Times Online June 14, 2006
Mahmoud al-Zahar, who was stopped at the border with $20 million in his suitcase (George Azar/The Times)
Posted on 06/15/2006 8:47:26 PM PDT by FARS
IRAN TOLD HAMAS, HAMAS TOLD THE JORDANIANS, THE JORDANIANS TOLD THE AMERICANS (Washington D.C.) - and the Americans invited the Iraqis to join in to bolster the new government's ministerial positions.
Nobody really knows exactly why "anything" but speculation can be reasonably accurate. Might the cash-strapped Hamas have been angling for the $25 million bounty on which to operate?
Or was this a gift from Hamas to the West aimed to potentially reinstate Jordan as the land of the Palestinians as was originally intended long ago and now so feared a possibility - with 60% of Jordanians of Palestinian descent - that Jordan has requested a halt or slow down to American efforts to form a Palestinian State.
Did Iran offer Zarghawi as a precursor to their dubious offer to help the USA in Iraq if the nuclear matter of sanctions were dropped?
Iraqi Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie offered this English translation of a document captured from Zarghawi, which contains multiple reasons Iran decided the liability of using Zarghawi over shadowed his usefulness after becoming a double edged sword cutting both ways:
"The situation and conditions of the resistance in Iraq have reached a point that requires a review of the events and of the work being done inside Iraq. Such a study is needed in order to show the best means to accomplish the required goals, specially that the forces of the National Guard have succeeded in forming an enormous shield protecting the American forces and have reduced substantially the losses that were solely suffered by the American forces.
This is in addition to the role, played by the Shi'a (the leadership and masses) by supporting the occupation, working to defeat the resistance and by informing on its elements.
As an overall picture, time has been an element in affecting negatively the forces of the occupying countries, due to the losses they sustain economically in human lives, which are increasing with time. However, here in Iraq, time is now beginning to be of service to the American forces and harmful to the resistance for the following reasons:
1. By allowing the American forces to form the forces of the National Guard, to reinforce them and enable them to undertake military operations against the resistance.
2. By undertaking massive arrest operations, invading regions that have an impact on the resistance, and hence causing the resistance to lose many of its elements.
3. By undertaking a media campaign against the resistance resulting in weakening its influence inside the country and presenting its work as harmful to the population rather than being beneficial to the population.
4. By tightening the resistance's financial outlets, restricting its moral options and by confiscating its ammunition and weapons.
5. By creating a big division among the ranks of the resistance and jeopardizing its attack operations, it has weakened its influence and internal support of its elements, thus resulting in a decline of the resistance's assaults.
6. By allowing an increase in the number of countries and elements supporting the occupation or at least allowing to become neutral in their stand toward us in contrast to their previous stand or refusal of the occupation.
7. By taking advantage of the resistance's mistakes and magnifying them in order to misinform. Based on the above points, it became necessary that these matters should be treated one by one:
1. To improve the image of the resistance in society, increase the number of supporters who are refusing occupation and show the clash of interest between society and the occupation and its collaborators. To use the media for spreading an effective and creative image of the resistance.
2. To assist some of the people of the resistance to infiltrate the ranks of the National Guard in order to spy on them for the purpose of weakening the ranks of the National Guard when necessary, and to be able to use their modern weapons.
3. To reorganize for recruiting new elements for the resistance.
4. To establish centers and factories to produce and manufacture and improve on weapons and to produce new ones.
5. To unify the ranks of the resistance, to prevent controversies and prejudice and to adhere to piety and follow the leadership.
6. To create division and strife between American and other countries and among the elements disagreeing with it.
7. To avoid mistakes that will blemish the image of the resistance and show it as the enemy of the nation.
In general and despite the current bleak situation, we think that the best suggestions in order to get out of this crisis is to entangle the American forces into another war against another country or with another of our enemy force, that is to try and inflame the situation between America and Iran or between America and the Shi'a in general.
