EXCLUSIVE/ Two independent sources told EurActiv.com that the US has
started transferring nuclear weapons stationed in Turkey to Romania,
against the background of worsening relations between Washington and
Ankara.
According to one of the sources, the transfer has been very challenging in technical and political terms.
“It’s not easy to move 20+ nukes,” said the source, on conditions of anonymity.
According to a recent report by the Simson Center,
since the Cold War, some 50 US tactical nuclear weapons have been
stationed at Turkey’s Incirlik air base, approximately 100 kilometres
from the Syrian border.
During the failed coup in Turkey in July, Incirlik’s power was cut,
and the Turkish government prohibited US aircraft from flying in or out.
Eventually, the base commander was arrested and implicated in the coup.
Whether the US could have maintained control of the weapons in the
event of a protracted civil conflict in Turkey is an unanswerable
question, the report says.
Another source told EurActiv.com that the US-Turkey relations had
deteriorated so much following the coup that Washington no longer
trusted Ankara to host the weapons. The American weapons are being moved
to the Deveselu air base in Romania, the source said.
Deveselu, near the city of Caracal, is the new home of the US missile shield, which has infuriated Russia.
The Romanians are denying the story. And of course, no one else is confirming it.
According to practice dating from the Cold War, leaked information
regarding the presence of US nuclear weapons on European soil has never
been officially confirmed. It is, however, public knowledge that
Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Italy host US nuclear weapons.
From Israel's perspective, anything that gets nuclear weapons away from Turkey is good for the Jews.
Is NATO clearing the way for an Iranian attack on Israel?
A reporter for Turkey's Hurriyet daily raises the possibility that the withdrawal by the United States and Germany of their Patriot missile batteries from Turkey will actually clear the way for an Iranian attack on Israel.
What was stationed in Kurecik was an early-warning missile detection
and tracking radar system. Its mission is to provide U.S. naval assets
in the Mediterranean with early warning and tracking information in case
of an Iranian missile launch that might target an ally or a friendly
country, including Israel. So, a six-battery Patriot shield to protect
the NATO radar in Kurecik against possible Iranian aggression was
necessary. And that explains why the Iranians went mad about Kurecik and
openly threatened to hit it.
NATO and Turkish officials have always denied any link between the
Patriot missiles and the NATO radar in Turkey. They have often pointed
out that the Patriot batteries were stationed in the provinces of Adana,
Kahramanmaras and Gaziantep, while Kurecik was in nearby Malatya
province. But the Patriot is a road-mobile system: It can be dismantled
easily and re-deployed in another area in a matter of hours (the road
distance between Kurecik and Kahramanmaras is a mere 200 kilometers, or
124 miles).
Clearly, Iran did not go mad and threaten to hit all NATO
installations in Turkey because it wanted 3.5 million Turkish citizens
to die from the chemical warhead of a Syrian missile. It went mad and
threatened because it viewed the defensive NATO assets in Turkey as a
threat to its offensive missile capabilities, which the Patriots could
potentially neutralize.
Why, otherwise, would a country feel "threatened" and threaten others
with starting a "world war" just because a bunch of defensive systems
are deployed in a neighboring country? Iran did so because it views the
NATO radar in Turkey as an asset that could counter any missile attack
on Israel; and the Patriots as hostile elements because they would
protect that radar. In a way, Iran's reaction to the NATO assets in
Turkey revealed its intentions to attack.
It could be a total coincidence that the U.S. and Germany (most
likely to be followed by Spain) have decided to pull their Patriot
batteries and troops from Turkey shortly after agreeing to a nuclear
deal with Iran. But if it is a coincidence, it is a very suspicious one.
In theory, the Patriot systems were deployed in Turkey in order to
protect the NATO ally from missile threats from Syrian President Bashar
al-Assad's regime. Right? Right.
Assad's regime is still alive in Damascus and it has the same missile
arsenal it had in 2013. Moreover, Turkey's cold war with Assad's Syria
is worse than it was in 2013, with Ankara systematically supporting
every opposition group and openly declaring that it is pushing for
Assad's downfall. Why were Assad's missiles a threat to Turkey two and a
half years ago, but are not today?
On my first trip to Israel, in 1972, my father z"l (of blessed memory) took our family on a tour that started in Tel Aviv and ended in Eilat. On the way, we passed what you see pictured at the top. The guide told us that we were not to tell anyone what we saw there (all we did was drive past it) and that he would not tell us what it is. My father told me at the time that it was 'obviously' a nuclear reactor.
As you might recall, last month, the Obama administration made public for the first time that Israel is a nuclear power. Yes, we've all known that for 40-50 years (or thought we did), but the Obama administration made it official. They did so by releasing some - but not all - of the US documents relating to what may have been one of the greatest intelligence failures in US history: the failure to realize that Israel was becoming a nuclear power until it was too late to stop it.
Those documents have now been reviewed and a fascinating summary of them appears here. Here are a few short paragraphs from a very long and fascinating story.
