Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Happy Birthday/Daily Gam Shot
Tia Carrere aka Juno Skinner in "True Lies (1994)" aka Cassandra in "Wayne's World (1992)" aka Minako Okeya in "Showdown in Little Tokyo (1991)" aka Jingo Asakuma in "Rising Sun (1993)" aka Gina Walker in "The Immortals (1995)" aka Diane Norwood in "Hollow Point (1996)" aka Candy in "Scar City (1998)" (age 46)
Prominent Al Qaeda and Afghan Taliban fighters asked Pakistani militants in a pair of rare meetings to set aside their differences and step up support for the battle against U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan, militant commanders said Monday.
The meetings were held in Pakistan's tribal region in November and December at the request of the Afghan Taliban's leadership council. They could indicate the militants are struggling in Afghanistan, or conversely, that they want to make sure they hit U.S. forces hard as the Americans accelerate their withdrawal this year. That could give the Taliban additional leverage in any peace negotiations.
"For God's sake, forget all your differences and give us fighters to boost the battle against America in Afghanistan," senior Al Qaedacommander Abu Yahya al-Libi told Pakistani fighters at a meeting on Dec. 11, according to a militant who attended.
Pakistani militants have long been split over where they should focus their fighting. The Pakistani Taliban have concentrated on toppling their own government, although they have sent some fighters to Afghanistan. Other Pakistani groups based in the tribal region have almost exclusively directed their attacks against foreign forces in Afghanistan.
The Pakistani Taliban, an umbrella organization set up in 2007 to represent roughly 40 insurgent groups, has also been split by infighting over turf and leadership positions after commanders were killed by the Pakistani military and U.S. drone strikes.
The group has fractured into more than 100 smaller factions, a process that some analysts have suggested would take a toll on militants fighting in Afghanistan by making it increasingly difficult for them to find recruits, as well as restricting territory in Pakistan available to them.
Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud attended the two meetings on Nov. 27 in Wana, the main town in South Waziristan, and Dec. 11 in the Datta Khel area of North Waziristan, Pakistani Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told The Associated Press.
Other prominent Pakistani militant leaders who attended included Mehsud's deputy, Waliur Rehman, and two commanders who have focused on fighting in Afghanistan, Maulvi Nazir and Gul Bahadur, Ehsan said. Also there was Sirajuddin Haqqani, an Afghan militant based in North Waziristan who leads one of the most feared groups fighting in Afghanistan.
The Afghan Taliban fighters at the meetings included Zabiullah Mujahid, a well-known spokesman, and Maulvi Sangin, who claims to have custody of U.S. Army Pvt. Bowe R. Bergdahl, captured in Afghanistan in 2009.
The four Pakistani commanders and Haqqani agreed to form a council to resolve differences, said two Pakistani Taliban commanders who attended the meetings. They spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
A pamphlet handed out in North Waziristan over the past two days announced the formation of the five-member committee, saying it was established in consultation with the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the name given to the country by the Taliban. It called on Pakistani militants to coordinate with each other and "avoid unwarranted killings and kidnappings for ransom."
"If any holy warrior is found involved in an unjustified murder or crime, he will be answerable to the committee and could face Islamic punishment," said the pamphlet, a copy of which was obtained by the AP.
Al-Libi, the Al Qaeda commander, asked the Pakistani militants to provide additional fighters to the Afghan Taliban in March, when the snow melts from the passes connecting Pakistan and Afghanistan and the spring fighting season begins.
Ehsan, the Pakistani Taliban spokesman, said the militants agreed, but that did not mean the group would end its fight against the Pakistani government.
"We will continue our jihad against Pakistani security forces," Ehsan pledged.
#1
But, but, Joe Biden said that the Taliban are not our enemy!
And Karzai agreed.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
01/02/2012 16:35 Comments ||
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#2
Makes no sense for the Pakistani Taliban to fight the US, given that (1) GI's are a way more formidable enemy and (2) Pakistan is a much bigger prize than Afghanistan - a barren wasteland that nobody has really bothered to hold for any length of time, all the way from Alexander through Genghis to Victoria.
