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Politics : I Will Continue to Continue, to Pretend.... -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (18942)	3/25/2006 4:22:06 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Russia, Unmasked By Captain Ed on War on Terror Captain's Quarters Thanks to the release of the captured Iraqi Intelligence Service documents, we now know that the former superpower and our supposed partner in the war on terror instead has allied itself with our enemies -- namely, the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein. The Pentagon confirmed this evening that intelligence gathered during Operation Iraqi Freedom shows clearly that Russia passed vital intelligence to Saddam before and during the war, including our plans for capturing Baghdad: <<< Russia had a military intelligence unit operating in Iraq up through the 2003 U.S. invasion and fall of Baghdad, a Russian analyst said Friday as the Pentagon reported Moscow fed Saddam Hussein's government with intelligence on the American military. Iraqi documents released as part of the Pentagon report asserted that the Russians relayed information to Saddam through their ambassador in Baghdad during the opening days of the war in late March and early April 2003, including a crucial time before the ground assault on Baghdad. Pavel Felgenhauer, a respected independent Moscow-based military analyst, told The Associated Press the report was "quite plausible." He said a unit affiliated with the Defense Ministry's Main Intelligence Department, known by its abbreviation GRU, was actively working in Iraq at the time of the U.S. invasion. The unit apparently was shut down after the fall of Baghdad. >>> As I wrote yesterday, this betrayal carries some consequences, both for the US-Russian relationship and our current negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program. Moscow deliberately gave Saddam information that, in the hands of a competent military leader, would have resulted in the deaths of many American soldiers and Marines. Vladimir Putin has strong ties to the Russian intelligence community, so this can't be dismissed as a rogue operation, especially given the high profile of the Iraqi situation and the involvement of Putin's diplomatic corps. Putin allied himself with Saddam and against the US, presumably to protect its commercial interests. However, one cannot discount the motivation Putin has for re-establishing Russia as a power base in the post-Soviet world. He has played at restarting the Great Game for the last several years in Southwest Asia, trying to gain the upper hand over the Anglosphere in the oil-producing regions. And that brings us to Iran. After finding out that Putin has a habit of supplying tyrannical enemies of the Western nations with military intelligence to use against us, the last country we should trust with Iran's nuclear program is Russia. We can also kiss off the UN; as long as Russia has its veto, that route will lead nowhere. Russia has revealed itself to be a major part of the problem in the Middle East, and we should stop pretending that they are part of the solution. At least now we know why the CIA and John Negroponte wanted these documents to remain sealed. captainsquartersblog.com news.yahoo.com

To: Sully- who wrote (18942)	3/25/2006 4:24:48 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Russians hid from UN inspectors in Iraq The American Thinker More and more information is coming out on the extent of Russian perfidy in aiding Saddam’s WMD programs. Ray Robison posts documents showing Russians hid from UB inspectors on supposedly surprise inspections. Ray makes the following interesting comment: <<< Note this is [written] within four months of the start of the war and “poor Saddam” (who the AP reported as frustrated because he was so honest about having no weapons) has Russian experts hiding from U.N. teams. Nice job AP, that is some cutting edge reporting. How is it a clown like me and a dedicated volunteer linguist can find this stuff and the media can’t? >>> americanthinker.com rayrobison.typepad.com

