Two outlaw leaders were killed in "crossfire" during shootouts between the police and Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) in Pabna and Jhenidah early yesterday.
A regional leader of the outlawed Purba Banglar Communist Party (PBCP-ML-Red flag) was killed in a gunfight between the Rab and his accomplices at Dhopaghata village in Pabna sadar upazila.
O-o-o-oh, a commie! Do tell!
Rab-5 sources at Pabna said they had arrested Mokhtar Hossain "Red" Bachchu, 25, at C&B Bazar in Bera upazila on Friday and took him to the zonal headquarters for interrogation.
"Say 'Red', whydoncha come with us to headquarters?"
"Umm, okay, just so long as we don't go to any abandoned warehouses."
Following his statement, ...
"Ooch! Ouch! I'll talk!"
... a Rab team took him to the Chakdarpara village early yesterday to recover hidden weapons and arrest his accomplices.
"See 'Red', no abandoned warehouses here!"
Rab officials said as they reached a nearby Dhopaghata village at about 2:00am, ...
... must have had a two-fer going that night ...
... the outlaws opened fire on them, prompting the law enforcers to retaliate.
"Cheez, the RAB's got 'Red'! Open senseless fire!"
Mokhtar died on the spot when he was caught in the crossfire.
"Proletariat feets don't fail me ..." [thwip] [THUD] "Rosebud!"
His accomplices, however, managed to escape, the Rab officials added.
Just melted away into the teeming masses, they did.
One shutter gun from the police evidence room, three bullets and some sharp weapons were recovered from the spot.
Sharp weapons from some dull homeboyz.
The body was sent to the Pabna General Hospital morgue for autopsy.
"Here you go Dr. Quincy! A real man of the people, this one!"
Rab sources said "Red" Mokhtar was accused in a number of cases, including three for murder.
But wait, it's a double feature!
A regional leader of outlawed Gono Mukti Fouz (GMF) was killed in "crossfire" during a shootout between his accomplices and the police in Shailakupa upazila of Jhenidah district in the early hours yesterday.
GMF needs a new 'number 3', do they?
Acting on a tip-off, a police team of Sreepur Police Station raided Mashalia village in the upazila in Magura district and arrested Baka, 40, alias Bijoy alias Biplob around 1:30am and took him to the police station for interrogation.
He couldn't come up with a better alias then 'Biplob'? Just shoot him now. Oh wait ...
Police later took him to Thakur Malithia village in Shailakupa to recover arms.
A lair or an abandoned warehouse? We'll never know ... or care ...
As they reached a field in the village around 3:45am, ...
Told ya it was a two-fer night, the RAB just finished with 'Red'.
... the GMF operatives opened fire on them.
"Open up on them, boys, they got Biplob!"
Police retaliated with shots, causing an hour-long gunfight.
Baka, of course, didn't last the entire hour ...
Baka, caught in the crossfire, died on the spot while he attempted to flee, police claimed.
And don't you go claiming otherwise.
Two police constables, Firoz and Monir, were also injured during the shootout.
"Lift with the legs, not with the back, you guys!"
Police retrieved two country-made guns, two shutter guns and six bullets from the spot.
Two shutter guns? There's more than one??
Baka, hailed from village Borobari-Bogra in Shailakupa upazila, was accused in 12 criminal cases including eight for murder.
And now Biplob's dead. Another night's work for the RAB.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/16/2005 00:17 ||
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#1
country-made guns
Country-made guns are starting to appear side-by-side with shutter guns in all the important upazilas.
SIR IAN BLAIR, the Metropolitan police commissioner, has admitted he may soon be forced to resign over the shooting of an innocent Brazilian man on the London Underground.
Britainâs top policeman told a private gathering of business leaders and officials last week that he might have to go âfairly soonâ over the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes.
Describing the pressure he faced over the botched operation, he said: âWhere does resignation end? Of course, it might end fairly soon.â
He added: âIâd much rather resign than be pushed.â
Blairâs comments, made to the Windsor Leadership Trust, indicate his recognition that the pressure on him is building to a critical point. At the time of the shooting he considered resigning but ruled it out.
Senior police officers say the inquiry into the operation will reveal a âhorror storyâ when it is completed before Christmas.One senior insider said: âHe (Blair) has obviously been damaged. His own self-confidence has been damaged. You can see that he looks visibly older.â
Blair disclosed at the meeting that his personal role in the affair was now being investigated by the Independent Police Complaints Commission. Blair tried to block an immediate IPCC inquiry into the shooting at Stockwell Tube station.
In a letter to the Home Office, written just hours after the shooting, he said he should be able to suspend the legal requirement for an inquiry on national security grounds. He was overruled by Sir John Gieve, the Home Officeâs most senior civil servant.
In his lecture on âleadershipâ, delivered last Wednesday, Blair indicated that mistakes had been made and that his officers had failed to stop certain information circulating in the media. This is thought to be a reference to the incorrect belief that de Menezes had been wearing a bulky coat and had vaulted the barrier when entering the station.
Blair also said that allowing subordinates to âmake mistakesâ was a key strength of a good manager.
He maintained that he had not tried to cover up the truth about the shooting. Lawyers representing the de Menezes family have said there was a âfatal delayâ in starting the official inquiry.
Yesterday a Scotland Yard spokesman said Blair had made it clear in the speech that âit would be arrogant not to consider the issue of resignation in such circumstances but stressed he had no plans to resignâ.
Those present last week included Lord Phillips, the new lord chief justice, and Sir Brian Burridge, the commander of British forces in the recent Gulf war.
At least 10 officers involved in the shooting are understood to have been served with police disciplinary notices. They include the marksmen from CO19, who fired 11 bullets at de Menezes after he boarded a train at Stockwell. Senior officers up to the rank of deputy assistant commissioner may also face manslaughter charges.
Blair has said he did not find out until the day after the shooting â on the morning of July 22 â that his officers had killed an innocent man. Five hours after the shooting he said it was âdirectly linkedâ to the hunt for the would-be suicide bombers of July 21.
On July 23 Blair was still praising the Met for âplaying out of its socksâ, but at 5pm that day Scotland Yard issued a statement in which it admitted the shot man was not connected to the plot.
As the IPCC examines whether Blair made misleading public statements, it has emerged that some of his most senior officers were aware by the mid-afternoon of July 22 that de Menezes was innocent. A senior officer told The Sunday Times that Blair should have been in a position to know what his officers had found out by then.
Another insider said: âSerious doubts about whether they had shot the right man emerged very soon after the incident. All they had to do was look at the identity documents in his wallet to see that he wasnât a terrorist.â
The commissioner is also likely to face difficulties over his decision to activate Operation Kratos, the secret guidelines which authorise police marksmen to shoot suspected suicide bombers in the head.
The policy was drawn up by a special terrorism committee of the Association of Chief Police Officers in 2003. Many senior officers are, however, privately concerned about the legal basis of the policy.
Blair continues to defend the guidelines in public, but many other police chiefs have distanced themselves from the policy and several forces plan never to use it.
When Zarema Valgasova last saw her son, he was semiconscious and bleeding profusely from a badly broken arm with cigarette burns on his body - the result, she says, of police torture after his arrest.
After Thursday's attack by dozens of Islamic militants on police and security facilities in the southern Russian city of Nalchik, police rounded up more than three dozen people - most of them Muslim men.
The latest violence was in Kabardino-Balkiriya republic, a tense area ridden with poverty and corruption. It underscored the volatility of the Caucasus region where a long-running conflict in Chechnya is spilling over with increasing frequency to nearby republics.
At least 108 people, including 72 attackers, were killed in this week's fighting, according to a tally of accounts by officials, news reports and an Associated Press reporter.
Twenty-four law enforcement officers were killed and 51 were wounded, government officials said.
Chechen rebels have claimed involvement in the attacks, raising fears that Islamic militants who have been fighting Russian forces for most of the past decade were opening a new front in the troubled Caucasus.
Rebels for years have harassed Russian forces in Chechnya with roadside bombs and homemade explosives, but the Nalchik attacks appeared to be part of a strategy to target areas outside the volatile republic and keep Moscow off-balance.
The attack comes amid a long-running regional campaign aimed at undermining nascent Islamic extremism - which Russian officials describe as "Wahhabism" - a term stemming from the strict and austere form of Islam predominant in Saudi Arabia and practiced by Osama bin Laden.
Rights lawyers and the region's officially sanctioned Islamic leader say the campaign has caught up innocent, peaceful young Muslims, alienating and offending them as they rediscover their religious heritage.
If police continue their crackdown on Kabardino-Balkariya Muslims, it could lead to renewed violence against authorities, said Larisa Dolgova, a lawyer who represents Muslims in their complaints about harassment and torture.
"Muslims will exercise their right to believe," she said. "If not, I promise there will be mass disorder."
