Target Centermass

Category: War on Terror

  • London. Again.

    (c) FreeFoto.com

    Second verse same as the first. Only less so.

    Two weeks to the day after the July 7 London bombings, attackers tried — and failed — to set off explosive devices at three Tube stations and on a double-decker bus.

    Police said evidence left behind in Thursday’s attempted bombings has given them what may be a “significant breakthrough” in their investigation.

    Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair told reporters the intention of the terrorists “must have been to kill” and that some of the devices failed to explode.

    There are reports of one person wounded, although ambulance services said they did not transport anyone from the scenes.

    There’s is no official word at this time that the latest terror attack was the work of Moslem radicals, but let’s safely say they do have a pretty good track record in these matters. There’s an old saying that has been modified to more adequately match reality: the race isn’t always to the swiftest nor the fight to the strongest … but that’s the way to bet. The terrorists aren’t always radical Islamists, but putting your money down on the red crescent would seem to have a generally solid rate of return.

    Maybe we should all just sit down and have a nice little powwow on the matter. Just yesterday, Prime Minister Tony Blair pondered on a conference to ponder on how best to deal with Islamic extremism. British Moslem leaders countered with a call for an investigation into the motivation of the terrorists. Great, throw in a few rounds of kumbayahs and we might be on to something.

    Prime Minister Tony Blair said Wednesday he is considering calling an international conference on how to eliminate Islamic extremism following last week’s terror bombings in London, while Britain’s Muslim leaders demanded a judicial inquiry into what motivated the four “homegrown” suicide bombers.

    Want to understand them? Want their motivation? Well, I have it — they want and feel they deserve domination of the whole freakin’ world. Ace also has it and spells it out quite clearly [emphasis in original].

    The Islamofascists do not need fresh provocations for their mass murders. They have 1400 years of greivances they want payback for.

    And, by the way, the ideology is expansionist, imperialist, and colonialist– they want to control all territory they once held, and they want to controll all territory which Muslims have, through immigration, “colonized.” They believe it against the demands of Allah for any Muslim to subjugate himself to any authority except a strict Islamic one.

    Do you really think they just want Israel and Iraq?

    What about the disputed areas of Kashmir? What about Muslim-heavy areas of the Balkans? What about East Timor? What about non-Muslim parts of Lebanon? What about Africa?

    What about the scores of smoldering little civil wars going on all over the world, the majority of which involve Muslims fighting non-Muslims?

    Why does the left insist on believing that actual diagnosable psychopaths — and I am NOT using that term hyperbolically; Islamofascists are true psychopathic murderers — are somehow “reasonable” and if we just give them a little they’ll be satisfied with that?

    Does a shark stop eating after its third fish?

    You can appease to your heart’s content, ladies. But they want Spain back too.

    So please write out a list of all the territory of the world you are willing to cede to viciously medieval thugocratic rule in the interests of buying “peace” from people who have told you, out of their own mouths and with no equivocation, they simply want to eradicate you and there’s nothing you can give them that will change their minds.

    Their worldview must be reshaped or eliminated. It’s as simple as that, and the civilization we cherish and hope to pass on to our progeny hangs in the balance.

  • Survey: 25K Civilians Killed in Iraq War

    A recent study has set a new guidepost for anti-war arguments — the death of 25,000 innocent Iraqis.

    Nearly 25,000 civilians have been killed since the start of the Iraq war, according to a group that tracks the civilian death toll from the conflict.

    The Iraq Body Count — a London-based group comprising academics and human rights and anti-war activists — said on Tuesday that 24,865 civilians had died between March 20, 2003 and March 19, 2005 [Jeez, London-based? I’d have waited a wee bit longer if I were them].

    The group said 42,500 injuries were recorded as well.

    Actually, as cold as it may sound, those figures don’t sound unreasonable, given an entire country being militarily defeated and then subjected to two-plus years of ongoing terrorist activity, the burden of which has been cowardly projected upon the civilian populace by our enemies. Compare these numbers to the approximately 43,000 killed in the London Blitz by one side. Oh yeah, throw on over 139,000 Brits wounded for a twisted topping and the cruel but unfortunate numbers may come into perspective.

    The report also said that “U.S.-led forces were sole killers of 37 percent of civilian victims” and that “anti-occupation forces were sole killers of 9 percent of civilian victims.” It added that “criminals killed 36 percent of all civilians.”

