HT Wretchard the Cat at The Belmont Club

From the best of the best in the Blogos re Lebanon, Hezbollah, Israel and et al in the GWOT.

RBT

*****

Pulp Fiction

I am going to write a completely speculative piece on the fighting in Lebanon. It's born of a need to make sense of events which on the face of it are incomprehensible, though by so doing the post detaches itself from verifiable fact. The reader is warned. Read on if you wish for entertainment but beware that what follows is hypothesis, there aren't even going to be hyperlinks for reference.

The first question that must be answered in divining IDF intentions in Lebanon is what the center of gravity of the Hezbollah is, because that is what the IDF must be aiming to destroy. The two obvious ones are Hezbollah's ability to influence the Lebanese government and the motor of that influence -- the military force that Hezbollah maintains in the south. A step down we can ask, what is the most important component of Hezbollah's power in the south? Again the answer is easy. It is the Hezbollah cadres themselves. Hezbollah's most precious possession isn't Katyushas, long-range rockets, night vision goggles or antitank missiles or electronic equipment. It is the trained core of its military force. Equipment can be replaced but Hezbollah's cadres represent an expensive, almost irreplaceable investment. In them resides the organizational knowledge of Nasrallah's organization. It embodies man-decades of operational experience against Israel. Rockets can be replaced. The stars of Hezbollah's operational force are less expendable.

From this observation I'm going to say that despite the received wisdom of the newspapers to the contrary, the fighting at Maroun al-Ras and Bint Jbeil have been and continue to be an unmitigated defeat for the Hezbollah. The Hezbollah are doing the single most stupid thing imaginable for a guerilla organization. They are fighting to keep territory. Oh, I know that this will be justified in terms of "inflicting casualties" on the Israelis. But the Hez are probably losing 10 for every Israeli lost. A bad bargain for Israel you say? No. A bad bargain for Hezbollah to trade their terrorist elite for highly trained but nevertheless conventional infantry. Guerillas should trade 1 for 10, not 10 for 1.

[...]

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HT Jawa Report

RBT was thinking the samething when he commented that the rest of the Arab world are nervous about the Iranian Shi'ia gaining power in the ME

RBT

*****

Syria : Iran's Sunni Prison B*tch?

Mark Steyn's latest column. The money shot:

...Saudi-Egyptian-Jordanian opportunism on Palestine has caught up with them: It's finally dawned on them that a strategy of consciously avoiding resolution of the "Palestinian question" has helped deliver Gaza, and Lebanon and Syria, into the hands of a regime that's a far bigger threat to the Arab world than the Zionist Entity. Cairo and Co. grew so accustomed to whining about the Palestinian pseudo-crisis decade in decade out that it never occurred to them that they might face a real crisis one day: a Middle East dominated by an apocalyptic Iran and its local enforcers, in which Arab self-rule turns out to have been a mere interlude between the Ottoman sultans and the eternal eclipse of a Persian nuclear umbrella. The Zionists got out of Gaza and it's now Talibanistan redux. The Zionists got out of Lebanon and the most powerful force in the country (with an ever-growing demographic advantage) are Iran's Shia enforcers. There haven't been any Zionists anywhere near Damascus in 60 years and Syria is in effect Iran's first Sunni Arab prison bitch. For the other regimes in the region, Gaza, Lebanon and Syria are dead states that have risen as vampires.

Meanwhile, Kofi Annan in a remarkable display of urgency (at least when compared with Sudan, Rwanda, Congo et al.) is proposing apropos Israel and Hezbollah that U.N. peacekeepers go in, not to keep the "peace" between two sovereign states but rather between a sovereign state and a usurper terrorist gang. Contemptible as he is, the secretary-general shows a shrewd understanding of the way the world is heading: Already "non-state actors" have more sophisticated rocketry than many EU nations; if Iran has its way, its proxies will be implied nuclear powers. Maybe we should put them on the U.N. Security Council.

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HT Jihad Watch

Robert Spencer also has concerns about August 22nd, the date the Iranians have announced they will respond to the West's demands on nuclear enrichment.

RBT

*****

Spencer: Iran's Day of Terror?