So how did Washington finally discover Dimona, and why was the attitude
one of great concern? The story that we reconstruct here, which is based
upon newly unearthed, hitherto obscure primary sources, is still
incomplete and fragmentary. Much of the record is still classified at
the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, not only in State
Department files but also in the records of the Atomic Energy
Commission. Indeed, over 100 documents from 1960-61 still remain
classified at NARA until a pending declassification request sets them
free. Yet, based on the available declassified record, it is possible to
tell a fascinating story, much of which is novel.
The first report that Israel was secretly building a large nuclear
reactor with French assistance came to the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv
through an American source. In late July 1960, David Anderson, an
employee of American Machine and Foundry Atomics—the company that
installed the Atoms for Peace reactor at Nachal Soreq—informed U.S.
Embassy officials that he had heard that French personnel were
constructing “a 60 megawatt atomic power reactor” in the Beersheba area.
His source was an Israeli oil company director who told Anderson that
the French nationals were working on a project described to him as “gas
cooled power reactor capable of producing approximately 60 megawatts of
electrical power.” Anderson’s understanding was that the project had
been underway for “about two years,” with the completion date two years
off. This report is the first and earliest available U.S. document that
makes explicit reference to the Dimona project as it was actually
underway.
When the U.S intelligence community got wind of the
embassy report, it took time to digest it; U.S. officials realized that
more information was needed, given that they had no independent sources
to corroborate the report. The CIA formulated a list of questions about
French-Israeli collaboration, including the organizations involved in
the project, reactor specifications and plans for spent fuel, e.g.,
whether the Israelis were building a chemical separation plant. Only in
October 1960 did the State Department send the CIA questions as an
“Instruction” to the U.S. embassy in Israel, with the embassy in Paris
and the U.S. mission to the IAEA also receiving copies. The request for
information did not get high priority; it had a “Routine collection
priority.”
...
In early January 1960, Ambassador Reid brought these questions up in
another meeting with Ben-Gurion. The telegram itself remains classified,
but a summary is available. The essence of the matter, according to
Ben-Gurion, was that: (1) Israel “has no plans for producing nuclear
weapons”; (2) Israel had no plutonium, but “as far as we know” returning
the plutonium produced by the reactor was a “condition” imposed by the
country (France) that sold the uranium; and (3) it would not accept IAEA
inspection, especially if Russians were involved, or international
safeguards “until all reactors are treated as equals.” The implication
was that Israel would not accept international safeguards and
inspections until they applied to every reactor around the world.
Ben-Gurion, however, did allow for the possibility of visits by
representatives of “friendly power,” an offer that the incoming Kennedy
administration would pursue. How State Department officials interpreted
these statements remains unknown, but they probably saw the answer about
nuclear weapons as evasive.
More answers would come from the
French, who asserted that plutonium produced in the reactor would be
returned to France, that France and Israel had agreed that the reactor
was for “exclusively peaceful use” and that French inspectors would be
visiting the reactor. Yet what mechanisms were in place to assure that
the French took the plutonium and to assure that Israel kept its pledges
remained unclear.
Sometime in late January 1961, days after
John F. Kennedy was sworn in, the U.S. Joint Atomic Energy Intelligence
Committee prepared a “post-mortem” study on the SNIE on Dimona. This
document is one of the most intriguing documents in the collection. Its
aim was to explain why the U.S. intelligence community had failed to
detect in real time the Israeli nuclear project, and, indeed, how late
it was in making that determination. It provides an account of what was
known, and when, about the Israeli nuclear program, concluding that
Washington might have seen through Israeli “secrecy or deception” and
better understood Israeli intentions at least a year earlier if the
“atomic energy intelligence community had properly interpreted” the
available information. In essence, the overall conclusion was that the
root cause of the delay was not so much the absence of information as
that some important reports and items of information had been lost in
the shuffle and the dots not properly connected.
As the
classification of this document is only “secret,” and the document is
relatively brief and deliberately vague about the intelligence means and
sources employed in the final determination (e.g., it does not refer
explicitly to the U-2 flights), it is quite possible that the
intelligence community had more sensitive information that it excluded
from this version of the post-mortem or that a more thorough report on
the subject existed with higher classification.
Ultimately, the
challenge of Dimona was too big for Eisenhower to resolve; it had to
fall in the lap of his newly elected successor. Ben-Gurion would tell
Kennedy the very same cover story and make sure that U.S. visitors to
Dimona learned very little. Israel continued to refuse IAEA safeguards
on Dimona. And Washington would discover that France had little power to
ensure that Israeli kept its promises.
Obama's revenge continues - exposes Israel's nuke program
Did you ever have a kid throw a tantrum and just start throwing things around your house? That's what Barack Hussein Obama is doing. He's having a tantrum and he's throwing around pieces of the US-Israel relationship.
The mainstream media has largely missed it, but early last month, the Obama administration exposed details about Israel's nuclear program. The details were part of a 1987 report on the nuclear capabilities of Israel and the NATO countries. But Israel - and only Israel - has been exposed.