    I’ll buy the 25K, but I’ll need to see a bit more substantiation for this distribution of blame. They seem a little light on the “anti-occupation” category, given the wealth of recent terrorist bloodbaths. As a little side note, please realize that “anti-occupation” is the latest buzzword from al Jazeera, where even the terrorists comprising Hezbollah are glorified as anti-occupation fighters.

    Still, this 25K figure is far more reasonable than the previous 100,000 that has been so flaunted by the leftists, defeatists and pacifists.

  • Iraq Over the Weekend

    Big truck go boom.

    I gave myself over to the Bard and the girlfriend and, hence, I am a little late with what I view as the big story of the weekend — the bloody carnage surrounding a tanker truck blown up by a suicide bomber. CNN.com reported yesterday as follows:

    A suicide bomber detonated his explosives near a propane fuel tanker parked near a gas station south of Baghdad Saturday evening, killing at least 60 and wounding as many as 100 people, police sources said.

    The massive blast occurred in the center of Musayyib along a dangerous stretch in Babil province known as the Triangle of Death about 45 miles south of the capital. Musayyib is predominantly Shiite.

    The explosion destroyed a neighboring apartment complex and damaged a Shiite mosque and surrounding businesses, police said.

    The tanker entered Musayyib after being searched at the city’s entrance and parked at the city center, according to police. The bomber, strapped with an explosive vest, approached the tanker and detonated. Police are calling it a coordinated attack, suggesting the tanker’s driver was part of the attack.

    Today, CNN upped the death toll to at least 90. As I am a day late and a dollar short on my coverage, I’d like to take a look at the fallout of the terror strike.

    First, let’s look at a follow-on piece from the Los Angeles Times.

    Blast Designed for Maximum Casualties, Officials Say

    The claim of that headline, as the terrorists certainly are not using “smart” technology and most assuredly ply their trade in blood, seems practically too obvious to even be stated. Anyway, according to the story, the collusion of the truckdriver is confirmed.

    On Sunday, law-enforcement officials in Baghdad and Hillah, the provincial capital, said the massive explosion that killed at least 90 Iraqis and wounded more than 150 at about the time of sunset prayers was part of an elaborate insurgent operation designed to inflict maximum civilian casualties.

    A police official in Baghdad said the license plate of a gasoline tanker detonated by a suicide bomber matched one stolen by armed bandits a few days earlier on the road between the capital and Fallujah. Police in Hillah said the suicide bomber, who was on foot, set off his explosives as soon as the tanker’s driver fled the scene.

    “These people harbor satanic ideas,” said the spokesman for the provincial police headquarters, a captain who asked to be identified by his nickname, “Abu Hareth,” for security reasons. “It was just like hell itself.”

    Any pretense that innocent civilians were not the intended targets must quickly fall by the wayside.

    The bomber apparently was sitting at a cafe along a traffic circle in the town’s main square, sidling up to the truck as it stopped across the roundabout from the People of Musayyib Hosseiniyeh, a Shiite mosque. Several witnesses said they spotted the driver escaping moments before the explosion.

    “The explosive belt is very hard for us to counter,” said Wathiq Jawad, a police detective in Hillah. “We cannot detect it.”

    Samir Ibrahim, a 30-year-old computer engineer, was surfing the Internet at a cafe in the square, a lively if modest commercial center of two- and three-story buildings filled with private doctors’ offices, outdoor clothing stalls, coffee and tea houses, pastry shops, ice vendors and cell-phone retailers.

    Ibrahim escaped the bombing unharmed but lost three cousins.

    “The truck was full of gas, and fire was floating in the air and burned the buildings that were close,” he said. “Most of the people who were there were shop owners and women who had come to shop or see a doctor.”

    The explosion charred a 300-foot black circle in the town center, damaging nearby buildings. As the fire erupted, mortar rounds landed near the police station and the hospital, adding to the chaos.

    Ibrahim watched in horror as men, women and children burned to death in a blast that destroyed 20 cars and torched ramshackle houses.

    “A little one was only 3 months old, and she did not make it,” he said.

    The terrorist sat at a cafe before the attack and had time to ponder those who would be his victims. He most assuredly knew that he was not striking a blow against “occupying infidels” but instead Iraqi women and children, shopkeepers and workers. To top it off, the bastards followed up by targeting the overwhelmed hospital with mortars.