#4
See also DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > [Afghan, Pakistani] TALIBAN PLEDGE NOT TO TARGET [Pakistani Govt.] SECURITY FORCES | AFGHAN, PAKISTANI TALIBAN UNITE AGZ THE US [+ NATO].
Artics denote or infer that joint Afghan-Pak, anti-US-NATO Taliban Sura was formed at behest of TALIBAN TOP LEADER MULLAH OMAR out of concern for collateral casualties occrring amongst ordinary civiians.
* SAME > US SAYS AFGHAN TALIBAN IS "NOT [ncecessarily] OUR ENEMY".
US plans to engage in secret talks or meetings wid same in 2012.
[Pak Daily Times] Gunmen sprayed bullets at New Year revellers in two bars in northeastern Kenya on Sunday, killing at least two people, a witness and police said, the latest in a wave of attacks near the border with Somalia.
A worker at one of the pubs in Garissa town said gunnies approached in a vehicle, fired at the bars and then drove away. "The guys fired from the vehicle. They first shot the guard, (and then) shot more bullets at those who tried to leave and those who were at the entrance," said the witness who declined to be named.
North Eastern provincial police commander Leo Nyongesa said two people had been confirmed dead. A medic, who refused to be identified, said 28 people had been maimed, including security officers and several women. Kenyan forces crossed into Somalia in October to attack the al Qaeda-linked al-Shabaab ... successor to the Islamic Courts... bully boys, whom it blamed for a spate of kidnappings and cross-border attacks on its soil.
Al-Shabaab has denied responsibility Nope. Wudn't us. for the kidnappings and has vowed major retaliation against Kenya. Kenyan police said on Saturday they were looking for 15 people whom they said had information on al-Shabaab.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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(Ay Pee) -- Egyptian authorities have jugged a Coptic Christian student accused of posting a drawing of Islam's prophet on Facebook that triggered two days of violence in southern Egypt.
Gamal Massoud has been accused by fellow students of ridiculing the Prophet Muhammad.
According to a security official, the 17-year-old student denies that and says friends posted the picture on his Facebook page. The official spoke Saturday on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press.
Since Wednesday, villagers have attacked Massoud's house while chanting "holy shit! Allahu akbar," or "God is Great." They have set fire to other Christians' houses.
Security forces intervened, using tear gas to disperse Moslem protesters.
[An Nahar] Egypt's military ruler decreed on Sunday that multi-phase elections for parliament's consultative upper house, the Shoura, will be held over a shorter period, effectively speeding up steps towards drafting a new constitution.
The elections, which had been due to take place in three phases between January 29 and March 11, will now be done in two steps, wrapping up on February 22, according to the decree by Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi quoted by state news agency MENA.
The first phase will take place in 13 provinces, including the largest cities Cairo and Alexandria, and the second in the remaining 14.
MENA said Tantawi had decided that the Shoura would meet for the first time on February 28, nearly a month earlier than previously expected.
With the final phase of elections to the lower house due to wrap up with second-round run-offs on January 17, the two houses will now be able to move more swiftly towards writing a new constitution.
Tantawi heads the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, the military junta that took power when president Hosni Mubarak ...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011... was driven from office in February by a popular revolt.
Under the framework for a transfer to civilian rule, the SCAF has said that the two chambers, once elected, should choose 100 members of a constitutional commission.
Most political parties are pressing for the constitution to be completed before presidential elections are held before the end of June.
The parliamentary elections, the first since Mubarak was ousted, began in November.
