THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ, ELEVENTH THREAD

No mystery about Mysteryman then, he's solid bone above that red neck.

I wouldn't wish, and they didn't intend, for anyone to be killed.

If they could have damaged an engine or two, then the plane would have been delayed, that's all. The engines have sensors to detect that kind of thing.

I note that one of their weapons was photos of Iraqi children to stick onto the bomb doors.

Dangerous terrorists and a real threat, obviously. :wink:

By violating the perimeter of that base,especially during a time of war,the AF security detail had every right to shoot them.

USAF security force should have shot them.

mm wrote :

Quote:

USAF security force should have shot them.

SHOOT 'EM ! that's always the best way to resolve any problem ; you can always ask questions later .
no wonder there is so much violence in the united states .
i'm just glad not all americans subscribe to mysteryman's way of handling conflicts .
hbg

BBBs most recent article about fleeing Iraqis is rarely mentioned, but the Bush administration sees fit to ignore this problem as if it doesn't exist. Pitiful.

Doors closing on fleeing Iraqis
By Jon Leyne
BBC News, Amman


They are not sitting in camps, or straggling through the desert. In fact any Western visitor to Jordan might not even notice them.
But this country now plays host to up to one million Iraqis who have fled the fighting in their country. Up to a million are in nearby Syria.

And there are big numbers in Iraq's other neighbours.

After nearly four years of war, they know they are not about to return home any time soon. The hidden crisis is beginning to demand the world's attention.

At Jordan's desert border crossing with Iraq, you see the Iraqi families arriving. Their belongings are piled high in GMCs, big American 10-seater vehicles that race across the badlands of western Iraq.


You've got to ask how long this generosity can continue before they start closing the borders
Andrew Harper

The Iraqis here will tell you of their relief after running the gauntlet of American soldiers, Iraqi insurgents, and the many bandits, that make this one of the most notorious journeys in the world. This wind-blown border post, many kilometres from the nearest town, is their safe haven, their refuge.

But Jordan is only letting in a fraction of the numbers it used to, perhaps only 10 or 15 car loads a day.


Divided families

One old man I met just inside the border, who was arriving for medical treatment, was furious after a young nephew travelling with him was turned back by the Jordanians.

Almost all Iraqis you speak to have tales of how much more difficult it is to get into Jordan, compared with just a few months ago.


"It's very difficult to get people outside of Iraq," explained Lutfi, an Iraqi doctor who has just managed to help his father join him in Jordan.

"I used to come easily, there was no trouble at all. But lots of things have changed. Most of the Iraqis are forbidden to come unless they have something to prove they are studying, or for business or investment."

The Jordanian government says there has been no formal change of policy; but a spokesman said there had been a tightening of regulations, particularly for security reasons.

Precious passports

It is a trend echoed around the region. Kasra Mofarah works in Jordan coordinating aid agencies operating in Iraq.

"Most of the borders of the neighbouring countries of Iraq are very difficult to pass. They have administrative problems, passport issues, and they are not welcome any more," he explained.

"Also the Western countries and the wealthier countries, they are becoming more and more difficult in terms of allocating any visa, or allowing any entrance. So it seems the doors are closing one by one around the world on the face of Iraqis."


It's even harder to move on from Jordan. Britain and the United States have just introduced new rules, invalidating most Iraqi passports.
Even Iraqis who have managed to get one of the prized new G-series passports will be even luckier if they can get a visa.

Ashraf worked for an American company in Baghdad. He decided to get out after being kidnapped twice. Now he is stuck in Jordan:

"I applied for a visa to go to the UK and also to the States. I got rejected many times by the British government and the American government.

"They are pretty much responsible to help people like me and other friends that I know that worked with the military or the Americans."

'Sent to die'

Lina and Nasir are two Iraqi doctors, who travelled to Britain to study in order to further their work on the mass graves where victims of Saddam's regime are buried.

The insurgents tracked them down and started sending terrifying threatening emails.

They were refused even an extension of their visas to stay in Britain, and were told not to bother even applying for political asylum.

"It's unbelievable", said Nasir. "If you just send me home you send me to die. It's a matter of life or death, it's nothing in between."



In fact the number of Iraqis being granted refugee status or political asylum in Britain has actually gone down since the invasion in 2003.

Only five Iraqis were granted refugee status by the British government in 2005.

It's the most graphic illustration of the world's neglect of this growing crisis.


