This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Terror War

  • Israel Doing What It Does Best

    Kicking ass and taking names:

    DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Dubai police appealed for an international manhunt Tuesday after releasing names and photos of an alleged 11-member European hit squad accused of stalking and killing a Hamas commander last month in a plot that mixed cold precision with spy caper disguises such as fake beards and wigs.

    Israel is neither “confirming nor denying”  that they had a role in this. Well, I can neither confirm nor deny the sky is blue.

    I don’t think Dubai is serious about apprehending this “hit squad”. The fact is that Arab governments have about as little tolerance for the Palestinians as the Israelis do. If you look at the history of the Palestinians terrorist groups in places like Jordan, Syria, Egypt, and Lebanon you will find that the Palestinians haven’t been exactly welcomed with open arms by their “brother” Arabs. The noises about a trying to catch these guys (who are probably relaxing on a beach in Haifa right now) is just a way to appease the Arab street and radical elements in their own country.

    A job well done Israel.

  • Taliban chief captured in Pakistan

    The news is all abuzz this morning about the capture of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar several days ago by Pakistani intelligence services. According to Associated Press, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar is the number 2 leader of Taliban behind Mullah Omar.

    Typically, the Taliban denies that Baradar has been captured;

    “We totally deny this rumor. He has not been arrested,” Zabiullah Mujahid told the AP by telephone. He said the report of the arrest was Western propaganda aimed at undercutting the Taliban fighting against an offensive in the southern Afghan town of Marjah, a Taliban haven.

    “The Taliban are having success with our jihad. It is to try to demoralize the Taliban who are on jihad in Marjah and all of Afghanistan,” he said.

    Of course, the Left, in the personage of Spencer Ackerman, suggests that the best way to get intelligence from Baradar is to take him out to Applebee’s for a nice meal;

    Torturing Baradar — which the Pakistanis have been known to do — is counterproductive to that effort. If we treat the guy respectfully, in a demonstrated way, it might spur a reconsideration of Taliban goals. I am not counting any chickens, but any hope of a game-changing possibility will be foreclosed upon if we or our allies torture Baradar.

    Since Pakistanis have more experience in extracting useful intelligence than Spencer Ackerman, I’ll try real hard to not tell them how to do it. Better yet, why don’t we send Ackerman to Pakistan to supervise the sessions with Baradar.

    I wonder if Ackerman is aware that as a leader of Taliban, Baradar encourages throwing acid on little girls for the crime of attending school. This is not a guy who will respond as we’d like just because we take him to Dairy Queen for a Blizzard milk shake.

  • More Joe Biden prognostication

    I guess Joe Biden has been quiet too long. Fox News reports that yesterday, he took the opportunity to flex his brain on the chance there will be no 9/11-type attack on the US;

    Top intelligence officials told congressional lawmakers early this month that the terror network can be expected to try another attack in the next three to six months. But Biden, interviewed on CNN, downplayed the risk.

    “Look, let me put it this way. The idea of there being a massive attack in the United States like 9/11 is unlikely, in my view,” the vice president said.

    It was the latest in a line of sweeping forecasts Biden has made in recent years.

    I guess it’s time to stock up on bullets and fill sandbags.

  • Speaking of Joe “Smarter than you” Biden

    The LA Times catches Joe Biden on the Larry King Show last night (Lord knows none of us would have caught it during our regular programming hours);

    I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You’re going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer. You’re going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government.

    I spent — I’ve been there 17 times now. I go about every two months — three months. I know every one of the major players in all the segments of that society. It’s impressed me. I’ve been impressed how they have been deciding to use the political process rather than guns to settle their differences.

    Hmm, lemme see what Biden’s record has been on Iraq. First he voted for the use of force against Hussein, then he told us the only way to pacify Iraq was to partition it by religious beliefs, then he told us that war was lost and we should just pull out. Sure, Biden visits Iraq frequently, but you have to wonder if he’d be doing that if we’d adopted any of his hare-brained schemes for Iraq.

    And, oh, by the way, this administration’s “great achievement” in Iraq was brought about by the same policy the President and Vice President BOTH opposed in 2006 and 2007 – the “surge”. So how do they summon the chutpah to claim it as their achievement?

