SPECIAL WAR UPDATE MARCH 2003



when war came, the government so feared a deluge of refugees descending on the Karamak border crossing that it built a tent city near the town of al-Ruweishid to contend with the expected crisis. But then something strange happened, something that is happening still.

The exiles who showed up at the border - almost all the exiles who showed up at the border - were coming from a direction nobody had expected. They were coming from the west, from inside Jordan itself. And they were heading east, home to Iraq. According to reports, more than 5,000 of them have to date made this trip

Middle east times march 27 2003

Awe and shock hum, it seems more like Awe and piss them off program, Muslims from all parts of the  Middle east are gathering to fight here not because they love Hussein they hate him, but because they see that the US is clearly wrong we have no right in challenging a nations sovereignty We lost the Vietnam war and had big problems in the Korean war, could it be that we win but get such a beating considering that the Iraqis are outgunned in every sense of the word, the world is watching and their sympathy is with Iraq as more and more innocent people die and we look more and more arrogant. The Rise and fall of the Roman Empire, this Empire is already crumbling. This regime keeps forgetting the financial weapon of treasury bonds the Muslims and many Asian nations have against us. Russian Muslims are now joining in the battle, if all these nations sell their treasury holdings, the US will plunge into the worst depression ever, we will literally implode. The financial assets of this country are in the hands of foreigners we might have guns but they have the financial power to render guns almost useless

THE ROVING EYE
Jihad in Mesopotamia
By Pepe Escobar

RUWEISHED, eastern Jordan - Saddam Hussein has called on Iraqi television for a jihad against the Anglo-American invasion of his country. And the jihad is already on. Saddam's complex amalgam of militantly secular Arab leader, devout believer and bold warrior of Islam is now total. From the depths of his bunker-cum-television studio, Saddam is promising to deliver hell: widespread jihad, urban guerrilla, man-to-man fighting in each and every Iraqi city. The Pentagon may underestimate Saddam at its own peril.

George W Bush personalized this war. Saddam played along, taking it to the battleground of the world, and especially Arab public opinion. Saddam has seized on his unique chance to be seen in many parts of the world, even though he might be detested, to be fighting a neocolonialist war, and to be seen in the Arab world as the only leader with enough courage to stand up to the superpower. Carefully calibrating his latest speech, drawing from a wealth of poetic resources in the Arabic language, and tapping on deep Arab and Muslim resentment against the United States, Saddam is also increasingly sounding like Osama bin Laden - who ironically despised the Iraqi leader as an infidel 

Middle east times march 27^th 2003 Pakistani and Afghan sources tell Asia Times Online that thousands of Arab-Afghan mujahideen have already deployed around Baghdad and Mosul preparing suicide commando - or "martyrdom" - operations against the invasion, as well as 2,500 Hezbollah from Lebanon. About 700 Algerian volunteers who received weapons training in Iraqi camps are also at hand. The mujahideen will fight to the death because they are all convinced that the occupation of Iraq is the springboard for further occupation of other Arab and Muslim nations. But it is impossible to confirm for the time being assertions by different sources that key al-Qaeda operatives have also entered Iraq through Iranian Kurdistan.

All mujahideen are given official approval from the regime to enter Iraqi territory. They are "unilaterals" - not linked with the Ba'ath Party structure - and are developing their own independent strategies. These separate commandos of Ansar al-Islam, Hezbollah, Algerians and Afghan-Arabs will be instrumental in boosting Saddam's master plan of a protracted jihad-cum-guerrilla war. As the scholars of the al-Azhar Islamic University in Cairo - the Vatican of the Sunni Muslim world and the leading university in the Islamic world - have already made clear, this is a defensive jihad, and absolutely legal from the point of view of Islamic jurisprudence. About 12,000 students at al-Azhar have been chanting "Baghdad don't surrender" for two days now.

