The United States has warned of an Al Qaida attack on Western oil employees in the Gulf. The State Department has alerted Americans of the prospect of a range of attacks in the Middle East and Gulf region. Officials said Al Qaida could be targeting Westerners who work in the defense and oil sectors of Gulf Cooperation Council states, particularly Saudi Arabia. "The department is concerned that extremists may be planning to carry out attacks against Westerners and oil workers in the Gulf region," the department said in a March 14 statement. "Armed attacks targeting foreign nationals in Saudi Arabia that resulted in many deaths and injuries, including U.S. citizens, appear to have been preceded by extensive surveillance."
The State Department said attacks on Americans could take place against aviation, ground transportation and maritime interests. The statement cited the Middle East, including the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, the Arabian Peninsula and North Africa, adding that security concerns could result in the closure of U.S. embassies and consulates.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 ||
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Link ||
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#1
Al Q has to get something going or their credibility will be totally lost on the masses. If they target civilians too much, they will be ratted out. I have a feeling that their assets are stretched, too, so they are at a crossroads.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/18/2005 10:19 Comments ||
Top||
#2
The problem is that oil attacks are almost completely ineffective...
here comes OldSpook school boys and girls - sorry if I get a little pedantic
Examine the whole route Petrochemicals take from the wellhead to the gas tank.
If they blow up some oil wells, we proven that's only a month or 2 to get them back into operation (c.f. 1st Gulf War). Not to mention a miniscule attack in terms of impact.
If they blow a pipeline up? Well its back within a few days (c.f. the current war in Iraq). Same as above regarding impact.
Shipping dock? Ditto, regarding Iraq and the ability to get these facilities function quickly. Plus its diufficut to get enough explosives close enough to do any real damage.
Sink a Tanker? Maybe, but remember the "Tanker War" where Iraq and Iran tried sinking tanker s in the gulf? No serious economic impact. A USS Cole type operation would be the likely method. But given that the US Navy and the Coasties aree standing watch in most arab-based areas for just this sort of thing, its probably not as likely to succeed.
So why would they do any of these? Mainly because the Media Impact it would generate due to the "environmental impact". Pictures of oil covered "cute-n-furry" critters would bring the Enviros irrationally screaming at Bush and the US in horror, not that they need much prodding.
So other than impressing the terrorists unwitting (or not?) allies in the main stream media who magnify everything into a major defeat for us and victory for them (nevermind the truth) in their zeal to sensationalize any story (and try to drag Bush down), attacks on oil targets above will have no impact on the target other than PR and media attentoin.
Except one
A Refinery
Count the number of refineries.
Remember where they are.
Remember that they have large supplies of highly explosive and flammable products going through miles of exposed pipes. And lots of controls and vlaves that can be opened for spills or closed to build up pressures. Consider the HUGE economic impact of losing even a single refinery worth capacity.
Don't beleive me? Re-Read the beginning of Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising. Except imagine it in Houston, for example. There's a reason Clancy wrote that and had so much detail . Think about it. There's a lesson there, one that some of us learned a long time ago looking at the old Soviet Union.
I'm hoping that the current crop of people "looking" are looking inward too and doing the right things to defend the refineries - and defend them like the national strategic asset that they are.
You want the great big glaring weakness in the oil chain from the well-head to your gas tank? There it is. A US Refinery is where they will be targeting. And by God we had better wake up or they will hit it.
#5
A Clancy refresher for those of you who don't ahve the book (Remember this was written in 1984-86 - and note the terrorists):
They moved swiftly, silently, with purpose, under a crystalline, star-filled night in western Siberia. They were Muslims, though one could scarcely have known it from their speech, which was Russian, though inflected with the singsong Azerbaijani accent that wrongly struck the senior members of the engineering staff as entertaining. The three of them had just completed a complex task in the truck and train yards, the opening of hundreds of loading valves. Ibrahim Tolkaze was their leader, though he was not in front. Rasul was in front, the massive former sergeant in the MVD who had already killed six men this cold night-three with a pistol hidden under his coat and three with his hands alone. No one had heard them. An oil refinery is a noisy place. The bodies were left in shadows, and the three men entered Tolkazeâs car for the next part of their task.
...
"Ishaaa!" the man screamed in terror and shock. Tolkaze shot him in the mouth, and hoped Boris didnât die too quickly to hear the contempt in his voice: "Infidel." He was pleased that Rasul had not killed this one. His quiet friend could have all the rest.
The other engineers screamed, threw cups, chairs, manuals. There was nowhere left to run, no way around the swarthy, towering killer. Some held up their hands in useless supplication. Some even prayed aloud-but not to Allah, which might have saved them. The noise diminished as Rasul strode up to the bloody corner. He smiled as he shot the very last, knowing that this sweating infidel pig would serve him in paradise. He reloaded his rifle, then went back through the control room. He prodded each body with a bayonet, and again shot the four that showed some small sign of life. His face bore a grim, content expression. At least twenty-five atheist pigs dead. Twenty-five foreign invaders who would no longer stand between his people and their God. Truly he had done Allahâs work!
...
Tolkaze smiled, certain that it was the final Sign in a plan being executed by hands greater than his own. Serene and confident, he began to fulfill his destiny.
First the gasoline. He closed sixteen control valves-the nearest of them three kilometers away-and opened ten, which rerouted eighty million liters of gasoline to gush out from a bank of truck-loading valves. The gasoline did not ignite at once. The three had left no pyrotechnic devices to explode this first of many disasters. Tolkaze reasoned that if he were truly doing the work of Allah, then his God would surely provide.
And so He did. A small truck driving through the loading yard took a turn too fast, skidded on the splashing fuel, and slid broadside into a utility pole. It only took one spark . . . and already more fuel was spilling out into the train yards.
With the master pipeline switches, Tolkaze had a special plan. He rapidly typed in a computer command, thanking Allah that Rasul was so skillful and had not damaged anything important with his rifle The main pipeline from the nearby production field was two meters across, with many branch lines running to all of the production wells. The oil traveling in those pipes had its own mass and its own momentum supplied by pumping stations in the fields. Ibrahimâs commands rapidly opened and closed valves. The pipeline ruptured in a dozen places, and the computer commands left the pumps on. The escaping light crude flowed across the production field, where only one more spark was needed to spread a holocaust before the winter wind, and another break occurred where the oil and gas pipelines crossed together over the river Obâ.
And there you have it - Islamic terrorists detroying a refinery from within. In 1986 by Tom Clancy.
#6
Good analysis Oldspook. I would give a bit more weight to blocking a chokepoint (Hormuz/Mallaca/Singapore) with a tanker than you, but otherwise I agree. One other point is that loading and unloading infrastructure are on the coast and consequently are vulnerable to a ship being steered directly into them. In addition, refineries and LPG terminals are often right next door. I have been in an oil refinery recently and storage tanks were no more than 20 meters from shore. Hijack multiple ships and drive them into oil loading facilities and you would take millions of barrels offline for months. A coordinated hijacking of ships is logistically fairly easy and almost impossible to defend against.
#7
Saudi Arabia's primary oil export terminals are located at Ras Tanura (6 million bbl/d capacity; the world's largest offshore oil loading facility) and Ras al-Ju'aymah (3 million bbl/d) on the Persian Gulf, plus Yanbu (as high as 5 million bbl/d) on the Red Sea. Combined, these terminals appear capable of handling around 14 million bbl/d, around 3.0-3.5 million bbl/d higher than Saudi crude oil production capacity (10.5-11.0 million bbl/d), and about 6 million bbl/d in excess of Saudi crude oil production in 2002. Despite this excess capacity, there have been reports that the Saudis are planning to conduct a feasibility study on construction of an oil pipeline from the Empty Quarter of southeastern Saudi Arabia through the Hadramaut in Yemen to the Arabian Sea. Looks to me like they are deliberately building in redundancy.
#8
Aramco is taking this warning seriously. Our friends who are still stuck there just e-mailed with news that the Security Guards, even at the internal gates, are openly holding machine guns!
#9
OldSpook - My worry is CITGO.
Citgo is owned by the Peoples Republic of Chavez.
Chavez is in bed with anybody that hates the US.
Chavez's refineries are in Texas.
Chavez just replaced the top honchos in Texas.
Chavez is shopping Citgo to Saudi
HOUSTON ON EDGE OVER FUTURE OF CITGO
Few places are as jittery as this city when it comes to the future of Citgo Petroleum, the oil refining giant owned by the government of Venezuela and based here.
Popular sentiment in Venezuela is critical of Citgo's rich links to the United States, and the administration of Hugo Chavez has recently signaled its intent to exert greater control over Citgo and perhaps even dismember it.
So, Rafael Ramirez, the president of Venezuela's national oil company, tried to dispel uncertainty in energy markets when asked about the recent turmoil at Citgo, which is the main conduit for Venezuelan oil exports to the United States. Citgo lends its brand to 14,000 independently owned gas stations in this country. It also accounts for almost 15 percent of oil refining output in the United States.
``Houston has nothing to fear,'' Ramirez, who is also Venezuela's energy minister, said in an interview in Caracas. To be sure, at Citgo's headquarters in Houston, the view is somewhat different.
Next week, a group of Venezuelan lawmakers will come to the headquarters to interview officials as part of a recently expanded investigation by Venezuela's National Assembly into reports of corruption at Citgo and PDVSA Services, the Houston-based purchasing arm of Petroleos de Venezuela. Citgo officials declined requests for interviews.
About a month ago, the Chavez administration quietly but abruptly ousted Citgo's chief executive, Luis Marin, only the second Venezuelan to run the company since Petroleos de Venezuela bought control of Citgo in 1990.
Petroleos de Venezuela replaced Marin, who had overseen the recent transfer of Citgo's headquarters to Houston from Tulsa, Okla., with Felix Rodriguez, a senior executive at Petroleos de Venezuela and a vocal supporter of Chavez.
Then, last week, Petroleos de Venezuela took the unusual step of purging Citgo's entire board, replacing longtime directors with people who are explicitly loyal to Chavez and who support increasingly activist policies intended to diversify Venezuela's oil exports to markets other than the United States.
``It's not unusual for our CEOs to serve a relatively short term and then be replaced by another executive,'' said David McCollum, a Citgo spokesman. McCollum declined to comment further on the recent management upheaval at Citgo.
Venezuela's ambitions for Citgo have recently come under greater scrutiny, amid statements from Caracas about the politically charged energy relationship with the United States. Though Rodriguez, Citgo's new chief executive, has insisted that a sale of Citgo's refining assets is not imminent, Ramirez, the president of Petroleos de Venezuela, acknowledged that Venezuela was actively considering the sale of parts of Citgo. Lukoil, a major Russian oil company, has said publicly that it is in discussions with Citgo about possibly refining Russian oil for export to the United States.
``We are in conversations with several interested companies, and are reviewing which refineries are beneficial for the country and which aren't,'' Ramirez said. ``People keep asking us about the sale of Citgo as if it were as simple as selling a pair of shoes.''
Of course, the reliance of the United States on Venezuelan oil imports is not so simple. Oil from the Middle East, West Africa or Central Asia could potentially be redirected to American ports if Venezuela were to curtail oil exports to the United States through severing commercial ties with Citgo. But doing so could help drive up global crude prices.
Energy officials in Venezuela are aware of the benefits of selling oil to the United States; the country's total oil export revenues soared 47 percent in 2004, to $29.1 billion. Yet during a time of elevated oil prices, clarity from Caracas in relation to Citgo seems in short supply in its new home city. Less than a year ago, city officials celebrated the arrival of Citgo, which is transferring 700 jobs to the Houston headquarters out of a total work force of 4,000.
