The qualifications of the conservative chief justice of the supreme court, Fazil Hadi Shinwari, are being questioned in the wake of his controversial ban on cable television. Shinwari does not appear to meet the requirements for the post set out by the 1964 constitution, which is the law of the land under the Bonn Agreement. He is over the age limit of 60 and has not received an education in secular law. He's also an Islamist, and one thing Afghanistan's got is more than enough Islamists telling everybody in sight how they're supposed to behave and thinnk.
But Shinwari, speaking to IWPR in a rare interview, defended his recent decision and insisted that he has the right to continue to hold his post. "I think the knowledge I have in Islamic studies and principles is enough for a chief justice," he said. "I will never accept and am not obliged to learn any law or regulation opposing Islamic law." But he acknowledged that "there are some foreign rules and regulations that are similar to Islamic laws, such as human rights, and I will never oppose them". "Don't need none o' them there books. Ever'thing I need to know, it's right there in the Koran."
Shinwari, who is Pashtun, was born in 1930 in rural Nangahar province, eastern Afghanistan. He received his primary education from his father, who was a mullah, and other religious scholars. In 1945-46, he studied at the prestigious Dewband Madrasa in India, and he was also educated in Afghanistan in an Arabic madrasa. Former president Burhanuddin Rabbani appointed Shinwari to the supreme court in December 2001, just before the Bonn Agreement was adopted. President Hamed Karzai made him chief justice in June 2002, under the new legal system.
Because of the precarious balance of power in Afghanistan, they're stuck with this Islamist yokel, an ignorant xenophobe of the same stripe as the Talibs. The country's not going to turn around until this sort of person is sidelined, sent back to the madrassa to pore over fatwahs, while people with real legal training come up with some sort of code of laws that involves the concept of individual liberty. If that doesn't happen, then Afghanistan is nothing but West Pakistan.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 01:23 pm ||
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#1
This is why Afghanistan was picked as "the base" for al Qaida. A remote, land-locked backward area where a little jiihad and some greased palms will make a cozy nest for terrorists. They may never be right in our point of view, but having a nest of hornets and nutcases walking amuk in the NWFP in Pakistan next door does not help. It is hard to do open heart surgery when one is running a marathon.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 13:41 Comments ||
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#2
But 2 points for being under scrutiny. They want their MTV.
Afghan security sources said on Monday that Minister of Education Mullah Saeid Shahid Kheil and a senior staff of the information department Asadollah Sadouzi of the toppled Taliban regime were arrested during special operations to mop up remnants of the Taliban regime and the al-Qaeda terrorist network. Taliban's trade minister Mullah abdul Razzaq was also arrested during an operation in Oruzgan province of Afghanistan on Tuesday. Asadollah Khaled, one of the political and security officials of Ghazni province said the security forces of the Afghan government, backed by the international coalition forces, arrested a number of remnants of the Taliban and the al-Qaeda terrorist network. The remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaeda network entered the Afghanistan soil via southern and eastern borders with Pakistan after rehabilitation. The Afghan state forces have launched special operations to clean up southern and eastern provinces in cooperation with international coalition forces stationed in that country. Doesn't sound like they were actually rehabilitated in the course of their stay in Pakland.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 11:17 am ||
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#1
I think rehabilitation in Pakistan follows the Taliban program of R&R, ranting and reloading.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 11:27 Comments ||
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#2
Rehabilitation?
"Now quit doing.....bad stuff in Afghanistan, okay?"
"Okay."
Sounds like somebody at Rehabilitation Institute might be picking up some fast cash dimeing these guys out when they head back over. They've been getting some pretty good scores lately.
Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein should consider stepping down to sacrifice himself for his country and end the bloodshed of Iraqi citizens, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister said Tuesday. "Mr. Saddam Hussein has asked his people to sacrifice for their country, and if the only thing that keeps the conflict going is his presence, then he should listen to his own advice," Saud al-Faisal, a member of Saudi Arabia's ruling family, told reporters.
Saud, responding to questions, repeated remarks he made in an interview by suggesting that the Iraqi leader sacrificially step down. Only one other Arab nation, the United Arab Emirates, has called on Saddam to leave.
The United States says the time has passed for Saddam to depart voluntarily and has vowed to press ahead with the war. Neither the United States nor Iraq has responded to Saudi Arabia's call for peace talks.
Saudi Arabia, which borders Iraq to the south, is the world's leading oil exporter and one of the United States' most dependable Arab friends in the Mideast. But Saud warned that the Bush administration's pursuit of the war is testing U.S.-Saudi relations and has raised Arab suspicions about U.S. intentions.
"It's a relationship that's there, in my mind, to stand, if we have anything to do with it in this country," he said. "But relationships can stand only because two sides work together, hard, at maintaining those relationships.
Critics of President Bush's Iraqi policy fear that U.S. aggression will spread into other Arab countries after the conflict ends, and Saud said the United States has sent a mixed message about its post-Saddam intentions. On one hand, he said, the Bush administration officially denies that it has a hidden agenda that would threaten other Arab nations. But Saud said statements by "prognosticators" and administration officials whom he declined to name suggest otherwise.
"The United States is not an imperialist country, nor is it a warlike country," he said. But "these advisers", he said, are causing "a great confusion in the Arab world about the motives of the United States." Asked if he thought the United States has territorial interests in the Arab world, Saud responded: "I don't think so. I don't think so. But the only people who can clarify that for sure are United States officials."
(Thought this would add interesting fodder for the posts)
#1
Responding, un-named American officials said:
"Territorial interests? What, are you crazy? It's a fucking DESERT! If we were gonna steal land, it'd damn well be GOOD land!"
#2
Cripes, can't anybody read the tea leaves? We are going to give the Paleo's Palestine back(No oil, no water anyway) back, and give the Isrealies the deed to Iraq (Lots of oil, water, hilltops to settle on, big construction projects pending) thereby making everyone a winner!
Eleven people with suspected links to the al-Qaida terror network â including two of the government's most-wanted terror suspects â have been arrested in various parts of Yemen, a security official said Tuesday. The 11 suspects were arrested in various parts of Yemen on Friday and now are detained in the intelligence prison in the capital, San'a, the official said on condition of anonymity. I'm sure that they are very uncomfortable
An Interior Ministry bulletin said Tuesday that two men wanted by the government were arrested last week, but further details were not available. The arrests came amid tightened security in Yemen following the outbreak of the war in Iraq and U.S. warnings of possible terror attacks on American interests in Yemen. Slowly and surely being picked up all over the world
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 01:43 pm ||
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Reported in Al-Guardian 8:10 AM GMT
An Iraqi missile was shot down by a Patriot missile battery before it reached Kuwait, a military spokesman said Tuesday. Good for both the Patriot system and the Kuwaitis.
``Our radars detected a missile launched by Iraq.... It was shot down in southern Iraq before it entered our airspace,'' the army's Lt. Col. Awad Metawtah told Kuwaiti television. He said a Patriot missile hit the Iraqi missile at 9:05 a.m. Sirens had sounded in Kuwait City, warning of what appeared to be at least the 17th missile that Iraq has fired at Kuwait since coalition troops invaded Iraq from Kuwait on March 20. Before dawn Tuesday, an explosion resounded across the Kuwaiti capital, but Metawtah said it apparently resulted from a false alarm. ``A watch center suspected an enemy object in the northern area,'' he told television at the time. ``An anti-missile missile was launched and exploded in the area.'' U.S. Patriot missile batteries have been guarding Kuwait against a series of Iraqi missile attacks. Good shooting, Awad! Keep it up.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 01:52 am ||
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#1
The Patriots have worked better that I expected against the al-Sammy, Frog, Scud, etc. The one that hit the pier next to the shopping mall was a Silkworm/Seersucker anti-shipping missile. Those fly low just above the water below Patriot level. Need to park a couple of warships in close to handle those until we clean out that area they are launched from.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 7:46 Comments ||
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Two Algerians linked with al-Qaeda have been found guilty of plotting to raise money for terrorist activities. Brahim Benmerzouga, 31, and Baghdad Meziane, 38, planned to make money, equipment and propaganda material available to Islamic extremists, Leicester Crown Court heard during the eight-week trial. The two Algerians were also part of an international credit card fraud aimed at raising funds for terror organisations such as al-Qaeda. Benmerzouga and Meziane, who were both jailed for 11 years on Tuesday, are the first people in the UK to be convicted of being linked to al-Qaeda. Bravo the Brits, for sweeping their streets!
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 04:46 pm ||
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THE reporter sacked by American TV for telling the truth about the war is joining the Daily Mirror. Truth hurts
Veteran newsman Peter Arnett was axed by NBC yesterday accused of being a Saddam stooge. He told state-run Iraqi TV the conflict was not going to plan because of fierce resistance and said his Baghdad reports âhelp those who oppose warâ. He joins the Mirror on the day it was revealed that 8,700 bombs have rained down on Iraq in 12 days, including 3,000 missiles over the weekend. After his sacking, Pulitzer Prize winner Arnett said: âI report the truth of what is happening here in Baghdad and will not apologise for it. I have always admired your newspaper and am proud to be working for it.â Well done buddy, no more CNN / NBC censorship of Bush communism
The New Zealand-born journalist was vilified across the US for an interview in which he said: âThe first war plan has failed because of Iraqi resistance. Now they are trying to write another war plan. Clearly, the war planners misjudged the determination of the Iraqi forces. In my TV commentaries Iâd tell the Americans about the Iraqi forces and their willingness to fight. President Bush says he is concerned about the Iraqi people. But if Iraqi people are dying in numbers, then American policy will be challenged very strongly.â Who cares, where is the oil
Arnett, 68, added that there was growing opposition about the conduct of the war. He said: âOur reports about civilian casualties here, about the resistance of the Iraqi forces, are going back to the US. It helps those who oppose the war when you challenge the policy.â On Sunday, NBC praised the reporter for risking his life to deliver news from Baghdad. Gratitudes don't last long
The station said of the Iraqi TV interview: âHe answered their questions out of professional courtesy. He saw it as purely analysis.â But the furious White House said Arnett spoke from âa point of complete ignoranceâ. They day after backing him, NBC cut him loose.
Yesterday Arnett said on NBC: âI want to apologise to the American people. It was clearly a misjudgment talking to Iraqi TV. Iâm not anti-war. I said what we all know about this war. But Iâve created a firestorm and for that Iâm sorry.â Asked about his future, he joked: âThereâs a small island in the South Pacific Iâll try to swim to. Iâll leave.â
Arnett was one of the few TV journalists in Baghdad. He said: âThe Iraqis let me stay because they see me as a fellow warrior. They know I might not agree with them. But Iâve got their respect.â The reporter, the first Western journalist to interview Osama bin Laden and the last to interview Saddam Hussein, was accused of peddling pro-Iraqi propaganda while covering the 1991 Gulf War. But he gained much of his prominence for reporting the last conflict with Iraq for CNN. His Pulitzer Prize came for reporting in Vietnam in 1966 for the Associated Press.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 01:28 am ||
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#1
"Well done buddy, no more CNN / NBC censorship of Bush communism "
#3
Yesterday this was funny, now I just feel sorry for the guy. How pained must he be by the prospects for his own country (now that we're going to let their economy mostly tank) and its shameful role in this matter to lash out like this on a foreign blog?
#4
Just keep your eyes closed for realities, like the 7 women and children killed at a checkpoint in the operation "liberation - free Iraq".
For as long the ostrich politics works, see no evil, hear no evil.
"Whatch CNN be the first to know", bwah what a farce.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 3:04 Comments ||
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#5
One of the long term benefits of this war has been to force the authoritarian fascist left to show its true colors. Our friend Murat, for example, clearly defines freedom and truth in terms of support for the ravings of the Saddamite propaganda ministry, this being practically all we heard from the Stalinist liar Arnett while he was in Baghdad. Nobody blocked NBC's door to force them to fire Tailwind Pete, but Murat's totalitarian colleagues and fellow fifth-columnists have, in fact, tried that with the "corporate media" including CNN. This is nothing but a rationale for censorship. The real farce, Mu-rat, is you and the rest of the pacifascist mass-murder and suicide bomb apologists pretending to give a rat's ass about the lives of Iraqis.
#7
"HOME OF THE FREE: ARNETT JOINS MIRROR"
From reporting for the biggest,most preistigis news orginazations,to working for a gossip-printing,tabloid rag.
How does that bullet wound in your foot feel?
Hey Mu-rat,looks like you are going to have company being irrelavant and ignored.
#8
What I don't think you realize is, the definition of what makes a nation, organization, etc. great, does NOT have to hinge upon a single incident (or two). It is more about how great its average performance is in comparison to others. The AVERAGE performance of the US in ALL areas (including: human rights, humanitarian effort, foreign policy, etc, etc, etc)is a cut above the performance in these areas by just about any other nation throughout thier long histories.
How else does a country become the cultural, scientific, human rights, political, economic, etc etc (ad nauseum) hub of the entire world???
Many people may not respect some act or acts committed by the US, but NONE who know the truth can fail to acknowledge the fact that when anyone has a problem -- the US is always looked to for a solution!!!
Quite frankly, I'm tired of the whole affair - I'd rather quit the war in Iraq - bring our troops home, and let all of the morons out there wipe each other out -- we can take care of OURSELVES without YOUR help... Lets see how all of these other nations do when we compete with them on an even economic footing, not using trade resitrictions that actually favor foreign companies.....
Posted by: steve ||
04/01/2003 5:53 Comments ||
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#9
This is supposedly Arnett's first article for the Mirror. Do not read it immediately after eating. Do not be surprised if it is difficult to pull up either (I had to keep trying over 15 minutes to get it to work......don't these lefties have decent servers???)
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/page.cfm?objectid=12795678&method=full&siteid=50143
Ok, Murat, I'm confused.....Bush is a commie? I thought you guys thought he was a nazi. Next you'll be saying he voted for Nader......
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 6:04 Comments ||
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Murat:
dead Iraqi civilians?
That's what happens when Saddam uses human shields and suicide bombers, and hides his troops among civilians.
Cause - effect
They did not start off like this.
If the troops think it is kill or be killed, they will kill and rightly so. That van was given warning shots, it refused to stop. For all they knew it could've had a bomb-bunny in it
#12
Hey Murat, when the war's over and the real truth about what happened comes out, are you going to own up to your nonsense? Or will you be too busy trying to emigrate to the newly democratic Republic of Iraq?
#17
That WAS good. Not as good as the earlier mentioned "Operation Zionist Infidel Crusader", but good enough to earn my vote as funniest blog Troll.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
04/01/2003 10:01 Comments ||
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#18
Fred, eniough is enough. Murat is a troll or a propagandist. "Bush Communism"? Give me a break. Fred its time to send Murat off to make his own weblog if he wants to do pure propaganda.
And Murat, you racist ignorant Turk, what say you about your Racist Genocidal Kemalist government and how it had attempted to "ethnically cleanse" the Kurds and Armenians, hmm? Still no answers to the charges history, recent and ancient, brings against your pathetically backward country? Typical - you are all bluster and no guts. Typical Turkish Coward. Go grow a mustache to make up for the internal mahood you lack.
#20
OldSpook. It's like TV. You don't like what's on, you turn the channel. In my humble opinion, Murat's an idiot. An amateur idiot. But let him post his crap, either ignore it or comment on it, and move along to the next post. Don't let him get to you. I know that's hard sometime. Believe me, I know.
#21
I've been leaving Murat's posts in because they've been tied to news items. It's good for us to get regular doses of news from the other side - though I agree he's crossing the line lately. News from the other side, yes; picking fights, no - though some commenters seem willing and able to wade in with bare knuckles and the occasional bludgeon.
I try to build a daily summary of the war on terror. I'm going to start deleting or modifying articles that are posted to pick fights. Most of us don't have the time to waste on that nonsense.
Murat, please observe basic courtesy toward other readers and posters. And the link goes in the bottom box on the GuestPoster screen.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 14:02 Comments ||
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#22
Fred, Fair enough - thanks for the response. And a couple of his posts are fairly informative, when he doesnt go off the rails editorially & inflammatorially, especially to demonstrate what distortions the "other side" accept as "truth".
As for the bludgeon...
(in my best imitation Saddam voice)
No, thats not me, nevermind the bloodied (verbal) baseball bat I'm holding behind my back.
Dominique de Villepin stepped into the lion's den in London when he came to deliver a lecture to the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a bastion of the British military-political establishment. The French Foreign Minister soothed the British with promises of mending friendships after the war, obligatory references to "shared values" and wartime alliances, even invoking the spirit of De Gaulle and Churchill. He looked ahead to a world in which the Security Council took decisions "by consensus" without saying what should happen if there was none. Presumably nothing. If something happened, it wouldn't be the UN, would it?
One thing he did emphasise. The UN should take control of Iraq after the war. His words were: "The UN must be at the heart of the reconstruction and administration of Iraq. The legitimacy of our action depends on it. We must come together to build peace together." As Tonto was reputed to have said, "What you mean 'we', white man?"
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 05:01 pm ||
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#1
The cheese eating, surrender monkeys who lost their stinking country twice in the last century want to reap the spoils of war without putting anything at risk. Send this Perrier swilling waiter back to the bordello he came from!
#2
There's been a steady, but interesting transition of the Franco-Germans position vis-a-vis post-war Iraq.
About a two weeks back: "You swine will come crawling back to us and the UN after the war! You will need us! We will make you grovel for our help and you'll be sorry then!"
About a week back: "We demand to be a part of the administration of Iraq! You cannot deny us our right to participate!"
Now: "Oh, please, please, pretty please! Let us be a part of post-war Iraq!"
Posted by: Patrick Phillips ||
04/01/2003 17:34 Comments ||
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#3
Anything less than the abject humiliation of this arrogant prick as well as Chirac will be self-defeating. An example has to be made. No French involvement and full cancellation of all deals prior to liberation. Expose all Sanctions-busting trade and WMD's. Once Chirac is out of office, he's exposed to prosecution for bribery charges
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 18:36 Comments ||
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#4
Sorry, you slimy pimp. No French need apply. And pass the word to that midget at the UN.
PARIS - A French climber who calls himself "Spiderman" scaled the 47-story headquarters of oil giant TotalFina Elf outside Paris on Tuesday to protest the war in Iraq. I wonder if he realizes how ironic this is - it's all about French oil interests
Wearing a shirt with the message "No war," Alain Robert reached the top of the office tower in less than an hour. At the top, he unfurled a flag with the same slogan. Police greeted Robert at the top of the building, located in the La Defense financial district west of Paris, and escorted him to the ground floor. "I wanted to protest against the war because I'm an idiot I find the war completely illegal," Robert told reporters, as police led him away. It wasn't clear whether he would be charged with being an idiot criminally.
#2
This is about the fourth article today I've read that has the "illegal war" message planted in it. Sigh...you think they'd get a clue. The word games were for Clinton. Bush doesn't play.
Vandals have defaced one of the biggest British war cemeteries in northern France with graffiti condemning the US-British invasion of Iraq, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) said. Insults aimed at British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George W Bush were sprayed in red paint over a monument to Britain's dead from World War I and discovered by a gardener last Thursday. "It was removed by the afternoon but not before a couple of coach loads [of visitors] had been through and seen it - we are pretty hacked off and I am pleased to say the French authorities are too," Tim Reeves said, the CWGC's representative in France.
The words "Rosbifs [British] go home! Saddam Hussein will win and spill your blood" were painted in French over the base of the cemetery's main monument - an obelisk topped by a cross. On one side was a swastika and the words "death to the Yankees". Also daubed were the words "dig up your garbage, it is fouling our soil," and "Bush, Blair to the TPI (International Court of Justice)". Some 11,000 British dead are buried at Etaples, which lies on the Channel coast around 24 kilometres south of Boulogne.
"This violation of a burial place, scandalous in itself, is an attack on the memory of the sacrifice made by the British and American soldiers who contributed to the liberation of our soil," local member of parliament, former Socialist arts minister Jack Lang said. "Our disagreement with the British and American governments [on Iraq] can in no way justify any assault on the memory of men who sacrificed themselves for our country," he said. We'll remember this too, Mr. Chirac. You're the one responsible for stirring up this pot of hate, now stew in it!
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 02:12 pm ||
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#1
Well hey thats no surprise to me, where else would some young punk French spoiled brats go to express their annoyance against British or American soldiers? - Somewhere where any American or British soldiers cant get up and kick their french little pansy asses. Thats a psych 101 no-brainer. Of course they are "big-shots" in a cememtery.Its the only place they can attempt to act like they have some balls.......among the defenseless dead.The funniest part is that they used a Swastika.... I guess they never read a history book. The reason why they are able to walk free, are because those brave young men are buried there, and is because we, The Americans and the Brits, fought to stop that Swastika - Furthermore the pansies that are their fathers that spawned them, were afraid to fight that Swastika. If they liked it so much - they should have told us back in 1941. We all would have loved to have our Grandfathers and Uncles come home, instead of defending them.
Posted by: True American ||
04/01/2003 14:40 Comments ||
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#2
Chirac is 100% to blame for this hate. He's the one who is going to pay. We actually fought for these people, can you believe that. What were we thinking, look how they pay us back. Telling us the men who died for them are garbage.
Posted by: George ||
04/01/2003 14:43 Comments ||
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#3
What a disgrace. Let's see if the gendarmes let this one slide. Mr. Chiraq and his countrymen must be so proud.