More warriors from all parts of the Muslim world are joining and the radicals have now joined to them death is nothing, you cannot win against these type of people, go back to the Vietnam war,  we lost there fighting a people that we outgunned completely, what was it that made them win, passion and the Iraqi’s now have it also, they are not fighting for the murderer Hussein but for their country and they will fight to the end, we cannot kill them all. The longer this wars goes on the more credibility the US loses and the faster it will force Russia and either china  to team up or find some other nations to team up with. Russia and Ukraine can easily supply all the middle east with weapons and they have some incredible weapon the MIG 31 Jet is a formidable jet, one of the best jets in the world, you can bet if the Iraqi’s had these  one or two air craft carriers would be history plus the US would not be advancing so fast. I take no sides most the time I just call it as I see, and as I see it we are wrong, because if we are talking about an axis of evil why did  or have we not attacked so many of the African countries  who have dictators, how about Rwanda where 800,000 people were slaughtered in one month yes you read it right and the atrocities Mugabe I Zimbabwe is committing, because there is nothing of value of there.

Full story http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EC26Ak06.html

( middle east time march 27 2003)

The stunning results of the elections that took place recently in Algeria, Bahrain, Morocco, Pakistan and Turkey are indicative of public mood in the Islamic world and an eye-opener to the Islamic movement leadership of other countries.Results of all five elections saw opposition Islamist groups either win outright or achieve significant gains. The biggest victory was by the Justice and Development Party in Turkey, giving it a parliamentary majority and control of the next government. In Bahrain, the Islamic parties won 24 of the 40 seats in the 80-member Parliament (the king appoints the other 40 members). In Pakistan, Islamic parties scored big victories in two of the four national provinces.

In Algeria, the municipal elections saw the Islah and other Islamic parties hold their ground behind the resurgent National Liberation Front. In Morocco, as the governing coalition maintained control of Parliament, the Islamist Justice and Development Party made the biggest gains.

Full story  http://www.milligazette.com/Archives/01122002/0112200267.htm

There seems to be a free for all to attack Arab countries and secure oil assets as conqueror's booty. US secretary of defence has already declared that what Israel conquered in a war, is its own in perpetuity. The so-called occupied territory and all its resources are for Israel to keep. A French Jewish commentator, Laurent Murawiec, appearing in a Pentagon committee, had openly urged US to attack Saudi Arabia, usurp all its oil fields, and confiscate its bank assets in all countries of the world. All, in punishment for not having allowed its territory to be used by the US on its planned war on Iraq.  Full  story http://www.milligazette.com/Archives/01092002/0109200292.htm

A coalition of weakness
The recently renamed "Coalition to Disarm Iraq" is Washington's only opportunity to salvage a semblance of international legitimacy for war. A closer look at the coalition shows that the majority of the nations provide little diplomatic or economic strength or troops and many countries have human rights records that rival Saddam Hussein's. (Mar 27 2003 Asia  times)  full story  http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EC28Ak01.html

US furious with Turkey over stalled overflight permission: officials WASHINGTON, MARCH 21 The United States is "furious" with Turkey over continued delays in opening Turkish airspace to US warplanes as the war against Iraq prepares to enter a key phase, senior officials said Friday.

The officials, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, accused the Turkish government and its powerful military of "obstructionism" and said Ankara was severely testing Washington's goodwill.

"Everyone is just furious at the Turks today,"  full story

http://www.metimes.com/2K3/issue2003-12/methaus.htm

Iraq war means new Naqba
URI AVNERY

A journalist asked me, after we published a warning to this effect in his paper: "Why do you think that Sharon may exploit the American attack on Iraq in order to carry out transfer in the occupied territories? Aren't you crying wolf?"

I could have given him the list of quotations from members of the present government, who openly advocate the mass expulsion of Palestinians. I could have cited rumors. I could have told him that a creeping transfer is going on all the time, by making the life of the inhabitants intolerable through wholesale destruction of homes, closure, curfew and starvation. But I preferred to tell him about some occurrences to which I have been an eye-witness in the past.

In 1967, after the Israeli army had conquered the West Bank, the writer Amos Kenan, who was a soldier serving in the Latrun area, gave me a report about what he had seen. (I was at the time a member of the Knesset and the editor of Haolam Hazeh news magazine.)

