"Plan B" by Seymour Hersh...part 2
The Israelis, however, view the neighborhood, with the exception of Kurdistan, as hostile. Israel is convinced that Iran is on the verge of developing nuclear weapons, and that, with Syria’s help, it is planning to bolster Palestinian terrorism as Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip.
Iraqi Shiite militia leaders like Moqtada al-Sadr, the former American intelligence official said, are seen by the Israeli leadership as “stalking horses” for Iran—owing much of their success in defying the American-led coalition to logistical and communications support and training provided by Iran. The former intelligence official said, “We began to see telltale signs of organizational training last summer. But the White House didn’t want to hear it: ‘We can’t take on another problem right now. We can’t afford to push Iran to the point where we’ve got to have a showdown.’”
*note from this blogger ...and for all the american bluster about 'axis of evil' 'war on terror' ...blah blah blah...the syrians , north koreans and iranians...hell--everybody in the world for that matter--knows america is over-extended in iraq...so why insist on further alienating the rest of the world ? why does the bush administration continue to make itself look foolish with wild west sherrif talk and cowboy posturing that everybody knows america can't back up ?
Last summer, according to a document I obtained, the Bush Administration directed the Marines to draft a detailed plan, called Operation Stuart, for the arrest and, if necessary, assassination of Sadr. But the operation was cancelled, the former intelligence official told me, after it became clear that Sadr had been “tipped off” about the plan.
*note... first , who tipped Sadr off ? is it that the iraqi security services are so thoroughly infiltrated by both sunni and shia insurgents that vital intel leaks through like cheesecloth ? or is that the old ahmed chalabi security leak again? Or is it an Iyad allawi security leak--both men being shia's with an interest in not seeing the shia militias completely destroyed since shia's would need a counterbalance to sunni and kurdish military in the new iraqi political dynamic/vaccum.
*and secondly , Yeah...that's the way to REALLY build democracy in iraq...arrest the political opposition on trumped up charges , or assassinate them 'if necessary'...that's DEFINITELY how to win hearts and minds... But then the old question re-emerges of what's the difference between you and saddam? and where's your justification for the war...after the WMD threat proved a scam , you said you invaded to bring democracy to iraq ? you invaded because saddam was a cruel dictator who arrested his opposition on trumped up charges , shut down opposition newspapers , tortured and assassinated his political rivals ? What's the difference between old and new regime...what's the difference between then and now ? Perhaps the islamic world doesn't hate america , as bush claims , because america has 'freedom' ...perhaps they hate america for the TYPE of 'freedom' it brings ?
Seven months later, after Sadr spent the winter building support for his movement, the American-led coalition shut down his newspaper, provoking a crisis that Sadr survived with his status enhanced, thus insuring that he will play a major, and unwelcome, role in the political and military machinations after June 30th.
“Israel’s immediate goal after June 30th is to build up the Kurdish commando units to balance the Shiite militias—especially those which would be hostile to the kind of order in southern Iraq that Israel would like to see,” the former senior intelligence official said. “Of course, if a fanatic Sunni Baathist militia took control—one as hostile to Israel as Saddam Hussein was—Israel would unleash the Kurds on it, too.”
* note ...maybe this might have something to do with why the kurds get such bad treatment in the region...either that or a sign of their desperation...their willingness to be pawns of israeli interests ? Allowing themselves to be used and then abandoned by the us and now used by the israelis in hopes of a kurdish state that Turkey , Iran, Syria as well as many Iraqis are vehemently opposed to . Of course a kurdish state would greatly intensify all sorts of long simmering domestic squabbles in those countries ...weakening them and taking much pressure off israel in terms of foreign opposition...if the nations of the region were greatly weakened by internal strife , the palestinians , with little or no support left from those countries , could perhaps be bullied into a settlement with israel giving them even less than the 'nothing' they were given in previous negotiations with zionist state.
Of course the zionists will have meticulously evaluated whether sacrificing good relations with Turkey are worth the advantages that destabilizing Turkey , Syria Iraq and Iran would bring the Israelis... personally this blogger thinks Sharon and company would gleefully give that destabilization the go-ahead ...which should be a warning to the Turks , the Kurds and anyone else ...make deals with the devil and you always get burned...
