Yikes, this is getting a bit close for comfort.....
DEBKAfile Exclusive: US financial sources in Bahrain report American investors
in Bahrain advised to pack up business operations and leave
March 30, 2007, 3:56 PM (GMT+02:00)
USS Nimitz nuclear carrier
The advice came from officers with US Central Command 5th Fleet HQ at Manama,
who spoke of security tension, a hint at an approaching war with Iran. Arab
sources report the positioning of a Patriot anti-missile battery in Bahrain this
week; they say occupancy at emirate hotels has soared past 90% due mostly to
the influx of US military personnel. They also report Western media crews
normally employed in military coverage are arriving in packs.
Thursday, March 29, Gen. Khaled al-`Absi, Bahrain's chief of air defense
operations disclosed that new alarm networks had been installed and air defense
systems upgraded to handle chemical, biological and radioactive attacks.
The USS Nimitz and its support ships will be departing San Diego Monday, April
2, to join the John C. Stennis Strike Group in the Persian Gulf. The nuclear
carrier is due to relieve the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower , but military sources in
the Gulf believe all three US carriers will stay put if tensions continue to
climb or if fighting breaks out involving American, British and Iranian forces.
The mighty American armada is further supported by the USS Bataan and USS Boxer
strike groups.
War tensions have been triggered most recently by the crisis over the seized
British sailors and large-scale US sea, air and amphibious exercises in the
Gulf.
1. DEBKAfile's Tehran sources report that in the contest within the Iranian
leadership over how to handle the affair of the captured British seamen, the
wildest radical element has gained the upper hand, reducing the prospects of
their imminent release. Heading the tough Tehran faction are hardline president
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Gen. Rahim Safavi, commander of the Revolutionary Guards
whose naval wing performed the seizure.
They gained strength from the British premier Tony Blair's initial passive,
semi-conciliatory response. Tehran quickly grasped it had acquired not just a
propaganda tool but a military asset, which the UK cannot match as long as the
Americans desist from throwing their military might into the fray. Washington
has refused to risk of a full-scale war confrontation with the Revolutionary
Guards for the sake of the British sailors.
Iranian strategists also registered that, although the Blair government has
begun moving mountains to gain the freedom of the marine crew held in Tehran,
London appeared fairly laid back about the kidnap of BBC correspondent Alan
Johnston in broad daylight by gunmen in Palestinian Gaza, although three weeks
had gone by.
Revolutionary Guards serving with Palestinian terrorist groups in Gaza no doubt
filed a full report on the Johnston case to Tehran, which drew its own
conclusions.
2. Taking part in the big demonstration of American naval, air and marine force
launched March 27 are the two nuclear carrier strike forces Stennis and
Eisenhower , thousands of marines and 100 warplanes. Maneuvers on this scale in
the tight, overcrowded waters of the Persian Gulf carry risks of a collision
between American and Iranian craft.
DEBKAfile's military sources report that the Nimitz group is composed of the
Princeton guided-missile cruiser, four guided missile destroyers - the Higgins ,
Chafee , John Paul Jones and Pinckney . The strike force is armed with two
helicopter squadrons and a special unit for dismantling sea mines and other
explosive devices.
Earlier, DEBKAfile quoted intelligence sources in Moscow as predicting that a US
strike against Iranian nuclear installations codenamed Operation Bite has been
scheduled for April 6 at 0040 hours. Missiles and air raids will conduct strikes
designed to be devastating enough to set Tehran's nuclear program several years
back. |