    That said, I do want to point out a little needlessly negative spin in the Times piece as they look at the security aftermath.

    No fewer than eight checkpoints — manned by various teams of Iraqi Army, Iraqi police, Iraqi highway patrol and U.S. soldiers — dotted the 40-mile road from Baghdad to central Musayyib, which was closed to vehicular traffic.

    Such measures offered little protection against suicide bombers on foot like the one who struck Musayyib.

    While true that these efforts may offer little enhanced protection against suicide bombers, they do limit the opportunity for the bomber to utilize a stolen tanker truck for enhanced devastation. That is the weapon that made the Musayyib strke so horrific.

    Now let’s turn to blast’s aftermath on Iraqi politics.

    After Iraq attacks, calls for militias grow

    A devastating blast south of Baghdad, the latest in a series of suicide attacks aimed at undermining Iraq’s US-mentored political process, has raised the temperature between Sunni and Shiite political factions and revived dormant questions about the effectiveness of government security forces.

    […]

    Shiite parliamentarian Khudayr al-Khuzai called on the government Sunday to “bring back popular militias” to protect vulnerable Shiite communities. “The plans of the interior and defense ministries to impose security in Iraq have failed to stop the terrorists,” he told the National Assembly.

    […]

    Following Mr. Khuzai’s outraged speech in parliament, other members of the Shiite-led majority bloc said they also wanted militias to help stop such attacks. “We need militias to provide protection,” said Saad Jawad Kandil, a member of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a key party in the Shiite-led alliance that dominates parliament.

    SCIRI controls the roughly 7,000-strong Badr militia force, which frequently has been accused by Sunni leaders of torturing and killing innocent Sunni civilians, including clerics. Before the government’s formation, the multiparty Shiite alliance called loudly for a purge of police and Army units, in order to root out Baathist officers allegedly still loyal to the fallen regime of Saddam Hussein. But Sunnis and Kurds fear that a move by SCIRI to fill that hole with Badr militia. This would effectively ensure control of the security apparatus by SCIRI, which has ties to Iran.

    Despite claims of abuse against Sunnis, the Badr militia has reportedly been helpful previously in securing urban neighborhoods. During the Jan. 30 elec- tions, Shiite militiamen, through informal agreements with the Iraqi provisional government, helped Iraqi and coalition security forces set up barricades to defend polling stations. Meanwhile, militias controlled by Kurdish parties, which collaborated with US forces during the 2003 invasion, continue to play a key security role in northern Iraq.

    There are obviously short-term plusses and long-term minuses surrounding the existence of local militias already in place. The call for the creation of more such militant organizations is irresponsible and damaging to actual progress being made. Early U.S. plans acknowledged the dangers of such bands.

    Under US-drafted provisional legislation, nongovernmental militias are meant to be either disbanded or integrated into the government security apparatus as part of Iraq’s transition to democracy and rule of law. But with no side willing to give up its firepower, the militia issue appears to have been sidestepped during current talks aimed at producing a permanent constitution.

    Should Mr. Khuzai get his way in the call for an increase in local militias, he would be hearkening for a brief increase in security that would hearken to an actual rule on the ground by warlords and almost certainly lead to civil war. I understand the emotion of the moment, but it is irresponsible of a parliamentarian to make steps that would actually guaranty far greater bloodshed by his countrymen.

    The U.S. should, without stepping on the actual sovereignty of the new Iraqi government, put pressure to prevent such a reactionary move and its predictable consequences.

  • Army Declines to Discipline Gitmo General

    Hmmm…

    Military investigators said they proposed disciplining the prison commander at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, because of abusive and degrading treatment of a suspected terrorist that included forcing him to wear a bra, dance with another man and behave like a dog.

    They said Wednesday they recommended that Army Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller be reprimanded for failing to oversee his interrogation of the prisoner, who was suspected of involvement in the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

    But Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, commander of U.S. Southern Command, said he overruled their recommendation and will instead refer the matter to the Army’s inspector general. Craddock concluded that Miller did not violate any U.S. laws or policies, according to officials familiar with the report.

    I don’t know that the details of this story constitute abuse, as they really sound more like mild hazing. I do actually hope that the bra portion is true, because the thought of a violent terrorist wearing Victoria’s Secret dainties in lieu of a bomb vest is freaking funny.

