Strike On Al Qaeda In Somalia?
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A U.S. Air Force gunship has conducted a strike against suspected members of al Qaeda in Somalia, CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports exclusively.
The targets included the senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa and an al Qaeda operative wanted for his involvement in the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in Africa, Martin reports. Those terror attacks killed more than 200 people.
The AC-130 gunship is capable of firing thousands of rounds per second, and sources say a lot of bodies were seen on the ground after the strike, but there is as yet, no confirmation of the identities.
The gunship flew from its base in Dijibouti down to the southern tip of Somalia, Martin reports, where the al Qaeda operatives had fled after being chased out of the capital of Mogadishu by Ethiopian troops backed by the United States.
Once they started moving, the al Qaeda operatives became easier to track, and the U.S. military started preparing for an air strike, using unmanned aerial drones to keep them under surveillance and moving the aircraft carrier Eisenhower out of the Persian Gulf toward Somalia. But when the order was given, the mission was assigned to the AC-130 gunship operated by the U.S. Special Operations command.
If the attack got the operatives it was aimed at, reports Martin, it would deal a major blow to al Qaeda in East Africa.
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Wag the dog!
Wag the dog!
Anyone our military kills is a terrorist by definition.
I guess if we’re not allowed to win in Iraq, we can help the Ethiopians win in Somalia.
Every time a terrorist dies, a Democrat loses his mind. For evidence, see the comments above.
al Qaeda is whoever the US wants them to be- its a pretext for bombing any nation it pleases. Somalia is just the next victim but the trend will continue. And of course, when we discover only civilians were murdered in the operation then the government will blame it on intelligence failure. as a Somali american, this whole operation has revealed to me first hand the deceptiveness and ugliness of US foreign policy. I guess you dont grasp it until it strikes at home.
“… If the attack got the operatives it was aimed at, reports Martin, it would deal a major blow to al Qaeda in East Africa…”
And if it didn’t? Another recruiting coup for Al-Qaeda.
Hmmm… Why do I NOT believe the report as written? Because if it were REALLY a victory against Al-Qaeda, the video would already be up on YouTube.
This has every sign and the loser-smell of another Pentagon fuck-up.
I guess if we’re not allowed to win in Iraq
Mommy won’t let you enlist?
toaster: You butthead. I was in and out of the Army, including a brief tour in Vietnam (longer than Kerry was there), before you were even born, asswipe.
BTW, where were all you jerks the last few weeks when Ethiopia was cleaning their clocks? No mention of it not being al Qaeda, then, eh?
Blame America First
fd: The Army wants you back. We haven’t killed enough “terrorists” in Iraq yet.
No comment, OW?
Based on your past comments about why you oppose the Iraq invasion, this ought to meet with your approval.
Here’s the story with background.
America has troops in Sub – Saharan Africa along with Foreign Legionnaires — is that international enough for you early 20th Century thinkers?
What Quaker said. OW was saying earlier (maybe he now regrets that remark – which was a ‘get Bush’ heat of the cyber-moment thing) that we ought to invade Pakistan to get Al Qaeda/UBL. This would seem to fit that mold perfectly – to say nothing of perhaps helping a little with the ‘civil war’ in Somalia.
The response of the left here is strongly negative. Thats why I say if a Democrat is elected in 2008, there will be great strife within the left – between the moderates and the yahoos. 1968 redux. Dugger said it first. The recent Sheehan heckling incident is merely a precursor. The extremists think they have compeltely engineered the Congressional take over and deserve to get their way.
“The response of the left here is strongly negative.”
I think that’s cause the right has screwed up so often that at this point it is safe to assume that if the right does it, it was a mistake.
What’s most telling is the assumption that these were bad guys killed. That the military had the right intel, that they were able to find their target, and that there was no collateral damage.
If this was done under Clinton, Bush Sr., or Reagan, that might be a fair assumption to work under. Under Bush Jr.? Nope.
FD and Dugger, your child-like, naïve faith in Pentagon reports is nothing short of awesome to a secular progressive such as myself.
It’s like watching the crippled at Lourdes, dipping their hand into the “holy” fountain yet one more time, really.
You would think after Jessica Lynch, Pat Tillman, Capt Jamil Hussein and other plain examples of the Pentagon’s active disinformation campaign against all Americans who do not believe in this war that you would at least agree you need to use a few grains of salt in reading Pentagon dispatches nowadays, but noooo…..
If CentCom says it, it must be true. Riiiiight – wing! LOL
Wellstone: Don’t make me laugh. You’re the one with the tin foil hat.
You probably believe the moon landing was shot at Universal Studios.