The Freedom and Justice party of the Moslem Brüderbund and al-Nour, representing the even more conservative Salafist ...Salafists espouse an austere form of Sunni Islam that seeks a return to practices that were common in the 7th century. Rather than doing that themselves and letting other people alone they insist everybody do as they say and they try to kill everybody who doesn't... current of political Islam, won a substantial combined majority in the first two rounds of voting for the lower house.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Sub polls suggest that the Ikhwan was elected solely because of their anti-corruption stance. Someone else will get that vote, if their is a next election.
#1
Strange. Taking explosives FROM the civilian world TO the military world. "Military grade wrapping" implies the stuff was wrapped in military grade wrapping but wasn't, itself, milspec.
If the guy wanted non-milspec, he could wait until he got to his base and go off post in his spare time and get it. If he wanted milspec, he could finesse it more easily there than at home. Unless there's a leak in the military supply system in Texas that doesn't exist elsewhere and he knew about it in advance. But it's not milspec, apparently.
If it isn't, what is it? And why wrap it in military grade wrappings? Why not a ziploc?
Wonder if he had something or other non-explosive wrapped in some old paper he'd found lying around the base and the detectors spotted traces from the wrapping.
TSA might be wanting to demonstrate their usefulness by snatching some guy who's only got wrapping paper.
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
01/02/2012 9:33 Comments ||
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[Dawn] Two security personnel were killed when a bomb went kaboom! on the Miranshah ... headquarters of al-Qaeda in Pakistain and likely location of Ayman al-Zawahiri. The Haqqani network has established a ministate in centered on the town with courts, tax offices and lots of madrassas... -Dattakhel road in North Wazoo on Saturday while 12 Death Eaters were killed when jet fighters bombed their hideouts in Upper Orakzai region.
Officials and military sources said Death Eaters detonated a remote-controlled device when bomb disposal squad was passing through the area between Boya and Dattakhel.
The team was there to clear the road for a convoy of security forces. A soldier was killed on the spot and the other died while being taken to a hospital.
Local authorities imposed a curfew from Miranshah Dattak to Nahar Lami for an indefinite period.
ORAKZAI: Twelve Death Eaters were killed and nine others injured when jet fighters pounded their hideouts in Mamozai in Upper Orakzai.
Sources said that hideouts were destroyed in Bilras, Bar Mella and Toor Semath.
Meanwhile, ...back at the ranch, Butch and the Kid finally brought their horses under control... a Frontier Corps man, Razaq, was allegedly rubbed out by his colleague in Kalaya after the two traded insults. Asif, the suspect, was placed in long-term storage.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] Suspected Orcs and similar vermin blew up a state-run high school for girls at Badhber on the suburbs of provincial metropolis on Friday night, police said.
An official of Badhber cop shoppe told Dawn that two powerful explosives were planted at different places in the school building. The devices went off late in the night, he added.
He said that at least four rooms of the school were blown up while some others developed cracks. He said that each of the locally made explosives weighed about one kilogram.
A resident of the area, wishing not to be named, said that despite improvement in law and order situation, schools were not safe in the area.
He said that Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... Assembly Deputy Speaker Khushdil Khan had directed police to depute community police to protect schools but to no avail.
He said that most of sabotage incidents were carried by thug organization, Lashkar-i-Islam as its members could easily enter Beautiful Downtown Peshawar from Bara via Frontier Road.
Meanwhile, ...back at the the conspirators' cleverly concealed hideout the long-awaited message arrived. They quickly got to work with their decoder rings... security forces shelled alleged hideouts of Orcs and similar vermin in the Amay Kamay mountain between Darra Adamkhel of FR Kohat and Orakzai Agency ... crawling with holy men, home to Darra Adam Khel, the world's largest illegal arms bazaar. 14 distinct tribes of beturbanned primitives inhabit Orakzai agency's 1500 or so square kilometers... on Saturday.
They claimed that several Orcs and similar vermin were killed and a number of hideouts destroyed in the attacks.