Specifically the Sistani Shi'a, since most of the support that the Americans are getting is from the Sistani Shi'a, then, there is a possibility to instill differences between them and to weaken the support line between them; in addition to the losses we can inflict on both parties. Consequently, to embroil America in another war against another enemy is the answer that we find to be the most appropriate, and to have a war through a delegate has the following benefits:
1. To occupy the Americans by another front will allow the resistance freedom of movement and alleviate the pressure imposed on it.
2. To dissolve the cohesion between the Americans and the Shi'a will weaken and close this front.
3. To have a loss of trust between the Americans and the Shi'a will cause the Americans to lose many of their spies.
4. To involve both parties, the Americans and the Shi'a, in a war that will result in both parties being losers.
5. Thus, the Americans will be forced to ask the Sunni for help.
6. To take advantage of some of the Shia elements that will allow the resistance to move among them.
7. To weaken the media's side which is presenting a tarnished image of the resistance, mainly conveyed by the Shi'a.
8. To enlarge the geographical area of the resistance movement.
9. To provide popular support and cooperation by the people.
The resistance fighters have learned from the result and the great benefits they reaped, when a struggle ensued between the Americans and the Army of Al-Mahdi. However, we have to notice that this trouble or this delegated war that must be ignited can be accomplished through:
1. A war between the Shi'a and the Americans.
2. A war between the Shi'a and the secular population (such as Ayad 'Alawi and al-Jalabi.)
3. A war between the Shi'a and the Kurds.
4. A war between Ahmad al-Halabi and his people and Ayad 'Alawi and his people. 5. A war between the group of al-Hakim and the group of al-Sadr.
6. A war between the Shi'a of Iraq and the Sunni of the Arab countries in the gulf.
7. A war between the Americans and Iran. We have noticed that the best of these wars to be ignited is the one between the Americans and Iran, because it will have many benefits in favor of the Sunni and the resistance, such as:
1. Freeing the Sunni people in Iraq, who are (30 percent) of the population and under the Shi'a Rule.
2. Drowning the Americans in another war that will engage many of their forces.
3. The possibility of acquiring new weapons from the Iranian side, either after the fall of Iran or during the battles.
4. To entice Iran towards helping the resistance because of its need for its help.
5. Weakening the Shi'a supply line.
The question remains, how to draw the Americans into fighting a war against Iran?
It is not known whether America is serious in its animosity towards Iran, because of the big support Iran is offering to America in its war in Afghanistan and in Iraq.
Hence, it is necessary first to exaggerate the Iranian danger and to convince America and the west in general, of the real danger coming from Iran, and this would be done by the following:
1. By disseminating threatening messages against American interests and the American people and attribute them to a Shi'a Iranian side.
2. By executing operations of kidnapping hostages and implicating the Shi'a Iranian side.
3. By advertising that Iran has chemical and nuclear weapons and is threatening the west with these weapons.
4. By executing "exploding operations" in the West and accusing Iran by planting Iranian Shi'a fingerprints and evidence.
5. By declaring the existence of a relationship between Iran and terrorist groups (as termed by the Americans).
6. By disseminating bogus messages about confessions showing that Iran is in possession of weapons of mass destruction or that there are attempts by the Iranian intelligence to undertake terrorist operations in America and the west and against Western interests."
Speculation also abounds on multiple aspects pinpointing this terrorist's location and his last moments, ranging to opposite ends of the spectrum. This includes Coalition Forces beating him to death instead of acknowledging their medic tried to keep him alive (much more useful to us than dead) and 'he rolled off the stretcher to escape', was replaced, then died mumbling something nobody could decipher.
Was it "Prepare my Virgins"? As good a phrase as any to indicate he addressed Allah, though as the half-witted thug born and raised in a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan, he may well have simply cursed his captors unprintably with his last breath.