#4
I'm kind of impressed that they bothered to quote the "Rosbifs" insult accurately, rather than just translate it. It is, of course, a term for the British of the same type as "Frogs" for the French, "Krauts" (or "sausage-eaters") for the Germans, etc. You make fun of what people eat, in this case the Roast Beef of Olde England.
Posted by: John Thacker ||
04/01/2003 15:31 Comments ||
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#5
Guess that makes me a Haute Dogue. Those idiots, they even get the swasitka backwards. Nothing more pathetic than a French Fascist.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
04/01/2003 15:52 Comments ||
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#6
Good luck yelling for help the next time the Krauts roll over your asses...
#8
yeah, but you kept it in regular fonts - when I see Murat-work (all caps) I know not to waste my time reading his drivel. Scumbags? my ex called me worse than that ;-)
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 18:42 Comments ||
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#9
When they find out who's responsible, what will the French do with the culprits?
A) give them the Legion de Honneur
B) give them a parade down the Champs-Elysee
C) appoint them to the Executive Board of Total-Fina-Elf
D) give them 10000 frequent flyer miles on Air France
E) all of the above
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 20:22 Comments ||
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#10
I'd suppose these were some radical jihadis out of the slums of Paris. They might not have the French nationality.
The spelling of "rosbeef" is interesting indeed. No French would ever spell that insult this way. It's always "rosbif". Then again they didn't even spell "Sadam" the right way and the swastika is wrong as well.
ha ha April Fools! Edited
In statements aimed at smoothing relations with the United States, French leaders on Thursday warned against anti-Americanism and said they were on the "side of the democracies" in the war in Iraq. Notice they don't actually say the "US"
"It is indispensable to be vigilant against all displays of anti-Americanism, which would be unacceptable," spokesman Jean-Francois Cope quoted Raffarin as telling representatives of Parliament at a meeting Tuesday at the prime minister's office. Not exactly a "we support you" type statement
Villepin, who last week refused to answer a reporter's question about whom he wanted to win the war, declared on Tuesday in Parliament that France was firmly behind its allies. Notice how he doesn't say "US".
"How far behind?"
"Fifty, sixty miles, I'd say..."
The foreign minister called Saddam Hussein the leader of a "cruel and dictatorial regime," and said it was France's responsibility to back the side of law and peace. Notice how he doesn't say "US".
"In the war, this responsibility naturally leads France to stand at the side of its allies, on the side of the democracies," he said, apparently referring to the United States and Britain. "Apparently" he didn't actually say "US and Britian. The weasel wording continues but edited for length ,
I'd guess "on the side of the democracies" is referring to Belgium and Germany. I don't see anything about us, either...
"France does not turn on its friends, because it doesn't have any" declared Christian Poncelet, the president of the French Senate. "They have taken a position that is not ours, but that in no way dents our good relations." hahahahahahahahhaaaaahahhah sniff...ah..heh heh!
#1
Too late. See above story on the desecration of a WW1 British cemetery in France.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 14:21 Comments ||
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#2
if france wants to smooth relations they can act. They could have approved release of oil for food without snipping about the wording. They didn't.
Now they could support UN participation in humanitarian relief without getting hung up about UN political control - they could compromise and accept a limited UN political role, rather than hold out for full UN control as condition for post-war aid and help. Better yet they could simply retroactively state that the war is justified.
#3
The 40 bil or so in weasel banks in the Oiiiiiillllll for Food program belongs to the Iraqi people. It needs to go to them. We need to keep this in the public arena and need to demand an accounting of it. Kofi and Chiraq need some scrutiny---big time.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 14:50 Comments ||
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#4
I hope as a nation we never forget about what France and Germany have done to us. They actively conspired against us, raising the risk for our soldiers in the field. No amount of trying to play nice now should fade those memories. FRANCE IS EVIL. GERMANY IS EVIL.
Posted by: g wiz ||
04/01/2003 14:53 Comments ||
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#5
These people are toast and they know it. Let them twist in the wind forever as far as I care.
Due to our kindness and your willfull blindness we shall let you peek into the future.
In the future, NATO (though it may go by another name) will emerge a world-wide body representing responsible governments across the globe. Russia and China are already interested. Expect NATO peacekeeping duties to pop up in Afghanistan within the year. You are not invited to participate (this is a gentleman's club)
Meanwhile, the United Nations will continue to function as the arbitor of doublespeak, Halloween diplomacy, and meaningless resolutions. Feel free to veto anything that offends you...our admin assistants are standing by to hear your complaints.
Let's not go overboard here, and end up as bad as those we condemn. It isn't the French people as a whole that are evil, just those at the top, and the ones that support them. The same thing is true of Germany, and TGA reminds us. Let us condemn those who are truly responsible: Mr. Chirac and Schroder. Both represent the Socialist parties in their respective countries.
While those who have stuck their hand in the till should be held accountable, they don't represent ALL the people in their respective countries. I fully back a response - mainly by turning our back to these slimeballs in power - but I don't want to stoop to classifying two entire nations, each with millions of citizens, as being "evil". Hussein, on the other hand is truly evil, and those who have profited by dealing with him should lose everything they have gained.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 17:24 Comments ||
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#8
Of course france doesn't turn it's back on friends - in their minds there are similar interests, no friends. The anglosphere and some east european countries will form a firmer coalition than NATO ever was
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 19:02 Comments ||
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#9
Georgie Patton. Sixty miles ain't far enough...
#10
German opposition leader Angela Merkel has just reaffirmed her backing of US policy and the Iraq war. Not an easy thing to do as the populace is against it and even many members of her conservative CDU party would prefer to keep a low profile for now. Some say she is ruining her chances for 2006, I say the lady has balls, so to speak. And she seems to have a pretty clear idea about who is going to run the show in 2006. Not Putin. And certainly not Monsieur Chirac.
The 12-year no-fly mission over northern Iraq that began just after the first Gulf War has ended with Operation Iraqi Freedom, throwing into question the fate of the largest U.S. military presence in Turkey. Goodbye, Turkey.
The final Operation Northern Watch no-fly mission flew March 17, two days before the war began on March 19, said Maj. Bob Thompson, ONW spokesman at Incirlik Air Base in southeast Turkey. The end of the no-fly mission frees up a full wing of aircraft for possible strikes against Iraq. They just wonât attack from Turkey. Aircraft and crews assigned to ONW are now leaving Incirlik, but Thompson declined to discuss their destinations. About 50 U.S. Air Force and British Royal Air Force aircraft and about 1,400 people including pilots, maintainers and support personnel are either returning to home bases, or are redeploying to support the war in Iraq, Thompson said. People are dispersing âfairly rapidly,â he said. âThis is the, no kidding, last act.â The end of the no-fly mission frees up F-15s from the 1st Fighter Wing at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, F-16s from the Indiana National Guardâs 113th Fighter Squadron from Terre Haute and from the 55th Fighter Squadron at Shaw Air Force Base, S.C., as well as Navy EA-6B electronic warfare planes, refuelers and AWAC planes.
Once the war began, the mission of protecting Kurds and other minorities in northern Iraq ended, Thompson said. The Turkish government, which controls Incirlik, is allowing U.S. aircraft to fly over Turkey, but refuses to allow the U.S. to launch offensive missions from Turkish soil. It will take time for the units â including British Jaguar fighter-bombers and refuelers, to be completely gone, Thompson said. Some ONW officers and capabilities will stay at Incirlik under a new command designation. As the new Combined Air Forces North, the group will operate out of the former ONW combined air operations center, or CAOC, to coordinate coalition overflights into northern Iraq with the Turkish General Staff, which controls Incirlik. What remains uncertain is how the end of ONW affects the perhaps 2,000 people assigned to the 39th Wing, the large Air Force support wing. Officials with the U.S. Air Forces in Europe officials did not respond to inquiries by Stripesâ deadline. While the 39th Wing has no aircraft, it does service aircraft transiting to American operations in Afghanistan and Central Asia. The wing also has other responsibilities including wartime and contingency planning, weapons storage, housing, a hospital, communications and training. It has 21 tenant units, as well as separate operations in Izmir, Diyarbakir and other locations in Turkey. It's been real, it's been fun, it just hasn't been real fun.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 01:34 pm ||
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In other news, OSW has been stepped up slightly: thousands of sorties daily covering all of Iraq.
Posted by: Brian ||
04/01/2003 14:49 Comments ||
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Wonder if any of those forces are now comfortably esconced at H2 and H3...
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 14:50 Comments ||
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I know that this is a piddly little thing, however, I would love to say that I'm really going to miss incirlik afb. I had an awesome time there. So their politics don't coincide with ours right now *shrugs*, I can't help that. However, in my humble opinion, as a party place, Turkey ROCKS!.
Italian police have arrested an Egyptian, a Somali and two Iraqi Kurds on suspicion of having links with Islamic terrorist groups, anti-terrorism police said Tuesday. The arrests were ordered by Milan prosecutor Stefano Dambruoso, who has been leading investigations into suspected Islamic cells in Italy. Bruno Megale of Milan's anti-terrorism police confirmed the arrests but refused to say where or when they were made, saying the investigation was in progress. The Italian news agency ANSA and other reports said that two of the men were picked up in Milan and other two in Parma, another northern Italian city. They were planning to leave the country, the reports said. Italian dailies Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica said the arrests were apparently carried out Monday evening and the men were suspected of belonging to an extremist Islamic group based in northern Iraq called Ansar al-Islam. Corriere reported that before the arrests, the suspects' telephone conversations had been tapped for months. Let's hope they have enough to hold them.
Ansar was actually a pretty smart operation: set up in the hinterlands of the most unstable and inaccessible (to westerners) area they could find, with an outward glow of rustic Talibanism, the facade hid Zarqawi's Tawhid operation â which was the real, professional core of Bad Guys â that spread from Kurdistan through Syria, Lebanon, Chechnya, and into Europe and Britain. I wonder where Zarqawi is now?
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 09:36 am ||
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The Belgian Council of State annulled on Monday the decision to extradite terrorist Fehriye Erdal, one of assailants of businessman Ozdemir Sabanci assassination. The Belgian Interior Ministry had decided to extradite Erdal. The Council of State listened to views of the lawyers of the terrorist and the prosecutor on March 20 and said that it would later announce its decision. The Belgian Council of State said that it acted from the view that it had not been proved that the terrorist posed a threat for public security in Belgium as claimed by the Interior Ministry. She just killed Turks, so Belgiums have nothing to fear
Erdal, one of the assailants of the assassination of Sabanci Holding Automotive Group Chairman Ozdemir Sabanci, Toyota-Sa General Director Haluk Gorgun and secretary Nilgun Hasefe on January 9, 1996, was captured in Belgium with a false passport in the name of Nese Yildirim on September 26, 1999. Belgium had rejected Turkey's request for Erdal's extradition due to existence of death sentence in laws and at the same time returned political asylum application of the terrorist. I thought that Turkey had renounced the death penalty as part of their application to join the EU? Murat?
After serving a year in prison, Erdal was taken under house arrest and is waiting to be tried on charges of crimes she committed in Belgium. Carrying a gun, taking part in activities of a crime gang and using false identity are among these crimes. No danger to Belgium at all.
The Belgian Interior Ministry had passed a decree against Erdal's political asylum request two years ago and demanded Erdal's extradition by saying that this person posed a threat for the security of the country. At least they seem not to have lost their minds.
The terrorist firstly applied to the Council of State and provided the suspension of the decision. But, she could not seek asylum again since the mentioned decision was on the agenda and was not annulled. Today's decision of the Council of State gives the right to the terrorist to seek political asylum under the auspices of the United Nations (U.N.) High Commissioner for Refugees. Oh ya, they'll do....something
Judicial sources say that Belgian Interior Minister Antoine Duquesne can take a new extradition decision regarding Erdal.
Interior Ministry officials said that the decision of the Council of State has not officially been notified yet and added that they will make an evaluation after the decision is notified. "We have to kill a goat and examine the entrails. We'll get back to you."
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 08:01 am ||
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Yes true, the death penalty has been renounced, although I don't support a death penalty, rapers and terrorist could have been exceptions.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 8:31 Comments ||
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Turkey turned its back on the U.S. on the Iraq war, and in return it gets - this? A slap in the face from Belgium?
The European Commission raised concerns yesterday over the distribution of aid by British soldiers, and suggested that troops should instead create "humanitarian corridors" to help relief workers do their job in Iraq. Bunch of busybodies.
So far almost no aid has been handed out in Iraq, apart from limited amounts distributed by British troops at Umm Qasr and on the outskirts of Basra. Yesterday the United Nations said it faced its biggest food distribution challenge in its history as it launched a $1.3 bn (£0.8bn) global appeal to save Iraq from mass starvation. The UN World Food Programme unveiled a six-month plan to feed the 27 million Iraqis once the country's food stocks run out in May. James Morris, WFP executive director, admitted a prolonged war would wreck its plans and leave the country facing a humanitarian catastrophe. The UN plan would begin with a month-long programme of emergency help for millions of Iraqi refugees. $1.3 billion? Sounds like that should be available, just ask the French to disburse it from the "Oil for Food" money they're holding.
That would be followed by the distribution of food to the entire Iraqi population for three months, and then a further two months of help for the most vulnerable members of the population, such as the elderly, children and hospital patients. But officials in Brussels warned that aid workers' lives could be put at risk if there was confusion over who was making essential supplies of food and water available. They also conceded that there were cases where it was too dangerous for charities and non-governmental organisations to operate and where troops might have to be used for a short time. How about further conceding that you'll do as you're told in Iraq?
The EU humanitarian aid official responsible for Iraq, Javier Menendez Bonilla, said that the "ideal situation" was for aid to be provided by "humanitarian organisations, which are the ones that have the capacity and expertise". Asked about Basra, he suggested that soldiers could provide security for "humanitarian corridors" which would allow aid agencies to enter the city. Better yet, we'll whack all the Fedayeen hard boys. If you're squeamish, don't watch.
The WFP wants to revive the distribution system used in the oil-for-food programme, which ground to a halt last month. The UN Security Council approved a resolution on Friday to establish a successor to the scheme. Michael Curtis, PR flack spokesman for the European Commissioner for Development, Poul Nielson, said that, in principle, the EU opposed the distribution of aid by the armed forces. "There is a danger that there could be a blurring of the role of aid agencies and the military, and that humanitarian aid workers could become targets," he said. Mr Curtis added that there was a risk of aid distributed by soldiers being given on a preferential basis to particular groups, although there was no evidence this had been done by British soldiers. Thus he attempts to tar the reputation of British soldiers. You might want to stay home, Mr. Curtis.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 02:20 am ||
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UMMM, what nonexistant "refugees" are they planning on feeding? And why the heck are they appealing for money when the oil for food account has billions in it already???
#2
Yesterday the United Nations said it faced its biggest food distribution challenge in its history as it launched a $1.3 bn (£0.8bn) global appeal to save Iraq from mass starvation.
#3
Obviously the WFPers want to keep their jobs, and they must be afraid that if their beloved humanitarian crisis fails to materialize, then this war could damage them much as it has the UNSC.
But I can think of a good troop security reason for not letting them in, at least not yet: throughout liberated villages in S. Iraq, there are still guys who aren't sure whether they want to accept the Allied forces and go with the smart side of history, or whether they want to dig up that AK in the backyard. Continued contact with our troops can only be a good thing, both to keep a trained eye on things, and to start building bridges between the longsuffering Iraqi people and the Best in the West.
Posted by: (lowercase) matt ||
04/01/2003 9:10 Comments ||
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#4
"humanitarian corridors" to help relief workers do their job in Iraq. This will just turn into a "Fayadeen corridor".
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/01/2003 10:52 Comments ||
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"humanitarian corridors" to help relief workers do their job in Iraq. This will just turn into a "Fayadeen corridor".
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/01/2003 10:53 Comments ||
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They just don't want anyone to cut into their their Food-for-KiddieSex Program. A very popular program in the Belgium government.
Posted by: Don ||
04/01/2003 14:09 Comments ||
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Just another idiot attempt to get the United Nations in control. It doesn't matter what, they just HAVE to be the ones 'in charge'. I don't think we really need their help.
If the United States needs some help "withdrawing" the funds from French banks, I volunteer to help.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 15:33 Comments ||
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He's not tarring the Brits, he's tarring US. Seems we handed out some food to a group that was in our favor.
If the UN really wanted to make a point, it would move that program out of brussels into Iraq. After all, the bricks-and-mortar part should be closer to those who need it.
The European Union entered a new era yesterday when it launched its first military operation, taking over peacekeeping duties in Macedonia from Nato. The force â which comprises 320 soldiers â will provide a crucial test of the EU's long-standing ambitions to play a bigger role in the Balkans and the wider world. What color helmets do they wear?
At a ceremony in the Macedonian capital, Skopje, Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy representative and Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, Nato's secretary general, hailed the move as a breakthrough, as they handed control to French Brigadier-General Pierre Maral. Wonder how long before a French officer leaks information to one of the militas fighting in Macedonia?
Lord Robertson said: "A new chapter in European security has opened. By taking on its first military mission, the EU is demonstrating that its project of a European security and defence policy has come of age." That message was echoed in London by Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, who said Europe's security and defence policy "comes of age" with the launch of the operation. One objective is to test whether the European force would be able to assume the much bigger and more complex peacekeeping role in Bosnia — where 13,000 Nato troops are stationed — next year. The EU is hoping to take charge in Bosnia towards the middle of 2004, if the Macedonia operation goes well. Its embryonic military machine knows it must win hearts and minds in Macedonia, because the EU's image in the Balkans is shaped by the memory of the West's failure to intervene speedily to stop the carnage in the Balkan wars of the 1990s. Ask the Dutch about that.
Plans to set up the EU's first military mission were deadlocked for months over an argument about how much it should be linked with Nato. That row was resolved last December and the EU has used the alliance's planning capabilities and will rely on Nato soldiers should the situation there deteriorate. Meanwhile, the overall mission commander is General Rainer Feist, a German who is deputy commander of Nato forces in Europe. Question isn't whether it's an EU or NATO led mission. Question is whether, if people start shooting, the Euro leaders will allow their troops to shoot back. Past performance isn't encouraging.
Macedonia ought to prove a manageable task: its six-month ethnic war ended in 2001 and a multi-ethnic government is now in place. EU troops will operate in small units spread out across the country, with 22 lightly armed and eight heavily armed teams patrolling in armoured vehicles and helicopters. Yesterday's deployment also comes amid speculation that France and Germany will try to forge a "hard core" of EU countries to co-operate on European defence issues — excluding the UK. Belgium is to host a meeting with France, Germany and Luxembourg on the issue at the end of next month. We're going to need a scorecard to know all the military defense groups in Europe.
Britain will hope that the start of concrete military operations in Macedonia will outweigh any Franco-German desire to marginalise the UK, which is the EU's biggest military power. "European defence without Britain is like economic and monetary union without Germany," one EU diplomat said. My money's on the Brits.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 02:05 am ||
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What color helmets will they wear? I expect the design will be based on the EU flag - blue background with a circle of twelve gold five-pointed stars, or, apparently, "on a field azure a circle of twelve mullets or, their points not touching" (I'm kidding ye not, but this website might be). For clarification purposes, I would expect the stars to be enlarged and held proud of the helmet, perhaps attached to springs, perhaps in the form of a halo, perhaps orbiting the head at eye level.
#4
A helmet color scheme like Bulldog describes sounds more like a sighting-in target than a melon protector. Even if the EU gets good, well-disciplined troops im Macedonia, some instant hostilities would require a committee of EU-niks to sort it out before issuing orders for the correct response.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 10:42 Comments ||
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The Dixie Chicks controversy continues with the trio getting some support from former Vice President Al Gore. Gore spoke to a college audience last week on the subject of fewer companies owning more media outlets, and what he sees as the increasing lack of tolerance for opposing views. According to the Tennessean, Gore used recent attacks on the Dixie Chicks that followed anti-war comments by Natalie Maines as an example. Gore told the audience, "They were made to feel un-American and risked economic retaliation because of what was said." (Awww -- tomebody huwt dey widdie feewings, and dey is wisking economic weetaliation, bo-hoo-hoo.)
"Our democracy has taken a hit," Gore said. "Our best protection is free and open debate." Well, hopefully our democracy didn't inhale, Al. So let's see ... the best way to have protected free and open debate was for the people who disagreed with the Chicksy Blix to keep quiet about it, eh?
Record sales have fallen for the Chicks and radio stations across the country banned the trio's music after Maines told a London concert crowd that she was "ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas." Maines later released an apology.
Posted by: John Phares ||
04/01/2003 05:39 pm ||
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What, we're no longer free to vote with our pocketbooks?
#2
"What, we're no longer free to vote with our pocketbooks?"
There's an idea that will never be a plank in the Donk platform!
Posted by: John Phares ||
04/01/2003 18:55 Comments ||
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Al Bore hasn't learned that he's irrelevant yet. I think the 2004 elections will bring the message home to him very sharply.
