attacks followed over the next two years.
The absence of further violence since then is cited by Judge al-Hitar as evidence of the success of his scheme.
The Yemeni authorities say the scheme's biggest success came after one of its converts tipped them off on the whereabouts of their most wanted al-Qaeda suspect, Mohammed al-Ahdal.
So far, 364 young men have been freed on parole under the scheme, which also gives them state help to start a new life.
Reports about Judge al-Hitar's achievements led to his first invitation to Britain from the Foreign Office in February last year, soon after a visit by the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, to Yemen. Al-Hitar talked to Metropolitan Police officers and Home Office officials and returned three months later to speak to Special Branch.
Whitehall's attention followed concern that some Muslim prisoners, such as the shoe bomber Richard Reid, were being radicalised in British jails.
#4
The British would be less enamored of this sort of debate if they ever read the book. The motion "Mohammed approves the slaying of the infidel oppressors" is going to carry everytime.
Posted by: Baba Tutu ||
10/09/2005 12:28 Comments ||
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#5
why would the chief body guard of osama be let go in the first place?
#6
At the time I first heard this, I supported al-Hitar, mainly because I felt bound to try non-violent means of turning these men from the violent side of Islam. I used to be in a prison ministry, and we had a lot of success emphasizing the "Higher Power", and I hoped al-Hitar equal success.
But then again, we were teaching Christianity, not Islam.
At the same time, one cannot expect 100% success: Our failure rate was 15% (3 out of 20), and this article says "some" had taken up arms again. What percentage makes up "some" is open to debate.
We had our ways of weeding out the "true converts" from those looking for our support in getting out early ("Jail house religion"). A Jail Ministry version of "trust, but verify". Seems that al-Hitar went the bleeding heart liberal approach of "we trust you, and won't offend you by trying to verify."
Multi-National Forces (MNF) from Task Force Freedom detained 48 suspected insurgents, seized weapons caches, and killed an insurgent during operations in northern Iraq on October 3-6, said an MNF statement. The statement said 16 individuals were detained and multiple AK-47s along with full magazines and other weapons seized during separate operations in Mosul, on October 4-6." It added that six individuals "suspected of terrorist activity" were also arrested during separate operations in eastern Mosul on October 3 and 6, while five other individuals "suspected of terrorist activity" were detained during two operations in eastern Mosul on October 5.
In Tal Afar, US troops detained six individuals "suspected of terrorist activity and killed a terrorist" after receiving small arms fire during separate operations on October 3-4. -- Three individuals "suspected of terrorist activity" were also arrested and three weapons caches seized during separate operations in Tal Afar on October 4-5. The statement said one of the weapons seized was a result of an Iraqi citizen's tip. Also seized was a weapons cache consisting of AK-47s with multiple magazines, a shotgun with a bandoleer, and an improvised explosive device. While reducing the cache, the unit engaged a suspected terrorist fleeing through a gully, said the statement. The individual fled into a safe house where "the unit conducted a raid and detained 11 suspected terrorists on Oct 4, " added the statement.
US troops also detained an individual "suspected of terrorist activity" during a cordon and search near the Syrian border on October 5. Weapons were also confiscated. And near Qayyarah, US soldiers seized a weapons cache during a search operation on October 3. The cache included rocket propelled grenades, various rockets, RPG boosters, mines, and an artillery round.
Meanwhile, an Iraqi police source in Kirkuk said that two civilians were killed and three policemen were injured in the explosion of a car bomb at the passage of a police patrol in central Kirkuk. In another development in the southern province of Misan, four explosive devices planted on the roadside were defused.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:16 ||
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#1
Well done, all! It's especially nice to hear about what the MNFs are doing -- they don't seem to make the news as often.
American army announced on Saturday completing Operation Iron Fist, which targeted foreign and local gunmen in Al-Qaim region. A US army statement, of which a copy was received by Kuwait News Agency (KUNA), said that MNF forces established a police station in Al-Saadah city to restore order in the area and to cut off gunmen infiltration through Syrian borders. Operation Iron Fest, the statement said, involved about 1,000 American soldiers to deprive Al-Qaeda in Iraq of their combat abilities in the Euphrates valley.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:17 ||
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#1
Arm and equip that police station like a FFB
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/09/2005 10:16 Comments ||
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#2
Operation Iron Fest. A good time was had by all
A member of Huwaijah's municipal council was killed on Saturday by unknown gunmen. According to police sources, Abdul-Majed Al-Jubouri was riding his car when he was shot by unknown gunmen. Huwaijah is in south-east Kirkuk.
In another development, two Iraqis were killed due to a blast targeting a US army patrol in Tikrit. In a press statement, a police source said while bomb killed the two innocent bystanders, it did not harm any of the patrol's members.
In Baghdad, the quartet committee assigned with prisoners' affairs released 272 Iraqis due to insufficient evidence. In a press statement, a source from Iraq's Justice Ministry said the committee was formed by the Justice Ministry, Human Rights Ministry, Interior Ministry and the Multi-National Force (MNF). He added that the release of more prisoners on similar grounds was quite expected.