Security forces had earlier asked the residents of Bostikhel in Darra Adamkhel to vacate the area for combing operation, as rocket attacks were being launched on Kohat from this area while Orcs and similar vermin there easily beat feet to Orakzai Agency after attacks. However, nothing needs reforming like other people's bad habits... the idea was dropped for unknown reasons and the forces started simultaneous aerial attacks in the mountainous area to stop the movement of thugs.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Yah, and America is the problem. Whenever you see someone point the blame finger, look at what they are pointing away from.
[Dawn] Unidentified gunnies put on fire at least 12 trucks, loaded with smuggled foreign goods, and kidnapped three drivers from Jabba area of Jamrud tehsil in Khyber Agency on Friday.
Official sources said on Saturday that scores of gunnies hijacked 12 trucks loaded with electronic appliances, auto parts and tyres from Jabba area near Ali Masjid while on their way to Karkhano market in Beautiful Downtown Peshawar. Later, the gunnies torched all the vehicles and destroyed all the goods loaded on them.
The gunnies also took away three drivers after putting the vehicles on fire and shifted them to Qazi's guesthouse an undisclosed location, officials said. Tribal carriers bring the smuggled goods from across the Afghan border into Bazaar Zakhakhel area via Tabbai hillock, bordering Nangrahar province of Afghanistan.
Security forces had few years ago sealed the route as it was generally believed that the Bara-based myrmidon organization Lashkar-i-Islam was the sole beneficiary of the money, collected at more than a dozen illegal checkpoints established by the group.
The LI activists used to charge Rs5,000 to Rs10,000 per vehicle on these checkpoints depending upon the quality of goods, supplied though the vehicles. The route was reopened in June this year after Zamhakhel tribal lashkar forced LI supporters to leave the area. Since then a considerable surge was witnessed in smuggling of various types of foreign goods via Ali Masjid-Peshawar route.
Although no one has so far grabbed credit for burning the trucks and kidnapping the drivers yet officials believed that the incident could possibly be a result of rivalry between Zakhakhel tribe and LI.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] A kaboom in Pakistain's northwestern tribal belt on Sunday killed an anti-Taliban militiaman and maimed three others, an official said.
The injured were two other anti-Taliban fighters and a passer-by, senior government official Faaz Mohammad told AFP.
The remote-controlled bomb hit a shop in Salarzai town, about 20 kilometres northeast of Khar, the main city in Bajaur, a part of the lawless tribal belt bordering Afghanistan.
"The bomb destroyed the shop and killed one anti-Taliban fighter," the official said.
Bajaur was the scene of a major anti-militant operation in August 2008 and in February 2009 and the military said the area had been secured.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] A suspected armed thugwent kaboom!" in a suicide kaboom during an operation by security forces in the Khyber agency region on Sunday, DawnNews reported.
According to security sources, two seperate groups of armed snuffies clashed together in the areas of Landi Kotal and Karmna of Khyber agency. A house was destroyed in a blast as a result of the clash.
Security forces cordoned off the area and started an operation against the thugs. One of the snuffies went kaboom!" with a bomb as security personnel got closer.
A soldier and four snuffies were killed in the suicide kaboom.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Two mortar shells fired from the Gazoo Strip landed in southern Israel on Sunday, causing no damage or injuries, an Israeli police spokeswoman said.
"Two mortar shells fired from the northern Gazoo Strip fell this morning in the Eshkol district, there was no damage or injuries," Luba Samri told AFP.
On Saturday, Israeli troops at the frontier with Gazoo shot and maimed a Paleostinian man near the border fence.
And on Friday, an Israeli air strike killed a senior bad turban in Gazoo, who the Israeli military said was suspected of involvement in planning an attack from Egypt.
Israel said the strike targeted a "terrorist squad that was identified moments before firing rockets at Israel from the northern Gazoo Strip."