This morning in FrontPage I discuss the August 22 deadline that Iran's Thug-In-Chief has given for responding to the West's jizya offer (news links in the original):

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has frustrated Western officials by refusing to reply to their offer of various incentives in exchange for Iran’s discarding its nuclear program until August 22. The Western governments had asked Ahmadinejad to reply by June 29; why would Tehran need two extra months?

Farid Ghadry, the president of the Reform Party of Syria, has offered a provocative explanation for this delay. He asserts that the Supreme National Security Council of Iran chose the August 22 date “for a very precise reason. August 21, 2006 (Rajab 27, 1427) is known in the Islamic calendar as the Night of the Sira’a and Miira’aj, the night Prophet Mohammed (saas) ascended to heaven from the Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem on a Bourak (Half animal, half man), while a great light lit-up the night sky, and visited Heaven and Hell also Beit al-Saada and Beit al-Shaqaa (House of Happiness and House of Misery) and then descended back to Mecca.…”

[...]

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HT Roger L. Simon

99% of Beirut untouched

... at least as of yesterday, according to this post at Vital Perspective (it includes a map). If true this further corroborates what propaganda we are being fed from Hezbollah and their many sympathizers at home and abroad. But we know that, don't we?

UPDATE: Of course it's always hard to know how accurate anything is during the fog of war. Nasrallah himself may be confused.

[...]

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Atlas of Atlas Shrugs has a similar piece and a very ineresting map that puts things in perspective:

Check out Israpundit.

Click on the picture for a larger map. Notice how small the area is that the bombing focused on. About the size of three race tracks.

You wouldn’t know it from the televised images.

HT The Counterterrorism Blog via Instapundit

The Battle of Bint Jubayl and Hezbollah's Army
By Bill Roggio

As the smoke clears from the fighting in the Lebanese border town of Bint Jubayl, Hezbollah's military capabilities become clearer. Today, 8 Israeli soldiers from the Golani Brigade's 51st Battalion were killed and 22 wounded during a "well-planned Hezbollah ambush on the outskirts" outside of Bint Jubayl. This follows the 4 killed and 18 wounded during Sunday's engagement in the town.

Hezbollah was reported to have suffered 150 killed as of this morning, and another 40 killed in today's action after fighting "gun battles at point-blank range." An unnamed American military officer reports several Hezbollah operatives, whose primary purpose is logistical support, have been captured and are currently being interrogated by Israeli intelligence.

The Hezbollah bunker in Bint Jubayl was taken nearly intact. Hezbollah attempted to destroy the equipment in the bunker, but was not successful in destroying it all, according to an intelligence source. Abu Jaafar, the Hezbollah commander in southern Lebanon, may have killed himself rather than being captured. The Israeli troops seized Hezbollah computers, documents and monitoring devices used to observe the Israeli border, in addition to the "electronic surveillance equipment, weapons and communication devices made in Iran" which was reported yesterday. The bunker served as the equivalent of a Hezbollah headquarters and command and control center for the southern border.

The Israelis targeted the town of Bint Jubayl with the hope of obtaining further intelligence on Hezbollah's organization and capabilites, as well as the location of their two captured soldiers. The documents and computer seized by the IDF may outline Hezbollah's command and organizational structure in southern Lebanon, although this is unknown at this time. Israeli intelligence is currently analyzing the data.

The Israelis have confirmed that Hezbollah is fighting like a professional military. Their units are fighting at the company level at the least (Unit size of approximately 100 men), and perhaps in larger formations. Intelligence also confirms there is specialization within the Hezbollah units, including trained infantry, mortar teams, missile squads, and logistical personal. Iran has trained and organized Hezbollah's army into something far more deadly than a militia force. Hezbollah's core 'active' army is estimated at 3,000 - 5,000, with as many as 50,000 part time militia and support personnel that can be called upon to fight (20,000 is the average estimate).

Intelligence sources also have confirmed that members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps Qods Force have indeed been killed during the fighting in southern Lebanon.

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Machiavellian Foreign Policy or a Highstakes Game of Texas Hold'em

On July 16th, 2006 Dr Terry Law and Iraqi General Georges Sada spoke at a church in RBT's neighborhood. RBT attended and scored the General's autorgraph on RBT's copy of his book, Saddam Secrets. RBT had the pleasure to speak with the General.