Valgasova said her 26-year-old son, Daniil Khamukov, is a family man with two young children - and an observant Muslim.
On Thursday morning, not long after gunfire reverberated around the city of 235,000, he said goodbye to his wife and two young children and set off for his job as a window dresser.
By 11 a.m., his battered body was in the courtyard outside his home, bleeding from a compound arm fracture, Valgasova said. He lay there for seven hours, she said. Paramedics refused to help.
"They told us: 'They say he's one of the fighters. Let him die,'" she said.
About 6 p.m., police came and collected Khamukov and took him to a local precinct house. Valgasova said she did not know anything more about his fate.
Dolgova, the lawyer, said Khamukov was arrested simply because he is an observant Muslim who does not practice his belief through official channels, for example, by attending worship services at Nalchik's only authorized mosque.
Even before Thursday's attacks, Dolgova said relatives of detained Muslims had turned to her for help filing legal complaints about mistreatment by law enforcement officials.
"Moral, psychological, abusive attitudes, that's what the authorities are showing toward observant Muslims," she said.
Anas Pshikhachev, the official mufti, or Islamic leader, for Kabardino-Balkariya, mildly criticized local authorities.
For example, he said the decision to close all the city's mosques except for his was a mistake. And some female university students had been accosted for wearing headscarves while some observant men confronted for wearing the style of beard of devout Muslims, added.
But the mufti was quick to add those were isolated incidents.
Still, this spring, the region saw a series of demonstrations by residents demanding an end to arbitrary police sweeps in search of what they said were Islamic extremists.
Russian officials said the 2002 seizure of hundreds of people in a Moscow theater, the 2004 school hostage-taking in the southern city of Beslan that killed 330 and other terror attacks were conducted by the Chechen militants with support and guidance from al-Qaida.
However, there is no firm evidence the two groups are coordinating their strategies.
#1
Seems to me the ruskies are showing way too much restraint -- they know how to play tough! Why haven't all Muslims been dumped in the Gulag by now? Let 'em stew in their own juices, with no food, shelter, or equipment, far from civilization....
#3
I'd like to add to lotp's statement that the Russians _have_ been much more aggressive in committing atrocities upon Moslems in their little two-faced (I say because of their support of Iranian nukes and delivery systems) pretend-war against terrorists but it hasn't really gotten them any security. Killing tens of thousands of civilians in Grozny during two separate sieges there in the past decade or so didn't do anything to prevent the Beslan massacre.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
10/16/2005 15:51 Comments ||
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#4
perhaps teh atrocities just haven't been committed in the right place? Think 40-60 Princelings of Arabia kidnapped and executed might make a change in the situation?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/16/2005 17:06 Comments ||
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Rarely in wartime is it possible to read over the shoulder of the enemy and discover his most intimate thoughts about the battle. But the United States is claiming just such an intelligence coup with the capture of a letter from Ayman Zawahiri, the cerebral chief strategist of al Qaeda, to his hotheaded field commander in Iraq, Abu Musab Zarqawi.
The July 9 Zawahiri letter was released Tuesday by the office of John Negroponte, the new director of national intelligence. If authentic, the letter takes us inside the tent of al Qaeda's battered but clear-eyed leadership as it plans the next stage of its global jihad.
Al Qaeda in Iraq claims that the letter is a fake, but I would say that, too, if someone had intercepted my battle plans. More troubling is a critique by Juan Cole, one of the leading American experts on Shiite Islam. After carefully reviewing the Arabic text, he argued on his Web site Friday that some of the usage sounds like that of a Shiite or perhaps a Pakistani but not an Egyptian Sunni like Zawahiri. Not so, insist the CIA's Arabic-speaking analysts. "We have the highest confidence in the letter's authenticity," a senior intelligence official reiterated Friday.
At the heart of the letter is an argument that al Qaeda must build a broad political movement in the Muslim world, even as it continues its military campaign to drive America and Israel from the region. Students of 20th-century history will recall a similar shift by the Communist Party in the 1930s, when it moved from a tight, exclusionary strategy to a broader one known as the "Popular Front." Zawahiri's call for mass Muslim politics, which would include those outside his own tight Salafist circle, is plausible because it tracks other recent statements.
"We are in a media battle in a race for the hearts and minds of our umma ," Zawahiri advises, referring to Muslim peoples. He chastises his field commander for using brutal tactics that are alienating the masses. "The common folk are wondering," he says, about Zarqawi's slaughter of poor Shiite civilians, his bombings at mosques and his gruesome beheading of hostages, all of which the masses "will never find palatable." In the elaborate politeness of Arabic discourse, Zawahiri is telling his firebrand commander: You are blowing it. We cannot achieve political power by terrifying our fellow Muslims. Here again, the letter, along with other recent indications, reveals that al Qaeda's leadership is unhappy with Zarqawi's cutthroat tactics.
The Zawahiri of the letter is a clever commander. Even on the run, cut off from normal communications, he has a remarkable ability to see the battle space. He takes it for granted that the Americans are pulling out of Iraq and expects some sort of United Nations-sponsored transition. He advises Zarqawi to "fill the void" quickly by establishing a Sunni "emirate" ministate as the Americans leave areas where the insurgents are strong.
The letter also draws a fascinating self-portrait of Zawahiri himself. We sense the vanity of this man who bears an ostentatious prayer mark on his forehead from bowing in prayer so passionately each day. He asks if Zarqawi has seen his appearances on al-Jazeera, read his recent book, listened to his 15 audio statements.
We sense Zawahiri's isolation. He can't see television or read newspapers easily. He complains frequently of being out of touch, and it's clear that some of his couriers have been intercepted, making communication difficult. And he senses that his enemies are closing in. One of his top deputies, Abu Faraj Libbi, was lured into a trap earlier this year, and Zawahiri still seems unclear how it happened. "The real danger comes from the agent Pakistani army," he says -- and he's right. I'm told the Pakistanis have stealthily captured or killed more than 400 of al Qaeda's leaders.
We see, finally, that Zawahiri is being squeezed by Iran. He tells Zarqawi to stop his crazed anti-Shiite attacks because the Iranians are holding more than 100 al Qaeda prisoners, many of them old members of the leadership or part of Osama bin Laden's family. Zarqawi's bloodthirsty assault on the Shiites, he says, "compels the Iranians to take countermeasures." If the letter is an Iranian forgery, which is one of the possibilities Cole suggests, it's a diabolically astute one.
Reading the Zawahiri letter, you sense that the field of battle is shifting. Al Qaeda is waging a political war for Muslim hearts and minds as it seeks to build a global caliphate. America shouldn't make the same mistake for which Zawahiri is upbraiding his Iraq commander -- fighting in the Iraq theater in ways that make it harder to win the larger war.
Everything good until the end, Ok so the next country we attack, he'll be saying the same thing, the only solution he implies is that we are in no muslim country to fight the bigger war..geez, maybe we should build floating military bases, hmmmm....
#1
He also mentions the Juan Cole theory that the memo is fake, possibly Iranian. Cole has not impressed me and he lets his political agenda impede whatever scholarly benefit he brings to the table, but has anybody seen Cole's point addressed.
Ignatius seems to imply we're losing hearts and minds in Iraq. We'll see. I think Iraqi and American expectations were unrealistic at the beginning, but as time passes and political steps are taken in Iraq along with a drawdown of our forces outside of Anbar Province it's hard to see how we're losing.
#2
Rarely in wartime is it possible to read over the shoulder of the enemy and discover his most intimate thoughts about the battle.
wtf does this guy think we pay all those guys at Ft. Meade to do all day? That's what we did to the Germans, the Japanese and the Ruskies. That's one reason why our casualties are low historically.
Is this real? is it fake from Tehran? Is it fake from Langley? Beats the heck out of me. Civilians will probably know for sure in 20-40 years.
And why would anybody bother wasting time addressing the points raised by a fifth columnist like Cole. That guy is a certifiable moonbat and deeper in the pockets of the islamofascists than Kofi Anan.
#3
Just checked Cole's blog. Turns out he retracted much of the linguistic criticism of the letter but still suspects that it is US psyops. After all, Al Queda in Iraq agrees. Ignatius should not have wasted his time quoting this guy. His idea of studying our enemy is shilling for them.
#4
It absolutely is psyops. Every press release in wartime is psyops, just as every MSM story is psyops. The questions are for which side? black or white?
#5
Confusing, is it not? Yet with this capture we have a significant advantage over telling the current status of the al-Qaeda leadership. If we exploit the opportunity by making some sort of psyops gesture to weaken his position significantly enough, we may be able to get al-Qaeda to send in a less-capable commander. Still, what are we going to do?
#6
Releasing it definitely was phyops regardless of where it came from and who wrote it. I suspect it's real, but don't really care because I think it weakens the enemy regardless.
