Filed under: airstrikes, Australia, Baghdad, Coup, ehud olmert, f-16, False Flag, gaza, greece, H. Con. Res 362, hamas, IAEA, Iran, Iran war resolution, Iraq, Israel, kevin rudd, Kyl-Lieberman amendment, Military, military strike, NIE, north korea, Nuke, Olmert, palestine, Pentagon, Preemptive Strike, preemptive war, Propaganda, Robert Wexler, Russia, Saber Rattling, Saddam Hussein, Sergey Lavrov, shaul mofaz, Shock and Awe, Syria, Tehran, Troops, War On Terror, WW3, ww4 | Tags: Mike McConnell, Yediot Aharonot
U.S. Says Israel Military Exercise Directed At Iran
IHT
June 19, 2008
Israel carried out a major military exercise earlier this month that American officials say appeared to be a rehearsal for a potential bombing attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Several American officials said the Israeli exercise appeared to be an effort to develop the military’s capacity to carry out long-range strikes and to demonstrate the seriousness with which Israel views Iran’s nuclear program.
More than 100 Israeli F-16 and F-15 fighters participated in the maneuvers, which were carried out over the eastern Mediterranean and over Greece during the first week of June, American officials said.
The exercise also included Israeli helicopters that could be used to rescue downed pilots. The helicopters and refueling tankers flew more than 900 miles, which is about the same distance between Israel and Iran’s uranium enrichment plant at Natanz, American officials said.
Israeli officials declined to discuss the details of the exercise. A spokesman for the Israeli military would say only that the country’s air force “regularly trains for various missions in order to confront and meet the challenges posed by the threats facing Israel.”
But the scope of the Israeli exercise virtually guaranteed that it would be noticed by American and other foreign intelligence agencies. A senior Pentagon official who has been briefed on the exercise, and who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the political delicacy of the matter, said the exercise appeared to serve multiple purposes.
One Israeli goal, the Pentagon official said, was to practice flight tactics, aerial refueling and all other details of a possible strike against Iran’s nuclear installations and its long-range conventional missiles.
A second, the official said, was to send a clear message to the United States and other countries that Israel was prepared to act militarily if diplomatic efforts to stop Iran from producing bomb-grade uranium continued to falter.
“They wanted us to know, they wanted the Europeans to know, and they wanted the Iranians to know,” the Pentagon official said. “There’s a lot of signaling going on at different levels.”
Several American officials said they did not believe that the Israeli government had concluded that it must attack Iran and did not think that such a strike was imminent.
Shaul Mofaz, a former Israeli defense minister who is now a deputy prime minister, warned in a recent interview with the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot that Israel might have no choice but to attack. “If Iran continues with its program for developing nuclear weapons, we will attack,” Mofaz said in the interview published on June 6, the day after the unpublicized exercise ended. “Attacking Iran, in order to stop its nuclear plans, will be unavoidable.”
But Mofaz was criticized by other Israeli politicians as seeking to enhance his own standing as questions mount about whether the embattled Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, can hang on to power.
Israeli officials have told their American counterparts that Mofaz’s statement does not represent official policy. But American officials were also told that Israel had prepared plans for striking nuclear targets in Iran and could carry them out if needed.
Iran has shown signs that it is taking the Israeli warnings seriously, by beefing up its air defenses in recent weeks, including increasing air patrols. In one instance, Iran scrambled F-4 jets to double-check an Iraqi civilian flight from Baghdad to Tehran.
“They are clearly nervous about this and have their air defense on guard,” a Bush administration official said of the Iranians.
Any Israeli attack against Iran’s nuclear facilities would confront a number of challenges. Many American experts say they believe that such an attack could delay but not eliminate Iran’s nuclear program. Much of the program’s infrastructure is buried under earth and concrete and installed in long tunnels or hallways, making precise targeting difficult. There is also concern that not all of the facilities have been detected. To inflict maximum damage, multiple attacks might be necessary, which many analysts say is beyond Israel’s ability at this time.
But waiting also entails risks for the Israelis. Israeli officials have repeatedly expressed fears that Iran will soon master the technology it needs to produce substantial quantities of highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons.