Now the mood has changed amid doubts over the company's future. In an editorial titled ``Our Chavez Problem,'' The Houston Chronicle recently criticized the handling of Marin's ouster as Citgo's chief executive and the Venezuelan government's positioning of Citgo as a bargaining tool in relations with the United States.
Citgo, of course, remains an essential pillar of Venezuela's economy as the nation's principal outlet for foreign crude oil sales and one of the most important operators of oil refineries in the United States, with interests in eight installations in this country that process crude oil into gasoline and asphalt. Those refining assets, analysts say, are among the most coveted in the energy industry.
The growing profitability of Citgo's refineries is the main reason many energy executives in Houston are puzzled as to why Venezuela might consider selling them. Citgo's revenue has more than doubled, to $29.9 billion in the year that ended last Sept. 30, compared with $13.3 billion for the period in 1999, the year Chavez was elected president of Venezuela, said Bryan Caviness, an analyst at Fitch Ratings who follows bonds issued by Citgo.
Citgo's net income also soared during those five years, to $499.2 million in 2004 from $146.5 million in 1999, a trend illustrated by Citgo's payment of a record $400 million dividend to the government of Venezuela last December.
Ramirez, the president of Petroleos de Venezuela, complained that while Citgo was originally acquired with the intent of refining Venezuelan crude it now has to buy about 50 percent of the petroleum for its refineries from other countries, mainly Canada and Mexico. That fact might indicate one option Petroleos de Venezuela is considering when weighing the sale of some of Citgo's assets.
``For a trader this would probably be a good business but it doesn't make any sense for us,'' Ramirez said in reference to its refineries that do not use Venezuelan crude. ``Does that mean we're going to abandon our refineries and leave the American market? No.''
Nor does that mean, of course, that Citgo will remain out of play in Venezuela's strategy of finding new markets for its oil as far afield as China. For several years it has been impossible to separate any discussion of Citgo from the whirlwind of Venezuelan politics.
The Chavez administration is critical of the way previous administrations opened up the oil sector to private investment and acquired foreign refining assets under Citgo's control, insisting these were attempts to hide revenue from the state.
Many Venezuelans, particularly supporters of Chavez, remain profoundly mistrustful of Citgo and skeptical of a company that employs few Venezuelans and until recently did not return large dividends to Petroleos de Venezuela.
``Citgo has never been a good business for Venezuela, and the general population knows it,'' said Rafael Quiroz, a former board member of Petroleos de Venezuela and a vocal supporter of selling Citgo. He said there were ``serious and legitimate doubts'' whether Citgo's revenue had helped ease poverty in Venezuela.
This mistrust was evident in a hearing this week in Caracas on reports of financial irregularities at Citgo. A five-member commission questioned Marin, the former Citgo president, for more than two hours on Tuesday about issues like pension funds and crude oil contracts.
When asked whether Citgo was in fact profitable for Venezuela, or whether it should be sold, Marin offered few clues about the ultimate fate of the company.
``That evaluation must be made by the shareholder,'' he said, referring to the Venezuelan state.
"Citgo currently has capacity for refining Group I basestocks only, but it would take a relatively small investment to upgrade the Lake Charles refinery in Louisiana to produce Group II and higher. It's not likely that they're going to get the money from PDVSA, but they might get it from Lukoil," Agashe says.
Despite rising profits, Venezuela has expressed unhappiness with Citgo's performance. PDVSA purchased Citgo Petroleum primarily as an outlet for its heavy and sour crude, but some of Citgo's refineries, including the Lemont, Illinois, plant, are procuring crude oil from Canadian sources, rather than from Venezuela. With the worsening of U.S.-Venezuelan political relations and lower-than-expected use of Venezuelan crude, PDVSA has indicated a growing interest in the energy-hungry Chinese and Indian markets. http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/050316/nyw104_2.html
#11
I would like to see that SOB crawling back when the Chinese bubble bursts!
Chinese, Pequiven discuss petrochem JVs - Venezuela
Published : Friday, March 18, 2005 15:49 (GMT-0400)
A delegation from Chinese oil company Sinopec is currently in Venezuela to discuss petrochemical joint ventures with Pequiven, the petrochemical subsidiary of state oil firm PDVSA, a Pequiven official told BNamericas Friday.
Heading the Chinese delegation is Sinopec''s senior vice-president Wang Tianpu. The joint ventures Beijing-based Sinopec envisions are in the urea-based fertilizers business, and there has been talk of building a fertilizers plant jointly with Pequiven.
The Sinopec delegation toured Venezuela''s largest petrochemical complex, Jose, in Anzoátegui state and home to several high-profile petrochemical joint ventures, including Metor in which Pequiven and Japan''s Mitsubishi are partners.
Sinopec and Pequiven have agreed to exchange technical delegations after this initial visit. Sinopec is also interested in advising Pequiven on building infrastructure for offshore natural gas processing as well as in plant construction, where Sinopec has extensive experience, the official said.
Venezuela is home to extensive natural gas reserves, with proven reserves of 150 trillion cubic feet and potential reserves of more than double that. The administration of President Hugo Chávez has made it a central tenet of its energy policy to seek to develop these gas reserves.
In related news, Pequiven''s executive headquarters may soon be moved from the capital city of Caracas to Morón, an industrial city in Carabobo state, the official said. Morón is home to PDVSA''s El Palito refinery.
#12
So why don't we just nationalize Citgo? It's only fair!
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/18/2005 23:34 Comments ||
Top||
#13
The problem is that oil attacks are almost completely ineffective...
here comes OldSpook school boys and girls - sorry if I get a little pedantic
Examine the whole route Petrochemicals take from the wellhead to the gas tank.
If they blow up some oil wells, we proven that's only a month or 2 to get them back into operation (c.f. 1st Gulf War). Not to mention a miniscule attack in terms of impact.
If they blow a pipeline up? Well its back within a few days (c.f. the current war in Iraq). Same as above regarding impact.
Shipping dock? Ditto, regarding Iraq and the ability to get these facilities function quickly. Plus its diufficut to get enough explosives close enough to do any real damage.
Sink a Tanker? Maybe, but remember the "Tanker War" where Iraq and Iran tried sinking tanker s in the gulf? No serious economic impact. A USS Cole type operation would be the likely method. But given that the US Navy and the Coasties aree standing watch in most arab-based areas for just this sort of thing, its probably not as likely to succeed.
So why would they do any of these? Mainly because the Media Impact it would generate due to the "environmental impact". Pictures of oil covered "cute-n-furry" critters would bring the Enviros irrationally screaming at Bush and the US in horror, not that they need much prodding.
So other than impressing the terrorists unwitting (or not?) allies in the main stream media who magnify everything into a major defeat for us and victory for them (nevermind the truth) in their zeal to sensationalize any story (and try to drag Bush down), attacks on oil targets above will have no impact on the target other than PR and media attentoin.
Except one
A Refinery
Count the number of refineries.
Remember where they are.
Remember that they have large supplies of highly explosive and flammable products going through miles of exposed pipes. And lots of controls and vlaves that can be opened for spills or closed to build up pressures. Consider the HUGE economic impact of losing even a single refinery worth capacity.
Don't beleive me? Re-Read the beginning of Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising. Except imagine it in Houston, for example. There's a reason Clancy wrote that and had so much detail . Think about it. There's a lesson there, one that some of us learned a long time ago looking at the old Soviet Union.
I'm hoping that the current crop of people "looking" are looking inward too and doing the right things to defend the refineries - and defend them like the national strategic asset that they are.
You want the great big glaring weakness in the oil chain from the well-head to your gas tank? There it is. A US Refinery is where they will be targeting. And by God we had better wake up or they will hit it.
#14
A Clancy refresher for those of you who don't ahve the book (Remember this was written in 1984-86 - and note the terrorists):
They moved swiftly, silently, with purpose, under a crystalline, star-filled night in western Siberia. They were Muslims, though one could scarcely have known it from their speech, which was Russian, though inflected with the singsong Azerbaijani accent that wrongly struck the senior members of the engineering staff as entertaining. The three of them had just completed a complex task in the truck and train yards, the opening of hundreds of loading valves. Ibrahim Tolkaze was their leader, though he was not in front. Rasul was in front, the massive former sergeant in the MVD who had already killed six men this cold night-three with a pistol hidden under his coat and three with his hands alone. No one had heard them. An oil refinery is a noisy place. The bodies were left in shadows, and the three men entered Tolkazeâs car for the next part of their task.
...
"Ishaaa!" the man screamed in terror and shock. Tolkaze shot him in the mouth, and hoped Boris didnât die too quickly to hear the contempt in his voice: "Infidel." He was pleased that Rasul had not killed this one. His quiet friend could have all the rest.
The other engineers screamed, threw cups, chairs, manuals. There was nowhere left to run, no way around the swarthy, towering killer. Some held up their hands in useless supplication. Some even prayed aloud-but not to Allah, which might have saved them. The noise diminished as Rasul strode up to the bloody corner. He smiled as he shot the very last, knowing that this sweating infidel pig would serve him in paradise. He reloaded his rifle, then went back through the control room. He prodded each body with a bayonet, and again shot the four that showed some small sign of life. His face bore a grim, content expression. At least twenty-five atheist pigs dead. Twenty-five foreign invaders who would no longer stand between his people and their God. Truly he had done Allahâs work!
...
Tolkaze smiled, certain that it was the final Sign in a plan being executed by hands greater than his own. Serene and confident, he began to fulfill his destiny.
First the gasoline. He closed sixteen control valves-the nearest of them three kilometers away-and opened ten, which rerouted eighty million liters of gasoline to gush out from a bank of truck-loading valves. The gasoline did not ignite at once. The three had left no pyrotechnic devices to explode this first of many disasters. Tolkaze reasoned that if he were truly doing the work of Allah, then his God would surely provide.
And so He did. A small truck driving through the loading yard took a turn too fast, skidded on the splashing fuel, and slid broadside into a utility pole. It only took one spark . . . and already more fuel was spilling out into the train yards.
With the master pipeline switches, Tolkaze had a special plan. He rapidly typed in a computer command, thanking Allah that Rasul was so skillful and had not damaged anything important with his rifle The main pipeline from the nearby production field was two meters across, with many branch lines running to all of the production wells. The oil traveling in those pipes had its own mass and its own momentum supplied by pumping stations in the fields. Ibrahimâs commands rapidly opened and closed valves. The pipeline ruptured in a dozen places, and the computer commands left the pumps on. The escaping light crude flowed across the production field, where only one more spark was needed to spread a holocaust before the winter wind, and another break occurred where the oil and gas pipelines crossed together over the river Obâ.
And there you have it - Islamic terrorists detroying a refinery from within. In 1986 by Tom Clancy.
#15
The problem is that oil attacks are almost completely ineffective...
here comes OldSpook school boys and girls - sorry if I get a little pedantic
Examine the whole route Petrochemicals take from the wellhead to the gas tank.
If they blow up some oil wells, we proven that's only a month or 2 to get them back into operation (c.f. 1st Gulf War). Not to mention a miniscule attack in terms of impact.
If they blow a pipeline up? Well its back within a few days (c.f. the current war in Iraq). Same as above regarding impact.
Shipping dock? Ditto, regarding Iraq and the ability to get these facilities function quickly. Plus its diufficut to get enough explosives close enough to do any real damage.
Sink a Tanker? Maybe, but remember the "Tanker War" where Iraq and Iran tried sinking tanker s in the gulf? No serious economic impact. A USS Cole type operation would be the likely method. But given that the US Navy and the Coasties aree standing watch in most arab-based areas for just this sort of thing, its probably not as likely to succeed.
