Iran is seeking to import large consignments of bomb-making uranium from the African mining area that produced the Hiroshima bomb, an investigation has revealed.
A United Nations report, dated July 18, said there was “no doubt” that a huge shipment of smuggled uranium 238, uncovered by customs officials in Tanzania, was transported from the Lubumbashi mines in the Congo.
Tanzanian customs officials told The Sunday Times it was destined for the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas, and was stopped on October 22 last year during a routine check.
The disclosure will heighten western fears about the extent of Iran’s presumed nuclear weapons programme and the strategic implications of Iran’s continuing support for Hezbollah during the war with Israel.
It has also emerged that terror cells backed by Iran may be prepared to mount attacks against nuclear power plants in Britain. Intelligence circulating in Whitehall suggests that sleeper cells linked to Tehran have been conducting reconnaissance at some nuclear sites in preparation for a possible attack.
The parliamentary intelligence and security committee has reported that Iran represented one of the three biggest security threats to Britain. The UN security council has given Iran until the end of this month to halt its uranium enrichment activities. The UN has threatened sanctions if Tehran fails to do so.
A senior Tanzanian customs official said the illicit uranium shipment was found hidden in a consignment of coltan, a rare mineral used to make chips in mobile telephones. The shipment was destined for smelting in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan, delivered via Bandar Abbas, Iran’s biggest port.
“There were several containers due to be shipped and they were all routinely scanned with a Geiger counter,” the official said.
“This one was very radioactive. When we opened the container it was full of drums of coltan. Each drum contains about 50kg of ore. When the first and second rows were removed, the ones after that were found to be drums of uranium.”
In a nuclear reactor, uranium 238 can be used to breed plutonium used in nuclear weapons.
The customs officer, who spoke to The Sunday Times on condition he was not named, added: “The container was put in a secure part of the port and it was later taken away, by the Americans, I think, or at least with their help. We have all been told not to talk to anyone about this.”
The report by the UN investigation team was submitted to the chairman of the UN sanctions committee, Oswaldo de Rivero, at the end of July and will be considered soon by the security council.
It states that Tanzania provided “limited data” on three other shipments of radioactive materials seized in Dar es Salaam over the past 10 years.
The experts said: “In reference to the last shipment from October 2005, the Tanzanian government left no doubt that the uranium was transported from Lubumbashi by road through Zambia to the United Republic of Tanzania.”
Lubumbashi is the capital of mineral-rich Katanga province, home of the Shinkolobwe uranium mine that produced material for the two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.
The mine has officially been closed since 1961, before the country’s independence from Belgium, but the UN investigators have told the security council that they found evidence of illegal mining still going on at the site.
In 1999 there were reports that the Congolese authorities had tried to re-open the mine with the help of North Korea. In recent years miners are said to have broken open the lids and extracted ore from the shafts, while police and local authorities turned a blind eye.
In June a parliamentary committee warned that Britain could be attacked by Iranian terrorists if tensions increased.
A source with access to current MI5 assessments said: “There is great concern about Iranian sleeper cells inside this country. The intelligence services are taking this threat very seriously.”
Saturday, August 05, 2006
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Re-Thinking an Iran-Hizballah-al-Qa’ida Axis by Jeffrey Cozzens
Reports that Usama bin Laden’s son, Sa’ad, has been released from “house arrest” by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) to organize “Islamist terror cells” in Syria and Lebanon should be treated with a healthy dose of skepticism. Such a move could seriously undermine al-Qaeda’s (AQ) leadership of the largely Salafi global jihadi movement. The following analysis briefly examines why such a decision might be detrimental to AQ and the jihadi movement it leads.
First, anything that smacks of Salafi-jihadi subservience to the Shi’a regime in Tehran would create fissures in the wider global jihadi movement—possibly to the degree of undermining AQ’s credibility. Even though older AQ ideologues (namely, bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri) have acted with some amount of pragmatism and political acumen toward the Shi’a—almost certainly a reflection of their advanced learning, age, their ascendance from the fringes of the Muslim Brotherhood, and their appreciation for the “martyrdom” tactics of Hizballah—younger elements of the global jihadi movement generally reflect the radical, virulently anti-Shi’a “takfiri” worldview of the late Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi, and his mentor, Muhammad al-Maqdisi (also a Jordanian of Palestinian extraction). To give so much as the appearance of fighting “under the banner” of Tehran or Hizballah might therefore seriously alienate droves of the most ardent Salafis from AQ.
Second, by defaulting to the whims of the IRGC, AQ puts itself in a position of becoming yet another Sunni network co-opted by Iranian influence, similar to many of the Palestinian jihadi factions. Even though Sa’ad bin Laden is ostensibly being freed to organize Sunni militants (i.e. fragments of the Syrian jihadi movement and extant Sunni Lebanese jihadi factions) in support of Hizballah, his activities—no matter how they are parsed—would be subject to a degree of IRGC surveillance and/or interference. In the unlikely event the Die Welt report proves to be accurate, as one well-placed European source commented to me today, Iran might simply be acting out of concern for its own (IRCG) resources and well-being by “arranging for [Sa’ad] bin Laden’s martyrdom, which would free up considerable resources now being used to keep an eye on him. They’ll give him some sort of an ultimatum, then send him to Lebanon with knowledge that he won’t get out alive.” Either way, Iran is no friend of the global jihadi movement; it only shares a common enemy.