Iran is also taking steps to better defend its nuclear facilities. Two sets of advance Russian-made radar systems were recently delivered to Iran. The radar will enhance Iran’s ability to detect planes flying at low altitude.
Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, said in February that Iran was close to acquiring Russian-produced SA-20 surface-to-air missiles. American military officials said that the deployment of such systems would hamper Israel’s attack planning, putting pressure on Israel to act before the missiles are fielded.
For both the United States and Israel, Iran’s nuclear program has been a persistent worry. A National Intelligence Estimate that was issued in December by American intelligence agencies asserted that Iran had suspended work on weapons design in late 2003. The report stated that it was unclear if that work had resumed. It also noted that Iran’s work on uranium enrichment and on missiles, two steps that Iran would need to take to field a nuclear weapon, had continued.
In late May, the International Atomic Energy Agency reported that Iran’s suspected work on nuclear matters was a “matter of serious concern” and that the Iranians owed the agency “substantial explanations.”
Over the past three decades, Israel has carried out two unilateral attacks against suspected nuclear sites in the Middle East. In 1981, Israeli jets conducted a raid against Iraq’s nuclear plant at Osirak after concluding that it was part of Saddam Hussein’s program to develop nuclear weapons. In September, Israeli aircraft bombed a structure in Syria that American officials said housed a nuclear reactor built with the aid of North Korea.
The United States protested the Israeli strike against Iraq in 1981, but its comments in recent months have amounted to an implicit endorsement of the Israeli strike in Syria.
Pentagon officials said that Israel’s air forces usually conducted a major early summer training exercise, often flying over the Mediterranean or training ranges in Turkey where they practice bombing runs and aerial refueling. But the exercise this month involved a larger number of aircraft than had been previously observed, and included a lengthy combat rescue mission.
Much of the planning appears to reflect a commitment by Israel’s military leaders to ensure that its armed forces are adequately equipped and trained, an imperative driven home by the difficulties the Israeli military encountered in its Lebanon operation against Hezbollah.
“They rehearse it, rehearse it and rehearse it, so if they actually have to do it, they’re ready,” the Pentagon official said. “They’re not taking any options off the table.”
Your last chance: Israel’s warning
Sydney Morning Herald
June 19, 2008
ISRAEL’S Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, has warned the radical Islamic movement Hamas that the truce due to take effect today is the last chance to avoid a massive military incursion into the Gaza Strip.
In an exclusive interview with the Herald – his first interview with the Australian media in four years – Mr Olmert said the people of Gaza were “pissed off with Hamas” and sick and tired of the years of violence.
Since Israel withdrew from Gaza three years ago, the 250,000 residents who surround Gaza have been subjected to almost daily rocket attacks from Palestinian militants.
“You think the people of Adelaide would put up with this?” demanded Mr Olmert. “Or the people of Brisbane?
“I think the strategy of Hamas, which does not want to recognise Israel’s right to exist in the first place, and the extremism, and the fanaticism, and the religious dogmatism is the enemy of peace. We are at the end of our tolerance with regard to terror in Gaza.”
Dismissing an escalating corruption investigation which looks certain to force either his resignation or fresh elections by November, Mr Olmert said he was “going nowhere” and did not rule out running again for the leadership of his Kadima party.
So certain is Mr Olmert of his political survival that he has already sent an invitation for Kevin Rudd to visit Israel later this year.
“I don’t know yet personally enough the new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, but I am very impressed with his friendship and his commitment to the well-being of the state of Israel,” Mr Olmert said.
Greeks help Israel prepare for Iran war?
Press TV
June 20, 2008
The Greek Air Force says it partook in an Israeli military exercise which is regarded as a rehearsal for a potential attack on Iran.
Greek sources speaking on condition of anonymity confirmed a New York Times report that Israel’s military maneuvers which were carried out earlier this month off the southern Mediterranean island of Crete, were preparations for a future war with the Islamic Republic.
The Greek source, however, assured that no terrestrial targets were involved as the operation was mainly aimed at personnel training.