The Kurdish armed forces, known as the peshmerga, number an estimated seventy-five thousand troops, a total that far exceeds the known Sunni and Shiite militias.
The former Israeli intelligence officer acknowledged that since late last year Israel has been training Kurdish commando units to operate in the same manner and with the same effectiveness as Israel’s most secretive commando units, the Mistaravim.
The initial goal of the Israeli assistance to the Kurds, the former officer said, was to allow them to do what American commando units had been unable to do—penetrate, gather intelligence on, and then kill off the leadership of the Shiite and Sunni insurgencies in Iraq. (I was unable to learn whether any such mission had yet taken place.)
“The feeling was that this was a more effective way to get at the insurgency,” the former officer said. “But the growing Kurdish-Israeli relationship began upsetting the Turks no end. Their issue is that the very same Kurdish commandos trained for Iraq could infiltrate and attack in Turkey.”
The Kurdish-Israeli collaboration inevitably expanded, the Israeli said. Some Israeli operatives have crossed the border into Iran, accompanied by Kurdish commandos, to install sensors and other sensitive devices that primarily target suspected Iranian nuclear facilities. The former officer said, “Look, Israel has always supported the Kurds in a Machiavellian way—as balance against Saddam. It’s Realpolitik.” He added, “By aligning with the Kurds, Israel gains eyes and ears in Iran, Iraq, and Syria.” He went on, “What Israel was doing with the Kurds was not so unacceptable in the Bush Administration.”
Senior German officials told me, with alarm, that their intelligence community also has evidence that Israel is using its new leverage inside Kurdistan, and within the Kurdish communities in Iran and Syria, for intelligence and operational purposes.
*note...the israelis with kurdish commandos are crossing from kurdish held iraq into iran and installing sensors that "target" iranian nuclear facilities ??? "Target" as in targeting for aircraft bombing as the israelis did to iraq's nuclear facility in the 1980s ???
the iraqi facility was built by France at the urging of the US--from whom i believe the iraqis were also urged to borrow the money , the facility was strictly monitored from the start by the international atomic energy agencies and certified by them as a non-weapons type reactor ...the israelis waited until it was completed and then bombed it to hell. THAT act BTW , marked the beginning of saddam hussein's attempts to get a nuclear weapon in his arsenal... Apparently , once again the israelis are able to thumb their noses and do whatever they want , despite international law to the contrary .
Syrian and Lebanese officials believe that Israeli intelligence played a role in a series of violent protests in Syria in mid-March in which Syrian Kurdish dissidents and Syrian troops clashed, leaving at least thirty people dead. (There are nearly two million Kurds living in Syria, which has a population of seventeen million.) Much of the fighting took place in cities along Syria’s borders with Turkey and Kurdish-controlled Iraq.
Michel Samaha, the Lebanese Minister of Information, told me that while the disturbances amounted to an uprising by the Kurds against the leadership of Bashir Assad, the Syrian President, his government had evidence that Israel was “preparing the Kurds to fight all around Iraq, in Syria, Turkey, and Iran. They’re being programmed to do commando operations.”
The top German national-security official told me that he believes that the Bush Administration continually misread Iran. “The Iranians wanted to keep America tied down in Iraq, and to keep it busy there, but they didn’t want chaos,” he said. One of the senior German officials told me, “The critical question is ‘What will the behavior of Iran be if there is an independent Kurdistan with close ties to Israel?’ Iran does not want an Israeli land-based aircraft carrier”—that is, a military stronghold—“on its border.”
Another senior European official said, “The Iranians would do something positive in the south of Iraq if they get something positive in return, but Washington won’t do it. The Bush Administration won’t ask the Iranians for help, and can’t ask the Syrians. Who is going to save the United States?” He added that, at the start of the American invasion of Iraq, several top European officials had told their counterparts in Iran, “You will be the winners in the region.”