"Insufficient evidence" isn't the same thing as "not guilty."
As for military operations, the British forces arrested a number of suspects while executing a series of raids in Basra, said witnesses. In statements to reporters, the witnesses said the forces had the backup of tanks, helicopters and boats. After last Thursday's mission, this mission was the second largest mission executed by British forces in Basra.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:13 ||
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Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Sounds good to me, let the "Secondary" coalition members guard while the "Primary" are kicking the shit out of iran, saudi, lybia, syria etc (Note no capitals for these sub-nations)
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/09/2005 10:53 Comments ||
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#2
The catch word here is "troops". Right now, I think this really means "offensive" military, those who go out and maxim their oppressors.
Once the Iraqis are doing that well enough on their own, these offensive troops can go elsewhere. However, a goodly number will remain behind as part of the Middle East Command.
With the new parliment, there will immediately be a Status of Forces agreement, like there was for Germany. Most likely several large military bases will be built, like the German kasernes, and the foreign forces will be there, but just won't be seen.
Until things have settled down.
Once that has happened, there will be a slow re-emergence of foreigners back into Iraqi society, not as invaders, but as wealthy consumers, who want to buy stuff, and at high prices. Such pocketbook diplomacy works wonders.
With their economy booming, NGOs helping out all over the country, and the areas around these bases prospering most of all, as happens around US bases, the Iraqis should become as comfortable and welcoming to the US military as did the Germans.
The Americans really won't stick out, as Iraq is a natural crossroads for travel, and large parts of Bagdad should become very cosmopolitan and international.
The US missile defence program, initially written off by sceptics as a waste of money and effort, can already intercept and destroy a North Korean ballistic missile aimed at the US mainland.
On a brief visit to Australia, US Missile Defence Agency director Henry Obering said the program already had nine missile interceptors between California and Alaska.
The system is mainly being configured to cope with missiles launched from North Korea or the Middle East, but it will ultimately have the ability to cope with missiles from anywhere. Australia is deeply involved in the program as one of just four nations with full missile defence co-operation agreements with the US. The others are Britain, Japan and Italy.
Australia's primary involvement is in research and development, with further co-operation through the Pine Gap satellite communications facility in central Australia.
However, the Howard Government has announced plans to buy three air warfare capable destroyers with the Aegis missile defence system.
This will provide defence against missiles aimed at deployed Australian forces, naval or army, and could also provide some limited defence to points on the Australian mainland. And Australia could in the future buy a more comprehensive missile defence.
Lieutenant-General Obering said Australian industry could make a real contribution to missile defence. "There are some very significant capabilities in Australian industry that could be jointly pursued. We don't have all the answers in the US. Many of our threat nations around the world are collaborating against us."
Lieutenant-General Obering, with a budget this year of $US6.4 billion ($8.45 billion) for development and $US1.4 billion to operate the existing system, said more countries were moving towards missile defence, with the US in the process of negotiating agreements with a number of other friendly nations and allies.
"Increasing numbers of nations are realising that other means of defence are not sufficient," he told The Australian. "Many actors are just not deterrable. We're beginning to understand fully what it's like to be in the post-Cold War world."
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 15:08 ||
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#1
...initially written off by sceptics as a waste of money and effort...
#3
I'm happy to report that I was working on Star Wars back in the mid-1980's. The project involved coating the main-optics of a multi-megawatt FEL (Free Electron Laser) with a first-surface layer of silicon dioxide on a 1,000mm diameter x 75mm thick mono-crystalline silicon relector that would enable us to engage enemy satellites from ground-based installations. This was a full decade or more before 1,000mm silicon wafers would make their debut in solid state device fabrication.
I have always supported this program due to the immense promise of spin-off technologies alone. Its deterrent value against the Soviet Union was immeasurable, as well. With communist China constantly increasing its threat level, the revival of this program continues to make sense.
I can only hope that America is also delegating equal resources towards intercepting a nuclear attack by its more likely route, a transoceanic shipping container. This is why I so wholeheartedly support killing all of the people who want to load that container in the first place.
If there is one nation on earth that can do both all three, it is America.
#4
...initially written off by sceptics as a waste of money and effort...
The initial goal of defending against massive attack from the Soviet Union was totally unfeasible. Many American engineers and scientists said so. They were correct. Fortunately, the Soviets leadership didn't beleive them or their own scientists, and spent themselves into oblivion trying to counter it.
The more modest goal of defending against a single missile, or a handful of missiles is a very different problem and requires exponentially less computer processing power. It's still expensive, but no so when compared to the devastation of a Nork nuclear attack or the even the threat of Nork nuclear blackmail.
#5
I'm happy to report that I was working on Star Wars back in the mid-1980's
I supported several of the SDIO programs ... directed energy weapons, kinetic energy weapons, and several others. Yes - some good work was done and the spinoff potential is/was very high.