Third, this decision would undoubtedly rile the most militant of Saudi clerics, who give a degree of theological succor and legitimacy to AQ as credentialed scholars. Could one reasonably expect the ultra-radical Sheikh Nassar al-Fahd (infamous for his fatwa that attempts to legitimize jihadi WMD use) to support an AQ decision to operate under Iran’s influence, or broker a strategic alliance with Hizballah? Taken a step further, even the vast majority of Saudi Salafi scholars (most Salafis world-wide, for that matter) who are not friendly to AQ view the Shi’a as deviants from the Prophetic model. This is important because Salafism’s “reformist” trends form a “fertile field” of sorts from which its most militant strains grow. Why would AQ’s leadership risk alienating such an enormous pool of actual and potential supporters by agreeing to fight jihad based upon conditions set by Iran, or by committing to work side-by-side with Hizballah?
Fourth, we must contextualize al-Zawahiri’s much-discussed recent remarks. Certainly, his latest statement does appear to hint at supporting Hizballah’s fight in Southern Lebanon, but one must balance this with others he has made previously. For example, in a 2005 letter to al-Zarqawi, he wrote:
"People of discernment and knowledge among Muslims know the extent of danger to Islam of the Twelve'er school of Shiism. It is a religious school based on excess and falsehood whose function is to accuse the companions of Muhammad of heresy in a campaign against Islam, in order to free the way for a group of those who call for a dialogue in the name of the hidden mahdi who is in control of existence and infallible in what he does. Their prior history in cooperating with the enemies of Islam is consistent with their current reality of connivance with the Crusaders."
The collision between any state based on the model of prophecy with the Shia is a matter that will happen sooner or later. This is the judgment of history, and these are the fruits to be expected from the rejectionist Shia sect and their opinion of the Sunnis. These are clear, well-known matters to anyone with a knowledge of history, the ideologies, and the politics of states.
In sum, al-Zawahiri has no love for the Shi’a (especially their leadership); they are a “danger to Islam” that must be dealt with at a later time. So then, just as AQ leaders railed against the sanctions imposed upon Iraq during the post-Gulf War 1 era, yet had no love for Saddam Hussein, and did so to provide an example of the “global conspiracy” of the “Zionist-Crusader Alliance” against Islam (which in turn “justified” an equally global program of jihad against these sources of Islamic “oppression”), al-Zawahiri’s recent statement should be read as another addressed to the ummah (Islamic nation), not necessarily to the Shi’a.
While there is no doubt that the IDF incursion into Southern Lebanon makes this area a viable “land of jihad” for an eclectic array of radical Islamists, any AQ decision—or the appearance of such a decision—to operate at the behest of, or in conjunction with Shi’a networks is a risky venture. After all, the Iraqi conflict has heretofore functioned as the center of jihad since 2003, and as a result, anti-Shi’a sentiment amongst militant Sunnis has reached a peak. Low-level tactical cooperation between the two camps remains a possibility—in fact, we know that AQ modeled its own tactical methodology largely upon Hizballah’s—but a strategic partnership, or any operation subservient to the Shi’a (including Sa’ad’s alleged activities) would represent an unlikely sea-change for bin Laden’s network. Plainly, it is hard to imagine that AQ core leaders would support a move that would potentially undermine its core constituency—the Salafi movement. And lest we forget Iran and Hizballah, is it in their strategic interest to facilitate al-Qa’ida operations? I think not.
First, anything that smacks of Salafi-jihadi subservience to the Shi’a regime in Tehran would create fissures in the wider global jihadi movement—possibly to the degree of undermining AQ’s credibility. Even though older AQ ideologues (namely, bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri) have acted with some amount of pragmatism and political acumen toward the Shi’a—almost certainly a reflection of their advanced learning, age, their ascendance from the fringes of the Muslim Brotherhood, and their appreciation for the “martyrdom” tactics of Hizballah—younger elements of the global jihadi movement generally reflect the radical, virulently anti-Shi’a “takfiri” worldview of the late Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi, and his mentor, Muhammad al-Maqdisi (also a Jordanian of Palestinian extraction). To give so much as the appearance of fighting “under the banner” of Tehran or Hizballah might therefore seriously alienate droves of the most ardent Salafis from AQ.
Second, by defaulting to the whims of the IRGC, AQ puts itself in a position of becoming yet another Sunni network co-opted by Iranian influence, similar to many of the Palestinian jihadi factions. Even though Sa’ad bin Laden is ostensibly being freed to organize Sunni militants (i.e. fragments of the Syrian jihadi movement and extant Sunni Lebanese jihadi factions) in support of Hizballah, his activities—no matter how they are parsed—would be subject to a degree of IRGC surveillance and/or interference. In the unlikely event the Die Welt report proves to be accurate, as one well-placed European source commented to me today, Iran might simply be acting out of concern for its own (IRCG) resources and well-being by “arranging for [Sa’ad] bin Laden’s martyrdom, which would free up considerable resources now being used to keep an eye on him. They’ll give him some sort of an ultimatum, then send him to Lebanon with knowledge that he won’t get out alive.” Either way, Iran is no friend of the global jihadi movement; it only shares a common enemy.