If not, we can always ask a couple of Marine vets from this operation to make the point in person. The dummycheat party's response to the war effort has seriously divided the party: one side sees the handwriting on the wall, and has been supportive. The other side are blind to all but their own personal opinion, and are fast disappearing from the radar screen.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 19:27 Comments ||
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Al and others confuse the right to free speech with a supposed right to be free from criticism (and consequences) for your speech. I would be delighted if he were the nominee in '04 so he can show his outrage at our misplaced patriotism... yeah, riiiggghhhtt - too good to happen
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 19:41 Comments ||
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Thank God he lost the election!!
I don't recall any government agency saying I couldn't buy one of their CD's. I think I would have noticed that, considering I WORK for one!
Economics, Al.....it's a boycott.....not censorship.
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 19:43 Comments ||
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If the Supreme Court had done their job and allowed the votes to be counted, we would now be enjoying peace and prosperity. It's going to take a hundred years for America to recover from Bush's disastrous leadership. His administration negligently allowed the 9/11 attacks to occur, asleep at their post. They have wrecked the economy, and they have now led us into this disastrous military adventure, a disaster the scale of which will be dawning on us for the next two or three generations, despite our preordained 'victory'.
Yes, trash Gore, but it is only the transference of Republican guilt in the face of incredible failure.
#7
The 9/11 attacks wrecked the economy and led us into a disasterous military adventure, and they accomplished this while sleeping at their post? Zowie!
Posted by: John Phares ||
04/01/2003 20:11 Comments ||
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(Repeated with clarifying modifications)
If the Supreme Court had done their job and allowed the votes to be counted, America would now be enjoying peace and prosperity. It's going to take a hundred years for America to recover from Bush's disastrous leadership. His administration negligently allowed the 9/11 attacks to occur. Bush was asleep at his post. The Bush administration has wrecked the economy, and now Bush has led us into this disastrous military adventure, a disaster the scale of which will be dawning on us for the next two or three generations, despite our preordained 'victory'. Yes, trash Gore, but it is only the transference of Republican guilt in the face of incredible failure.
#9
Wetzel, you mean the Al Gore and his party hacks who's first act in the Florida issue was to strip every servicemember of their fundamental right to vote by getting their absentee ballots thrown out? Hope you enjoy your little Michael "Hindenburg" Moore lovefest. BTW, a Miami paper paid for a recount after the official decision, 8 out of 9 methods of counted showed Bush won and the ninth didn't include the military absentee ballots trashed by the Al Gore team.
#10
Notice Wetzel is a euphemism for Weasel? Neither did I
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 20:44 Comments ||
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Wetzel, I am ashamed to admit this, but....I VOTED FOR GORE, OK? And, I'M STILL GLAD HE LOST! Refer back to the Constitution. You may not like the results, but it's over now. Please let it rest.
Maybe I missed something, but I think that the terrorist attacks really started off under CLINTON. Remember the first bombing of the WTC? And the attacks on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania? GWB wasn't the president then. Clinton was "asleep at his post".
It was only a matter of time before the accounting tricks that were prevalent in the '90's came crashing down. It wouldn't matter if Gore or Bush was president; Clinton just got out in time.
So, let me get this straight.....liberal to liberal. You are against this war? So....that means you are on the side of those who rape, torture, and kill? Nice. Real nice.
I could care less why Bush got us into this war. I've learned enough about life to realize that there is no way to truly discern another's motives.
If it keeps Saddam from throwing people into industrial plastic shredders, it will be worth it. If it gives Arabs a shot at democracy (and yes, I think that Arabs want to live in freedom), that will be something wonderful.
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 20:54 Comments ||
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#12
I would suggest this war against the west started on November 4, 1979 when "Student Radicals" overran the american embassy in Tehran. While it is not PC to say this, we are in war of civilization between radical Islam and western civilization.
#14
Al Gore, Al Gore.... was he involved in this country at some arcane level...oh wait he was the guy who potrayed Cooter on the Dukes of Hazard Right.....I found a rutabega in my garden last spring that strongly reflected Al Gores political savvy, turned out it was Al hisself all along..now he just rotting in the mulch, thats about par with lecturing on the college level is it not?
#15
Doug DeBono -- good point regarding the American Embassy takeover. I stand corrected.
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 22:10 Comments ||
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Hey, Wetzel, you ever hear of Bob Brinker? He's a finance guy. January 2000 newsletter GET 100% OUT OF THE MARKET. I did not listen. Market high was March 6, 2000, if I remember correctly.
W wasn't even the nominee yet. So, stuff it on the economy. Smart rich money got out in 1999.
We swam w/the sharks and got eaten alive.
And one other question, in what general election was a voter allowed to vote for 2 candidates for pres? Remember seniors are the most reliable voters and they've been voting over 50 years. One would think after 50 years, they would finally understand the process.
#18
tu3031 -- it worked out better for everyone. Gore gets to be sanctimonious, which is what he enjoys most, and we didn't have to tolerate him for four long years.
Good lord, I sound like a Republican! ;)
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 22:54 Comments ||
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"Yes, trash Gore, but it is only the transference of Republican guilt in the face of incredible failure."
You just look silly in that Dr. Freud beard, Al...
It looks like Madonna's been promoted to... uhhh... Corporal-Major. Let us follow along in admiration while she goes potty...
Madonna has decided to withdraw the violent, anti-war video for her new single "American Life" out of respect for the troops fighting in Iraq. Yeah, right...
In a statement posted on her Web site Monday, the singer said the video was filmed before the war started and was not appropriate to air at this time. "Due to the volatile state of the world and out of sensitivity and respect to the armed forces, who I support and pray for, I do not want to risk offending anyone who might misinterpret the meaning of this video," Madonna said. Nope. None of that Dixie Chick Stuff for me. Not flushing my career down the toilet.
The video for the title track of a new album shows Madonna wearing military garb next to dancers in camouflage on a fashion runway. At one point, a grenade is thrown in the direction of a lookalike of President Bush. Scenes are intercut with images of war. Now I ask you? Who could misintepret that???
The video also shows Madonna trapped in a bathroom stall, where she uses a knife to carve "protect me" on the wall. Well, call me dense, but just what the hell is that supposed to mean???
Warner Bros. Records will be releasing Madonna's new album April 22. The video was scheduled to premiere on VH-l on Friday. The single "American Life" has just been released to radio. ...and we can all hardly wait.
The DRUDGE REPORT obtained the clip, which is by far the most controversial work ever made by the artist.
Scenes of stealth bombers and missile launches are edited with flashes of the American flag, while Madonna is shown urinating on a toilet.
Later, images of mushroom clouds are mixed with innocent faces of Iraqi children.
"F**k It!" Madonna says in the video, moments before she pulls the pin on a grenade and throws it at a President Bush look alike.
The "president" picks up the lit grenade that Madonna throws -- and lights his cigar with it!
The image is "my wish to find an alternative to violence to war and destruction," the singer said over the weekend before deciding to shelve the project. "...It's me being ironic and tongue in cheek."
It's doubtful anything that sophomoric presents a danger to the Republic. And I doubt anyone with Madonna's acting skills can gather much more opprobium. (Thanks to Michelle for the headzup!)
Thousands of Pakistani primitives tribesmen are standing by to fight U.S. and British occupation forces in Iraq, leaders from the country's north-western tribal region said Tuesday. "Government should make arrangements for 10,000 volunteers of this area to take part in jihad against U.S. invading forces in Iraq," Maulana Mohammad Zaman, a religious leader of the Skhakot tribal region bordering Afghanistan, told AFP. The volunteers' program was unveiled as demonstrations continued in various cities of Pakistan against the U.S.-British invasion of the oil-rich Muslim country. Pakistan's foreign office has said the government would not help volunteers travel to Iraq, but similar demands were made at two other rallies in the semi-autonomous region. Perv is trying to avoid making the mistake Bashar made, regardless of what the fundos want. The Paks sent thousands of jihadis to Afghanistan to fight the hated infidels, and they're still trickling home from jug. When it happens a second time, without an adjacent border, we're going to take it as a really, really unfriendly act. The least involvment by the Pak government would be a death sentence.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 03:15 pm ||
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Pakistan's veteran politician and the Secretary General of Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf on Tuesday charged the United States was a killer not liberator of Iraqi people. During an interview with 'IRNA' Meraj Mohammad Khan said that the history would never forgive the US-led allies for their heinous war crimes against the defenseless people of Iraq. He ridiculed US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair's claim that they had unleashed attack to liberate Iraqis from President Saddam Hussein's rule. "The invaders are resorting to relentless slaughter of innocent men, women, children and the elderly. They are killers. Iraqis have risen against them. Liberators are welcomed but US-led allies have been hated," he pointed out. Meraj Khan noted that the invaders had met a miserable failure in their conspiracy to divide the people in Iraq on racial and religious basis. "The Sunni and Shia Muslims were fighting shoulder-to-shoulder to defend their motherland," he said. On the dead bodies of Iraqi Muslims, he contended, the US and its allies were now talking about reconstruction contracts and devising plan to restore `democracy' in Iraq. The PTI secretary general said democracy and peace could not be restored on the basis of sowing seeds of hatred and massacre of people. Doesn't seem like democracy and peace were there to be restored, except among our allies, the Kurds. I think democracy and peace have got to be grown from seedlings.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 11:24 am ||
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Fred---I think that our democracy ideals are going to have a hard time sprouting because so many people there are not wired to code, and I mean that literally, because of the environment of violence, jiihad etc etc. However, we must make a start and at least interrupt the system. Making this change will require some real long range thinking and committment, which we in the western world have been lacking in the last few decades. However, we must do it, and I believe we can. This country--and the world--will be going through a very painful process in the next decade. Hang onto your hats.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 12:51 Comments ||
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OUTSTANDING NEWS!!!
American troops on Tuesday rescued Army Pfc. Jessica Lynch, who had been held as a prisoner of war in Iraq since she and other members of her unit were ambushed March 23, the Defense Department announced.
Lynch, 19, of Palestine, W.Va., had been missing with 11 other U.S. soldiers from the 507th Maintenance Company. The unit was ambushed near Nasiriyah after making a wrong turn during early fighting in the invasion of Iraq. Five other members of her unit were later shown on Iraqi television answering questions from their Iraqi captors. U.S. troops rescued Lynch near where her unit was ambushed, said Jean Offutt, a spokeswoman for Fort Bliss, Texas. The 507th Maintenance is based at Fort Bliss.
Lynch had been listed as missing in action but was identified by the Pentagon Tuesday as a POW. She was not among the seven U.S. soldiers â including the five from the 507th shown on television â formally listed as prisoners of war.
Offutt said she did not know whether Lynch had been wounded or when she might return to the United States.
The rescued soldier's hometown erupted in celebration at the news. "They said it was going to be the biggest party this road had ever seen," Lynch's cousin Sherri McFee said as fire and police sirens blared in the background. "Everybody was really worried ... but we all remained hopeful and knew she would be home," McFee said. Good for them.
Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks at Central Command headquarters in Qatar announced that a U.S. POW had been rescued but refused to provide any further details. In a brief statement, Brooks said: "Coalition forces have conducted a successful rescue mission of a U.S. Army prisoner of war held captive in Iraq. The soldier has been returned to a coalition-controlled area."
Central Command officials in Qatar, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Lynch was rescued from a hospital in Iraq.
Fifteen other Americans are formally listed as missing. The other POWs include two Army Apache helicopter pilots captured March 24 after their helicopter went down.
The 507th Maintenance was attacked during some of the first fighting in Nasiriyah, a Euphrates River-crossing city where sporadic battles have raged since U.S. troops first reached it. Troops and military officials have said much of the fighting there has involved members of the Fedayeen Saddam and other Iraqi paramilitaries who have dressed as civilians and ambushed Americans.
Lynch, an aspiring teacher, joined the Army to get an education and take advantage of a rare opportunity in a farming community with an unemployment rate of 15 percent â one of the highest in West Virginia. She was also following in the footsteps of her older brother Gregory, a National Guard member based in Fort Bragg, N.C. Jessica enlisted through the Army's delayed-entry program before graduating from Wirt County High School in Elizabeth. "You would not believe the joys, cries, bawling, hugging, screaming, carrying on," said Lynch's cousin, Pam Nicolais, when asked Tuesday about the rescue. "You just have to be here."
Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., called the rescue a miracle.
"God watched over Jessica and her family," Rockefeller said through a spokesman in Washington. "All of West Virginia is rejoicing. This is an amazing tribute to the skill and courage of our military." Central Command spokesman Jim Wilkinson said: "We also have others, other POWs we are just as worried about. This is good news today but we need a lot more good news."
"America doesn't leave its heroes behind," Wilkinson added. "Never has. Never will." What great news. God bless those guys who went in and got her.
#3
Tommy Franks telegraphed this one over a week ago, in a news briefing. Here's the question and response:
Q: Paul Robertson of the Daily Mirror. Can you tell us anything about the British soldiers which are missing today? Are they now prisoners? And if not, what are you doing to try to help find them?
GEN. FRANKS: Actually, I won't talk about the Brit potential missing troops any more than I would talk about the specifics of our helicopter pilots or of the youngsters in this maintenance company.
I will say -- and I've seen speculation in a number of places -- that a coalition like this would take action, where action is appropriate, to secure the release of people who are taken prisoners. I think you can go back a long, long time in the history of warfare, and you'll find that to be the case. And so we'll just have to wait and see what the days ahead look like.
US Intelligence believes Saddamâs cousin - Gen. Ali Hassan al Majid, âChemical Aliâ and nephew called Rakan were killed in allied targeted attack Monday on Iraqi military convoy near Ash Shatra
Got him? Who knows. We'll maybe know in a couple weeks...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 07:05 pm ||
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#1
where do they get the DNA to check? Beelzebub?
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 19:42 Comments ||
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#2
We've heard this before. The problem remains there still is a Dirt Bag ruinning this sand box.
Coalition forces were engaged in a âmajor battleâ with Iraqâs elite Republican Guard in the town of Karbala, about 60 miles southwest of Baghdad, a U.S. military official at Central Command headquarters said Wednesday. The comments came after intense overnight bombing in the area, where where the Medina Division of the Republican Guard â possibly augmented by other, repositioned units of Saddamâs best trained and best equipped troops â was defending the approach to the capital against U.S. infantry. Some military officials hinted that this was the beginning of a major ground offensive against Baghdad. Lets pray for these guys. We're light on the ground withouth the 4th.
âTHIS IS THE big battle,â said the U.S. military official at forward headquarters in Qatar. Asked if the fighting represented a much anticipated new push toward the Iraqi capital, the official said: âIt well could be.â
FOLLOWUP: From FoxNews teevee...
FoxNews reports that 3ID is engaging Medina RG Division, and the 1st MEF are engaging the Baghdad RG Division at al-Kut.
#1
"light on the ground"? We're damn heavy in the air. The Americans aways want overwhelming firepower and the air provides a lot of that.
Posted by: Don ||
04/01/2003 20:42 Comments ||
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#2
Is this the big battle or a prelude? Me thinks that when they get a taste of combined arms fires to grid; they be quitting pretty quick. MLRS has some tangy punch to it.
Also I am thinking if saddam is alive at all he's in Tikrit, which has been very silent, DOD saying nothing about it. Probably snuck up there with his favorite sons hoping to run the war from there and if neessary skip town from there.
#3
Look at the map. The Marines are pulling ot the east of their area at Al Kut. The 3rd ID is pulling ot the west of Karbala (gap between the city and the resevior).
Where is the 101st?
Bomb the RGs to weaken them, pull them in opposite directions, and then hey-diddle-diddle, straight up the middle for the 101st which would allow the 101 to exploit and kill off artillery units (primary souce of chem weapons in the Iraqi army) - and strategically, that would cut off the retreat routes for the RGs - in effect pocketing them in 2 sections isolated from each other and Baghdad.
That would be the biggest full encirclement since WW2, possibly Kursk or the the trapping of OB-West in the Ruhr.
(Discounting the last GW, since there was considerable flight fromthe pocket prior to it closing).
Edited
The United States is prepared to pay a "very high price" in terms of casualties to capture Baghdad and oust President Saddam Hussein, a US central command official has said. "We're prepared to pay a very high price because we are not going to do anything other than ensure that this regime goes away," the official said, adding that US casualties in the war had been "fairly" light. "If that means there will be a lot of casualties, then there will be a lot of casualties," said the official. "There will come a time maybe when things are going to be much more shocking," he said, adding: "In World War II there would be nights when we'd lose 1000 people."
On the 13th day of the war
51 Americans and 26 Britons had been killed and 14 US troops were missing. Iraq said 589 civilians had been killed, and almost 5000 injured.
When I listen to the media, NPR, BBC, and every major paper and news station, the message seems to always be the same, you have already lost the war, go home. They believe that if they can just tie us up for 90+ days, we will lose our will and go home. They are wrong, as this article indicates. Our enemies are looking to Modudishu (sp?) and Viet nam, but it is a mistake to do so. It is a grave miscalculation of the nature of the American people, who are not represented by the tiny liberal elite, Hollywood or the media. The more Americans that are subjected to Mogadishu, and Muslim barbarity, the more our resolve will stiffen. It's just a shame so many have to die before they realize it.
#1
Vietnam is a bad example of our unwillingness to take casualties. Weren't more than 50,000 US troops killed and many more wounded?
Mogadishu is relevant, however. Thanks, Bubba!
Posted by: Tibor ||
04/01/2003 18:30 Comments ||
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#2
The American people [at least 70%] understand the mission and the objective. Understand that, they will be willing to absorb the casualties. The actions of the Saddam regime may appeal to the Arab Street(TM), but they have fail to grasp the impact upon the Jacksonian spirit of American. It's angered and will not let up till the job is done this time.
Posted by: Don ||
04/01/2003 20:50 Comments ||
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#3
The rangers in Somlia were tasked to support Delta Force personnel in the UN requested capture of the Warlord what ever the mutts name was. The event that sparked the mission was the massacre of 200(?) Pakistani peace keepers in the Mogadishu soccer stadium. An example of Islamic charity that even the UN could not stomach. And the losses would not of been nowhere near as bad or possibly even without loss if Les Aspin and the rest of the administration had allowed the use of gunships and armored vihicles in support of the operation
Posted by: Someone who did NOT vote for William Proxmire ||
04/01/2003 21:06 Comments ||
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no offical word, but they awakened all of the reporters at 2:00 AM Doha time, word is that its very good news.
"command post" is saying its about our POWS.
One POW has been extracted. Details will be made available later, after next of kin have been notified.
Fox says it's Jessica Lynch, from 507th Maintenance Co. She was captured March 23rd, at Nasiriya. She was rescued in a joint Ranger-SEAL operation. Family's been notified.
Posted by: Frank Martin ||
04/01/2003 05:46 pm ||
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#1
Early reports (from my local Channel 10 news) are saying that some POWs have been rescued, but that no one knows whose soldier's they are.
Where are those embedded reporters when you need one?
Posted by: Matt ||
04/01/2003 18:56 Comments ||
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#5
As I recall, there were several female POWs during GW1. At least 1 anyway. I'm not absolutely sure about that though so take it with a grain of salt.
#7
In Gulf War 1 there were two, a Flt Surgeon Major and a PFC or Specialist truck driver. There numerous U.S. women POW in WWII mostly taken in the Phillipines and Java. I don't believe there were any in WWI.
Posted by: Paul K. ||
04/01/2003 19:39 Comments ||
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#9
there's some ugly speculation going on on other sites, notably Command Post, and while I hope they aren't right, it doesn't need to be in the public realm. The truth should be passed on to the 3rd ID , 4th when they arrive, and no quarter shown to the f*&king bastards who did this. Also, the truth should be shown to the UN, NATO and other pussies who've watered down efforts to kill these bastards. Chirac? This one's for you. To our anti-war protestors? you better stay outta my way
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/01/2003 22:10 Comments ||
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The Pentagon said Tuesday it is asking Fox News Channel to remove Geraldo Rivera from a posting with U.S. troops in Iraq where he was accused of disclosing unauthorized information. "We have asked that he be removed and we are working with them to make that happen," Lt. Col. Dave Lapan said. He said the network had agreed.
Lapan said Rivera reported details of troop operations by drawing a line in the sand showing where his unit was and where it was going next. Reporters who are "embedded" with U.S. troops are not supposed to disclose details that could help Iraqis figure out their location and plans. Fox News Channel executives did not immediately return calls seeking comment Tuesday.
Posted by: John Phares ||
04/01/2003 05:24 pm ||
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#1
Stop him before he discovers Sammy's Secret Vault!
US Marines moved into the southern Iraqi town of Shatrah today to recover the body of a dead comrade which had been hanged in the town square. Hundreds of troops were dispatched on the operation after intelligence reports indicated the body of a dead American, who was killed in a firefight last week, had been paraded through the streets and hanged in public. "We would like to retrieve the body of the marine but it is not our sole purpose," said Lieutenant-Colonel Pete Owen, of the First Marine Expeditionary Force. The hell it's not! Get the meal out of your mouth!
Military sources said another part of the operation was to arm local militias to fight against members of the ruling Baath party loyal to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Shatrah is some 40 km north of Nasiriyah, where Iraqi forces have been harassing US supply lines and putting up tough resistance for more than a week.
A U.S. Marine captured and supposedly strung up in the middle of the town of Shatrah is dead, military officials in Iraq confirmed Sunday.
Officials also said initial reports were wrong. The Marine was not strung up, though his body was left on the street.
The Marine was captured Friday during an attack on a 200-vehicle convoy that was traveling north, through Shatrah on Route 7.