So why would they do any of these? Mainly because the Media Impact it would generate due to the "environmental impact". Pictures of oil covered "cute-n-furry" critters would bring the Enviros irrationally screaming at Bush and the US in horror, not that they need much prodding.
So other than impressing the terrorists unwitting (or not?) allies in the main stream media who magnify everything into a major defeat for us and victory for them (nevermind the truth) in their zeal to sensationalize any story (and try to drag Bush down), attacks on oil targets above will have no impact on the target other than PR and media attentoin.
Except one
A Refinery
Count the number of refineries.
Remember where they are.
Remember that they have large supplies of highly explosive and flammable products going through miles of exposed pipes. And lots of controls and vlaves that can be opened for spills or closed to build up pressures. Consider the HUGE economic impact of losing even a single refinery worth capacity.
Don't beleive me? Re-Read the beginning of Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising. Except imagine it in Houston, for example. There's a reason Clancy wrote that and had so much detail . Think about it. There's a lesson there, one that some of us learned a long time ago looking at the old Soviet Union.
I'm hoping that the current crop of people "looking" are looking inward too and doing the right things to defend the refineries - and defend them like the national strategic asset that they are.
You want the great big glaring weakness in the oil chain from the well-head to your gas tank? There it is. A US Refinery is where they will be targeting. And by God we had better wake up or they will hit it.
#16
A Clancy refresher for those of you who don't ahve the book (Remember this was written in 1984-86 - and note the terrorists):
They moved swiftly, silently, with purpose, under a crystalline, star-filled night in western Siberia. They were Muslims, though one could scarcely have known it from their speech, which was Russian, though inflected with the singsong Azerbaijani accent that wrongly struck the senior members of the engineering staff as entertaining. The three of them had just completed a complex task in the truck and train yards, the opening of hundreds of loading valves. Ibrahim Tolkaze was their leader, though he was not in front. Rasul was in front, the massive former sergeant in the MVD who had already killed six men this cold night-three with a pistol hidden under his coat and three with his hands alone. No one had heard them. An oil refinery is a noisy place. The bodies were left in shadows, and the three men entered Tolkazeâs car for the next part of their task.
...
"Ishaaa!" the man screamed in terror and shock. Tolkaze shot him in the mouth, and hoped Boris didnât die too quickly to hear the contempt in his voice: "Infidel." He was pleased that Rasul had not killed this one. His quiet friend could have all the rest.
The other engineers screamed, threw cups, chairs, manuals. There was nowhere left to run, no way around the swarthy, towering killer. Some held up their hands in useless supplication. Some even prayed aloud-but not to Allah, which might have saved them. The noise diminished as Rasul strode up to the bloody corner. He smiled as he shot the very last, knowing that this sweating infidel pig would serve him in paradise. He reloaded his rifle, then went back through the control room. He prodded each body with a bayonet, and again shot the four that showed some small sign of life. His face bore a grim, content expression. At least twenty-five atheist pigs dead. Twenty-five foreign invaders who would no longer stand between his people and their God. Truly he had done Allahâs work!
...
Tolkaze smiled, certain that it was the final Sign in a plan being executed by hands greater than his own. Serene and confident, he began to fulfill his destiny.
First the gasoline. He closed sixteen control valves-the nearest of them three kilometers away-and opened ten, which rerouted eighty million liters of gasoline to gush out from a bank of truck-loading valves. The gasoline did not ignite at once. The three had left no pyrotechnic devices to explode this first of many disasters. Tolkaze reasoned that if he were truly doing the work of Allah, then his God would surely provide.
And so He did. A small truck driving through the loading yard took a turn too fast, skidded on the splashing fuel, and slid broadside into a utility pole. It only took one spark . . . and already more fuel was spilling out into the train yards.
With the master pipeline switches, Tolkaze had a special plan. He rapidly typed in a computer command, thanking Allah that Rasul was so skillful and had not damaged anything important with his rifle The main pipeline from the nearby production field was two meters across, with many branch lines running to all of the production wells. The oil traveling in those pipes had its own mass and its own momentum supplied by pumping stations in the fields. Ibrahimâs commands rapidly opened and closed valves. The pipeline ruptured in a dozen places, and the computer commands left the pumps on. The escaping light crude flowed across the production field, where only one more spark was needed to spread a holocaust before the winter wind, and another break occurred where the oil and gas pipelines crossed together over the river Obâ.
And there you have it - Islamic terrorists detroying a refinery from within. In 1986 by Tom Clancy.
Dhamar has been in chaos for several days due to a battle involving the tribe of Hodeibah, in Al-Hada district. It comes after the killing of the son of Sheik Ahmed Hussein Al-Hudaibi. Different kinds of light and heavy weapons are being used in this battle. The security forces have failed to contain the battle. Though 12 military vehicles arrived, they were compelled to withdraw. The tribal battles take place frequently, while the government finds them hard to control.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 ||
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Link ||
[5 views]
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#1
Boys will be boys (especially when they have those lovely guns that go bang bang so satisfactorily).
A British soldier serving in Iraq who saved 30 members of his unit from an ambush has been awarded the first Victoria Cross for more than 20 years. Private Johnson Beharry, 25, was struck by enemy fire as he guided a convoy of Warrior fighting vehicles through the town of Al Amarah last May. A month later he saved more lives in an attack which left him in a coma. Mr Beharry is one of 140 servicemen and women honoured for Iraq, Afghanistan, the former Yugoslavia and Africa.
Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon said: "These honours and awards recognise the outstanding achievements of these extraordinary men and women and their acts of great courage, bravery and determination." Mr Beharry, still recovering from his injuries, said he was "speechless" when told he was winning the VC. The award is the first of the medals to be awarded since posthumous VC given to Lieutenant Colonel Herbert Jones and Sergeant Ian John McKay during the Falklands conflict. It makes him the first living recipient of the VC - the highest award in the British and Commonwealth military - since 1965. The medals are made from the remains of a Russian cannon captured in the 1850s Crimean War. "When I was told yesterday I thought it was great to have received the award. I was speechless," said Mr Beharry, from London.
The soldier was at the head of a five-vehicle convoy when it came under attack on 1 May 2004, and guided the column through a mile of enemy ground to drop off wounded comrades at great risk to his own safety, his citation said. Weeks later, his vehicle was hit by an RPG round. Despite a head wound, he managed to reverse his Warrior to safety. "Maybe I was brave, I don't know. I think anyone else could do the same thing," he said. Mr Beharry, who was born on the Caribbean island of Grenada, is one of only 13 recipients of the award still alive. "At the time I was just doing the job, I didn't have time for other thoughts," he said of his actions. "I want to return to service, but I don't know when that will be and I would go back to Iraq if I had to."
The former construction worker, who came to the UK in 1999 and joined the army in 2000, has also served tours in Northern Ireland and in Kosovo. "I joined the Army for a change of life. I've really thought about it, it was a good decision to make," he said. Mr Beharry has had brain surgery for wounds he received in the second enemy action. Chief of Defence staff Sir Mike Jackson praised his bravery, and said that it would have to be Mr Beharry's decision to return to duty because of the severity of his wounds. "His citation is an extraordinary story of one man's courage, in the way he risked his life for his colleagues not once, but twice."
Royal Marines reservist Colonel Paul Anthony Jobbins, 56, of Chipping Sodbury, Gloucestershire, won the George Medal for peacekeeping work in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The retired police fingerprint officer was responsible for control of UN forces in the town of Bukavu, which fell to rebels in June 2004.
The unarmed officer held negotiations with warring factions amid a wave of violence which killed hundreds. "At great personal risk, Jobbins continuously demonstrated remarkable gallantry," his citation read. Seven other awards have been made for distinguished service during the Boscastle floods last August, when helicopters were used to rescue 150 people. Troops of the Black Watch also received citations for their Iraq tour of duty.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/18/2005 8:30:05 AM ||
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#1
Absolutely brilliant! Let's hope Private Beharry's rightly looked after and doesn't end up having to sell his medal later in life like many others have done.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
03/18/2005 9:11 Comments ||
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#2
With all due respect, the Brits are a bit strict about awards, far more than the Americans. To get the VC, this had to have been one hell of an event. Congrats Private Beharry!
#4
I like that about making it out of the cannon, I'd forgotten about that decidedly British twist. What should the MOH be made of? Cannon captured from Chapultepec maybe (several at Castle San Marco in St. Augustine)? Polished moon rock? A chunk of that Russ sub for the bubbleheads?
You are wrong, about American Awards. Some of them are distributed like pop-corn. Example Purple Heart and at some times and places, the Bronze and Silver Star (in Vietnam they were awarded to paper pushers and even to John Kerry). But I have read about the people who got the Medal of Honor and I was dumbfounded. Jumping on a grenade to protect comrades is about the most basic of the heroicities you will find. Single handedly stopping a column of tanks, capturing a dozen bunkers while dispatching a hundred ennemies is common. And one of the most interesting: an American unit was trapped at the top of cliff and its medic went up and down the cliff on a rope carrying prisoners to safety. He saved over fourty people. He was a conscient objector.
#8
JFM, the Bronze Star is handed out whenever possible and may not even involve combat. A lot of times they push them on bright eye officers who may or may not deserve them. The idea is to award officers for their hard work because they can't pass out monetary awards. Personally anyone who doesn't get into the fetal position and shit himself in combat should be at least awarded the Bronze Star, but that is just my opinion. Yes, I would include John Friggin Kerry in that group too. But we are staining these fine men with his name. I noticed that Mr Beharry wants to return to active duty, good luck and god speed him on that effort, we need more like him. It only proves further that this award was made to the right person.
#9
The Bronze Star comes in two flavors, Valor and Meritorious Achievement. It originated in 1944 and was awarded to anyone who held a WWII Combat Infantryman Badge. It was meant to equate to the Air Corps Air Medal. The Meritorious Achievement came in later. The Bronze Star is only awarded for service in direct or direct support of combat operations.
Valor means you did something significant while getting shot at, most often a single act. You pin a small "V" on the ribbon to mark the difference. MA means you exceeded your performance standards beyond that required for a Commendation medal. The peacetime/non-combat theater equivalent is the Meritorious Service Medal. BSM MA usually went to company grade officers and senior NCOs.
All medals have strict criteria. For eaxample a Purple Heart requires that you be wounded in action against the enemy. This is why former Senator Max Clelland did not get a PH for dropping a grenade. When they are getting handed out like popcorn, there is some serious action going on.
This is not to say that some medal inflation does not go in. Reponsible commanders keep it well in check. When awards and decs are treated like Crackerjack prizes, they lose meaning and can be casually tossed aside, as JFK demonstrated.
Posted by: Billy Hank ||
03/18/2005 14:36 Comments ||
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PS - I never saw a paper pusher awarded a Silver Star. I know there have been aberrations like LBJ's , and JFK's. I had the collateral duty of Wing Awards and Decs officer for a year and the Wing COs were strict on justification.
Posted by: Billy Hank ||
03/18/2005 14:41 Comments ||
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Billy Hank
During the electoral campaign some people in this site told that in Vietnam there were servicemen getting the Silver Star for their efficiency at desktop work. I also know that during WWII the British were shocked about America's liberal distribution of medals to its servicemen.
As a personal note I never understood you could be handled a medal just for being wounded: even a guy shaking in fear and dirtying his pants in his foxhole can still be wounded by a mortar.
But the people who got a Medal of Honor went well beyond uncommon valor.