Third, this decision would undoubtedly rile the most militant of Saudi clerics, who give a degree of theological succor and legitimacy to AQ as credentialed scholars. Could one reasonably expect the ultra-radical Sheikh Nassar al-Fahd (infamous for his fatwa that attempts to legitimize jihadi WMD use) to support an AQ decision to operate under Iran’s influence, or broker a strategic alliance with Hizballah? Taken a step further, even the vast majority of Saudi Salafi scholars (most Salafis world-wide, for that matter) who are not friendly to AQ view the Shi’a as deviants from the Prophetic model. This is important because Salafism’s “reformist” trends form a “fertile field” of sorts from which its most militant strains grow. Why would AQ’s leadership risk alienating such an enormous pool of actual and potential supporters by agreeing to fight jihad based upon conditions set by Iran, or by committing to work side-by-side with Hizballah?
Fourth, we must contextualize al-Zawahiri’s much-discussed recent remarks. Certainly, his latest statement does appear to hint at supporting Hizballah’s fight in Southern Lebanon, but one must balance this with others he has made previously. For example, in a 2005 letter to al-Zarqawi, he wrote:
"People of discernment and knowledge among Muslims know the extent of danger to Islam of the Twelve'er school of Shiism. It is a religious school based on excess and falsehood whose function is to accuse the companions of Muhammad of heresy in a campaign against Islam, in order to free the way for a group of those who call for a dialogue in the name of the hidden mahdi who is in control of existence and infallible in what he does. Their prior history in cooperating with the enemies of Islam is consistent with their current reality of connivance with the Crusaders."
The collision between any state based on the model of prophecy with the Shia is a matter that will happen sooner or later. This is the judgment of history, and these are the fruits to be expected from the rejectionist Shia sect and their opinion of the Sunnis. These are clear, well-known matters to anyone with a knowledge of history, the ideologies, and the politics of states.
In sum, al-Zawahiri has no love for the Shi’a (especially their leadership); they are a “danger to Islam” that must be dealt with at a later time. So then, just as AQ leaders railed against the sanctions imposed upon Iraq during the post-Gulf War 1 era, yet had no love for Saddam Hussein, and did so to provide an example of the “global conspiracy” of the “Zionist-Crusader Alliance” against Islam (which in turn “justified” an equally global program of jihad against these sources of Islamic “oppression”), al-Zawahiri’s recent statement should be read as another addressed to the ummah (Islamic nation), not necessarily to the Shi’a.
While there is no doubt that the IDF incursion into Southern Lebanon makes this area a viable “land of jihad” for an eclectic array of radical Islamists, any AQ decision—or the appearance of such a decision—to operate at the behest of, or in conjunction with Shi’a networks is a risky venture. After all, the Iraqi conflict has heretofore functioned as the center of jihad since 2003, and as a result, anti-Shi’a sentiment amongst militant Sunnis has reached a peak. Low-level tactical cooperation between the two camps remains a possibility—in fact, we know that AQ modeled its own tactical methodology largely upon Hizballah’s—but a strategic partnership, or any operation subservient to the Shi’a (including Sa’ad’s alleged activities) would represent an unlikely sea-change for bin Laden’s network. Plainly, it is hard to imagine that AQ core leaders would support a move that would potentially undermine its core constituency—the Salafi movement. And lest we forget Iran and Hizballah, is it in their strategic interest to facilitate al-Qa’ida operations? I think not.
Turkey Launches Limited Incursion into Iraq by Daveed Gartenstein-Ross
On July 19, Turkey was making noise about launching a unilateral cross-border incursion into Iraq to engage the Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK) in combat operations. The situation had become so serious that Turkey warned both the U.S. and Iraqi ambassadors that its patience with continued PKK presence in Iraq was wearing thin. On July 25, Turkey and the U.S. entered an agreement designed to prevent such unilateral intervention by increasing the two countries' cooperation against the PKK. Late last week, Turkey launched its first reported incursion into Iraq. Zaman Online reported on July 28:
"The 1st division commander of Iraq's Kurdistan Democrat Party (IKDP), Fahmi Sofi, claimed that about 200 Turkish soldiers entered two kilometers into Northern Iraq on Wednesday. His statement came from the Voice of Iraqi Radio. While debates about a cross-border operation continue in Turkey, Iraqi Radio announced that the Turkish military advanced into the Dohuk region, passing the Iraqi border. Deputy Commander Sofi stated that about 200 Turkish soldiers passed the border around 3:00 pm in a statement he made to the station broadcast from Baghdad. . . . Another related news story on a website called 'Peyamner', known to be the broadcasting body of IKDP, also reported that a division of the Turkish military entered the Kveste village region in Ahmediye bound to the Duhok city in order to conduct an operation against the terror organization PKK."
There has been no indication in press accounts about whether this cross-border incursion occurred pursuant to the joint U.S.-Turkish agreement on cooperation against the PKK. However, since no diplomatic wrangling emerged after the incursion, it's best to assume that it took place pursuant to the agreement.
