“Killing Quasem Solemani was actually a de-escalating event,” states “Michael Pregent of the Hudson Institute, a well-connected Middle East intelligence expert who’s also fought in that region.” Pregent reveals why killing top Iranian General Qassem Soleimani was a necessity and why he posed an imminent threat, contrary to the persistent undermining of Trump by the Leftist media.
Pregent exposed the real danger that warranted the strike. He revealed in a CBN interview:
They were going to take over the embassy, take all the Americans in the embassy hostage and then broker their release in exchange for sanctions relief.
This is quite plausible, given Iran’s history of aggression. Many officials of the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces were also present, and were killed in the American strike along with Soleimani, including Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of the Popular Mobilization Force.
Rocky Sickmann was one of 52 Americans taken hostage at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and held captive for 444 days. Sickmann said that the “killing of Soleimani has been a long time coming,” and that “they knew he was not coming in for a Tupperware party. He was coming in to make a major plan to kill additional Americans.”
As former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley put it: “The only ones that are mourning the loss of Soleimani are our Democrat leadership, and our Democrat presidential candidates.”
“Intelligence Expert to CBN News: Soleimani Planning to Take Americans Hostage in Iraq Embassy, Broker Sanctions Relief,” by Eric Phillips, CBN, February 11, 2020:
CBN News has learned new details about the imminent threat that led to the killing of Iranian military leader Qasem Soleimani.
The information came from Michael Pregent of the Hudson Institute, a well-connected Middle East intelligence expert who’s also fought in that region.
During an interview with CBN News on Tuesday, Pregent said the so-called “chatter” regarding the situation could not be ignored.
“He was worse than Osama bin Laden. He was worse than Baghdadi. He was worse than Zarqawi,” he said.
Last month President Trump ordered a drone strike that killed Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, another well-known terrorist.
“It was the best move we could have made,” Pregent said.
Pregent said his sources provided a clear picture of the threat Soleimani posed to the US Embassy in Baghdad, making his demise a must.
“The chatter was they were going to do a 1979 hostage siege,” Pregent told CBN News.
“They were going to take over the embassy, take all the Americans in the embassy hostage and then broker their release in exchange for sanctions relief,” he explained.
While Soleimani was the main target, Pregent says the other terror leader killed in the strike would have also played a key role in the siege.
“The chatter was they were going to put Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in as prime minister,” Pregent said. “So do a coup and then seize the embassy.”
Pregent said when militia forces penetrated the embassy on Dec. 31, it was essentially a dress rehearsal for what was to come.
“They’d walked into the embassy without weapons. Trashed it. Saw how close they could get to it. Saw they could throw things over. Saw they could get as close as to almost break the windows with the US guards on the other side,” he noted.
“The next thing they wanted to do was roll through the embassy in a protest with civilians with Iraqi flags and make it look like the protestors were taking the embassy when it was really the militias,” the intelligence expert continued.
Pregent says if Soleimani and Al Muhandis had lived, the coup was all but certain…..
barbaracvm1 says
Let the democrats be the hostages. See how long they like being a prisoner. Yet they are the ones who have been crying over stopping the monsters.
mortimer says
Unfortunately, the Dems would not be the only hostages if Soleimani had lived and had his way.
Taking hostages and holding them for ransom is as Islamic a practice as female circumcision, enslavement or beheading.
Western, Christian countries have paid hundreds of millions of dollars, pounds, guilders and ducats to Muslim pirates since the foundation of Islam by Mohammed’s lustful raiders.
If American hostages had been taken under the watch of Pres. Trump, the Dems would have tried to impeach him for not preventing it.
They are seen to be two-faced hypocrites indulging in selective outrage.
mortimer says
It’s beyond belief that the Dems would mourn the death of a major enemy of NATO forces, and a military commander whose job was to create Shi’ite terrorist organizations in Syria, Iran, Lebanon and Yemen.
Soleimani was a trained military officer who knew the rules of engagement established by the international community and he consciously failed to observe them. He was thereby consciously a ‘war criminal’ on the loose.
Soleimani was not an honorable soldier.
James Lincoln says
mortimer says,
“It’s beyond belief that the Dems would mourn the death of a major enemy of NATO forces, and a military commander whose job was to create Shi’ite terrorist organizations in Syria, Iran, Lebanon and Yemen.”
That certainly would have been true back in the day with JFK type Democrats.
Not true with most members of the current Democratic Party. Some are literally traitors – and “enemies of the state”.
Walter Sieruk says
That Soleimani was scheming to invade and then take American’s hostage in the US embassy in Iraq, which would natural included much violence, is still further proof that Soleimani was a very violent and dangerous man. Therefore it was necessary that he was eliminated.
Therefore, President Trump had shown wisdom in ordering that US drone airstrike which eliminated that brutal, violent and murderous Iranian terrorists commander , at the Baghdad airport, is thievery best way of sending those cruel ruthless jihad –minded rulers in power in the “mullah regime “ of Iran a message in the only language that they will understand. Which is a message sent with and by the power of strong military might.
As Thomas Jefferson had, so clearly, declared, “With every barbarous people …force is law.”
mortimer says
In Islamic jihad, the end justifies the means. There are no ‘rules of engagement’ for Muslims that may not be set aside.
Islam is self-consciously opportunistic and amoral.
WithPurpleAbandon says
I am not surprised in the least, either. It was obviously the intention to take hostages. Why else would Soleimani have been there ? The Iranians just couldn’t leave well alone with the anniversary of their wretched Revolution in mind, they just felt it necessary to put the icing on the cake. With the ill-fated 1979 Operation Eagle Claw in mind, Trump must have thought he was not going to sit idle and watch a repeat of that. He de-escalated the whole situation the only way he could. Killing Soleimani was indeed the right decision.
