Hi again, Ray. We're already organized...already got uniforms, funny hats, and a fight song: "Praise the Lord, and pass the ammunition!" <gg>.......jj
debka.com
Saddam May Get First Strike in:
Israel Is Prime Target
DEBKAfile Military Analysis:
21 September:
DEBKAfile’s
military sources point to the
danger of Iraqi ruler Saddam
Hussein attempting to turn
the tables on the American
offensive against his regime
by stealing a leaf from the
Bush administration’s newly-
enunciated first-strike
strategy.
An Iraqi pre-emptive could take three forms:
1. Nuclear, biological or chemical terror strike in a
major American city or closer to home against Israel.
2. Military or terrorist action against one of the
Persian Gulf nations that have made bases available
to the United States, with Kuwait, Qatar and Oman
first in line.
3. A large-scale missile assault on Israel.
The latest official pronouncements have played down
any such threat to Israel.
US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on
Thursday, September 19, that he trusted Israel would
not react if struck by Iraqi missiles, while the Israel
chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon said last week
that he is less worried about the Iraqi threat than he is
by Palestinian terror. Nonetheless, neither official is
oblivious to the possibility of an Iraqi first strike
action and both the United States and Israel have
made appropriate preparations. DEBKAfile reports
as a certainty that, far from refraining to respond,
Israel will reply to any Iraqi strike by making its
military presence known to Iraq in the full strength.
The threat of an Iraqi military strike increases the
closer the Americans come to launch-date for their
overt war against Baghdad. Washington admitted
Saturday, September 21, that a detailed Pentagon plan
containing the military options for deposing Saddam
had been delivered to the White House in early
September.
In its latest issue, on September 20,
DEBKA-Net-Weekly reported that, on September 10,
the Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard
Myers, and the head of the Central Command, General
Tommy Franks, informed President Bush they had
wound up the preparations for war and it was over to
the president for the countdown to D-Day. The
exclusive report noted that covert military operations
are advancing stage by stage, concurrently with the
White House’s all-out bid for support in and outside
the United Nations and in the US Congress.
“It is a kind of modular exercise†- one high-placed
Washington source put it, "structured so that when it
is completed, the commander in chief can signal the
transition to open war without further preliminaries on
the ground.â€
DEBKA-Net-Weekly ’s military sources report that
special forces units from the United States,Britain,
Turkey,Jordan are operational inside Iraq. A steel ring
furthermore encloses Iraq by land and sea, some of its
links formed by bases in such countries as Saudi
Arabia (despite its ifs and buts - as we first revealed
on August 2), Egypt,Qatar, Bahrain,Oman, Kuwait.
Friday, September 20, President George W. Bush,
when he hosted Russian defense and foreign
ministers at the White House, opened the door to a
compromise on Moscow’s resistance to a new and
tougher UN Security Council on Iraq that spelt out the
consequences for Iraq’s failure to disarm. This was
confirmed in the US president’s conversation with
Vladimir Putin at his Black Sea holiday resort. In any
case, US counteraction by veto is in the air. US
Secretary of State Colin Powell warned Council
members that if they refuse to endorse the American
resolution, Washington will vote against sending UN
arms inspectors to Iraq.
Baghdad has meanwhile announced that it will not
admit inspectors dispatched in accordance with the
American-formulated resolution.
Cutting through this diplomatic cat’s cradle, Franks
stepped forward Saturday, September 21, to confirm
his forces are ready to undertake whatever activities
and actions may be directed as soon as the president
makes the decision to go to war. He spoke while
touring US bases in Kuwait after calling two
unscheduled training exercises that could quickly be
converted into war action in neighboring Iraq.
The evidence in hand at the moment points to the first
or second week of October as the likeliest time for the
overt side of the war to be launched by Washington
– barring any unforeseen Iraqi pre-emptive move.
With telling timing, the Bush administration unveiled
Friday, September 20, its national security strategy, a
document that emphasized military pre-emption as the
prime means for maintaining America’s political and
military superiority against the newly-emerging
threats.
“As a matter of common sense and self-defenseâ€,
says the paper, “America will act against such
emerging threats before they are fully formedâ€. It is
therefore willing to launch pre-emptive military strikes
against perceived dangers posed by tyrant state and
terrorist networks before they reach American shores.
Terrorists and rogue states were identified as the
common enemy of the world’s great powers. “The
greatest danger our nation faces lies at the crossroads
of radicalism and technology.â€
The paper addresses the transformation of national
security institutions, stressing the need to improve
intelligence.
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