We're likely to see further Turkish military engagement of the PKK. One reason is that the PKK seems to have escalated its attacks against Turkish civilians and government entities. On Sunday, for example, a PKK-laid landmine killed one child and injured three others in the eastern province of Bingöl, while a PKK attack on police lodgings in the province of Ağrı injured six officers and a passer-by. Such attacks will continue to drive public pressure for the Turkish government to counter the PKK presence in Iraq.
A second factor that will likely drive Turkey to further engagement with the PKK is the appointment of Gen. Yasar Buyukanit to head the Turkish military. Gen. Buyukanit is known as a "blunt-speaking hawk," and most observers believe that he will call for more aggressive action against the PKK.
Expect to see further Turkish incursions into Iraq -- coordinated with the United States if not carried out in conjunction with U.S. troops -- over the coming weeks and months.
"The 1st division commander of Iraq's Kurdistan Democrat Party (IKDP), Fahmi Sofi, claimed that about 200 Turkish soldiers entered two kilometers into Northern Iraq on Wednesday. His statement came from the Voice of Iraqi Radio. While debates about a cross-border operation continue in Turkey, Iraqi Radio announced that the Turkish military advanced into the Dohuk region, passing the Iraqi border. Deputy Commander Sofi stated that about 200 Turkish soldiers passed the border around 3:00 pm in a statement he made to the station broadcast from Baghdad. . . . Another related news story on a website called 'Peyamner', known to be the broadcasting body of IKDP, also reported that a division of the Turkish military entered the Kveste village region in Ahmediye bound to the Duhok city in order to conduct an operation against the terror organization PKK."
There has been no indication in press accounts about whether this cross-border incursion occurred pursuant to the joint U.S.-Turkish agreement on cooperation against the PKK. However, since no diplomatic wrangling emerged after the incursion, it's best to assume that it took place pursuant to the agreement.
We're likely to see further Turkish military engagement of the PKK. One reason is that the PKK seems to have escalated its attacks against Turkish civilians and government entities. On Sunday, for example, a PKK-laid landmine killed one child and injured three others in the eastern province of Bingöl, while a PKK attack on police lodgings in the province of Ağrı injured six officers and a passer-by. Such attacks will continue to drive public pressure for the Turkish government to counter the PKK presence in Iraq.
A second factor that will likely drive Turkey to further engagement with the PKK is the appointment of Gen. Yasar Buyukanit to head the Turkish military. Gen. Buyukanit is known as a "blunt-speaking hawk," and most observers believe that he will call for more aggressive action against the PKK.
Expect to see further Turkish incursions into Iraq -- coordinated with the United States if not carried out in conjunction with U.S. troops -- over the coming weeks and months.
Monday, July 31, 2006
Lebanon: Long Term vs. Short Term and Images by Michael Kraft
The controversy over imposing an immediate ceasefire in Lebanon reflects a basic issue in dealing with terrorism and especially hostage taking –how to solve the short term problem without creating more problems in the long term.
Without acknowledging it because to do so would mean tarnishing the memory of a Republican icon, the Bush Administration apparently is heeding lessons from the Reagan Administration. During the 1980's, the Reagan Administration talked the tough talk but folded its tents and made deals in reaction to terrorist bombings and hostage-taking in Lebanon by the same terrorist group, Hezbollah, that precipitated the current crisis by crossing the international border to seize Israeli hostages and then launching rockets against Israeli civilians.
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and others calling for an immediate ceasefire seem to have forgotten much history and hard facts of life.
The deaths of civilians in Lebanon are heartbreaking and a major tragedy. There is almost no way one can ignore the dramatic television footage and photos, especially from the village of Qana where a building housing civilians was hit this weekend. It is impossible not to be moved by the scenes on TV. The repeated dramatic airing on Arab television stirs already hot emotions and the numerous human interest stories on Western television add to the pressures for an immediate ceasefire.
These calls, however, are another grasping for short term “solutions” that can lead to more deaths in the future.
President Bush’s stance that a Lebanon ceasefire should be sustainable is not as calloused a response to the immediate suffering as many,especially in the Arab world, contend. Whether or not the President has the Reagan administration in mind, his effort to make sure that Hezbollah is not in a position to create future crises with more rocket launchings and cross-border attacks has a solid basis in relatively recent history.
In the 1980s when Hezbollah took more than three dozen westerners hostage, Reagan Administration officials made deals to solve the short term problem. These were the infamous deals orchestrated by Ollie North to trade antitank missiles to Iran, the prime backer of the Hezbollah hostage takers. But shortly after each American hostage was released, another was taken. And when Reagan withdrew the U.S. peacekeeping force in Lebanon after a Hezbollah suicide bomber killed 241 U.S. Marines, Navy and Army personnel, this was taken as a further sign in the region that the Americans were weak and paper tigers.
Israel’s past hostage deals with Hezbollah added to the perception of weakness when in 2004 they swapped 433 Arab prisoners for the bodies of three Israeli soldiers killed by the Hezbollah and a businessman who had been lured into a trap.
These U.S. and Israeli fixes were short term. They fertilized the ground for long term problems---the growth of Hezbollah, the emergence of other extremist groups such as al Qaeda and especially the Iranian-Syrian supply of an estimated 13,000 rockets and extensive construction of underground tunnels, bunkers and storage facilities. Many of them were deliberately located in civilian areas, a trick used by the PLO before the Israelis drove it out of Lebanon in 1982.
