A "slightly fictional" account of Iran's takedown of CIA's Baluchi operative

February 26-28, 2010 -- A "slightly fictional" account of Iran's takedown of CIA's Baluchi operative

The CIA definitely has egg on its face over the Iranian VEVAK intelligence operation that nabbed Langley's top Iranian Baluchi guerrilla commander in Pakistan and his subsequent arrest in Iran. With all the sordid details being revealed about the CIA's proprietary Blackwater/Xe/Paravant "cowboy" operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq, the following "slightly fictionalized" account of the capture by Iran of Baluchi operative Abdolmalek Rigi by WMR's Asian journalist colleague who has covered events in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India for a number of years could be the screenplay for a movie titled: "The Frigging of Rigi"

Jundallah, the CIA's Iranian Baluchi terrorist group, says its leader Abdolmalek Rigi was betrayed by the United States, United Kingdom, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Perhaps the CIA should teach its would-be guerrillas to watch not only their backs but also both sides. The CIA is reportedly flummoxed by the actions of Iran's VEVAK intelligence service, as well as Pakistan's Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) in the capture of their main man who launched terrorist attacks in eastern Iran to soften up the Persians before the deadly U.S. and Israeli body blow. Here is the "how-to-reshuffle-the-deck Persian-style."

So the Persians, via their intermediaries on the ground know Rigi's destination, the
schedule of his meeting with the American VIP in Bishkek, and the arrangements, and they nod their heads and prepare two receptions at Bandar Abbas . . . meanwhile . . .

Through the gates of Shamshi, a small convoy of Americans, military and "civilian", together with their Pakistani minders, accompany Rigi to Gwadar Airport for the cross-Gulf hop to Dubai Airport, where he is to transit with a fake Afghanistan passport and a bogus Pakistani travel document to Bishkek-Manas.

The Americans wave from the tarmac as a small charter jet takes Rigi with his Pakistani
escorts to Dubai. The Pakistanis are along for the ride to ensure that Rigi doesn't bolt in Dubai for a local girlie bar but gets on the flight to Bishkek, since "Mr. Big" is waiting for him specially at the U.S. airbase at Manas.

The flight flies low and switches off radio contact to evade potentially hostile radar. The Pakistani escorts then divvy up the work. One orders Rigi and his pal to stay in their
seats, the other goes to the cockpit with new destination. The pilot says "What?" The
Pakistani answers "Top Secret Mission, part of the U.S. plan. Our men are on the ground
in Bandar. Just a delivery, a small detour."

The small jet lands on the spacious strip. The Pakistanis push Rigi and pal out the door with a huge "whew" and "good riddance, you Baluch camel shit!"

The smiling Iranians greet Rigi: "Welcome to Iran. You are now a guest of the Revolutionary Guards. Everything will be taken care of."

While the air crew and the Pakistanis go for a cup of coffee, the happy Iranians put
on their masks for the photo op next to the small jet with their 'trophy." And then they
whisk Rigi and his accomplice to a small "hotel room" for a series of "chats."

Next, the Pakistanis and the air crew return to the plane to resume the flight to
Dubai. In the passenger seats are two men - ah, they took a piss, smoked a
cigarette and are back, "OK, let's go."

Under the radar, the small jet dashes across the Gulf to make up for lost time and then lands at Dubai International. The Pakistanis thank the charter jet captain, who decides to have some drinks and spend the night with a hooker across "the Creek." A job
well done deserves a reward.

The Pakistanis now take "Rigi and friend" to Departures. "Oh, I nearly forgot, I've been holding the passports. Here you go. Have fun, Iranian girls are oooh-la-la!"

The Pakistanis head to a local hotel to ogle the Lebanese hookers.

"Rigi Junior and Friend Junior" go through immigration, and then board Kyrgyzstan flight 454. "Too bad we're not going to Kyrgyzstan, I hear those Uzbek girls are oooh-la-la. Iranian girls make for a good wife, but I hear as girlfriends they've got expensive tastes."

"Ahmed, my young friend, after this performance you will be able to have two wives, one Punjabi and the second a Pashtun!"

"Oh, Jamal, that would be a real war. The Pastuni would have to be No.1. Their women are crazy and violent!"