Did you follow that link I posted, or are you waiting for Kos to verify?
I guess this is more Pentagon misinformation.
More fakery?
Blah, blah, blah.
If the report is ideed accurate, and AQ operatives were killed, then I say good on’em. Maybe we are finally waking up to the fact that terrorism and terrorists have no borders and can move about. Iraq is not a kennel.
“You probably believe the moon landing was shot at Universal Studios.”
Nope, it was actually filmed in England under the direction if Stanley Kubrick. Can you believe it?
(And before you flame me, look up Opération lune.)
“If the report is ideed accurate, and AQ operatives were killed, then I say good on’em. ”
I agree. I’m not sure it is accurate, I’m not even hopeful that it is accurate. But this would be a good step in the right direction, as long as it is combined with diplomacy.
D*mn! Its hard to know who to treat seriously. I thought Frank was fishing aimlessly, but up pops Strowbridge with a lunar conspiracy and Wellstone with some garbage about a unique, but massive Pentagon disinformation campaign directed at all who do not believe in the Iraq war. And surprisingly very few people know about this massive campaign. Wellstone is so fortunate.
Reminds me of the time I was fishing for croaker and caught a big ol’ black drum. You just never whats down there on the bottom.
If these guys are really Al Qaeda, I’m all for this. If we had done more of this and less of the invasion and occupation we’d be way ahead of the game.
The problem is George Bush is such a bad president, these sorts of actions are always under question.
“The problem is George Bush is such a bad president, these sorts of actions are always under question.”
That’s exactly what I said above… Well, different words but the same meaning.
“up pops Strowbridge with a lunar conspiracy”
Whoosh! Right over his head! Nice work, C.S.!
Strowbridge: Don’t you mean Operation Loon?
The problem is George Bush is such a bad president, these sorts of actions are always under question
Actually, the problem is that your feelings toward the President are so thoroughly poisoned that you doubt even the news sources you found reliable in the past (CNN, CBS) when something makes him look even less than evil.
That’s not his fault, that’s your fault.
CBS is reporting what administration officials say. It isn’t CBS I have the issue with, but the often lying administration officials. Based on the polling of the administration’s trustworthiness, I ain’t alone.
The man is responsible for half a million Iraqi deaths, Frank. The man is keeping us in Iraq out of vanity. Poisonous feelings are the only possible response from moral people.
I’ll give them (the Pentagon) this: at least they didn’t say they got the #3 man in al Qaeda –again.
Of course, toasters, it would be quite possible to get the third man in Al Qaeda several times. Ask an adult. Several times this year there were different # 3 men in NFL rushing yards for instance. is that a W or Pentagon conspiracy, too? Think.
Dr AGH: So I guess I can’t possibly be a moral person, is that it?
Elitist much?
“Strowbridge: Don’t you mean Operation Loon?”
No, Lune, and is the French word for Moon. It’s a documentary, of sorts. You can actually watch it for free on the Internet, but I still want to buy it on DVD.
“Of course, toasters, it would be quite possible to get the third man in Al Qaeda several times. Ask an adult. Several times this year there were different # 3 men in NFL rushing yards for instance. is that a W or Pentagon conspiracy, too? Think.”
Yeah, but they keep getting the number three man. Don’t you think it’s strange that wheneven they take out a high ranking Al Qaeda member it is almost always the #3 man? It’s almost like the Pentagon is lying about the importance of the target in order to get some publicity / score points with the public.
Damn, Strowbridge, I took French in high school, and at the Army Language School. I even looked up the movie.
You really don’t have a sense of humor, do you?
“So I guess I can’t possibly be a moral person, is that it?”
Maybe, if you put some effort into it.
From Dugger:
…and Wellstone with some garbage about a unique, but massive Pentagon disinformation campaign directed at all who do not believe in the Iraq war. And surprisingly very few people know about this massive campaign. Wellstone is so fortunate…
Dugger, you have just confirmed how naïve and uninformed you little right-wing tools are:
Let me educate you. In the last budget, the Pentagon was allocated over 300 MILLION dollars to run its own propaganda shop.
Something about the media was not publicizing the GOOD things that were happening in Iraq, and losing Iraqi hearts and minds. Sound familiar? Looks like they left you out of the loop, huh?
Maybe you should read some MSM for a change. Rush and Sean woulsd NEVER tell you these things:
Pentagon Weighs Use of Deception in a Broad Arena
By THOM SHANKER and ERIC SCHMITT
Published: December 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/13/politics/13info.html?ex=1260594000&en=d83314fc17eb65d5&ei=5090
“…Within the Pentagon, some of the military’s most powerful figures have expressed concerns at some of the steps taken that risk blurring the traditional lines between public affairs and the world of combat information operations.