Several additional points need to be made in this age of media-influenced foreign policy:
• Emotional reactions are dangerous -- not just because of street mobs attacking U.N. facilities in Beirut or other forms of violence but because they often affect the judgments of policy makers.
-- The hyperbole by Lebanese officials and others in calling the Qana bombing a “massacre” and war crimes is too often reported at face value, especially when they are silent about Hezbollah’s deliberate firing of rockets packed with ball bearings designed to kill and main Israeli civilians. Initial assertions that Israel deliberately hit civilian targets or killed huge numbers of people often turn out to be unsubstantiated. A recent case was the bomb that hit the U.N. Observer post.U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan originally claimed it was deliberate. However the Canadian media has reported that that a couple days before he was killed, the Canadian Army observer had earlier emailed that Hezbollah was firing at Israel from nearby positions.
-- Exactly what happened in the Qana explosion also may not be clear cut. Israeli officials said that the building collapsed hours after Israel struck a near by launcher emplacement. The suggestionsthat explosives may have been stored in the building may be self serving but there have been media reports that the roof of the building had not been hit, as would normally been the case if the building struck by a bomb. The Israelis had nothing to gain by deliberately hitting a civilian target, and obviously much to lose. If a smart bomb or laser guided bomb went astray it would not be the first time for either Israel or the U.S.
-- The U.S. Israel and other countries have made deals to release hostages because policy makers were affected by the emotions and pressures from family members and the public.
• Pictures may not lie but they can distort. (And in the age of digital photography they can be made to lie.)
-- It is easy for photographers to focus on a destroyed building, such as the Hezbollah headquartersin southern Beirut, but one has to look closely to note that the nearby buildings apparently suffered only superficial damage. Photos of damage to one area of a city can give the false impression that the whole city is destroyed. Demonstrations can be filmed with a tight focus, giving the impression that more people are taking part than is the case.
-- In January, 1983, I went to Beirut as part of a Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff team to look at proposals for U.S foreign assistance following the Israeli withdrawal the previous year. As a result of watching the television coverage of Israel's invasion to oust the PLO, I half expected to see most of the city leveled. Instead, as we drove in from the south past rows of intact apartment buildings, an American military attaché pointed out the occasional blackened corner apartment that had been burnt out. There had been PLO machine gun nests or rocket launcher in those apartments he said, that were knocked out by Israelis. He said the TV photos had focused on the billowing smoke, making it appear as if the entire building and section of the city was on fire. But in reality, the damage was confined to one or two apartments in a relatively small number of buildings.
(For the record, the proposed foreign assistance program was largely designed to help the Shia residents of southern Lenabon who had been ignored by the Lebanonese government. The program collapsed when Shia terrorists blew up the American embassy in 1983, killing Agency for International Development experts as well as CIA agents and embassy personnel.)
-- In the first Iraq war the U.S. called the fighting to a halt before Saddam Hussein’s armor was destroyed, largely because of TV footage of the “mile of death” – a long line of trucks and other vehicles that had been attacked and burned by American aircraft. Much of the footage focused on the poor drivers of the lead vehicles who were burnt to death in their cabs. Most of the Iraqis in the other vehicles were caught in the traffic jam, jumped out and escaped. Yet the dramatic TV footage and the fears it might make it appear to Arabs as if the U.S. was “piling it on” the Iraqis, was a factor in calling the war short before the elite Republican guard equipment was destroyed. Saddam Hussein thus was left in a better position to attack the Kurds in the north and the marsh people in the south.
One can only wonder whether if real time television coverage existed in World War II, the allied bombing of French and Belgian villages would have caused an outcry to halt the Normandy invasion to roll back Germany’s control of Western Europe.
It is easy and almost par for the course for the U.N. Secretary General, European and Arab officials to react to emotions and photos by calling for an immediate ceasefire in the current Lebanon crisis. But a simple cease fire would allow Hezbollah to re-supply, perhaps with more long range missiles from Iran and Syria and dig in further. Lebanon will be further destabilized. And the next round of fighting is likely to cause even larger numbers of civilian casualties, especially if Hezbollah obtains more large rockets capable of hitting Haifa and perhaps even Tel Aviv and the Israeli military strikes back even harder.
Whatever other elements might be included in an eventual ceasefire deal, they must include arrangements to cut off Syrian and Iranians re-supply of rockets and other weapons to Hezbollah so it does not feel emboldened to launch more cross-border attacks in the future.
A cease fire that allows Hezbollah to claim victory will encourage Iran and the Islamic fundamentalist terrorists who already have left their fatal mark on British, Spanish, Turkish, Iraqi, Saudi, Egyptian, Moroccan, Indonesian, Kenyan and Tanzanian cities in addition to New York and the Pentagon in Washington. The Europeans, Arabs and UN officials who have tried to soft-pedal the threats from fundamentalists and a nuclear equipped Iran and are now clamoring for an immediate cease fire only would be postponing another and perhaps worse crisis.
Short term deals with terrorists too often lead to long term pain.