According to a New York Times report, more than 100 Israeli F-16 and F-15 fighters participated in the military drills which involved simulated aerial combat, attacks on terrestrial targets, aerial refueling, and search and rescue missions.
http://www.bloomberg.com/..jLlSBbx5E&refer=home
Israeli attack on Iran: “not a matter of if, but when”
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jun2008/iran-j20.shtml
Tehran pledges to deal ’powerful blow’ against attack
http://en.rian.ru/world/20080620/111496436.html
Uh-Oh…Wexler Backs Naval Blockade of Iran
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert..n-steroids_b_108122.html
How Iran would retaliate if it comes to war
http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0620/p07s04-wome.html
Russia’s Lavrov warns against attack on Iran
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080620/ap_on_re_eu/russia_iran
Bomb Iran? What’s to Stop Us?
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/061908c.html
Filed under: Abu Laith al-Libi, Afghanistan, airstrikes, al-qaeda, B-52, CIA, civilian casualties, False Flag, FBI, George Bush, michael hayden, Military, military strike, Musharraf, neocons, Pakistan, Taliban, Troops, uav, War On Terror, Washington D.C., White House, William Fallon | Tags: Mike McConnell, Mike Mullen, PPP, South Waziristan
Musharraf Approves US Military Strike in Pakistan
The Times of India
March 24, 2008
The Musharraf regime has indirectly approved the US Drone (pilotless plane) attacks on al-Qaida targets in tribal areas of Pakistan bordering Afghanistan.
Since January, missiles have been fired from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operated Predator drones and have hit at least three suspected hideouts of Islamic militants, including a strike on March 16 in Toog village in South Waziristan that left 20 dead.
Sources said that the recent wave of Predator attacks are the result of Musharraf’s understanding with the US officials and other top Pakistanis which gave Washington virtually unrestricted authority to hit targets in the border areas.
The surge began after senior US official’s visit to Pakistan including intelligence czar Mike McConnell, CIA director General Michael Hayden and William Fallon, who recently resigned as Commander of the US forces in the region.
Bruce Riedel, a retired CIA expert on the region, said that a new wave of terrorism inside Pakistan (there were 62 suicide attacks last year, after just six in 2006) has forced Musharraf and the new military chief Ashfaq Kiyani to acknowledge that the extremists threatening Americans now also pose a growing threat to Pakistan’s internal security.
Another US strike inside Pakistan’s border region
WSWS
March 19, 2008
An air strike on Sunday on a compound in the Pakistani tribal area of South Waziristan that borders Afghanistan has left up to 20 people dead. While Washington has not acknowledged responsibility, there is little doubt that the US military or the CIA carried out the attack as part of a widening covert war against anti-American militants entrenched in the Pakistani border areas.
Up to seven missiles or bombs flattened the compound just south of the regional centre of Wana at around 3 p.m. “When I heard the explosions, I rushed to the place where it happened. I saw dead bodies scattered everywhere,” a villager Aziz Ullah Wazir told the Washington Post. Local residents and officials claimed that the house belonged to a Taliban sympathiser, Noorullah Wazir, and was frequented by “Arabs”—the term used to denote foreign supporters of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Veteran journalist Sailab Masood told the Guardian, however, that local tribesmen were angry that innocent civilians had been killed.
Details of the attack are scanty. According to the New York Times, villagers said a B-52 bomber carried out the raid. Other reports cite locals who claim to have heard the sound of a US Predator drone—an unmanned surveillance vehicle that has been used in previous attacks inside Pakistan. The Pakistani military acknowledged that the blasts had occurred, but pointedly refused to identify the attackers, saying only that the army had no operations in the area.
Both Washington and Islamabad are deliberately playing down the attack, which will only further fuel anger at Pakistan’s support for the US-led occupation of Afghanistan. President Pervez Musharraf’s involvement in the Bush administration’s bogus “war on terrorism” and tacit approval of US operations inside Pakistan were a major factor in generating opposition to his regime.