For instance, the mobile high energy tactical lasers ....
#6
DMFD -- the goal remains unmet, but one has to admit the progress made thus far is a very significant milepost.
Let's not diminish the magnificant work done to date to prevent rogues from lobbing a nuke on innocent peoples. And, let's continue to invest in the technology improves that ultimately realize President Reagan's ambitious goal.
The spin-off byproducts amply pays down the investment.
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 16:21 Comments ||
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#7
I worked on the anti-missile system during the Carter administration. Yes, the left would be horrified to know what their sainted ex-Prez was secretly funding.
Posted by: jolly roger ||
10/09/2005 17:37 Comments ||
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#8
JR - particularly since the donks planned to minimize the Star Wars investment under a Kerry administration and grossly underfunded under Clinton.
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 17:43 Comments ||
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#9
jolly roger,
Details, Please.
The vorpal rabbit? The holy hand granade? The peanut manuever .. WHAT?
#10
300mm is current stae of the art for production silicon. 400mm and 500mm silicon wafers have been made in small quantities. 1,000mm had to have been quite an accomplishment, even more so given the elapsed time. But I know the program was successful, ultimately.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
10/09/2005 20:11 Comments ||
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#11
WM, according to the clientâs attending engineers (company name rhymes with Huge Aircrash), the 1,000mm dia. x 75mm thick blanks were lathed out of 1,500mm (18") diameter CZ (Czokralski) ingots from a specially built crystal puller. The outer three inches were turned off the slugs to reach the most defect-free heart zone of the ingot. After I coated the blanks, they were returned to the client facility. Then the front-side diffraction grating was patterned on a massive (20ââ40â) multi-ton optical bench that was reputed to be good down to 5% of a wavelength in the ultraviolet region. One of my prize high-tech specimens is a small 50mm pilot production sample wafer, given to me by the engineers, that carries the same grating pattern as the final optics. Needless to say (then why say it?), the blaze is spectacular.
#12
I worked on one SDIO project too--not so happily. How do you distinguish the real warheads from the fakes? (No, detecting the gammas {in liquid argon} from neutron-irradiated fissionables is NOT the answer, and we had quite a job explaining that to our boss.) But if you've only got a dozen missiles lobbed at you, you've probably got enough excess capacity that you can just shoot at them all.
Posted by: James ||
10/09/2005 21:48 Comments ||
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THREE of the most wanted men in Southeast Asia narrowly escaped capture in the last two days, two in the Philippines and one in Indonesia, The New York Times reported yesterday, quoting officials in the two countries.
In Indonesia, a special counterterrorism unit swept into a village in Central Java early Friday, hoping to find Mohamad Noordin Top, a 35-year-old Malaysian believed to be a central player in several bombings there, including the Bali bombings of October 2002 and a week ago.
But Top had fled the village a few hours before the counterterrorism unit arrived, police officials said.
Noordin and another Malaysian, Azhari Husin, are the top suspects in the recent bombings, but police have said they had no firm evidence to confirm their suspicions.
In the Philippines, more than 1,000 soldiers have started a manhunt for two Indonesians, Dulmatin and Umar Patek, suspected of helping assemble the bombs that were used in the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people.
Dulmatin, who uses only one name, is believed to have learned his bomb-making skills at an al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan.
"We were close to getting them at one point, but the mountainous terrain proved disadvantageous to us," Brigadier General Ben Dolorfino, commander of the Philippine Marine Brigade, said in an interview on Saturday. "We will get them sooner or later."
But a ranking official of the largest rebel group in Mindanao yesterday doubted the two suspected Jemaah Islamiyah members with a combined $11-million bounty on their heads were hiding on the island.
Eid Kabalu, spokesperson of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), said the group had not confirmed the sighting of Dulmatin and Patek.
Claiming he had been misquoted earlier, Kabalu said he was merely citing Philippine military reports when he said two JI members were being hunted in Central Mindanao.
"We have no confirmation (of their presence in Mindanao). As far as the MILF is concerned, there have been no sightings. We have no personal knowledge that they are here," Kabalu told the Inquirer over the phone.
Earlier reports had quoted Kabalu as saying that Dulmatin, Patek and Abu Sayyaf leader Khadaffy Janjalani had been together in Central Mindanao when the military launched an offensive against them in July.
Kabalu, however, said Khadaffy was hiding in Maguindanao province and persistent military offensives there may have reduced his group to two or three men.