    Perhaps they’d like to claim credit for the pacification of Germany and Japan, too, since we’re drawing down the forces in those two countries, too.

  • Taliban chief confirmed dead

    The Pakistan government has confirmed that Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud has indeed been killed despite Taliban claims to the contrary;

    Reports of Mehsud’s death emerged after a spate of U.S. missiles hit his stronghold in Pakistan’s northwest tribal belt in mid-January. Mehsud was said to have died of wounds suffered in one of the strikes.

    The Taliban have denied his death, but have backed off an initial promise to prove the 20-something still lives.

    Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik and a senior intelligence official told AP that Mehsud was dead, but neither gave details as to when or how he died. The intelligence official spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak on the record.

    Of course this doesn’t do much to stem the attacks in Pakistan, but it cuts legacy costs for the Taliban.

    A bomb attack on a tribal police patrol in northwest Pakistan has killed at least 15 people, most of them security personnel.

    According to Pakistani officials, the attack targeted the police convey in the Khyber district near the Afghan border late on Wednesday.

    Sources say three tribal chiefs are among the dead. Twelve others were also wounded in the blast that hit a police vehicle traveling through the area.

    Of course, Joe Biden’s robot zombie ninja operations will have a limited effect on short term outcome of operations in Afghanistan, but it’s always nice when the good guys get one of the bad guys.

  • Taliban plan to use ROE against US in A’stan

    McClatchy and Stars & Stripes reports that civilians caught in the noose the US Army has looped around Marjah in Afghanistan aren’t leaving the area;

    “Commanders in the area are reporting no significant increase in persons moving out of Nad-e Ali district in the last month,” the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force said in a statement. “Despite reports of large numbers of civilians fleeing the area, the facts on the ground do not support these assertions.”

    Thousands of U.S., British and Afghan soldiers are poised to push into the area, with preliminary operations reported to have begun late Tuesday. Afghan police will accompany the soldiers in an effort to establish law and order quickly.

    The presence of a large number of civilians could make the operation much trickier and provide a test of the new coalition military doctrine of protecting the population. A large media contingent from around the world will accompany the troops, recording their progress.

    Well, that’s because the cowardly Taliban plan to hide behind skirts and let the media break up the US attack for them. They should let the Afghan Army lead the attack with a column of photographers right behind them. Let the Afghans live with our new ROE. Or die with the new ROE.

  • Obama: Hey, I’m Bush

    miss-me-yet-bush

    William McGurn in the pages of the Wall Street Journal writes this morning that President Obama is finally admitting that President Bush was right about a lot of stuff related to the war against terrorists. But like Arthur Fonzerelli he can’t quite get the words out that Obama has been wrong;

    “I think that the most important thing for the public to understand,” he told Ms. Couric, “is we’re not handling any of these cases any different than the Bush administration handled them all through 9/11.” Mr. Obama went on to add that “190 folks”—folks presumably just like the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks—had been tried and convicted in civilian court during Mr. Bush’s tenure.

    Leave aside, for just a moment, the substance. Far more arresting is that Mr. Obama now defends himself by invoking a man he has spent the past year blaming for al Qaeda’s growth. You know—all those Niebuhrian speeches about how America had gone “off course,” “shown arrogance and been dismissive,” and “made decisions based on fear rather than foresight,” thus handing al Qaeda a valuable recruiting tool.

    Funny how that works, huh? All of that talk about “critical thinking” and dissent being patriotic doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in Hell when it’s all put into practice. “Critical thinking” means putting your thumb in your ass and looking pleased with yourself.

    By the way, that DeMotivator at the top of this post is mysteriously sitting on a billboard in Minnesota.

  • The Real Deal

    The milblog community just exposed and destroyed another phony. Jonn, TSO, and everybody else involved should be proud and definitely deserve more credit (which was pretty much none) than they got in the local Houston media.

    I think its appropriate that after spending a lot of time talking about a phony hero that some time is spent talking about a real hero who legitimately earned a stack of medals and ribbons and someone who is disrespected and dishonored by fake pieces of crap like Michael Patrick McManus.