Slipping into poverty

Jordan itself has been widely praised for its tolerance in allowing in so many Iraqis. But Andrew Harper of the UN refugee agency warned that its a situation that cannot go on for ever.

"You've got to ask how long this generosity can continue before saturation and before they start closing the borders," he warned. "And once they are closed, what then happens to those refugees who are trying to escape from Iraq?"

In Jordan itself, most Iraqis are not allowed to work. Apart from a few rich businessman, they are slowly sinking into poverty.

Schooling is difficult, medical care even more precarious.

Dr Lutfi is trying to support the family he has managed to get out of Iraq. But he can't earn money here.

After being turned down for visas by Britain, the USA and Sweden, he decided there was no option but to return to Iraq and find work there.

A desperate remedy for an increasingly desperate situation.

Logic Lesson on Iraq and Terror for Bush from Palm Beach

The Palm Beach Post editorial on Bush's illogic does what newspapers are supposed to do. It questions the logicality of a politician's assertion. Last week Bush gave a news conference in which he was asked why Bin Laden hadn't been caught. He said, "because he is hiding." No one in the vaunted White House press corps replied to him, "Mr. President, that is a tautology."

So here is the logic lesson from Palm Beach:


'See if you can follow this argument:

The United States has to be in Iraq to fight the terrorists who are in Iraq because the United States is in Iraq. '

From Juan Cole.

Quote:

Logic Lesson on Iraq and Terror for Bush from Palm Beach

The Palm Beach Post editorial on Bush's illogic does what newspapers are supposed to do. It questions the logicality of a politician's assertion. Last week Bush gave a news conference in which he was asked why Bin Laden hadn't been caught. He said, "because he is hiding." No one in the vaunted White House press corps replied to him, "Mr. President, that is a tautology."

So here is the logic lesson from Palm Beach:


'See if you can follow this argument:

The United States has to be in Iraq to fight the terrorists who are in Iraq because the United States is in Iraq. '

After the United States invaded Afghanistan October 2001, al-Qaeda began December 2001 accumulating in Iraq.

The United States invaded Iraq March 2003 for among other reasons to stop al-Qaeda's accumulation in Iraq.

The United States has not stopped the accumulation of al-Qaeda in either Afghanistan or Iraq.

Once for every 100 times ican posts his alternate reality account of events, I have to react to it. I can't help it. It's an allergic reaction.

ican711nm wrote:

After the United States invaded Afghanistan October 2001, al-Qaeda began December 2001 accumulating in Iraq.

No, it didn't. In December 2001, Jund al-Islam (led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi) and a splinter group led by Mullah Krekar formed Ansar al-Islam - in the north of Iraq, in the no-fly zone and outside the control of Saddam Hussein.

And while Krekar denied any links to al Qaeda or Osama bin Laden, many reports said that al-Zarqawi, too, was more a rival than an ally of bin Laden.

However, had the United States seen Ansar al-Islam as a problem, they could have easily taken out the alleged training camps without much of an effort.

ican711nm wrote:

The United States invaded Iraq March 2003 for among other reasons to stop al-Qaeda's accumulation in Iraq.

Note: ican claims that the United States invaded Baghdad in order to fight an islamist group that was neither tied to nor under the control of the former Ba'athist government. ican claims that the United States invaded Baghdad in order to fight a group of some 300 men in the North of Iraq that was under the control of the United States all the time.

Highly suspicious claims there.

However, al-Zarqawi officially pledged alliance to al Qaeda not before October 2004. According to ican's account of events, the United States invaded Iraq in March 2003 for something that would happen 18 months later.

ican711nm wrote:

The United States has not stopped the accumulation of al-Qaeda in either Afghanistan or Iraq.

Well, I agree with that statement. The United States have done a pretty bad job in Afghanistan. Part of the problem might be giving up the hunt for Osama bin Laden in order to invade Iraq.
The United States have done a catastrophic job in Iraq, were no terrorist network or group tied to al Qaeda had any foothold under the Ba'athist regime. Today, Iraq is a veritable breeding ground for terrorists.

Congress's Joint Resolution September 14, 2001
emphasis added
SEC. 2. AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES.
...
(a) IN GENERAL- That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons.

Congress's Joint Resolution Oct. 16, 2002
Public Law 107-243 107th Congress Joint Resolution (H.J. Res. 114) To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq.
...
[10th]Whereas members of al Qaida, an organization bearing responsibility for attacks on the United States, its citizens, and interests, including the attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, are known to be in Iraq;

[11th]Whereas Iraq continues to aid and harbor other international terrorist organizations, including organizations that threaten the lives and safety of United States citizens;
...