"What we can confirm is that some villagers tried to help him - they didn't know if he was alive or dead - and they may even have tried to get him to a hospital," said Maj. Dave Holahan, executive officer of the 1st battalion, 4th Marine regiment.
"But the Republican Guard, or death squads, took him away from the villagers and dumped him on the street. They didn't string him up, as previously stated, they just dumped him in the street."
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 05:10 pm ||
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#1
Marines will get him - the officer was just keeping the reporters happy.
What his battalion commander told his staff was more like
"They hung one of our dead in there - lets get the bastards and teach them respect. SgtMajor and the S4 - get the troops supplied full up on class 3 and 5 ASAP. S1 - get the Company commanders and let them know I want their unit status in 5 minutes, and for them to be prepared for a fragord in 30, then get hold of regiment. S2 & S3 come with me, lets get the battle plan going. And XO, get rid of that reporter then report to me at the TOC"
4:38 EST The Iraqi military has brought in reinforcements to bolster Republican Guard Al Medina Division units that have been battered by days of air strikes, artillery attacks and assaults from tank-busting Apache helicopters. Reinforcements reportedly include a few Republican Guard divisions and elite troops backed by heavy armor. (You keep sending them and we'll keep chewing them!)
At the Pentagon, NBCâs Jim Miklaszewski reported that U.S. intelligence indicated a full armored brigade from the Adnan division of the Republican Guard had been destroyed as it made its way from Tikrit, north of Baghdad, to defensive positions south of the capital.
#3
Iraq seems to have an awful lot of "Elite" troops.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/01/2003 16:33 Comments ||
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#4
Looks like they're giving up the north and committing to the south in a BIG attempt to give us a bloody nose down there and try to make us quit. Trouble is, when they move, they die.
#6
The plan suggested 2 centers of gravity: Saddam and the RG. We may have missed the Dirt Bag, but he's got a nice used tank lot of slightly used and abuse Soviet armor south of Baghdad.
#7
Well, there's the Republican Guard, and then there's the Special Republican Guard. No joke.
Posted by: John Thacker ||
04/01/2003 17:31 Comments ||
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#8
Granted there is the RG and SRG, but unit cohesiveness has taken quite a beating with 24x7 air strikes and artillery barrages. If anyone has CW and BW weapons it will be SRG or one of Saddam's special intelligence units. It could either way: They collapse and give up, or they figure they have nothing to lose launch the bad stuff.
Michael O'Hanlon Special to The Yomiuri Shimbun
On NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard Myers claimed that some Iraqi Republican Guard units had already been weakened by 50 percent due to air attacks in the war's first 12 days. His comments were repeated later by another military officer. Although I have little doubt the war is going well, these estimates seem misleadingly high. The Pentagon has been very sparing in providing information to the public about how many bombs it has dropped in the war so far. It has been even more circumspect about estimating damage to Iraqi forces. But historical and technical considerations suggest the 50 percent estimate might be high. Perhaps certain very small and select units have suffered that level of attrition, but it seems more likely that Republican Guard forces on the whole have absorbed losses of less than 10 percent to date. It still seems likely to me that a serious ground-air battle will be needed to neutralize Republican Guard divisions such as the Medina and Baghdad units outside Baghdad. While we are capable of conducting that mission successfully, it will not be as easy as Myers seemed to suggest the other day.... This is what worries me:
...the capabilities of U.S. sensors are still severely challenged when looking for stationary vehicles against a complex backdrop. We saw that in Kosovo, where U.S. forces thought they had destroyed one-third of all enemy armor by late May of 1999, only to discover after the June 10 termination of the war that actual Serb losses were only 25 percent of initial totals--and possibly much less. We have more joint surveillance target attack radar system (JSTARS) aircraft today than in 1991 or 1999, but they are better at finding moving vehicles than stationary, dug-in objects.
#1
the point about Kosovo is well made - one presumes the Iraqis have learnded from the Serbs about decoys and such. On the other hand, shouldnt Iraq be different because of the presence of US ground forces, which can probe, find decoys, and attack forces that are over dispersed - isnt that the whole idea of combined arms - if he disperses we hit him on the ground, if he concentrates we hit him from the air? Which we couldnt do in Kosovo where we attacked from the air only?
#2
National Review On Line's The Corner has had several posts about this.
O'Hanlon has testified before Congress that the President's Defense budgets are too high.
The Air Force went to school on the lessons of Serbia and learned a lot. And the geography of Iraq makes it hardly a complex backdrop.
Also, we are in contact with the forces that we are bombing. Eyes on the ground help a huge amount.
Also, JSTARS doesn't need to see the dug-in tank. It sees the cars driving up to it, the fuel trucks, the lunch wagons. JSTARS identifies the nodes where traffic comes and goes, and the terminuses where it goes and stays. All are then targets.
#4
One way to corroberate the losses is noting that additional troops are being drawn down from the north and placed in the south. We keep putting people into the north, and old hasbeen keeps weakening his defenders up there. That can only mean that he's REALLY worried about the troop strength in the south.
I went into an area in Laos after a Buff arclight strike (I was one of those that helped develop "boxes", and they thought this would help me do that). Think of a piece of hard clay ground in west Texas plowed to a depth of 20 feet - about fifteen times. Huge trees five feet in diameter were splintered into toothpicks, then the toothpicks broken. NOTHING lived in a strip three miles long by a half-mile wide. We have new, precision bombs that can target a specific window on a building, but percussion and shrapnel are still the main killing force.
Drop enough weapons on someone's head, and even if his skin is intact, his mind is jello. I can well envision a 50% kill after five days of heavy bombing.
The big question is, how much equipment do the survivors have, and what kind of condition is it in? Can't fight a war with T-55 tanks if the barrel is bent in the middle.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 19:03 Comments ||
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Drinkers in the Iraqi capital are hard up these days -- the main liquor-selling district in Karradet Mariam has the misfortune of being right next to the main presidential palace, a top target for U.S. bombers. Damm, that'll piss off the troop's when they get there.
Scores of liquor stores selling everything from Tayyara (Plane) arak, an ultra-strong alcohol made of dates with a picture of an airliner taking off on the label, to European beer brands were closed even before the war started 13 days ago. And those which struggled to stay open to meet wartime demand have bad news for their customers. Hanna Boulos (John Peter), a small store in the mainly Christian area, re-opened on Tuesday, hours after the presidential compound took another battering on Monday night. "Yes, we raised our prices. Try to find another Heineken in Baghdad," said Akram, the son of the owner as he doubled the price of a half-litre can of imported beer to $3. Hell, that's not bad. I was paying $10 for a can of beer in downtown Tokyo.
The war premium extends to everything Hanna Boulos sells, including arak. Unlike the Lebanese and Syrian variety, which are made of grapes, Iraqi arak requires a strong stomach and cautious consumption is advised. Asriyah, the premium Iraqi arak brand, is out of stock at Hanna Boulos. Tayyara, the second best line, has now doubled in price to 4,000 dinars ($1.30) a bottle. And they think this is expensive? Another good reason to move our troops here from Saudi, cheap booze.
"Arak is selling fast," says Akram. "Customers want something that knocks them out quickly during bombardment." Usually, the pounding in my head starts the morning after drinking, but I see his point. If you're gonna get bombed, get really bombed!
Iraqis were starting to buy arak as a substitute for local beer, such as Farida and Shahrazad, whose factories have closed. Iraq , a mainly Muslim country, has traditionally taken a more relaxed attitude to alcohol than its Gulf neighbours, despite occasional crackdowns. Beer and wine were available in smart Baghdad restaurants in the days leading up to war. Iraqi beer used to be affordable, selling for about 10 cents in refillable bottles. Its strong barley taste was too much for most foreigners but for Iraqis, impoverished and unable to buy imported beer, it was fine -- at least before the war.
"I am buying arak now," said Raeq, a taxi driver. "I think it is destroying my stomach, but I need to sleep at night, especially where I live." Raeq lives next to the Iraqi Olympic Committee, which is headed by President Saddam Hussein's son Uday. The huge compound was targeted by bombs overnight and remained burning for hours. Sorry, Raeq. Sucks to have neighbors like that.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 01:49 pm ||
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#1
Cheeze, life is getting tough all around. The Baghdadis are short on booze, the Marines are short on smokes...
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 14:28 Comments ||
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#2
i seem to recall from Salam Pax's blog that nominaly only Iraqi christians can buy booze, not muslims, but that there are various "workarounds"
Note - beer was invented in pre-Islamic Mesopotamia (but without hops)
#3
There was speculation a few years ago that beer was born in ancient Dilmun, located in the area of today's Bahrain. There was a lovely seal found that had a picture of two fellows sitting and drinking a pot of beer through straws. I believe it's on exhibit at the museum in Arhus, in Denmark, and that the motif has been incorporated into the state seal of one of the Gulf States. Probably because of the discovery of beer, Dilmun was considered a holy land in ancient Mesopotamia. Utu-napishtim, the hero of the flood story, who was gifted with immortality by the gods, retired there, to spend eternity boozing it up, and Gilgamesh went there to visit him and ask his advice when Enkidu died. I imagine Utu-napishtim has been pretty bored since the Muslims took over and banned the other staff of life...
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 15:27 Comments ||
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#4
Somebody in Baghdad should start thinking ahead and start hoarding the stuff. He could get rich selling it to thirsty American boys in the not too distant future.
Edited for length:
BASHUR AIRFIELD, Iraq: The first Air Force C-17 Globemaster III of the night could be heard but not seen, until its silhouette finally appeared against a ridgeline as it touched down. Marshals on the taxiway waved orange glow sticks like conductors, and a forklift whose driver wore night-vision goggles closed in on the aircraft. The plane's ramp dropped, revealing an interior bathed in soft red light. Pallets of equipment, two Humvees, two five-ton trucks and two dozen infantry soldiers carrying M-4 rifles came off the aircraft. Two more C-17s that landed minutes behind the first were unloaded at the same time. In 24 minutes, all three planes were back in the air, replaced on the ground within five minutes by two more C-17s.
More than a million pounds of equipment has been flown into the Bashur airfield every day since 1,000 paratroops of the 173rd Airborne Brigade jumped into northern Iraq Wednesday. The number of troops here has more than doubled since. The light infantry brigade is building power, allowing it to launch operations that could include a move southwest in the direction of Iraqi forces. In the coming days, Air Force security forces will begin manning checkpoints around the airfield now operated by Army soldiers. "We will assume that role so they can concentrate on their main mission -- move out and make contact with the enemy," said Col. Steven Weart, commander of the 86th Contingency Response Group, the Air Force unit overseeing unloading operations here.The massive airlift is taking place at a primitive strip that is changing rapidly. A fleet of bulldozers and dump trucks, operated by Kurds and U.S. soldiers, pushed dirt and laid gravel in a field adjacent to the runway, creating staging areas for the vehicles and equipment still being flown in. Tents are springing up all around the airfield, along with satellite dishes, generators and a forest of antennas. A brigade officer has flown in with $500,000 in cash to buy supplies from the Kurds -- from vehicles to gravel to a freezer to store blood for the surgical team. "We have money to spend," said Lt. Col. David Coburn, the brigade comptroller. And spending it with people who are thankful we are there.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 01:00 pm ||
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William Safire NYT Tuesday, April 1, 2003
Snap judgments
WASHINGTON I never made it higher than corporal, but it doesn't take a military genius to figure out the strategy when you have air supremacy: Break the back of the enemy's armor and its infantry before your big ground assault. A month's bombing worked in the 1991 Gulf War, and a couple of weeks should "degrade" the Iraqi Army again.
.
Here is a baker's dozen of my snap judgments about this war:
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1. Best gamble: America jumping the gun a few days early in a daring bid to win all at once. The air strike to kill Saddam Hussein and his gang may not have succeeded, but failing to try on the basis of a sleeper spy's tip would have been a great mistake.
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2. Biggest diplomatic mistake: trusting the new Islamist government of Turkey. This misplaced confidence denied America an opening pincers movement and shocked the awesomeness out of "rapid dominance."
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3. Best evidence of Saddam's weakness: his reliance on suicide bombers for media "victories." Individual self-destruction may or may not terrorize a civilian population but is not a weapon capable of inflicting decisive casualties on, or striking fear into, a powerful army. (It does vividly demonstrate the Baghdad-terrorist nexus.)
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4. Most stunning surprise: the degree of intimidation of Shiites in southern cities by Saddam's son Uday's Gestapo. When Basra falls, however, fierce retribution against these thuggish enforcers by local Shiites may send a message of uprising to fellow Shiites who make up a third of Baghdad's population.
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5. Most effective turnaround of longtime leftist lingo: Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's labeling of Uday's paramilitaries as "death squads."
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6. Most profound statement from a military leader: General Tommy Franks, refuting criticism of a "pause" in the ground war, said, "We have the power to be patient."
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7. Most overdue revelation by the Pentagon: that Russia has long been smuggling sophisticated arms to Saddam's regime with Syria's hostile connivance. Who suppressed this damning data for a year, and to what end? And is the CIA still ignorant of the transmission to Iraq through Syria of a key component in rocket propellant from China, brokered by France?
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8. Most inexplicable weakness of U.S. intelligence and air power: the inability to locate and obliterate all of Saddam's television propaganda facilities.
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9. Biggest long-run victory of coalition forces to date: the lightning seizure of southern oil fields before Saddam had a chance to ignite them. This underappreciated tactical triumph will speed Iraq's reconstruction by at least a year.
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10. Worst mistake as a result of State Department and CIA interference with military planning: Fearing to offend the Turks, America failed to arm 70,000 free Kurdish fighters in northern Iraq. Belatedly, the United States is giving Kurds the air, commando and missile support to drive Ansar-Qaeda terrorists out of a stronghold, but better planning would have given America a trained, indigenous force on the northern front.
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11. Best military briefer: Franks is less of a showman than the last Iraq war's bombastic Norman Schwarzkopf, but his low-key deputy, Lieutenant General John Abizaid, is Franks' secret information weapon. Because Abizaid speaks fluent Arabic, why doesn't he hold a cool news conference with angry Arab journalists?
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12. Most inspiring journalism: "Embedding" is almost-full disclosure that puts Americans in close contact with local conflict, but the greatest war correspondent of this generation is not attached to any unit. He is John Burns of The New York Times, who is reporting with great insight, accuracy and courage from Baghdad, and makes me proud to work on the same newspaper.
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13. Greatest wartime mysteries: What heroic tales of special operations derring-do behind the lines await the telling? Who, in the fog of peace, will honor Iraqis inside Baghdad spotting military targets to save civilian lives? Will we learn firsthand of the last days of Saddam in his Hitlerian bunker? What scientists, murdered lest they point the way to germs and poison gases, left incriminating documents behind? Where are the secret files of Saddam's Mukhabarat, detailing the venal transactions with Western, Asian, Arab and Iranian political and business leaders - and connections to world terror networks?
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Snap judgments, these. Considered conclusions come after unconditional surrender.
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E-mail: safire@nytimes.com
#1
(sorry for the length - please feel free to remove if its too long, or post it as an editorial)
In the Hindsight is 20/20 category:
#4. They feydaheen and intimidation factor.
My analysis:
Remember The Presidency of LBJ, and the Nixon victory? I mean PERSONAL memory, not remembering what you read in history books?
No?
OK how about Gerald Ford, and the raid on the Mayaguez off the coast of Cambodia? I mean PERSONAL memory, not remembering what you read in history books?
No?
OK, then think back to Jimmy Carter. 1978. Can you clearly remember anything that happened prior to the hostage crisis with Iran/Khomeni? I mean PERSONAL memory, not remembering what you read in history books?
No?
Ok. Now put yourself in the place of an Iraqi citizen, 35 years old. You were born when LBJ was in office - thatâs when the Baathists took over.
When you were 10, a coup from inside the party allowed a guy by the name Saddam to take control via assassination.
When you were 20, the only president you could ever remember is Saddam, and your whole life you have been told to watch what you say and obey. Youâve seen those who didnât punished, tortured and killed. You were forced to serve in the army, and either saw or heard rumors of mustard gas and nerve gas being used against rebels in the north. You hear that 10s of thousands were killed. Many of your old schoolmates tell tales of poison gas against the Iranians, and of officers shooting troops that didnât fight hard enough in the Shatt AlArab offensives a few years ago.
You're 25, and you were lucky enough to survive the war in Kuwait 2 years ago. The TV stations play it up as a win, but you know better. The problem is: if you say anything, you'll end up with you and your new wife and child dead. So you shut up and go along. After all, obedience is how everyone does things. Especially since the Americans left those folks in Basra out to hang after they asked them to rebel. Better to be quiet and live.
You're now 30 - its 1998, and the US President just flew over 300 cruise missiles into military targets all over the country. You probably know someone who lost a family member to these. Saddam claims another victory, but you donât see how getting your own people and places destroyed is a "victory". But again, you know better than say anything - or Uday and Qusai's "dark troops" will come get you and your family if one of their spies reports you even telling a joke. After all, you saw your neighbor's wife hauled into the street, accused of "prostitution", flung to an iron bench, and beheaded. And your family was forced into the street to watch - including your young children.
Now its 2003. You're 35. The Coalition armies have come again, this time into Iraq and near your city. Your government says the Republican Guard and Iraq is winning. Al-Jazeera says the US is killing whole families. Even the US Press says they cannot win, one of their own famous reporters even said so on Iraqi TV just the other day. You've been lucky enough to hide your oldest son and yourself away from the Feydaheen and their summoning of all males to fight or die. But water is running out, food is scarce. Soon you will have to risk leaving. You do not trust the Americans, after all even their own press says they are immoral and there might be some truth to Al Jazeera claims. And they are soldiers after all â your whole life soldiers job is to kill civilians who oppose their regieme â you have known this your whole life. You know better than trust the Feydaheen, the Iraqi Army, and any other Army.
After the Americans take your town in passing, they donât hurt you or your family, they even give you a little food. But they move their tanks down the road and prepare to move on to the next town. You remember what happened in Kurdistan in the north when they rebelled, and what happened in Basrah the last time the Americans left. So no cheering the Americans - you don't know who is watching. No acting like you are free, because the government and its spies are everywhere - you've learned obedience and silence your whole life. And the clandestine radio programs you get from the west speak of defeat and troops doing nothing and large protests against this war. Plus Saddam and his ministers still speak and are seen on TV.
So you know better than do ANYTHING that might be noticed, because it will get you killed. You've lived this long because you were cowed well enough to not be a threat. Nobody is going to help you - you have survived your whole life in the hands of madmen, and the only way for you and your family to survive is to not be noticed, to obey and submit to Saddamâs power. Your whole life is proof of this. You will not trust anyone, even those who seem to be your liberators. Not until you see Saddam dead, see the liberators staying to protect you, see the Feydaheen Saddam killed and chased out of the town⦠Not until your family and you are safe.
So THAT is why we are not being praised or welcomed. This is a populace that knows NOTHING but the constant threat and fear of its own government. And until it is very clear that A) That government is gone and B) That we are staying around as liberators - we will not see much of anything from the general populace.
Personal aside: I wish we had been allowed to finish the job the last time. We even had provisional orders to turn and march on Baghdad - the way was clear - but Bush-I bowed to the UN and fear of being unpopular, and stopped us. I hope this President Bush learns from his fatherâs mistakes and his own mistakes to ignore the UN, and just do whatâs right.
#2
OldSpook... Thoughtful and perceptive analysis that may explain what we are finding. I think back on the Allies finding the concentration camps and wonder if it too may offer a parallel. The population was so pychologically and physically devastated that they largely dispersed quietly... and not jubulently as you would expect from the newly liberated.
#3
Oldspook: I do remember the VietNam War, the Mayaguez incident, and all of the aforementioned items. While I'm only 44 this year, I've more or less always been especially attuned to current events. While I was never "officially" in uniform, I've also been places and done things that needed doing at the time (and have the scar on my throat to prove it due to one particularly unfortunate occurrence that sent me home) though there's no official record of said service. I hope to be able to perform additional service to my country as an elected representative in the future.
I understand and agree with all of your points and do fervently hope that we do it right this time around as well.
We cannot go back to the UN. The UN would be happy to keep Saddam in power and Food for Oil to run FOREVER. They make too much money to give it up.
Ask yourself how long the UN has taken "care" of the refugees of Jenin and Gaza. Ask yourself how long they intend to police Cyprus. Once they get involved, they never leave. And the UN is not about human rights, its all about money.
The UNSC was willing to put the UNMOVIC inspectors back into Iraq as a sop to the Americans. Little bit of inspection for as long as it took to get America to lose interest, GW to change the subject, and then business as usual.
Unfortunately, GW kept his eye on the post 9/11 ball, and France and the rest of the SC shenanigins is now history.
The UN is not about peace and human freedom. It is all about dictatorial power and money
Posted by: john ||
04/01/2003 15:27 Comments ||
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#5
I remember that peanut was attacked by a rabbit, just can't remember if it was before or after 1978. And one making $25K was "rich." I remember the iron fist in the velvet glove wearing the same dress she wore when he became guv. I remember Grease & Animal House, both 1978. And the price of gas. Hey, I was in HS, after all. And the hair. Just went to a restaurant and a teenager had the same 70s hair. And my daughter can choose from the styles I wore. UGH!