The strike came after two days of increased rocket fire from Gazoo, with at least seven rockets being fired from the territory into Israel in the space of 48 hours, according to the Israeli military.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Paleostinian President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... warned in an interview on Sunday that the international peacemaking Quartet ... The Quartet are the UN (xylophone), the United States (alto), the European Union (soprano), and Russia (shortstop). The group was established in Madrid in 2002 by former Spanish Prime Minister Aznar, as a result of the escalating conflict in the Middle East. Tony Blair is the Quartet's current Special Envoy.... will have "failed" if it cannot kickstart negotiations by January 26.
"If the Quartet can't get the Israeli and Paleostinian sides to the table by January 26, it means they have failed and the Paleostinian leadership will study its position and act accordingly," he told Paleostine TV.
January 26 is the deadline set by the international peacemaking Quartet for Israel and the Paleostinians to submit comprehensive proposals on territory and security as the group works to restart peace talks.
But so far the Quartet, which groups the United States, United Nations ...what started out as a a diplomatic initiative, now trying to edge its way into legislative, judicial, and executive areas... , European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... and Russia, has had little success in coaxing the sides back to the negotiating table.
Israel says it wants talks without preconditions, but the Paleostinians want a freeze on settlement construction and agreement on the framework for talks before beginning negotiations.
With little sign of progress, some commentators have warned of the prospect of a third Paleostinian intifada, or uprising.
But Abbas, who has consistently rejected violence and promoted peaceful protest, said he saw little chance of that.
"If nothing happens, then all options are open to us, and of course there are people who say there will be a third intifada, but I say that is unlikely and I do not accept it," he said.
With peace talks on hold, the Paleostinians focused in 2011 on diplomatic measures, including seeking full U.N. membership and winning membership of the UNESCO cultural organization, over U.S. and Israeli opposition.
Senior Paleostinian official Nabil Shaath said in December that such efforts were now effectively on hold until January 26.
"But this political ceasefire will end on January 26," he told news hounds.
"If on the 26th Israel does not come up with a freeze of the settlements and talks based on the 1967 borders, we will continue our international drive."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Peace is a joke, with hezbollah and hamas there to wage terror.
[An Nahar] Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... officials monitoring violence in Syria appear to be in conflict over whether government snipers are perched on rooftops in the southern flashpoint city of Daraa.
In a video released by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a man wearing an orange vest with the vaporous Arab League logo said in Daraa: "There are snipers; we have seen them with our own eyes."
"We ask the authorities to remove them immediately; if they don't remove them within 24 hours there will be other measures," the unnamed speaker in the video, which was dated Friday, told a crowd of people.
"Otherwise our coming here is for nothing," he added.
Veteran Sudanese military intelligence officer General Mohammed Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi, who is heading the observer mission, said however that the official seen in the video was making a hypothetical remark.
"This man said that if he saw -- by his own eyes -- those snipers he will report immediately," Dabi told the BBC's Newshour program. "But he didn't see (snipers)."
A first team of 50 observers arrived on Monday as part of an Arab plan endorsed by Syria on November 2, which calls for the withdrawal of the military from towns and residential districts, a halt to violence against civilians and the release of detainees.
The Arab League mission has been the focus of controversy, with some Syrian opposition members unhappy with the choice of Dabi to head it.
For some the general is a controversial figure because he served under Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir who is wanted by the International Criminal Court ... where Milosevich died of old age before being convicted ... for crimes allegedly committed in the Darfur region.
The general ruffled opposition feathers by saying Syrian authorities were so far cooperating with the mission and by describing his visit to the flashpoint city of Homs as "good."
Rights activists have urged the Arab monitors to do more to protect civilians from regime forces.
The Britannia-based Observatory reported that Syrian forces on Friday used "nail bombs" to disperse anti-regime rallies, and fired live ammunition, tear gas and stun grenades at tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters.
The U.N. estimates that more than 5,000 people have been killed in the regime's crackdown on dissent since March. Assad's government insists the violence has been instigated by "terrorist armed gangs" with foreign help.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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Iran plans to test-fire two long range missiles during the last day of its naval exercises in the Gulf. Iranian deputy navy Commander Mahmoud Mousavi told state TV, "Today we will test fire Qader and Nour long range missiles during the drill."