The issue remains highly sensitive as the winners of last month’s elections—the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N)—prepare to form a government. Whatever their limited criticisms of US militarism during the campaign, both parties have a long record of supporting Pakistan’s alliance with Washington and collaborating with the US military. Significantly, neither party has protested against the latest missile strike, an indication that the new government, like Musharraf, will acquiesce to US strikes in the tribal areas.
There are many signs that the Bush administration has expanded covert operations inside Pakistan since the beginning of the year. In early January, the New York Times reported that a top-level White House meeting, involving Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley and other senior officials, discussed in detail “far more aggressive covert operations” inside Pakistani border areas.
“The new operations for expanded covert operations include loosening restrictions on the CIA to strike selected targets in Pakistan, in some cases using intelligence provided by Pakistani sources, officials said. Most counter terrorism operations in Pakistan have been conducted by the CIA… [I]f the CIA were given broader authority, it could call for help from the military or deputise some forces of the Special Operations Command to act under the authority of the agency,” the article stated.
While the New York Times claimed that no decisions were taken at the January meeting, another article last month reported that the CIA had established a base inside Pakistan. “Among other things, the new arrangements allowed an increase in the number and scope of patrols and strikes by armed Predator surveillance aircraft launched from a secret base in Pakistan—a far more aggressive strategy to attack Al Qaeda and the Taliban than had existed before,” the Times explained.
In its report of Sunday’s strike, the Times noted that Mike McConnell, director of national intelligence and General Michael Hayden, director of the Central Intelligence Agency, reached an agreement in January with the new Pakistani army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, to allow the US greater freedom to strike targets in the tribal areas without specific permission from the Pakistani Army. The article claimed that the US was receiving “better on-the-ground human intelligence” by providing “large cash payments to tribesmen”.
There has been a marked increase in visits to Pakistan this year by senior American military officers, including two by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen. During his latest visit on March 4, Admiral Mullen discussed US assistance to expand Pakistan’s Frontier Corps to a force of around 85,000 recruited from tribesmen in the border areas. The Pentagon has already spent around $25 million to provide the Frontier Corps with equipment, including vehicles, radios and surveillance devices, and plans to spend another $75 million over the next year.
At least two other US aerial attacks have taken place inside Pakistan this year. On January 29, a missile destroyed a compound in the village of Khushali Torikhel in North Waziristan, killing 13 people. US and Pakistani officials claimed that Abu Laith al-Libi, a senior Al Qaeda commander, was among the dead. On February 28, a missile strike destroyed an alleged Taliban safe house in the village of Kaloosha in South Waziristan, killing at least 10 people. A local tribal leader told the Washington Post that women and children were among the dead, and that at least six others were injured.
It is not possible to confirm the identity of the victims of these attacks. In neighbouring Afghanistan, US officials routinely brand the casualties of US operations as “Taliban” and “Al Qaeda” and deny civilian deaths even in cases where locals have provided clear evidence to the contrary. On-the-ground intelligence provided by paid informants is often unreliable and coloured by local rivalries and animosities. Claims about the outcome of US strikes inside Pakistan are undoubtedly just as uncertain.
Other attacks on targets within Pakistan are taking place from US bases inside Afghanistan. Pakistani officials lodged a formal complaint with the US military after artillery fire from Afghanistan hit a house in North Waziristan last Wednesday, killing two women and two children. According to the Pakistani-based News, last Friday four missiles fell on the village of Botraki, just inside the Pakistani border.
The extent of Washington’s covert war inside Pakistan remains unclear, but such operations are fuelling widespread anger and provoking a rising number of suicide bombings and attacks on Pakistani security forces and other targets. Last Saturday, a bomb blast at a restaurant in Islamabad popular with foreigners killed a Turkish woman and wounded at least 10 others, including five American officials, two Japanese journalists and a British police officer. Four of the five Americans were FBI agents operating in Pakistan.
The escalation of US operations can only have a profoundly destabilising impact, not just in the border regions, but throughout Pakistan, which is already wracked by deep political crisis. While the PPP and PML-N won a decisive victory in last month’s election, in part because of their criticism of Musharraf’s collaboration with the US, the mood will quickly turn as the new government seeks to maintain the US alliance amid ongoing American strikes on Pakistani soil.
noworldsystem.com 