In the shocking report Kenan described how the inhabitants of four villages in the Latrun area had been evicted from their homes. Men, women, children and old people had been forced to walk, in the stifling heat of over 30 degrees Celsius, towards Ramallah – a distance of 30 kilometers (19 miles). Immediately afterwards, the army destroyed the houses.

Full story http://www.metimes.com/2K3/issue2003-12/methaus.htm

Sharon has only one interest in mind right now to advance Israel’s interest as much as he can. We are in dangerous times.

Bus owners refuse to rent out to US Army
By Saeed Albayyat
Saudi Gazette Staff
DAMMAM
TRANSPORT companies in the Eastern Province are rejecting lucrative offers by the US Army to rent their buses and trucks for use in the aggression against Iraq.

Representatives of transport companies said that the US Army was keeping negotiations open through brokers but that there would be no change in their ? firm and unanimous? stand.

The US Army has offered monthly rents of up to SR30,000 per bus and SR12,000 per truck, the representatives said. One of the army?s conditions for hiring buses was that the drivers should not be Saudis. There are about 1,000 buses (total investment over SR300 million) operating in the Eastern Province   (  Saudi gazette march 27 2003)

It shows that there is a universal hatred for what we are doing and that the longer this war lasts the more the hatred will go and the more Hussein will be viewed as a martyr even though he is far from it and the  royal families and kings from Saudi to Jordan could get their butts royally kicked.

One battle, two stories: Differing TV images feed Arab, US viewers
By John Donnelly
and Anne Barnard
The Boston Globe
THE Arab world sees pictures of bloodied bodies of young children. They watch scenes crowded with corpses, including gruesome images of dead American soldiers.
Americans see almost none of that. Their view of the war in Iraq, through television and print, is dominated by long-distance photos of bombs going off in Baghdad and intimate battlefield scenes conveyed by reporters who are traveling with US and British soldiers.
The two contrasting visions of this war, one seen by Americans and the other seen in the Mid-east, help to sharpen differences over the conflict, say analysts and diplomats.
?Friends from Syria are sending e-mails to me, asking what are the people in the US telling you about the images of civilian casualties,? said Imad Moustapha, chief of public diplomacy at the Syrian Embassy in Washington. ?My answer to them is very simple and sad: ?Sorry, no one is seeing those images here.??

In the Mid-east, one US diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, spoke of watching CNN and Fox News one minute and Al-Jazeera and Abu Dhabi TV the next, thinking he was watching different battles.

?The Arab world is seeing trips to the hospitals, grieving parents, while the American cable stations and networks are showing the troops in the field,? said the diplomat. ?The trouble is, it is creating different memories of the war, and it will reinforce the anger here about what the US is doing.?  Full story  http://www.okaz.com.sa/SGAZETTE/DATA/2003/3/27/Art_119393.XML

If we truly had a free press here we would be able to see these stories on TV and read them on the news, welcome to reality, you are only free in your dreams and when you wake up, you are in a jail cell that has no physical bars but mental bars.

Over 650 civilians killed

BAGHDAD (Agencies)

HEAVY fighting raged in south and central Iraq Wednesday and at least 15 Iraqi civilians were killed in a Baghdad street by what may have been an errant US missile.

At least 15 people died and many more were injured in an explosion at a busy market place in the northeast of Baghdad that Iraqi officials said was caused by the bomb from the invading forces.

US troops backed by tanks killed 650 Iraqis in the central town of Najaf, a US officer said Wednesday, reporting what appeared to be the most lopsided victory of the Iraq war so far.

About 200 of the deaths were reported around a storage depot that has come under scrutiny as a possible chemical weapons factory, said Major John Altman, intelligence officer of the Third Infantry Division?s First Brigade.