  • Terror ‘Round the World

    Not in too much of a mood for blogging tonight, so how about link dumpalooza on the war against Islamist terror?

    Let’s start with what, in my view, is the most disgusting story of the day.

    Suicide bomber kills 18 Iraqi kids

    Tiny plastic sandals, some tattered and stained with blood, lay in a pile near a child’s crushed bicycle. Mothers wailed and beat themselves after a suicide bomber killed 18 children and teenagers getting candy and toys from American soldiers.

    One of the soldiers was among the up to 27 people killed in Wednesday’s blast in an impoverished Shiite Muslim neighborhood. At least 70 other people, including three U.S. soldiers, were wounded. A newborn was among those hurt.

    […]

    “There were some American troops blocking the highway when a U.S. Humvee came near a gathering of children,” said Karim Shukir, 42. The troops began handing out candy and smiley-face key chains.

    “Suddenly, a speeding car bomb…struck both the Humvee and the children,” Shukir said.

    Americans give chocolate. Islamists give death. Tell me this is not a war that needs to be fought.

    Australia to redeploy troops to Afghanistan

    Australian Prime Minister on Wednesday announced that Australia will send 150 troops to Afghanistan at the request of the United States, Afghanistan and others to combat the regrouping of Taliban and al-Qaeda networks.

    The troops, comprising SAS (Special Air Services) soldiers, commandos and logistic support, will be deployed in September, when parliamentary elections will be held in the war-ravaged country.

    The fresh troops will stay there for 12 months working with the US troops.

    […]

    Australia sent 1,500 strong troops to Afghanistan in 2001 but withdrew all the troops in 2002. There is only one Australian engineer being engaged in mine clearance in the Asian country at present.

    Welcome back, blokes. As an aside, I’ve always held the Aussie spirit in very high regard.

    Labor alarmed by PM’s talk of terror attack

    Labor’s foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd is alarmed by Prime Minister John Howard’s comments that the possibility of suicide bombing attacks in Australia like those seen last week in London cannot be ruled out.

    Mr Howard says he does not believe the Government’s decision to redeploy soldiers to Afghanistan will make Australia more of a target but says he cannot count out the possibility of an attack here.

    “We shouldn’t complacently imagine that there aren’t potentially suicide bombers in this country,” Mr Howard said.

    Mr Rudd says if Mr Howard has intelligence about potential threats he should make it public.

    “If you have have no intelligence that there are suicide bombers in Australia, then make that plain to the Australian people as well,” he said.

    Mr. Rudd, I have some relevant intelligence for you: there are people out there that would love to kill you. And me. And any infidel they can touch with their knives or shred with their bombs.

    British Police Search for Mastermind of Blasts

    Britain said today that it was hunting the mastermind of the terror attacks here last week, and the British Home Secretary offered the first official indication that officials believe the four attackers were suicide bombers who “blew themselves up” in the blasts.

    The police said late today that officers had raided a home in Buckinghamshire, around 40 miles northwest of London and close to Luton, where police seized a car laden with explosives one day earlier. Police officials declined to give further details or to say whether the raid, conducted under anti-terrorism laws, was against the home of a fifth suspect.

    The four coordinated mass-transit bombings last Thursday confronted Britons with the very scenario they feared most – an attack by British-born terrorists drawn from the ranks of disaffected Muslims and seeming to copy the grim tactics of assailants in Israel or Iraq that most Britons see only on their television screens.

    Make no mistake — suicide bombers will find there way to many more western countries. The London attacks underscore the dire situation many European nations must soon face, that of large pockets of isolated, unassimilated Moslem immigrants that are fertile breeding grounds for radicalism and violence.

    Pakistan ‘thwarted’ UK pre-poll plot

    Pakistan helped Britain avert a terrorist attack ahead of the general election in May by alerting officials to a potential plot, the Pakistani interior minister said on Wednesday.

    Aftab Khan Sherpao said that information shared by Pakistan with Britain led to arrests in various countries, including Pakistan, and that the plot was “aborted”.

    “Before the general elections in the UK we had received reports that [a terrorist attack] may arise before the elections, and that was aborted because of the information provided by the government of Pakistan,” Mr Sherpao told reporters in Islamabad.