â With all due respect, the Brits are a bit strict about awards, far more than the Americans.â
You know first of all itâs not with all due respect or you would not have said it., secondly I have been decorated for combat service and I can assure you I earned my award and the others around me earned theirs so piss off, take this polite American bashing crap to the DU.
BTW I am sure Private Beharry earned his award, as has any other soldier, anywhere who has served in combat and I am very proud of him.
Posted by: Big Sarge ||
03/18/2005 22:09 Comments ||
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The MOH receipient that earned it through leadership was General Vandegrift during the battle for Guadalcanal, Tulagi, and the Solomon islands, to wit:
General Alexander Archer Vandegrift, who earned the Medal of Honor in World War II, served as the eighteenth Commandant of the Marine Corps, from January 1, 1944 to January 1, 1948. The general commanded the First Marine Division, Reinforced, in the battle for Guadalcanal, and the First Marine Amphibious Corps in the landing at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville, during World War II.
For outstanding services as Commanding General of the First Marine Division, Reinforced, during the attack on Guadalcanal, Tulagi, and Gavutu in the Solomon Islands on August 7, 1942, he was awarded the Navy Cross, and for the subsequent occupation and defense from August 7 to December 9, 1942, was awarded the Medal of Honor. His citation for the latter reads in part:
"With the adverse factors of weather, terrain and disease making his task a difficult and hazardous undertaking, and with his command eventually including sea, land, and air forces of the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps, Major General Vandegrift achieved marked success in commanding the initial landings of the United States Forces in the Solomon Islands and in their subsequent occupation. "His tenacity, courage and resourcefulness prevailed against a strong, determined and experienced enemy, and the gallant fighting spirit of the men under his inspiring leadership enabled them to withstand aerial, land and sea bombardment, to surmount all obstacles and leave a disorganized and ravaged enemy. "This dangerous but vital mission, accomplished at the constant risk of his life, resulted in securing a valuable base for further operations of our forces against the enemy."
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
03/18/2005 22:42 Comments ||
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Prosecutors on Friday interrogated a retired army officer over the dramatic roadside assassination attempt against Anatoly Chubais, an architect of Russia's privatization program of the 1990s. Late Thursday, police detained a retired military officer and explosives specialist on suspicion of involvement in the attack after authorities tracked down a possible getaway car. The Defense Ministry identified the suspect as 57-year Vladimir Kvachov, a retired colonel who had also worked as a civilian employee of the ministry. The Kommersant newspaper said he was an Afghan veteran who had served in the Soviet GRU military intelligence agency and was decorated for bravery several times. The Interfax news agency quoted an unnamed investigator as saying the retired military officer was one of the army's leading specialists in sabotage techniques. He said police also suspected his 30-year-old son of involvement. The news agency quoted the official as saying the attack might have been carried out "for ideological reasons."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 11:23:57 AM ||
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Anatoly Chubais, head of Russia's state power monopoly, survived an assassination attempt on Thursday by assailants who detonated a roadside bomb and sprayed his convoy with automatic gunfire.
Just a question: Can the head of a state power monopoly credibly called a reformer?
The 49-year-old Chubais, one of Russia's best-known figures, came to prominence as the architect of post-Soviet economic reforms under which two dozen "oligarchs" acquired vast wealth while ordinary people suffered a huge slump in living standards. Interfax news agency quoted unnamed police sources as saying a retired military sabotage specialist had been detained and that police searching his home had found explosives. Chubais is now chief executive of Unified Energy System, and the prime mover behind reforms to introduce competition to the power sector of the world's largest country. He told a press briefing he had been aware of a plan to kill him, but refused to say who he thought was behind the attack. "I have an idea of who could have taken out a contract on me," a shaken but defiant Chubais said from the safety of UES headquarters in Moscow. "We had reason to believe something like this might happen."
Witnesses said Chubais was on his way to work from his country home when a roadside bomb hit his two-car cortege and gunmen opened fire with automatic weapons. His armored BMW fled the scene despite being hit in the windshield, hood and front tire. Security guards traveling in a separate car returned fire at two hitmen, who escaped into the surrounding woods. Police said they had found a green Saab they believe was used as a getaway car. An unnamed police source quoted by Interfax news agency said investigators had taken in a suspect for questioning. The man was a retired serviceman who attacked Chubais for "ideological reasons," the agency quoted the source as saying. There was no official confirmation that a suspect had been detained.
A militia leader in the Solomon Islands has been jailed for life for the murder of Catholic priest Father Augustine Geve, a cabinet minister, in 2002. Harold Keke and two of his associates were found guilty of the murder. Father Geve was shot dead on a remote beach as violence between indigenous residents and settlers escalated. Australia, which sent a military force to end the chaos in 2003, welcomed the verdict, calling it a "significant achievement for the Solomon Islands".
Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and Justice Minister Chris Ellison said in joint a statement: "It demonstrates the Solomon Islands justice system is again able effectively to uphold and enforce the laws of the country. Keke, 34, Ronnie Cawa, 24, and Francis Lela, 22, had pleaded not guilty to murder. Keke claimed Father Geve was misusing money meant for his constituents in the Weathercoast region. Police in the Solomon Islands said Keke was responsible for a string of atrocities, including torture and beheadings, during a period of ethnic unrest that began in the late 1990s.
The South Pacific archipelago was riven by conflict between indigenous residents of the main island of Guadalcanal and settlers from the province of Malaita, fought over land rights and jobs. Before the foreign troops arrived, the government in Honiara admitted it was powerless to stop the country's slide into anarchy. Keke and the Guadalcanal Liberation Front he led have been described as terrorists by the New Zealand authorities. He is expected to face trial for other alleged offences in the coming months, including the kidnap and murder of seven Anglican missionaries.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/18/2005 8:38:53 AM ||
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#1
Good.
Still wrestling with the intricacies of the apostrophe, eh Steve-O?
AN Australian man has been accused of threatening to blow up a Russian plane on a flight from Japan to Moscow. Australian government officials today said a 28-year-old Sydney man had been arrested in Moscow, allegedly for trying to enter the cockpit of a Russian Boeing-777 Aeroflot plane travelling from Tokyo to Moscow. As the plane approached Moscow's Sheremetyevo international airport, the pilot alerted controllers that a passenger had threatened to blow up the plane, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported, citing an unnamed airport spokesman. "The Australian embassy in Moscow has verified the man's detention and will provide normal consular assistance," a Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spokeswoman told AAP. "He's been detained by Russian authorities, he's been questioned as to his identity and his motives."
An official at the airport told foreign news agencies: "The Australian-based passenger, born in 1976 and travelling from Sydney to Yerevan, Armenia via Tokyo and Moscow, tried to enter the pilot's cabin but was prevented from doing so by the crew." Reports by ITAR-Tass suggested the man did not have explosives and that he would undergo psychiatric tests. The Australian embassy in Moscow will help the detained man obtain a lawyer, the spokeswoman said.
Posted by: God Save The World ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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To an old Cold-Warrior like me, this still boggles my mind at times when I see phrases like this:
TUCSON - A federal grand jury Wednesday indicted two Syrian men on charges of impersonating U.S. citizens after Border Patrol agents stopped them in southern Arizona and found an undocumented Mexican immigrant in their car. According to a criminal complaint, Ala Salem Mamoud Al-Kurdi and Mohamed Tamman Nakchgandi, both citizens of Syria, were pulled over by Border Patrol agents on Feb. 18 on Arizona 86, a highway that runs through the Tohono O'odham Nation, a vast reservation southwest of Tucson. In the back seat of the Cadillac, driven by Kurdi, agents spotted a Mexican man who later admitted to crossing the U.S.-Mexican border illegally three days earlier, according to Border Patrol reports. Kurdi and Nakchgandi, the passenger, said they were naturalized U.S. citizens born in Syria, but agents found they were in the country illegally, according to court records. The agents reported that a second Cadillac was spotted traveling in tandem with Kurdi's along the highway, but got away. The Mexican man later told authorities he crossed the border with five other undocumented immigrants, who were in the second car, the Border Patrol reported.
A check of immigration records showed that Nakchgandi had entered the country legally in 1999 with a temporary visitor's visa, but overstayed, according to the Border Patrol. The agency reported that Kurdi also entered legally with an employment-authorization card that recently was canceled. Kurdi, 25, and Nakchgandi, 24, were each charged with impersonating a U.S. citizen. Authorities have not established a link between the pair and the undocumented Mexican man, "except that they were all in the same vehicle," according to the Border Patrol. An arraignment for Kurdi and Nakchgandi is scheduled for Thursday in U.S. District Court in Tucson, said Sandy Raynor, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office. The two men are being held in federal custody until trial, according to court records. Their attorneys did not return phone calls Thursday.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/18/2005 9:22:32 AM ||
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#1
'personating an 'merkin should be a capital crime.
#3
nice: illegals helping illegals enter the US. Deport them to Iraq south
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/18/2005 11:14 Comments ||
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#4
FRANK nice: illegals helping illegals enter the US. Deport them to Iraq south
Recent legal immigrants are also in the illegal alien business. They employ them and show them the ropes here. They show illegal aliens from their homeland how to game the system. This legal/illegal alien networking is pervasive
#5
I'm all for minimum sentencing standards for illegal aliens. Every one we catch should be sentenced to five years' hard labor, working 12-hour days, six days a week, building and repairing a fence from Brownsville to Nogales, and cleaning up the trash their fellow illegals leave all over Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/18/2005 14:51 Comments ||
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#6
" A federal grand jury Wednesday indicted two Syrian men on charges of impersonating U.S. citizens after Border Patrol agents stopped them in southern Arizona".
indicted? How 'bout held wothout bond.
Posted by: Annie War ||
03/18/2005 15:42 Comments ||
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The United States is advising western shipping firms and other maritime interests of a possible terrorist attack on vessels off the coast of east Africa, according to a government warning.
The so-called "special warning" refers to intelligence indicating that terrorists may use speedboats to attack a western ship in east African waters and has been broadcast over an open channel to seafarers since last week.
"As of early 2005, the United States government has received unconfirmed information that terrorists may attempt to mount a maritime attack using speedboats against a western ship possibly in East Africa," it says.
"This information is unconfirmed and the United States is not aware of additional information on the planning, timing or intended targets of the maritime attack," the warning says.
The threat applies to inland channels, ports, territorial and international waters in and off the coasts of the Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, the Seychelles, Somalia, Sudan and Tanzania, according to the warning...
The threat information contained in the warning was compiled by the US State Department in coordination with the departments of defense and commerce and the Central Intelligence Agency.
It has been broadcast to US military ships, the Coast Guard and US shipping companies over an open-channel satellite since March 11, according to the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency which disseminates "special warnings."
Special warnings "are issued in response to extraordinary political threats to US shipping, including war, terrorist threats and seizure and harassment of vessel by government authorities," according to the State Department.
The last special warning to be issued by US authorities was in March 2003 after the start of the US-led invasion of Iraq, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency says on its website.
Recently captured terrorists say two al-Qaida-linked groups are training members in scuba diving in preparation for seaborne attacks, according to a Philippine military report.
The report, obtained by the Associated Press, also points to increasing collaboration among the Muslim terrorists in other areas, including financing and explosives.
As WND first reported based on information gathered by the premium online intelligence newsletter Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the threat of Islamist terrorism on the high seas is worldwide — not limited to one region.
WND also exclusively reported that al-Qaida had purchased at least 15 ships, creating a veritable terror armada.
U.S. intelligence services believe scores of acoustic sea-mines, found to have disappeared from a naval base in North Korea by a U2 spy plane, could be aboard these bin Laden "terror ships" and that Western luxury liners and aircraft carriers were the targets of this sea jihad.