[T]he Pentagon early last month quietly declassified a Department of
Defense top-secret document detailing Israel's nuclear program, a highly
covert topic that Israel has never formally announced to avoid a
regional nuclear arms race, and which the US until now has respected by
remaining silent.
But by publishing the declassified document from 1987, the US
reportedly breached the silent agreement to keep quiet on Israel's
nuclear powers for the first time ever, detailing the nuclear program in
great depth.
The timing of the revelation is highly suspect, given that it came as tensions spiraled out of control between
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and US President Barack Obama ahead
of Netanyahu's March 3 address in Congress, in which he warned against
the dangers of Iran's nuclear program and how the deal being formed on
that program leaves the Islamic regime with nuclear breakout
capabilities.
Another highly suspicious aspect of the document is that while the
Pentagon saw fit to declassify sections on Israel's sensitive nuclear
program, it kept sections on Italy, France, West Germany and other NATO
countries classified, with those sections blocked out in the document.
The 386-page report entitled "Critical Technological Assessment
in Israel and NATO Nations" gives a detailed description of how Israel
advanced its military technology and developed its nuclear
infrastructure and research in the 1970s and 1980s.
Israel is "developing the kind of codes which will enable them to
make hydrogen bombs. That is, codes which detail fission and fusion
processes on a microscopic and macroscopic level," reveals the report,
stating that in the 1980s Israelis were reaching the ability to create
bombs considered a thousand times more powerful than atom bombs.
The revelation marks a first in which the US published in a document a description of how Israel attained hydrogen bombs.
The report also notes research laboratories in Israel "are equivalent
to our Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore and Oak Ridge
National Laboratories," the key labs in developing America's nuclear
arsenal.
Israel's nuclear infrastructure is "an almost exact parallel of the
capability currently existing at our National Laboratories," it adds.
"As far as nuclear technology is concerned the Israelis are
roughly where the U.S. was in the fission weapon field in about 1955 to
1960," the report reveals, noting a time frame just after America tested
its first hydrogen bomb.
Institute for Defense Analysis, a federally funded agency operating under the Pentagon, penned the report back in 1987.
Obama's term cannot come to an end soon enough. What a despicable piece of dirt.
Turkey - led by President Hussein Obama's best friend forever - is refusing to collaborate with the United States against the Islamic State terror organization (Hat Tip: Joshua I). But Obama is loyal to Recep Tayyip Erdogan - unlike his attitude toward the United States' real allies. Instead of punishing Turkey for its obstinence, within 24 hours of Turkey's refusal to join, US Secretary of State John Kerry was in Ankara meeting with Erdogan.
After a two-and-a-half hour meeting, the pair emerged to announce
that they had decided to cooperate “against all terrorist movements in
the region,” rather than just against IS.
The announcement, which was brief and contained almost no details,
was a signal that Turkey and America will not permit an open rift over
Turkey’s reluctance to join the US-led coalition. Instead, Turkey and
the US will continue to help the Syrian opposition and to share
intelligence. Neither of these developments should come as a surprise.
The compromise is considerably less than the US had hoped for at the
beginning of the week.
Thursday’s conference of Arab nations and the
United States in Jeddah marked the point when it became clear that
Turkey - even though it is the only NATO member in the region - would
not be a full member of the coalition. For some observers the
realization brought home claims made earlier this week by Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen that Turkey and Qatar were neither definite friends nor enemies, but ‘frenemies’.
The Turkish delegation seems to have had the package of US military
measures unveiled to them in Jeddah. But when Turkey’s foreign minister,
Mevlut Cavusoglu, phoned home for further instructions, he was told not
to sign.
...
Sabah, a newspaper close to the Erdogan government outlined what it
says is the “partial support” that Turkey will give the US-led
coalition; humanitarian assistance, intelligence, and border security.
On the face of it, this package adds little or nothing particularly
new. Work is already well underway in all three areas. Turkey is a
refuge for around one million Syrian refugees and it now recognises that
it needs to prepare its borders against possible incursions from
IS-occupied areas. Turkish forces are also doing what they can to make
the highly porous frontier between Syria and Turkey and between Turkey
and Iraq more secure, although with a border stretching more than 820 km
with Syria and 350-km border with Iraq this is an extremely difficult
task.
Quite apart from a sense of comradery with Sunni activists in Syria
and Iraq, Turkey’s hands are also tied by another issue that hung over
the talks.
As long as 49 Turkish hostages, diplomats, family and staff from the
consulate-general, are being held in Mosul by IS, Turkey cannot take
strong moves against the militants without endangering the lives of the
captives.
While this consideration was not been openly stated, it was brought
up immediately by Turkish officials, who began discussing the problem
immediately after their country failed to sign the Jeddah communiqué on
Thursday.
...
It is possible that Turkey is clandestinely providing more support to
the anti-IS alliance than it openly admits. Indeed, there are claims
that US drones from Incirlik air-base are taking part in strikes on
Iraq, but there has so far been no confirmation of this and if Kerry has
extracted assistance of this sort, there was no hint of it today.
Instead, for the time being, the US and Turkey seem mainly to have
agreed to paper over the cracks in a difficult relationship.