"His presence there is confirmed," he said. "We believe that they are there to take advantage of the ceasefire between the MILF and the military. They probably want a piece of the peace here."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/09/2005 13:49 ||
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Investigators desperate for a breakthrough in the Bali terrorist attacks on Saturday dropped thousands of photos of the two suspected masterminds over a city close to where one of the fugitives narrowly escaped capture a day earlier. A helicopter flew low over the city of Solo and the surrounding area in Central Java province early Saturday, releasing 10,000 photographs of Noordin Mohamed Top and Azahari bin Husin, believed to be key leaders in the Southeast Asia-based terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, which has been linked to al-Qaida. Police have struggled to produce any firm leads since suicide bombers launched near-simultaneous attacks on three crowded cafes in Bali tourist resorts in Kuta district and nearby Jimbaran beach on Oct. 1. The death toll in the attacks climbed to 23 â including the three bombers â after one of the injured died Friday in a hospital.
Noordin slipped away from authorities Friday, fleeing a remote village in Central Java province's Purwantoro district hours before a raid by anti-terror police, police said. Noordin and Azahari are two of Southeast Asia's most wanted men. But the two Malaysians have kept one step ahead of a massive hunt for years, moving constantly in densely populated areas of this sprawling nation of 220 million people and more than 10,000 islands.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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Britain must stop being soft and use its might to stop terror, says Michael Rubin
Tony Blair confirmed last week that bombs used to kill eight British soldiers in Iraq were a type used by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and groups that it supports in Lebanon.
His words were circumspect, but the point was clear: London considers Tehran responsible for killing British troops in Iraq. Blair's accusations confirm that the British-secured zone, once praised as a triumph for the 'softly-softly' approach, is a model no more. In recent weeks death squads have kidnapped and murdered journalists, most famously Steven Vincent, an American freelance writer who had warned of Iranian infiltration of the police. Dozens of Iraqis have fallen victim to Iranian-backed militias.
It did not have to be this way. The Iranian challenge in Iraq has long been apparent. In January 2004, Lebanese Hizbollah opened offices across southern Iraq. In the centre of Basra, Lebanese Hizbollah flags flew from an annexe to the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq headquarters.
In exchange for quiet, British officials have turned a blind eye to the Iranian challenge. When Shia militias turned away from schools girls not conforming to Muslim standards of dress, British forces did nothing to guarantee them a right to education. When young gangs plastered the University of Basra with posters of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, British officials remained silent. An official assessment following Muqtada al-Sadr's uprising in April 2004 blamed a British political officer in al-Kut for 'intentionally toning down' reports of [Shia] insurgent activity'. In Amara, British officials transferred the Baath party headquarters to the Badr Corps; many locals wanted to use it as a health clinic instead. The Iranian-trained militia festooned their new headquarters with anti-coalition slogans. British troops refused to be provoked.
For terrorists and their sponsors, British restraint is assumed. There is little fear of military reprisal. A major factor behind the Iranian government's willingness to murder British troops has been the impotence and naivety of UK diplomacy.
It has become conventional wisdom among the foreign policy elite that military force is never appropriate. The outbreak of the Iraqi insurgency and the fumbled reconstruction have reinforced anti-war sentiment among the chattering classes. If only President Bush had listened to the international community and allowed United Nations inspectors to finish their job, they say, war might have been averted.
War should always be the last resort. But a credible military threat is sometimes necessary to maintain peace. In the case of Iran, British cabinet officials have undercut diplomacy. As tension between Washington and Iran escalated last month, for example, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw was asked about the possibility of military action. 'US Presidents always say all options are open. But it is not on the table, it is not on the agenda. I happen to think it is inconceivable,' he told the BBC on 28 September. Al-Jazeera's headline for this was: 'No military action against Iran.'
Straw may have wanted to reinforce the notion that London remained committed to diplomacy, playing to a British public conditioned to view the American President as a reckless cowboy and religious nut. But his words were interpreted in Tehran as weakness.
Engagement alone can backfire. Between 2000 and 2005, trade between Iran and the European Union has almost tripled. During the same period, it doubled its number of executions and spent several billion dollars on its nuclear programme.
Iranian diplomats may be sincere. They may have impressed Straw. But the Islamic republic's structure leaves them impotent. Only the Supreme Leader, the Revolutionary Guards, and the Intelligence Ministry wield power. It is no accident that Iran's envoy to Iraq was not from the Iranian Foreign Ministry, but from the division of the Revolutionary Guards charged with the export of revolution.
Diplomacy backed by the threat of military force can be a winning combination. What little success the negotiations regarding Iran's nuclear intentions have had are due not only to European carrots, but also American sticks.
Iran is not alone in this. Examining Libyan leader Muammar Gadaffi's decision to settle his differences with London and Washington, US columnist Charles Krauthammer suggested it was no coincidence that 'Gadaffi's first message to Britain, the principal US war ally and conduit to White House war counsels, occur[red] just days before the invasion of Iraq.
'And his final capitulation to US-British terms occur[red] just five days after Saddam Hussein is fished out of a rathole.' Had Straw assured Gadaffi he need never fear military reprisal, the Libyan leader would today be nearing completion of his nuclear bomb. Might matters.