One vengefully satisfying fact is certain. Before he died, he had full defeated knowledge of capture by his enemy. His mind must have raced asking who had betrayed him, never thinking his own murderous viciousness had delivered him to his foes. Or that the $25 million reward dangled by the USA had cemented his final betrayal by a colleague. Iran was the conduit for his betrayal but his savage slaughter of Shiites tipped the scales for them to consider giving up a useful tool.
Again, speculation abounds that the Sunnis made a deal with Iraqi Prime Minister Al-Maliki to deliver Abu Musab Al-Zarghawi to him in return for appointing a Sunni Minister of Defense. Though this may have possibly played a role, it was the terrorist's savage brutality and his ruthless, gleeful killing, which contributed to his ousting from under an established insurgent veil of secrecy. Nobody liked him.
Others posit that Al Qaeda may have tired of his thirst for blood and been instrumental in passing the word to their senior man in Iraq, Waliya Arbili to either rein in Zarghawi or remove him to prevent further erosion of support for insurgents in Iraq. Specially of the non-Iraqi ilk. Zarghawi screaming abuse at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad in a tape released June 6th, 2006, criticizing the empty words of "destroying Israel off the map" but in fact doing nothing to achieve this.
Remember, Zarghawi was a Palestinian. He came from a refugee camp in a town called al-Zarghaa in Jordan but was not a Jtrue ordanian. His prime objective as a Palestinian was always and remained the destruction of Israel.
Human error in white also contributed to Zarghawi's capture - his white truck. Jordanian security forces amazingly provided a location for him from his gun-jamming video in the middle of nowhere.
How could anyone recognize the desert area from the little view provided? Probably nobody, but a white truck shown in the video and seen by Jordanian spies operating in and around a certain area, could have been the end of the ball of string, which later unraveled. Jordanian Special Forces were involved though their exact role has not been clarified.
HAMAS, for its part, appeared to have leapt at the opportunity to soothe recent tensions with the Jordanian Government. April and May 2006 had seen a series of arrests in the Kingdom of HAMAS operatives captured with weapons and explosives which were alleged to have been used against Jordanian Government targets throughout the country.
According to the Jordanian Government, the HAMAS weapons caches included automatic weapons, submachineguns, ammunition, hand-grenades, mines, different types of explosives, GRAD missiles, LAW anti-tank missiles, and Katyusha rockets (some of which were reportedly Iranian made).
With his spiritual mentor and advisor Sheikh Abd al-Rahman fingered and then cross-linked with various sightings of the white truck, the end became almost inevitable. Here comes the human error. Not repainting the truck, even with cans of spray paint, every so often to change its appearance. Factory white looked good, so white it remained. Nobody in the town where Zarghawi grew up considered him any brighter than a half-wit, so little wonder.
Interestingly enough in the first Gulf war, we knew where Saddam Hussein was at any given time after we discovered he was using a bus to move around and transmit his public messages. Luckily for him our policy at the time did not include terminating him.
Additionally, Zarghawi's rising star inside Iraq, his growing operational control and involvement in European terrorist actions and nascent activities in Canada and potential strikes in the USA itself, using East European/Balkan Moslems, Hispanic, specially Puerto Rican gangs, African-American Moslems and eventually rising to prominence above Ossama Bin Laden himself, may have been dominos in his downfall. Dominos which Ayman Al-Zawahiri, Ossama's second in command in Al Qaeda might well have been happy to set up, as he too, was being overshadowed.
Two days before he was killed Al-Jazeera televison lauded Zarghawi as a prominent leader, as a key and highly important person in the struggle against the Coalition and the West and the Al Qaeda prince of the region. An hour after news of his death reached them they did a 180 and began saying that Zarghawi getting killed was no big deal since he was an unpopular, low level maverick and not truly important to Al Qaeda's cause in Iraq.