A lawyer for Tariq Aziz has denied a British newspaper report that the former Iraqi deputy prime minister will testify against Saddam Hussein.
The lawyer, Badie Izzat Aref, said Mr Aziz would not give evidence against the former leader, whose trial is set to begin on Wednesday.
The Sunday Telegraph said Mr Aziz would testify in return for his freedom, quoting both US officials and Mr Aref.
Saddam Hussein's trial will be taking place in an undisclosed location.
The Sunday Telegraph said in return for his testimony the main charges against Mr Aziz would be dropped and he would be allowed to live quietly and work on his autobiography.
Mr Aziz has so far not been charged with any specific crimes. He has been held at a secret location since his surrender in April 2003.
A US official told the paper: "Things are very delicate and a plea bargain is never sealed until the witness takes the stand and delivers his side of the deal."
His lawyer, Mr Aref, said of the Telegraph report: "It's completely false, I have always said that Tariq Aziz never had any intention of testifying against Saddam."
He added: "What I told the British newspaper is that during a questioning session, Tariq Aziz was asked about who in Iraq took sovereign decisions like declaring war, suppressing a revolt or a civil mutiny.
"Tariq Aziz's answer was that sovereign and political decisions were in the hands of Saddam and he had nothing to do with them."
Five judges will open the proceedings against Saddam Hussein and seven associates accused of killing more than 100 civilians in the Shia Muslim village of Dujail in 1982.
It is not clear what other charges will be filed.
The start of the trial has been delayed several times, amid criticism of the tribunal's legitimacy and fears for the security of its judges.
Speaking on the BBC's Sunday AM programme, lawyer Abdul Haq al-Ani, who says he is authorised to speak on behalf of Saddam Hussein's defence team, said he had no evidence that any of the deposed leader's former colleagues would testify against him.
He said the trial had no jurisdiction as it had been set up by an occupying power which was not entitled to change the legal system of an occupied country.
"Saddam Hussein is entitled to a fair trial. This won't be a fair trial because it has been created to fit the offence," he said.
Yeah - we want trials that DON'T fit the offense.
Posted by: too true ||
10/16/2005 15:29 ||
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A propaganda cell leader for Al Qaeda in Iraq was captured in a raid on a suspected terrorist safe house in Karabilah last month, Multi-National Forces said in a statement issued Sunday.
Yasir Khudr Muhammad Jasim al-Karbali, also known as Abu Dijana, was apprehended in the September 25 raid, the military said.
He was the senior Al Qaeda in Iraq propaganda cell leader for Karabilah, Al Qaim and Husaybah, the statement said.
"Abu Dijana's cell consisted of photographers who used video and still photograph images to document insurgent attacks against Iraqi citizens and Iraqi and Coalition Forces," according to the statement.
"Local Al Qaeda in Iraq leaders notified Abu Dijana of impending attacks in the area, at which time he would contact his terrorist cell members and provide them with equipment and supplies needed to record the attacks."
Abu Dijana later collected the photographs and video and forwarded them to other Al Qaeda in Iraq propaganda officials for their use, the military said, and the images were made into terrorist propaganda products for distribution through print and Web sites.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/16/2005 14:31 ||
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#1
I thought you were going to say Michael Moore. Pity.
#3
"Abu Dijana's cell consisted of photographers who used video and still photograph images to document insurgent attacks against Iraqi citizens and Iraqi and Coalition Forces,"
BFD. How hard can it be to raid the AP office? They probably struck 59 minutes into happy hour.
#4
Spot=on, GC. Prolly sold shit, helping to finance as well as propagandize, to AP, Rooters, AFP, CNN, NYT, WaPo - the whole slew of biased MSM bastards. It might be fascinating to track any available records, but I would imagine at least a few would've been smart enough to pay cash and avoid the paper trail.
#5
but I would imagine at least a few would've been smart enough to pay cash and avoid the paper trail
That's ok. We can just arrest all the rest who weren't quite smart enough. Darwinism in the news biz, too. Perhaps the smart ones will figure out that that selling truth (as opposed to TRUTH) is a more successful way to go.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday that initial assessments indicate Iraqis had probably approved a controversial constitution, although the turnout alone showed the fragile new political process has taken hold despite a deadly insurgency.
"There's a belief that it has probably passed," Rice told reporters traveling with her, based on people in Iraq who are seeing preliminary vote tallies. At least 63 percent of Iraqis voted Saturday, she said, an increase of about 1 million voters over the first democratic election in January for a transitional government. Much of that increase, she said, comes from the higher participation of Iraq's minority Sunni Muslims.
The violence also was lower and produced fewer lethal attacks than in January's vote, she noted.
The constitution requires a simple majority to be approved, unless two-thirds of voters in three of Iraq's 18 provinces voted against it. Then the constitution would not pass and Iraqi leaders would be forced to draft a new document to be submitted to voters.
News services from Baghdad reported Sunday that early returns suggested large numbers of voters rejected the constitution in the Sunni strongholds of Anbar and Salahuddin provinces. But according to initial results, Sunni voters may not have been able to reach the two-thirds threshold in Diyala province east of Baghdad or in Nineveh province in the north, where Sunnis also have large representation.
Disputes over the constitution have been intense and threatened to deepen the religious and ethnic divide right up to the Saturday vote. But Rice said the turnout sends a strong signal to insurgents that the political process is "alive and well."
"What [the referendum] will certainly help to do is to broaden the base of the political process," she said, and diminish the influence of those supporting violence.
"Ultimately, insurgencies have to be defeated politically. You defeat them by sapping them of their political support, and increasingly Iraqis are throwing their support behind the political process, not behind the violence," she said on the last stop of her week-long tour of Central Asia, Afghanistan and Europe.
Rice denied that a rejection of the constitution would be a setback. "Iraqis had a process . . . that told them, 'write a constitution and then have a referendum,' " and they have done so, Rice said. "It's not a setback for the Iraqis if they exercise that right one way or another, it is a process that is alive and well."
Rice compared the outcome, either way, to the U.S. system of referendums. "That would be like saying in the United States if you put something up for a referendum and people don't vote for it, that's a setback for democracy. No, that is democracy," she said.
Vast numbers of Sunnis, who largely boycotted the January vote, have shown they are now "very concentrated" on December elections for a permanent government, the final step of the three-stage political transition outlined by the United States after the ouster of president Saddam Hussein in 2003, Rice added.
Sunnis particularly have an incentive to participate because many of the decisions on the most-sensitive issues of establishing a government have been put off until the next national assembly, part of a package of last-minute compromises that were made to ensure that Sunnis feel they are not being marginalized by the powerful Kurds and the majority Shiite community, she said.
Rice warned, however, that the violence will continue and noted that even a few insurgents can launch violent attacks in an attempt to sabotage the transition.
"I have no doubt that the terrorists are going to continue to try to derail the political process, but they've failed every time they've tried to derail it," Rice told reporters.
America's top diplomat praised Iraqi police and security forces who deserved "a lot of credit" for the peaceful voting day. Iraqi forces played the leading role around the polls, with the U.S.-led coalition backing them up, she said. Their performance is key, since the training and deployment of Iraqi forces is the pivotal step in bringing home U.S. and other foreign troops deployed in Iraq since March 2003.
On the violence in Iraq, Rice disclosed that the United States has send a demarche to Iran expressing concern about its role on supplying or facilitating access to materiel for the roadside explosive devices that have proven so deadly to U.S. troops. "We have had limited contacts with Iran when necessary," she said, although she provided no specifics except to say contacts were made "sparingly."
Appearing on Fox News today, Rice also acknowledged that the impending trial of Saddam Hussein, due to start this week, is likely to inflame passions in Iraq. A large part of the insurgency is fueled by Sunnis who are Hussein loyalists. But she said many Sunnis also suffered during Hussein's long and brutal rule. The trial will "bring back a lot of bad memories," she said.
Two SAS soldiers imprisoned by Iraqis last month had been spying on a senior police commander who was torturing prisoners with an electric drill, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.
The SAS detachment in Basra was trying to establish who was behind the reign of terror at the jail
The real story behind the soldiers' undercover operation emerged last week after the Government promised to pay compensation for any injury or damage caused during the rescue operation.
It is understood that the Special Air Service had been ordered to carry out surveillance operations against several members of the Iraqi police, who were believed to be responsible for torturing prisoners at the notorious Jamiyat prison in Basra.
Military sources said that the operation was ordered by senior officers after the body of an Iraqi, who had been arrested by the police for smuggling and gun-running, was found on the outskirts of the city in April. An examination of his body had revealed that an electric drill had been used to penetrate his skull, hands and legs.
Iraqi sources later gave information to the Army that suggested the torture had been carried out by a senior police officer, who is a member of one of the most powerful tribes in southern Iraq.