US President George W. Bush praised the ?lethal precision? of American pilots and warned Sadda Full story  m Hussein that his

Full story  http://www.okaz.com.sa/SGAZETTE/DATA/2003/3/27/Art_119385.XML

As we keep killing innocent people,  the world watches, the world becomes further enraged every day.  The Muslim world simmers with hate as they watch their innocent brothers slaughtered mercilessly. We are going to piss the Arabs of so much that they will hate as much as they hate the Israeli’s and with all the killing and force Israel has not been able to stop the suicide bombers, we will be bringing suicide bombers into this country soon at the rate we are going. Just remember that the middle east is different culture a seething cauldron of hate and rage that we don't fully understand and the last thing we should be doing is stepping into this furnace.

SYRIA TIMES

politic

23-3-2003

Ð Press editorials yesterday continued condemning the aggressive war launched by the US and its allies against Iraq, stressing that this war constitutes a violation of the international legitimacy and unanimity.

In Riyadh, Òal-JazeeraÓ daily condemned the US-British aggressive war on Iraq warning the aggressors that they will pay for their irrational act.

The daily asserted that the war which is running on the Arab territories of Iraq has disclosed all masks and violated all human values alleged by those who launch this hostile war.

In Doha, the Qatari daily Òal-WatanÓ asserted that the national demonstrations experienced in the Arab and world cities form a significant message and a pressure on the US resolution to return to the world law.

In Cairo, the Egyptian daily Òal-AhramÓ condemned the barbaric and immoral attack on Iraq asserting that the history will not have mercy on the US President George Bush and his allies, the British and the Spanish Prime Minister and every one, who took part in attacking Iraq and stabbing the international legitimacy and its institutions.

In Abu Dhabi, the UAE daily Òal-KhaleejÓ warned against the ambitions of the Bush-Blair war on Iraq namely the establishment of a colonialist base in the heart of the Arab region.

http://www.teshreen.com/syriatimes/s-su/po009.htm

BAGHDAD: The United States admitted yesterday after a week of war in Iraq that its punishing air strikes on Baghdad might have killed some civilians after 15 people were reported dead in missile attacks in the capital.

The admission came as the death toll from the US-led war aimed at ousting Iraqi President Saddam Hussain climbed, with US troops saying they had killed 1,000 Iraqis near Najaf over the past 72 hours

 Full story http://www.gulf-times.com/

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030328/ap_on_re_mi_ea/war_us_military&cid=716&ncid=716

Russia Military Experts: U.S. and British Officials Play down Death Toll in Iraq

Russian military experts believe that the official statistics on American and British casualties in Iraq is understated.

"Only losses from friendly fire" must have been much more than announced, Colonel-General Valery Mironov, former defence minister and a participant in hostilities in Afghanistan, told a Friday RIA Novosti press conference.

"The strategic influence sector of the Pentagon often presents unilateral information and even brazens misinformation to the public", stressed the general.

In his opinion, "the propaganda component is becoming for the United States and its allies a military means of attaining their goals".

Later on, "the allies' propaganda machine may even form an opinion that the Iraq war is over and the enemy has been defeated", muses General Mironov. "By doing so, they will not cope with all problems and peace will not come to the Iraqi soil very soon", he added.   ( Pravada  Russian paper march 28 2003)

Le Figaro: Coalition Troops Have Committed Hitler’s Mistake

Tactical errors the allied troops committed in the first days of the Iraqi war are a serious problem to the key operation, attack on Baghdad. As France’s influential newspaper Le Figaro reported Thursday, excessive extension of the US/UK troops on the territory of Iraq is their main problem.

The newspaper cited experts from the France Ministry of Defense who required anonymity. They say, the US troops have rushed toward the Iraqi capital and now they are extended for hundreds of kilometers on the territory of the country. Under these conditions, centers of resistance may emerge at the rear of the attacking troops. The French military say if a counter-attack is delivered by Iraqis in the enemy’s rear, some vanguard groups of the US/UK troops will be cut off from their rear formations. Le Figaro mentions that for this very reason the German army was defeated in the Soviet Union in 1941-1942.

At present, the allied troops are far from successful realization of its plans to seize Baghdad, French experts say. They add, the coalition troops didn’t expect resistance of the Iraqi troops would be so stiff. Realization of the US war plan is impeded by the fact that operations are mostly held not in the desert, but close to cities which makes the Iraqi defence more steadfast. Besides, 50 thousand of US soldiers who were planned to attack Iraq from Turkey haven’t got a permission from Ankara on deployment on the Turkish territory. That is why they will be able to reinforce the US army in Iraq only in a week.