WND reported last June on evidence terrorists were learning about diving, with a view to attacking ships from below. The Abu Sayyaf group in the Philippines kidnapped a maintenance engineer in a Sabah holiday resort in 2000. On his release in June this year, the engineer said his kidnappers knew he was a diving instructor — they wanted instruction.
The owner of a diving school near Kuala Lumpur reported a number of ethnic Malays wanting to learn about diving, but being strangely uninterested in learning about decompression.
G2 Bulletin pointed out this was reminiscent of reports that Sept. 11 hijackers who attended U.S. flight schools were only interested in learning how to fly planes, not land.
The new Philippine report said Indonesia-based Jemaah Islamiyah has given Abu Sayyaf at least $18,500 for explosives training alone in the past year.
One month ago, the AP reported, the U.S. Coast Guard announced it wanted to upgrade protection of the nation's ports from terrorist attacks by scuba divers.
The Coast Guard is seeking development of a new sonar system that can distinguish human swimmers from dolphins.
The FBI announced three years ago it was probing al-Qaida's alleged training of scuba divers to blow up waterfront targets, including ships and power plants.
The Philippine report stated Abu Sayyaf member Gamal Baharan -- a suspect in a deadly Manila bus bombing Feb. 14 -- told of being trained with other terrorists for scuba-diver strikes.
Baharan said Abu Sayyaf leaders Khaddafy Janjalani and Abu Sulaiman initiated the training in preparation for a Jemaah Islamiyah bombing plot on unspecified targets outside the Philippines.
A man suspected of Al Qaeda links has been detained after arriving at Manila airport from Saudi Arabia and may have been handed over to U.S. officials, Philippine immigration officials said Friday. The man, identified by the officials as Saudi Arabian national Abdullah Nassar al-Arifi, 34, appears on an FBI list of terror suspects, and may have links to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States as well as the 2002 bombings in Bali, Indonesia, the officials told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. He was detained shortly after arriving on a Philippine Airlines flight from the Saudi capital, Riyadh, on Wednesday, the officials said. An immigration official said U.S. federal agents took custody of the suspect, but other officials said he was still being held by the Philippine immigration bureau and that U.S. officials were taking part in an investigation. No other details were immediately available. The U.S. Embassy did not comment on the case.
Immigration Commissioner Alipio Fernandez said Abdullah Nassar al-Arifi, 34, whose name was on a blacklist of individuals with possible terrorist links, was detained upon disembarking from a commercial flight from Riyadh on Wednesday. However, Fernandez said Nassar al-Arifi was turned over to the Saudi ambassador yesterday after Bureau of Immigration investigators failed to find any evidence against him.
Immigration officials told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity that Nassar al-Arifi appears on a US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) list of terror suspects. An investigation which included FBI agents failed to link him to terrorism, the officials added. An immigration official said Nassar al-Arifi would be deported to Saudi Arabia because his name was on the FBI list.
This article starring:
ABDULLAH NASAR AL ARIFI
al-Qaeda
Immigration Commissioner Alipio Fernandez
Posted by: tipper ||
03/18/2005 9:56:56 AM ||
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...The X-55 has a ranged of 3,000 km and is capable of carrying 200 kiloton nuclear warheads. It puts Japan, all of Russia and Israel within range. Piksun's admission is the first official confirmation of the Ukrainian missile sale that was first made public last month by a Ukrainian parliament member.
Their acquisition heightens concerns about Iran's nuclear weapons program. The US embassy in Kiev is "closely monitoring" the investigation and demands the findings be made public in full. The Japanese embassy echoed the demand.
DEBKAfile's Moscow sources reveal that the Ukrainian shipment to Iran included radioactive materials for making "dirty bombs."
According to DEBKAfile's military sources, the 12 strategic cruise missiles place the strategic ratio between the Islamic Republic and Israel on a completely new level. Iran shares this asset with only two other world powers, the United States and Russia. This weapon is used for destroying known relatively fixed-position targets, such as Israel's Dimona nuclear center and population centers. Its guidance system combines inertial-Doppler navigation and position correction based on in-flight comparison of terrain in targeted regions with images stored in the memory of its on-board computer. The propulsion system is a dual-flow engine located underneath the missile's tail.
Possession of the Kh-55 makes Iran's Shahab-3 or its projected Shahab-4 missile programs irrelevant. Tehran may have given them exposure as a red herring to distract attention from its high-profile missile asset... Worst case: Israel now considers itself under imminent threat of nuclear attack from Iran. Unless the US can guarantee that no missiles will enter Israeli airspace, then any Iranian alert-launch may trigger nuclear retaliation. Note: It has been suggested that these missiles are only fully-functional training missiles, but that does no explicitly say that they cannot be converted to weapon carrying systems.
#3
I call BS on this one. I don't think the Mad Mullahs have the capability to maintain, reprogram and deploy these bad boys without direct help from the Russians. They will look good in a military parade, however.
#4
Even if they could find the "On" switch on these things, they'd have to fly them over Iraq to get to Israel. The moment these things are spotted, the US will assume out of prudence that Iran was launching an attack on US forces there.
Posted by: Laurence of the Rats ||
03/18/2005 17:09 Comments ||
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#5
And that doesn't even count the fact the moment they are spotted, Israel is going to hammer Iran out of existence. And for the wobblies out there, no, they won't ask our permission first.
#6
Report I saw said the ChiComs got some too. What are the chances that they can reverse engineer the things to make use of em? We already know how they love to share stuff with the mullahs.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
03/18/2005 17:33 Comments ||
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#7
The 1st problem for the Iranians is how to make a warhead small enough to fit the payload capacity of these missles.
The scond problem is how to get them pas air defenses - unlike ballistic missles, these can be spotted and shot down rather easily - the F-14 (back in the 1970's) was designed to look-down shhot-down in order to kill sea skillers that were a danger to US ships. Who is to saythat Israeli CAP would not be able to do the same? Add to that overflight of Iraq and exposre to SAM batteries there...
Not to say these are not a threat (filled with bio or chem munitions), but they are not as severe a threat as ballisitic missles with nuke warheads.
#8
This is just an alternative power delivery system from their peaceful nuclear power plants. Apparently, the Mad Mullah Neighborhood Association doesn't allow for overhead transmission wires. The solution? Why nuclear tipped missiles, of course. Soon they will be able to deliver 200 kilotons, ahem, watts of nuclear power to their new customers in Israel, Iraq, and southern Europe.
Posted by: Scott R ||
03/18/2005 17:45 Comments ||
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#9
Quick! Call in the UN for surrender negotiations...
This is a terrain-following system. That means that to launch it, you need the missile, launcher and a bunch of support equipment including the targetting computers. Now, if Teheran or Beijing got digital terrain map models and the associated software from Kiev, they have the full capability. Otherwise, they have something interesting to parade and to reverse engineer. The Chinese certainly will have done that and the Iranians might have.
Re: warheads, it takes a lot of expertise to miniaturize a nuclear package to fit a missile of this size. Chem or possibly bio is more likely.
Posted by: Robin Burk ||
03/18/2005 18:41 Comments ||
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#11
N.B.: The Iranians are demanding the Russians launch their targetting satellite as soon as possible. A satellite to pinpoint targets is fairly unneccessary, but used to map terrain en route to targets would be very cost effective.
#12
Assume the worst case, that Iran got the bare system without the targeting computers or terrain maps. That leaves them with two basic problems: building the GIS waypoint list and loading it into the missiles.
Building the necessary terrain maps is almost child's play if done the conventional way. Back in the day I wrote, in a matter of months, a global terrain mapping application that placed terrestrial users and tracked their LOS communications links with LEO satellites and I was no better than an average software engineer. That sort of thing could be adapted to plot waypoint courses in a matter of hours (days at the most). There's relatively solid GIS data available commercially to feed such systems and one can always just dial in a few extra meters altitude at each waypoint to keep the missile from slamming into the side of a mountain so there's no huge obstacle there.
If the Iranians don't want to wing it they have other options. They could, for example, send a GPS-equipped person across northern Saudi Arabia and Jordan to the Israeli border or across southeastern Turkey and Syria to the Israeli border then simply download the list of waypoints from the traveler's commercial GPS (they have several routing solutions, not just across Iraq). I'd imagine they'd have little trouble doing something similar within Israel itself so figure the waypoints / terrain map issue is absolutely moot.
Communicating with the guidance systems in the missiles is also probably not an issue. Assuming the Russians used stolen western commercial microprocessors, derivatives thereof, or systems they themselves documented well, they'll be well-documented and easy to interface with. Nothing beyond the capabilities of any moderately competent electrical engineer.
The only real challenge will be figuring out where to load the waypoints, the precise format required, and how many waypoints can be used / are required. Figure 6 months for a team of particularly dull and unimaginative engineers to completely reverse engineer the primitive operating / guidance system and viola, operational missiles.
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/18/2005 19:47 Comments ||
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#14
Heh I'm with Old SPook but for another reason. The payload capacity of the KH-55SM variant (the nuke capable variant) is about 3300lbs. However these suckers are huge and were only carried by the Bear and Blackjack bombers. Next you have the debka article which doesn't exactly state which variant we're looking at which may add limitations. There are a lot of the anti-ship variants of the Kh-55 that were pushed in the 90s by the Russians for sales abroad which were more limited to tactical ranges and a lot smaller payloads, but had basically the same designation. I'd say at the moment finding out if this is true and then finding out which variants were sold if true is the most important thing right now.
#15
And it is Debka. Traffic volume is probably more important than content. I would not be surprised to hear lots of disinformation from that source in the days running up to any action by Israel.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
03/18/2005 19:55 Comments ||
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#16
The original story was a mea culpa and an admission by the Ukrainian State Prosecutor. Debka has just picked up on that story and filled in some blanks, from their point of view. I also noted that the Ukrainians said that materials related to "radiation weapons" were delivered to Iran. Now, putting a rad weapon on one of these things is a terrible waste of money; but, if you deploy radiation bombs ahead of time it might be a useful distraction, either before or after you launch your nuclear weapons. Last but not least, remember that Iran *also* still has the SHAHAB missiles, and just because they use one weapons system doesn't mean they won't use several.
#17
As another steely-eyed (if near-sighted) missile-man, I too am Old Spook on this.
As we have seen here at Rantburg, roughly analogous (though smaller) weapons can be made by private individuals from commercially available components. The real hang-up is the nuclear package for this missile, but even that may not be out of reach for a nation-state with Iran's resources and worldwide network of sympathizers.
#18
I remember a distant, now dead, relative tell me in the late 90s that, based on his reading of intel, Iran had three battlefield tacticals. (Some how by hook or crook after the USSR fell). Seems they might be small enough for these cruise jobs.
#20
The 1st problem for the Iranians is how to make a warhead small enough to fit the payload capacity of these missles.
The scond problem is how to get them pas air defenses - unlike ballistic missles, these can be spotted and shot down rather easily - the F-14 (back in the 1970's) was designed to look-down shhot-down in order to kill sea skillers that were a danger to US ships. Who is to saythat Israeli CAP would not be able to do the same? Add to that overflight of Iraq and exposre to SAM batteries there...
Not to say these are not a threat (filled with bio or chem munitions), but they are not as severe a threat as ballisitic missles with nuke warheads.
#21
The 1st problem for the Iranians is how to make a warhead small enough to fit the payload capacity of these missles.
The scond problem is how to get them pas air defenses - unlike ballistic missles, these can be spotted and shot down rather easily - the F-14 (back in the 1970's) was designed to look-down shhot-down in order to kill sea skillers that were a danger to US ships. Who is to saythat Israeli CAP would not be able to do the same? Add to that overflight of Iraq and exposre to SAM batteries there...