Without acknowledging it because to do so would mean tarnishing the memory of a Republican icon, the Bush Administration apparently is heeding lessons from the Reagan Administration. During the 1980's, the Reagan Administration talked the tough talk but folded its tents and made deals in reaction to terrorist bombings and hostage-taking in Lebanon by the same terrorist group, Hezbollah, that precipitated the current crisis by crossing the international border to seize Israeli hostages and then launching rockets against Israeli civilians.
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and others calling for an immediate ceasefire seem to have forgotten much history and hard facts of life.
The deaths of civilians in Lebanon are heartbreaking and a major tragedy. There is almost no way one can ignore the dramatic television footage and photos, especially from the village of Qana where a building housing civilians was hit this weekend. It is impossible not to be moved by the scenes on TV. The repeated dramatic airing on Arab television stirs already hot emotions and the numerous human interest stories on Western television add to the pressures for an immediate ceasefire.
These calls, however, are another grasping for short term “solutions” that can lead to more deaths in the future.
President Bush’s stance that a Lebanon ceasefire should be sustainable is not as calloused a response to the immediate suffering as many,especially in the Arab world, contend. Whether or not the President has the Reagan administration in mind, his effort to make sure that Hezbollah is not in a position to create future crises with more rocket launchings and cross-border attacks has a solid basis in relatively recent history.
In the 1980s when Hezbollah took more than three dozen westerners hostage, Reagan Administration officials made deals to solve the short term problem. These were the infamous deals orchestrated by Ollie North to trade antitank missiles to Iran, the prime backer of the Hezbollah hostage takers. But shortly after each American hostage was released, another was taken. And when Reagan withdrew the U.S. peacekeeping force in Lebanon after a Hezbollah suicide bomber killed 241 U.S. Marines, Navy and Army personnel, this was taken as a further sign in the region that the Americans were weak and paper tigers.
Israel’s past hostage deals with Hezbollah added to the perception of weakness when in 2004 they swapped 433 Arab prisoners for the bodies of three Israeli soldiers killed by the Hezbollah and a businessman who had been lured into a trap.
These U.S. and Israeli fixes were short term. They fertilized the ground for long term problems---the growth of Hezbollah, the emergence of other extremist groups such as al Qaeda and especially the Iranian-Syrian supply of an estimated 13,000 rockets and extensive construction of underground tunnels, bunkers and storage facilities. Many of them were deliberately located in civilian areas, a trick used by the PLO before the Israelis drove it out of Lebanon in 1982.
Several additional points need to be made in this age of media-influenced foreign policy:
• Emotional reactions are dangerous -- not just because of street mobs attacking U.N. facilities in Beirut or other forms of violence but because they often affect the judgments of policy makers.
-- The hyperbole by Lebanese officials and others in calling the Qana bombing a “massacre” and war crimes is too often reported at face value, especially when they are silent about Hezbollah’s deliberate firing of rockets packed with ball bearings designed to kill and main Israeli civilians. Initial assertions that Israel deliberately hit civilian targets or killed huge numbers of people often turn out to be unsubstantiated. A recent case was the bomb that hit the U.N. Observer post.U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan originally claimed it was deliberate. However the Canadian media has reported that that a couple days before he was killed, the Canadian Army observer had earlier emailed that Hezbollah was firing at Israel from nearby positions.
-- Exactly what happened in the Qana explosion also may not be clear cut. Israeli officials said that the building collapsed hours after Israel struck a near by launcher emplacement. The suggestionsthat explosives may have been stored in the building may be self serving but there have been media reports that the roof of the building had not been hit, as would normally been the case if the building struck by a bomb. The Israelis had nothing to gain by deliberately hitting a civilian target, and obviously much to lose. If a smart bomb or laser guided bomb went astray it would not be the first time for either Israel or the U.S.
-- The U.S. Israel and other countries have made deals to release hostages because policy makers were affected by the emotions and pressures from family members and the public.
• Pictures may not lie but they can distort. (And in the age of digital photography they can be made to lie.)
-- It is easy for photographers to focus on a destroyed building, such as the Hezbollah headquartersin southern Beirut, but one has to look closely to note that the nearby buildings apparently suffered only superficial damage. Photos of damage to one area of a city can give the false impression that the whole city is destroyed. Demonstrations can be filmed with a tight focus, giving the impression that more people are taking part than is the case.
-- In January, 1983, I went to Beirut as part of a Senate Foreign Relations Committee staff team to look at proposals for U.S foreign assistance following the Israeli withdrawal the previous year. As a result of watching the television coverage of Israel's invasion to oust the PLO, I half expected to see most of the city leveled. Instead, as we drove in from the south past rows of intact apartment buildings, an American military attaché pointed out the occasional blackened corner apartment that had been burnt out. There had been PLO machine gun nests or rocket launcher in those apartments he said, that were knocked out by Israelis. He said the TV photos had focused on the billowing smoke, making it appear as if the entire building and section of the city was on fire. But in reality, the damage was confined to one or two apartments in a relatively small number of buildings.
(For the record, the proposed foreign assistance program was largely designed to help the Shia residents of southern Lenabon who had been ignored by the Lebanonese government. The program collapsed when Shia terrorists blew up the American embassy in 1983, killing Agency for International Development experts as well as CIA agents and embassy personnel.)