The French military think that all troubles the allied troops suffer in Iraq are explained with the haste the Pentagon made when it decided to wage a ground attack without prior air strikes against selected objects on the Iraqi territory. As Le Figaro emphasizes, during the 1991 Desert Storm Americans delivered mass air strikes against the territory of Iraq which made the ground stage of the war operation a success. But this time, the US/UK troops entered the Iraqi territory on the second day of the war.

As a high-ranking French army officer says, the US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld understands that the USA cannot leave Iraq without triumph as it would be treated as humiliation for America. He adds, this is the reason why the Pentagon is persuading the public opinion that the war will be long and will entail considerable losses. ( Pravda  Russian paper March 28, 2003)

/

Washington Can Win the War But Has Already Lost Its Authority"

Elisa Carrio, Argentine presidential candidate, tells PRAVDA.Ru her interesting view on current world events. As anti-war rallies grow bigger, more voices in Latin America rise against the US-led strike on Iraq

"Baghdad can be many places in the world. Baghdad could be you", says Elisa Carrio, a hard woman who runs for president of Argentina without financial resources, but with great confidence. "U.S. has the force, but lacks of authority to head this war" told Carrio to PRAVDA.Ru, as she believes that world protests against the US-led war undermine Washington's symbolic power and could mean a retreat of the imperialist ruling.

Elisa Carrio agrees with the view that the fall of the United Nations means a serious danger for peripheral countries, as without UN institutions they cannot guarantee their territorial integrity and political sovereignty. "Therefore, the task is a joint action to stop the imperial advance of the United States", says Carrio, who is at the head of the local opinion polls, together with three other presidential candidates, for the incoming elections.

"This is the last chance for South America. We have to promote an active alliance with France and Germany against US policies. There is no space for neutrality: It is a matter of principles", says Carrio. But the Argentine politician is not the only voice against the war in Latin America. As anti-war demonstrations fill the streets, almost all the specialists and the largest portion of politicians agree with this view.

Many political leaders and citizens of Latin American countries have expressed their opposition to the US-led war in Iraq, and some warned the war and government support for the war would have serious consequences.  ( full story   http://english.pravda.ru/war/2003/03/27/45139.html

Ausralia: Howard Declines a War Summit

Bush invited Howard and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to attend Camp David talks, but a spokesman for Howard said he thought it best to stay in Australia for the moment.

The Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer will go instead to meet US Secretary of State Colin Powell and other senior administration figures a few days later for talks on the war and emerging humanitarian issues. ( pravada March 28, 2003)

Did American Companies Supply Weapons to Saddam?

The USA is still blaming Russia for illegal weapons supplies to Iraq. US Ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow declared that economic sanctions would be imposed on companies and enterprises supplying weapons to Iraq. However, as a special reporter of GAZETA found out after he read a secret report of the US Department of State, the USA must apply sanctions to its own defense establishments. It was the USA that supplied weapons and special military technique to the countries which George W. Bush’s administration later referred to the “axis of evil”. And these very devices let Iraq deflect bombs and missiles away from military objects, and which causes much harm to the Iraqi civil population. As PRAVDA.Ru earlier reported, it is not ruled out that European and American companies supplied war technologies to Iraq. Now this supposition is confirmed.

If Kornet anti-tank missiles were in Iraq, American troops would have suffered more severe losses during the war (

(FULL STORY  http://english.pravda.ru/war/2003/03/28/45175.html

US Bombs Children's Hospital in Baghdad

One of Baghdad's main children's hospitals was destroyed last night during a bombing raid on suburbs of the Iraqi capital. Fortunately, there were no casualties, as half an hour before the raid all the patients were evacuated to a bomb shelter.

The Iraqi authorities said that the attack on the children's hospital was an international crime for which Britain and the US would 'be held responsible before an international tribunal.'