These tensions were cast into stark relief this summer in Iraq when Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top commander in Iraq, approved the combining of the command’s day-to-day public affairs operations with combat psychological and information operations into a single “strategic communications office.”
In a rare expression of senior-level questions about such decisions, Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, issued a memorandum warning the military’s regional combat commanders about the risks of mingling the military public affairs too closely with information operations.
“While organizations may be inclined to create physically integrated P.A./I.O. offices, such organizational constructs have the potential to compromise the commander’s credibility with the media and the public,” it said.
But General Myers’s memorandum is not being followed, according to officers in Iraq, largely because commanders there believe they are safely separating the two operations and say they need all the flexibility possible to combat the insurgency.
Indeed, senior military officials in Washington say public affairs officers in war zones might, by choice or under pressure, issue statements to world news media that, while having elements of truth, are clearly devised primarily to provoke a response from the enemy….”
Rumsfeld’s Roadmap to Propaganda
Secret Pentagon “roadmap” calls for “boundaries”
between “information operations” abroad and at home
but provides no actual limits as long as US doesn’t “target” Americans
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB177/index.htm
National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 177
For more information contact:
Kristin Adair / Thomas Blanton
202 994 7000
Washington, D.C., January 26, 2006 – A secret Pentagon “roadmap” on war propaganda, personally approved by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in October 2003, calls for “boundaries” between information operations abroad and the news media at home, but provides for no such limits and claims that as long as the American public is not “targeted,” any leakage of PSYOP to the American public does not matter.
Obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by the National Security Archive at George Washington University and posted on the Web today, the 74-page “Information Operations Roadmap” admits that “information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa,” but argues that “the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG [U.S. government] intent rather than information dissemination practices.”
The Smith-Mundt Act of 1948, amended in 1972 and 1998, prohibits the U.S. government from propagandizing the American public with information and psychological operations directed at foreign audiences; and several presidential directives, including Reagan’s NSD-77 in 1983, Clinton’s PDD-68 in 1999, and Bush’s NSPD-16 in July 2002 (the latter two still classified), have set up specific structures to carry out public diplomacy and information operations. These and other documents relating to U.S. PSYOP programs were posted today as part of a new Archive Electronic Breifing Book.
Several press accounts have referred to the 2003 Pentagon document but today’s posting is the first time the text has been publicly available. Sections of the document relating to computer network attack (CNA) and “offensive cyber operations” remain classified under black highlighting…..
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/09/AR2006040900890.html
Military Plays Up Role of Zarqawi
Jordanian Painted As Foreign Threat To Iraq’s Stability
By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 10, 2006; Page A01
“…The military’s propaganda program largely has been aimed at Iraqis, but seems to have spilled over into the U.S. media. One briefing slide about U.S. “strategic communications” in Iraq, prepared for Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, describes the “home audience” as one of six major targets of the American side of the war.
That slide, created by Casey’s subordinates, does not specifically state that U.S. citizens were being targeted by the effort, but other sections of the briefings indicate that there were direct military efforts to use the U.S. media to affect views of the war.
One slide in the same briefing, for example, noted that a “selective leak” about Zarqawi was made to Dexter Filkins, a New York Times reporter based in Baghdad. Filkins’s resulting article, about a letter supposedly written by Zarqawi and boasting of suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the Times front page on Feb. 9, 2004.
Leaks to reporters from U.S. officials in Iraq are common, but official evidence of a propaganda operation using an American reporter is rare…”
So please, wingnuts and others, follow Uncle Wellstone’s rule of salt:
ALWAYS ALWAYS carry some to POUR on anything released from CENTCOM, OK?
You may be looking at some of the Lincoln Group’s best propaganda effort.
Gee, thanks, Wellstone, for informing us that politicians are ofttimes deceptive.
What an epiphany!
Of course, liberal politicians have never been known to deceive anyone, eh?
Of course, toasters, it would be quite possible to get the third man in Al Qaeda several times.
And Spinal Tap’s drummer died like 20 times. But everybody agrees that was a joke.
“Damn, Strowbridge, I took French in high school, and at the Army Language School. I even looked up the movie.
You really don’t have a sense of humor, do you?”
If you looked up the movie, you wouldn’t have called them loons. The joke just doesn’t make sense based on the facts.
“based on the facts”?
Holy Crap!
I was making a joke, not a data entry.
Are you human, or is this some kind of blog robot I’m addressing?
“Gee, thanks, Wellstone, for informing us that politicians are ofttimes deceptive.”
Argumentum ad Hominem Tu Quoque.
