Terrorism

The Kirkuk primary begins -- with the assassination of a Sadrist leader.

In other Iraq news, two guys planting a bomb in Mosul blew themselves up.

Poetic justice, right? Sort of. But it reminds me of a day in Baghdad when  some guys who had been firing mortar shells to near where I was were killed when a shell detonated in their tube. I was surprised and a bit taken aback at the glee I felt at this turn of events. An Iraqi I worked with warned me against taking pleasure in such events, saying that by giving way to such feelings we give up some of our humanity. He told me about his brother, a policeman, who had gotten so accustomed to violent death that one day, after collecting body parts at bombed market, swung his official pickup truck by his home for lunch -- only to have his young son, pleased to unexpectedly see his father at midday, jump up into the bed of the police pickup, and land in the parts.

kurdistan/Flickr   

Like I was saying, I think someone in authority might want to pay attention when a disaffected Muslim doctor uses a formal medical lecture at Walter Reed to deliver a talk to his colleagues on the Koran, and concludes, "We love death more then [sic] you love life!"

Did I mention that he also was in e-mail contact with a radical anti-American Islamic cleric?

Will Palmer/Flickr

John McCreary of NightWatch fame answers my question of yesterday about what the Saudi bombing in Yemen (and the Israeli arms interception near Cyprus) might mean:

The significance is that Saudi Arabia is now engaged in counter-insurgency operations.  Tallying the score in the Middle East-south Asian region during the past five years, a Shiite government is in Baghdad, replacing a secular government, but violence is down for now. 

The Taliban in Afghanistan now operate in more than 220 of the 400 districts in Afghanistan, compared to fewer than 30 five years ago. A new Pakistani Taliban movement has sustained insurgency in the Pakistan border regions and spread terror east of the Indus River boundary and threatened to carry it to India.

Iran and North Korea have continued to proliferate weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems. Lebanon has no government. Most Central Asian states have returned to the Russian fold. Western China has become less stable and more unpredictable. Yemen is fighting a low level civil war that has now required Saudi Arabian air force assistance. Iran continues to send arms to its proxies in Lebanon, Gaza, Sudan, Eritrea and Somalia. New Iranian made rockets now held by Hamas in Gaza can reach Tel Aviv, and maybe Dimona. Iran's nuclear program continues to expand.

The tally does not look like progress towards stability."

garlandcannon/Flickr

A French official who conducted investigations in Pakistan adds more weight to charges that Pakistani intelligence officers are in bed with the Taliban and even with al Qaeda.

In a new book, What I Could Not Say, to be published next week in France,  Jean-Louis Bruguiere says that he came away with the impression that some Pakistani officials don't even consider al Qaeda to be a terrorist organization, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times. He is quoted as writing, "The central government has lost control of certain elements of the army and the ISI, an intelligence service that no longer has the trust of its foreign partners." French investigators in Pakistan also were physically intimidated, he charges.

Bruguiere now works in Washington on terrorism financing issues, the newspaper said.

(HT to Barnett Rubin)

Kash if/Flickr

My CNAS homie retired Army Col. Bob Killebrew has a good piece in Small Wars Journal on crime and terrorism. As you might expect, the news isn't good. Bob, a longtime mentor of mine, is especially worried by the nexus of drugs, crime and insurgency, and their effect on the way we live: "the explosion of the illicit economy, the merger of crime and terrorism, and their reach inside our borders, have added a new and possibly more imminent challenge to our safety -- not only at the national level, but on our streets."

Rich Man/Flickr

Two small military actions in recent days intrigue me. First, the Israelis intercepted in the Mediterranean what they described as a shipload of weapons headed to Hezbollah. Then the Saudis bombed Yemeni rebels. I don't know quite what it all means...

DrJimiGlide/Flickr

In the new issue of the New York Review of Books, Joost Hilterman of the International Crisis Group offers a good summary of why he thinks the coming year will be a turbulent one in Iraq. I think he is right -- and that 2010 will stand alongside 2003 and 2007 as a turning point. In short,

...just as Odierno will be pulling out his first combat brigades, starting in March, Iraq will be entering into a period of fractious wrangling over the formation of a new government. If Iraqi national forces fail to impose their control, an absence of political leadership could thus coincide with a collapse in security; if politicians and their allied militias resort to violence, the state, including its intelligence apparatus so critical for maintaining internal stability, could fracture along political, ethnic, and sectarian lines."

Fasten your seat belts. Meanwhile, here is a bunch of headlines from this morning:

• Bomb wounds 4 civilians in Baghdad
  November 4, 2009 - 10:37:30

• 4 wounded in 3rd explosion in Baghdad
  November 4, 2009 - 09:03:50

• 2nd sticky bomb in Baghdad wounds 5 people
  November 4, 2009 - 08:22:02

• 3 wanted men nabbed in Wassit
  November 4, 2009 - 08:07:17

• Sticky bomb injures 7 people in western Baghdad
  November 4, 2009 - 07:33:56

Bfelice/flickr

I think we all tend to criticize too much and praise too little, especially with public officials. So I was impressed today to see proven provider John McCreary, who has forgotten more about intelligence than I will ever know, commend Hillary Clinton for her sharp comments in Pakistan yesterday:

"The US secretary of state questioned Pakistan's commitment to the fight against al-Qaida, saying she found it hard to believe that no-one in the Pakistan government knows where senior figures are hiding.

"I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn't get them if they really wanted to," she told a group of newspaper editors during a meeting in the city of Lahore on Thursday.

Bravo for Secretary Clinton.  Either the Pakistani security services contain senior officers who know where bin Laden is and are lying or they are incompetent and ought to be dismissed. There are no other explanations for Pakistan having become the headquarters for al Qaida and the base area for international Islamic terrorism.

‘Nuff said.

AAMIR QURESHI/AFP/Getty Images