If democracy prevails in Iraq, the Iranian leadership understands that 70 million Iranians will clamour for the same rights. Iraq's success poses an existential challenge. While Iran's youth crave Western pop, fashion and freedom, ideology dominates the Islamic republic's leadership. Khomeini's constitution enshrines theocracy and the export of revolution.
No amount of reform can change that. And no amount of engagement can ameliorate its challenge.
The best the West can hope for is containment. Diplomacy can repulse the Iranian challenge in Iraq, but nice words alone are insufficient. Deals must be obeyed and promises kept. Sometimes that takes a willingness to use force.
Armies, not words, are a diplomat's most potent tool.
Posted by: DanNY ||
10/09/2005 12:40 ||
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#1
Threats are useless to those who do not respect them through overuse. After all of these years of threatening the US and Israel and everybody else, on a weekly basis, the concept of the threat in Iran has become vitiated to the point where it has lost its seriousness.
As an alternative, a sense of fear and respect must be regained among the belligerent. The best such way would be something along the lines of the "You have just been assassinated" calling card. Sent from a non-existent terrorist organization by a hundred different means, to a thousand or more of Iran's top leadership, all arriving about the same time. It would obviously be the work of the US, but would have plausible deniability.
Its unstated message would be to say that in the circumstance of war, each of the lives of these thousand government and religious leaders would be forfeit, that their names are on a death list. It would even take them weeks to discover the scope of who the cards were sent to.
#3
Permit me to correct a minor error in the headline:
"Only threat use of force will tame Tehran"
The best such way would be something along the lines of the "You have just been assassinated" calling card.
While I agree in principle, my own vote is for lobbing in a few dozen cruise missiles during a full session of their council of mullahs and the revolutionary guard.
The total annihilation of Iran's corrupt and hostile leadership would serve notice to other proliferators that there are severe consequences involved with disregarding regional peace and stability.
Similar treatment of the statehouse in Khartoum might have gone a long way towards averting the last half of Darfur's genocide.
One more time, there are no sovereign rights for nations that seek to propagate genocide, intolerance and oppression. They are fair game for those who can eliminate them.
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/09/2005 14:47 Comments ||
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#5
Jack Straw will have to go if things are to change . But even that will not solved the problem.
The Military of England in no match for Iran even in a proxy fight in southern Iraq. Not enough men or money has been invested in it. No support exists at home for what needs to be done. The British, Scotch and Welch soilders there have been doing "peace keeping" that is about all they are equiped and authorised to do.
To regain control they will have to kill lots of Iraqi's, that isn't going to happen. In short are truly screwed. The EU lovers in the UK government. They have got what they want. I big knife in the back of Iraq and the US. They now will amplify the din of: "It was a grave mistake." "More time should have been given." "It is an illegal war." "The UN didn't approve." "We need to be more aligned with the EU."
We are screwed and unscrewing ourselves will be hard and cost many lives.
#7
Tater's tots need to be toasted to a crisp, and the "man" himself strung up from a light pole. It's best done by an Iraqi military force, with US "help" only in the background. That should be followed by closing all of Iran's offices in Iraq, and the closing of their common border. Then there should be "sightings" of about 50 US submarines in the Persian Gulf - the same half-dozen subs popping up at various places over and over. If Tehran still doesn't get the message, THEN send the tommahawks flying.
It can all be done in four-six months, if done with determination. But one thing is beyond negotiation: tater needs to be squashed like the bug he is.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
10/09/2005 17:11 Comments ||
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...The report said the fire affected four out of 13 pipelines connecting a refinery in the city of Abadan, 675km south west of Tehran, to Bid Boland, a centre for processing oil product.
It mentions foreign companies having various contracts in the general area.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
And right after hitting "post" it occured to me that I should have put "Iran" in the title.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/09/2005 0:09 Comments ||
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#2
Fixed, moved to Page 1.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 0:13 Comments ||
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#3
Gosh, I hope this isn't due to some of the SAS boys being careless with matches. Like Smokey the Bear sez: Only YOU can prevent pipeline blazes in oppressive theocracies.
#4
Maybe this is the beginning of severe destabilization within Iran. Unfortunately, sheer incompetence could just as easily explain what has happened. I dearly hope this will fuel further plummeting of their stock exchange.
#6
The fire "affected four out of 13 pipelines." Wotta coincidence.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 0:37 Comments ||
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#7
Gosh, I hope this isn't due to some of the SAS boys being careless with matches. Like Smokey the Bear sez: Only YOU can prevent pipeline blazes in oppressive theocracies.
You know, accidents are common enough that I doubt this is sabotage.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/09/2005 1:02 Comments ||
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#8
I hope it is homegrown, sheer incompetence make up for 2 brigades of good men. muslims seem to not be able to look into the future, as in preventitive maintenence, so they may literally stew in their own juices, one can only speculate
#9
I suspect that we are at the beginning of a time when things just stop working in Iran. That is, technology just seems to break all of the time, lubricating oil no longer seems to work, power outages and concrete failures seem commonplace, and certain warehouses containing expensive and difficult to replace spare parts have terrible fires. Replacement parts are of low quality, even though they are brand name, and factory delays due to equipment failure are the rule, rather than the exception.