Though Shia Iran continued to train and fund Zarghawi, having had a track record together through the pro-Iran Ansar Al-Sunna, located mostly in the North Eastern Iraq, on both sides of the Kurdish border, his indiscriminate killing of both Sunnis and Shias, specially Shias like the school children he took off a minibus and executed, made his usefulness a double edged sword. And finally pushed Iran to deep six him when negatives outpaced his positives.
True, he was fomenting major trouble for the Coalition Forces and a possible sectarian if not civil war, but he had also crossed that invisible line that separates even terrorists from a sheer evil very few can stomach. And, he was having major disagreements with Al Qaeda's second most senior representative in Iraq, Waliya Arbili to the point Bin Laden had to appoint a local resident, Abdulhadi al-Iraqi, over both their heads to maintain some semblance of order.
Abdulhadi's difficult task of preventing a bloody power struggle among Al Qaeda factions, foreign insurgents and Iraqi born ones, inside Iraq, may have become much more difficult with the demise of not only Zarghawi, concurrently with several of his top aides and two female intelligence personnel, but also because of the intelligence garnered and operatives arrested in 17 immediate raids by combined Coalition and Iraqi forces - between the attack on Zarghawi and the announcement of his death.
Some 39 related raids the next day and over 400 after that, further poked large holes in the torn fabric of the terrorist insurgency, leaving the field open for leaderless younger "militants" wanting to follow Zarghawi's ideals to struggle for positions of recognition in Iraq's terror organizations. Thereby, triggering a surge in intelligence from Iraqis with little, less or no respect for the newer, young Ansar al-Islam operatives appearing on the scene.
Abdulhadi may need all the help he can get from Bin Laden's reported choice of replacement of Zarghawi, a little known operative named Abdullah bin Rashid Al-Baghdadi. However, other reports state the Egyptian, Al-Mesri, claims to have been selected to fill the void. This in itself creates a potential conflict while they vie for position in the new hierarchy, offering leaks and intelligence coups. Al-Jazeera reports of an unknown person with a pseudonym of al Muhajer (the Immigrant) as the new boss of the Ansar al-Islam show part of the turmoil Al Qaeda faces.
Positively speaking, the rips in the Iraqi organizations and the intelligence feasts from the 56 locations may force Al-Zawahiri and Bin Laden to reveal themselves as their need to communicate faster to repair the gaps, clashes with their need for secure concealment. Over 150 later raids and a massive 40,000 person campaign by the new Iraqi government with some 7,000 US military personnel backing them up, may deal an insurmountable blow to Iraq's insurgency.
With so many missing from the old structure, Iran appears t have decided to move more forcefully into the game. With much bigger fish to fry than just Iraq and with a wealth of senior Al Qaeda members as guests inside Iran, including Bin Laden's son, Iran may upgrade its efforts from acting by proxy to more definitive, direct intervention. They are already more deeply involved in Al Qaeda activity in North Africa than is generally known.
Inside Iraq, Iran has an estimated 40,000 specially trained agents, Iranian nationals or Iranian-Iraqi citizens, scattered among the major cities, infiltrated into Shia mosques and blended into Moqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi militia in Southern Iraq.
Though, with Zarghawi gone, much of the incentive to join the Mehdi militia may disappear as sectarian violence fomented by Zarghawi will diminish and the need to protect Shias from his slaughter will no longer be a recruiting call that everyone will heed.
Taking a leaf from Khomeini's revolution inside Iran, where mosques became hubs for his take over plans, Iranian intelligence agents have additionally set up Islamic libraries in many major cities in Iraq, through which they recruit, fund, organize and control anti-Coalition and anti-Iraqi government activity. This set up, while technically secular, provides cover for Islamic jihadist meetings, indoctrination, safe houses and similar clandestine needs.
Generally considered an unintelligent child and later a mindless, minor thug as he was growing up in Jordan, Zarghawi operated on his cultural background and upbringing as a Palestinian refugee camp denizen. Like Arafat, who was thrown out of every Arab country for fomenting trouble against his host government, Zarghawi had no allegiance to Jordan and probably never formally received Jordanian citizenship.