"Due to the Yingji-82 missile's small radar reflectivity, low attack flight path (only five to seven meters above the sea surface) and strong anti-jamming capability of its guidance system, target ships have a very small chance of intercepting the missile. The single shot hit probability of the Yingji-82 is estimated to be as high as 98%. The Yingji-82 can be launched from airplanes, surface ships, submarines and land-based vehicles. Its export name is the C-802.
#3
So if we sink all their ships, bomb all of their aircraft into junk, and shoot up, blow up, or incinerate any vehicle within 200 km of the straits, I guess we'll be safe...oh since the Gulf is shallow, we give it to the subs just to be safe.
Posted by: Bill Clinton ||
01/02/2012 9:18 Comments ||
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#4
The single shot hit probability of the Yingji-82 is estimated to be as high as 98%.
If you are a big fat tanker. Not so much if you are a corvette or larger warship.
#6
98%. Hah, ha. There is less than a 98% chance that the average person will pour a glass of milk and not spill.
Anti-ship missiles are highly complex physical things. To just get the thing to fire off the rail will have a few percent failure rate. Then to maintain track a few more. And so on.
Oh, and it was made as an export only item by the same Chinese that built those collapsing schools for their own children. An it is operated by Iranians who have purged their military of anyone with any talent.
If the Iranians could achieve a 50% hit rate against a stationary target with these things without killing many folks on the launch team, it would be a surprise. Against a moving commercial ship it would be less. Against a modern warship, much less.
But I digress, this whole thing is just a show by Iran to keep the price of oil high. And Obama wants that too. So, the whole situation is all full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
The next big shooting war, people are gonna find out real fast that the seas are ruled by antiship missiles, and that only subs and little craft can survive.
#9
Yes, gromky, in the littoral land based missiles will keep big high value ship away from shore. There U.S. submarines will clear the seas. In blue water, missiles will also will clear the sea, but they will have been from launched from U.S. ships. On the ground U.S. aircraft based on land and blue water carriers will dominate the operational space.
The capability of the U.S. militarily is overwhelming, dynamic, and multidimensional.
The prospects for a small backward country like Iran in conventional battles with the U.S. are dim. That is why they will talk big, but continue playing little ball using terrorists and proxies to destabilize things, and use both methods to run up the price of oil.
Even the Saudi's on their own have the capability to completely dominate Iranian airspace, destroy all their fleet, sterilize their army bases and weapons sites. Why don't they? Because it would disrupt the sale of oil. So the Saudi's know the Iranians aren't going to disrupt oil sales, just as we know they aren't going to either.
So while, tactically, anti-ship missiles are important and analytically interesting, the question here is strategic. How can Iran do crazy stuff to get the most money out of the oil Iran is selling today?
#10
A while back it was suggested that by using odd bands of energy, satellites could see through water, if not to the bottom of deep trenches, then at least to maximum submarine depth, thus a single overflight could spot every submarine in a particular ocean, for location, depth, direction of travel and speed.
As early as the early '80's, it was alleged that in a test, every modern ship sunk in the English Channel was plotted. If that was the case, the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman would be a breeze, and the Arabian and Caspian seas could also be policed.
#13
OTOH DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > [Amin Sakal] US + ISRAEL HAVE RUN OUT OF OPTIONS AGZ IRAN.
One indigenous nuclear fuel rod doth NOT evidence of an Iranian NucProg maketh.
IIUC ARTIC = THE MAIN/PRIMARY EVIDENCE IN SUPPORT OF A US WAR ON IRAN ARE THOSE N-O-T-RELATED TO IRAN'S NUCPROGS, ostensibly because the US, etc. has failed to prove Iran has a viable NucProg, let alone one covertly designed to dev NucWeaps.
versus
* WAFF > {PressTV = Shamus Cooke, Global Research] "INVADING IRAN [ + Syria] IS INVADING RUSSIA, CHINA".