"Ahmed, do you suppose they serve drinks aboard this flight?"

"You mean halal vodka?" Both laugh.

By now the plane is already descending - on schedule, if you happen to be an
impostor with the ISI.

While the plane's descending, Abbott asks, "Haven't we seen this place before? I thought they said we're going to Tehran. The pretty girls . . ." Costelllo replies, "Don't worry. All the Gulf islands look same, except for the Palm that sank the UAE.

Together they say, "Not Bandaid Abcess again!"

The other passengers are chattering. "Isn't that's an island in the Gulf?" "Engine problems, oh no!" "Do you think we're going to crash?"

Prayer beads are clicking, one woman is sobbing hysterically. "Calm down, my dear, probably just a minor mechanical problem," an older businessman from Bahrain reassures the hysterical woman from Kyrgyzstan.

Smooth landing and then the plane idles on tarmac. Several uniformed Iranians with small arms board the plane, looking intensely at the passengers and then spot "Abbott and Costello."

"If you gentlemen will accompany us."

"Oh, my Allah! Terrorists aboard our plane!" says the overweight babushka from Osh, Kyrgyzstan's second-largest city.

"You are in no danger, madam. Everything is under control. Have a nice flight to
Kyrgyzstan," replies the Iranian security officer.

Meanwhile, the Iranian security officer in the cockpit reminds the air crew: "This is a routine exercise. We're not supposed to discuss details over radio. Your supervisor in Manas is already informed of details. Thank you, gentleman. Have a good journey, Ins'Allah!"

At Manas, a U.S. Embassy staffer is reading Time magazine in a VIP Lounge. "Don't
worry, the ragheads are always running late. The only ones who every show up on
time are the Taliban."

His Grey Eminence is bored. This is the worst VIP Lounge I've ever seen. Built with USAID money, too. I know, corruption as usual, he muses to himself.

The plane reaches the gate. The reception team waits. "Is that all the passengers?
Can you check the manifest for a Mr. Rigi?"

"We're sorry, sir, the record indicates he boarded in Dubai. He must've slipped past you."

The Americans rush down to the baggage carousel. The passengers are all gone by now. "What the . . . your mobile. What's the country code for Afghanistan?"

Mr. CIA shouts over his mobile phone: "Hey, there, did the package get into the mail? Yes? Double check the postage? Yes? Well, it never arrived!"

Back at the lounge. "Sir, there's been some sort of mix up. We've got a guy checking with the air crew."

Incoming cell phone call from another "Mr. CIA" at the airport: "Dude, just checked with a pilot. They landed in Bandar Abbas. Two passengers were taken off the plane."

"Oh, shit. Excuse me, sir. Our contact can't make it. Sends his apologies. Maybe you should take an earlier flight to Tbilisi."

"Goddammit, can't you people get anything right? What the fuck are we going to do now? Don't let this get out or you're going to be running PR in Helmand. Get me on that flight NOW!"

The junior agent was flipping channels between BBC and Al-Jazeera in the VIP lounge, waiting for the bad news to arrive.

On the flight to Tbilisi, where Georgian President Mikhael Saakashvili would provide a little cover by announcing that he was sending 1000 of his "crack" presidential security troops to Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke, President Obama's Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, could only think of the dressing down he was going to get for Rigi being snatched by the infernal Iranians.

There would be the deep Hebrew-accented remonstration from Mossad chief Meir Dagan. But the worst would come from White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, who would let loose a volley of four-letter epithets on Holbrooke: "Godammit Holbrooke! This delays our Iran military action and how will I explain this royal-ass fuckup to Bibi after his recent success in snuffing that Hamas asshole in Dubai?"

Holbrooke's evening in Tbilisi could be called "The Night The Lights Went Out in Georgia."

For Abdolmalek Rigi, the refrain would be "Don't trust your soul to no Presidential Harvard lawyer. Cause the judge in Tehran's got bloodstains on his hand."

Meanwhile, hidden away somewhere deep inside a forest dwelling in the Serb Republic of Bosnia, wanted former Bosnian Serb Army Commander Ratko Mladic raises a shot glass of slivovka plum brandy at the news he's just received from his contacts about Holbrooke's embarrassment in Manas. Before pounding down the shot, he boasts: "Good, that bastard got what's coming to him!"