#6
I'm in my a bit older than my example. But I scarcely remember Ford other than my dad (ex-Navy PT boat WW2 veteran) beign angry at him over the pardon (my first memory of military was asking questions about the Mayaguez and why didnt we have special foces that were any good), and the main thinga I remember about "Jimmuh" (pre-hostage) were sweaters/fuel-shortages, inflation (my dad explained it to me), Dan Ackroyd doing imitations of him, and him being the person that drove my dad to cast the first Republican vote of his life.
But my point was, even for an Iraqi in their 40's, its been a quarter of a century, all their "adult" life essentially, spent under the thumb of fear and terror and totalitarianism, living in an insane society. Thats why the current populace isnt rising - we burned them the last time, and Saddam/thugs have had decades to condition them against freedom and into fear.
As for the 70's - my mom still has a picture of me in wide flared plaid pants and long hair as an early teen that she threatens to send to my old war buddies as a joke. I counter that she shoudl sent the one wiht the mohawk when I was in my Punk Rock stage, just before I joined and got my current haircut.
Never a "bad hair day" with a high-n-tight. :-)
FYI FOTSGreg, - I worked to support some compartmented codeword "projects" that go unspoken even today, over a decade and a half later, so who knows, I may have set you up a long time ago. Small world. I used to speak Arabic (Iraqi dialect), Russian and a little G.I. German & G.I. Japanese so guess where I was. Its been 8-9 years since I last really used my Arabic, longer than that for my Russian. Funny thing is the G.I.-German stuck well enough that I can still help my kid with his German homework.
#7
I joined the Air Force the summer after Kennedy was killed in Dallas. I retired just after the Gulf war in 1991. Yes, I remember. We have a lot in common, Old Spook - I'd almost think we know each other. I'd like to offer a suggestion to all who read Rantburg: get a copy of Leon Uris' "The Haj" and read it. Very eye-opening. Uris has a habit of doing really in-depth research. His work of fiction has much that is fact. It provides a unique perspective on the entire Middle East.
The United Nations needs to be pruned down to a small group of "coordinators" who cannot expand their bureaucracy, and their powers should be limited to "making suggestions". Relationships with other countries should once more be established through bilateral treaties, not multilateral "agreements". As for what the UN is allowed to do in Iraq, "nothing" sounds about right to me.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 18:36 Comments ||
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#8
FYI, it was more of a "Bootsy Collins" thing, before you get any ideas about the hair. Big P-Funk fan. I still cannot beleive I wanted that big "bush" afro on my head. The mowhawk was like Flea - not one of those white-guy rooster heads. Not to much of a step from that to a high and tight, hah.
#9
OldSpook: All I can say about what I did back then was that I can still read most of a Spanish language newspaper to this day. Small world indeed. I saw more "jungle" than I ever want to again though.
I've sworn oaths to my country 3 times in the past 25 years (mustering in and out at various times for various ops and special projects) and hope to do so at least once more before I pass on (not in any military sense however as my next goal is politics).
BAGHDAD, Iraq â The Iraqi information minister, reading a statement he said was from Saddam Hussein, called Tuesday for a jihad, or holy war, against the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
Don't they ever not call for jihad?
"The aggression that the aggressors are carrying out against the stronghold of faith is an aggression That's why they call 'em "aggressors," sport; 'cause they're aggressive, y'know!
on the religion, the wealth, the honor and the soul and an aggression on the land of Islam," Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf said on national television.
"Therefore, jihad is a duty in confronting them," he added, saying "those who are martyred will die a meaningless, empty, futile, militarily insignificant death in the service of a lost cause be rewarded in heaven. Seize the opportunity, my brothers."
The statement was issued as U.S. forces were reported within 50 miles of Baghdad and as B-52 bombers were pounding Republican Guard positions north of Karbala.
The B-52s "Greatest Hits" collection is in heavy rotation on Armed Forces Radio.
Saddam has delivered two prerecorded televised addresses since the war began March 20. It was unclear why the Iraqi leader did not appear Tuesday.
"Oooh! Oooh! Mister Kotter! Call on me! I know why!"
"Okay, Horshak, why?"
"Uh, 'cause he's already dead."
"Strike at them, fight them," the statement said. "They are aggressors, evil, accursed by God. You shall be victorious and they shall be vanquished.
Keep charging across no man's land through a hail of artillery and machine guns! One of you'll get through eventually! Remember Paaschendale!
"Fight them everywhere the way you are ineffectively fighting them today," it said. "And don't give them a chance to catch their breath until they declare it and withdraw from the lands of the Muslims, defeated and cursed in this life and the afterlife."
Banzai!
Posted by: Mike ||
04/01/2003 12:01 pm ||
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#1
Wow! Great speech. I think Al-Sahhaf is really coming into form. I look forward to seeing him on Larry King once this is all over.
#5
"The Black Knight ALWAYS TRIUMPHS!"
http://www.intriguing.com/mp/_scripts/knight.txt
Posted by: El Id ||
04/01/2003 12:26 Comments ||
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#6
There's one piece of evidence which says Saddam is still alive:
The Iraqi military keeps charging into the KZ south of Baghdad. An intelligent military commander would recognize it for what it was.
#7
Saddam may very well be taking that eternal dirt-bath. Even if true, his plan is still in effect. Those left in Baghdad have much blood on their hands and they have every incentive to carry on the fight (have others do it for them) in hopes of saving their hides. They'll hold on until the last moment, then the rats will bolt. It's Berlin '45 all over again.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
04/01/2003 13:01 Comments ||
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#8
Its clear what the Iraqi strategy is: They are waiting for the Coalition to run out of bombs, missiles, and bullets! It's a brilliant strategy when you think about it. Right after we run out of ammo, whoosh--we are in BIG trouble!
Posted by: Colonel Mike ||
04/01/2003 14:19 Comments ||
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#9
Of course, we've already captured enough weapons and ammo to supply our entire army (not just what's in Iraq) for two years, so I think sadsack's generals are engaging in some very heavy dreaming. Dreams don't win wars. These donuts have a very unpleasant future ahead of them.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 15:00 Comments ||
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#10
Clearly these lame ass speeches are the result of too much time spent with the 72 virgins. No quality time to create coherent prose. Or his NoKor speechwriter just had triplets.
Posted by: john ||
04/01/2003 15:34 Comments ||
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Australian SAS troops in western Iraq are involved in intercepting hostile forces coming from Jordan and Syria amid concerns that suicide bombers from neighbouring Arab states are trying to join the jihad against the US-led war effort. Asked what steps the coalition was taking to stop the potential suicide bombers entering Iraq, US military spokesman Brigadier-General Vince Brooks said special forces were under orders to "eliminate" freedom of movement. "We have interdicted people and turned them back," he said. "We are denying freedom of movement in the western desert and have been very effective." "Welcome to the Baghdad Express. Please have your tickets ready to be punched!"
Australia's commander in the Middle East, Brigadier Maurie McNarn, has confirmed that Australia's special forces are in western Iraq, where they were seen on the weekend patrolling roads 80 kilometres from Baghdad checking vehicles. It is on those roads that busloads of expatriate Iraqis and others, including potential suicide bombers, are trying to flood back into Iraq to repel the coalition forces. It is believed that an Australian is high up in the command structure directing special forces in western Iraq. At the outset of the conflict, the special forces were given the task of hunting down missile sites that could be used to send weapons of mass destruction into Israel. Several missile sites have been destroyed and recent intelligence has suggested that task has substantially changed. Looks like the feared "Scud Box" turned into a pine box.
But the task has been augmented as the phenomena of suicide bombers and jihadists becomes a new threat facing the coalition. A spokeswoman for the Australian contingent at central command in Doha said: "We don't comment on current operations." "We're busy, call back later"
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 11:52 am ||
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#1
Me-thinks I'll lift a Foster's to toast our South Pacific brethern this evening.
I can't wait until the Special Ops stories from this war come out into the open. These amazing folks are truly a secret weapon.
#2
the special forces were given the task of hunting down missile sites that could be used to send weapons of mass destruction into Israel. Several missile sites have been destroyed...
Did they save some of those Scuds to show Blixie?
Be nice if they did.
#3
I have pleasant visions dancing in my head of a long line of burned out tour buses strung out between the Jordanian border and Baghdad, each of them chock full of roasty-toasty jihadi corpses. If that should be true, I promise, I'll never say another disparaging word about Foster's.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 12:52 Comments ||
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#4
Fred---I wouldn't be suprised if the SAS did that very thing and left them as visual aids for subsequent travellers along the road to death.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 12:59 Comments ||
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#5
Snicker, use them as mile markers, and range stakes.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 14:29 Comments ||
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A Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) official pointed out here on Tuesday that the patriotic union of Iraq (PUI) is being formed by Iraqi military forces opposed to the Baghdad regime. The PUK member, who wanted not to be named, told IRNA that the PUI will soon launch its attacks against Baghdad along with the American and British troops. According to him, a few senior officers from the Iraqi army are also members of the PUI. He did not refer to the headquarters of the union, but informed sources believe that it is mainly based in northern Iraq and the areas controlled by (Jalal) Talabani of the PUK forces. Four senior officers from the Iraqi army, who had surrendered to the PUK, are staying at the Palace Hotel in Suleymaniyah, where foreign reporters usually stay. Working a little deal with them, are they? A PUI isn't a bad idea, I guess. Wonder what Barzani and the KDP have to say about it, though. And the INC — which has so far shown itself to be about as effectual as the EU...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 12:03 pm ||
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#1
PUK (and KDP) need some non-Kurds, whether INC or whomever, as cover so that they can call it a "free Iraqi army" and not a "Kurdish army" when they walk into Kirkuk. Gotta keep Turkey happy.
Meanwhile there are reports that 100 Iraqi "tribesmen" assisted US troops in battles in Nassariya and/or Diwaniyah.
Commander of the Iraqi Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) in Halabja region said on Tuesday the remnants of Ansar al-Islam Party who surrendered voluntarily will be granted amnesty. Speaking at a press conference, Sheikh Jaafar said five members of the Ansar al-Islam Party who have surrendered themselves will be pardoned and freed over the next few days. He added that the general region of Halabja and areas under the control of Ansar al-Islam have been cleared up in cooperation with US forces and currently there were no Ansar forces in the region. The Kurdish military official said the US forces backed up PUK Peshmergas in their massive ground attacks on the positions of Ansar al-Islam. The PUK has launched comprehensive plans for development of the region and compensating the damages inflicted by Ansar al-Islam, he noted. During the press conference, five US officers briefed reporters on the operations aimed at suppression of the Ansar al-Islam and said any comment on political issues should be made by politicians. I'm not sure those beauzeaux deserve an amnesty, but I'd guess they're local Kurdish yokels, rather than Arab professional killers. I still think it would be a good idea to require that they become agnostics as a condition of release, though. Nobody's ever heard of an agnostic jihad.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 11:13 am ||
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Just a short snippet from the NY Daily News, but don't you think that except for the Kurd/Ansar asskicking, it's been very quiet up north? Too quiet?
About 10 huge cargo planes an hour - packed with heavy armor, trucks, Humvees and troops - landed at a makeshift northern Iraq airstrip controlled by U.S. troops over the last 24 hours, officials said yesterday. The steady stream of planes included C-17 Globemasters, big enough to carry an Abrams tank, and C-130s. The giant planes hit the airstrip, disgorged their load and were back in the air in 30 minutes, officials said. Hummmm, this was a pretty good sized airstrip, wasn't it?
A few miles away yesterday, coalition war planes pounded Iraqi positions to aid U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters as they seized territory in preparation for an advance by coalition troops. A key mission for the troops in northern Iraq will be to ensure that the Iraqi regime doesn't sabotage oil fields. Hoshiar Zebari, a leader of the governing Kurdistan Democratic Party, said limited U.S. ground operations have begun around the oil-rich, northern cities of Mosul and Kirkuk. Far fewer Iraqi troops were visible outside Kirkuk than in recent days, indicating that the enemy may be retreating toward Mosul, the largest northern city. Reporters near Kirkuk estimated that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's army had pulled back 20 miles since Thursday and now occupies only the innermost of three defensive lines around the city. Sammy has been pulling forces from other areas to re-enforce the RP on the southern defenses of Baghdad. Hummmmm?
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 10:58 am ||
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#1
Two questions: 1) which division is being deployed; 2) when do they start moving against the Iraqis.
#3
Another tidbit, culled from several stories: Paratroopers seize control of an airfield near Bashur in northern Iraq. Troops from the U.S. Army¹s 1st Infantry Division are flown there with tanks and other military equipment needed to wage war. The movement of the C-130s is constant as the huge transport planes arrive from Saudi Arabia, land at the Harir airfield and return to Saudi Arabia for reloading and refueling. U.S. commanders at the Harir airfield in Kurdish territory, where 1,000 U.S. paratroopers landed last week, say 1 million pounds of gear are coming in each day, along with a steady flow of troops.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 12:51 Comments ||
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#4
I saw a comment somewhere about the 1/63 Armor being deployed. That's from the 1st Infantry Division.
#5
Big Red 1 is on its way. 72-96 hours to fully airlift a medium brigade into theater, depending on how many tank battalions they try to lift (Mech Bde = 1 tank Bn 2 Inf Bn, Armor Bde = 2 tank Bn 1 Inf Bn).
Don't bet on it...
There are over 40,000 Iraqi exiles already in Jordan, but since the start of the war it has become obvious that predictions of thousands more arriving as refugees were Iraqi gross miscalculations. Meaning maybe they want to stay and be liberated?
What in fact appears to be happening is the opposite. Huge numbers of the Iraqi exiles who initially left Iraq because of political reasons have decided to return to participate and fight side by side with their Iraqi brothers. According to the Iraqi Embassy in Amman, 5,700 Iraqis have left Jordan to go and fight what they believe is an invasion and potential occupation of their home country.âWe have catered to these 5,700 Iraqis to get their documents in order,â said Jawad Al-Ali, the Iraqi Embassyâs press attache, in an interview with Arab News. âSome have lost their passports or their papers have simply expired,â Al-Ali added. âOn the first day of the war, we processed the papers of 2,500 Iraqis, and they are still coming.â ...or maybe they want a free ride home so they can be liberated too? Or maybe they have a death wish?
Large groups are taking buses from midtown Amman for $17 per person in order to make their way back to Baghdad. If it was me, there'd be a lot of blown up buses on the Amman-Baghdad highway.
But what of the past? âIâve lived in Jordan for the last 10 years,â Azziz Alzumaan, 42, who owns a small kabab shop in downtown Amman, told Arab News. âI left for political reasons and to find a peaceful life, but those things are not important anymore. Iâm going home to be with my family and to fight the invading aggressors, and God willing we will win or die trying,â he added. Azziz left on the morning bus to Baghdad. A 12-hour ride to his past, present and future. Well... you won't win. Say hello to Allah for me.
Also, the first free bus to Baghdad left here yesterday, courtesy of one of Saddam Husseinâs sons, with 50 Iraqi men on board. I think that makes "The Uday Express" a legit target...
âIt was too expensive for me to leave before, but now the trip is free and Iâm going back to fight for my country,â said Samir, a 35-year-old construction worker. He added that he was going back to Basra, the main southern Iraqi city partially controlled by the US/UK forces where pockets of Iraqi resistance still remain. Basra? Better hustle it up, Samir.
Also yesterday, dozens of âvolunteersâ left Beirut to take up arms in Iraq, proclaiming they were ready to embrace death to expel US and British forces from Arab land, witnesses said. The mostly Lebanese young men, enraged by gruesome television images showing Iraqi civilian casualties of the 12-day-old war, left by land via Syria to join the fight. Witnesses saw 36 volunteers cross the Lebanese border into Syria in a bus. They said they were on their way to Iraq. Destination: Death. All aboard.
And some 15 young Algerians gathered yesterday outside the Iraq Embassy in Algiers, proclaiming themselves ready to die as martyrs to defend the âhonor and dignity of Arabs and Muslimsâ as the âenemies of humanityâ wage war on Iraq.
âI donât know the first thing about using weapons, but I learn quickly,â said Ali, who, judging by his peach-fuzz beard, couldnât be a day over 20. Good. They'll make you a general.
Next to him, a self-assured Samir piped up: âI know how to use a Kalashnikov and an RPG (rocket launcher). I did my military service. The Kalash is a great weapon.â It is especially easy to throw away...
Posted by: tu3031 ||
04/01/2003 10:51 am ||
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#1
That's all well and good.. except for the Rangers sitting on the highway.
#4
When they're all dead, that will have been God's will...
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 12:05 Comments ||
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#5
Best news yet - all these wannabee terrorist are bundling themselves up, and headed right into the most Ranger-GreenBeret-Brit/SAS-Aussie/SAS-GROM infested place on planet earth.
Perfect place for them. Anyone want to take bets on how many actually make it to Baghdad?
My over/under is about 75 miles into Iraq before they become a Busload of Illegal Combatant Casualties.
"Samir" and "Ali" are going to face the toughest professional soldiers this side of the Spetznatz (Russia) and Sayaret (Israel). They are in for a rude awakening, just long enough for them to realize they are going to die as quickly and uselessly as a mosquito in a bugzapper.
#7
Only one small problem for sadsack and his sfb comrades - God isn't necessarily on HIS side. Wonder when he and his henchmen are going to wake up to that fact.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 15:03 Comments ||
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#8
Napoleon said that "God is on the side of the bigger batallions"
Maybe that needs to be amended to "better" battalions.
Radical Filipino Muslims in the Middle East may have joined the Saddam Hussein's fedayeen (suicide fighters) in repulsing invading US troops, a report said Tuesday. The Philippine's STAR newspaper quoted Sources in the Muslim community as saying extremist Filipino Muslims in Iran and Syria were among those who have slipped into Iraq to fight the Americans and allied forces. Datu Zamzamin Ampatuan, director general of the Office of Muslim Affairs of Philippine, who has neither confirmed nor denied the report, said a small group of Filipino Muslims had fought against Soviet troops in Afghanistan in the 1980s. "These are small groups of extremists who had undergone military training and made themselves available to join jihad," Ampatuan was quoted as saying. Ampatuan said radical Filipino Muslims in Mindanao have publicly expressed their desire to go to Iraq to join the Iraqi resistance against the American invaders. However, he said the majority of Filipino Muslims support the American action to oust Saddam Hussein and drive him out of Iraq because of the atrocities he committed against his people. "The Filipino Muslim community is fully supportive of the programs of President Arroyo for national development, except for a few who are identified with peace activists, they would rather concentrate on their daily undertakings rather than join in a jihad," he said. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front has not announced any public support for Saddam's regime, he added. That last statement surprises me, though the presence of Filipino thugs doesn't.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 11:06 am ||
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This sounds plausible (from the iraqwar.ru Russian site.) Anyone?
US experts at the coalition command headquarters studied the cases of destroyed and damaged M1A2 tanks and various APCs. The conclusion was that without a doubt the Iraqis do possess modern anti-tank weapons but so far use them on a ?very limited scale.? Only three tanks have been hit by guided weapons which destroyed these tanks with the first hit. The rest of the tanks were destroyed with more standard weapons. Some of the most common causes [of destroyed armor] include: anti-tank guns (about 40% of all hits), man-portable rocket-propelled grenade launchers (25% of hits), and landmines (25% of hits). Effectiveness of anti-tank artillery has been particularly high. ?Impacts by high-velocity projectiles do not always destroy the tank and its crew. However, in 90% of all cases the tank is disabled and the crew is forced to abandon the tank on the battlefield?? ? says the report that was distributed to the commanders of the forward units for analysis.
Russian military analysts are advising the Iraqi military command against excessive optimism. There is no question that the US ?blitzkrieg? failed to take control of Iraq and to destroy its army. It is clear that the Americans got bogged down in Iraq and the military campaign hit a snag. However, the Iraqi command is now in danger of underestimating the enemy. For now there is no reason to question the resolve of the Americans and their determination to reach the set goal ? complete occupation of Iraq.
Posted by: BLoB ||
04/01/2003 10:49 am ||
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These must the ATGM-14s sold to the Iraqi dirtbags by our Russian friends. You know they have been so helpful - the GPS jammers, the weaponized small pox and now ATGMs. It is nice to have comrades you kount on.
#2
That's the thanks we get for the hundreds of Chechen jihadis who were taken out of circulation in Afghanistan. I wonder if any of the Russians involved in these deals have sons fighting in Chechnya?
#3
I checked out that site a few days ago and didn't go with their news summaries. The position they're taking is straight-up anti-U.S., which means we can do nothing right, and they seem to get a lot from the Iraqi official channels. So I'd look for corroboration before relying on them too much.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 12:08 Comments ||
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#4
Serious reservations about this story.
First, battle damage assessment would be highly restricted info. Little chance we would be advertising to the world how to take out our Abrams.
Second, other than stating that 3 tanks were hit by guided weapons, it has no breakdown by numbers, but does give percentages. Obviously, not a lot of hard data behind this.
Third, a professional assessment of this war shows that the the Iraqis are getting rolled off the battlefield with a wildy lop-sided kill ratio, so the caution against "excessive optimism" is an amusing touch.
#5
Three Abrams knocked out (not necessarily destroyed) does not a statistical analysis make. You need a collection of more than 3 data points to make any sort of statistical analysis so I agree that this "assessment" should be taken with a heavy dose of salt.