RBT's has found a MP3 audio file * from a similar speaking engagement a few months ago at a church in Oxford, UK

As RBT has said before based on his 35 year's experience as a street cop and detective, RBT believes that General Sada is telling the truth. Dr. Law is staking his reputation on the General.

RBT is perplexed why the Bush Administration has not jumped on General Sada's story that Saddam's chemical weapons went to Syria in the run up to Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The Administration doesn't seem to be concerned about Saddam's chemical weapons going to Syria even though Zarqawi's bunch were caught with some 20 TONS(!) in their foiled chemical gas attack on Amman, Jordan. Don't know if Saddam had the capacity to manufacturer sarin gas. If it was of Russian origin perhaps the Russians have contained it or returned it to Russia.

Perhaps the US has assurances these stocks are now safe and out of play. The US now doesn't want to publically embarass the Russians as their help with reigning in the Iranian Mad Mullahs is thought necessary.

As said before here, RBT believes that there is a high stakes game of Texas Hold'em being played out behind the scenes with the Russians and the Chinese.

RBT believes the Russians and the Chinese won't be much help in controlling the Mullahs' madness. Even if they weren't playing both sides of the fence for their own self-interests e.g. Russians need hard cash and the Chinese need oil, President MAD and Imman Yazdi will not be detered from their fanatical Armageddon Quest to hasten the return of the 12th Immam.

The next interesting date on the Islamofascist Calendar is August the 22nd, which coincidently corresponds with the date the Iranians have announced that they will respond to the West's nuclear incentive package.

For further on the madness of President MAD and Immam Yazdi see:

IRAN - Ahmadinejad Really is Insane

RBT

* Complete HTML links to MP3 audio file:

http://www.oxfordbiblechurch.co.uk/derek/messages.html
(Scroll down to April 9th, 2006)

Here's the direct link. Don't know if it will work correctly without going through the home page:

http://www.oxfordbiblechurch.co.uk/derek/messages/Terry%20Law%20&%20George%20Sada.mp3

Sam Pender was kind enough to give me a link to a WMV file of the General's appearence on FOXNEWS' Hannity and Combs Program:

http://www.msunderestimated.com/SaddamsWMDs.wmv

Update:

Jihad Watch with more on August 22nd

Spencer: Iran's Day of Terror?

Machiavellian Foreign Policy or a Highstakes Game of Texas Hold'em

On July 16th, 2006 Dr Terry Law and Iraqi General Georges Sada spoke at a church in RBT's neighborhood. RBT attended and scored the General's autorgraph on RBT's copy of his book, Saddam Secrets. RBT had the pleasure to speak with the General.

RBT's has found a MP3 audio file * from a similar speaking engagement a few months ago at a church in Oxford, UK

As RBT has said before based on his 35 year's experience as a street cop and detective, RBT believes that General Sada is telling the truth. Dr. Law is staking his reputation on the General.

RBT is perplexed why the Bush Administration has not jumped on General Sada's story that Saddam's chemical weapons went to Syria in the run up to Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The Administration doesn't seem to be concerned about Saddam's chemical weapons going to Syria even though Zarqawi's bunch were caught with some 20 TONS(!) in their foiled chemical gas attack on Amman, Jordan. Don't know if Saddam had the capacity to manufacturer sarin gas. If it was of Russian origin perhaps the Russians have contained it or returned it to Russia.

Perhaps the US has assurances these stocks are now safe and out of play. The US now doesn't want to publically embarass the Russians as their help with reigning in the Iranian Mad Mullahs is thought necessary.

As said before here, RBT believes that there is a high stakes game of Texas Hold'em being played out behind the scenes with the Russians and the Chinese.

RBT believes the Russians and the Chinese won't be much help in controlling the Mullahs' madness. Even if they weren't playing both sides of the fence for their own self-interests e.g. Russians need hard cash and the Chinese need oil, President MAD and Imman Yazdi will not be detered from their fanatical Armageddon Quest to hasten the return of the 12th Immam.

The next interesting date on the Islamofascist Calendar is August the 22nd, which coincidently corresponds with the date the Iranians have announced that they will respond to the West's nuclear incentive package.

