Radical Muslims have declared on more than one occasion recently that they intend to try to disrupt their enemy economically if possible. From CNN, :
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraq's oil industry appears to be the latest target of insurgents, with an oil company security chief shot to death Wednesday and a second straight day of attacks on a key oil pipeline. ...Revenues from Iraq's oil industry are in jeopardy in the wake of the latest attacks.
In Kirkuk on Wednesday, gunmen opened fire on a car carrying Ghazi al-Talabani, the security chief for Iraq's Northern Oil Company, killing him and wounding his driver, according to a police source in the northern Iraqi city.
Al-Talabani was a cousin of Jalal Talabani, the leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and a member of the disbanded Iraqi Governing Council.
Over the weekend, three prominent residents of Kirkuk were killed in targeted attacks, including a well-known Kurdish cleric, a district mayor who also served as a police officer, and the father of Kirkuk's police chief.
Insurgents have been focusing their attacks on participants in the new Iraqi government in advance of the June 30 handover.
Islam wants Iraq, a secular state under Saddam, to become an immediate part of the campaign to re-establish the caliphate. For that end, only officials approved by Shia Iran will be allowed to remain in their posts. (Remember that mullahs in Iran "approved the candidates that ran in their recent "elections.)
Iran has sent in insurgents and Al Sadr is an example of a group that is loyal to Iran. Although Al Sistani is Shia, he doesn't appear to be following Iran's lead. Sistani has pushed for immediate direct elections, which could be a ruse to placate the Americans before the handover at the end of June 2004. Iran has only to wait as it has many agents in the country.
Iraqis that agree to man the "take-over government" are brave indeed. It appears that few,if any, will still be alive on that date.
So much for democratization of the Middle East. Islam will not tolerate divergent and opposing ideas.
This should be an object lesson for us all!
***I suppose it's just another example of Iranian backing of terrorists. If they can force us out before the timetable, as they'd hoped to do with the Israeli's and their withdrawal...not only do we lose face, but they gain it, and credibility in the Arab world...
In Iraq, officials of the incoming Interim National Government continue to be assassinated and there’s been this upsurge in attacks on its oil-installations. In Saudi Arabia, the oil-facilities are even more strenuously guarded (making such sabotage more rare), but the abduction of foreigners, for terror, torture, murder and mutilation, carries on - particularly of Westerners working in the Saudi oil industries.
This isn't being perpetrated solely in order for the Jihadis to indulge their bloodlust; the Islamo-fascists behind this death and destruction are fully aware of the West’s vulnerability to one weapon, which they believe they can lay their bloody hands on: proven back in 1974, the “Oil Weapon”. Their bombing of pipelines in Iraq cuts shipments from that source immediately, while terrorism in Saudi Arabia discourages investment in the Kingdom’s future production.
Of course all steps ought to be made to release Western economies from their deadly reliance on oil, specially from the Persian Gulf (not discounting from other regions). It can’t take place overnight, so for the next decade, or two, at least, ways will be needed to control this vital commodity.
In rawest, Machtspolitikal terms, to attain a maximal energy-security, a Western “protectorate” over the oil-fields, refineries, depots and ports of the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia’s Hasa Province, Kuwait, southern Iraq and Iran’s Khuzistan Province, would be ideal - to be reliquished either when alternatives to oil are on stream and functioning, or else the oil under there runs out.
Naturally, this would be vituperously disparaged as the worst of naked neo-imperialism, but if it delivers peace and prosperity to the majority of the people on the planet, for many years, as it’s most likely to do, by totally sidelining the regional potentates (“Pharoahs”) - and all of the grave problems they cause, ubiquitously, every day - from the scene, then so what and who cares?
The people of the rump Arab states and Iran will be queueing to get into the zone of the West’s “Protectorate”, looking for jobs, fun and freedom. For those countries, it could be the ticket to a much more organic transformation into Democracy than any of the recipes circulating at the moment.
Well if they want it Fixed they will have to pay we have put all the money to fix the country that we are going to!!
Any more money we spend will be for our military not the Iraqi people!
If The Arabs want to live in a sh-thole it is their sh-thole!!!
What is that saying you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink!!
Any dumb dog will drink the Water in the desert!
And we know that Iran has their eyes on Iraq will The Iraqi People let Iran walk in and take their country! It is sad Iraq could feed the arab world and it will remain a waste land! Becaue the people will not help save themselfs!!
Lets look who they are letting lead them all Iranis alstistani is an Irani and sarar is an Irani look who is killing all the Iraqi people ? Muslums killing Muslums again sad!
I guess with the oil wells on fire that will cause scorched earth and because brown and root can't go in who will?
We can eat our grains and feed our cars but what will the Arabs eat OIL???
How sad OH MY !!!
Part of the American Tribe
God Bless the USA and her Fighting Forces and All who Fight with her give them Strength and Courage to stay the course to Victory Amen
Subject: WWW III - While we snooze
: WW III
You have to read the catalogue of events in this brief piece.
Then, ask yourself how anyone can take the position that all we have to do is bring our troops home from Iraq, sit back, re-set the snooze alarm, go back to sleep, and no one will ever bother us again.
In case you missed it, World War III began in November 1979... that alarm has been ringing for years.
U.S. Navy Captain Ouimette is the Executive Officer at Naval Air Station, Pensacola, Florida. Here is a copy of the speech he gave last month. It is an accurate account of why we are in so much trouble today and why this action is so necessary.
AMERICA NEEDS TO WAKE UP!