It had been previously reported that the SAS had been monitoring the activities of police officers thought to be members of the al Mehdi army, an insurgent organisation trying to force Britain to withdraw from southern Iraq. Sources within the Army now believe that hundreds of people who have been arrested by the Iraqi police might have been tortured at the prison, a two-storey complex that houses Basra police's major crimes unit and was once nicknamed Gestapo HQ by British officers.
British Government ministers are understood to be extremely concerned and embarrassed by the allegations of torture because it was the Army that helped to re-create the police force and reopened Jamiyat jail.
Brig John Lorimer, the officer who launched the raid to rescue the two SAS men who were taken prisoner, gave an indication of the problems at the jail when he described it in an interview with this newspaper as a "very nasty place".
The SAS detachment in Basra was given the task of trying to establish who was behind the reign of terror at the jail. They were also warned to tread carefully because the Iraqi police were meant to be allies of the coalition.
"The finger of suspicion started to point in the direction of a senior officer inside the Jamiyat," said a senior Army source. "We believe victims were strapped into a chair and then the torture would begin. We think it was more to do with inter-tribal warfare than clamping down on terrorist activity. This is a very corrupt society."
As part of the investigation, two SAS men were ordered to monitor the movements of the Iraqi police officer but the operation was compromised on September 19 when the SAS team became involved in a shoot-out with four plain-clothed police officers just as they were about to withdraw from the surveillance operation.
Fearing that they would be killed, one of the SAS men opened fired as they drove off.
The Iraqi men gave chase and a few hundred yards later the SAS soldiers dumped their car in the belief that they had a better chance on foot.
The SAS men contacted their headquarters and were moving towards an emergency rendezvous point when they were stopped by a uniformed Iraqi police unit that had driven into the area after hearing the shooting.
To try to avoid a shoot-out with the police, the SAS soldiers decided to surrender and each pulled out handkerchief-sized Union flags and began shouting, "British forces, British forces".
The SAS soldiers were arrested and taken to the jail where they were beaten and interrogated.
The source said that the soldiers concocted a cover story and never admitted to being members of the elite special forces unit.
He added that when the soldiers were eventually moved to another house, the mood of their captors changed and that although their hands remained bound together they were treated quite well before being freed in a rescue operation by their colleagues.
The two SAS men were flown back to Hereford, where the unit is based, and were debriefed by senior officers. It is understood that all SAS operations against Iraqi police have since been suspended.
Posted by: Oliver ||
10/16/2005 9:48 Comments ||
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#3
Gee,they might have been doing something really, really bad... like leading them around on dog leashes, naked, and putting panties on their heads.
Has anyone told Seymour Hersh and the NY Times about this?
#4
Hersch wouldn't touch this story - it might impede the war effort.
Posted by: anon again ||
10/16/2005 10:39 Comments ||
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#5
Thank you, Sgt. Mom. The unendurable and ghastly travesties of Abu Ghraib immediately sprang to mind. I remain confident that the moral relativists will somehow manage to shrug off this "bit" of vile nastiness as they continue to shriek about the horrors of war.
#6
I really hope this isn't true - the thought of the SAS being used to spy on some iffy Iraqi copper leaves a nasty taste in my mouth.
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
10/16/2005 12:10 Comments ||
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#7
Tough call Tony. It's not like Britain or the US has no responsibility for what the Iraqis are doing in their zones of control. If it is going on, this kind of torture is over the line and I don't know that we want to be responsible for setting up a regime that practices it, at least before we've left.
#8
The torture isn't about a bent copper. Rather, the torture is a tool with which to set up a Shia-ruled tribal enclave within conquered Iraq, under the unwitting protection of the oblivious, but well-intentioned, British Army. Ths SAS are the proper tool to fix that kind of problem. I most sincerely hope the High Command is not serious about discontinuing this effort, as that would mean the people of Basra would have been freed from Saddam Hussein's tyrannt only to be turned over to the tender mercies of Arab tribal/religious infighting -- which is certainly not what America spent troops and treasure to achieve.
#10
You're reading more into this than I see, but it is certainly not impossible, and if it is the case, and the Brits would seem to have implemented their colonial strategy of co-opting the most powerful tribe.
It may be that leaving them in charge of Basra was a mistake. And it's hard to imagine where else they could have been helpful, except possibly Kurdistan. Perhaps the Brits should have gone in there through Turkey.
LONDON - Two British soldiers captured briefly by Iraqis last month had beeen spying on a senior police commander who was allegedly torturing prisoners with an electric drill, a British newspaper reported on Sunday.
The Sunday Telegraph also gave a vivid account of how the elite pair were detained in the southern Iraqi city of Basra and their subsequent rescue by British forces, who raided a police station and then a nearby house.
The drama triggered a rift between the local authorities and the British army, which has been deployed in the region since the March 2003 invasion.
The newspaper said Britainâs Special Air Service (SAS) had been staking out several members of the Iraqi police, who were suspected of torturing prisoners at the notorious Jamiyat prison in Basra. The operation was ordered after the body of an Iraqi, who had been arrested by the police, was found on the outskirts of the city in April. An examination of the corpse showed that his skull, hands and legs had been penetrated with an electric drill, the Telegraph said. The army learnt, from Iraqi sources, that a senior police officer was behind the abuse.
Citing military sources, the weekly said hundreds of people arrested by the local police might have been tortured at the prison. The allegations are an embarrassment for the British government, which helped to establish the new Iraqi police force and re-opened the jail.
Describing the suspicions of torture, a senior army source told the newspaper: âWe believe victims were strapped into a chair and then the torture would begin. We think it was more to do with inter-tribal warfare than clamping down on terrorist activity. This is a very corrupt society.â
On September 19, the two SAS soldiers were just about to end a surveillance mission as part of the investigation when they became involved in a shoot-out with four plain-clothed police officers, the Telegraph revealed. One soldier opened fire as the pair drove off in a car. The Iraqis gave chase. The British soldiers decided to ditch their vehicle, thinking they had a better chance on foot.
They were en route to an emergency meeting point after having made contact with their base when a uniformed Iraqi police unit stopped them. The SAS soldiers decided to surrender to avoid a shoot-out and each pulled out small Union flags and began shouting, âBritish forces, British forcesâ.
They were arrested and taken to the jail where the they were allegedly beaten and interrogated before being moved to another house. At this point their captorsâ mood lightened and the men were treated well before being freed by the British rescue mission, the paper said.
The two men are back in Britain.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/16/2005 00:00 ||
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PALESTINIAN gunmen killed three Israelis in a drive-by shooting and Israeli troops shot dead a senior Palestinian militant in an eruption of violence in the occupied West Bank today.
The killings, a month after Israel completed a pullout from the Gaza Strip, tore at a flimsy ceasefire and raised fears of a resurgence in violence in the West Bank where Jewish settlements continue to grow on land Palestinians want for a state.
Hoped-for peacemaking momentum from the withdrawal has not transpired. A Middle East summit has been postponed. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will meet US President George W Bush this week to discuss how to resuscitate a "road map" peace plan.
Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed wing of Mr Abbas' Fatah faction, claimed responsibility for the shootings outside Gush Etzion settlement bloc and Eli settlement, the first of their kind in four months.
"This is taste of even more to come," al-Aqsa said in a statement, calling the attacks revenge for Israel's killing of militants.
Israeli officials said the army would reimpose some restrictions on Palestinian movement in the West Bank that had been lifted as part of rapprochement efforts in recent months.
A Defence Ministry source said troops would encircle major West Bank cities and require that Palestinians travel between them by public transportation only, rather than private cars.
"We will reconsider this measure if the Palestinian Authority cracks down on terrorists," the source said.
In the far north of the West Bank, Israeli troops shot dead an Islamic Jihad militant commander after he opened fire on them, Palestinian witnesses and Israeli military sources said. There were no Israeli casualties in the clash, south of Jenin.
Three Israelis were killed in the Gush Etzion attack and four were hurt, medics said. Minutes later, Palestinian gunmen fired on a road junction outside Eli, wounding two Israelis. The identities of the casualties were not immediately clear.
"A Palestinian passed by in a car, let off a burst of fire, and struck down people standing at the hitchhiking post," Shaul Goldstein, a settler leader in Gush Etzion, told Israel Radio.
Palestinian militants had vowed to avenge a series of Israeli army arrest raids that netted hundreds of their comrades in the West Bank since the Gaza pullout.
The ambushes could embarrass Mr Abbas just before his talks with Mr Bush at the White House on Thursday.
Mr Abbas has been under US and Israeli pressure to rein in and disarm militants as a condition for "road map" negotiations on Palestinian statehood.
Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian ||
10/16/2005 18:57 ||
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#1
Palestinian militants had vowed to avenge a series of Israeli army arrest raids that netted hundreds of their comrades in the West Bank since the Gaza pullout.
So Paleos "avenge" arrests by killing Jewish civilians? Seems to me the IDF would do well to kill every single terrorist that comes into their sights, no questions asked.