In a Saturday editorial, the Wall Street Journal said that Turkey is not a US ally and that the US ought to move its airbase out of Incirlik. Incirlik is less than 100 miles from Turkey's border with Syria.
US daily The Wall Street Journal has claimed in its editorial
on Saturday that it is the "unavoidable conclusion" that the US needs
to find a better regional ally to fight the self-proclaimed Islamic
State (ISIL) than Turkey, suggesting that the air base Turkey is
currently hosting should be moved somewhere else.
Recalling Turkey's reluctance in joining the anti-ISIL coalition, the
editorial said not only will Ankara take no military action, it will
also forbid the US from using the US air base in İncirlik—located fewer
than 100 miles from the Syrian border—to conduct air strikes against the
terrorists.
"That will complicate the Pentagon's logistical and reconnaissance
challenges, especially for a campaign that's supposed to take years," it
added.
The newspaper said the US military will no doubt find work-arounds
for its air campaign, just as it did in 2003 when Turkey also refused
requests to let the US launch attacks on Iraq from its soil in order to
depose Saddam Hussein. It said Turkey shares a 910-km border with Syria
and Iraq, meaning it could have made a more-than-symbolic contribution
to a campaign against ISIL.
The daily described it as a "reality" that the Turkish government, a
member of NATO, long ago stopped acting like an ally of the US or a
friend of the West. The editorial quoted former US Ambassador to Turkey,
Francis Ricciardone, who said this week that the Turkish government
"frankly worked" with the al-Nusrah Front—the al Qaeda affiliate in
Syria—along with other terrorist groups. It claimed that Ankara also
looked the other way as foreign radical groups used Turkey as a transit
point on their way to Syria and Iraq.
The WSJ noted that İncirlik air base has been a home for US forces
for nearly 60 years, but perhaps it's time to consider replacing it with
a new US air base in Kurdish territory in northern Iraq.
Don't expect Obama to listen to that advice. What could go wrong?
In
2011, Israel released
10 Hamas operatives to Turkey as part of the prisoner
exchange that saw Hamas release kidnapped Israel Defense Forces (IDF)
soldier Gilad Shalit. Since then, Hamas men have come and gone. But one thing
is clear: The Hamas members who remain in Turkey are active. They attend local
universities, join Turkish organizations, and play a role in its politics, and also
appear to travel freely into and out of the country.
Take Mahmoud Attoun. In the early morning of Dec. 13, 1992, Attoun and a group
of other Hamas terrorists abducted IDF Sgt. Maj. Nissim Toledano, a 29-year-old father of two
young children, on his walk home from work in the Israeli town of Lod. After his
arrest on June 3, 1993, Attoun, then 23,was
sentenced
to a life term in Israeli prison. He was released in 2011.
Today, Attoun is a rising star within Hamas. He frequently advocates for Hamas
around the region, traveling
to Tunisia this April to speak
with students at the University of Sfax about the Palestinian militant organization.
He appeared on a special program in 2012 on al-Quds TV honoring the
freed Hamas prisoners, where he openly acknowledged his presence in Turkey. Attoun
is also actively involved with the Hikmet Bilim Dostluk ve Yardimlasma Dernegi
(HIKMET), a Turkish
NGO associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, and has spoken
at one of their events.
There is also Taysir Suleiman. The Hamas
operative was convicted of kidnapping and murdering an Israeli soldier in 1993,
and sentenced
to life in prison in Israel's high-security Nafha Prison in the Negev Desert. In
2011, he was also shipped abroad in the Shalit deal; today, he openly notes on
his Facebook
profile that he lives in Istanbul, and he appeared alongside Hamas political
bureau leader Khaled Meshaal in a video dated March 2012
in the city. That same summer, he traveled to Southeast Asia and Tunisia,
where he presented
slide shows to students about the al-Qassam Brigades. In October 2013, Suleiman
was featured in an
hour-long special on the al-Quds TV station
celebrating his release from Israeli prison.
Along with Arouri, Suleiman,
and Attoun, there appear to be at least nine other Hamas figures
living in Turkey, based on open-source information. None of them were identified
by the Israelis in the alleged plot to overthrow Abbas in the West Bank.
However, given that the plot was allegedly
hatched out of Turkey, the presence of Arouri and the otherHamas figures prompt some troubling questions about Erdogan's pro-Hamas
policies.
Read the whole thing. And keep in mind that Erdogan is President Hussein Obama's best friend forever.... What could go wrong?
Surprise (not): Former Generals say we can do without the Jordan Valley
In an earlier post, I told you that I believe that what Israel really needs for its security is the mountainous areas of Samaria and not the Jordan Valley. A group of former IDF Generals has now confirmed that. Well, sort of confirmed that.
The retired
generals, all members of the Council for Peace and Security, cast doubt on the
claim that the Jordan Valley is today an essential strategic
asset.
Maj.-Gen. (res.) Shlomo Brom, former director of the Strategic
Planning Division of the General Staff and a senior researcher at the Institute
for National Security Studies, called for “leaving the slogans behind” and a
purely strategic discussion of the consequence of leaving the Jordan
Valley.