For further on the madness of President MAD and Immam Yazdi see:

IRAN - Ahmadinejad Really is Insane

RBT

* Complete HTML links to MP3 audio file:

http://www.oxfordbiblechurch.co.uk/derek/messages.html
(Scroll down to April 9th, 2006)

Here's the direct link. Don't know if it will work correctly without going through the home page:

http://www.oxfordbiblechurch.co.uk/derek/messages/Terry%20Law%20&%20George%20Sada.mp3

Sam Pender was kind enough to give me a link to a WMV file of the General's appearence on FOXNEWS' Hannity and Combs Program:

http://www.msunderestimated.com/SaddamsWMDs.wmv

HT Bill Roggio at Counterterrorism Blog

Analysis of latest action by IDF by Bill Roggio.

RBT

*****

IDF, Hezbollah battle over the "Hezbollah Capital"
By Bill Roggio

[...]

The Golani Brigade continues to slug it out with Hezbollah between the towns of Maroun al-Ras and the Bint Jubayl on the Israeli-Lebanon border. Reports indicate 15 Hezbollah have been killed, and 4 IDF killed and 18 wounded during the fight. Two Israelis helicopter pilots were killed in an unknown incident (Hezbollah claims to have shot down the helo) and two tankers were killed. Two tanks were destroyed during today's fight, one by a mine, another by an anti-tank missile. The "Golani Brigade troops, tanks and combat engineers engaged in heavy fighting... The troops came under attack from anti-tank missiles and sniper fire," reports the Jerusalem Post.

Despite the fact that the Golani Brigade moved towards the town of Bint Jubayl on Saturday evening (reports indicated "the IDF is moving [towards Bint Jubayl] with fire and surveillance," on Saturday), the status of the town is still contested. Today, fighting was also reported in Maroun al-Ras, which the IDF took on Friday. The Israeli newspapers indicate Bint Jubayl has been surrounded, but the Daily Star claims the IDF was "repelled'. This account shouldn't be dismissed out of hand as the Golani Brigade was forced to pull back from Maroun al-Ras late last week.

[...]

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HT Wizbang

CNN Reporter Admits He was Propaganda Tool for Hezbollah

Rich Noyes writes at Newsbusters that CNN's Nic Robertson admitted that his anti-Israel hit piece of last week was propaganda for Hezbollah. In fact, Hezbollah members maintained tight control on what Robertson video taped and reported:

Back on July 18, Hezbollah took Robertson and his crew on a tour of a heavily damaged south Beirut neighborhood. The Hezbollah "press officer" even instructed the CNN camera: "Just look. Shoot. Look at this building. Is it a military base? Is it a military base, or just civilians living in this building?"


In his original story, Robertson had no complaints about the journalistic limitations of a story put together under such tight controls, and Robertson himself at one point seemed to agree with the Hezbollah propaganda claim that Israeli jets had targeted a civilian area: "As we run past the rubble, we see much that points to civilian life, no evidence apparent of military equipment."

Challenged by Reliable Sources host (and Washington Post media writer) Howard Kurtz on Sunday, Robertson suggested Hezbollah has "very, very sophisticated and slick media operations," that the terrorist group "had control of the situation. They designated the places that we went to, and we certainly didn't have time to go into the houses or lift up the rubble to see what was underneath," and he even contradicted Hezbollah's self-serving spin: "There's no doubt that the [Israeli] bombs there are hitting Hezbollah facilities."

But the closest Robertson came to making any of these points in the taped package that aired last week was admitting that "we [he and his CNN crew] didn't go burrowing into all the houses," after pointing out (for the second time) that "we didn't see any military type of equipment" in the area Hezbollah chose to let them tour.

CNN again sold whatever integrity it had left for an exclusive from a Hezbollah propagandist. Robertson learned much at the Eason Jordon School of Journalism.