A number of Russian police officers have arrived in Gaza and the West Bank to train Palestinian police and security forces, the Palestinian Ministry of Interior said in a statement on Saturday.
But the ministry didn't say how many Russian officers arrived in the Palestinian territories and how long they would stay.
Russia has promised to assist the Palestinian security apparatuses in training and donate 55 armored vehicles and light weapons to the Palestinian security forces.
By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service
For the first time since the start of the intifada, more Palestinians have been killed in internal violence since the start of the year than those who have died in clashes with Israel, according to an official report published Thursday.
In the report, the Palestinian Authority's Interior Ministry cited 219 deaths as a result of inner-Palestinian violence compared to 218 deaths at the hands of Israeli security forces over the course of the first nine months of this year. The statistics reflect the relative calm in the territories vis-a-vis Israel as well as the increasing anarchy in PA-controlled areas.
The ministry, which oversees the PA's security services, argued that the data speaks to the dangers inherent in the deteriorating security situation within the PA. It called on all the factions within the PA to support efforts in enforcing the law.
The PA added that the security services are trying to cope with two main challenges in establishing law and order - crime and domestic violence within families, and the activities of armed groups and factions in the territories.
PA police in Tul Karm permitted to carry arms
Israel has agreed to allow Palestinian Authority civilian policemen in the West Bank town of Tul Karm to carry arms as part of the PA's efforts to rein in the growing anarchy in the territories.
PA civilian police have been authorized to carry weapons in all West Bank towns except for Tul Karm. The ban, which has been in place for months due to recent suicide bombings which were carried out by Palestinians who lived in and operated from Tul Karm, was lifted two weeks ago.
#1
Hey, they've got to hone their murderous skilz somehow. If there aren't any Jews available, their own folk will have to do. When do we get to the part about them eating their young?
Which makes it even more important to trace the terror networks and actually put / keep people in jail for terror acts.
Indonesian forensic experts fear terrorists have developed a bomb that does not leave a trace.
Police working with Australian, Japanese and British experts to piece together the methods used for the October 1 bombings in Bali believe that Malaysian terrorist Azahari bin Husin may have used ingredients that are impossible to detect after detonation, the Indonesian investigative magazine Tempo reports.
Few details are known about the analysis being conducted at police headquarters in Jakarta to establish what was used in the attack that killed 23 people, including four Australians.
But there is speculation hydrogen peroxide, hydrogen chloride and triacetone triperoxide (TATP) was mixed with citric acid, a catalyst, for the explosion. TATP has been used by suicide bombers in Israel.
Investigators of the London bombings reportedly told Indonesian police such a combination would leave only traces that were already in the atmosphere: carbon monoxide and water.
#1
Only one cure for this, the deadly GPS guided 2000 lb. ice bomb.
Posted by: Oliver ||
10/16/2005 9:51 Comments ||
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#2
Sounds to me like complete combusion - like in the laboratory - might not leave any residue, but I suspect real explosions are seldom "textbook".
Posted by: Bobby ||
10/16/2005 10:52 Comments ||
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#3
Sounds like sorcery to me. A sure test for a bomb would be destroyed scenery and scattered body parts. And if the chemical signature of the bomb can't be found, then we know it is of the "other" type, and can move on to finding the perpetrators, no?
SUSPECTED Muslim militants killed a Buddhist monk and two teenage boys and set fire to a temple in Thailand's restive south, police said today.
The militants who attacked the Buddhist temple in the southern Pattani province late yesterday had slit the 76-year-old monk's throat, said a police report obtained by Reuters.
The charred bodies of the two teenagers were found in the temple, said the report, which did not give details.
A Buddhist farmer was beheaded on Friday, the second decapitation since the Islamic holy month of Ramadan began and the 12th in 21 months of unrest in the region that has claimed more than 900 lives.
Although the government has sent 30,000 soldiers and police to the region, where 80 per cent of people are Muslim, ethnic Malays, the insurgency appears to be growing.
Booby traps, decoy attacks and ambushes of army and police convoys have become daily occurrences in the densely wooded region, suggesting the anti-Bangkok guerrillas are becoming more sophisticated and inventive.
Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian ||
10/16/2005 00:37 ||
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#1
Reported online on the Daily Telegraph (Australian paper) with all references to Islam or Muslim deleted.
#2
Buddhism arose in the Indian subcontinent but its followers, pacifist as they were, could not resist the onslaught of the muslim armies invading from the west. Millions were killed and enslaved, the great libraries destroyed, temples coated with naptha and burned. Having almost eradicating the religion from the land of its birth, the jihadists seek further conquests.
Posted by: john ||
10/16/2005 10:46 Comments ||
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#3
fight back Thailand...Get the M16's out and drive the fuckers into the sea...
Posted by: Wayne Bin Rooney ||
10/16/2005 11:55 Comments ||
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#4
When another religious sect views Buddhists as a threat, that ought to set off some pretty clangorous alarms. So, does it?
[John Belushi] - But noooooooooooooooooooooo! [/JB]
This world must awaken itself to the hideous prospect of Global Cultural Genocide that awaits those who downplay the threat of Islamist terrorism.
#5
I agree Zenster, but I think that the payback for Islam will not be pleasant. There are too many people now who aware of what ROPMA means and frankly, they don't like it.
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
10/16/2005 13:23 Comments ||
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#6
Also, I saw a photo on Cellar IOTD, and it wiped off any smile I had on my face from the swimming piglets of the day before....
(I can't include an img tag, I keep getting redirected to roadsideamerica.com if I do...weird)
It's called a monkmobile, and it's to protect the monks from the ROP.
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
10/16/2005 13:31 Comments ||
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#7
I once asked a secular Moslem why so many Buddhists were murdered by Jihadis. Believe it or not he first blamed Israel but then I asked how about the Buddhists murdered in the 8th, 9th, etc. centuriers.
Then he blamed the Christian missionaries for inciting the Buddhists to make anti Islamic remarks.
#9
Payback is slowly coming to the muslims.. The Balinese are growing very impatient with them, Russians are rounding them up & i was reading an article the other day about a group of Russian skin-heads beating up a group of muslims with iron bars while they were shouting "Russia for Russians" & "there is no room for Muslims in Russia". Paybacks a bitch
Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian ||
10/16/2005 21:29 Comments ||
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WASHINGTON - A series of clashes in the past year between U.S. and Syrian troops, including a prolonged firefight this summer that killed several Syrians, has raised questions of what to do with the bodies the prospect that cross-border military operations may become a new front in the Iraq war, according to current and former military and government officials.
The firefight, between Army Rangers and Syrian troops along the border with Iraq, was the most serious of the conflicts with President Bashar al-Assad's forces, according to U.S. and Syrian officials.
It illustrated the dangers facing U.S. troops as Washington tries to apply more political and military pressure on a country that President Bush last week labeled one of the "allies of convenience" with extremists.
One of Bush's most senior aides, who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the subject, said that so far U.S. military forces in Iraq had moved right up to the border to cut off the entry of insurgents, but he insisted that they had refrained from going over it.
But other officials, who say they got their information in the field or by talking to Special Operations commanders, say that as U.S. efforts to cut off the flow of fighters have intensified, those operations have spilled over the border â sometimes by accident, sometimes by design.
Some current and former officials add that the U.S. military is considering plans to conduct special operations inside Syria, using small covert teams for intelligence gathering.
The broadening military effort along the Iraqi-Syrian border has intensified as the Iraqi constitutional referendum scheduled for today approaches, and as frustration mounts in the Bush administration and among senior U.S. commanders over their inability to prevent foreign radical Islamists from engaging in suicide bombings and other deadly terrorist acts inside Iraq.
Increasingly, officials say, Syria is to the Iraq war what Cambodia was during the Vietnam War: a sanctuary for fighters, money and supplies to flow over the border and, ultimately, a place for a shadow struggle. Quagmire!!!
In the summer firefight, several Syrian troops were killed, leading to a protest from the Syrian government to the U.S. Embassy in Damascus, according to U.S. and Syrian officials.
A military official who spoke with some of the Rangers who took part in the incident said they had described it as an intense firefight, although it could not be learned whether there had been any U.S. casualties, nor could the exact location of the clash be learned.
In a meeting at the White House on Oct. 1, senior aides to Bush considered a variety of options for further actions against Syria, apparently including tactical nuclear weapons special operations along with other methods for putting pressure on al-Assad in coming weeks.
U.S. officials say Bush has not yet signed off on a specific strategy and has no current plan to try to oust Assad, in part for fear of who might take over. The United States is not planning large-scale military operations inside Syria, but a whole lot of small scale ones are in the hopper as we speak.I certainly hope that's not true with the number of planners in the Pentagon. and the president has not authorized any covert action programs to topple the Assad government, several officials said.I certainly hope that is true since there's been so little progress in that direction.
