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Intelligence Indications
And Warnings Abound
On Bush Iran Military Strike
By Wayne Madsen
1-3-5
Intelligence and military sources in the United States and
abroad are reporting on various factors that indicate a U.S.
military hit on Iranian nuclear and military installations,
that may involve tactical nuclear weapons, is in the final
stages of preparation. Likely targets for saturation bombing
are the Bushehr nuclear power plant (where Russian and other
foreign national technicians are present), a uranium mining
site in Saghand near the city of Yazd, the uranium enrichment
facility in Natanz, a heavy water plant and radioisotope
facility in Arak, the Ardekan Nuclear Fuel Unit, the Uranium
Conversion Facility and Nuclear Technology Center in Isfahan,
the Tehran Nuclear Research Center, the Tehran Molybdenum,
Iodine and Xenon Radioisotope Production Facility, the Tehran
Jabr Ibn Hayan Multipurpose Laboratories, the Kalaye Electric
Company in the Tehran suburbs, a reportedly dismantled uranium
enrichment plant in Lashkar Abad, and the Radioactive Waste
Storage Units in Karaj and Anarak.
Primary target: Bushehr nuclear reactor and hundreds of
Russian technicians
Other first targets would be Shahab-I, II, and III missile
launch sites, air bases (including the large Mehrabad air
base/international airport near Tehran), naval installations
on the Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea, command, control,
communications and intelligence facilities. Secondary targets
would include civilian airports, radio and TV installations,
telecommunications centers, government buildings, conventional
power plants, highways and bridges, and rail lines. Oil
installations and commercial port facilities would likely be
relatively untouched by U.S. forces in order to preserve them
for U.S. oil and business interests.
There has been a rapid increase in training and readiness at a
number of U.S. military installations involved with the
planned primarily aerial attack. These include a Pentagon
order to Fort Rucker, Alabama, to be prepared to handle an
estimated 50,000 to 60,000 trainees, including civilian
contractors, who will be deployed for Iranian combat
operations. Rucker is home to the US Army's aviation training
command, including the helicopter training school.
In addition, there has been an increase in readiness at nearby
Hurlburt Field in Florida, the home of the U.S. Air Force
Special Operations Command. The U.S. attack on Iran will
primarily involve aviation (Navy, Air Force, Navy-Marine
Corps) and special operations assets.
There has also been a noticeable increase in activity at
Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center at Twentynine Palms,
California, a primary live fire training activity located in a
desert and mountainous environment similar to target areas in
Iran.
From European intelligence agencies comes word that the United
States has told its NATO allies to be prepared for a military
strike on Iranian nuclear development and military
installations.
On November 17, 2005, Russian President Vladimir Putin spent
seven hours in secret discussions with Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan during the the opening ceremonies in
Samsun, Turkey for the Russian-Turkish underwater Blue Stream
natural gas pipeline, festivities also attended by Italian
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
According to sources knowledgeable about the meeting, Erdogan
promised Putin, who has become a close friend, that Turkey
would not support the use of its bases by the United States in
a military attack on Iran. That brought a series of high level
visits to Turkey by Bush administration officials, including
CIA chief Porter Goss, FBI Director Robert Mueller, and
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Although Erdogan listened to Goss's and Rice's pleas for
Turkish logistical, political, and intelligence help for an
attack on Iran and Turkish Army Chief Yasar Buyukanit heard
much the same from Pentagon officials during his recent trip
to Washington, the word is that Putin now has enough clout in
Ankara to scuttle any use of Turkey by the U.S. for an attack
on Iran. [Mueller delivered Ankara intelligence
"proof" of Iranian backing for Kurdish Workers'
Party (PKK) guerrillas in Turkey. Intelligence agencies and
business intelligence units around the world are now
discounting any intelligence coming from the Bush
administration as neocon propaganda invented by think tanks
and discredited intelligence agencies in Washington, Tel Aviv-Herzliya,
and Jerusalem].
A U.S. Attack on Iran: The Perfect Storm for wider nuclear
conflict
U.S. political and military officials have also approached
Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Jordan, Oman, and Azerbaijan
seeking their support for a U.S. attack on Iran. Ina replay of
the phony pre-war intelligence on Iraq, Washington is trying
to convince various countries that a link exists between Iran
and "Al Qaeda."
Polish intelligence sources report that Poland's Defense
Minister Radek Sikorski assured Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld of Poland's support for any U.S. strike against Iran.
Sikorski is a former American Enterprise Institute colleague
of such neo-cons as Richard Perle, Michael Ledeen, and Lynne
Cheney, the so-called "Second Lady" of the United
States. Sikorski and Polish Foreign Minister Stefan Meller
assured Rumsfeld and Rice, respectively, that Poland would
stand by the United States during the split in NATO that will
occur as a result of the American strike. Polish intelligence
sources, who are unhappy with the arrangement of the new
right-wing government in Warsaw with the Bush administration,
leaked the information about the recent U.S. demarche to NATO
in Brussels about preparation for the attack.
Similar intelligence "leaks" about the U.S. attack
plans were also leaked to the German magazine Der Spiegel.