Wizbang Link

HT Atlas of Atlas Shrugs

FROM WND'S JERUSALEM BUREAU
Iran soldiers killed in Lebanon
transferred to Tehran via Syria
Follows info Revolutionary Guard units assisting Hezbollah against Jewish state
Posted: July 23, 2006
4:15 p.m. Eastern

By Aaron Klein
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com

JERUSALEM – The bodies of Iranian Revolutionary Guard soldiers who were killed by the Israeli army in Lebanon have been transported to Syria and flown to Tehran, senior Lebanese political sources told WorldNetDaily.

The information was confirmed by Israeli and Egyptian security officials. It follows scores of reports the past few days Iranian soldiers have been aiding Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon in their attacks against Israel, including help with the firing of rockets into Israeli population centers.

[...]

WND reported earlier this month Israeli security officials said they have "concrete information" hundreds of Iranian soldiers stationed at Hezbollah positions in Lebanon have aided in efforts to fire missiles into the Jewish state.

The Israeli officials said Iranian guards directed the firing two weeks ago of a radar-guided C–802 missile that hit an Israeli navy vessel off the coast of Lebanon, killing four soldiers. Israel says Iran acquired the missile from China.

The officials said the Iranian soldiers' duties include keeping custody of long-range missiles within Hezbollah's arsenal, including Zalzal rockets which are said to have a range of 125 miles, placing Tel Aviv within firing range.

[...]

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HT The American Thinker

The need for actionable intelligence

The Weekly Standard has an outstanding article called “Intelligence Dominance” by Richard H. Shultz Jr. and Roy Godson. If you thought Valerie Plame is not the model for a CIA that can win the war on terror, Shultz and Godson make a strong case for a better way. They have done their homework, by talking to successful counterinsurgency pros around the world – in Israel, Latin America, Northern Ireland and Iraq. The problem, simplly, is the dearth of actionable inteligence: Knowledge about the enemy that allows us to do something effective in time to avoid catastrophe.

When we’re spending $40 billion a year on intelligence and committing 150,000 men to the Iraqi front, why can’t we create the actionable intelligence required to roll up the insurgents? .... we listened intently as these former practitioners discussed what to our surprise turned out to be a common set of measures-intelligence dominance was the summary term we came up with to describe the model-they had used to overcome bloody threats posed by armed groups. They convinced us that this is the wheel the United States must now reinvent if it is to win in Iraq and on other murky fronts of the war on terror.

An anecdote from an British intelligence pro sums up the kind of street-cop detail required, in this case tracking down a meeting of several IRA subcommanders in 1980s Belfast:

One of the boys in my unit had gotten pretty close to a local grocery store owner. He would see the owner two, three times a week. At one of those get-togethers the store owner happened to mention that a Mrs. McCoy had come in several times over the last week with grocery lists many times larger than the size of her normal purchases. ‘You’d think she was planning to feed a small army,’ the grocery man said. We put her house under surveillance, tapped the phones, all the normal stuff. Turns out it was the IRA safe house we were looking for.

Our biggest national security failures are in intelligence. We have the best armed forces in the world, the best technology, and an inspiring wellspring of young people willing to risk their lives for us. But we also have a fat, dumb and happy intelligence bureaucracy that cannot even admit that there are systemic failures. Naturally, Shulz and Godson point out, their plan for better actionable intelligence is meeting institutional resistance from the usual suspects.

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HT The American Thinker

Now here's something different. Mind you there was an Iranian presence for the launch.

RBT

*****

North Korean missiles and Iran

The website China Confidential reports that the North Korean missile tests in early July are regarded in North Korea as successful, implying that the Taepodong missiles were destroyed intentionally, after proving their lift-off and guidance capability. According to the report, the tests were paid for and conducted for Iran.

US, Japanese, and Israeli analysts believe the Iranian contingentwhich traveled to North Korea via Beijingincluded scientists, technicians, and 10 or more Iranian Revolutionary Guards officers, including members of the elite Partisans of the Mahdi group. Sources say the Iranians paid for the tests and were keen to observe the results as Tehran’s strategic and tactical missile system was built by North Koreans, using Chinese designs. Iran’s Islamist leadership is apparently convinced that the US intends to attack it-directly or through Israel.

Sources say the Iranians and their North Korean hosts were satisfied with the test results. Contrary to media reports, the exercise was successful.

The report includes a very chilling graphic, apparently of a North Korean poster celebrating an attack on the United States.

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