-- In the first Iraq war the U.S. called the fighting to a halt before Saddam Hussein’s armor was destroyed, largely because of TV footage of the “mile of death” – a long line of trucks and other vehicles that had been attacked and burned by American aircraft. Much of the footage focused on the poor drivers of the lead vehicles who were burnt to death in their cabs. Most of the Iraqis in the other vehicles were caught in the traffic jam, jumped out and escaped. Yet the dramatic TV footage and the fears it might make it appear to Arabs as if the U.S. was “piling it on” the Iraqis, was a factor in calling the war short before the elite Republican guard equipment was destroyed. Saddam Hussein thus was left in a better position to attack the Kurds in the north and the marsh people in the south.
One can only wonder whether if real time television coverage existed in World War II, the allied bombing of French and Belgian villages would have caused an outcry to halt the Normandy invasion to roll back Germany’s control of Western Europe.
It is easy and almost par for the course for the U.N. Secretary General, European and Arab officials to react to emotions and photos by calling for an immediate ceasefire in the current Lebanon crisis. But a simple cease fire would allow Hezbollah to re-supply, perhaps with more long range missiles from Iran and Syria and dig in further. Lebanon will be further destabilized. And the next round of fighting is likely to cause even larger numbers of civilian casualties, especially if Hezbollah obtains more large rockets capable of hitting Haifa and perhaps even Tel Aviv and the Israeli military strikes back even harder.
Whatever other elements might be included in an eventual ceasefire deal, they must include arrangements to cut off Syrian and Iranians re-supply of rockets and other weapons to Hezbollah so it does not feel emboldened to launch more cross-border attacks in the future.
A cease fire that allows Hezbollah to claim victory will encourage Iran and the Islamic fundamentalist terrorists who already have left their fatal mark on British, Spanish, Turkish, Iraqi, Saudi, Egyptian, Moroccan, Indonesian, Kenyan and Tanzanian cities in addition to New York and the Pentagon in Washington. The Europeans, Arabs and UN officials who have tried to soft-pedal the threats from fundamentalists and a nuclear equipped Iran and are now clamoring for an immediate cease fire only would be postponing another and perhaps worse crisis.
Short term deals with terrorists too often lead to long term pain.
Sunday, July 30, 2006
Hezbollah's Arsenal: It's More Lethal than Everyone Thought by Dan Darling
As the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah continues to escalate in Lebanon, one of the most alarming discoveries since the beginning of the fighting has been the variety, as well as the capabilities, of the weaponry employed by Hezbollah.
Under the headline "Arming of Hezbollah Reveals U.S. and Israeli Blind Spots," the New York Times recently provided a sense of just how powerful Hezbollah has become since the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000. As the Times explained, "the power and sophistication of the missile and rocket arsenal that Hezbollah has used in recent days has caught the United States and Israel off guard . . . both countries are just now learning the extent to which the militant group has succeeded in getting weapons from Iran and Syria."
There is good reason to be concerned. Since the fighting began, Hezbollah has inflicted more damage on Israel than Saddam Hussein's Iraq was able to inflict on Kuwait during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. Hezbollah has deployed a range of extremely sophisticated weapons against Israel. The most notable has been the Iranian C-802 Noor (Tondar) variant of the Chinese Silkworm missile that was used against an Israeli gunship off the Lebanese coast. Four Israeli sailors were killed, and the gunship was put out of commission.
The Associated Press reports that "Iran is believed to have supplied Hezbollah with up to 120 Fajr-3 and Fajr-5 rockets, with ranges of 22 miles and 45 miles respectively," noting that it was a Fajr-3 that is thought to have been responsible for an attack on Haifa that killed 8 civilians. More recently, Israeli military officials have sought to destroy sites in Lebanon believed to house long-range Zelzal missiles of Iranian manufacture that they suspect are capable of hitting Tel Aviv. And while early reports that an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was responsible for the attack on the Israeli warship were inaccurate, Hezbollah is still assumed to possess several UAVs.
Nor is Iran Hezbollah's only source of weaponry. The New York Times quoted anonymous officials as saying that "some of the rockets in Hezbollah's arsenal--including a 220-millimeter rocket used in a deadly attack on a railway site in Haifa on Sunday--were built in Syria. . . . Officials have since confirmed that the warhead on the Syrian rocket was filled with ball bearings--a method of destruction used frequently in suicide bombings but not in warhead technology." An intelligence official was quoted in the article as saying, "We've never seen anything like this."
Given the apparent intelligence failure surrounding both Hezbollah's acquisition of this advanced weaponry and the willingness of Iran and Syria to supply it, the question whether the capabilities displayed to date by Hezbollah represent the full extent and scope of its arsenal may be worth raising.
Moreover, even the group's more mundane weapons have undergone numerous improvements. The Times reports that U.S. and Israeli intelligence were "surprised by the advances that Hezbollah had made in improving what had been crude rockets--for example, attaching cluster bombs as warheads, or filling an explosive shell with ball bearings that have devastating effect." While some of these advances have come about through experience and murderous innovation, it is undeniable that Hezbollah would not be able to threaten Israel to the degree that it does without the full and active support of Syria and Iran. Clearly, contrary to the prognostications of many, state sponsorship still plays a major role in the amount of force that a terrorist group like Hezbollah can bring to bear against Israel. This is particularly true if, as Time magazine reported on its website in June, Hezbollah's long-range weapons are "under the direct command of officers of Iran's Revolutionary Guards," the elite branch of the Iranian military. According to the New York Times's unnamed intelligence sources, Revolutionary Guards probably "trained Hezbollah fighters on how to successfully fire and guide the missiles."