Classic military threats from the east, characterized by an
invasion of organized Arab armies, vanished by the early 1980s, he argued, and
in recent years, “the reality has changed completely.”
Iraq as a military
power has disintegrated, and it will take “many years” before it can reappear on
the military map.
The threat of an Iraqi task force moving through Jordan
to attack Israel is nonexistent.
“There are no Iranian army divisions
threatening us. Iran does not have the ability to project ground-based military
power,” Brom said.
“It bought some Russian tanks, but most of its
investment is in surface to surface missiles, its navy, and its nuclear
program,” he added.
The Gulf Arab states are in a form of partnership
with Israel, and Jordan itself has an interest in maintaining a strategic
partnership with Israel that goes beyond the peace treaty, Brom said. Syria may
have thought of using Jordan as a staging ground to strike at Israel in the
past, but this threat is gone, too.
At the same time, Brom said, the IDF
has been at the forefront of a revolution allowing it to observe and strike
targets at a distance like never before.
He stressed the rapidly changing
nature of firepower and maneuvering, the introduction of long-range, standoff
weapons available to a range of platforms, and intelligence capabilities that
allow Israel to observe developing threats in real time; meaning that a future
threat can be dealt with differently.
“This changes the way of thinking,”
Brom said.
Asked about the threat of Jordan becoming a failed state, allowing
hostile military or terrorist forces to transit through it towards Israel, Brom
said that in such a scenario, the whole of Jordan would become a
battlefield.
Developing threats should be struck well before they reach
the Jordan Valley, he added. “It [the Valley] is today an artificial strategic
asset,” he said.
“My impression is that even [Prime Minister Binyamin]
Netanyahu and [Defense Minister Moshe] Ya’alon understand this.”
What about the Philadelphi corridor scenario of weapons smuggling? Denial ain't just a river in Egypt.
The
second type of threat inherent in leaving the Jordan Valley centers on the
possibility that it will turn into a second Philadelphi Corridor, like that on
the border between Gaza and Sinai, under which countless weapons have been
smuggled into the Strip. Not only weapons might cross the Jordan Valley, but
also “information and terrorists as well,” Brom warned.
This can be
answered through the introduction of a third party, a reliable military force
like NATO, to staff border passages, and to respond to intrusions along the
border in between the passages. As for the border areas between passages, Brom
envisaged a gradual process, in which Israel would first control the border,
then international forces, and finally, after years, Palestinian forces would
control their own border, after Israel becomes convinced that they are capable
and willing to do so.
“In the first years, Israel must be there to see
what is happening. If things works out, it can relinquish control to a
third party,” he added.
“If you look at who staffs border passages, who
is there? Police and customs, not military. Customs finds smuggled
goods,” Brom said. A reliable third party wouldn’t endanger itself or fight, and
Israel can monitor events through surveillance, he added. “This has to be done
correctly. If entities like NATO take part, it will underline the international
commitment to border security.”
Just like EUBAM maintained security in the Philadelphi corridor and ran away as soon as Hamas arrived. International forces are mostly useless in this region. If anything, they're a hindrance because they become human shields.
The Council for Peace and Security is a Leftist organization with an agenda. They're at least partly right about the Jordan Valley but aren't even being asked about maintaining the high ground of Samaria - which is much more important.
Turkey’s western allies look puzzled by a
looming decision by Ankara to select Chinese long-range anti-missile
and air defense systems which they think cannot be integrated into the
NATO-sponsored early warning architecture currently deployed on Turkish
soil. “That would certainly leave many of us speechless,” said one
senior diplomat from a NATO country. “Turkey has every right to choose
its own air defense system but we do not quite understand the logic of
opting for a Chinese system with no interoperability with the existing
[NATO] assets.” A NATO ally defense attaché in Ankara said that
deploying a Chinese air defense system to protect Turkish airspace could
have political repercussions. “Questioning Turkey’s geopolitical
trajectory would then be legitimate,” he said.
It's now been three weeks since Prime Minister Netanyahu was suckered into apologizing to Turkey's Islamist dictator, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, by President Hussein Obama. So far, all indications are that Netanyahu was suckered.
Diplomatic relations between Israel and Turkey have not been restored, and are unlikely to be restored for the foreseeable future. That's because Erdogan is insisting that Israel fully lift its blockade of Gaza before Turkey restores its ambassador to Israel, and Israel cannot do so without endangering its security (Hat Tip: Joshua I).
Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Saturday that Turkey will not send an envoy
to Israel -- as part of a recent move for normalization of ties between
countries after an Israeli apology for a deadly naval raid -- before
the blockade on the Gaza Strip is lifted.
Erdoğan reiterated Turkey's
stance on the issue and said Israel must lift the blockade before a full
restoration of diplomatic ties can take place, including the return of a
Turkish envoy to the Israeli capital.
Turkey, Tunisia and Egypt rejected plans to hold a meeting of NATO’s
Mediterranean Dialogue group, Turkey’s Hurriyet Daily News reported on Saturday.