His indiscriminate killing of Iraqis, specially of the Shia persuasion, reviled as they are by Sunnis, was in keeping with his feeling no allegiance to anyone in Iraq either. Anymore than he did toward Jordanians when he blew up a wedding party in a hotel or tried to use a dirty bomb to attack Jordanian Security.
After all, he was not killing his fellow Palestinians, who were the only ones for whom he might feel any affinity. Like the paramilitary Basiji in Iran, mostly mercenary Arabs, Palestinians or Taliban Afghans, having no hesitation or compunction in killing Shia Iranians to suppress street or student demonstrations, Zarghawi took pleasure in killing Iraqis, Jordanians and Westerners. With no other claim to fame, since he used others for strategic or tactical brainpower, ruthless spilling of blood gave him the notoriety he sought to recruit a following. He was death personified, which in the terrorist world provides a loathsome charisma.
Various other matters continue to roil in Iraq, Syria, Jordan and Iran.
The new government's confrontation with the insurgency while Al Qaeda has been disrupted extends to also warning Syria to stop permitting insurgents to enter or flee Iraq by way of that country, including a warning that Iraqi military will not hesitate to make incursions into Syrian territory in pursuit of insurgents or to suppress their operations near the border regions on the Syrian side.
With Iraq also concerned by Iran and Iran's Palestinian allies in Hamas and Syrian support of them, Iraq and Jordan have established a new alliance to face the Palestinian threat – mostly to Jordan – and to co-operate on capturing and killing foreign insurgents using Jordanian territory as border crossing points.
Provocative operations into Jordan from HAMAS bases in Syria would not have occurred without approval from Damascus. Equally, Damascus would not have undertaken such levels of attempted strikes — the second of their kind attempted and foiled in the Kingdom in as many years from Syrian bases — without serious consultation with their most important strategic partner, Tehran.
The Iranian Government deliberately selling out one of its former assets — even though Zarqawi was nominally an al-Qaida leader — has direct parallels to the deliberate selling out of the al-Qaida leader in Saudi Arabia, Saleh al-Oufi, in August 2005.
When Saleh al-Oufi disobeyed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and persisted with attacks on Saudi oil infrastructure instead of supporting the major effort of the time, to escalate the Iraq conflict, the bin Laden leadership leaked al-Oufi’s whereabouts to the Saudi security forces. Saleh al-Oufi and several of his colleagues were killed in firefights with Saudi security forces on August 18, 2005.
The direct parallels between the al-Oufi and Zarqawi incidents raise the question once again of the depth of Osama bin Laden’s links with Iran, and whether bin Laden himself is still in Iran and coordinating his actions with those of Iran.
Meanwhile, intelligence indicates major, still unspecified terrorist plans are being put into place against Western targets but despite the nearly 500 targetted raids inside Iraq and capture of a treasure trove of information, pinpointing where the now looming clouds will drop their rain, continues to a mystery intelligence forces of many nations pursue with great diligence.
There are multiple factors that made Iran do what it did. None of them were intended to take any credit 'after the fact'. The take down decision was made at the top levels of the neo-Iranian regime (Ahmadi-Nejad etc.) with Al Qaeda input and request. The "leak" of this being Iranian has damaged them not helped them and was not intended to come out.
1. They host some very senior Al Qaeda leaders, including OBL's son and several hundred others. These were increasingly upset at Zarghawi refusing to work with the most senior Al Qaeda operative in Iraq and rising above his position. Remember he was considered a thug and a half-wit even by the Al Qaeda, so not held in high esteem for what he did.
2. As you say, Iran backs the Shias and Zarghawi crossed the line with his slaughter of Shia innocents. And also Sunnis in a fairly indiscriminate fashion to suit himself not Iran's plans. This reached a point where he became a liability to the whole insurgency movement - with both Sunnis and Shias and Iraqis in general beginning to hate him for killing innocents.