There may have been more data points if the analysts take into account the Bradleys that may have been knocked out of action, but they refer to "tanks" and these analysts ought to know the difference between a Bradley and an Abrams (IFV vs MBT).
#6
There have been several reports about the AGTM-14 Kornet anti-tank missile on the Net over the last few days. Good summary here. Loads of good information about Iraqi military equipment, including the Kornet here.
Looks like Iraq didn't get any of these until 2003, which is a direct violation of the UN sanctions. There's also some indications that the Iraqis also got a couple of Russian Kormorant anti-ship missiles from the Russians, too, and they were captured at Al Faw.
The Russians are beginning to smell as bad as the French. As more information comes out about past dealings between Iraq and other nations, there may be an avalanche of incriminations tossed about.
From all I've read, two Abrams have been damaged, and a Bradley 'seriously damaged' by these Kornet missiles. Either they're not as potent as the Russians indicate, or the Iraqis are so inept at using them they haven't managed to make a kill. Either option is good news for us, and sucks for the Iraqis. Pity, pity.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 14:37 Comments ||
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Could be Kornets: our russki allies sold 2-3000 to Iraq.
Also check out RPG-29. Dunno if they got these under Lend-Leaski program, but I hope Putin got his money up front...
#8
When this is over, what are the bets that all these Russian violations get swept under the rug? Even if we push it, what's the UN going to do to Putin? Whack his pee-pee?
#9
I recall hearing (FOx probably) that the M1's were knocked out by rear-shots from wire guided ATGM. Since there were no casualties, that indicates a mobility kill on the engine that started a fire in the turrent, giving the crew time to bail. Not a tank in the world can stand those shots. So no Uber Weapons - just proper tactical employment by the Iraqi.
Problem for the Iraqis now is that the US unit that allowed them to get into their rear has learned that lesson, and will be much more thorough about securing their approaches and flanks as they drive thru an area now. More Bradleys on "Sagger Watch". Having a .50 Cal or 25mm gun chewing the terrain around you is enough to distract the aim by enough to cause a miss with a wireguided ATGM.
It is optically guided. How that works when your world is Suddenly Violent Feces (SVF) is up to the operator.
The right hit might take out an Abrams.
With 2-3 lost (Bradleys are a different matter, ditto-but-less-so Crusaders) in only 250 miles and 13 days, I say we run up the white flag while there's still time. That last SCUD was nearly as close to San Diego as it was to Kuwait and I believe they have us bracketed.
Long article.
Triumphant Royal Marine commandos yesterday mopped up the final traces of resistance in the south of Basra after the success of the first urban infantry assault of the war by British troops.
Under cover from smoke shells fired by British gunners, troops from Delta Company of 40 Commando renewed the assault at first light, attacking two enemy positions, known by military planners using the operation's James Bond theme as Pussy and Galore. Damm, the Brits have all the cool nicknames.
Attempts by Iraqi troops to flee from the British advance over the Shatt Al-Arab waterway were confounded when two boats crammed with soldiers were attacked by mortars and helicopter-borne missiles. They're fish food now.
By midday some sort of normality had returned to the riverside suburb of Abu Al Khasib and Royal Marine foot patrols were already deployed Northern Ireland-style, looking for Saddam loyalists. This is an area where the Brits have an advantage, they've been doing this for years.
They received a warm welcome from the members of the 30,000-strong population, with children and adults giving the thumbs-up, smiling and shouting "Mister, mister, England good". Smile
The success of Operation James may now embolden senior commanders to order a full advance on the heart of Basra, a city believed to be controlled by a desperate pro-Saddam minority. While there were some Royal Marine casualties from accidents in the battle for Abu Al Khasib, none was caused by enemy fire. Looking at the devastation around the town, that seemed astonishing. Under plumes of black smoke from two burning oil tankers, more than 10 destroyed Iraqi tanks could be seen in one stretch of road alone. Each had been stopped in its tracks, its thick steel armour peeled open. There did not appear to be any Iraqi dead inside, but plenty of hastily removed uniforms were strewn here and there. "It looks like the crews got out before the tanks were actually engaged," Brig Jim Dutton, the commander of 3 Commando Brigade, said. "That says something I suppose about the level of commitment from the enemy we face." The Challenger 2 tanks from C Squadron the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards were crucial to the battle. "Plenty of rocket-propelled grenades were fired at our call signs but they simply bounced off the armour," said Capt Fraser McLeman, 26, from Stratford-upon-Avon, the leader of one of the tank troops. One British armoured vehicle was attacked by 70 rocket-propelled grenades but it was not destroyed and its occupants were unhurt. Bet they have the Mother Of All Headaches
A Royal Marine told of a grenade glancing off his helmet and another told of how an Iraqi colonel driving a car with a briefcase full of cash refused to stop and was shot dead. "I didn't know what to do with the money so I gave it to the kids, bundles of the stuff," the Royal Marine said. Be good for toilet paper
For the Iraqis the arrival of the British also appeared to be welcome news. British troops discovered evidence of the brutality of the regime in a police station in the suburb where they found what appeared to be a torture chamber. "If any proof was needed of the nature of Saddam Hussein's regime then things like this give it," Lt-Col Gordon Messenger, the commanding officer of 40 Commando, said. Local people were not yet in any mood to discuss the past, but life appeared to be returning to some sort of normality yesterday. Shops opened, selling bags of spices and nuts, and at least one bakery was producing fresh, unleavened bread in a wood-fired oven.
The Royal Marines now patrolling the streets of the town reported good relations with the local population, who tipped them off on Sunday about an ambush being prepared by Saddam loyalists. Using this information, the British soldiers surprised their ambushers, killing three of them. For Col Messenger yesterday, there was only a residual sense of pride in the performance of his men. "To the layman the achievements in Abu Al Khasib of these men might sound strange but I know them well and it came as no surprise to me," he said. "Quite simply, they were magnificent." Bravo!
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 10:26 am ||
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interesting to contrast this with WaPo, which this AM says brits are sitting outside Basra, essentially waiting for Bagdad to fall first, and have not moved into city at all. Telegraph's map al Khasib as within 10 miles of center of Basra - shows Brits within 10 to 20 miles all around.
Im not sure whats happening - the usual fog of war and reporters "looking through a straw" (and US reporters not understanding the "sandhurst way of war")or if there is deliberate disinformation going on, one way or the other.
Too many contradictions
1. Brits are pushing into Basra, and sitting quietly outside it
2. 3rd ID and Marines are waiting for air campaign and raids to reduce RG, or are pushing towards Bagdad.
3. Iraqis are pulling RG's rapidly from north, while we are quietly wrestling with the Kurds and Turks about what to do about Kirkuk - Kurds say the northern front wont happen in obvious way.
I think (hope?) something important and largely invisible is underway, im certainly not sure what.
#3
Liberalhawk, what do you mean by 'supposed to'? Is this a monthly thing, an annual thing, a scheduled-months-ago-thing, or something scheduled since that strike? Would make all the difference if the Iraqis had recently promised he'd be on air in the last few days...
#4
More good news! I love it! Further proof that once they kick in the door good and hard, the whole rotten edifice will come down. The Iraqi people just need to believe we won't abandon them (again), and then the battle is won.
This scenario will be playing out all over Iraq in the next few weeks. We just have to be patient and supportive.
Posted by: Dar Steckelberg ||
04/01/2003 12:47 Comments ||
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You realize that all this is during a "6 day pause".
#6
Liberalhawk. My bet is they've got something going out west. All we're hearing about is the northern and southern front, and it appears Sammy's pulling forces from the north to the south. In the west, they took 2 airfields the first day and we haven't heard much since. I think they took those airfields for more then eliminating the Israeli Scud threat.
Two Iraqi soldiers who said they were sent on a suicide attack mission to the country's largest port have turned themselves in to British troops, the British commander said Tuesday. "We had two suicide bombers turn themselves in yesterday because they didn't want to be suicide bombers any more," Col. Steve Cox, commander of the Royal Marine Commandos running Umm Qasr, told reporters. "We are accommodating them." You gotta love those Brits.
The pair had no explosives in their possession when they surrendered, Cox said, adding that they were turned over to British military intelligence for interrogation and would be treated as enemy prisoners of war. He did not give any details about the alleged plans for a suicide attack. Suicide bombers with no bombs and who want to live.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 09:41 am ||
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"...they didn't want to be suicide bombers any more,"
Guess the retirement package wasn't up to snuff. Hope Sammy's men aren't holding relatives of these guys for insurance purposes, though, or publicising their unprofessionalism isn't going to help deter future bombers.
Dismissing reports that he's been ejected from Iraq for revealing tactical information about the 101st Airborne Division, reporter Geraldo Rivera said he plans to ride with U.S. troops into Baghdad. ...whether they like it or not.
Rivera, of Fox News Channel, revealed tactical information and at one point told about an attack two hours before it took place, according to sources at the U.S. Central Command who asked not to be identified. Maybe he's a spy. He's got that BIG moustache, you know.
Fox's rivals, CNN and MSNBC, both reported Monday that Rivera had been kicked out of the country. "During a live broadcast, Geraldo drew a map in the sand of where that unit was going. Not exactly what you're supposed to do out there," CNN anchorman Leon Harris said. Shortly thereafter, Rivera delivered a report via satellite phone saying he was 60 miles from Baghdad. In the report Rivera labeled reports of his ouster "a pack of lies" spread by his former colleagues at NBC. "It seems to me like some rats at my former network are spreading lies about me," he said. "They can't compete fair and square on the battlefield, so they're trying to stab me in the back. It's not the first time." Geraldo, let's turn the volume down on the ego, okay? The war's not about you.
Rivera said he intended to ride into Baghdad in search of Saddam Hussein, "the Iraqi Hitler." Yeah, I know. "Secrets of Saddam's Vault"...
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said that while Rivera was not embedded with any military unit, any violations of embedding rules were taken very seriously. "I have been in contact with the news organization and assured they are taking it seriously," Whitman said. "We will make an appropriate determination once we have evaluated all of the facts."
Fox News Channel executives did not immediately return telephone calls seeking comment. "The war among the press is about as intense as the war in Iraq," Fox prime-time host Bill O'Reilly said in a telephone interview. Don't think so, Bill. And why aren't you and your humungous ego suited up and on the line? Just asking.
Posted by: tu3031 ||
04/01/2003 09:22 am ||
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This is proof that Sadaam is dead. There exists no country big enough to hold both the egos of Sadaam and Geraldo at the same time.
#2
No wonder we haven't heard from Sammy lately. As a matter of fact, has anyone seen Sammy and Haroldo in the same place at the same time? (..and who, disguised as a mild-mannered reporter...) This is very suspicious! It would explain Haroldo's military genius which is apparently the same as Sammy's.
#3
Did Geraldo leak something that was actually true, or did the troops feed him inuendo and let his ego do the rest? Is that why they were all standing around grinning?
#5
Sammy may be imbedded, but it is not the same way as the reporters.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 11:05 Comments ||
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A patriot missile fired from Kuwait shot down a missile this morning. Geraldo, reporting on Fox this morning claimed to have WATCHED the intercept. He ALSO claimed to be in Iraq's western dessert. That's at least 300 miles away.
I bet Geraldo is still with the 101st and in Iraq, but with a supply unit back on the border with Kuwait. (Anybody remember the flap back in Afghanistan when Geraldo ah, "misreported" his position as being at the scene of some bloody fighting?)
Posted by: Dave ||
04/01/2003 12:33 Comments ||
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That last comment from Dave would seem to confirm the CNN.Com report that Fox has reached a deal with the Pentagon for Geraldo to leave Iraq voluntarily.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
04/01/2003 12:57 Comments ||
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This was reported by the AP wire:
"We have asked that he be removed and we are working with them to make that happen," Lt. Col. Dave Lapan said. He said the network had agreed.
. . .
"Earlier, Rivera had dismissed reports that he had been ejected . . ."
Posted by: GP ||
04/01/2003 13:12 Comments ||
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Air based reconnisance has reported seeing a set of fingernail marks that drag the 300 miles from the 101st HQ at Karbala down to the kuwaiti border.
Posted by: Frank Martin ||
04/01/2003 13:18 Comments ||
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Here's an idea. Cuff him and throw him on a chopper outbound.
#11
Sorry Dave, but you've forgot that the element of the 507th was part of the Patriot system being deployed forward to provide airdefense to the forward units of this campaign. The Patriot system is not just anchored along the Kuwait border. It is mobile and can be well beyond the Kuwait frontier. The intercept could have been against a missile aimed or transiting over these forward deployed batteries.
Posted by: Don ||
04/01/2003 14:31 Comments ||
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From the SMH no less! Heavily Edited — recommend you read the original.
The coalition has made astonishingly rapid progress. Only three Republican Guard divisions stand between the coalition forces and the city itself. Once reinforcements arrive, or even before, the opposition will be defeated.
Second: casualties so far have been encouragingly few.... irregulars have not won any battles or even mounted successful ambushes. Suicide tactics, so deadly against civilians in crowded city streets, work less well, if at all, against armed soldiers on the alert in open country.
Third: the Iraqi army is not fighting. The divisions around Baghdad seem to be waiting to be attacked. Although the long line of communications from Baghdad to Basra is coming under pressure, the attacks are sporadic and small-scale.
Fourth: the Americans have achieved a vital success in capturing several of the essential bridges over the Euphrates. The failure to hold the bridges, or to blow them before capture, suggests a highly defective Iraqi defensive strategy.
Fifth: ...the population seems inert. While it is not welcoming the invaders en masse, it is equally not raising the standard of resistance.
Finally, and to revert to the large military picture, the coalition enjoys total air superiority.
In a conventional military environment, not so heavily influenced by the surveillance of the media, any commanding general might reckon the campaign had made highly satisfactory progress so far. It has secured most of the territory and facilities over which it needs to operate, has a secure base, has acquired its own resupply port, dominates the enemy and is not threatened by large-scale civilian disorder.
The critical phase, the battle for Baghdad, has still to be reached. It is inconceivable, however, that the American army will not defeat the Republican Guard outside the city and such a defeat, in all likelihood, will rapidly bring about the city's fall.
Meanwhile, the focus is on Basra. There is no reason to think that the British will not succeed in the occupation. The fall of Basra will be a severe blow to Saddam's prestige and will signal to the population that the coalition is winning. Wow! When the Syndey Morning Herald feels obligated to acknowledge the war is going well, it speaks volumes.
Posted by: becky ||
04/01/2003 09:21 am ||
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Becky, you missed what I think was the best quote from the article:
"War has been their (journalists) staple diet for much of their professional lives but they seem to have made precious little effort to understand what they are paid to report."
Posted by: Patrick Phillips ||
04/01/2003 11:20 Comments ||
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There is a war on, and danger lurks ahead, and the Marines of the 3rd Battalion, 7th Infantry are getting desperate â for tobacco. It's been two weeks since they left they relative luxury of their camp in Kuwait and their supplies of cigarettes and chewing tobacco are running out. They are rationing their precious supplies, and even begging smokes from local farmers. An army, Napoleon reputedly said, marches on its stomach. But for generations, armies have also marched on nicotine. And these Marines - smoking more than usual under the stress of battle conditions - are getting antsy. Cranky, irritable Marines, look out Sammy!
It's hard to overestimate the importance of tobacco to the Marines. Cigarettes are smoked at every possible break and the doors of many Humvees are streaked brown from the spurts of tobacco-filled spit that shoot out of the windows every few minutes. Won't see these pictures on your evening news.
Tobacco helps relieve boredom, relax or stay awake for long nights, the troops say. While living in their tent camp in Kuwait for nearly two months, the Marines were constantly resupplied with cigarette cartons and rolls of 10 tins of dip mailed by family members or with tobacco they bought themselves at the PX truck. But there are no stores in this desert, though many Marines swear they have huge stores of tobacco in the mail somewhere out there, there's yet to be a mail delivery and there's little hope for one soon. "The Dips in the mail!"
With smokers and dippers becoming more desperate, the value of tobacco has exploded. Cpl. Aeron Jackson, 22, of Circleville, Ohio, sold 9 tins of chewing tobacco, for which he paid $4 each, for prices that started at $5 and escalated to $20 as his comrades run out. Now he is almost on empty himself. I see the plot for a GW2 movie. Sgt Bilko, seeing a chance to make a buck, driving a truckload of bootleg smokes across the desert with his crew of wacky sidekicks, gets lost in a sandstorm and winds up in Baghdad. Hilarity ensues as he trys to find his way back with his load of smokes, his team captures Saddam and wins the war.
But most Marines, no matter how low their stocks, are sharing what little they have. "As soon as someone gets a can it's pretty much gone in a day," said Kibler. He offered to trade the entire contents of his day pack, except his sleeping bag, for one more tin. "Every time I see somebody light up a cigarette I'm right there: 'What's up, man?'" he said. So far, Marines have not exploded with nicotine rage. But they have become a little more irritable and uncomfortable. "The real test will come when we're up for long hours and no one's got dip or smokes," Kibler said. "If we're up for 30, 36 hours, you'll see people getting real edgy." "Don't make me edgy. You won't like me when I'm edgy!"
Im surprised the professionally virtuous haven't succeeded in cutting off the availability of tobacco to U.S. forces "for their own good."
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 08:51 am ||
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Jeez, what happened to the new healthy, non-smoking military that I used to see all the time on the news and read about in the paper? I guess that was all PC media bullshit too?
#6
Crikey. I saw this story last night and said, "nah, Rantburg wouldn't want this." I should have known better!
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 10:57 Comments ||
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"Im surprised the professionally virtuous haven't succeeded in cutting off the availability of tobacco to U.S. forces "for their own good."
They keep trying to stop on-base sales, the BX/PX and Commisary folks keep fighting back by saying they would loose a lot of sales from people just buying their tabacco off-base. The clubs and bowling centers are smoke-free, everyone has to go outside to smoke, and we were always being "urged" to attend stop smoking classes.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 13:21 Comments ||
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British forces said they saw signs Tuesday that the tide of the war in southern Iraq may be turning in their favor: Iraqis were starting to warm to their presence in towns firmly under their control, where troops felt safe enough to replace helmets with berets. Lights flickered on for the first time in months in the port city of Umm Qasr, and schools and shops were reopening. Significantly, more civilians were informing foreign troops about the whereabouts of paramilitary forces and members of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's Baath Party, British officials said. "Within the southern area of Iraq, we see a large degree of normality starting to appear amongst the Iraqi population," said Group Capt. Al Lockwood, a spokesman for British forces in the Gulf.
Around Nasiriyah, where the coalition has met with stiff resistance, civilians are now helping U.S. special forces find troops loyal to Saddam, Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks told reporters Tuesday at a news conference in Kuwait. Brooks said local Iraqis are "increasingly willing" to aid the U.S. and British forces throughout the main areas of fighting. Marines were aided by 100 tribal fighters who helped fight Iraqi forces and remove explosives from a bridge north of Nasiriyah. In the western desert, civilians helped Army troops remove explosives from a hospital and check buildings, he added. Once the Iraqi citizens believe that we are not going to abandon them like we did last time, I expect to see more of this happening.
Lockwood stressed that tensions were still high in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city where British forces have skirmished almost daily with forces loyal to Saddam while trying to provide humanitarian aid to the city's 1.3 million people. And military operations continued in the region, including a raid on Baath party members in the town of Safwan, said another British spokesman, Col. Chris Vernon. But Lockwood said residents were increasingly willing to approach British troops who have ringed Basra to give information about known paramilitaries and other loyalists. "They realize that we are there to liberate them, not to occupy," he said. "Certainly, there are still military engagements happening with the paramilitary forces, but the aid is flowing into Basra now."
The British appear confident that they have reached some level of security in four southern towns. On Tuesday, British troops had changed their combat helmets for berets in Umm Qasr, As Zubayr, Rumeila and Safwan, British officials said. Lockwood said the berets makes the soldiers appear more friendly and approachable, and serve as a confidence-building measure on both sides. "It shows that we have confidence in them, and they can have confidence in us," he said. In addition, more humanitarian aid was flowing into the region, including from the United Nations and other aid organizations, he said. U.S. and British officials have acknowledged the expected uprising by anti-Saddam Shiite residents of Basra and other southern towns in support of coalition troops hasn't borne out to any large degree. They have attributed the residents' wariness to the fact that when Shiites did rise up in 1991, allied forces largely abandoned them and left them to be punished or killed by the Iraqi leadership. "They have suffered tragically, enormously under the Saddam Hussein regime," Lockwood said. "And although it's taken some time because of the events of 1991, they're beginning to gain the confidence now, they know we're not going away. They know we will be there to protect them."
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 08:42 am ||
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Thanks, Steve! Best news I've read in over a week now. I needed that.
Posted by: Dar Steckelberg ||
04/01/2003 10:00 Comments ||
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Edited for length:
A U.S.-led assault on a compound controlled by an extremist Islamic group turned up a list of names of suspected militants living in the United States and what may be the strongest evidence yet linking the group to al-Qaida, coalition commanders said Monday. The cache of documents at the Ansar al-Islam compound, including computer discs and foreign passports belonging to Arab fighters from around the Middle East, could bolster the Bush administration's claims that the two groups are connected, although there was no indication any of the evidence tied Ansar to Saddam Hussein as Washington has maintained. More documents, yummy!
There were indications, however, that the group has been getting help from inside neighboring Iran. I'm shocked!