To: Sully- who wrote (18942)	3/25/2006 8:29:02 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Criswell predicts ... posted by wretchard The Belmont Club Pajamas Media has posted a translation of Iraq Document CMPC-2003-001950 which recounts the information provided by the Russian Ambassador to Saddam Hussein. Point numbers 3 to 5 in the document say: <<< 3- During the meeting the ambassador gave us the following information about the US military presence in the Gulf as per the 2nd of March: Number of troops: 206,500 out of which 98,000 naval forces and 36,500 infantry. 90% of theses forces are in Kuwait and on the Navy ships. [emphasis mine] US troops have reached the island of Bubiyan (Bubiyan is largest Kuwaiti island in the Kuwaiti coastal islands chain) Number of tanks: 480 Number of armored cars: 1132 Number of artillery: 296 Number of Apache helicopters : 735 Number of fighter planes: 871 Number of Navy ships: 106. 68 in the Gulf and the rest in Oman (State of Oman), Aden (Yemen), the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. Number of air carriers: 5. One nuclear powered. Three in the Gulf one in the Mediterranean and one on its way. Number of Cruise missiles: 583 based on the US Navy and distributed on 22 ships. Number of Cruise missiles on planes: 64 Number of heavy bombers B-52 H: 10 in the Indian Ocean. Number of B1-B: 8 present in the US base of Thumarid in Oman. 4- The ambassador pointed that what worried us (most probably “us” refers to the Russians) was the increase in the number of planes in Jordan where the number of planes in Al Sallt base was as follows: 24 planes F-16 10 planes Tornado 11 planes Harrier He also mentioned that there were 10 A-10 tank destroyers in the Jordanian base of King Faysal. 5- The ambassador also pointed that a certain number of the 82nd Division (82nd Airborne) which was deployed in Afghanistan started coming to Kuwait. The number of troops has reached 750 soldiers. >>> Some or most of the information on the US order of battle must have come from Russian intelligence sources. The tally of US Naval units for example, or the count of B52-Hs in the Indian Ocean would most likely have been obtained by technical means like satellite surveillance or naval sensors. But the curious thing about the order of battle given to Saddam on March 2 is that the 4ID does (not - sic) appear in it at all. It was potentially the most dangerously placed American unit of all and the most powerful. Yet the Russian ambassador treats the 4ID as if didn't exist. A contemporaneous account from the New York Times describes what happened the day before the Russian Ambassador provided his order of battle to Saddam. <<< Turkish Parliament Refuses to Accept G.I.'s in Blow to Bush, By Dexter Filkins, New York Times -- ANKARA, Turkey, March 1 - The Turkish Parliament today dealt a major setback to the Bush administration's plans for a northern front against Iraq, narrowly rejecting a measure that would have allowed thousands of American combat troops to use the country as a base for an attack. ... The final tally was 264 to 251, with 19 abstentions ... Even before the vote, American officials signaled that they were confident that American forces would probably be allowed to stage through Turkey. When asked on Friday whether the Pentagon was past the point where it needed a definitive answer from the Turks, Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said, "No." Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld added, "We'll be all right." Pentagon officials have said that Gen. Tommy R. Franks, the commander of American forces in the Persian Gulf, has backup plans for moving American forces into northern Iraq. "General Franks, as we speak, is looking at lots of options," General Myers said on Friday. >>> Despite what Secretary Rumsfeld and Generals Myers and Franks were saying on March 1 about "lots of options", the Russian Ambassador was certain by March 2 that the 4ID was out of the battle. In the event the US landed the 173 Airborne Brigade in Kurdistan in late March. As to the 4ID itself as contemporaneous Fox News release tells the story: <<< Friday, March 14, 2003 -- WASHINGTON — Signaling impatience with the Turkish government, the Pentagon on Friday began moving warships out of the Mediterranean into the Red Sea, where they could launch long-range cruise missiles on a path to Iraq that would not go over Turkey, officials said. Of the approximately one dozen ships to be shifted, a first group of five transited the Suez Canal on Friday, harbor officials at Egypt's Port Said said. They identified the ships as the guided missile destroyer USS Arleigh Burke of the Theodore Roosevelt battle group and the destroyer USS Deyo of the Harry S. Truman battle group. >>> Update The other striking thing in Document CMPC-2003-001950 was why the Russians should be particularly worried about the smallest component of the deployment: <<< 4- The ambassador pointed that what worried us (most probably “us” refers to the Russians) was the increase in the number of planes in Jordan where the number of planes in Al Sallt base was as follows: 24 planes F-16 10 planes Tornado 11 planes Harrier He also mentioned that there were 10 A-10 tank destroyers in the Jordanian base of King Faysal. >>> Why were these relatively small forces so worrisome? My guess is their location near the Iraq-Syrian border and the composition of these air units were suggestive of support for an air assault attack on traffic to and from Syria. What was moving between Iraq and Syria that would be of concern to the Russians? Commentary The Pajamas documents provide a peek into the greatest diplomatic catastrophe associated with Operation Iraqi Freedom. The elimination of the 4ID from Turkey relieved Saddam at a stroke from the problem of facing a two front war. The US lost the use of its most powerful ground unit and faced the excruciating logistical problem of sailing it thousands of miles to attack along another axis. It deprived America of crucial manpower in the aftermath of the fall of Saddam. It eliminated the unit tasked with tackling the Sunni Triangle and forced other units to spread out and take up the slack. How did this debacle happen? What were its consequences? Readers are invited to comment. fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com blogs.pajamasmedia.com sweetliberty.org cnn.com foxnews.com

To: Sully- who wrote (18942)	3/27/2006 12:13:58 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