#14
Lest we fergit, IRAN'S MULLAHS had already indicated their strategy many years ago in case of de facto US attack + ground invasion, namely ...
> ALLOW US GROUND FORCES ENTER IRAN WHERE THEY WILL ENCOUNTER VIETNAM-ERA STYLE "PEOPLE'S/
GUERILLA WAR" = ARMED RESISTANCE.
> Tehran to be willing use Any + All WMDS [CBRNE] weapons at their disposal, be it indigenous andor foreign. AGZ US = US-ALLIED TARGETS ON IRANIAN SOIL, including widin Iranian Cities + Towns as pertinent.
> Iranian Armed Forces, IRGC, + BASIJ to be flexible + MOUNT PREDATORY CROSS-BORDER ATTACKS FROM OUTSIDE IRAN'S BORDERS, WID OR WIDOUT THE SOVEREIGN CONSENT OF IRAN'S MUSLIM NEIGHBORS.
> INDUCE ANTI-US "GREAT POWER" MILPOL, NUCLEAR CONFRONTATION, IFF NOT DIRECT INTERVENTION.
The above by Iran is consistent wid them also staying on the Media + Diplomatic, etc. "strategic defensive" AMAP ALAP ATAP.
IOW, Iran will be willing to induce both REGIONAL WAR, as well as potens GLOBAL WAR, iff attacked + invaded.
"IRAN GETS ITS NUKES, OR ELSE IRAN GETS INVADED" = akin to "IFF THE US, ETC. WANTS TO STOP US, LET THEM COME + GET US"!, as every other Great Power or Enemy of Persia-Iran has had to do in antiquity.
---------
* ION TOPIX > IRAN MISSLE TEST POINTS TO DANGEROUS 2012 IN DEALING WID TEHRAN.
* SAME > MIDDLE EAST: IRAN THREATENS 150,000 MISSLE RESPONSE TO ISRAEL'S JERICHOS, to includ possibly also agz NATO = NATO-EU.
[Emirates 24/7] Syrian pro-democracy protesters saw the New Year in with demonstrations in several flashpoint centres, activists said Sunday, as more deaths were reported in the regime's crackdown on dissent.
Arab League ...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... officials monitoring violence meanwhile appeared to be in conflict over whether government snipers are perched on rooftops in the southern protest hub of Daraa, where the uprising started in mid-March.
"The youths of the revolution held huge and simultaneous protests overnight to welcome the New Year" across Syria, said the Local Coordination Committees (LCC) network of activists.
Protesters erupted into the streets in Daraa, Idlib and Aleppo ...For centuries, Aleppo was Greater Syria's largest city and the Ottoman Empire's third, after Constantinople and Cairo. Although relatively close to Damascus in distance, Aleppans regard Damascenes as country cousins... in the north, in the mostly Kurdish city of Qamishli in the northeast and in Zabadani near Damascus ...Home to a staggering array of terrorist organizations... , the LCC said in a statement received by AFP in Nicosia.
"May 2012 bring us all peace, safety and a promise of a free Syria," the LCC said after more than nine months of anti-regime protests and a lethal regime crackdown on dissent that has killed thousands of people.
"The Local Committees corroborated in the year 2011, exactly 5,862 deaders, including 321 male children, 74 female children and 146 women," the group said in another statement.
United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... estimates unveiled in early December had also put the corpse count in Syria at more than 5,000.
On Saturday three more civilians were reported killed by gunfire from regime forces, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Sunday, including two rubbed out by snipers in the flashpoint province of Homs.
Activists have accused the regime of posting snipers on rooftops as part of their brutal crackdown on dissent, in which government forces have also been accused of firing tear gas, stun grenades and on Friday "nail bombs."
But the issue of snipers appears to have triggered a dispute among the vaporous Arab League observers deployed since last Monday in Syria to implement a peace plan to end the bloodshed.