Not to say these are not a threat (filled with bio or chem munitions), but they are not as severe a threat as ballisitic missles with nuke warheads.
Nice thought having bad guys fight bad guys until they are weak enough for the people to break through, but not happening, per PubliusPundit
Of course Assad's position is bad right now. Everyone already knows that. It isn't news. Whoever is running this site Referring to the original website that broke the "news" is making up a clearly evident situation to be more than it is. The facts, as he reports them, do not stack up one bit.
Read more at the link from several sources in Damascus and such
Posted by: OldSpook ||
03/18/2005 9:32:56 AM ||
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#1
I'm thinking what is going on in Damascus is more "backroom at the Bada Bing" than "les Miserables"...
LONDON — Two sons of assassinated former prime minister Rafik Hariri have fled Lebanon after hearing that they too are in danger of assassination, a media report here said.
"Golden sandals don't fail me now!"
The report, appearing in Independent, said Hariri's elder son, Bahar, has flown to Geneva while Saad has left hurriedly for Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, after warnings that they could be the next targets of their father's assassins.
Riyadh? Did he draw the short straw?
The report also claimed that the United Nations' Irish-led special investigation team would report that the Lebanese authorities have covered up evidence of the murder on 14 February of the former prime minister. According to the report, UN's Irish, Egyptian and Moroccan investigation team has now been joined by three Swiss bomb experts following the discovery that many of the smashed vehicles in Hariri's convoy were moved from the scene of the massacre only hours afterwards - and before there was time for an independent investigation.
Oh, the surprise! I feel faint, I'd best go lie down ...
"(On Sunday), frogmen were sent into the sea off the Beirut Corniche to recover the wreckage of the one car in the Hariri convoy that was not taken away by the authorities because it was blasted over a hotel wall into the Mediterranean by the force of the explosion", it said. "If they successfully recover parts of the vehicle, they may be able to discover the nature of the explosives. First reports that Hariri was killed by a car bomb are now being challenged by evidence that the explosives - estimated at 600kg could have been buried beneath the seafront avenue",
Tossed a car into the drink so it wasn't little.
According to the report, a "unique photograph handed to The Independent in Beirut which is now also in the hands of the UN investigators - was taken on the afternoon of 12 February, about 36 hours before the bombing. It shows a drain cover in the road at the exact spot where the explosion was to tear a 30-foot crater in the highway, instantly killing Hariri and many of his bodyguards".
There's a drain cover in front of my house, too.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 ||
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#1
Authorities here would have cleared the street, too, once the casualties had been taken care of. Major thoroughfares can't be kept blocked for weeks for the convenience of dilatory foreign investigators.
#2
I they seem keep them closed forever in the UK. They take their time for forensic evidence gathering it seems. They set a tent up in the middle of the road and take their time.
#3
Bzzzzzzt - bad answer, good sarcasm though, TW - a blast like that would require complete removal/replacement of the soils at 90-95% compaction to provide a stable road bed for the future. This work had nothing to do with reopening a road...coverup badly done
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/18/2005 11:23 Comments ||
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#4
Consider the nature of public services there in Beruit . . . not non-existent, but not as competent as the immediate clean-up would imply. Maybe they just got a commisioner of roads who is ambitious . . .
Posted by: Jame Retief ||
03/18/2005 12:13 Comments ||
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#5
Those who try to assinate their way to power get really obsessive about others ascending to positions of power, democratically elected or not, in the wake (pardon the pun) of their fathers having once held high office.
The thugs who want to assassinate Hariris sons want the very thing they think Hariris sons might possibly want, namely to make their way to leadership positions, the difference being the thugs want to do it by force in a Lebanon that is not a free and liberated Lebanon.
The crime syndicates who run autocratic regimes in the Middle East and elsewhere are plagued with rival attempts to achieve the exact same autocracy over and over and over again, through one cuop after another. Makes the whole thing seem pointless until the rackett is run down by the worlds superpower doing the right thing for a change. thank you Mr. Bush
Posted by: Annie War ||
03/18/2005 15:59 Comments ||
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BEIRUT - The Syrian army completed on Thursday the first stage of its withdrawal from Lebanon, a pullback of 8,000 troops to the east of the country, a Lebanese military source told AFP. Syrian troops and intelligence services have now evacuated north Lebanon as well as the capital Beirut and positions they held in the mountains that overlook the city, the source said.
According to the source, 8,000 military personnel were involved in this first phase of the pullout. Half of these have been pulled back to the Bekaa valley on the border with Syria while the other half have been withdrawn into Syria itself.
Maybe to take sides in the supposed coup?
Before the pullback began, Syria was believed to have 14,000 troops in Lebanon and an unspecified number of brownshirts intelligence personnel.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 ||
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The regime of President Bashar Assad, said to have fled Damascus, has come under severe strain amid its military redeployment in Lebanon. Lebanese opposition sources said the Assad regime has been divided over the decision to withdraw thousands of troops from Lebanon. The sources said some elements of the military have refused to follow orders for the pullout of troops as well as intelligence agents from both central Lebanon and the eastern Bekaa Valley.
Syria's military was said to have increased deployment around Damascus amid tension within the regime. Opposition sources said the Syrian military has undergone a split, with a rebel faction having taken control over parts of the capital. The rebel faction was said to be led by Syrian Interior Minister Ghazi Kanaan and Firas Tlas, the son of former Defense Minister Mustapha Tlas. The sources said this group, which included Syrian intelligence chief in Lebanon, Maj. Gen. Rustom Ghazaleh and Maj. Gen. Ali Madi, has rebelled against Assad's decision to withdraw from Lebanon.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 11:43:22 PM ||
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#2
If this is a serious split, then SYria will end up boiling into a "Lebanon". Which is a good thing from one point of view: Hezbollah will be caugh in the middle of a hurricane and have no local support (Iran will have a hard time getting things through the infighting in Damascus and Bekka) - and Hamas will have its (mainly Syrian) support almost completely ruptured.
I say hope for a very evenly matched civil war which will wear down both sides militarily and fiscally, to the betterment of all surrounding nations (except Iran).
#3
Sounds like they're talking about a coup by hardliners... not the good guys... I don't know why you'd have your fingers crossed, unless you're hoping against the coup.
#4
OldSpook, how about instead of hoping for the syrians to suffer for years under a civil war, we hope and support the people of syria in their aspirations for a free and democratic country? With our military if neccesary.
#6
Hard line status quo who wants to not budge on the drug and smuggling operations via Lebanon against a stupid but pragmatic Baby Assad? Could be, but it could be his own family against him too. We don't need anything unpredictable right now. Slow and certain is better than fast and uncertain.
#9
There are two reasons I am keeping my fingers crosed. 1. is whenever a thugocrat gets his just desserts preferably of the 9mm variety it is good thing and an object lesson for others. 2. Any government that replaces Assad will almost certainly move towards satisfying the international demands on Lebanon, terrorism, etc. because Syria's current precarious position results from these policies and would be the cause of the coup. I think a worse government would be unlikely.
#10
Indeed it is. I can't believe people are still posting this.
Posted by: Robert Mayer ||
03/18/2005 2:06 Comments ||
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#11
Slow certain death is still death. By Slow I mean 6 months not 6 days and I don't mean 6 years. Assad has to go, we need to be in a position to make sure there is a benifit by whatever happens. We don't need it getting worse.
#12
In recent memory whenever a tyranny fell, it happened quickly (USSR, Romania, East Germany). Once the society reaches the tipping point -- or even just one faction of the ruling clique does -- the tyrant's hold is not just loosened but broken completely. If this were true (a pity it's not, but thanks to publiuspundit for keeping a close eye on it for us), I would expect to see Assad and a very few of his supporters suddenly reappear in Paris or Saudi Arabia, and the situation turn very quickly. The Syrians have seen their rulers unable to quell the situation in Lebanon, and that says they can't pull another Hama massacre. And if they can't, why should the the populace fear, and why should Assad's rivals hold back the knives that have always been in their fists?
The only time where this wouldn't hold true, is if the regime is supported by an outside power running interference. Examples would be Europe supporting Arafat's PA, China supporting North Korea. But even Iran isn't likely to openly stand against the world for their Syrian clients.
I vote with Old Spook: let them fight themselves out if it comes to that, then deal with the result. Either one Baath faction will win, in which case we continue current pressures until it folds; or, the people win, and and we help them get to work on establishing democracy in both Syria and unoccupied Lebanon, inasmuch as is possible -- which may not be very much, given the byzantine politics they so much enjoy; or, the situation degenerates into civil war, in which case no intervention short of MOABs will put a stop to it until they've worn themselves out -- especially as Iran is likely to keep stirring the pot to aid their favorite faction -- but the Syrians then won't be able to devote their attention to Lebanon, which can concentrate on rebuilding its democracy.
That's my opinion, worth exactly what you just didn't pay to hear it. ;-)
#13
LOL. The valuation on your opinion is pretty high in my book trailing wife.
I wonder and worry about blowback from things we may or may not have done years and years ago when stuff comes unglued in this region. These people have long memories and violent way of evening up percieved slights and affronts. Stuff we don't need flowing into Iraq.
I wonder if this coup is actually about Saddams WMDs and goodies. Assad may not even know about them. The hardliners may have them and want to keep their options open with them. Saddam and the Iraqi Baathists are never going to use them, They are Syria's now. I wonder what's the motovations are if this indeed is happening? If it isn't Baby Assad is getting himself ready in case someone tries.
#14
Nothing reported on DEBKA or in the JP. Other blogs report Syrian bloggers have not confirmed anything.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/18/2005 8:30 Comments ||
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It may be shocking to us RBers, but public opinion in Damascus is probably very pro-Assad.
Partly this is due to fear of losing patronage; partly fear of change; partly a bizarre feeling that Syria is the candle in the wind of Arab pride (Elton John could write a song about that - oops he did).
I'm hoping for a military take over but to do it will require someone coming up with a 'Assad has betrayed us' story that has resonance with the locals.
However, the really good news here is that Assad is dependent on the good will of the locals. As Martha used to say, 'and that's a good thing'.
#16
mhw, I can state with confidence that public opinion in Damascus loathes Assad. Most Damascenes are Sunnis Arabs and Assad is a member of an obscure mountain sect that has been murdering Sunnis for years.
#17
Id really like to see a detailed analysis of Syrian politics, which at bottom may be as communal as Lebanon or Iraq (perhaps more so than Iraq). Also we need to distinguish being opponents of the Baath regime, and possible opposition to Assad from WITHIN the Baath power structure. I know little about the latter, which by its nature will be secretive. as to the former, my understanding is the Alawites are proregime, the Kurds are antiregime. The biggest group, the Sunni Arabs, are questionable. The Islamists among them rose against the state and were crushed - OTOH they have no love for us, and may be reconciled to the regime - and of course Assad is sending them into Iraq to die whenever possible. Secular Sunnis would have good reason to support the regime, for protection against the Islamists. The other big groups are Druze and Orthodox Christians (no Maronites in Syria) - im not sure about them.
he is in Damascus this year and will return to the U of Oklahoma in 2006
Josh's Syrian friends range from mildly to very pro Assad. Of course, these are university types and their kin who have a stake in the ruling class remaining the ruling class.
#19
hes the guy publius linked to? the guy who thinks Satloff has been running US policy on the middle east for the last 15 years? who confused phalangists with South Lebanese Army in talking about the site that first reported the non-coup? Excuse me, but he dont impress me much.
#20
"debunked" coups still give the authorities the willies, heh heh. Time for a purge?