American Soldier, by General Tommy Franks, 7/1/2004
"10" Regan Books, An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

page 483:
"The air picture changed once more. Now the icons were streaming toward two ridges an a steep valley in far northeastern Iraq, right on the border with Iran. These were the camps of the Ansar al-Isla terrorists, where al Qaeda leader Abu Musab Zarqawi had trained disciples in the use of chemical and biological weapons. But this strike was more than just another [Tomahawk Land Attack Missile] bashing. Soon Special Forces and [Special Mission Unit] operators, leading Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, would be storming the camps, collecting evidence, taking prisoners, and killing all those who resisted."

page 519:
"[The Marines] also encountered several hundred foreign fighters from Egypt, the Sudan, Syria, and Lybia who were being trained by the regime in a camp south of Baghdad. Those foreign volunteers fought with suicidal ferocity, but they did not fight well. The Marines killed them all. "

Congressional Intelligence Report 09/08/2006
REPORT OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE
Conclusion 6. Postwar information indicates that the Intelligence Community accurately assessed that al-Qa'ida affiliate group Ansar al-Islam operated in Kurdish-controlled northeastern Iraq, an area that Baghdad had not controlled since 1991.

ANSAR AL-ISLAM
Ansar al-Islam (Supporters or Partisans of Islam) is a Kurdish Sunni Islamist group, promoting a radical interpretation of Islam and holy war. At the beginning of the 2003 invasion of Iraq it controlled about a dozen villages and a range of peaks in northern Iraq on the Iranian border. It has used tactics such as suicide bombers in its conflicts with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and other Kurdish groups.

Ansar al-Islam was formed in December 2001 as a merger of Jund al-Islam (Soldiers of Islam), led by Abu Abdallah al-Shafi'i, and a splinter group from the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan led by Mullah Krekar. Krekar became the leader of the merged Ansar al-Islam, which opposed an agreement made between IMK and the dominant Kurdish group in the area, Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).

Ansar al-Islam fortified a number of villages along the Iranian border, with Iranian artillery support. [1]

Ansar al-Islam quickly initiated a number of attacks on the peshmerga (armed forces) of the PUK, on one occasion massacring 53 prisoners and beheading them. Several assassination attempts on leading PUK-politicians were also made with carbombs and snipers.

Ansar al-Islam comprised about 300 armed men, many of these veterans from the Afghan war, and a proportion being neither Kurd nor Arab. Ansar al-Islam is alleged to be connected to al-Qaeda, and provided an entry point for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and other Afghan veterans to enter Iraq.[/b][/color]

9/11 Commission Report

2 THE FOUNDATION OF THE NEW TERRORISM

2.1 A DECLARATION OF WAR
In February 1998, the 40-year-old Saudi exile Usama Bin Ladin and a fugitive Egyptian physician, Ayman al Zawahiri, arranged from their Afghan headquarters for an Arabic newspaper in London to publish what they termed a fatwa issued in the name of a "World Islamic Front." A fatwa is normally an interpretation of Islamic law by a respected Islamic authority, but neither Bin Ladin, Zawahiri, nor the three others who signed this statement were scholars of Islamic law. Claiming that America had declared war against God and his messenger, they called for the murder of any American, anywhere on earth, as the "individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it."1