CHP's Livaneli: This is Bush, oil and arms merchants' war

Opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) Istanbul Deputy and renowned musician Zulfu Livaneli said the ongoing Iraq war was not the war of American people but of Bush, oil and the arms merchants surrounding him.

Addressing lawmakers during the debate on the Culture Ministry's 2003 budget, Livaneli said everybody was deeply grieved while watching the bombardment of Baghdad, emphasizing that this war was the latest example of the war culture.

"This war is the war of Bush, oil and arms merchants. That's why I prefer to call Washington, 'Bushington' and White House, 'Black House' until the Bush administration leaves the latter," Livaneli added.

According to Livaneli, while Washington destroys the legendary city of the Tales of the Arabian Nights and the great culture center with its bombs, it acts no different than the Taleban that destroyed the Buddha sculptures in Bamyan. "Both committed the crime of destroying the world's cultural heritage," he added.

Livaneli suggested that the only way for Mankind to stop these dreadful wars is to prefer a peace culture rather than a war culture.

Ankara - Turkish Daily News

Britain and US at odds over port

The first signs of tension between Britain and America over the rebuilding and running of post-war Iraq have emerged with the award of a $4.8m (£3m) contract to manage the captured port of Umm Qasr.

British forces are determined to engage an Iraqi director and staff to run the country's only deep-water port, which is expected to provide the gateway for humanitarian aid and military supplies.

But the US Agency for International Development has already awarded the contract to Stevedoring Services of America, a Seattle company. The British Army is pressing ahead with its plan to reinstall the man who directed the port before the Allied invasion. Britain sees this as the first big test of the proclaimed Allied intention to ensure that Iraqi resources are used for the benefit of the Iraqi people.  Full story http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=391528

Koreans vow to fight aggressors

    Pyongyang, March 28 (KCNA) -- Many people have visited the victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum with the situation of the Korean Peninsula getting all the more acute due to the reckless military manoeuvres started by the United States and South Korea against the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Lecturers are heroes who performed feats in the Korean War, serving in different services and arms.
    They brief the visitors on the invincible might of the heroic Korean people, who defeated the U.S. invaders for the first time in history. And they speak of the crime-woven history of the United States, which has wrecked peace in all parts of the world by dint of aggression, plunder, destruction and arbitrariness, and the aggressors' crimes in the 3-year Korean War.
    The veterans also give explanations of President Kim Il Sung's Juche-based military ideas, outstanding commanding art, noble virtues and imperishable exploits, and patriotism, mass heroism, lofty spirit and moral traits of the Korean people and servicemen.
    They reveal the aggressive nature of the Iraqi war and condemn the "Foal Eagle" and "reception, staging, onward movement and integration", large-scale war exercises going on in South Korea against the DPRK.
    Hearing their explanations, the visitors are determined to annihilate the U.S. imperialists, the sworn enemy of the Korean people, if they unleash another war in Korea ( Korean news March 28, 2003)

That should give you enough information on what the world thinks of this war. Now that war has begun things will never be the same again, my predictions  are and I hope I am wrong but its hard to see how with the way things are

1)    Terrorism is going to increase instead of decrease

2)    The US is very close to having suicide bombers blow themselves, as a result of this war its inevitable now its just a matter of when and not if they will strike

3)     This war is going to cost way more than what they estimated, since its going to be a long protracted war and the US will have to keep soldiers there to maintain the government they install, so US dollar goes down, Gold goes up and we are heeded for a depression now.

4)    Stock Market will crash the possibility of it going to 4000 is now over 50% and to Dow 2000 is just under 50%

5)    Strongest currencies will be the  NZ, ozzie and dollar, followed by the South African Rand at some point in time the 2.50 rands may equal one dollar, remember at one point it took 13 rands plus to get one dollar.

6)    You know have to start looking for a second back up, country to stay, because we are heading to becoming a Gestapo state.

7)    A second passport will be a necessity soon and no longer just a plain option

When will all this transpire you ask, well it won’t all happen at once, but in stages and at certain point in time it will all just accelerate, most Americans will learn the meaning of a new word