    This story, along with the recent bombings, show the flawed concept of treating this war exclusively as a criminal matter, even with large cooperation from the international community. Law enforcement and intelligence has to be perfect or blood flows. That is the reason why such a strategy must be coupled with something more. Currently, that something more is trying to provide an alternative to the radical culture by building a viable, democratic Iraq. If that fails, the alternative strategy may eventually have to be far bloodier.

    Italy convicts 2 on terror charges

    An Italian judge on Wednesday convicted two North Africans of belonging to an extremist cell alleged to have planned attacks in Italy, including one against Milan’s subway.

    Judge Silvia Milesi sentenced the defendants — Moroccan Mohamed Rafik and Tunisian Kamel Hamraoui — to up to four years and eight months in prison, a defense lawyer said.

    A third suspect, Tunisian Najib Rouass, was sentenced to one year and two months in prison on the lesser charge of inciting violence, while a fourth, Tunisian Romdhane Ben Othmane Khir, was acquitted, said lawyer Ilaria Crema.

    All defendants denied the charges, and those convicted are expected to appeal the ruling. Prosecutor Roberto Di Martino described the verdict as a “balanced ruling.”

    I do sincerely hope that the aim of the ruling was for justice rather than balance.

    Italy police detain 174 people in anti-terror sweep

    Police raided scores of homes and detained 174 people across Italy on Wednesday in a sweeping anti-terrorism crackdown on suspected Islamic militants.

    “The operation has been prepared for some time and confirms Italy has never lowered its guard in the face of terrorist risks,” Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu told journalists.

    The crackdown, involving 201 search warrants from Milan to Naples, follows last week’s deadly attacks in London and comes a day after Pisanu warned that terrorism was “knocking on Italy’s door” and urged parliament to strengthen security laws to prevent an attack.

    “I’m not saying that we have seized terrorists. It’s a preventative operation in high-risk environments,” Pisanu said before the announcement of detentions.

    Okay, so you won’t say you seized terrorists. Would you at least describe the round-up as a “balanced raid” of potentially murderous radical Islamist bastards?

    Now, let’s bring it home to America where the “T” word apparently finally has some bite.

    Muslim Leader Gets Life for Inciting Jihad

    A man convicted for what he said — words that prosecutors said incited his followers to train for violent jihad against the United States — had a few more things to say yesterday in a federal courtroom in Alexandria before he was sentenced to life in prison.

    Ali Al-Timimi, a prominent Muslim spiritual leader, delivered an impassioned statement in which he asserted his innocence, read the preamble to the U.S. Constitution and said his religious beliefs do not recognize “secular law.” He then compared himself to the Greek philosopher Socrates, who was sentenced to death for corrupting the young and dishonoring the gods of Athens.

    “I will not admit guilt nor seek the court’s mercy,” Timimi told a courtroom crowded with his supporters and prosecutors. “Socrates was mercifully given a cup of hemlock. I was handed a life sentence.”

    […]

    The Timimi case culminated an investigation in which 11 Muslim men, all but one from the Washington area, were charged with participating in paramilitary training — including playing paintball — to prepare for “holy war” abroad. Timimi was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the earlier case, in which nine men were convicted in 2003 and 2004.

    […]

    The heart of the government’s evidence against Timimi was a meeting he attended in Fairfax on Sept. 16, 2001, five days after the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center. Timimi told his followers that “the time had come for them to go abroad and join the mujaheddin engaged in violent jihad in Afghanistan,” according to court papers.

    Treason.

    Hey, if the guy wants hemlock, give him some freakin’ hemlock already.

    That’s tonight’s global terror link-o-rama. It’s a small (terror-filled) world after all.

  • More National Guard News

    National Guard chief says Iraq danger “misrepresented”

    The head of the National Guard says the dangers American troops face in Iraq have been exaggerated — complicating recruitment efforts at home.
    Lieutenant General Steven Blum says the casualty rate for Guardsmen is low compared to any previous armed conflict. He says he loses more people in private car and motorcycle wrecks.

    Blum says Iraq is dangerous — but that the degree of danger has been “misrepresented.”

    Surveys of potential recruits and their parents show fear of being hurt as one of the major reasons young people don’t enlist.