All those idiots in the American media and here in the European MSM have no real sense of history and they blame Trump for something that has taken deep root in the consciousness of American governments ever since 1979. But they just fail to see it, because hating Trump is their number one priority. They just have to keep on brooding about Trump’s decision, no matter how justified it was in practice.
If anything, it tells me that these MSM idiots are the worst of fanatics themselves, they simply can’t help pointing the finger. Which makes them curiously akin to the mullahs of Iran, no less.
James Lincoln says
WithPurpleAbandon,
Judging from all of my past postings, one can immediately see that I like Pres. Trump and am in support of his policies.
Even if someone does not personally like Pres. Trump, the positive things that he is done for the United States should still be recognized.
If one does still not like him for other reasons, then fine.
YYCAlberta says
Direct from the Prophet: “War is deceit.” In other words, “the west plays by the rules, we make our own rules.”
mortimer says
Admiral Yamamoto was shot down by American pilots in the South Pacific as Yamamoto was flying to the Philippines to help prevent its liberation. Many additional thousands of Americans and Filipinos would have died if Yamamoto had lived. The rocket attack on General Soleimani is a similar case. Taking him out before his nefarious plans could be realized was a responsible act of military wisdom.
revereridesagain says
Not very bright if he couldn’t tell the difference between presidents Donald J. Trump and Jimmy Carter.
Spiro says
I sure this will be lead story on all the MSM after all it justifies his elimination
James Lincoln says
It doesn’t fit their narrative, Spiro.
Spiro says
I know it wasn’t serious
James Lincoln says
Got it…
Kepha says
US intelligence had been tracking Soleimani for years. It was probably because we caught wind of a plan to bring about a hostage crisis in Iraq that the Trump administration decided on taking him out–and rightly, in my opinion. That the killing of Soleimani was a surgical as it was, with so little collateral damage, is in itself commendable, and clearly in the US national interest.
@Mortimer (12:24 PM): The killing of Admiral Yamamoto was actually questionable (at least in hindsight). Yamamoto was one of the Japanese leaders who cautioned against war with the USA, especially as he had served as a military attache in Washington. He was certain that the Pacific War was a lost cause for Japan after Midway. Had he not been killed, he might have been very useful to the US occupation of postwar Japan, and might’ve been one to presure his government towards making peace earlier.
Back to Soleimani: The position of Soleimani in Iraq underscores the self-defeating charcter of too extensive a US-involvement in the poitics of the Islamic world. It shouldve been clear long ago that Sykes’ and Picot’s lines in the Middle East were untenable, save, ironically, with Israel, where a clear national identity was established. Elsewhere, the ethnic and sectarian patchwork was simply too volatile to last without strongman rule–which, in other ways, is highly destructive and dangerous. Our intervention in Iraq turned out to do little more than make the area safe for Shi’ah extremism, especialy since the fall of Sodom Insane brought about vicious Sunni-Shi’ite infighting. It could have been expected that Iran would certainly used this conflict as a way of extending its influence among the Shi’ite majority.
We’ve seen as well that Afghanistan essentially remains a hole in the map, and subject to an impossible set of ongoing tribal and sectarian feuds. As for the O-[mal-]administration’s attempt to make nice with the apparent “wave of the future” in the Arab countries–the Muslim Brotherhood– by destabilizing the Mubarak, Assad, and Qaddafi regimes, we see that it resulted in unmitigated disaster for all involved. As for Libya, the taking out of a tamed Qaddafi shows as well that it may also be time to stop deferring to European “expertise” (which kicked in in favor of certain Italian oil interests).
Our Kuwaiti intervention in the Fist Gulf War was also a mistake. It told the wold clearly that history was going to happen, especially to people who want it to happen oh-so badly. If we could live with Deng Xiaoping’s China (which showed its true colors on June 4, 1989), we could’ve lived with an enlarged Iraq; and perhaps a realignment of Arab Sunni regimes against an implaccable Iran would have worked in our favor.
Just Venting says
Christine, you have posted the post of the day twice so far!
This is great info, too bad most people will never hear these details.
Now, although only indirectly connected to this article, I hope that our forces in Afghanistan consider that the peace talks with the Taliban may be subterfuge rather than true peace feelers. Why do they want peace? The so called holy warriors are doing exactly what they like to do, pillage, loot, attack, and kill people. If there was true peace, these bums would need to go to work and get a real job. Other than goat herding and poppy raising, not sure what they would do in that pit.
I am concerned that something like TET 2.0 is more likely than a real peace accord.
We should have left that cesspool years ago.
ntesdorf says
It was a good day when Soleimani became a Giant Exploding Muslim.
gravenimage says
Soleimani was planning to take Americans hostage in Iraq embassy, broker sanctions relief
……………….
Yet so many are still outraged that we took this thug out.
James Lincoln says
Yes, gravenimage.
The outrage from the left is truly infuriating.
If a US politician is outraged over the fact that we took out Soleimani, it tells a lot about their loyalty to the United States…
roberta says
”The best-laid plans refers to something that has gone awry, something that has not turned out as well as one had hoped. The expression the best-laid plans carries the connotation that one should not expect for things to always turn out to plan.”
That sums it up. Roast in hell with mo.
No Muzzies Here says
Prominent members of the US Democrat party decided to oppose the elimination of Soleimani in order to put the blame on Trump if military action took place. They were hoping for a violent confrontation, which they would use to condemn Trump.
The US Democrat party is on the side of the theocratic regime of Iran, as has been obvious since the presidency of Barack Obama.