Even such things as crop failures, plants just mysteriously withering in the fields yet suffering from no disease; public water tasting very bad, if non-toxic; people in mosques suddenly feeling irritable and prone to fistfights.
All are signs that Allah is displeased with a nation. Allah likes to do shit like that.
Him too, huh? I wonder if that isn't going to be a popular set of activities for a while.
PS: I'm not THE anonymoose, just staying anonymous for this comment
Posted by: anonymoooose too ||
10/09/2005 13:21 Comments ||
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#13
"Most pipeline fires in south west Iran are due to ageing infrastructure, but officials have also blamed some recent blasts on Arab rebels seeking independence from Tehran."
Sweet irony if the UK was to find itself aiding/sponsoring such rebels - these were the guys responsible for the Iranian Embassy Siege back in 1980, in London. They were being helped by Saddam back then.
It would be nice to think Blair's given the nod to covert action against Iran. Maybe he feels he can now that NuLabour's Ethical Foreign Policy (TM) can now be considered forgotten and lost, still last seen in the hands of Robin Cook.
#14
#9... technology just seems to break all of the time, lubricating oil no longer seems to work, power outages and concrete failures seem commonplace, and certain warehouses containing expensive and difficult to replace spare parts have terrible fires. Replacement parts are of low quality, even though they are brand name, and factory delays due to equipment failure are the rule, rather than the exception.
Even such things as crop failures, plants just mysteriously withering in the fields yet suffering from no disease; public water tasting very bad, if non-toxic ...
#16
Actions-->consequences. Need a 101 lower division course in Iran for the MMs. Maybe lower oil output in the right places will also get the Chicoms attention. They need oil, lots of it, to keep their economic machine going. Problems of supply with Iran could get the Chicoms to send a message to the MMs to throttle back on their threats and nuke crap, for everyone's self interest. Just an idea.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
10/09/2005 14:53 Comments ||
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#17
#9 Anonymoose and others
We don't know whether this fire is the result of sabotage, but it might be useful to encourage the mullahs and their disciples to believe that it is (without providing any real evidence, of course).
Attributing this kind of "invisible hand" action to the US and its allies will actually work to our advantage. It creates the impression of super-human power among a target group that essentially worships power and force.
I am not the only one to have noticed this. I may be mistaken, but it seems that the Islamic media and their lefty shills have toned down the HAARP-style evil super-tech conspiracy theories of late. At least there is little evidence of this in the aftermath of the devastating South Asia earthquake this week. Contrast this with earlier disasters, like the Boxing Day tsunami, after which even semi-mainstream outlets like Al Guardian were openly speculating about a US-based technological cause.
The conspira-liars may have realized that they are only doing our work for us.
"He who has ears, let him hear":
This realization is at the heart of one of our most important black propaganda operations.
#18
Speaking of black propaganda, there are people on Indymedia who actually believe that B-1s are using experimental death rays to assasinate "progressives" by zapping their cars on the streets of a couple of Texas college towns.
#22
Atomic Conspiracy and Seafarious:
I hear you. Pretty apt descriptions from 2,000 years ago, huh?
Revelation 9
The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. When he opened the Abyss, smoke rose from it like the smoke from a gigantic furnace. The sun and sky were darkened by the smoke from the Abyss. 3And out of the smoke locusts came down upon the earth and were given power like that of scorpions of the earth....they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the thundering of many horses and chariots rushing into battle. They had as king over them the angel of the Abyss, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek, Apollyon."
Training camps used by jihadists battling with the Indian army for control of Kashmir were buried by landslides or left in ruins by the earthquake, bringing hope of a new opportunity for peace-making after a 16-year Islamic insurgency.
India and Pakistan, nuclear rivals who both lay claim to Kashmir in its entirety, have fought two of their three wars over the territory.
Security analysts said yesterday that the earthquake in Pakistan's highly-militarised Kashmir region had "significantly depreciated'' the insurgents' capacity to carry on their fight for independence in neighbouring Indian-administered Kashmir.
"The militant groups and their army handlers will now be totally absorbed in relief, rescue and rehabilitation efforts,'' said Arun Sahgal, of the United Service Institution in New Delhi.
India claims that Pakistan backs various insurgent groups, assisting them across the line of control that divides the disputed territory. Pakistan denies the claim.
Military sources said that an estimated 1,000 Pakistani soldiers died in the earthquake after their concrete-roofed bunkers along the Kashmir frontier collapsed. Security sources said 15 militant training camps had been put out of action by the earthquake.
Almost all groups fighting the Indian army in Kashmir had ''camp offices'' either in Muzafarrabad, the devastated capital of Pakistan-administered Kashmir, or surrounding areas.
Senior Indian army officers recently claimed the existence of least 55 militant training camps in the region.