It is also a Fallacy of False Equity.
“based on the facts”?
Holy Crap!
I was making a joke, not a data entry.
Are you human, or is this some kind of blog robot I’m addressing?”
Well, technically without context what you wrote was a pun. Word play.
To be a joke you need context, and in this case the context precludes humor, at least in your attempt.
In other words, it’s not that I don’t have a sense of humor. It’s that you are not funny.
To be a joke you need context
Now you’re an expert on humor?
On the other hand, you do have all the context you need to be a joke — have you been reading your posts lately?
Give it up, Strowbridge, you’re making yourself look more foolish than usual.
Wellstone, That was nothing. Rummy talked about a line between Psyops and regular info channels. And that he was not greatly worried if there was leakage. And the Myers dictum was about physically combining the two offices (in the combat zone). If you knew anything about psyops, you would know that DOD psyops would not be a compatible vehcile for stateside propaganda.
And now you mention only Centcom instead of a Pentagon conspiracy. Which is it? Whoi’s your bogeyman? The entire miltary or just the Pentagon?
You and I both know that there is no massive “disinformation” program. Every EVERY government agency will try to portray its operations in a positive light. That didn’t start with nor will it end with W. Funny, this massive powerful conpiracy couldn’t do a d*mn thing about Abu G.
Argumentum ad Hominem Tu Quoque.
It is also a Fallacy of False Equity.
Wrong again, Strowbridge!
His argument (I use the term very loosely) was old and worn out; i.e., nothing new.
I sarcastically reminded him of that.
Or are you an expert at sarcasm, too?
Let me anticipate:
sar·casm (sär’kăz’əm) pronunciation
n.
1. A cutting, often ironic remark intended to wound.
2. A form of wit that is marked by the use of sarcastic language and is intended to make its victim the butt of contempt or ridicule. [my intent - fd]
3. The use of sarcasm. See synonyms at wit1.
[Late Latin sarcasmus, from Greek sarkasmos, from sarkazein, to bite the lips in rage, from sarx, sark-, flesh.]
“His argument (I use the term very loosely) was old and worn out; i.e., nothing new.
I sarcastically reminded him of that.”
Sarcasm doesn’t magically make the fallacy go away. You were trying to make a point, a point that was based on a fallacy. You have said nothing to correct that problem.
Dugger, I just showed you that Rumsfeld and the Pentagon and CentCom are being funded to the tune of hundreds of millions to launch propaganda and disinformation strikes at targets foreign, and as we know now, domestic.
I have also shown you that even though in the past there was a line drawn at using psyops on the American people, under Rumsfeld and the Pentagon that line has been blurred and in many cases crossed with regularity and impunity.
For every Jessica Lynch hoax and Pat Tillman and Fallujah and Haditha and Abu-Ghraib outright lie they are caught in, how many more are there?
As I wrote above, as a dutiful member of wingnuttia, you are obliged, child-like, to defend your leadership wherever it may take you.
As an American, I am obliged to call the liars liars, and to grant credibility only after confirmation from trusted sources.
Experience and precedent over the last five years should tell anyone who wants facts to base opinions on that ANYTHING coming from the Pentagon, Iraq CentCom, the DoD, or the White House needs to first pass the propaganda smell-test.
And boy, does it stink around here.
“A point that was based on a fallacy.”
Which fallacy was that?
(Damn, you’re an annoying creature!)
Me: “A point that was based on a fallacy.”
Moron: “Which fallacy was that?
(Damn, you’re an annoying creature!)”
I wrote them down.
Argumentum ad Hominem Tu Quoque.
It is also a Fallacy of False Equity.
Wellstone, Sorry you know not what of you speak. I spent alittle time in AF psyops and there ain’t no way. their mission is geared speficially to other countries and the media prevalent in those countries.
their mission is geared speficially to other countries and the media prevalent in those countries.
….as far as you know.
DUGGER:
“Wellstone, Sorry you know not of what you speak…”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1988300,00.html
Somalia air strike failed to kill al-Qaida targets, says US
The US air strike on Somalia failed to kill any of the three top al-Qaida members accused of terror attacks in east Africa.
A senior US official said today that Sunday night’s attack had killed between eight and 10 “al-Qaida affiliates” near the southern tip of Somalia.
But he said that Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, Abu Taha al-Sudan and Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, all linked to the 1998 US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania and the 2002 Mombasa hotel attack, were still on the run. “Fazul is not dead,” said the official, contradicting earlier reports. “The three high-value targets are still of interest to us…”
This is by our own officials! According to the Somalis, and the Arab press we killed a lot of civilians, too.
Chalk another propaganda “victory” up for our side.