Israel is one of the Dialogue group’s seven member-nations.
The
Mediterranean Dialogue group for Foreign Ministers – which also includes
Algeria, Jordan, Mauritania and Morocco – has not met since 2008, according to
Hurriyet.
A Turkish official told Hurriyet that the meetings had not been
held because of political problems between Israel and Arab
member-nations.
Israel’s Prime Minister’s Office had no
comment.
That apology sure accomplished a lot, didn't it? Bibi, we've been had.
'Without Israel, Cyprus and Saudi Arabia are toast'
Defense strategist Mark Langfan argues that the United States isn't doing Israel any favors by declaring it a 'major strategic ally.' Langfan argues that if Israel were not where it is, the continued independent existence of Cyprus, Saudi Arabia and possibly even Greece could be endangered.
"Without Israel, Cyprus and Saudi Arabia are toast," Langfan told Arutz Sheva, "and they know it."
"Without Israel, oil would be $1,000 a barrel. Without Israel, the US
would have to fund an extra $200 billion yearly defense budget to
defend southern NATO countries from a Muslim caliphate's northward
tsunami."
Following reports of an AIPAC initiative to secure special "strategic
ally" status for Israel, Middle East security analyst Langfan said,
"Without Israel’s order of battle and very existence, it would be
impossible for NATO to defend Greece, let alone Cyprus, from a
Turkish/Muslim Brotherhood tidal wave which would lay waste to
everything in the eastern Mediterranean.
Whether NATO likes it or not,
Israel is a now the heart and soul of NATO’s southeastern flank.”
Langfan also noted that Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan issued a
direct threat on NATO when he warned on September 27, 2011, "I recommend
the international community take the necessary lessons from the Battle
of Preveza.”
The Battle of Preveza was a 1538 decisive Turkish/Ottoman naval battle against a Papal “Holy League” Pan-Christian Alliance.
“NATO and the entire EU now have an absolute vested interest against
the establishment of an autonomous Palestinian state in the 'West
Bank,'" Langfan added. "It has become abundantly clear that if such a
state was in existence Hamas would smuggle in thousands of Katyusha
rockets with chemical warheads that have the power to wipe out the
entire Tel Aviv coastal plain that holds 5 million Jews – in one
evening."
If you're wondering why President Hussein Obama is willing to 'go nuclear' to have the anti-Semite Chuck Hagel confirmed as Secretary of Defense, Mark Langfan has the answer: Hagel is one of the authors of a 2009 report calling for US troops to 'keep the peace' in the 'West Bank,' and Obama wants him to implement it.
I will let Hagel’s 2009 “recommendations” speak for themselves. But
to lend a note of rationality, Florence Gaub, a NATO researcher, in 2010
published a NATO Research paper outlining some of the problems of such a
deployment. (I.e. it would need about 60,000 US/Nato troops and about
160 billion Dollars over 10 years) I and I will excerpt her report as
well.
Obama’s determination in confirming Hagel is based on
Obama’s belief that Hagel will cripple Israel at any price: including
the deaths of thousands of US soldiers at the hands of Hamas suicide
bombs in the Palestinian Authority.
...
Florence Gaub’s NATO College real analysis exposes Hagel’s US
“peacekeeping” “recommendation” for the US defense policy fraud it is.
Based on Hagel’s sheer hate of Israel, and without a whit of real
thinking, Hagel would have had Obama commit the greatest US defense
error in US history bringing the deaths of thousands of US soldiers, and
the destruction of Israel, America’s anchor in the Middle East and
Eastern Mediterranean.
Can anyone imagine the depraved analysis
Hagel has been spewing while, at this very moment, he is currently the
“Co-Chair” of Obama’s “President Intelligence Advisory Board” (“PIAB”)?
In
fact, Obama specifically nominated Hagel as Co-Chair of the PIAB as
reward for Hagel’s 2009 insane Middle East “recommendations.” No wonder
Obama’s policy has enabled Iran’s nuke program, and betrayed all our
historic allies. “Hagel” and “Intelligence” are mutually exclusive
terms. For 3 years, Obama has seen Hagel prove himself to be a
useful-idiot who will dance to any Kill-Israel tune Obama plays for
him.
So, in conclusion, Obama will do anything and everything to
get Hagel confirmed because Obama knows Hagel, and only Hagel, hates
Israel enough to sacrifice 1000s of US soldiers in body bags, and dumb
enough to gladly blow 160 Billion US dollars, we don’t have, in order to
grossly cripple, or perhaps even destroy Israel.
The authors of the 2009 report are Zbigniew Brzezinski, Chuck Hagel, Lee H. Hamilton, Carla Hills, Nancy Kassebaum-Baker, Thomas R. Pickering, Brent Scowcroft, Theodore C. Sorensen, Paul A. Volcker and James D. Wolfensohn.
I covered the report's original release at some length here.
Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan said his country is opposed to NATO's initiative to
include Israeli in the joining of its ranks, the Turkish newspaper
Hurriyet reported. Erdogan said "as far as we are concerned, we are
unwilling to be a part of NATO so long as Israel is a part of the
organization."