Three months later, when interviewed in Afghanistan by ABC-TV, Bin Ladin enlarged on these themes.2 He claimed it was more important for Muslims to kill Americans than to kill other infidels. "It is far better for anyone to kill a single American soldier than to squander his efforts on other activities," he said. Asked whether he approved of terrorism and of attacks on civilians, he replied: "We believe that the worst thieves in the world today and the worst terrorists are the Americans. Nothing could stop you except perhaps retaliation in kind. We do not have to differentiate between military or civilian. As far as we are concerned, they are all targets."
...
Plans to attack the United States were developed with unwavering single-mindedness throughout the 1990s. Bin Ladin saw himself as called "to follow in the footsteps of the Messenger and to communicate his message to all nations,"5 and to serve as the rallying point and organizer of a new kind of war to destroy America and bring the world to Islam.
...
9/11 Commission Report
2.3 THE RISE OF BIN LADIN AND AL QAEDA (1988-1992)
...
Bin Ladin understood better than most of the volunteers the extent to which the continuation and eventual success of the jihad in Afghanistan depended on an increasingly complex, almost worldwide organization. This organization included a financial support network that came to be known as the "Golden Chain," put together mainly by financiers in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf states. Donations flowed through charities or other nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Bin Ladin and the "Afghan Arabs" drew largely on funds raised by this network, whose agents roamed world markets to buy arms and supplies for the mujahideen, or "holy warriors."21
...
Bin Ladin now had a vision of himself as head of an international jihad confederation. In Sudan, he established an "Islamic Army Shura" that was to serve as the coordinating body for the consortium of terrorist groups with which he was forging alliances. It was composed of his own al Qaeda Shura together with leaders or representatives of terrorist organizations that were still independent. In building this Islamic army, he enlisted groups from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Oman, Algeria, Libya, Tunisia, Morocco, Somalia, and Eritrea. Al Qaeda also established cooperative but less formal relationships with other extremist groups from these same countries; from the African states of Chad, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, and Uganda; and from the Southeast Asian states of Burma, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Bin Ladin maintained connections in the Bosnian conflict as well.37 The groundwork for a true global terrorist network was being laid.
...
Bin Ladin seemed willing to include in the confederation terrorists from almost every corner of the Muslim world. His vision mirrored that of Sudan's Islamist leader, Turabi, who convened a series of meetings under the label Popular Arab and Islamic Conference around the time of Bin Ladin's arrival in that country. Delegations of violent Islamist extremists came from all the groups represented in Bin Ladin's Islamic Army Shura. Representatives also came from organizations such as the Palestine Liberation Organization, Hamas, and Hezbollah.51
...
9/11 Commission Report
2.5 AL QAEDA'S RENEWAL IN AFGHANISTAN (1996-1998)
...
The Taliban seemed to open the doors to all who wanted to come to Afghanistan to train in the camps. The alliance with the Taliban provided al Qaeda a sanctuary in which to train and indoctrinate fighters and terrorists, import weapons, forge ties with other jihad groups and leaders, and plot and staff terrorist schemes. While Bin Ladin maintained his own al Qaeda guesthouses and camps for vetting and training recruits, he also provided support to and benefited from the broad infrastructure of such facilities in Afghanistan made available to the global network of Islamist movements. U.S. intelligence estimates put the total number of fighters who underwent instruction in Bin Ladin-supported camps in Afghanistan from 1996 through 9/11 at 10,000 to 20,000.78
...
Now effectively merged with Zawahiri's Egyptian Islamic Jihad,82 al Qaeda promised to become the general headquarters for international terrorism, without the need for the Islamic Army Shura. Bin Ladin was prepared to pick up where he had left off in Sudan. He was ready to strike at "the head of the snake."
...
On February 23, 1998, Bin Ladin issued his public fatwa. The language had been in negotiation for some time, as part of the merger under way between Bin Ladin's organization and Zawahiri's Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Less than a month after the publication of the fatwa, the teams that were to carry out the embassy attacks were being pulled together in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. The timing and content of their instructions indicate that the decision to launch the attacks had been made by the time the fatwa was issued.88
...
9/11 Commission Report
The attack on the U.S. embassy in Nairobi destroyed the embassy and killed 12 Americans and 201 others, almost all Kenyans. About 5,000 people were injured. The attack on the U.S. embassy in Dar es Salaam killed 11 more people, none of them Americans. Interviewed later about the deaths of the Africans, Bin Ladin answered that "when it becomes apparent that it would be impossible to repel these Americans without assaulting them, even if this involved the killing of Muslims, this is permissible under Islam." Asked if he had indeed masterminded these bombings, Bin Ladin said that the World Islamic Front for jihad against "Jews and Crusaders" had issued a "crystal clear" fatwa. If the instigation for jihad against the Jews and the Americans to liberate the holy places "is considered a crime," he said, "let history be a witness that I am a criminal."93
...
National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States
The Commission closed on August 21, 2004. This site is archived.

www.dni.gov/release_letter_101105.html
Summary of Letter from al-Zawahiri to al-Zarqawi July 9, 2005.
The war in Iraq is central to al Qa'ida's global jihad.
The war will not end with an American departure.
The strategic vision is one of inevitable conflict with a call by al-Zawahiri for political action equal to military action.
More than half the struggle is taking place "in the battlefield of the media."
Popular support must be maintained at least until jihadist rule has been established.