Many in New Delhi see the earthquake as presenting a new opportunity for India and Pakistan to overcome their past hostilities. "This is an opportunity for India and Pakistan to forget their differences," said N M Prusty, of the aid agency Care.
Within hours of the earthquake, Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, telephoned President Pervez Musharraf of Pakstan to offer help. The countries' military chiefs were in touch with one another, as were commanders along the Kashmir frontier. An Indian soldier who mistakenly crossed into Pakistani territory after the earthquake was allowed to return yesterday, an unthinkable gesture in the past.
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 21:08 ||
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"The planet Earth is spared the capacity for reason and is, therefore, oblivious to man and his machinations. Ignorance is, indeed, rocky bliss. From the planetary perspective of geologic time, man is merely a passing, if obnoxious, phenom. A forgotten itch, a billion revolutions hence."
I'm thinking this includes 'Slamic seething masses and Jihadi mugwumps.
When President Bill Clinton appointed Louis Freeh director of the FBI, he called Freeh âa law enforcement legend.â
And Freeh spent a controversial eight years as director before he left in June, 2001. But the 9/11 plot was hatched on his watch and he has been criticized by the 9/11 commission for not having his agents more focused on counterterrorism.
But it also turns out that no FBI director had a more strained relationship with the president who had appointed him, than did Louis Freeh with Clinton.
As FBI Director, Freeh rarely sat down one-on-one with reporters. But now heâs written a book, My FBI, and speaks out for the first time about his years as director, and his toxic relationship with Bill Clinton.
Hereâs how he wrote about the former president:
âThe problem was with Bill Clinton, the scandals and rumored scandals, the incubating ones and the dying ones never ended. Whatever moral compass the president was consulting was leading him in the wrong direction. His closets were full of skeletons just waiting to burst out.â
Freeh says he was preoccupied for eight years with multiple investigations, including Whitewater, Jennifer Flowers and the Monica Lewinsky affair.
He found it deeply awkward and frustrating to be constantly investigating his boss and says it became âtheater of the absurdâ when special prosecutor Ken Starr asked him to get a DNA sample from the president to compare with that notorious stain on Lewinskyâs dress.
Freeh says the entire scenario of getting a blood sample from the president was like a bad movie.
...Freeh had another reason for wanting to outlast Clinton. It was the 1996 Khobar Towers terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia, where 19 U.S. servicemen died and more than 370 were wounded.
President Clinton had sent the FBI to investigate and promised Americans that those responsible would pay. âThe cowards who committed this murderous act must not go unpunished. Let me say it again: we will pursue this. America takes care of our own. Those who did it must not go unpunished,â the president said.
Clinton made the same promise after the Sept 1995 bombing in Ryhaid that including the killing of my older brother. Same result.
But Freeh says the President failed to keep his promise.
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/09/2005 20:05 ||
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#1
The most important part of the 2006/2008 elections will be keeping Hillary and Bubba from gaining any more political power. A 2nd Clinton Whitehouse is unthinkable.
#3
This is going to be one of the best pissing contests in history.
Interesting choice of words. Apparently they're sending Sandy Burglar around to whip out the rebuttals to Freeh.
If I were running a news agency, the first question I'd ask Burglar would be, "Why, exactly, aren't you in prison?" The second would be, "G. Gordon Liddy had the grace to serve prison time for the crime he committed in defense of Nixon. Why didn't you do the same for your crime in defense Clinton?"
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
10/09/2005 22:14 Comments ||
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#4
I loved the wallace comment "On a charge this serious, we had to let President Clinton respond." Funny, I don't remeber teh same treatment of Bush over the Guard memo story.
A land mine exploded beneath a police vehicle in eastern India on Saturday, killing at least 15 officers, police said. Maoist rebels were suspected to have planted the mine on a road leading to Baniadih, a village in remote Jharkhand state, police superintendent Sudarshan Mandal said. He said the policemen were about to raid a village where rebels were believed to be hiding when the explosion happened. There were no immediate claims of responsibility.
Earlier in the week, police and paramilitary soldiers launched an operation against rebels operating in the state, Mandal said. The rebels, who claim to be inspired by Chinese revolutionary Mao Zedong, have been fighting for land and jobs for agricultural workers and the poor. They are active in five southern and eastern Indian states and often target police, accusing them of colluding with rich landlords.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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ALGIERS - Al Qaeda-aligned Islamic militants shot dead three civilians and wounded two others in Algeria a week voters backed an amnesty aimed at ending 13 years of violence, newspapers reported on Saturday.
The victims were travelling by car when they came under fire from rebels belonging to the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) late on Thursday in Jijel province, east of the capital Algiers, newspapers El Watan and El Khabar said, citing security sources. The authorities were not immediately available for comment.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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Two African Union peacekeeping soldiers from Nigeria were killed in an ambush Saturday in Sudan's Darfur region, a senior AU official said, in the mission's first deaths since deploying to the volatile area last year. Two civilian contractors attached to the peacekeeping team were also killed in the attack near Kourabishi and three African Union soldiers were wounded, the acting head of the mission, Jean-Baptiste Natama, said in a telephone interview. Natama offered no further details and did not say who was behind the ambush. The attack occurred as Javier Solana, the European Union security affairs chief, made a brief visit to Darfur.