This began to instigate an anti-insurgency backlash and Iraqis began to give up insurgents. Even openly fight against them in some areas. Not good for Iran's general plans. Nor Al Qaeda's objectives.
3.Iran has plans that require an even "negotiating" apearance as they try to buy time with the USA - as they have for years with the EU. Zarghawi was making this impossible and would not take orders any more. Even after Al Qaeda put in place someone above him and the other senior Al Qaeda man in Iraq to try to maintain some semblance of order in the ranks.
4. Iran's stance against Israel requires their surrogates HAMAS to be less of a target in Jordan, which had begun finding, arresting and disarming HAMAS operatives. And their weapons caches. Which through Syria and Jordan itself could be turned back and used against Israel at the right time. Again Zarghawi was making this impossible with his attacks on/in Jordan, including killing a prominent HAMAS leader in the hotel bombing.
5. He publicly berated and disrespecgted Iranian President Ahmadi-Nejad for paying lip service to the destruction of Israel and not really taking any action to achieve it. Remember Zarghawi is a Palestinian and a loose cannon here, who wants the destruction of Israel more than anything else. Other than rising to prominence to a point where he overshadows OBL and Al-Zawahiri. Neither of whom could stomach the dimwitted thug nor rely on his weak brain power to do what was best for the movement rather than personal notoriety.
6. Jordan feels vulnerable as HAMAS and 65% of Jordan's Palestinian population were reverting to considering Jordan as the new Palestinian State, something Arafat tried to promote but was kicked out of the country for preaching sedition. Zarghawi was again helping foment this thought and had to be removed sooner or later for Jordan's survival as a monarchy.
7. Iran would love for this story to go away instead of having two Iranian passengers in a car shot to death and their consulate in Southern Iraq attacked by Shias. Who resented Iran's support of Zarghawi and the latter's indiscrimihate murder of Shias. While Sunnis were becoming increasingly irritated by the manner of sectarian strife Zarghawi was sowing. Mostly indiscriinate slaughter. Neither Iran nor Al Qaeda needed this to continue after it crossed the red line of tolerance or acceptance by Iraqis. But Zarghawi would not listen and was "fired" - permanantly.
Iran could not clearly sully its own hands with his blood, so came the conduit to Jordan via HAMAS.
With Zarghawi becoming too big for his boots to listen to instructions and becoming a liability too great to continue to accept his mindless killings, Iran gave HAMAS detailed info, which they passed to Jordan, which then adivsed us in Washington DC.
Letting the USA know may not have been part of the plan since HAMAS was offering Jordan an olive branch and probably hoped Jordanian Special Forces, who operated in the region, would kill Zarghawi (they have always wanted him badly).
Jordan wants a slow down or halt to the USA pushing for a Palestinian State because it could be Jordan itself that became earmarked to be that State rather than the West Bank or Ghaza. So Jordan gave us the heads up to earn some brownie points.
This is all convoluted interaction of many policies and varied benefits among confrontational and amicable parties.
I respect your comments and would never need an apology of any kind ever, just a realization that interactions here run deeper and in more directions than may appear to your logic at first sight.
NOW! What think you of the North Korea missile situation? Has it also occurred to you that it is a proving test for equipment already sold to Iran?
That it is not an independent N. Korean action or test or sabre rattling but linked to Iranian plans for missiles and nuclear capability?
N. Korea has been the provider of nose cones to Iran and now a longer range missile than Iran's Shahab 3.
Which has to be first tested and proved before Iran hands over the money?
BTW - Somebody posted a link in this thread to the GIS website which describes what their activites are and have been for DECADES.
They are the "go-to" guys for many intel organizations as they have worldwide "assets" on the ground and among intel services of many countries. I cannot remember which post it was but it provided a link with contacts. As far as I know you can only subscribe if you are a member of a recognized intel organization. It's not for the general public or the Press.