Governments do Carry Out False Flag Terror

http://studentsforthesupportofgentiles.blogspot.com/

Forget the claims and allegations that false flag terror - governments attacking people and then blaming others in order to create animosity towards those blamed - has been used throughout history.

This essay will solely discuss government admissions to the use of false flag terror.

For example:

• The CIA admits that it hired Iranians in the 1950's to pose as Communists and stage bombings in Iran in order to turn the country against its democratically-elected president

• Israel admits that an Israeli terrorist cell operating in Egypt planted bombs in several buildings, including U.S. diplomatic facilities, then left behind "evidence" implicating the Arabs as the culprits (one of the bombs detonated prematurely, allowing the Egyptians to identify the bombers, and several of the Israelis later confessed) (and see this and this)

• The well-respected former Indonesian president admits that the government probably had a role in the Bali bombings

• The former Italian Prime Minister, an Italian judge, and the former head of Italian counterintelligence admit that NATO, with the help of the Pentagon and CIA, carried out terror bombings in Italy and blamed the communists, in order to rally people’s support for their governments in Europe in their fight against communism. As one participant in this formerly-secret program stated: "You had to attack civilians, people, women, children, innocent people, unknown people far removed from any political game. The reason was quite simple. They were supposed to force these people, the Italian public, to turn to the state to ask for greater security" (and see this)(Italy joined NATO in 1949, years before the bombings occurred)
  

• As admitted by the U.S. government, recently declassified documents show that in the 1960's, the American Joint Chiefs of Staff signed off on a plan to blow up AMERICAN airplanes (using an elaborate plan involving the switching of airplanes), and also to commit terrorist acts on American soil, and then to blame it on the Cubans in order to justify an invasion of Cuba. See the following ABC news report; the official documents; and watch this interview with the former Washington Investigative Producer for ABC's World News Tonight with Peter Jennings*

There are many other instances of false flag attacks used throughout history proven by the historical evidence. See this, this and this. The above are only some examples of governments admitting to using false flag terror.

You can't call it a conspiracy theory when the government itself admits it.

And this is not just ancient history:

• Jimmy Carter's former National Security Adviser - Zbigniew Brzezinski - told the Senate that a terrorist act might be carried out in the U.S. and falsely blamed on Iran to justify war against that nation
  

• A retired 27-year CIA analyst who prepared and presented Presidential Daily Briefs and served as a high-level analyst for several presidents, would not put it past the government to "play fast and loose" with terror alerts and warnings and even events themselves in order to rally people behind the flag

* Note: While the Joint Chiefs of Staff pushed for Operation Northwoods to be carried out, cooler heads prevailed; President Kennedy or his Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara apparently vetoed the plan.

Shebaa Farms "real issue" is water

Shebaa Farms "real issue" is water


The politics of the Israeli-occupied Shebaa Farms, a rugged sliver of mountainside wedged between Lebanon, Israel and Syria, have long overshadowed what some Lebanese environmentalists call "the real issue" of the disputed area: its water resources.

Now activists are calling for hydro-diplomacy to take precedence over political maneuvering as the most effective solution to one of the key stumbling blocks to Middle East peace.

"Rising Temperatures Rising Tensions," a report published in June by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), funded by the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, considers water to be a major trigger for conflict in the Middle East, the world's most water-scarce region.

Lebanon and Syria say the Shebaa Farms, measuring just 22 square kilometers, is Lebanese territory, though the UN has ruled it part of the Syrian Golan Heights, which lie just to the east, across water-rich Mount Hermon.

Both the Golan and Shebaa were occupied by Israel during the 1967 War and the Israelis say disengagement from Shebaa can only come under a peace deal with Syria and withdrawal from the Golan.

However, Fadi Comair, director-general of Hydraulic and Electric Resources at the Lebanese Ministry of Energy and Water, argues there is more to Israel's occupation of Shebaa than military-strategic concerns: "Israel's occupation of the Shebaa Farms has to do with control of its water."

Hizballah, the Lebanese resistance group that fought Israel to a bloody stalemate in 2006, has the liberation of Shebaa as one of its strategic objectives.