    Blum says more than 250-thousand National Guardsmen have been mobilized since Nine-Eleven. Only 262 of them have been killed. Pentagon figures show more than 90 percent of those were in Iraq.

    Part-Time Forces on Active Duty Decline Steeply

    The number of Reserve and National Guard troops on domestic and overseas missions has fallen to about 138,000, down from a peak of nearly 220,000 after the invasion of Iraq two years ago, a sharp decline that military officials say will continue in the months ahead.

    The decrease comes as welcome relief to tens of thousands of formerly part-time soldiers who, with their families, employers and communities, have been badly stressed by their long call-ups for duty in Afghanistan and Iraq.

    Reserve and National Guard members from all of the armed services make up about 35 percent of the troops in Iraq, a share that is expected to drop to about 30 percent by next year; the vast majority are from the Army Reserve and Army National Guard.

    Despite these pieces, a lag is to be expected before reality sinks in, if in fact the media truly ever lets the reality be well broadcast.

    U.S. National Guard chief sees recruiting shortfall

    The Army National Guard, tapped heavily by the Pentagon for soldiers in Iraq, likely will miss its recruiting goal for the third straight year, the general who runs it said on Tuesday.

    U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau at the Pentagon, argued that the Army National Guard was not in “serious crisis mode” even as it stood about 19,000 troops below the 350,000-strong force authorized by Congress.

    Perhaps there’s a need for this old soldier, perhaps not. I know a dear friend has gone back in and is over there in the sandbox. That little fact lives as a daily itch.

  • Nat’l Guard Criticized for Anti-Islam Poster

    The California National Guard, already facing an investigation into allegations of spying on anti-war activists [discussed here], is now under attack for being culturally insensitive towards our enemies.

    Islamic leaders and peace groups are criticizing the California National Guard for a flier posted in its headquarters suggesting the United States should execute Islamic terrorists with bullets dipped in pig’s blood to deny them entry to heaven.

    The poster attributes the practice to World War I General John J. Pershing.

    “Maybe it is time for this segment of history to repeat itself, maybe in Iraq?” the flier stated. It was posted outside a cubicle in the Guard’s Civil Support Division.

    A second flier showed the wings and tail of a bomber forming a peace sign with the slogan, “Peace the old fashioned way.” Also posted was a cartoon from a Web site showing a Red Crescent ambulance stuffed with weapons and a caricature that looks like the late-Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat unloading the weapons.

    Let’s see. The peace-through-strength poster, an idea that has stood the test of time, isn’t even worth mentioning beyond saying it sounds like a cool graphic. Yes, the other two posters sound culturally insensitive … to terrorists. Cue the freakin’ violins. Frankly, I have no problem with insensitivity towards our enemies. However, these fliers should not be on display in a home-front headquarters, at least not in today’s overly sensitive, politically charged world. At the absolute very least, they most definitely should not be up when it is known that CAIR and peaceniks are going to be visiting. That’s just stupidity.

    Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Doug Hart at first defended the postings to the San Jose Mercury News, which reported the posters Tuesday but later said they had been removed.

    Peace activists spotted the fliers during a tour last week. The tour came after peace groups and a state senator questioned whether a new Guard unit had been formed to spy on U.S. citizens and had monitored a Mother’s Day anti-war rally.

    “It’s troubling to see a governmental organization dedicated to the security of our country promoting culturally and religiously insensitive ideas,” said William Youmans, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Santa Clara. “It’s very possible to combat terrorism without offending the cultural values of a major world religion.”

    No, what’s troubling is that this political correctness garbage is trying to make an issue with how our military views our enemies. We’re talking about a dark-humored flier suggesting a foul way of treating animals who would want nothing more than to carve off the heads of our soldiers. We’re talking about posters not insensitive to Islam but rather fairly insensitive to terrorists. It was dumb for the posters to be up during the visit; it will be tragic if this story gains any further mileage.

    For the soldier or soldiers who put up the fliers, give the mildest of reprimands and maybe an annoying one-hour sensitivity lecture. Slightly more to the commander. For those offended, give a sample of caricatures of our enemies from WWII-era for maybe some hopefully annoying perspective.

    As an aside, Snopes.com has more on the Gen. Pershing story.

  • Hopes and Problems of Iraq Drawdown

    Last night I mentioned a leaked British memo regarding planned troop reductions. I put forth that, even if the memo was valid, its subject material should be considered tentatively optimistic. Well, that has proven accurate.