About a month and a half ago, a diplomatic source reported that
Turkey removed the veto it placed on the security cooperation between
NATO and Israel.
“It is not the Apocalypse if they do not let us in the E.U.,” Mr.
Erdogan told reporters during a visit to Budapest on Wednesday, as he
launched his latest broadside against the Union’s alleged delaying
tactics to keep his country out.
His remarks followed a news
conference earlier this week in Prague, where Mr. Erdogan described the
delay in granting membership to Turkey as “unforgivable.”
These
and similar expressions of frustration have come as Turkey approaches
the 50th anniversary of an agreement with what was then the European
Economic Community, which was to have led to eventual full membership in
the bloc.
Mr. Erdogan set the tone in a television interview last
month in which he accused the E.U. of dragging its feet because Turkey
was an Islamic nation.
As my colleague Andrew Finkel wrote
from Istanbul, the prime minister also “threw the diplomatic equivalent
of a cream pie” into the debate by suggesting Turkey join the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization instead.
Membership of the S.C.O., which
groups Russia, China and central Asian states, is not widely viewed as a
viable alternative to joining Europe. Andrew wrote that Mr. Erdogan’s
proposal prompted Turkish columnists to ask whether he might be bluffing
in an attempt to put pressure on the Europeans.
...
Washington has suggested that Turkish membership in the S.C.O., a
security organization viewed as an anti-American bulwark in Central
Asia, might be problematic in view of the Turkish role in N.A.T.O.
“Obviously
it would be interesting, given the fact that Turkey is also a N.A.T.O.
member,” Victoria Nuland, the State Department spokeswoman, said last week.
Turks
are frustrated not only by delays in the membership process, he told
Rendezvous, but also by the draconian visa regulations they face when
traveling to Europe. Potshots aimed at Turkey by European critics were
also deeply offensive to Turks, he said.
“But joining the E.U. is
not rocket science,” he added, emphasizing that Turkey had to meet the
requirements of the club if it wanted to join. This would include making
domestic reforms and changing its policy on Cyprus, an E.U. state that
it refuses to recognize.
Notice that the EU doesn't demand that Turkey end the occupation, but only that it recognize Cyprus. If they were really to declare it over, I wonder whether Germany would try to deport the thousands of Turks who live in Germany. Visa requirements? I would guess that most Germans believe that they're not strict enough.
But don't expect these 'negotiations' to break off anytime soon. No one wants to be the first to delcare it over. And as to NATO... I have to wonder why Turkey is still there at all.
On Sunday, I reported based on Israeli media that Israel was going to be allowed to participate in NATO exercises in exchange for Turkey obtaining Patriot missiles for deployment along its border with Syria. But the Turkish media is telling a different story, and according to that story, Israel will largely continue to be excluded from NATO activities at the Turks' behest (Hat Tip: Joshua I).
To solve the emerging rift between NATO
allies, Rasmussen introduced a new formula within the organization.
Israel joined the Mediterranean Dialogue initiative in 1995 with
Morocco, Mauritania, Tunisia and Egypt. Later on, Jordan and Algeria
were also accepted.
Tit-for-tat vetoes between NATO allies over the agreements for next
years exercises have prevented any cooperation that may assist in the
integration of NATO partner states, some of whom have experienced
dramatic shifts in the Arab Spring, further into the international
community.
Deciding that such a deadlock would harm NATO's reliability in the
eyes of its partners in the Mediterranean Dialogue group, Rasmussen has
begun a new initiative to limit Israeli participation in NATO exercises
to only dialogue programs such as seminars and workshops held by the
alliance, isolating it from military operations. Sources also added that
Israel would be barred from participating in workshops or seminars that
are to take place inside Turkey.
“The countries supporting Israel have realized Turkey's
determination, they see that their reprisal is of no use and it is only
slowing down NATO activities. And with the recent decision from the
secretary-general, Turkey has acquired what it wanted,” the diplomatic
sources claimed.
Turkey has also denied any link with the Patriot missiles, as was reported by Israeli media.
The officials said the approval had come as Turkey’s
request that NATO station Patriot missile batteries along its border with Syria
was granted, leading them to assess that NATO was using the deployment as
leverage to induce Ankara to thaw its relations with Israel.
Turkey, a
full NATO member, has been opposed to increasing Israel’s participation within
the military alliance as ties between the two countries deteriorated, according
to NATO officials.
Israel is a NATO partner and has accordingly
participated in seminars, exercises and training as part of that status. But
over the course of the past year, as new NATO activities were planned for
cooperating countries such as Israel, Turkey objected to their going forward,
according to Israeli sources.
NATO is a consensus-based organization
where any one of its 28 full members can veto a proposal, though often
opposition is conveyed through informal channels.
However, as Turkey’s
request for the Patriot systems was approved by NATO and deployment began, a
NATO work plan for 2013 that would include Israeli participation in a range of
courses and conferences went through.
Israeli officials don’t think the
timing was a coincidence.