In a video released by the Observatory, a man wearing an orange vest with the Arab League logo said in Daraa: "There are snipers; we have seen them with our own eyes."
"We ask the authorities to remove them immediately; if they don't remove them within 24 hours there will be other measures," the unnamed speaker in the video, which was dated Friday, told a crowd of people.
But veteran Sudanese military intelligence officer General Mohammed Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi, who is heading the observer mission, said the official seen in the video was making a hypothetical remark.
"This man said that if he saw -- by his own eyes -- those snipers he will report immediately," Dabi told the BBC's Newshour programme. "But he didn't see (snipers)."
Arab monitors are on a month-long mission to implement a plan calling for the withdrawal of the military from towns and residential districts, a halt to violence against civilians and the release of detainees.
A first deployment of 50 monitors have been touring since Tuesday protest hubs but their mission has been cloaked in controversy, with some Syrian opposition activists critical of Dabi.
For some the general is a controversial figure because he served under Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir who is wanted by the International Criminal Court ... where Milosevich died of old age before being convicted ... for crimes allegedly committed in the Darfur region.
The general ruffled opposition feathers by saying Syrian authorities were so far cooperating with the mission and by describing his visit to the flashpoint city of Homs as "good."
Rights activists have urged the Arab monitors to do more to protect civilians from regime forces.
Meanwhile two key Syrian opposition factions -- the Syrian National Council (SNC) and the National Coordination Body for Democratic Change (NCB) -- have inked a deal to bolster a united front against the regime.
Friday's agreement also lays the ground rules for a transitional period as dissidents eye the toppling of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Trampler of Homs... 's regime.
A statement by the NCB said the agreement would be submitted to the Arab League ahead of a congress of Syrian opposition forces to be held later this month under the aegis of the pan-Arab bloc.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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[An Nahar] Syrian authorities on Saturday seized "quantities of weapons and over 1,000 narcotic tablets near Sweid bridge on the Syrian-Lebanese border and in both cities of al-Qusayr and Tal Kalakh in Homs" near the border with Leb, Syria's state-run news agency ...and if you can't believe the state-run news agency who can you believe?... SANA reported Sunday.
"The weapons included PKM (machineguns), 14 anti-tank shells, 14 RPGs and various rifles," SANA said.
Authorities also seized "Alfa-type Lebanese (mobile phone) SIM cards," the news agency added.
Thousands of Syrian refugees have decamped to Leb as the state cracks down on a popular revolt against the Assad regime, now in its tenth month.
The Syrian army last month laced the Lebanese border with landmines in a bid to curb arms smuggling and hampering army defectors and refugees from fleeing.
Syrian troops have also staged deadly incursions into border villages in neighboring Leb, the last of which was on Tuesday, when three Lebanese men were killed by Syrian gunfire in Wadi Khaled.
The United Nations ...Parkinson's Law on an international scale... estimated earlier this month that more than 5,000 people have been killed in the crackdown since protests against the Assad regime began in mid-March.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/02/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
See also TOPIX > [Daily Star] HEZBOLLAH WARNS SYRIA CHAOS COULD HIT LEBANON.
and
* SAME > AL-QAEDA INFILTRATED EXTREMIST GROUPS
[circa 20] IN LEBANON: MP [Baath Party MO Asssem Qanso].
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.
(Ay Pee) -- Egyptian authorities have 
Wazoo
[Dawn] Suspected 
Orakzai Agency
[Dawn] A 
A suspected armed
Quartet
International Criminal Court
Iran plans to test-fire two long range missiles during the last day of its naval exercises in the Gulf. Iranian deputy navy Commander Mahmoud Mousavi told state TV, "Today we will test fire Qader and Nour long range missiles during the drill." 
[Emirates 24/7] Syrian pro-democracy protesters saw the New Year in with demonstrations in several flashpoint centres, activists said Sunday, as more deaths were reported in the regime's crackdown on dissent.