    A leaked British Defence Ministry memorandum has confirmed that London and Washington hope to reduce troop strengths in Iraq next year – but also reveals some of the problems.

    The memo does not indicate that basic policy has changed or will change. This is that the troops will be there “as long as is needed”.

    But the plan is that not so many will be needed.

    The authenticity of the memo has been confirmed by the British Defence Secretary John Reid, who signed it.

    He has called it an [sic] “scenarios” document, but it was prepared for the cabinet committee on defence and foreign policy and it demonstrates how seriously the British government is considering how to reduce its commitment.

    These are the hopes:

    • British troops could be reduced from 8,500 now to 3,000 by the middle of next year.
    • US troops could be cut from 176,000 to 60,000.

    These are the problems:

    Everything depends on handing over security to Iraqi control. This in turn depends on the build-up, training and ability of Iraqi security forces.

    A handover should happen in two British-controlled provinces, Muthanna and Maysan, in October and the two others, Dhi Qar and Basra, in April 2006.

    In the far more dangerous US sector, where most of the fighting is taking place, there are also plans to place security in Iraqi hands in most of the provinces next year.

    However – and it is a big however, especially in the US sector – the memo indicates strong disagreements within military staffs about the wisdom of this planning.

    The Pentagon and the US Central Command are said to favour large cuts, while local American commanders are more doubtful. These on-the-ground officers feel it is too soon to think about such reductions.

    The piece goes on to look at the political pressures, obvious though they may be, that drove the sunshine-on-my-shoulders best-case-scenario memo, as well as the inherent risks to such a sizable early withdrawal.

    As for me, I’m in favor of either a complete withdrawal or an increase in forces, or somewhere in between, depending on the actual situation on the ground at the time. I’m certainly against any scheduled withdrawal written in stone, though I would hope that our governments and militaries are planning for all reasonable contingencies.

  • Suspected Terrorists Escape in Afghanistan

    If only Col. Klink was running the show at the Bagram detention facility.

    Four suspected Arab terrorists broke out of a U.S. military detention facility in Afghanistan on Monday, fleeing through barbed wire stockades in the first escape from the compound since the American military took over the former Soviet airbase.

    […]

    U.S. and Afghan forces launched a manhunt for the suspects, identified as Arabs from Syria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Libya. U.S. soldiers set up roadblocks and helicopters clattered low over villages near the heavily guarded base north of the capital, Kabul.

    Bagram is in a wide, dusty plain at the foot of the Hindu Kush mountains, and much of the area around the base remains mined from Afghanistan’s civil war and Soviet occupation. The base itself is surrounded by a series of barbed wire fences and is intensely guarded by U.S. troops. The main entrance is a series of checkpoints and all visitors are checked several times by U.S. military guards.

    The escapes were another setback for the U.S. military as it struggles with insurgent fighting that has left more than 700 people dead in three months and threatened to sabotage three years of progress toward peace. Over the weekend, 22 Afghan soldiers were killed, including 10 who were beheaded.

    It should be noted that a very large portion of those 700 deaths were terrorists and Taliban holdouts taken out by U.S. and Afghan forces, something not made clear in the story.

    The four terrorist suspects who escaped Monday from the U.S. military detention facility at Bagram were identified as Abdullah from Syria, Mohammed al-Qatari from Saudi Arabia, Mahmood Ahmad from Kuwait and Abulbakar Mohammed Hassan from Libya, according to local police chief Abdulrahman Mawalana.

    “They are considered dangerous and are suspected terrorists,” U.S. military spokeswoman Lt. Cindy Moore told The Associated Press.

    Local government chief Kaber Ahmad said, “coalition forces, police and Afghan troops have surrounded several villages near the base,” and have distributed photos of the four, who have short hair and long beards.

    In the pictures, the men are wearing orange prison outfits and one man is grinning. Descriptions under the photos describe two of them as of Middle Eastern descent and the other as Arab. There is no description of the fourth.

    Moore declined to identify the four escapees or elaborate on why they were being held. Another military spokesman, Lt. Col. Jerry O’Hara, described them only as “enemy combatants.”

    He said it was the first time anyone has broken out of Bagram’s detention facility, where most of about 500 detainees in Afghanistan are held.