European intelligence sources also report that the recent
decision by Putin and Russia's state-owned Gazprom natural gas
company to cut supplied of natural gas to Ukraine was a clear
warning by Putin to nations like Ukraine, Poland, Romania,
Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Moldova, France,
Austria, Italy, Hungary, Bosnia, Serbia, and Germany that it
would do the same if they support the U.S. attack on Iran.
Gazprom natural gas is supplied, via pipelines in Ukraine,
from Russia and Turkmenistan to countries in Eastern and
Western Europe. The Bush administration charged Russia with
using gas supplies as a "political tool."
Putin has additional leverage on Western Europe since former
German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder accepted an appointment to
the board of a joint Russian-German North European Gas
Pipeline Consortium that is controlled by Gazprom. The
pipeline will bring Russian gas to Scandinavia, Germany,
Netherlands, and Britain, giving Putin additional leverage
over Washington in Europe.
Southeast Asian intelligence sources report that Burma's
(Myanmar's) recent abrupt decision to move its capital from
Rangoon (Yangon) to remote Pyinmana, 200 miles to the north,
is a result of Chinese intelligence warnings to its Burmese
allies about the effects of radiation resulting from a U.S.
conventional or tactical nuclear attack on Iranian nuclear
facilities. There is concern that a series of attacks on
Iranian nuclear installations will create a Chernobyl-like
radioactive cloud that would be caught up in monsoon weather
in the Indian Ocean.
Rangoon (Yangon) capital moved 200 miles north over fears of
monsoon season Iran nuclear fallout?
Low-lying Rangoon lies in the path of monsoon rains that would
continue to carry radioactive fallout from Iran over South and
Southeast Asia between May and October. Coastal Indian Ocean
cities like Rangoon, Dhaka, Calcutta, Mumbai, Chennai, and
Colombo would be affected by the radioactive fallout more than
higher elevation cities since humidity intensifies the effects
of the fallout. Thousands of government workers were given
only two days' notice to pack up and leave Rangoon for the
higher (and dryer) mountainous Pyinmana.
In neighboring West Bengal, the leftist government and its
national leftist allies around the country are planning
massive demonstrations during Bush's upcoming trip to India.
They are protesting the war in Iraq as well as the threats
against Iran.
Reports from Yemen indicate that western oil companies are
concerned about U.S. intentions in Iran since the southern
Arabian country catches the edge of the monsoon rains that
could contain radioactive fallout from an attack, endangering
their workers in the country.
The Bush administration aborted last minute plans to attack
Iranian nuclear and political installations prior to the 2004
presidential election. On October 9, Rumsfeld met with defense
minister colleagues on the now decommissioned USS John F.
Kennedy in the Persian Gulf to seek support for the attack.
That meeting has been confirmed by the Danish Defense Minister
who was in attendance, however, the topic of the meeting was
not discussed. According to U.S. naval personnel on board the
Kennedy, a special "war room" was set up to
coordinate the attack. Britain, Australia, Italy, Netherlands,
and Japan did not attend the meeting because of their
opposition to the attack plans.
Intelligence and military officials around the world are also
bracing for the results of a U.S. attack on Iran. This
includes the distinct possibility of a major Shia retaliatory
attack in Iraq, the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,
Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, and Afghanistan
against U.S. military, diplomatic, and economic targets in the
region. Radioactive fallout from a conventional or tactical
nuclear attack on Iran will result in major problems with
Pakistan, India, China, Russia, Japan, and other downwind
countries in Asia and the Pacific Rim, possibly including the
fall of the Pervez Musharraf government in Pakistan and
replacement by a radical Islamist regime having possession of
nuclear weapons. That would provoke a military response from
nuclear power India.
In a counter-attack, Iran would immediately launch its Shahab
I and II missiles at the U.S. Green Zone in Baghdad, the Al
Udeid airbase in Qatar, the US Navy base in Bahrain, Camp Doha
base in Kuwait, Al Seeb airbase in Oman, Baghdad International
Airport, the U.S. base in Kandahar, Afghanistan. Iran would
also launch its long-range Shahab III missiles on the Israeli
cities of Tel Aviv, Haifa, Beersheba, Eilat, and the Israeli
nuclear complex at Dimona. Iranian missiles would also be
launched at US naval ships in the Persian Gulf and oil
installations in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
The virtual end of NATO as a viable defense organization may
also result from an attack that will drive a final wedge
between Washington and Europe. And China may elect to respond
financially and militarily against the United States since
Iran is China's second largest source of imported Middle East
oil after Saudi Arabia and plans to use an Iranian terminal
for the export of natural gas from Turkmenistan. [China now
imports 60 percent of its oil needs, and Iran represents 17
percent of those imports].
Russia recently participated in, through the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization (SCO), a three-way military exercise
(code named "Indira 2005") between Russia, China,
and India to prepare for any new U.S. power projections in
Asia, including an attack on Iran, a prospective SCO member.
Last August, Russia and China held their first-ever joint
land-sea-air military exercises.
Iran also held a large military exercise in early December in
Bandar Abbas on the Gulf. An Iranian C-130 carrying Iranian
journalists from Mehrabad airport to Bandar to cover the
exercise crashed into a Tehran apartment building on December
6, killing at least 116 people, including 68 journalists.
Within the U.S. military and across the globe, there is
heightened tension about the intentions of the neocon Bush
administration and its allies in Israel.
http://waynemadsenreport.com/
Today, 11:07 AM
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