The Media As Semaphore By Captain Ed on International Politics Captain's Quarters Today's Washington Post coverage of the Russian perfidy in 2003 contains an interesting revelation from the Russians themselves which makes clear the administration's fury over their espionage on behalf of Saddam Hussein during the invasion. The release of the Pentagon study came before the US informed the Russians that they had discovered the smoking guns in the captured Iraqi intelligence: <<< Russian officials collected intelligence on U.S. troop movements and attack plans from inside the American military command leading the 2003 invasion of Iraq and passed that information to Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, according to a U.S. military study released yesterday. The intelligence reports, which the study said were provided to Hussein through the Russian ambassador in Baghdad at the height of the U.S. assault, warned accurately that American formations intended to bypass Iraqi cities on their thrust toward Baghdad. The reports provided some specific numbers on U.S. troops, units and locations, according to Iraqi documents dated March and April 2003 and later captured by the United States. "The information that the Russians have collected from their sources inside the American Central Command in Doha is that the United States is convinced that occupying Iraqi cities are impossible, and that they have changed their tactic," said one captured Iraqi document titled "Letter from Russian Official to Presidential Secretary Concerning American Intentions in Iraq" and dated March 25, 2003. A Russian official at the United Nations strongly rejected the allegations that Russian officials gave information to Baghdad. "This is absolutely nonsense," said Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the Russian mission to the United Nations. She said the allegations were never presented to the Russian government before being issued to the news media. [emphasis mine -- CE] >>> Under normal circumstances with a country viewed as a diplomatic partner, if not an ally, both nations would engage in discussions about this kind of information before making it public, probably through high-ranking diplomats. The aggrieved nation would at least demand an explanation prior to showing its hand. The failure to do so by the US shows that this development has George Bush mad enough to expose Vladimir Putin and his government to the kind of political damage that could restart the Cold War. That may be because Bush understands that, just as with 9/11 and its precursor attacks, that war has already been declared by our enemy. Make no mistake about it, this goes far beyond just a little friendly coaching and the protection of Russian assets. Ann Tyson and Josh White point out one specific battle where the Russians supplied excellent intelligence not only about our positions but the strategy we used to isolate Baghdad. The Russians accurately predicted that we would make a dangerous move across the Karbala Gap, where the US expected an attack in force by the supposedly premiere Republican Guard forces. An Iraqi commander took the information to Saddam and his sons, where his counsel was ignored. Had they reacted properly to the Russian data, we could have lost a lot of men in the Karbala Gap. The Post quotes Michael O'Hanlon from the center-left Brookings Institute: <<< Michael E. O'Hanlon, a defense expert at the Brookings Institution, said the passing of information on U.S. troop movements during combat, if true, constituted "a stark betrayal." He added: "I think we should be demanding a fairly clear explanation from Moscow." >>> It's telling that we didn't do so before we made this public. The message we sent the Russians says that we will not trust them in the next international crisis -- the one in Iran. The remote nuclear-fuel processing deal is dead regardless of the Moscow-Teheran talks, and the US will probably push them out of the negotiations altogether from this point forward. captainsquartersblog.com washingtonpost.com captainsquartersblog.com

To: Sully- who wrote (18942)	3/27/2006 12:20:55 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Now Putin's Really Done It! By Captain Ed on International Politics Captain's Quarters It's bad enough that Russia gave crucial war plans to our enemy before and during open hostilities, but now we find out that Vladimir Putin has committed an even graver sin: <<< Vladimir Putin -- KGB spy, politician, Russian Federation president, 2006 host of the Group of Eight international summit -- can add a new line to his resume: plagiarist. Large chunks of Mr. Putin's mid-1990s economics dissertation on planning in the natural resources sector were lifted straight out of a management text published by two University of Pittsburgh academics nearly 20 years earlier, Washington researchers insisted yesterday. Six diagrams and tables from the 218-page dissertation mimic in form and content similar charts in the Russian translation of the Americans' work as well, according to Brookings Institution senior fellow Clifford G. Gaddy. "It all boils down to plagiarism," he said. "Whether you're talking about a college-level term paper, not to mention a formal dissertation, there's no question in my mind that this would be plagiarism." >>> I think it's safe to de-list Putin from our blogrolls now ... captainsquartersblog.com insider.washingtontimes.com

To: Sully- who wrote (18942)	3/27/2006 3:44:01 AM
From: Sully-	Respond to of 35834

Gateway Pundit Scoops the Press Posted by John Power Line The Pentagon has reported, based on documents captured in Iraq, that Russia's military leaked American war plans, which they had acquired through espionage, to Saddam's government shortly before the start of the war in 2003. Russia denies it. Blog of the Week Gateway Pundit has the most complete roundup on the issue I've seen, including translated excerpts of reports from the Russian press, and photographs from Russian sources that, to my knowledge, have not appeared in the mainstream western press. Like this one, taken just days before the beginning of the war, of Russian Generals Vladimir Achalov and Igor Maltsev, both of whom served with Soviet rapid-reaction and air defense forces, at an awards ceremony with Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashim Ahmed: powerlineblog.com Based on the Pundit's roundup, it's hard to come to any conclusion other than guilty, guilty, guilty! Gateway Pundit's reign as Blog of the Week will end later today, but we hope you'll keep going back to visit one of the most prolific bloggers on the web. powerlineblog.com gatewaypundit.blogspot.com