That's what we think we heard on the 11th of September 2001 (When more than 3,000 Americans were killed -AD) and maybe it was, but I think it should have been "Get Out of Bed!" In fact, I think the alarm clock has been buzzing since 1979 and we have continued to hit the snooze button and roll over for a few more minutes of peaceful sleep since then.
It was a cool fall day in November 1979 in a country going through a religious and political upheaval when a group of Iranian students attacked and seized the American Embassy in Tehran. This seizure was an outright attack on American soil; it was an attack that held the world's most powerful country hostage and paralyzed a Presidency. The attack on this sovereign U. S. embassy set the stage for events to follow for the next 23 years.
America was still reeling from the aftermath of the Vietnam experience and had a serious threat from the Soviet Union when then, President Carter, had to do something. He chose to conduct a clandestine raid in the desert.
The ill-fated mission ended in ruin, but stood as a symbol of America's inability to deal with terrorism.
America's military had been decimated and downsized/right sized since the end of the Vietnam War. A poorly trained, poorly equipped and poorly organized military was called on to execute a complex mission that was doomed from the start.
Shortly after the Tehran experience, Americans began to be kidnapped and killed throughout the Middle East. America could do little to protect her citizens living and working abroad. The attacks against US soil continued.
In April of 1983 a large vehicle packed with high explosives was driven into the US Embassy compound in Beirut. When it explodes, it kills 63 people. The alarm went off again and America hit the Snooze Button once more.
Then just six short months later a large truck heavily laden down with over 2500 pounds of TNT smashed through the main gate of the US Marine Corps headquarters in Beirut and 241 US servicemen are killed. America mourns her dead and hit the Snooze Button once more.
Two months later in December 1983, another truck loaded with explosives is driven into the US Embassy in Kuwait, and America continues her slumber.
The following year, in September 1984, another van was driven into the gates of the US Embassy in Beirut and America slept.
Soon the terrorism spreads to Europe. In April 1985 a bomb explodes in a restaurant frequented by US soldiers in Madrid.
Then in August a Volkswagen loaded with explosives is driven into the main gate of the US Air Force Base at Rhein-Main, 22 are killed and the snooze alarm is buzzing louder and louder as US interests are continually attacked.
Fifty-nine days later a cruise ship, the Achille Lauro is hijacked and we watched as an American in a wheelchair is singled out of the passenger list and executed.
The terrorists then shift their tactics to bombing civilian airliners when they bomb TWA Flight 840 in April of 1986 that killed 4 and the most tragic bombing, Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, killing 259.
Clinton treated these terrorist acts as crimes; in fact we are still trying to bring these people to trial. These are acts of war.
The wake up alarm is getting louder and louder. The terrorists decide to bring the fight to America. In January 1993, two CIA agents are shot and killed as they enter CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.
The following month, February 1993, a group of terrorists are arrested after a rented van packed with explosives is driven into the underground parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City. Six people are killed and over 1000 are injured. Still this is a crime and not an act of war?
The Snooze alarm is depressed again.
Then in November 1995 a car bomb explodes at a US military complex in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia killing seven service men and women.
A few months later in June of 1996, another truck bomb explodes only 35 yards from the US military compound in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. It destroys the Khobar Towers, a US Air Force barracks, killing 19 and injuring over 500. The terrorists are getting braver and smarter as they see that America does not respond decisively.
They move to coordinate their attacks in a simultaneous attack on two US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. These attacks were planned with precision. They kill 224. America responds with cruise missile attacks and goes back to sleep.
The USS Cole was docked in the port of Aden, Yemen for refueling on 12 October 2000, when a small craft pulled along side the ship and exploded killing 17 US Navy Sailors. Attacking a US War Ship is an act of war, but we sent the FBI to investigate the crime and went back to sleep.
And of course you know the events of 11 September 2001. Most Americans think this was the first attack against US soil or in America. How wrong they are.
America has been under a constant attack since 1979 and we chose to hit the snooze alarm and roll over and go back to sleep.
In the news lately we have seen lots of finger pointing from every high officials in government over what they knew and what they didn't know. But if you've read the papers and paid a little attention I think you can see exactly what they knew. You don't have to be in the FBI or CIA or on the National Security Council to see the pattern that has been developing since 1979.
The President is right on when he says we are engaged in a war. I think we have been in a war for the past 23 years and it will continue until we as a people decide enough is enough.
America needs to "Get out of Bed" and act decisively now. America has been changed forever. We have to be ready to pay the price and make the sacrifice to ensure our way of life continues. We cannot afford to keep hitting the snooze button again and again and roll over and go back to sleep.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Admiral Yamamoto said "...it seems all we have done is awakened a sleeping giant." This is the message we need to disseminate to terrorists around the world.
Support Our Troops and support President Bush for having the courage, political or militarily, to address what so many who preceded him didn't have the backbone to do both Democrat and Republican. This is not a political thing to be hashed over in an election year this is an AMERICAN thing. This is about our Freedom and the Freedom of our children in years to come.
Please forward this to as many people as you can especially to the young people and all those who dozed off in history class and who seem so quick to protest such a necessary military action.
WHY DIDN'T WE FORESEE THIS?
The Islamic terrorists have attacked the main Iraqi oil pipeline and effectively shut down all oil flow from Iraq. Isn't this something we should have foreseen and for which we should have planned? The only way to beat the terrorists is to think like terrorists and plan for the things they're likely to do. Why aren't we doing that? Will we ever start?