I heard on the terriblevision last night that the head cheeses from Ansar ran across the border into Iran. If that's so, then the organization's not dead, unless the Medes and the Persians hand them over.
Kurdish and Turkish intelligence officials, some speaking on condition of anonymity, said many of Ansar's 700 members have slipped out of Iraq and into Iran putting them out of reach of coalition forces. The officials also said a U.S. missile strike on Ansar's territory on the second day of the war missed most of its leadership which crossed into Iran days earlier. Leaders being too holy to stay and fight
Sounds like they guessed what was coming, which didn't take real great intellect to figure.
According to a high-level Kurdish intelligence official, three Ansar leaders identified as Ayoub Afghani, Abdullah Shafeye and Abu Wahel were among those who had fled into Iran.
I don't know who Afghani is. Shafae is the current head of Ansar, replacing Mullah Krekar, to whom he was deputy. Abu Wa'il is reputed by the Kurds, who should probably know, to be Sammy's Mukhabarat liaison with Ansar. I've got a rough draft obituary on Ansar here.
The official said the three were seen being detained by Iranian authorities Sunday. "We asked the Iranian authorities to hand over to us any of the Afghan Arabs or Islamic militants hiding themselves inside the villages of Iran," said Boorhan Saeed, a member of the pro-U.S. Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. "We asked them about it Sunday, and still don't have a response." Don't hold your breath.
They might kick in with them. I think they're pretty tired of Ansar, too — not their style of terrorism. They blew the whistle on Mullah Krekar.
Last week, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld warned the Iranians to stop meddling in the war. Tehran denied any involvement. "Ansar? Never heard of them, infidel dog."
Using airstrikes and ground forces, Kurdish soldiers and U.S. troops have cooperated in the past week to dislodge and crush Ansar militants in 18 villages surrounding the Iraqi city of Halabja about 160 miles northeast of Baghdad. "We actually believe we destroyed a significant portion of the Ansar al-Islam force there," Maj. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, vice director of operations on the Pentagon's Joint Staff, said Monday. He said forces were investigating the finds. Among a trove of evidence found inside Ansar compounds were passports and identity papers of Ansar activists indicating that up to 150 of them were foreigners, including Yemenis, Turks, Palestinians, Pakistanis, Algerians and Iranians. Tap, tap, tap...Surprise meter broken, again
Coalition forces also found a phone book containing numbers of alleged Islamic activists based in the United States and Europe as well as the number of a Kuwaiti cleric and a letter from Yemen's minister of religion. The names and numbers were not released. How nice, we'll put them on our to-do list
"What we've discovered in Biyare is a very sophisticated operation," said Barham Salih, prime minister of the Kurdish regional government. Seized computer disks contained evidence showing meetings between Ansar and al-Qaida activists, according to Mahdi Saeed Ali, a military commander. It was unclear how strong Ansar remains. Officials from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of two parties that share control of an autonomous Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq, say they killed 250 Ansar members during two days of intense fighting and aerial bombardments. "There was ferocious fighting," Saeed said. He said he chased 25 Ansar militants across the Iranian border and captured nine Ansar sympathizers belonging to a group called the Islamic Movement of Kurdistan. The remaining Ansar fighters are thought to be in the mountains along the Iraq-Iran border, U.S. and Kurdish military officials have said. Kurdish soldiers on Monday continued sporadic fighting in several villages around Halabja and along the Iran-Iraq border near the village of Sargat, site of a destroyed building once allegedly used by Ansar militants to produce poison. Hunting season, no bag limit. Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Sunday the Sargat compound was probably the site where militants made a biological toxin, traces of which were later found by police in London. "We think that's probably where the ricin that was found in London came (from)" he told CNN's "Late Edition." "At least the operatives and maybe some of the formulas came from this site." They've been degraded, but they'll be back.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 08:27 am ||
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Update from IRNA: Molla Khord checkpoint, Iran-Iraq border, April 1, IRNA -- Sporadic clashes between Peshmergas forces of the Iraqi Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Ansar al-Islam Party still continue in Molla Khord at the zero border point on the Iran-Iraq frontier in Halabja region. "Although the region has been mopped up of Ansar al-Islam forces, a few number of their activists sometimes fire on the Kurdish Peshmergas from various areas and raise the number of the casualties," a PUK military commander told IRNA.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 9:20 Comments ||
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If it weren't for the reliability of the newspaper, I'd think it were an April fools joke. It IS true however. From the Daily telegraph mirror
SEVERAL people were wounded when a US warplane bombed two Iraqi buses carrying international volunteers, some of them American, who were operating as "human shields", Information Minister Mohammad Said al-Sahhaf said. Darwinism at work
Posted by: Anonymous ||
04/01/2003 06:20 am ||
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Murat, I hear they need some replacement Human Shields in Iraq - wanna volunteer?
#6
I heard on the radio this morning that the peace groups in Jordan, know nothing about this. I wonder if these human shields were the type looking to strap on bombs? Another message of "don't get involved maybe being sent".
Taha Yasin Ramadan is a member of Saddam Hussein's inner circle and is known as one of the Iraqi president's "enforcers".
Vice-President Ramadan is often sent abroad as the Iraqi leader's envoy and has held numerous senior posts since the Baath Party seized power in 1968.
Vice-President Ramadan is often sent abroad as the Iraqi leader's envoy and has held numerous senior posts since the Baath Party seized power in 1968.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 03:46 am ||
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Some of you may ask why I post this piece from the BBC about Taha Yasin Ramazan, vice president of Iraq, a member of Saddamâs closest circle.
I did it because since the Shia liberation did not go well as planned and the Shia did not rise against Saddam, some began to think if not the Shia, then weâll use the Kurds.
Well I have some little known back info, actually I wonder why it is little to not mentioned in the press, the vice president of Iraq, right hand of Saddam Taha Yasin Ramazan is a Kurd of the Cabak tribe.
I guessed it will rise some question marks for those who think they can automatically build on a Kurdish opposition support may face more bumpy stones on the road to victory.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 4:01 Comments ||
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#3
Thanks for the info Murat.
Taha is a Kurd. Tariq is a Chaldean Christian. I wonder if something bad happened at their bath party? I note his quote in the article, "I don't know anything about industry but anyone who doesn't work hard will be executed". Think again Labor!
#5
The Shi'ite or Shi'as or however you spell it have not joined the cause because they're still affraid of Saddam. Their support will have to be earned over time. Do you also get angry when Fedayeen shot families for surrendering or only when Americans are involved in accidents?
Ramadan may be a Kurd but I don't think the Kurds will forget al-Anfal or Halabja. I hope not. Does al-Jazeera have correspondents in Northern Iraq? What do they say about the Kurds? Slate.com's reporter says that things are going well and not spinning out of control.
Posted by: Tokyo Taro ||
04/01/2003 4:38 Comments ||
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#6
Hello Dishman, I am not combative as I donât respond to name callings of some of the posters but yes I do have a very different opinion on the situation with a complete disagreement on the war.
But apart from this it is not hard to see the troubles awaiting an US push from the north, according to MIT intelligence reports at least 7 loyal Kurdish tribes have been armed by Iraq. Since the CIA has made too many wrong assumptions lately it wont be a surprise if they misjudge the situation in the north also. They take quite a risk to suppose that all Kurds will salute the US troops as liberators. One of the guerrilla tactics can be to make it look like they receive soldiers as liberators and subsequently shoot in the back, canât be so difficult when soldiers think that armed peshmergas around them are on their side. I would watch my back especially at a moment when the peshmergas outnumber the forces at some places and in the remote villages.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 5:34 Comments ||
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#7
MIT intelligence reports? What, have we stopped getting them from Columbia, Harvard, & Yale?
#8
Still, this is hardly an argument, Murat. Yes, one member of Hussein's inner circle is a Kurd. That hardly means that all the Kurds would be against the US. In fact, most of the Kurds in northern Iraq are working with the US.
Most Americans are also capable of understanding that some Kurds, especially some in Turkey, are brutal, violent terrorists, while many others are of course not. The groups that mostly control northern Iraq are not, although of course the recently destroyed (by US and Kurdish forces) Ansar al-Islam had some Kurdish members.
It's ridiculous to make assumptions about an entire people based on one person, as you seem to be doing here.
Posted by: John Thacker ||
04/01/2003 7:52 Comments ||
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#9
...and then he swung at the end of a rope. The End.
#10
John Thacker, I did not say all Kurds are against the US, I said not all Kurds are with the US.
Yes, one member of Hussein's inner circle is a Kurd.
Not just a member but a vice president, and the whole of his tribe, and so are 6 more tribes at least (we talk about 300.000 â 500.000 people)
By the way MIT is the Turkish equivalent of the CIA.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 8:04 Comments ||
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#11
"MIT is the Turkish equivalent of the CIA. "
So we are to be sceptical of CIA claims, but MIT claims that many Kurds are pro-Saddam are to be taken at face value, without considering that MIT and Turkey may have motives for this.
We shall see what happens.
But, so far Kurds have fought alongside coalition against Al-Ansar, and have helped on the front line. Turkey has not helped at all. Perhaps either of these will change. We wait.
United States ground forces have engaged in combat with Saddam Hussein's "most prized forces" in southern Baghdad, a U.S. Marine official said late Monday. "In our own terms and in our own time, we'll continue the attack to defeat those fielded forces," said Col. Tom Bright, Marine Corps chief at the U.S. Central Command's joint operations center in Qatar, in an interview on CNN's Larry King Live. "Now, the fight's on to reduce those prize forces that he has," Bright said. Previously, Baghdad has been attacked only by coalition aircraft. The Few. The Proud. The Marines!!!
Posted by: Anonymous ||
04/01/2003 03:24 am ||
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#1
Whatever happened to that 4 day hold. Looks to me like they've been moving.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 11:10 Comments ||
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#3
Of course the story changed now to "south of Baghdad" and more recently "around Baghdad". I knew this would happen but I sorta wanted to be first to break the news on Rantburg. The headline is still accurate though :)
Edited to just the new stuff.
The war in Iraq entered a critical new phase last night as US Marines crossed Saddam Hussein's defensive "red line" outside Baghdad, skirmishing with Republican Guard units in preparation for an all-out assault on the capital. In the biggest air attack yet on what military sources said were control and command centres in Baghdad, Bâ1, B-2 and B-52 planes combined in a joint bombardment for the first time in US military history. The palace of the deceasedQusay Hussein, son of President Saddam, was hit at least twice in bombing raids on central areas of the city. Two thousand sorties in all were flown in the heaviest bombardment of the war so far.
American and British planes launched the most ferocious of a series of attacks on the Republican Guard divisions south of Baghdad. The main target was the Medina Division south-west of the city. The ground contacts with the Medina Division were described by the US military as "skirmishing" before the main battle for the city. "We are targeting them, we are destroying a number of them, we are taking away their ability to fight," said the Allies' deputy director of operations, Brigadier General Vince Brooks, at US Central Command in Qatar.
American forces appeared last night to have taken control of Hindiyah, between the holy city of Karbala and the ruins of ancient Babylon, 50 miles from Baghdad. Up to 35 Iraqi troops were killed in fierce fighting on the banks of the Euphrates as US Marines continued to establish a front line from which to launch a ground assault on the Iraqi capital. Although the fighting at Hindiyah — in which American forces captured dozens of Iraqi prisoners — was the closest yet to Baghdad, a senior military officer at Central Command warned that the real battle of Baghdad was still to come. Sources said the fighting was still the result of probing patrols designed to test the enemy's strengths and weaknesses. "This is the first time we have engaged the Republican Guard. There have been some serious skirmishes and some fierce fighting," said a military spokesman. "Patrols are moving forward and going in, finding out where they are strong and weak. It is quite frankly designed to keep the Republican Guard on their toes. This is not yet the main battle."
A US officer said: "Things are so bad for [Iraqi units in the south] that they have decided they have to bring in this valuable unit forward to step up the defence." Things will get bad for this valuable unit shortly.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 02:12 am ||
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Triangular insignia, eh? Any pyramids or eyeballs in evidence?...
ILL-FEELING between Britain and France over the invasion of Iraq has plumbed new depths ....
The defilement of Commonwealth war graves in northern France coincided with a poll for The Times which found that 54 per cent of Britons no longer regarded France as a close ally because of its opposition to the war....
Relations will be further rent by a second poll, in Le Monde, showing that only a third of the French felt that they were on the same side as the Americans and British, and that another third desired outright Iraqi victory over âles anglo-saxonsâ.
#2
I can't imagine the depth of the moral rot in that loathesome nation of whores, pickpockets, collaborators and perfumed dandies. The rot is, if anything, even deeper than it was three centuries ago when my ancestors fled to come to America. None of us, as best I can tell, has ever gone back.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
04/01/2003 19:46 Comments ||
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#3
Wait a minute, there, Dave.....I think you just insulted whores. Not all of them are French.
I don't think that anyone is surprised that 1/3 of them are on our side, and I don't think that's going to do serious damage to relations between US/Britain and France. The graveyard desecration is far worse. What a worthless bunch of cretins.
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 20:02 Comments ||
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#4
Take this poll with a grain of salt: If they took it in the outskirts of Paris where you have North African ghettos, the result is somewhat less surprising.
But I must say that I haven't met a German (non moslem) who wanted Saddam to win even if he was against the war. Looks like we're in bad company right now. Where is Manstein when you need him...lol
#5
France is the country we used to visit and spend money in...oh well, the french have more pressing business these days, defacing war memorials and such takes a countries full attention.
Edited for length
Guns and Roses Yeees!! GnR Baby! I'd like to request 'Knockin' on Heavens Door for this guy!
on Tuesday greeted the coffin of Palestinian volunteer Thaer Othman, waxedzappedbanged killed in Iraq on his way to fight U.S.-led troops. Iraq said on Sunday more than 4,000 Arabs had arrived to "martyr" themselves in the fight against U.S.-led forces.
3999 to go, I guess... A hegemon's work is never done!
Young men â some standing on rooftops and others leading the funeral procession â had gun sex fired volleys of shots into the air for two hours.
"Was it good for you, too, Mahmoud?"
Wonder how many people they took out when the bullets fell back down?
Shops were closed as a salute to Othman, and people stood on both sides of the roads, crying. Women ululated, and tossed rice on Othman's flower-covered wood coffin as it passed through the narrow streets of Beirut's Bourj al-Barajneh Palestinian refugee camp. A band played a funeral march and nationalist songs.GnR again?
"Bye-bye, Blackbird"?
Dozens of volunteers, including several Palestinians, left Beirut on Monday to fight in Iraq, joining several groups that left before them. Othman's brother, Samer, told Reuters the Palestinian left his home in Denmark on March 20 â the day Washington unleashed its war on Iraq â saying he was heading to Syria for vacation. Ahhh - Damascus in Spring.
"Thaer left Denmark on March 20 on a tourist trip to Syria. We didn't know he was in Iraq, He didn't have any political or party allegiances. He was married to a Danish woman, and has a child with her," he added, saying Othman, 30, also had another child. Palestinians in the camp, solemnly holding Othman's picture, said they saw him as a role model. "I don't know him, but I am going to be like him," Maher, 11, said as marchers chanted in the background.
And we're sure you will be, Sonny...
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/01/2003 03:46 pm ||
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Role model? He came back in a coffin. Maybe there's something to that.
This is in the "Other Developements" section at the bottom of the page.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday that the "impact or the legitimacy of the war" in Iraq had been diminished because no weapons of mass destruction had been found by coalition forces.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/01/2003 03:21 pm ||
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Dang - I can't spell 'Developments'! Sorry.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/01/2003 15:27 Comments ||
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Well, if we find one, we ought to bring it back to New York and shove it up this frauds ass!!!
#4
Could it be because WE HAVEN'T STARTED LOOKING YET? Kofi - why don't you go ignore Zimbabwe, eat cheese, and suck money from the US taxpayers - what you're good at - and leave saving the world to the professionals.
#5
Kofi, get over it already! You and France, Germany, Russia, and China have already proven that your sad organization is a leftover from the 20th Century. Your connivance together has destroyed your own organization - and just in time too!
Throw this guy out of the country along with the entire UN, the Iraqi "ambassadors" and anyone else who gives us sh*t.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
04/01/2003 17:35 Comments ||
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#11
Kofi, I think there may be an example or two for Blix to inspect in Kuwait.
I believe we shot the rest of them down before they landed.....sorry about that!
Posted by: Former Russian Major ||
04/01/2003 20:15 Comments ||
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Jordanian authorities have detained four Iraqis on suspicion of plotting to blow up the Hyatt Amman Hotel frequented by US nationals and foreign journalists, diplomatic sources told AFP. Nearly 70 foreign journalists were staying in the hotel at the time of the plot, along with many Americans staying in two adjacent tower blocks. Grand Hyatt Amman is located in the heart of the capital's business and diplomatic district. It includes 316 rooms and linked to the Hyatt Tower and Zara Expo, Amman's leading conference and exhibition center. Reuters, quoting diplomatic sources, also said Jordan suspected five Iraqi diplomats whom it expelled last month of plotting to poison water supplies serving military bases in the east of the country near the Iraqi border. I hope Sammy isn't paying his secret agents really big dollars. If he is, he's getting gypped...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 02:19 pm ||
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The United Nations should send human rights monitors to Iraq as soon as the security situation allows it, a U.N. expert said Tuesday. Jeez, guys...YOU'RE ONLY ABOUT 20 YEARS LATE ON THIS ONE!!!
"I would go tomorrow if the circumstances allowed it," Andreas Mavrommatis told a session of the 53-nation U.N. Human Rights Commission. "There is a lot to be gained by a U.N. presence in Iraq in the future in the field of human rights." ...especially us remaining as a viable organization so I, and many others, can keep my hack phony jobs. It would also offer us a chance to screw up the new Iraq. And, of course, we would monitor the evil Americans.
The Cypriot specialist presented a 15-page report on the rights situation in Iraq during the commission's annual six-week session. The report was prepared before the start of the U.S.-led war on Iraq, and makes no direct reference to the conflict. But in his speech, Mavrommatis urged both sides to "scrupulously observe international humanitarian law and shield the civilian population from the consequences of war." I hear the Iraqis are using them as shields. Is that what you mean?
The office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights has appealed for $1.6 million to send observers to Iraq "when conditions permit," spokesman Jose Diaz said Tuesday. Okay! There it is! Hand is out! 1.6M and we got feet on the ground in Iraq. Talk about a win-win for the UN.
Mavrommatis said his recommendations were similar to those in earlier reports. Last year, he urged Iraq to adopt a moratorium on executions, reduce the number of crimes which carry the death penalty and improve prison conditions. He also criticized discrimination against Iraq's Kurds and Shiite Muslims, who have suffered under Saddam Hussein's rule. Cooperation with Iraq was "a slow, painstaking process," Mavrommatis said. Baghdad's replies to his questions and recommendations "are at times incomplete and unsatisfactory." When this is over, you and Blixie should get together and have a good cry. You'll both feel better.
Mavrommatis was appointed in 1999 and visited the country for the first time in February 2002 at the invitation of Iraqi authorities. Iraqi Ambassador Samir al-Nima said the report was influenced by "unwarranted and unjustified political considerations," and failed to address violations by coalition forces attacking Iraq. Samir, why don't you kick him about 1.6M and maybe he'll revise the report? Might be kinda moot by the time you get it back. But it'll give you something to read when your in the brig at Gitmo.
#1
The UN Human Rights Commission is a big container full of swamp gas and the byproducts of millions of souls who were not protected by this worthless bunch of bureaucrats. We need to publically be in their faces and tell them so. These UN chaps are like cockroaches that need to be continuously stomped out. Man, they piss me off!!!!!!!
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 14:57 Comments ||
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Isn't this the commission that is currently headed by Libya? For cryin' out loud. Nice how they only show an interest in some place when we're runnin' the show? They, and their Incontinent Dog and Monkey Rodeo⢠can go beggin' somewhere else.
Posted by: Rex Mundi ||
04/01/2003 15:47 Comments ||
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The crash of a pick-up into the wall of the British Embassy compound in Tehran last night had been an accident, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi said on Tuesday. He told IRNA that the pick-up went into the wall after it slid due to the rainy surface of the street so it had been an accident by nature. He regretted that the vehicle's driver was killed instantly due to the ignition of his bomb belt outbreak of fire. The driver, carrying two large barrels of fuel oil in the open back of the vehicle, was killed instantly by the fire. Asefi said that the Foreign Ministry acknowledged the British Ambassador to Tehran of the nature of the accident soon after the crash.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
04/01/2003 12:18 pm ||
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The driver, carrying two large barrels of fuel oil in the open back of the vehicle, was killed instantly by the fire.
Read it, you know you want to.
A Microsoft spokesman announced today at Central Command in the desert of Qatar, that Microsoft recently helped the allied war effort by donating 100,000 fully licensed copies of Windows 95 to the current Iraqi regime. The horror! Clearly, this is against all rules of civilized warfare!
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 11:10 am ||
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In other news, U.N. weapons inspectof Hans Blix said today that there is no evidence that the Iraqi regime has been using Linux.
Posted by: Mike ||
04/01/2003 11:17 Comments ||
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Sigh. It's April 1st, isn't it?
Posted by: Fred ||
04/01/2003 11:19 Comments ||
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#3
We know that it is April Fool's Day in Anchorage, Alaska because we are having municipal elections as we speak.....