"Welcome to Darfur. Duck!"
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Take your pick - Nigerians supposedly aren't the favorite of either side.
An Islamic militant who authorities believe played a role in a failed attempt to kill President Gen Pervez Musharraf two years ago was arrested on Saturday in Karachi, police said. Sharafat Ali was captured in a residential area after a shootout, city police chief Tariq Jamil said, adding that the suspect was among those who tried to kill the president on December 25, 2005, in Rawalpindi.
Although Musharraf escaped unhurt, 16 people â mostly policemen â died when suicide bombers rammed their explosive-laden vehicles into Musharrafâs motorcade, the second attempt on his life in less than two weeks. Since then authorities have arrested several militants and some junior military personnel in connection with the attempted assassinations. On Saturday, Jamil said Ali was also involved in attacks against minority Christians in Karachi and three other cities of Punjab.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/09/2005 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
DHAKA - Islamic militants in Bangladesh have threatened to kill a judge and members of his family and blow up a court if the government goes ahead with plans to try suspected activists of outlawed Islamic extremist groups, media reports said on Saturday.
Militants who plotted the August 17 and October 3 terror attacks, had planned to strike the key point installations in the capital including the parliament building, secretariat and airport. This was disclosed by the arrested zealots during interrogation, sources said. During interrogation yesterday 
The 
LONDON: British police arrested 10 men in three different parts of the country on Saturday as part of an investigation into suspected international terrorism, a police statement said. âThree men were arrested in the Croydon area of south London, four in Wolverhampton and three in Derby,â Londonâs Scotland Yard police service said. It said the investigation was separate from the probe into Julyâs London bomb attacks. 
It was not the outcome the Foreign Office had been planning. When it was announced early last week that a senior British diplomat in Baghdad was flying back to London to give a briefing on Iraq's constitutional referendum, the general expectation in Whitehall was that the following day's headlines would focus exclusively on whether sufficient numbers of Iraqis would turn out to validate the exercise.
Multi-National Forces (MNF) from Task Force Freedom detained 48 suspected insurgents, seized weapons caches, and killed an insurgent during operations in northern Iraq on October 3-6, said an MNF statement. The statement said 16 individuals were detained and multiple AK-47s along with full magazines and other weapons seized during separate operations in Mosul, on October 4-6." It added that six individuals "suspected of terrorist activity" were also arrested during separate operations in eastern Mosul on October 3 and 6, while five other individuals "suspected of terrorist activity" were detained during two operations in eastern Mosul on October 5.
A member of Huwaijah's municipal council was killed on Saturday by unknown gunmen. According to police sources, Abdul-Majed Al-Jubouri was riding his car when he was shot by unknown gunmen. Huwaijah is in south-east Kirkuk.
Investigators desperate for a breakthrough in the Bali terrorist attacks on Saturday dropped thousands of photos of the two suspected masterminds over a city close to where one of the fugitives narrowly escaped capture a day earlier. A helicopter flew low over the city of Solo and the surrounding area in Central Java province early Saturday, releasing 10,000 photographs of Noordin Mohamed Top and Azahari bin Husin, believed to be key leaders in the Southeast Asia-based terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, which has been linked to al-Qaida. Police have struggled to produce any firm leads since suicide bombers launched near-simultaneous attacks on three crowded cafes in Bali tourist resorts in Kuta district and nearby Jimbaran beach on Oct. 1. The death toll in the attacks climbed to 23 â including the three bombers â after one of the injured died Friday in a hospital.
A land mine exploded beneath a police vehicle in eastern India on Saturday, killing at least 15 officers, police said. Maoist rebels were suspected to have planted the mine on a road leading to Baniadih, a village in remote Jharkhand state, police superintendent Sudarshan Mandal said. He said the policemen were about to raid a village where rebels were believed to be hiding when the explosion happened. There were no immediate claims of responsibility.
ALGIERS - Al Qaeda-aligned Islamic militants shot dead three civilians and wounded two others in Algeria a week voters backed an amnesty aimed at ending 13 years of violence, newspapers reported on Saturday.
Two African Union peacekeeping soldiers from Nigeria were killed in an ambush Saturday in Sudan's Darfur region, a senior AU official said, in the mission's first deaths since deploying to the volatile area last year. Two civilian contractors attached to the peacekeeping team were also killed in the attack near Kourabishi and three African Union soldiers were wounded, the acting head of the mission, Jean-Baptiste Natama, said in a telephone interview. Natama offered no further details and did not say who was behind the ambush. The attack occurred as Javier Solana, the European Union security affairs chief, made a brief visit to Darfur.