Given the sophistication and variety of Hezbollah's weapons and the role of Syria and Iran in supplying them, any lasting solution to the situation in Lebanon must involve the full disarmament or destruction of Hezbollah's arsenal, with a firm understanding that it will not be reconstituted.
The Times reported that the administration was reluctant to detail the role of Iran because of "a desire by the Bush administration to contain the conflict to Israeli and Hezbollah forces, and not to enlarge the diplomatic tasks by making Iranian missile supplies, or even those of Syria, a central question for now." While such reticence may make good diplomatic sense in the short term, no agreement that fails to address these issues will last.
The point is not to make Iranian missile supplies to Hezbollah central to our diplomacy--it is to prevent "the A-Team of Terrorists" from continuing to possess such weapons. If Hezbollah is allowed to retain its arsenal in return for a cease-fire, what guarantee is there that it will refrain from using them again?
Under the headline "Arming of Hezbollah Reveals U.S. and Israeli Blind Spots," the New York Times recently provided a sense of just how powerful Hezbollah has become since the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000. As the Times explained, "the power and sophistication of the missile and rocket arsenal that Hezbollah has used in recent days has caught the United States and Israel off guard . . . both countries are just now learning the extent to which the militant group has succeeded in getting weapons from Iran and Syria."
There is good reason to be concerned. Since the fighting began, Hezbollah has inflicted more damage on Israel than Saddam Hussein's Iraq was able to inflict on Kuwait during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. Hezbollah has deployed a range of extremely sophisticated weapons against Israel. The most notable has been the Iranian C-802 Noor (Tondar) variant of the Chinese Silkworm missile that was used against an Israeli gunship off the Lebanese coast. Four Israeli sailors were killed, and the gunship was put out of commission.
The Associated Press reports that "Iran is believed to have supplied Hezbollah with up to 120 Fajr-3 and Fajr-5 rockets, with ranges of 22 miles and 45 miles respectively," noting that it was a Fajr-3 that is thought to have been responsible for an attack on Haifa that killed 8 civilians. More recently, Israeli military officials have sought to destroy sites in Lebanon believed to house long-range Zelzal missiles of Iranian manufacture that they suspect are capable of hitting Tel Aviv. And while early reports that an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was responsible for the attack on the Israeli warship were inaccurate, Hezbollah is still assumed to possess several UAVs.
Nor is Iran Hezbollah's only source of weaponry. The New York Times quoted anonymous officials as saying that "some of the rockets in Hezbollah's arsenal--including a 220-millimeter rocket used in a deadly attack on a railway site in Haifa on Sunday--were built in Syria. . . . Officials have since confirmed that the warhead on the Syrian rocket was filled with ball bearings--a method of destruction used frequently in suicide bombings but not in warhead technology." An intelligence official was quoted in the article as saying, "We've never seen anything like this."
Given the apparent intelligence failure surrounding both Hezbollah's acquisition of this advanced weaponry and the willingness of Iran and Syria to supply it, the question whether the capabilities displayed to date by Hezbollah represent the full extent and scope of its arsenal may be worth raising.
Moreover, even the group's more mundane weapons have undergone numerous improvements. The Times reports that U.S. and Israeli intelligence were "surprised by the advances that Hezbollah had made in improving what had been crude rockets--for example, attaching cluster bombs as warheads, or filling an explosive shell with ball bearings that have devastating effect." While some of these advances have come about through experience and murderous innovation, it is undeniable that Hezbollah would not be able to threaten Israel to the degree that it does without the full and active support of Syria and Iran. Clearly, contrary to the prognostications of many, state sponsorship still plays a major role in the amount of force that a terrorist group like Hezbollah can bring to bear against Israel. This is particularly true if, as Time magazine reported on its website in June, Hezbollah's long-range weapons are "under the direct command of officers of Iran's Revolutionary Guards," the elite branch of the Iranian military. According to the New York Times's unnamed intelligence sources, Revolutionary Guards probably "trained Hezbollah fighters on how to successfully fire and guide the missiles."
Given the sophistication and variety of Hezbollah's weapons and the role of Syria and Iran in supplying them, any lasting solution to the situation in Lebanon must involve the full disarmament or destruction of Hezbollah's arsenal, with a firm understanding that it will not be reconstituted.
The Times reported that the administration was reluctant to detail the role of Iran because of "a desire by the Bush administration to contain the conflict to Israeli and Hezbollah forces, and not to enlarge the diplomatic tasks by making Iranian missile supplies, or even those of Syria, a central question for now." While such reticence may make good diplomatic sense in the short term, no agreement that fails to address these issues will last.
The point is not to make Iranian missile supplies to Hezbollah central to our diplomacy--it is to prevent "the A-Team of Terrorists" from continuing to possess such weapons. If Hezbollah is allowed to retain its arsenal in return for a cease-fire, what guarantee is there that it will refrain from using them again?
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