    When I was a boot PFC just out of security forces school, I had to spend eight months at Marine Barracks Washington (aka 8th and I) in order to obtain a security and weapons clearance so I could serve as part of the Marine detachment at Camp David. I was part of the guard force at the barracks and it was easily my most miserable time in the Marine Corps. The duty consisted of standing post for 12 hours on your feet with 12 hours off for sometimes weeks at a time because of a poorly-crafted security plan for the barracks. What made things particularly bad was that most (but not all) of the officers and SNCOs who served at the barracks while I was there were there for one thing only: to advance their careers. 8th and I is the home of the commandant and several other general officers and if you look at the bios of many Marine Corps general officers you will find that they spent time 8th and I. For this reason, the place attracts alot of ladder-climbers who put their own personal careers over the well-being of their Marines. Many combat decorated NCOs and Staff NCOs got thrown under the bus at 8th and I by these careerists. For these reasons, there wasn’t a lot of trust in and respect for the officers and senior enlisted leadership at Marine Barracks Washington while I was there. I was very happy to get out of that place and move on to Camp David.

    However there were a few exceptions and the most universally respected officer was Capt. Joshua Glover. When I was at 8th and I, Capt. Glover was the platoon commander of the Silent Drill Platoon. Capt Glover took care of not only his Marines in the SDP, but also Marines in other sections of the barracks. The guard force was always happy when Capt Glover was Officer of the Day. He would make a point of touring every post and spending time at each one to talk to the Marine sentries, sometimes for up to an hour. For a young PFC standing a 12 hour post by himself, this meant the world and made that miserable and lonely duty go by a lot quicker.

    Captain Glover was also a highly decorated infantry officer. He served three tours in Iraq with 1st battalion, 5th Marines, including the invasion, the first battle of Fallujah, and a tour in Ramadi. For actions during the first battle of Fallujah, Capt Glover earned the Silver Star. You can read about it here or pick up a copy of Bing West’s  No True Glory, in which Capt Glover’s actions are discussed in great detail. Capt Glover also received two purple hearts, a Navy Commendation with a V, and a Navy Achievement Medal with a V. It should also be pointed out that is likely that Capt Glover didn’t have to go back for a third tour to Iraq. In the Marine Corps, in most circumstances, after two deployments you rotate from a fleet unit to a non-deployable unit like 8th and I, the drill field, or some instructor billet (sometimes you don’t have a choice in the matter). This is done for a very good reason and helps insure that Marines get a break from the stresses of the fleet and that Marines just back from combat can train the next generation. However, Capt Glover knew that 1/5 was going back into the meat-grinder and wanted to be there with them.

    Capt. Glover receiving his Silver Star from General Hagee

    Captain Glover rotated back to a deployable unit around the same time I left Camp David for 2/1. I didn’t hear anything about him after that. Today, when I logged on to Facebook I saw a post by a Marine I served with (Dave who was with 3/8 in Afghanistan) mentioning that Capt Glover had been wounded back in November in Afghanistan and tonight he would be ringside at the UFC fight thanks to UFC fighter Brian Stann (I couldn’t embed the video but Stann talks about Glover in the fourth video from the left here). Capt Glover was wounded while participating in a rescue operation for two paratroopers from the 82nd (who unfortunately drowned in a river). There is a possibility he may lose one leg. More details about what happened can be found here at Glock Talk. This was Capt. Glover’s either third or fourth time being wounded and his fourth combat deployment.

    Captain Glover is the real deal. I hope McManus serves a long time in a deep dark hole for disrespecting men like Capt Glover.

    (Thanks to Dave and other Marines from the Yankee White community for the heads-up on what happened to Capt. Glover)

    UPDATE 02/06/2010: I received more information from a friend an fellow Marine who was in my platoon at Camp David (Steve, another Marine who is the real deal) about Captain Glover. I was wrong about some of the details about his injuries and circumstances behind his injuries. I have updated the post accordingly. Steve says Captain Glover is at Walter Reed is doing pretty well. If I get more information, I will update this post. Again, I would not have known about any of this without Marines from the Yankee White community.