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/18/2005 10:00 Comments ||
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#21
LH
I'm not recommending Josh for his analysis of the ME. He has a good education and he is a good writer and analyst but makes mistakes just like other people (especially people who blog). He also has a tendency to accept at face value the arab nationalism that he studies.
I'm recommending him for his reporting of what his coffee buddies are saying to him, what his girl friend's father says to him, what his sports bar buddies say to him, etc.
#22
mhw, you WANT a military takeover in Syria? As in, hardliner Ba'athists who don't want to give up the Bekka Valley and what's hidden there?
not me.
Posted by: too true ||
03/18/2005 11:10 Comments ||
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#23
re: debunked coup, I think the problem is with the term 'coup'. As I read the account, what you have is a refusal to execute policies and carry out orders, but not (yet, at least) a removal of Assad himself.
The latter is indeed debunked, but the former probably is happening.
Posted by: too true ||
03/18/2005 11:12 Comments ||
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#24
Good comment there trailing wife. Few women have the mind to figure out such hi stakes power struggles amongst men. Caroline Glick can do it.
#28
That's ok, Frank. Few man do, either. Most members of both sexes who can are either in the business, or here at Rantburg, methinks. Or quietly and desperately going mad because nobody in their world sees.
Emily might see sea cruise's comment differently, of course. But then, she knows more about sea creatures than I do... being one herself, I presume. But my brother-in-law is former navy, and sometimes we just humour him ;-) (And sometimes he returns the favour, so that's ok.)
Yes I want a military coup. It is true that there are some hardline military types who don't want to leave Lebanon. However, there are those who wanted to leave Lebanon 5 years ago. Most of the Syrian military don't really give a s..t either way.
This, however, isn't really that important. The Syrian military will leave Lebanon -- the only argument is whether they will still have some force in the populated areas for the May elections or whether all the military will be in the Bekaa valley and of course there are a few other issues like the Syria intell service, etc.
The way I see it, the military will depend on the business class (mostly Sunni secularists) for their support. The secularists will want a transition to civilian rule and to the kind of govt which maximizes profits. This probably leads to a stupid Arabist type system of oligopolies for a while but that can be cured in time and, in any case, it would be an improvement over the massive, systemically klepto-socialist mess they have now. The desire for profit will eventually lead the govt to lower their coorperation with Hizbollah (although at first they will learn to maximize skimming off the Iranian assistance that they are supposed to convey).
#31
There is a lot going on here and we only are seeing the tip of the iceberg. Remember Mubarak met with Assad on Wednesday. Anybody want to bet against me that he might have been carrying a message about how to stay healthy from our Prez? Assad-Mubarak meeting from Lebanese Newspaper
Assad Portraits are being disfigured in Beiruit... London Financial Times
BBC reports that the onjly Syrian Troops in Lebanon are in Bekaa (~8000)
Read between the lines and there are three forces at work... Hardliners, Revolutionaries, and Assadites... Civil war looms...
I hope the Prez has some CIA guys trying to pull the right strings and push the right buttons...
The Brits and Froggys are with us on this, the Rus' want Syria out of Lebanon, and are too worried about thge Chechens, etc, to get involved in Syria's internal politix...and the Chinese are too far away... (Remember we & the Brits have a pipeline next door...) The time is right...
#35
Beware irrational exuberance. If the Middle East is beginning to resemble the E. Europe of the 1980s, it's more like 1981, with Solidarnosc just starting to stir things up, than 1989.
Long road ahead, lots of bumps and reverses to come. Let's not get cocky.
#36
If this is a serious split, then SYria will end up boiling into a "Lebanon". Which is a good thing from one point of view: Hezbollah will be caugh in the middle of a hurricane and have no local support (Iran will have a hard time getting things through the infighting in Damascus and Bekka) - and Hamas will have its (mainly Syrian) support almost completely ruptured.
I say hope for a very evenly matched civil war which will wear down both sides militarily and fiscally, to the betterment of all surrounding nations (except Iran).
#37
If this is a serious split, then SYria will end up boiling into a "Lebanon". Which is a good thing from one point of view: Hezbollah will be caugh in the middle of a hurricane and have no local support (Iran will have a hard time getting things through the infighting in Damascus and Bekka) - and Hamas will have its (mainly Syrian) support almost completely ruptured.
I say hope for a very evenly matched civil war which will wear down both sides militarily and fiscally, to the betterment of all surrounding nations (except Iran).
In a move that looks set to increase the political tension in Lebanon, leading opposition MP Walid Jumblatt insisted the country's political opposition would refuse to serve in "any national unity government" while President Emile Lahoud remains in power. The ratcheting up of pressure on Lahoud comes as calls for his resignation increase from those who are not considered opponents of the government, such as former President Elias Hrawi. Jumblatt called on Syrian President Bashar Assad to "to rid the Lebanese of Lahoud by obtaining his resignation."
Jumblatt also commented on Syria's ongoing withdrawal from Lebanon, noting the distinction between U.N. Resolution 1559 and the Taif Accord. The MP expressed full support for the Syrian withdrawal from Lebanese territories as mentioned by the Taif Accord, but objected to the disarmament of Hizbullah stipulated in the U.S.-French brokered resolution. Jumblatt said: "U.S. President George W. Bush does not have the right to give us lessons on whether the resistance is a terrorist group or not. It is a national resistance and a national Lebanese liberation movement that achieved the noble goal of liberating South Lebanon from the Israeli enemy and Israeli terrorism." During an interview with the Hariri-family-owned television station Future TV, Jumblatt insisted that Lahoud's resignation was the only way to "put an end to the regime of intelligence agents that has been installed with Lahoud and to improve Syrian-Lebanese relations."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 10:58:36 PM ||
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looks like Jumblatt sees himself as kingmaker (or king) once Syria is gone - the guy who can reach out to both Hezb on one side, and the establishment Maronites and Sunnis on the other. Should make France happy, too. OTOH, once hes in power, he may find keeping the Hezb "resistance" militia around is fairly uncomfortable - riding a tiger, eh?
The Lebanese security chief yesterday offered to stand trial to clear allegations of negligence in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. Jamil Al-Sayyed, head of the General Security Directorate, however, rejected opposition calls for intelligence officers to quit, saying they would do so only if the opposition won power. "All chiefs of the security organs are ready to stand trial because we don't have any secrets," he told a news conference. "I have decided, on behalf of all those chiefs, to start legal proceedings against ourselves on the charges published and made through the media of shortcomings, negligence, complicity, cover-up or involvement (in Hariri's assassination)," he said. "We are ready to bear the consequences."
"I have decided... to start legal proceedings against ourselves..." I don't think I've ever heard such a statement before, except possibly in Blazing Saddles...
Opposition leaders have called on top security officials, all close to Syria, to step down, saying they could be involved in the Feb. 14 bombing that killed Hariri. The opposition has blamed the blast on Syria or its local allies in Lebanon. Damascus condemned the killing and denied any involvement. "I say to those who are accusing us and demanding we resign or get sacked that if you want us to resign because you won, we are ready to resign voluntarily once you actually win," Sayyed said.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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Syria completed the first phase of its troop pullout from Lebanon on Thursday, bringing Damascus closer to meeting US and Lebanese opposition demands that it quit the neighbour it has dominated for three decades. Washington wants all Syrian troops and intelligence agents out of Lebanon to allow for free elections in May and demands the disarmament of Hizbollah. But Hizbollah, which is backed by Syria and Iran, said it would keep its guns to fight Israel rather than confining itself to politics as demanded by US President George W. Bush.
All Syrian troops and intelligence agents in Lebanon have pulled back to eastern Lebanon or crossed into Syria under a two-stage withdrawal, a senior Lebanese security source said. "It roughly ended," he said, referring to the first phase of a pullout plan announced on March 5. "There are just some logistics left. But the people went, all of them." The source said 8,000 to 10,000 Syrian troops remained in the eastern Bekaa Valley while 4,000 to 6,000 had returned home. A joint Lebanese-Syrian committee was expected to meet in early April to discuss the future of the troops in the Bekaa, he said. Witnesses said the last two Syrian intelligence centres in the coastal city of Tripoli were completely emptied at dawn. They were among the last to be vacated in northern Lebanon.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 00:00:00 ||
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Where does the Syrian Army buy their trucks, the Bronx?
Eight soldiers were killed and 23 wounded in a fierce battle with tribal militants in Pakistan's troubled southwest, the military said on Friday, while a tribal politician said dozens of tribesmen died. On Friday, a day after the clashes in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, bombs exploded in two trains in the troubled region, killing two people and wounding nine. Military officials said the soldiers died on Thursday after gunmen from the Bugti tribe opened fire on a Frontier Constabulary convoy on the outskirts of the town of Dera Bugti. "Eight of our soldiers have been killed and 23 injured," constabulary spokesman Colonel Rizwan Malick said. Baluch nationalist opposition politician Kachkol Ali told reporters in the provincial capital Quetta that at least 50 tribal people died and 150 were wounded in the fighting, which lasted about 10 hours. Dera Bugti is about 150 miles southeast of Quetta.
Railway officials said a bomb exploded in the lavatory of a Quetta-bound train near the town of Mach killing one man and wounding six others. Another bomb went off in a train near the town of Sibi, about 60 miles southeast of Quetta, killing one man and wounding three people. A grenade was also thrown at the house of a railway official in Quetta, but no one was hurt. No one claimed responsibility but officials have previously blamed such attacks on Baluch nationalists. Baluch militants have been waging a low-level insurgency for greater autonomy for decades in Pakistan's largest but poorest province, but they have stepped up attacks on government targets, including natural gas and transport facilities, in recent weeks. Military officials said a ceasefire was agreed on Thursday to allow both sides to collect their dead and wounded from Dera Bugti and this was holding.
A cease-fire, ya said?
The military convoy had been on its way to the remote town of Sui, where there the military has beefed up security since a big militant attack on the country's largest gas field on Jan. 11 disrupted supplies for more than a week. "Around 100 heavily armed tribesmen attacked the convoy comprising around 40 paramilitary soldiers led by a colonel," a military official said on the condition of anonymity. "The soldiers were forced to retaliate." Around 400 tribesmen also attacked a security post manned by up to 20 paramilitary soldiers on the outskirts of Dera Bugti, he said. "The Bugti tribesmen used multi-barrel rocket launchers. The fighting lasted for around 10 hours, despite repeated attempts to reach a ceasefire," he said. "It was a very tense situation."
Afghan police have arrested a suspect in a bombing that killed five people and injured more than 30 in the southern city of Kandahar, a senior officer said Friday. Provincial police chief Khan Mohammed said the suspect was nabbed in the city after Thursday's roadside explosion, which hit a taxi carrying women and children and sent shrapnel flying into other civilian bystanders. Khan refused to give any details about the arrested man, saying a police investigation was continuing.
The bomb went off as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice visited the Afghan capital, Kabul, about 280 miles to the north, for talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. It was her first trip to the country. On Thursday, Khan blamed the attack on rebels from renegade warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hezb-e-Islami group, and the former ruling Taliban. A purported Taliban spokesman, however, denied the hardline militia's involvement.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 10:38:08 AM ||
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RAB arrests terrorist in city, arms recovered
RAB held a notorious terrorist and later seized three arms and 54 rounds of bullet from his den at Azimpur in the city early hours of yesterday. Paribahan Qamrul in a rickshaw was passing through the Azimpur Orphanage crossing at 2:30am. He was held in a drunken state. After interrogation Qamrul was taken to his arms den behind the Population Bhaban and two pistols, one gun and 39 rounds of bullet hidden under the earth were recovered.