*note...Iranians will be the 'winners' IF the israeli regional destabilization efforts and right winged zionist fanatical hopes of widening the US/Iraq war to include Syria and Iran , can also be checked...
TO BE CONTINUED...
Iraqi Shiite militia leaders like Moqtada al-Sadr, the former American intelligence official said, are seen by the Israeli leadership as “stalking horses” for Iran—owing much of their success in defying the American-led coalition to logistical and communications support and training provided by Iran. The former intelligence official said, “We began to see telltale signs of organizational training last summer. But the White House didn’t want to hear it: ‘We can’t take on another problem right now. We can’t afford to push Iran to the point where we’ve got to have a showdown.’”
*note from this blogger ...and for all the american bluster about 'axis of evil' 'war on terror' ...blah blah blah...the syrians , north koreans and iranians...hell--everybody in the world for that matter--knows america is over-extended in iraq...so why insist on further alienating the rest of the world ? why does the bush administration continue to make itself look foolish with wild west sherrif talk and cowboy posturing that everybody knows america can't back up ?
Last summer, according to a document I obtained, the Bush Administration directed the Marines to draft a detailed plan, called Operation Stuart, for the arrest and, if necessary, assassination of Sadr. But the operation was cancelled, the former intelligence official told me, after it became clear that Sadr had been “tipped off” about the plan.
*note... first , who tipped Sadr off ? is it that the iraqi security services are so thoroughly infiltrated by both sunni and shia insurgents that vital intel leaks through like cheesecloth ? or is that the old ahmed chalabi security leak again? Or is it an Iyad allawi security leak--both men being shia's with an interest in not seeing the shia militias completely destroyed since shia's would need a counterbalance to sunni and kurdish military in the new iraqi political dynamic/vaccum.
*and secondly , Yeah...that's the way to REALLY build democracy in iraq...arrest the political opposition on trumped up charges , or assassinate them 'if necessary'...that's DEFINITELY how to win hearts and minds... But then the old question re-emerges of what's the difference between you and saddam? and where's your justification for the war...after the WMD threat proved a scam , you said you invaded to bring democracy to iraq ? you invaded because saddam was a cruel dictator who arrested his opposition on trumped up charges , shut down opposition newspapers , tortured and assassinated his political rivals ? What's the difference between old and new regime...what's the difference between then and now ? Perhaps the islamic world doesn't hate america , as bush claims , because america has 'freedom' ...perhaps they hate america for the TYPE of 'freedom' it brings ?
Seven months later, after Sadr spent the winter building support for his movement, the American-led coalition shut down his newspaper, provoking a crisis that Sadr survived with his status enhanced, thus insuring that he will play a major, and unwelcome, role in the political and military machinations after June 30th.
“Israel’s immediate goal after June 30th is to build up the Kurdish commando units to balance the Shiite militias—especially those which would be hostile to the kind of order in southern Iraq that Israel would like to see,” the former senior intelligence official said. “Of course, if a fanatic Sunni Baathist militia took control—one as hostile to Israel as Saddam Hussein was—Israel would unleash the Kurds on it, too.”
* note ...maybe this might have something to do with why the kurds get such bad treatment in the region...either that or a sign of their desperation...their willingness to be pawns of israeli interests ? Allowing themselves to be used and then abandoned by the us and now used by the israelis in hopes of a kurdish state that Turkey , Iran, Syria as well as many Iraqis are vehemently opposed to . Of course a kurdish state would greatly intensify all sorts of long simmering domestic squabbles in those countries ...weakening them and taking much pressure off israel in terms of foreign opposition...if the nations of the region were greatly weakened by internal strife , the palestinians , with little or no support left from those countries , could perhaps be bullied into a settlement with israel giving them even less than the 'nothing' they were given in previous negotiations with zionist state.
Of course the zionists will have meticulously evaluated whether sacrificing good relations with Turkey are worth the advantages that destabilizing Turkey , Syria Iraq and Iran would bring the Israelis... personally this blogger thinks Sharon and company would gleefully give that destabilization the go-ahead ...which should be a warning to the Turks , the Kurds and anyone else ...make deals with the devil and you always get burned...