They are unerringly, sometimes eerily accurate and totally unjournalistic in their presentations. They write analyses for the intel pro and only for them.
Again Zarghawi was making this impossible with his attacks on/in Jordan, including killing a prominent HAMAS leader in the hotel bombing.
BIG MISTAKE!
Sounds like $ 20 million blood money found its way to Hamas.
Times Online June 14, 2006
Mahmoud al-Zahar, who was stopped at the border with $20 million in his suitcase (George Azar/The Times)
That it is not an independent N. Korean action or test or sabre rattling but linked to Iranian plans for missiles and nuclear capability?
N. Korea has been the provider of nose cones to Iran and now a longer range missile than Iran's Shahab 3.
Which has to be first tested and proved before Iran hands over the money?
What proof is there for these assertions?
it is a proving test for equipment already sold to Iran?
I think that this is just an informed speculation.
N. Korea has been the provider of nose cones to Iran and now a longer range missile than Iran's Shahab 3.
This could be true. N. Korea has been selling its missile technology for a long time, sometimes in exchange for oil.
No doubt. I'm not convinced yet, but I have a better understanding of your reasoning now. My biggest problems is I have a problem atributing this level of sophisticated thinking to Ahmadi-Nejad. The man is clearly insane. So if this scenario is true, it must be the mullahs behind the scenes. That or he is a very good actor and deserving of an academy award. Time will tell.
I respect your comments and would never need an apology of any kind ever, just a realization that interactions here run deeper and in more directions than may appear to your logic at first sight.
Likewise.
NOW! What think you of the North Korea missile situation? Has it also occurred to you that it is a proving test for equipment already sold to Iran?
I agree with that. They have had a somewhat symbiotic relationship for quite some time. Each has what the other needs. Iran needs nukes and long-range delivery systems, and North Korean needs oil to fuel it's military machine. It is also likely that Iran is financing North Korean research and testing.
Therefore, we should shoot that sucker down before it leaves Korean airspace--either with an Aegis sitting off the coast or the new airborne laser, or both. A nice fireball over Pyongyang would send a message even Kim and Nejad would understand.
I would also publicly state that since the two nation seemed joined at the military and nuclear hip, that any action by one will be seen and treated as an action by both.
Thanks - the whole thing didn't made sense before -- this information adds a dot.
The previous supply of four nuclear nose cones for the Shahab3 missile is old news and common knowledge in intel circles. Nothing new here.
The possibility of the new N. Korean missile test being done for Iranians is the kind of analysis done by intel people on the basis of "if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck etc., then it is most likely to be a duck".
The timing, the fit into the waft and weave of the symbiotic relationship of Iran and N. Korea and the need Iran has to expand its range, all fit too comfortably and conveniently to be off the mark. Like fitting pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, IF and as the pieces fit they create a picture.
The sudden sabre rattling move by N. Korea does not fit the current picture well and would be weird timing even if they do have a tendency to act in strange ways. Given a choice the "duck" factor fits better.
Most intel is based on extrapolating givens or close to givens to try to see beyond the obvious, then assessing the likelihood of this being reality more than sheer conjecture. Interlocking cogs of information then adjust the focus till we hopefully get a true view of what would otherwise remain hidden.
Much is often not available as "proof" or as posted articles with MSM, so you either ride with the logical analysis or you reject it. That is your option and mine, which does not matter since we are not decision makers.
Rather like the disinformation being put out by the Guardian and Juan Cole that 70% of Iranians suport Ahmadi-Nejad and that there is no idiom in Farsi (Persian) that can say "wipe Isreael off the face of the world map", so it was never said!
First, Ahmadi-Nejad would love to have that kind of support. Pure BS by the Guardian that has always led the pack with pro-Mullah disinformation.