    I’m hoping to be able to follow up on this story, as it could prove interesting. Terrain does not seem to favor the escapees, and they are just as likely to find friend and foe among the populace unless they have prior knowledge of safehouses. I would not at all be surprised to hear some of these four being found clad in women’s garb, a ruse not unprecedented among the Islamist terrorists.

    I would also like details on the escape itself, though I understand that it may be extremely unwise to publish any weaknesses in the security of the detention facility. I do know that any such expoitable weakness better be addressed and in a hurry.

  • War on Terror Update, 10 JUL 05

    Well, this is the “grain of salt” edition.

    Taliban claims to have beheaded missing US commando

    TALIBAN guerrillas claimed yesterday that they had killed a missing American commando they claimed to have captured in Afghanistan, but the US military said it had no information to support the claim.

    Taliban spokesman Abdul Latif Hakimi said the US commando was killed at 11am (0630 GMT) on Saturday and his body dumped on a mountain in the eastern province of Kunar, where a four-man Navy SEAL team went missing during a clash with militants June 28.

    I blogged previously that this alleged Taliban source has historically proven unreliable. Chad Evans at In the Bullpen now points us to a story showing the body of the SEAL has been recovered. As Chad points out, there is no apparent evidence of captivity in the details given to date.

    Either way, it does appear the fate of the SEAL is settled. My best wishes to his loved ones.

    SEALs ‘too close to Osama’

    THE first sign of trouble was a radio message requesting immediate extraction. A four-man team of US Navy SEALs commandos had run into heavy enemy fire on a remote, thickly forested trail in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan.
    Trouble turned to disaster when a US special forces helicopter carrying 16 men was shot down as it landed at the scene, killing all on board.

    Almost two weeks later, a mission that led to the worst US combat losses in Afghanistan since the invasion in 2001 has turned into an extraordinary manhunt. It has also opened an intriguing new front in the coalition’s battle against terrorism.

    The story of Operation Red Wing, a US-led search for Taliban and al Qaeda guerillas in the mountain wilderness of Kunar province, contains remarkable human drama and an unresolved military mystery.

    For five days, amid the hostile peaks and ravines along Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan, a lone US commando eluded the guerillas who had killed at least two of his colleagues and destroyed the Chinook helicopter.

    When the unnamed commando finally collapsed from exhaustion he was found by a friendly Afghan villager who summoned US forces.

    […]

    According to former special forces officers and other military sources, the four-man strike team may have come too close to one of the US-led coalition’s highest-priority targets – perhaps Mullah Muhammad Omar, the former Taliban leader, or even Osama bin Laden, the leader of al Qaeda.

    Other military sources suggested the target was a regional Taliban commander suspected of links with al Qaeda.

    However intriguing the tale, and it is an interesting read, I’ll let it suffice to say that the fantastic headline is based on sheer speculation.

    Arab view: ‘Enough, enough’

    Arabs and Muslims in Britain and across the world expressed outrage at the terrorist attacks in London, with the dominant viewpoint summed up by one person who wrote on a Web site, “Enough … enough.”

    The loud condemnation of the attacks that targeted civilians reverberated on the street, over the Internet, in newsrooms, and in Arab and Muslim seats of power.

    I read this and I recall the celebrations on the Palestinians streets as news of 9/11 spread. Some postings on internet feedback sites be damned — I might begin to believe that the world of Islam has seen enough of this butchery and barbarism when I see large-scale demonstrations against the radical Islamist terrorists. As it is, I’m not in too great a fear of having to face that dilemma anytime soon.

    US, UK plan to reduce troops in Iraq

    A leaked document says the British and U.S. governments are planning to reduce their troop levels in Iraq by more than half by mid-2006.

    British Defense Ministry has confirmed the authenticity of the document, which is reported to have been written by Defense Minister John Reid.

    London’s Mail on Sunday newspaper reported that the memo said Britain would reduce its troop numbers to 3,000 from 8,500 by the middle of next year.

    The British memo said Washington hoped to hand over control of security to Iraqi forces in 14 out of 18 provinces by early next year, allowing it to slash US-led troop levels to 66,000 from 176,000.

    While those reduction numbers seem reasonable given the growth and progress of the native Iraqi forces, it’s quite safe to say that the sharp decline in troop levels, even assuming the validity of the leak, is extremely tentative.