The Kurdish armed forces, known as the peshmerga, number an estimated seventy-five thousand troops, a total that far exceeds the known Sunni and Shiite militias.
The former Israeli intelligence officer acknowledged that since late last year Israel has been training Kurdish commando units to operate in the same manner and with the same effectiveness as Israel’s most secretive commando units, the Mistaravim.
The initial goal of the Israeli assistance to the Kurds, the former officer said, was to allow them to do what American commando units had been unable to do—penetrate, gather intelligence on, and then kill off the leadership of the Shiite and Sunni insurgencies in Iraq. (I was unable to learn whether any such mission had yet taken place.)
“The feeling was that this was a more effective way to get at the insurgency,” the former officer said. “But the growing Kurdish-Israeli relationship began upsetting the Turks no end. Their issue is that the very same Kurdish commandos trained for Iraq could infiltrate and attack in Turkey.”
The Kurdish-Israeli collaboration inevitably expanded, the Israeli said. Some Israeli operatives have crossed the border into Iran, accompanied by Kurdish commandos, to install sensors and other sensitive devices that primarily target suspected Iranian nuclear facilities. The former officer said, “Look, Israel has always supported the Kurds in a Machiavellian way—as balance against Saddam. It’s Realpolitik.” He added, “By aligning with the Kurds, Israel gains eyes and ears in Iran, Iraq, and Syria.” He went on, “What Israel was doing with the Kurds was not so unacceptable in the Bush Administration.”
Senior German officials told me, with alarm, that their intelligence community also has evidence that Israel is using its new leverage inside Kurdistan, and within the Kurdish communities in Iran and Syria, for intelligence and operational purposes.
*note...the israelis with kurdish commandos are crossing from kurdish held iraq into iran and installing sensors that "target" iranian nuclear facilities ??? "Target" as in targeting for aircraft bombing as the israelis did to iraq's nuclear facility in the 1980s ???
the iraqi facility was built by France at the urging of the US--from whom i believe the iraqis were also urged to borrow the money , the facility was strictly monitored from the start by the international atomic energy agencies and certified by them as a non-weapons type reactor ...the israelis waited until it was completed and then bombed it to hell. THAT act BTW , marked the beginning of saddam hussein's attempts to get a nuclear weapon in his arsenal... Apparently , once again the israelis are able to thumb their noses and do whatever they want , despite international law to the contrary .
Syrian and Lebanese officials believe that Israeli intelligence played a role in a series of violent protests in Syria in mid-March in which Syrian Kurdish dissidents and Syrian troops clashed, leaving at least thirty people dead. (There are nearly two million Kurds living in Syria, which has a population of seventeen million.) Much of the fighting took place in cities along Syria’s borders with Turkey and Kurdish-controlled Iraq.
Michel Samaha, the Lebanese Minister of Information, told me that while the disturbances amounted to an uprising by the Kurds against the leadership of Bashir Assad, the Syrian President, his government had evidence that Israel was “preparing the Kurds to fight all around Iraq, in Syria, Turkey, and Iran. They’re being programmed to do commando operations.”
The top German national-security official told me that he believes that the Bush Administration continually misread Iran. “The Iranians wanted to keep America tied down in Iraq, and to keep it busy there, but they didn’t want chaos,” he said. One of the senior German officials told me, “The critical question is ‘What will the behavior of Iran be if there is an independent Kurdistan with close ties to Israel?’ Iran does not want an Israeli land-based aircraft carrier”—that is, a military stronghold—“on its border.”
Another senior European official said, “The Iranians would do something positive in the south of Iraq if they get something positive in return, but Washington won’t do it. The Bush Administration won’t ask the Iranians for help, and can’t ask the Syrians. Who is going to save the United States?” He added that, at the start of the American invasion of Iraq, several top European officials had told their counterparts in Iran, “You will be the winners in the region.”
*note...Iranians will be the 'winners' IF the israeli regional destabilization efforts and right winged zionist fanatical hopes of widening the US/Iraq war to include Syria and Iran , can also be checked...
TO BE CONTINUED...
posted by dsekou at 1:40 PM
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