"There is no finding on Syria," said one senior official, using the term for presidential approval of a covert action program. But we're drafting it now
"We've got our hands full in the neighborhood," added a senior official.
#1
Only the NYT would describe a firefight between US Army Rangers and Syrian troops as "illustrating the dangers facing US troops." What, they're in danger of running out of targets? The A-10's are chopping the Syrians up so fine that the Rangers have to strain the remains for intel?
Posted by: Matt ||
10/16/2005 12:34 Comments ||
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#2
Lol, Matt! Graphic but accurate. I like it, heh.
#3
Increasingly, officials say, Syria is to the Iraq war what Cambodia was during the Vietnam War: a sanctuary for fighters, money and supplies to flow over the border and, ultimately, a place for a shadow struggle. Quagmire!!!
Actually more like chasing the Apache into Mexico. At a certain point the diplomatic crap was dropped and pursuit columns were sent across the border. As more pressure was put on raiders they eventually choose to stay home and turned on their hosts. Notice how the New Mexico Territory turned out?
#4
I can remember spending Labor Day on my swift camel in Syria as the President denied we had crossed the border. The event is seared -- seared, I tell you -- into my memory.
#7
Just like WorldCom's Bernard Ebbers & Enron's Andrew Fastow, Pinchy faces long Prison stretch.
In a stunning developement, New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has indicted the owner of the NYT for continuing to defraud investors and advertisers with false circulation figures.
#11
NIXON was right to send in US-SVN troops into Cambodia, as afterwards the level of Commie supplies into SVN dropped dramatically.As for SYRIA, its to Syria's and Assad's advantage to work with Dubya and the USA, as its the ambitions of Iran's Mullahs to spread fundamentalist and Shia rule over the ME, includ but limited to Syria. Iff news reports of IRGC taking control of Hezbollah and Hamas are true, the IRGC isn't going to stop at controlling only the militias. Ditto for China vs Taiwan - iff Beijing wilfully recognizes Taiwan's independence, the USA will work to stop Taiwan from any attempt to overthrow the CPC.
Yup. But go ahead, Europe ... keep on cultivating Putin to offset the US. Bow to the mullahs, too ... it might work long enough to let you retire on your fat state pensions if you can allow enough immigrants in to keep the economy going.
Former members of the Russian military have been secretly helping Iran to acquire technology needed to produce missiles capable of striking European capitals.
The Russians are acting as go-betweens with North Korea as part of a multi-million pound deal they negotiated between Teheran and Pyongyang in 2003. It has enabled Teheran to receive regular clandestine shipments of top secret missile technology, believed to be channelled through Russia.
Western intelligence officials believe that the technology will enable Iran to complete development of a missile with a range of 2,200 miles, capable of hitting much of Europe. It is designed to carry a 1.2-ton payload, sufficient for a basic nuclear device.
The revelation raises the stakes in the confrontation between Iran's Islamic regime and the West - led by the United States and European countries including Britain. Okay, I'll buy Britain - but the rest of Europe? Give me a break.
Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, clashed with Russian officials over Iran's nuclear programme during a visit to Moscow yesterday, saying that Teheran must fulfil its obligations under the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty.
She was later expected to urge President Vladimir Putin to back a referral of Iran to the United Nations Security Council.
A senior American official said Iran's programme was "sophisticated and getting larger and more accurate. They have had very much in mind the payload needed to carry a nuclear weapon.
"I think Putin knows what the Iranians are doing."
Iran is believed to be hiding its weapons development behind its nuclear power programme, for which it receives Russian support, and has refused to suspend uranium enrichment or to allow full UN inspections.
John Bolton, the US ambassador to the UN, told BBC2's Newsnight that Iran was "determined to get nuclear weapons deliverable on ballistic missiles it can then use to intimidate not only its own region but possibly to supply to terrorists".
Iran's longest-range missile is the Shahab 3, which, with an 800-mile range, could hit Israel. The North Korean deal will allow the Iranian missile to reach targets far into Europe - including Rome, Berlin, and much of France.
North Korea has developed a missile, the Taepo Dong 2, that could reach America's west coast, based on the submarine-launched Soviet SSN6. Modifications allow it to be fired from a land-based transporter and this technology is being smuggled to Teheran with Russian help.
Russians have provided production facilities, diagrams and operating instruction so the missile can be built in Iran. Liquid propellant has been shipped to Iran. Russian specialists have also been sent to Iran to help development of its Shahab 5 missile project, which the Iranians hope to have operational by the end of the decade.
The answer is anti-ballistic missile defense. And if the continent doesn't want to play, fine. I'd rather we not lose Europe to the Islamacists but it really isn't in our power to keep them as part of the West if they choose otherwise.
Posted by: too true ||
10/16/2005 07:53 ||
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#1
Europe just seems to be determinded to dig its own grave.
#3
Putin has lots of problems, including lack of control over these former military members. Aren't these the same guys that fled Baghdad for the Syrian border only to cause an international incident when the military fired upon them? They also know what happened to the WMD's....Putin wants respect and is in a good position with lots of natural gas and other resources. Perhaps ex-KGB Putin should be cultivated to root out those who are only undermining his credibility. After all, the Russians can take out what they helped install, and they alone have access!
Puttyputz, and those behind him, are the problem. I am truly fed up with excuses for what has transpired in Russia when compared with what could be. He's still 100% pure KGB asshole. No ifs, no buts, no BS about it.
#6
Lol, Ship you're a realcynic - as in realpolitik. The fucking Russians are not very bright, not very imaginative - unable to "see" what has poassed from local living memory, despite external examples - not very worthy. I had great hopes for US-Russian cooperation back in the day. No more. They're self-phucked.
#7
The fucking Russians are not very bright, not very imaginative - unable to "see" what has poassed from local living memory, despite external examples - not very worthy.
LOL, pd. Sums things up perfectly. Reminds me of how back in the Cold War, we were going to lose 'cause the Russkies all played chess and had math olympiads and we didn't. It makes you wonder how dumb the pundits and analysts are that they never grasped the reality.
#8
Sigh, if only I hadn't mispelled "passed", lol!
Indeed, I recall the same analyses - we were doomed. Between the fact that every Sov you ever heard of had a PhD or six (from Ideology U?), they would win by numbers at the Fulda Gap - not technology - though they were so "superior", and that there was a looming Mine Shaft Gap, lol, it was all over 'cept for the Fat Lady...
#9
Re: Russia and stupidity - the smart ones emigrated here, like my ancestors, and to Australia. Okay, some emigrated to Canada, it's true, but in the western provinces where moonbats are less welcome.
Same reason Scotland, once renowned for their warriors, is now populated by anti-nuke far lefters.
#10
I think that there may be another perspective here. The Russians might just think that they can play an advanced version of the Cold War surrogates battle. They might be figuring that they can control their proxies (aka Mad Mullahs) the way they did with the North Vietnamese, Castro, etc.
Why might they think this? Perhaps because they see us as wimps that won't crack down hard, whereas they have no inhibitions at all. MMs start getting uppity and they get whacked.
#11
lotp, that can be extended to other countries. Germany sent those who were fed up with being sent around the continent as mercenaries. So they kept the warriors and we got the peaceniks of the 18th and 19th centuries who turned out to be the better warriors when properly motivated (or threatened by resubjugation) in the 20th. Bottom line, whoever came had to struggle, have a dream, optomism and a willingness to change and adapt to new and strange circumstances. The winners in the old country stuck there because they had no initiative, no imagination, no conception that they could be better off. And they aren't. They're the losers now.
#12
RasPutin's hard-currency shell game with Iran needs to be tagged for what it is. This sort of blindly mercenary meddling in an already unstable region needs to come with a much heftier price tag attached to it. Russia's inability to connect the Beslan atrocity with its continued abetting of terrorist states like Iran takes cognitive dissonance to new heights. The emerging Trans-Caucasus Caliphate should serve Putin glaring notice of his abject failure in attending to Russia's actual security interests. Russia's downhill slide back into a degenerate authoritarian state is a fitting reward for their shortsightedness. Unfortunately, their hamfisted manipulating bodes rather ill for the security interests of most other nations.
#13
Folks, this shit only moves the "red line" up a bit faster.
Given that Condi paid an unproductive visit to Putty & Co. last Friday, and got no where, we are simply checking off all the boxes.
Posted by: Captain America ||
10/16/2005 12:08 Comments ||
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#14
I think Russia sees Uncle Sam as enemy number one and is arming anyone who looks like he might take the US on, seriously wounding the US while perhaps being destroyed by the US, leaving one less problem for Russia. I suspect Russia would love it if the Iranians nuked us and we annihilated Iran in return. Ditto with China. I'm not sure which they prefer more, because while China is the bigger military threat, Iran is a major problem because it shares a religion with a major proportion (20% and growing, because of higher birth rates) of the Russian Federation.