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 12:45 Comments ||
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Win95? The fully-unsupported one they don't sell any more? Nice gesture, I suppose, but sounds like warehouse space clearance with side of tax deduction.
Posted by: John A ||
04/01/2003 13:14 Comments ||
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#5
I thought Colorado Springs was the only place with that kind of a warped sense of humor. Looking over our list of 'candidates', it's a pretty sick joke. And once again, they left out "None of the Above".
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 13:20 Comments ||
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Edited for length:
Iran may have condemned the war raging just over the border in Iraq, but it is nevertheless hoping that the US-led coalition forces will knock out the leading Iranian armed opposition group, the People's Mujahedeen [Mujaheddin e-Khalq]. "The Mujahedeen are a terrorist group," Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi said Sunday in a rare public sign of what Iran hopes to gain out of the war on Iraq. "And if anyone knows terrorists, it's us."
The People's Mujahedeen, based on Marxist and Shiite principals, was instrumental in the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in 1979 but was later forced out of the country by the Islamic regime and set up camp in Iraq, where it boasted several bases and thousands of fighting men. Iranian opposition groups, both Kurd and Shiite, are hostile to the group, which has allied itself to Saddam since the mid-1980s and is classified as a terrorist organisation by Iran, the United States and the European Union. The People's Mujahedeen has been blamed for numerous assassinations and attacks in Iran. During the 1980-1988 war between Iraq and Iran, which claimed the lives of around a million people, the Iraqi authorities recognised the Mujahedeen as the legitimate representatives of Iran. The Iranian authorities are now hoping that the United States, which Tehran has often referred to as the "Great Satan" and which in turn has placed Iran in its "axis of evil", will soon put the Mujahedeen out of action. Some diplomats here say that Tehran was given assurances that if Iran did not get involved in the war in Iraq that the Mujahedeen would be sidelined in whatever regime takes over when Saddam is gone. But other diplomats doubt that the United States would make such a deal, and point out that the Mujahedeen would be targeted anyhow simply because they were allies of Saddam. Read somewhere today that members of Mujahedeen have been seen moving into the Kirkuk/Mosul region. We'll add them to the target list.
Foreign Minister Kharazi said Sunday that "the policy of the coalition is not to allow the Mujahedeen to have a base in Iraq after the fall of Saddam". But he insisted that this "does not mean that we have negotiated with the coalition on the issue of the Mujahedeen". Many of the Mujahedeen are reported to have defected to save their skins. Intelligence Minister Yunessi last week called on them to "abandon your movement's terrorist leaders and return to Iran", adding that the "Islamic Republic will forgive those who repent". But the Mujahedeen leaders will get no such tolerance. "The fate of those who cooperated closely with Saddam ... will certainly be the same as his," Interior Minister Abdolvahed Moussavi-Lari has warned. Works for me.
An illustration of the principle that the enemy of my enemy can still be my enemy in his own right.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 10:04 am ||
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This is how the jihadis learn boolian algebra:
ENEMY.OR.ENEMY.AND.ENEMY.NOR.ENEMY.NOT.ENEMY=
W.T.F.O? Imam I need help!
Sorry, Mahmoud, if it gets too confusing, just pick up your AK-47 and pop him.........like, this... uhhhhhhh (classmate slumps on his desk)
Imam, you just shot my friend Ahmed.
That's OK Mahmoud, I was just illustrating a point and giving you a life lesson in the bargain. Now who else in the class is confused?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 10:55 Comments ||
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#2
Imagine that - Iran complaining about terrorists. I guess it takes one to know one.
#4
Found the article: Mamad, mayor of the Kurd-controlled village of Sangaw near Kirkuk, said he had been told that part of an armed Iranian opposition group, the Mujahideen i-Khalq, based in Iraq with the blessing of President Saddam Hussein, had moved to Kirkuk from Khanaqin to the southeast.
Expendable cannon fodder. Sammy will fight to the last Mujahideen.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 12:25 Comments ||
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Head of the Lebanese Socialist Progressive PartyWalid Jumblatt warned Iraqi Kurd parties against 'falling into the trap of US plots in the region'. Bwahahaha!
"I hereby send my message to the leaders of the Iraqi opposition Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), Jalal Talabani, and Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) Massoud Barzani and warn them against US plots to divide the (ME) region and stress the United States will never support any country," Joumblatt said in a meeting with Lebanese Kurdish parties and associations. "The United States intends to destroy all Arab parties, nationalists and Islamic movements which pose threat to the Zionist regime," he stressed. Just those which pose a threat to us.
"If the US [has] success in its mission in Iraq, it would go after Syria and Lebanon in the future," he claimed. If you don't clean up your act, yes, we will.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 09:23 am ||
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Is this the same Walid "Wally" Jumblatt that used to be the head of the Druze militia in Lebenon? That was a might success;)
They've really been yapping at the Japanese lately...
The Japan Defense Agency set up the "headquarters for emergency measure" right after the U.S. start of the Iraqi war in a bid to support the U.S. military forces participating in the attacks on Iraq and intensify alert and watch on the DPRK, Nihon Keizai Shimbun said. The Japanese reactionaries are stepping up their preparations for reinvasion of the DPRK on the occasion of the U.S. war against Iraq, Rodong Sinmun today in a signed commentary says, and goes on:
The Japanese militarist forces dispatched aegis to the East Sea of Korea and launched an intelligence satellite, aiming at reinvading Korea. They are building up military strength to realize their ambition for overseas expansion with the backing of the U.S. and taking the DPRK as the first target of their attack. Oh, I don't know. The empire thing really didn't work out too well the last time.
Accordingly, their military strategy is focused on aggression on Korea. Their reckless moves, prompted by hostile hysteria against the DPRK, are a realistic danger. Bellicose remarks are made in Japan that a preemptive attack should be made on North Korea. We can not remain a passive onlooker to the reckless moves of the Japanese militarist forces, buoyed up by zeal for reinvasion as regards the U.S. war against Iraq. If Japan continues to run amuck in the preparations for reinvasion with the backing of the U.S., it will pay a very high price. They should just round up all the triplets in Japan and send them over. Kimmie will freak out.
Posted by: tu3031 ||
04/01/2003 08:26 am ||
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Hmm.. a Triplets Telethon, to raise aid money for the starving North Koreans..
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 13:08 Comments ||
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Remilitarizing Japan will scare the crap out of the Chinese (as well as the rest of the region). Look for more Chinese tightening of the leash on Kim Jong Il if he keeps pissing off the Japanese and pushing them to rearm.
#5
What a hopeless basket case. Japan has zero ability to project force, although their little advertised Self-Defence forces have been one of the best funded militaries on the planet for some time now. Threatening a build-up in reaction to N. Korea would be a good way to apply pressure on China and N. Korea itself to make concessions. Unfortunately, N. Koreans seem to have little understanding of cause and effect. You wonder if even the top N. Korean officials have come to believe their own lies - after swimming in them for 50 years.
Posted by: Tokyo Taro ||
04/01/2003 19:06 Comments ||
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A senior radio reporter in Swaziland who has been pretending to be reporting live from the war front in Iraq has been exposed as a fraud. Phesheya Dube who works for the state broadcaster, Radio Swaziland, was spotted in parliament by eagled-eyed MPs, Reuters news agency reported. Since the start of the war on Iraq, Mr Dube had been reporting on the English language "The Morning Show". The programme's presenter helped in the charade, by wishing Mr Dube well and telling him to "find a cave somewhere to be safe from the missiles" after he filed his pieces. But it appears he had just followed reports on the war from international radio and television networks, and then re-written them as his own eyewitness material. In parliament, MP Jojo Dlamini asked information minister: "Why are they lying to the nation that the man is in Iraq when he is here in Swaziland, broadcasting from a broom cupboard?" Clearly CNN material.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/01/2003 08:13 am ||
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The White House said Monday its road map for setting up a Palestinian state by the end of 2005 is not negotiable and that Israel must "play its part" to pave the way. Part of the Bush plan for stabilizing the Middle East is to establish some kind of Palestinian state. I'm not sure that this is the magic bullet that a lot of folks seem to think it is. In order for it to have the desired effect, the Palestinian state would have to be able to resist the use of its territory for attacks on Israel.
In a speech to a pro-Israel lobby group, Condoleezza Rice, who is President Bush's national security adviser, also called on all Arab governments to recognize Israel's right to exist and said democratic reforms within the Palestinian Authority were "extremely important." The Arab goverments recognize Israel's right to exist? I'm not holding my breath on that one.
The road map, prepared jointly with the European Union, the United Nations and Russia, is designed to reopen negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians once Mahmoud Abbas is confirmed as the Palestinian prime minister. Just another example of Amerian unilateralism, I guess.
Posted by: Patrick Phillips ||
04/01/2003 06:39 am ||
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Hmm. so what goes with this deal? Required Recognition of Israel by the surrounding Arab states who claim to want a Palestinian state, so that the Palestinians can get their homeland? Requirements to immediately agree to the Geneva conventions?
Sweeeeet. Arafatistan in 2005, immediately followed by war crimes committed by suicide bombers coming from Arafatistan, immediately followed by legal opening of hostilities.
This is like telling a homeless drunk that he now can earn a decent living and support himself and his family by taking over this tavern being given to him.
#2
Arafatistan in 2005, immediately followed by war crimes committed by suicide bombers coming from Arafatistan, immediately followed by legal opening of hostilities.
That wall that Israel is building should be done by then. Build a hanful of staffed access points at selected locations with complete screening facilities and that'll cut down on the number of 'splodeydopes gettin' through. :)
#3
a good point there.
If there were a Palestinian state, then splodeydopes would be an act of war, and a war crime at that. It'd be on the Palestinians to put an end to it or face a tribunal.
#6
The "Palestinians" already have a homeland. It's called "Jordan". The only thing driving the "palestinians" is the desire to destroy Israel and murder all the Jews that live there.
We need to get some rocks - really big rocks - and put these insects back under them where they belong.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 16:55 Comments ||
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Compiled by Daily Star (Lebanon) staff Edited for length The Syrians make their choice
DAMASCUS: Syria said Monday it had chosen to support the Iraqi people against the âillegalâ US-British invasion of Iraq, defying a new warning against Damascus from US Secretary of State Colin Powell. âSyria has chosen to align itself with the brotherly Iraqi people who are facing an illegal and unjustified invasion and against whom are being committed all sorts of crimes against humanity,â a Foreign Ministry spokesman said. In the latest shot of the growing war of words between the two countries over Iraq, Powell said that âSyria now faces a critical choice. Syria can continue direct support for terrorist groups and the dying regime of Saddam Hussein, or it can embark on a different and more hopeful course. âEither way, Syria bears the responsibility for its choices, and for the consequences,â he said.
Adding fuel to the fire, a senior Israeli intelligence officer told a parliamentary committee in Jerusalem that Iraqi chemical and biological weapons may be hidden in Syria, Israeli public radio said. âIt is possible Iraq transferred missiles and weapons of mass destruction to Syria,â General Yossi Kupperwasser told the committee Monday. He said the transfer could be one explanation as to why US-led forces scouring suspect sites in western Iraq had found nothing so far, the radio said. Kupperwasser also estimated the chances of Israel being attacked by Iraq, as happened in the 1991 Gulf War, as slim but warned that the regime of President Saddam Hussein could still try to strike once it sensed it was about to lose its fight against US-led forces.
Posted by: kgb ||
04/01/2003 02:37 am ||
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Think Brown! Sand is the real resource!
See my post(er)s on "Desert Waste Management"
#3
And the Syrian dictator supports suicide massacres. Scroll almost to the bottom of this gasbag's long address, to find the disgusting parts:
http://www.teshreen.com/syriatimes/s-tu/po001.htm
I agree that Syria is a threat to the region, and to the United States in particular. I also see the very real possibility that Hussein may have transferred SOME of his WMD to Syria. But remember the catastrophy Hussein faced when he "transferred" his Air Force to Iran in GWI? I'm not sure he'd be so willing to place all his trust in Assad.
Syria will be a much harder nut to crack. There haven't been any sanctions against Syria, and Russia has continued to sell them their most modern equipment. Syria's air defense assets are far more sophisticated than Iraq's, and include some systems that can easily target - and hit - ANY US air assets.
To the good, Syria has some very serious problems of its own: a weakened army, the necessity of keeping occupation forces in Lebanon (although they're not called that, that's essentially what they are), and a VERY CAPABLE, HOSTILE neighbor on its southern border.
Assad I wasn't the brightest bulb on the block, and I'm not terribly impressed with Assad II. Hopefully things won't explode before we're ready to deal with them, or we may very well have a two-front war to fight.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/01/2003 15:57 Comments ||
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Old Patriot:
My comments were semi-cavalier and not buttressed with the analysis yours were, but we share the same sentiment. Syria is a major supporter of terrorism and does have a more modern army than Sammy, but as you state, it also has the problem of that VERY CAPABLE, HOSTILE NEIGHBOR to the south. If we were a hostile neighbor from Iraq, the hammer could hit the anvil and Syria could start to look like a horse shoe or something.
On a macro level, Syria must be dealt with one way or the other. I would be more than happy for them to renounce terrorism, cooperate in the war on terror, expel Hezzbollah, and join the civilized world, but it is difficult to see them doing this. On the other hand, it is easy to see Hezzbollah declare war on the U.S. and then Syria is harboring terrs. Once that happens I could easily see the U.S. coming to blows with Syria. Then the admin says "gee... we could clean up lebanon at the same time... hmmmmm" Then Assad 2 gets to join Saddam in Sheol.
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran is preventing its citizens from crossing the border into Iraq to fight for President Saddam Hussein, saying that would violate its neutral status. "But I have a note from my ayatollah! Please?"
``I tried to cross the border, but military forces blocked my way,'' Mohammad Kanani, 23, a brain-damagedaddled fruit vendor from the border Ahvaz province, said Monday. ``I'm ready to sacrifice my cousin's blood to die in front of fight American and British liberators occupiers. Courageous decomposing Saddam is likely pushing up daisies standing up to them.''
Iranian military officials on the border said they were under orders not to let anybody through. ``We have prevented and will prevent anybody seeking to cross the border without authorization though it pains me to do this,'' a military officer said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has warned Iran that the United States would hold it responsible if any Iranian-sponsored forces crossed into Iraq. Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said Iran was determined not to take sides in the war. "Please don't hit us next! Hit those Syrians! Ummmm, yummy Syrians! Haven't you had a Syrian lately?"
Iran is known to be ambivalent about the war. On the one hand, Tehran is eager to see the end of the regime of Saddam Hussein, whom it blames for an eight-year war with Iran in the 1980s. On the other, Iran is loathe to see another neighbor - after Afghanistan and Pakistan - fall under American influence. Feeling a little surrounded, are we?
However, the war in Iraq has aroused the sympathies of the Arabic-speaking no-accounts people of western Iran. Many such people regard themselves as cannon-fodder Arabs first, Iranians second. Iran's main language elsewhere is Farsi.
Pro-Saddam collective eye-rolling demonstrations were reported last week in Ahvaz and Abadan, a port city on the border with Iraq. Abbas Heidari, an Arabic-speaking resident of Ahvaz, said he would wait for permission to cross into Iraq. ``I will not leave my brothers in Iraq alone if I am allowed to fight their American and British enemies,'' he said. "Then again, I could say here and herd goats."
Heidari, a driver in his thirties, said Arabic-speaking Iranians routinely tuned in to Iraqi television, followed its propaganda news and sympathized with Iraqi war victims. ``Many Iraqis don't fight for Saddam. They fight for their land. They want to keep their country clean from common sense foreign occupation,'' Heidari said. See ya soon, Heidari.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 01:54 am ||
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Though choice for Iranians, choosing between Saddam and the US.
Posted by: Murat ||
04/01/2003 3:17 Comments ||
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The religious nuts might prefer to join Saddam but how would the Iraq war veterans feel? Don't they want to see the Iraqi Shi'ites and their holy shrines free again?
Posted by: Tokyo Taro ||
04/01/2003 4:43 Comments ||
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Not sure if it would be such a bad idea to let them pass. Along with the Syrian jihadis, Hezballah, and the rest, if they want to die for Saddam, it might be a good idea to get them all in one place and whack the lot.
Posted by: Ben ||
04/01/2003 5:58 Comments ||
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lol... tough choice???... the everyday people pf Iran may be hoodwinked by thier leaders -- "look over there - those horrible American infidel dogs!!!"... I would think the economic elite of Iran would rattle thier sabres at us a little less when they remember how many of thier children they send to us for advanced education -- maybe they're just feeling guilty about the way they enjoy bootleg American porn and want to shift blame to the great corrupter?... these are the same PEOPLE, by the way, that we had confidence to arm in the 1970's -- if the poor bastards would be educated in the TRUTH, they'd line thier so-called "religious leadership" up against the wall and shoot them...
If they were capable of seeing the truth, they would never side with Saddam, would they? Really Murat, who is worse, the US or Saddam? Whose people are more likely to wake up in the morning to find a family member spirited away in the night? Whose people enjoy more freedom? Honestly, I don't see why this is such a difficult choice for the Iranians......
Posted by: steve ||
04/01/2003 6:11 Comments ||
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"Abbas Heidari, an Arabic-speaking resident of Ahvaz"
these are not ordinary Iranians - these are Ahvazis, "ethnic Arabs" who live in the southwest corner of Iran bordering Iraq. In Iran-Iraq war Saddam attempted to "liberate" ahvaz. He apparently also maintains an "Ahvazi Liberation Front" in Basra - these may be among holdouts in Basra.
Iran seems to be making its choices cautiosly, maybe even wisely. It would be interesting to know how this playing out between Khatami on the one hand, and the various ayatollahs on the other.
#6
Am I the only one disappointed that these Islamofanatics were not allowed to enter Iraq? Why is it that I have these images of CIA agents in Iran and Syria, by holding little seminars with coffee and donuts, titled: TEN EFFECTIVE TECHNIQUES OF A SUICIDE BOMBER. After the seminar, selected candidates are herded out the back door for their free, one in a lifetime, bus trip down HWY 80.
#7
Let 'em through on a one-way bus ride down Highway 666 if they are dumb enough.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/01/2003 10:59 Comments ||
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Iran is preventing its citizens from crossing the border into Iraq to fight for President Saddam Hussein, saying that would violate its neutral status.
This is a (sort of) brain.
Though choice for Iranians, choosing between Saddam and the US.
North Korea test-fired an anti-ship missile off its west coast Tuesday, Japanese officials said, in an apparent response to Japan's launching of spy satellites to monitor the communist nation.
However, South Korea's Defense Ministry said there was no evidence that North Korea had test-fired a missile. ``South Korean and U.S. military intelligence officials have checked on the report and concluded that there was no missile launch by North Korea,'' a ministry official said on condition of anonymity.
In Washington earlier, a Pentagon official had confirmed the launch of the ground-to-ship missile, but said the United States does not view it as a threat. A spokesman for South Korea's Unification Ministry had called the alleged launch ``routine for a bunch of nutters.''
There was no immediate explanation of the conflicting reports.
A North Korean test of the short-range missile would come just days after Japan launched two satellites into orbit to keep watch over Pyongyang's missile and suspected nuclear arms programs. That launch angered the communist state, which had foamed at the mouth threatened to test-fire a missile.
Japanese Defense Agency spokesman Manabu Shimamoto said Tuesday's launch was not a direct threat since the missile was aimed away from Japan. ``We believe it is a ground-to-ship missile that is impossible to reach Japan,'' Shimamoto said. Unless they got a new version of the Long-Dong.
The missile was fired from the northwestern coast of the Korean Peninsula, Japanese Defense Agency official Takamasa Iba said. The range of the missile is about 37 plus or minus 37 miles, said Kiyoju Arai, an official at the land and transport ministry.
In Seoul, the U.S. military said that American stealth fighter jets and other aircraft and troops in South Korea for joint war games will remain once the exercises are finished to act as a deterrent against North Korea. Six F-117A radar-evading airplanes and other forces have been here for the past month for war games with the South's military.
``Extending their training time in the Korean Theater of Operations affords an excellent opportunity to further enhance interoperability while also enhancing deterrence,'' a statement from the American military said. Yeah, whatever he said.
It said that in addition to an unspecified number of stealth aircraft, some F-15E fighter jets and a small Army task force would stay. The retention of the stealth fighters is likely to escalate tension on the Korean Peninsula.
North Korea test-fired two short-range missiles in late February and early March amid tensions over its suspected nuclear weapons programs. Washington and South Korea have criticized the tests as attempts to force the United States into direct talks. Which we won't do.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/01/2003 01:47 am ||
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"If you will not speak directly to us we will test something else! Perhaps a Cuisinart, one of our new French missiles!"
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.
Vandals have defaced one of the biggest British war cemeteries in northern France with graffiti condemning the US-British invasion of Iraq, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) said. Insults aimed at British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George W Bush were sprayed in red paint over a monument to Britain's dead from World War I and discovered by a gardener last Thursday. "It was removed by the afternoon but not before a couple of coach loads [of visitors] had been through and seen it - we are pretty hacked off and I am pleased to say the French authorities are too," Tim Reeves said, the CWGC's representative in France. 
One POW has been extracted. Details will be made available later, after next of kin have been notified. 