As for Cole's statement about Ahmadi-Nejad never saying he wanted Israel removed from the face of the earth, the Persian phrase (transliteration) is: "Israel bayad az nakhsh-e jahan hazv shavad" - that simple. Word for word this is "Israel - must - from - world map - be - deleted". No such idiom? Plain simple grammatical sentence.
There is a sudden surge in Europe to rehabilitate neo-Iran and Ahmadi-Nejad. Sadly encouraged by the USA at this point in our effort to bring them to the table.
What???? What???? Are you saying the Iranians already have four nukes? Please tell me that's NOT what you're saying...
The term would be "going for broke"? Is that what you mean? It seems to me the Iranians are much more rational - their showof nuttiness is just that - a show. While the North Koreans really are nuts. Then again if your system was used, and I was right, the Iranians would break away from the North Koreans - and that would be good... Oh, well. Nevermind.
The point is that since they are, in fact, behaving as allies against us on the world stage, we need to treat them as such.
If they are told in no uncertain terms that we view them as such, neither will be able do deny culpability in the actions of the other.
This creates check on their actions. It will also create diplomatic tension between them if they are not in perfect accord, as each will always have to wonder if the other will blink first in a confrontation sure to involve them both.
"I have a problem atributing this level of sophisticated thinking to Ahmadi-Nejad"
This sort of stuff is above Ahmadinejad. He doesn't make decisions like this independently. He'd need permission first.
That's exactly what I'm saying. In fact they have anywhere between eight and twelve but four are in nose cones and on mid-range Shahab 3 missiles.
Go to http://www.antimullah.com and read the article on Iran's nukes. There is a mention in some of the other articles.
"would need pesmission...."
"...need permission from Khamnei who is now under pressure from both the pro-Ahamdi-Nejad IRGC and Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, who is vying to replace Khamnei, dying of cancer."
He may be sick, (I don't know. He was rumored to be dying of cancer several years ago), but I don't believe he's incapcitated, and/or bending quite as much to the pressures of Yazdi as you do)
I think he's still in charge and calling the shots, and has plenty of his own loyal followers.
Thank you for the ping.
Even tho I am late in reading my pings, I have posted it on the WT thread.
I would be interested on your thoughts on the Chinese in Palestine as advisors......in post 417.
I pulled several searches, it looks interesting, but I have not gone back to work them through.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1650751/posts?page=508
Proof of the pudding will be in the eating, so to speak.
Khamenei may have loyal followers but they are so outgunned (literally speaking) by the IRGC elite forces who side with Ahmadi-Nejad that he is almost, I say almost, a puppet in the IRGC puppeteers hands.
At any point, A-N, who has already basically completed his palace coup, can rise and arrest both Khamenei and Rafsanjani for "corrupting Islam" and "dereliction of duty". The groundwork has been laid for this "putsch" and though the latter two may be wriggling and trying to regain some authority, they don't have any strike forces that can stand up to the IRGC.
So far it has not suited A-H and his group to remove the titular head and the major "old guard" clerics. Come November all this might change. (If we do not change everything a bit sooner, though our State Dept and the EU and MSM in both regions are heading in the direction of appeasement at present).
regards,
I do not know enough about this particular person to comment though Chinese activity worldwide - strategically and tactically is mind boggling. They have entrenched themselves in africa, specially oil and strategic metals regions, they control the ports at each end of every major shipping lane. they have taken over ports at the ends of canals like the Panama and water passageways.
BTW, about eight years or so a go there was a terrific world map that showed all the ports the Chinese controlled and the shipping lanes to/from those ports. I have never been able to find it again. though out of date by now to some degree it was an eye opener. If you ever run across it, I would love to have a copy.
I shall see if I can get any feedback on the Chinese operative who used to hang out with Arafart.
My point was : I don't believe a decision this major right now, is made by Ahmadinejad. (You may disagree.)
Khamenei may be replaced by Yazdi after the meeting in Nov., but Khamenei is still making these decisions now.
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