#18
I'm beginning to think there must be this secret reservoir of perfect people. Kept secret from me, anyway. I thought everyone with honor did what they could and perfection was mythical, though approached at times.
Posts like this make me wonder about that - a humbling thought, indeed.
But then it passes and I realize the poster probably hasn't a fucking clue what the role of a cabinet officer is - or just enjoys taking a gutless potshot at the underling who must deal with the assignment, no matter how hopeless it may be.
#23
I know is is now a hackneyed expression, but I knida miss the relative clarity of the cold war. They held their mutts, mopes and moonbats in check by fear and muscle, we sorta coalesced the less crazy elements of the West and a few sane independents together using standard of living and actual reason about how the world works. Both sides were convinced the other would pull the trigger (for differing reasons) and a sense of limited conflict without the doomsday ending was accepted. Now with the leash off our side disintegrates into shortsighted self-interest and their side minus the ChiComs (or whatever fascist, kleptocratic, oligarchy-variant they actually are)grows more self-destructive. Ruled by pious maniacs and really ignorant, racist, intolerant people, the moon-worshippers are running the world headlong into disaster, and the Russians try and buy back some chips in the hegemon game while the Chinese, the real enemy, look to mop up after the implosion in 2012 or so.......
jeez, i wish all i had to worry about was the Fulda Gap fighting positions or the airhead at Osan Airbase!
Posted by: Just About Enough! ||
10/16/2005 17:07 Comments ||
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#24
Point taken. My comments were made between my last cup o joe and my first and beer. Always a shaky time. Hence the qualifier at the end. Iâll apologize in advance if my next comments sound equally clueless. But here goes. Condolezza rice is an intelligent and gifted woman but in my opinion her performance, thus far, has been sub par. The President elevated her position to the United Statesâ top diplomatic position as Secretary of State. Who am I to question? Hell, itâs hard to imagine she could be less effective then her predecessor. Granted that position doesnât make policy, but dammit, they have to sell it. The one area I thought she would excel at is US â Russia relations. After all, I thought that was her area of expertise. And it seems with both the Iran and Syria issues looming, we can ill afford to maintain the status quo. By hook or crook, the US must effectively engage the Russians to resolve the immediate situations. Not looking for perfection hereâ¦but show me some results.
#25
Pappy, my comments about Ritter were not about his guilt or innocence. My point was if your going to accuse somebody of something as serious as being a sex offender you should have the balls to attatch your name to your accusations.
The Ritter saga is loaded with "condition of anonymity".
#26
I see your position, but I don't agree. Knowing an adversary is no guarantee of anything - save understanding why they do what they do, which does not always reveal the negotiating path to take - sometimes there isn't one. So, IMHO, the real point is it takes two to tango. Puttyputz is a pluperfect mercenary asshole. No progress is possible without either incentive or threat - and perhaps not even then. I don't think you want to try to "buy" Puttyputz - that is a bottomless / endless black hole. It seems to appeal to our legislative wizards. Hell, it's not their money, so... On the other hand, do you think we can threaten him persuasively / effectively? I don't.
It's a hard world and he's a bona-fide KGB whore... I'm just sayin...
Personally, I've reached an apocalyptic position - which I am loath to lay out, lol. So many mixed feelings, which I make a point of NOT mistaking for thinking - per Twain's clear warning, regardless of the cold hard logic that indicates certain actions make sense. Very very few people are willing to tolerate them - yet.
I guess there's a sick calculus underpinning most people's view of politics and crises. In the current situation, it's clear that the dead Americans count isn't sufficient for the civilized folks to get over themselves. Ain't that a kick in the head?
Two bomb blasts have hit a shopping centre near Iran's border with Iraq, killing four people, state TV reports. Up to 90 people were injured in the explosions in Ahwaz, capital of Khuzestan province in western Iran. The attacks, a few minutes apart, took place near an area attacked by several bombs in June.
Ahwaz, which is close to the Iraq border, was the focus of unrest between Arabs and Persians in April, when several people were reportedly killed.
Bombings have been rare in Iran since the war with Iraq ended in 1988. Saturday's blasts occurred shortly before dusk as shoppers crowded to buy food for the evening meal that breaks the daily fast during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The bombs were planted in rubbish bins, said an interior ministry spokesman. "They have killed two people and left 41 injured," Jahanbakhsh Khanjani said. The BBC's Frances Harrison in Tehran said no one has claimed responsibility for the bombs, which were homemade devices.
Ahwaz is the capital of the oil-rich province of Khuzestan, situated close to the border with Iraq and dominated by ethnic Arabs. Six bombs exploded in June in Ahwaz, killing at least 10 people, days before the presidential election.
A senior official said Americans were behind those attacks and also suggested that Britain might be involved - but he gave no evidence to support his claims.
April's trouble started after a letter circulated on the internet suggested that non-Arabs were being-relocated to the city to dilute its ethnic Arab population.
Six suspected al Qaeda members were killed Saturday and two arrested by Pakistani troops who had attempted to stop their vehicle at a check post in South Wazirstan, a tribal area of Pakistan, intelligence officials told CNN. The men killed were from central Asian countries, officials said, and one of those arrested was from Pakistan, while the other was also from central Asia. When the soldiers attempted to stop a suspicious vehicle at the Ladakh check point, the group exchanged fire with troops, officials said. Weapons were recovered from the vehicle the men were riding in.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/16/2005 14:39 ||
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ISLAMIC militants suspected to be linked to al-Qaeda stormed a house and cut the throats of two people in eastern Algeria in the latest attack since voters approved an amnesty for rebels, newspapers reported today.
The newspapers said rebels also kidnapped three people in the region. Authorities were not available for comment.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/16/2005 14:37 ||
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The army was slow to respond, and international aid agencies are in some ways just getting started. But here amid the rubble and the rain at the heart of Pakistan's earthquake zone, the zealous foot soldiers of Jamaat ul-Dawa, one of the country's most prominent Islamic extremist groups, are very much in evidence.
On a sloping muddy field near the rushing Neelum River, the group has established a large field hospital complete with X-ray equipment, dental department, makeshift operating theater, and even a tent for visiting journalists. Dispensaries are piled high with donated stocks of antibiotics, painkillers and other medical supplies.
"Even the army people have come over here to get first aid," said Mohammed Ayub, a long-bearded urologist from Lahore who is volunteering at the field hospital. "The casualties and destruction are so much that they are unable to cope."
Jamaat ul-Dawa is no ordinary charity. Founded in 1989 under a different name, it is the parent organization of Lashkar-i-Taiba, one of the largest and best-trained groups fighting Indian forces in the disputed Himalayan province of Kashmir. Lashkar-i-Taiba has been linked by U.S. authorities to al Qaeda and in 2002 was banned by Pakistan's government as a terrorist organization.
Jamaat ul-Dawa is one of several hard-line Islamic groups that have assumed a prominent role in relief operations following the devastating Oct. 8 earthquake in Pakistani-controlled Kashmir and adjacent areas.
Other groups with a visible presence on Saturday in Muzaffarabad, the largest town in the area, were the charitable wing of Jamiat-i-Islami, an Islamic political party with ideological links to the Palestinian militant group Hamas; and the Al-Rasheed Trust, a Karachi-based charity whose U.S. assets were frozen by the Bush administration in 2003 on grounds that it channeled funds to al Qaeda. The group has denied the charge and says it is focused purely on social welfare.
The groups' effective and visible relief work, analysts say, has bolstered their prestige, possibly at the expense of Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, and the army, whose initial response was widely criticized as slow and disorganized.
"Definitely they will gain," Ershad Mahmud, an analyst on Kashmir at the Institute for Policy Studies in Islamabad, said of Jamaat ul-Dawa. "They have diverted their whole network toward the relief operation."
Pakistani officials say the army has performed admirably given its own devastating losses in the quake, which killed about 450 soldiers. But in an interview Saturday, Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao acknowledged the vital role of Jamaat ul-Dawa and other such groups, calling them "the lifeline of our rescue and relief work."
Jamaat ul-Dawa, he added, "is only involved in extensive charity work, and their footprint now covers almost the entire quake-affected zone in the country." Pakistan placed Jamaat ul-Dawa on its "terrorism watch list" in late 2003.
"Even the army people have come over here to get first aid," said Mohammed Ayub, a long-bearded urologist from Lahore who is volunteering at the field hospital. "The casualties and destruction are so much that they are unable to cope."
Jamaat ul-Dawa is no ordinary charity. Founded in 1989 under a different name, it is the parent organization of Lashkar-i-Taiba, one of the largest and best-trained groups fighting Indian forces in the disputed Himalayan province of Kashmir. Lashkar-i-Taiba has been linked by U.S. authorities to al Qaeda and in 2002 was banned by Pakistan's government as a terrorist organization.