Water scarcity

Meeting the water needs of their rapidly growing populations has long been an existential challenge for the governments of the arid Middle East. Climate change is making that challenge more urgent and acute.

Israel, Jordan and the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) all fall well below the internationally accepted threshold of 1,000 cubic meters of water per person per year (cmwpy). According to the IISD, Israel has natural renewable water resources of 265 cmwpy, Jordan 169, and OPT just 90. Only Lebanon and Syria have water surpluses, with Lebanon having a potential of 1,220 cmwpy and Syria 1,541.

Yet supply is dwindling rapidly. By 2025 water use in Israel is estimated to fall to 310 cmwpy, while the country's own Environment Ministry has warned that water supply may fall by 60 percent of 2000 levels by 2100.

River Jordan

The IISD report goes even further, warning that the River Jordan, which is the key supplier of water to Israel, Jordan and OPT, could shrink as much as 80 percent by the end of the century.

Such drastic scarcity makes securing water supplies vital. The River Jordan rises in Mount Hermon, fed by tributaries in the Golan Heights and Shebaa Farms, and flows into the Sea of Galilee, also known as Lake Tiberius, before continuing south where it forms the boundary between Jordan, to the east, and the West Bank. After 320 kilometers it empties into the Dead Sea.

Major tributaries of the river include the Hasbani, which flows into Israel from Lebanon, and the Banias, which flows from Syria. The River Dan, which also supplies the River Jordan, is the only river originating in Israel.

Water wars

The absence of hydro-diplomacy reflects conflict in the region. In 1965, Syria and Lebanon began the construction of channels to divert the Banias and Hasbani, preventing the rivers flowing into Israel. Israel attacked the diversion works, the first in a series of moves that led to a regional war two years later.

In 2002, when the Lebanese constructed a pipeline on the River Wazzani intended to supply households in southern Lebanon with water, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared the action a causus belli. In the July War of 2006, Israeli warplanes targeted southern Lebanon's water network.

Bassam Jaber, a water expert at Lebanon's Ministry of Energy and Water, argues the Shebaa is critical to Israel's water needs, "especially because fresh water is critical when all sources within Israel are salty. The flows from the area help to regulate the saltiness of Lake Tiberius."

And it is not just the direct overland flow that the Shebaa provides Israel. According to the Lebanese Water Ministry's Comair, 30 to 40 percent of the River Dan's water flows into it through underground supplies originating in the Shebaa. "Israel is worried that if Lebanon gains control of the Shebaa, it can then control the flow to the Dan river," said Comair.

Hydro-diplomacy

As one of only eight states to have ratified the 1997 UN Convention on the Law of Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses, Lebanon is calling on Israel to do the same.

"Israel is not a signatory to the relevant conventions on water, which is a big problem since they are at the center of the issue of equitable use of water and reasonable sharing," said Comair.

Israel has already shown that water can play a role in peacemaking. Its 1994 peace agreement with Jordan included a commitment to transfer 75 million cubic meters of water per year to Jordan in return for secure borders to the east.

Lebanon's Ministry of Energy and Water is now calling for a regional water basin authority for the River Jordan, which would include Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel and the OPT. "How can you reach any agreements on the equitable sharing of international watercourses if there is no cooperation?" asked Comair.

Water solutions for all?

Not all are convinced Israel's occupation of Shebaa is primarily about securing water.

"Water is no doubt one aspect of the socio-political conflict, but it is not the main driver," said Mutasem el-Fadel, director of the Water Resources Center at the American University of Beirut.

He points to several projects currently being studied that could solve Israel's water needs, without requiring continued occupation of the Shebaa, such as the Red Sea-Dead Sea Canal Project, the Mini-Peace pipeline from Turkey, wastewater reclamation plans and desalination projects.

"All combined they can be the water solution for all five countries in the area," said el-Fadel.

But in the absence of hydro-diplomacy between Israel and Lebanon, the continued Israeli occupation of the Shebaa Farms will remain a key trigger to renewed conflict between the two countries.

"There will not be enough water for our generation or the next," said Comair. "We will see social, economic, political and military conflicts -- and in that order -- within the next 20 years."