What? He was arrested drunk at 2:30am, interrogated and taken to his den to collect arms, and no "crossfire" broke out? What has become of the RAB we know and love?
Legal action was taken against the terror, said a press release.
Well, that's no fun
Outlaw held in Rajshahi
Mar 17: A top listed criminal and front-ranking leader of the outlawed Purba Banglar Communist Party (PBCP) was arrested today from Naodapara under Shah Mukhdum police station in the city. Being informed, Detective Branch (DB) police of Rajshahi Metropolitan Police (RMP) conducted a sudden raid and arrested the extremist leader, Mohabbat Hossain alias Ukil, 32, son of Ashraf Ali, from his residence at Baigachha village under Baghmara upazila of the district. The arrested is an accused in five criminal cases, including two sensational murder ones, and has been hiding for last couple of years. He is a chargesheeted accused in the UP Chairman Golam Rabbani murder case of Baghmara police station.
Ctg arms haul case accused held in capital
A charge-sheeted accused in the country's biggest-ever arms haul case was arrested at Mirpur in the capital on Thursday, about a year after the seizure of 10 truckloads of arms and ammunition in Chittagong. Tipped off, the Mirpur police raided a house, Habib Manjil, in Lalkuthi area at about 2:30am and arrested Haji Yakub Ali, one of the 43 accused in the case. Yakub was sleeping when the police raided the house. Yakub, who hails from Purba Bagkhail village in Patiya of Chittagong, went into hiding after the police and the coast guards seized the arms and ammunition stuffed in 1,463 wooden boxes in the trucks at the Chittagong Urea Fertiliser Limited jetty on April 2, 2004. The boxes contained 4,930 sophisticated firearms, 27,020 hand grenades, 840 rockets, 300 accessories of rocket launchers, 2000 launching grenade tubes, 6,392 magazines and 1,140,520 ammunition.
Wow, that's a big shipment, even by Islamic standards.
The police said Yakub often visited Dhaka since the recovery of the arms and ammunition and would stay at Habib Manjil, owned by one Mohammad Nasiruddin. He last came to the city on March 15. Yakub and Nasir are the followers of a pir, spiritual leader, in Chittagong, the police said quoting Yakub. With the arrest of Yakub, nine of the 43 accused have so far been arrested while three others surrendered before the court. Eleven of them are in jail as one got bail. Thirteen others accused also took bail while the remaining 18, including the prime suspects Hafizur Rahman, Haji Abdus Sobhan and Din Mohammad, are absconding. The police lodged two cases, one under the arms act and another for arms smuggling, with the Karnaphuli police accusing 43 persons in connection with the recovery of the arms and ammunition. The investigation officer of the arms case, assistant superintendent of police of the Criminal Investigation Department AKM Kabiruddin, submitted the charge sheet accusing 43 persons and implicating 114 persons as witnesses in June while the IO of the smuggling case, ASP Meer Nawsher Ali, submitted the charge sheet in November keeping the same persons as accused and witnesses.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/18/2005 8:42:58 AM ||
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#1
Well the obvious question is what the heck were they going to do with those arms? Is AQ involved?
KATHMANDU - The editor of Kantipur, Nepal's biggest daily, said he was grilled by police on Thursday for a report in which the number of protestors arrested by police during countrywide anti-monarchy demonstrations was published.
"And if'in you don't start talkin', we'll have ya parboiled!"
Editor Narayan Wagle said he had been summoned to appear before police Thursday morning. "I was told the news report in my paper which said around 750 protestors across the country had been nabbed for holding anti-king protests on Monday, had gone against the spirit and norms of the royal proclamation of February 1," Wagle told reporters, referring to King Gyanendra's assuming of absolute power in Nepal last month.
"The police did not ask me to sign any papers or to be present before them in future," he said. "I was summoned just to discuss the matter with them." Lawyer Ram Krishna Nirala, who accompanied Wagle, said: "We told the police that they cannot summon journalists to clarify news reports. It should be done by concerned officials but not by police."
Journalists have been under pressure since Gyanendra's February 1 seizure of power and declaration of emergency rule, in which severe restrictions have been slapped on the media. Five journalists have been detained without trial.
Following the king's power grab, the International Federation of Journalists said about half of Nepal's newspapers had ceased to publish, at least 600 journalists had already lost their jobs and a further 1,000 could be out of work if press censorship remains in place.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/18/2005 12:05:04 AM ||
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SRINAGAR, India - Indian troops have shot dead five Islamic militants during a bloody clash sparked by a raid on rebel hideout in a village in revolt-hit Kashmir, an army spokesman said on Friday. The rebels were killed during a night-long gunbattle in Sonabari village near the southern health resort of Kokernag, he said. "The fighting erupted when soldiers raided a hideout on receiving a tip-off that militants were hiding there," he said.
"And we'd like to say a big thank you to Mahmoud the Weasel," he added.
The rebels, equipped with automatic rifles and grenades, had ignored calls to surrender.
"We ain't comin' out, and youse can't make us!"
"Oh yeah? Let'em have it, Mukkarjee!"
[Ka-BOOM]
"Rosebud ..."
The village was under siege early Friday as the security forces searched for rebels who may have escaped from the hideout. "The firing has stopped but the cordon is on and searches are under way," the spokesman said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/18/2005 12:01:01 AM ||
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Nigeria on Wednesday proposed a new African panel to hear cases of atrocities in Sudan's Darfur region in apparent opposition to European calls for trying cases before the International Criminal Court (ICC). The surprise memorandum from Nigeria, which holds the African Union presidency, came days before the UN Security Council plans a vote on a resolution on Sudan that seeks to impose targeted sanctions on individuals involved in the Darfur conflict and specify where to try perpetrators of atrocities. The Nigerian note, addressed to the European Union, proposed an "African panel for criminal justice and reconciliation" to prosecute those suspected of war crimes in Darfur and also to provide for reconciliation. It said the proposal enjoyed "the support of the government of Sudan."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/18/2005 12:00:01 AM ||
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#1
Does Nigeria have time for this? I seem to recall they have troubles of their own.
#4
On one hand, regional responsibility seems a fine thing, and each group of nations dealing with its own problems.
On the other hand, I have reasons to mistrust it: Throughout the third-world (and CIS too) there seem to be growing (or atleast not receding) movements of so-called "anti-colonialism" or "anti-imperialism" which in reality are merely a pretense for the case of regional or racial or religious unity in opposition to democratic pressures by Europe or the United States: in short they label the cause of democracy, freedom, human rights nothing bu "colonial intervention" -- but they look the other way in the face of the most brutal neighbourly oppression, imperialism or massacre.
"Indiofascists" in Latin America hating white folk -- black racists in Zimbabwe and South Africa trying to erase any elements of colonial past, blaming all that goes wrong to that past -- CIS nations condemning the Orange Revolution as "Western interventionism" -- Arabs calling the very existence of Israel as "colonial state".
So in short: "new African Panel" -- is the rejection of ICC a way to reject Western pressures and "Western values" in the cause of blind African "solidarity"? If so, that's a very bad thing.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
The United States has warned of an Al Qaida attack on Western oil employees in the Gulf. The State Department has alerted Americans of the prospect of a range of attacks in the Middle East and Gulf region. Officials said Al Qaida could be targeting Westerners who work in the defense and oil sectors of Gulf Cooperation Council states, particularly Saudi Arabia. "The department is concerned that extremists may be planning to carry out attacks against Westerners and oil workers in the Gulf region," the department said in a March 14 statement. "Armed attacks targeting foreign nationals in Saudi Arabia that resulted in many deaths and injuries, including U.S. citizens, appear to have been preceded by extensive surveillance."
Dhamar has been in chaos for several days due to a battle involving the tribe of Hodeibah, in Al-Hada district. It comes after the killing of the son of Sheik Ahmed Hussein Al-Hudaibi. Different kinds of light and heavy weapons are being used in this battle. The security forces have failed to contain the battle. Though 12 military vehicles arrived, they were compelled to withdraw. The tribal battles take place frequently, while the government finds them hard to control.
Prosecutors on Friday interrogated a retired army officer over the dramatic roadside assassination attempt against Anatoly Chubais, an architect of Russia's privatization program of the 1990s. Late Thursday, police detained a retired military officer and explosives specialist on suspicion of involvement in the attack after authorities tracked down a possible getaway car. The Defense Ministry identified the suspect as 57-year Vladimir Kvachov, a retired colonel who had also worked as a civilian employee of the ministry. The Kommersant newspaper said he was an Afghan veteran who had served in the Soviet GRU military intelligence agency and was decorated for bravery several times. The Interfax news agency quoted an unnamed investigator as saying the retired military officer was one of the army's leading specialists in sabotage techniques. He said police also suspected his 30-year-old son of involvement. The news agency quoted the official as saying the attack might have been carried out "for ideological reasons."
Anatoly Chubais, head of Russia's state power monopoly, survived an assassination attempt on Thursday by assailants who detonated a roadside bomb and sprayed his convoy with automatic gunfire. 
A militia leader in the Solomon Islands has been jailed for life for the murder of Catholic priest Father Augustine Geve, a cabinet minister, in 2002. 
TUCSON - A federal grand jury Wednesday indicted two Syrian men on charges of impersonating U.S. citizens after Border Patrol agents stopped them in southern Arizona and found an undocumented Mexican immigrant in their car. According to a criminal complaint, 
The regime of President Bashar Assad, said to have fled Damascus, has come under severe strain amid its military redeployment in Lebanon. Lebanese opposition sources said the Assad regime has been divided over the decision to withdraw thousands of troops from Lebanon. The sources said some elements of the military have refused to follow orders for the pullout of troops as well as intelligence agents from both central Lebanon and the eastern Bekaa Valley.
In a move that looks set to increase the political tension in Lebanon, leading opposition MP 
The Lebanese security chief yesterday offered to stand trial to clear allegations of negligence in the assassination of former Prime Minister 
Syria completed the first phase of its troop pullout from Lebanon on Thursday, bringing Damascus closer to meeting US and Lebanese opposition demands that it quit the neighbour it has dominated for three decades. Washington wants all Syrian troops and intelligence agents out of Lebanon to allow for free elections in May and demands the disarmament of Hizbollah. But Hizbollah, which is backed by Syria and Iran, said it would keep its guns to fight Israel rather than confining itself to politics as demanded by US President George W. Bush. 
The arrested is an accused in five criminal cases, including two sensational murder ones, and has been hiding for last couple of years. He is a chargesheeted accused in the UP Chairman Golam Rabbani murder case of Baghmara police station.
SRINAGAR, India - Indian troops have shot dead five Islamic militants during a bloody clash sparked by a raid on rebel hideout in a village in revolt-hit Kashmir, an army spokesman said on Friday. The rebels were killed during a night-long gunbattle in Sonabari village near the southern health resort of Kokernag, he said. "The fighting erupted when soldiers raided a hideout on receiving a tip-off that militants were hiding there," he said.
Nigeria on Wednesday proposed a new African panel to hear cases of atrocities in Sudan's Darfur region in apparent opposition to European calls for trying cases before the International Criminal Court (ICC). The surprise memorandum from Nigeria, which holds the African Union presidency, came days before the UN Security Council plans a vote on a resolution on Sudan that seeks to impose targeted sanctions on individuals involved in the Darfur conflict and specify where to try perpetrators of atrocities. The Nigerian note, addressed to the European Union, proposed an "African panel for criminal justice and reconciliation" to prosecute those suspected of war crimes in Darfur and also to provide for reconciliation. It said the proposal enjoyed "the support of the government of Sudan."