Jamaat ul-Dawa is one of several hard-line Islamic groups that have assumed a prominent role in relief operations following the devastating Oct. 8 earthquake in Pakistani-controlled Kashmir and adjacent areas.
Other groups with a visible presence on Saturday in Muzaffarabad, the largest town in the area, were the charitable wing of Jamiat-i-Islami, an Islamic political party with ideological links to the Palestinian militant group Hamas; and the Al-Rasheed Trust, a Karachi-based charity whose U.S. assets were frozen by the Bush administration in 2003 on grounds that it channeled funds to al Qaeda. The group has denied the charge and says it is focused purely on social welfare.
The groups' effective and visible relief work, analysts say, has bolstered their prestige, possibly at the expense of Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, and the army, whose initial response was widely criticized as slow and disorganized.
"Definitely they will gain," Ershad Mahmud, an analyst on Kashmir at the Institute for Policy Studies in Islamabad, said of Jamaat ul-Dawa. "They have diverted their whole network toward the relief operation."
Pakistani officials say the army has performed admirably given its own devastating losses in the quake, which killed about 450 soldiers. But in an interview Saturday, Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao acknowledged the vital role of Jamaat ul-Dawa and other such groups, calling them "the lifeline of our rescue and relief work."
Jamaat ul-Dawa, he added, "is only involved in extensive charity work, and their footprint now covers almost the entire quake-affected zone in the country." Pakistan placed Jamaat ul-Dawa on its "terrorism watch list" in late 2003.
The government on Saturday raised its estimate of the death toll from the quake to 38,000, with 62,000 injured. The worst damage was in the part of Kashmir controlled by Pakistan; about 1,400 are thought to have died on the Indian side of the province.
With a chilly rain falling on much of the earthquake zone and early snows dusting nearby mountaintops, aid officials voiced growing concern about the welfare of an estimated 2 million people made homeless by the quake. Already there are signs of disease, with 80 cases of diarrhea reported Saturday in the heavily damaged town of Balakot, up tenfold from the day before. Relief officials estimate that 600,000 toilets will be needed to provide adequate sanitation for survivors.
The Jamaat ul-Dawa camp is one of the most visible relief operations in Muzaffarabad, a city of about 70,000 that was largely destroyed by the earthquake and is roughly 50 miles northeast of Islamabad. Situated on the edge of town, the camp is marked with a large hand-painted banner and consists of about 35 canvas tents -- many bearing the name of Jamaat ul-Dawa -- housing medical facilities and more than 100 patients. U.S. helicopters, carrying supplies and the injured, regularly fly over the area.
Equipment and medicine for the camp were salvaged from the group's wrecked hospital in Muzaffarabad and supplemented with donations from across the country, camp officials said.
Besides volunteer doctors and other medical staff, personnel at the camp Saturday included about 20 bearded young men, some wearing camouflage jackets and white headbands emblazoned with the group's name. Ammar Ahmad, an engineering student from Lahore who is volunteering at the camp, said the men were on hand as protection "against ruffians" and were armed with 9mm pistols.
Qazi Kashif, who edits Jamaat ul-Dawa's national magazine and was visiting the camp Saturday, said that the organization no longer had any connection to Lashkar-i-Taiba and that the insurgent group now operates purely on the Indian side of Kashmir. Jamaat ul-Dawa, he said, is "for preaching and public welfare."
But he added, in reference to the Kashmir insurgency, "We are in favor of jihad, no doubt."
Lashkar-i-Taiba operated for years with the blessing of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Agency, which provided the group with arms and training and helped launch its fighters across the cease-fire line separating Pakistani and Indian forces in Kashmir. It was founded by Hafiz Sayeed, a former Punjab University engineering professor who also started Jamaat ul-Dawa. The two groups shared the same headquarters in the town of Muridke near Lahore.
During the height of the insurgency in the 1990s, Lashkar-i-Taiba fighters assembled openly in Muzaffarabad and nearby training camps. In early 2002, under intense pressure from the United States, Musharraf banned the group and froze its assets. Sayeed was subsequently arrested, although a Pakistani court later ordered his release.
The State Department, in its annual terrorism report, asserts that a top al Qaeda lieutenant was captured at a Lashkar-i-Taiba safe house in March 2002. That'd be Abu Zubaydah, for those keeping score ...
Notwithstanding recent progress in peace negotiations with Pakistan, Indian officials have questioned the sincerity of Musharraf's ban and said that Pakistan has yet to dismantle the infrastructure used by insurgent groups on its territory.
Some Pakistani officials seemed to acknowledge as much in the days after the quake. Sikander Hayat Khan, the senior elected official in Pakistani Kashmir, told the private Geo television network that "jihadi organizations had to face massive destruction" near the town of Bagh because of the quake.
And a senior police official from Pakistani Kashmir said that Lashkar-i-Taiba and another prominent separatist group, Hizb-ul-Mujaheddin, "have lost significant assets both in men and material." The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.
At the Jamaat ul-Dawa field hospital Saturday, Abdul Majid said he did not know whether the group was involved in violence, nor did he care. A 35-year-old construction worker, he was lying in a leaky tent with a broken leg and back injuries from the earthquake, which killed two of his children, ages 2 and 4.
"Every 10 minutes a doctor or medical attendant comes in to check on me," he said from beneath a heap of blankets. "I have a very high opinion about this organization."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/16/2005 14:28 ||
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Two hardcore militant outfits Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) and Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) have suffered major losses in the October 8 killer earthquake in terror camps in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir but militancy has continued in Jammu and Kashmir with the Army today saying it has killed 29 militants in the last one week.
Militant groups like HM have suffered "maximum losses" followed by LeT in camps in areas like Rawalakot in PoK, Director General of Military Operation (DGMO) Lt. Gen. Madan Gopal said. Asked if anti-militancy operations of the security forces have suffered because of the quake, he said the forces have been carrying out a "happy balance" of relief operations and, at the same time, not letting their guard down in operations against militants.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
10/16/2005 14:27 ||
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Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels shot dead a policeman and a soldier in fresh violence in Sri Lanka amid renewed attempts by Norway to revive peace talks, officials and the defence ministry said today. Gunmen opened fire on two constables in the northern peninsula of Jaffna last night and one of them succumbed to his injuries, a government military official in Jaffna said. In another incident, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels lobbed a grenade and opened fire at a boat-landing point in the east of the island late Thursday killing a soldier, the defence ministry said in a statement. There was no immediate word from the Tigers about the military allegations.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/16/2005 00:09 ||
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WANA, Pakistan - Pakistani paramilitary troops on Saturday killed six suspected terrorists militants and arrested two after a shootout at a checkpoint in a remote tribal area near the Afghan border, officials said. âSecurity forces have killed six Laplanders foreign terrorists militants and arrested another Samoan foreigner and a Pakistani after they refused to surrender at Laddah fort check-post,â a security official who requested anonymity told AFP.
The terrorists militants were travelling in a pickup truck from which weapons including rocket launchers and hand grenades were also seized, he said. âThey seem to be Uzbeks as they have Central Asian features,â the official said when asked about the nationality of the terrorists militants.
Posted by: Steve White ||
10/16/2005 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.
Two outlaw leaders were killed in "crossfire" during shootouts between the police and Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) in Pabna and Jhenidah early yesterday.
Two bomb blasts have hit a shopping centre near Iran's border with Iraq, killing four people, state TV reports. Up to 90 people were injured in the explosions in Ahwaz, capital of Khuzestan province in western Iran. The attacks, a few minutes apart, took place near an area attacked by several bombs in June. 
Six suspected al Qaeda members were killed Saturday and two arrested by Pakistani troops who had attempted to stop their vehicle at a check post in South Wazirstan, a tribal area of Pakistan, intelligence officials told CNN. The men killed were from central Asian countries, officials said, and one of those arrested was from Pakistan, while the other was also from central Asia. When the soldiers attempted to stop a suspicious vehicle at the Ladakh check point, the group exchanged fire with troops, officials said. Weapons were recovered from the vehicle the men were riding in.
Two hardcore militant outfits Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) and Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) have suffered major losses in the October 8 killer earthquake in terror camps in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir but militancy has continued in Jammu and Kashmir with the Army today saying it has killed 29 militants in the last one week. 
Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels shot dead a policeman and a soldier in fresh violence in Sri Lanka amid renewed attempts by Norway to revive peace talks, officials and the defence ministry said today. Gunmen opened fire on two constables in the northern peninsula of Jaffna last night and one of them succumbed to his injuries, a government military official in Jaffna said. In another incident, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels lobbed a grenade and opened fire at a boat-landing point in the east of the island late Thursday killing a soldier, the defence ministry said in a statement. There was no immediate word from the Tigers about the military allegations.
WANA, Pakistan - Pakistani paramilitary troops on Saturday killed six suspected 