“At the last minute – and I think it was
dependent on the Patriots – it was approved,” said one Israeli official,
speaking on condition of anonymity.
No comment yet from the 'Tzipi Livni party' in the face of this additional proof that Israel does not face international isolation.
More great news: NATO says it has plans in place to protect Turkey from Syria
Isn't this just great? An organization that's a Cold War anachronism has plans in place to protect a country that joined it under very different circumstances against the consequences of an Islamist uprising against a dictator that's been neglected by the West to the point of going really bad.
The head of NATO said on Tuesday the military alliance has plans in place to defend Turkey against attack from Syria if needed.
"We
have all necessary plans in place to protect and defend Turkey if
necessary," NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen told reporters
before a meeting of the alliance's defense ministers in Brussels.
And while they're at it, NATO could end up protecting Turkey against its own Kurdish rebels.
Turkey's Dogan news agency said some 25 warplanes had been sent to a
military base in Diyarbakir, the largest city in the southeast, and
reported military sources as saying this was in connection with Syria
and cross-border anti-terror operations.
It said a large number of
F-16 fighter planes landed at the base on Monday afternoon. Local
sources confirmed there was heightened activity at the base but said
this was related to operations against Kurdish militant bases in
northern Iraq, not Syria.
Turkey may have been less-than-honest with NATO regarding its F-4 reconnaissance jet that was downed by Syria, and it may yet suffer the consequences (Hat Tip: Joshua I).
Confusion about what happened to a military jet that went missing off the Syrian coast on June 22 has already sparked criticism at home towards the government for the way it has handled its process of investigation. But the ramifications may not be solely domestic as the confusion also puts Turkey’s international credibility, including within NATO -- which rushed to express solidarity with Ankara after the incident -- at stake.
In a statement on Wednesday, the military signaled revision in its version of the events, referring for the first time to the RF-4E Phantom that went missing as “our aircraft that Syrian authorities have claimed to have downed.” This means the plane may not have been downed by Syria at all and that it may have crashed into the water as a result of malfunction or piloting error or – assuming that the Syrians did attack the plane – faulty maneuvering while trying to escape from attack.
Soon after the jet went missing over the Mediterranean, Turkey said the aircraft was shot down by the Syrian forces with a missile in international airspace, calling it a “hostile act.” Ankara then summoned an emergency meeting of NATO under Article 4 of the alliance’s charter, which allows a NATO ally to request such NATO consultation if it feels its territorial integrity or security has been threatened.
“If it turns out that the Turks, who were among the first members of the North Atlantic Alliance, were less than honest with their NATO partners, it is going to put a major strain on the relations,” wrote Steven A. Cook, a Hasib J. Sabbagh senior fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, although he said this cannot be the case because Turkey “would never risk its status within the alliance.”
But even in the event that there was no deliberate attempt to hide facts from NATO allies, the way the government has handled the process still raises questions of trustworthiness. “Of course this risks Turkey’s credibility,” said Duygu Sezer, a professor of international relations at Doğuş University, commenting on the confusion that emerged after the military statement.
She said the Turkish authorities acted “hastily and on incomplete information” but also questioned the position of the United States, NATO’s biggest power, which she said is very unlikely not to have detailed information on the incident because of its impressive naval presence in the region. “It is out of the question for the US to not to have information on any incident unfolding in the Mediterranean,” she said. “I believe the Americans have all the information about the incident and find it confusing that they were completely silent when it was taken to NATO.”
Speaking after NATO’s emergency talks on June 26 in Brussels, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen condemned Syria for shooting down the Turkish jet and declared that the alliance was in solidarity with Turkey.
They're starting to sound like the little boy that cried wolf aren't they? Heh.
How's that Russian re-set going Barack? Russians say Turkish plane on NATO spy mission
Russia is claiming that a Turkish F-4 that was shot down by Syria last month was on a NATO spy mission (Hat Tip: IMRA).
Chairman of the Social Council at the Russian Defense Ministry, Igor Korotchenko, said that the Turkish aircraft downed in the Syrian territorial waters had violated Syrian airspace on an intelligence mission for the NATO aiming at measuring the capabilities of the Syrian anti-air defenses.
...
Korotchenko said that Russia has documented information on the infiltration of the aircraft which confirm the truth about the aircraft's mission and its crew's orders, adding that the aircraft was destroyed legally as it was within the Syrian airspace.
He said that the aircraft was conducting espionage and photo reconnaissance of important site, and that the Turks didn't anticipate that the Syrian anti-air defenses will be able to down this aircraft due to its high maneuverability and low altitude, expecting it to return safely to base after finishing its mission.
Korotchenko said that Turkish intelligence sought to obtain information about Syria's anti-air defenses for the benefit of NATO, and that the efficiency of these defenses were proven which constitutes a blow to the Turkish air forces due to this failure.
Maybe someone else needs to press that re-set button with the Russians to make it go back to the way it was.
The Turkish government, which moved tanks to the Syrian border after the June 22 incident, says the debris fell in Syrian waters, but maintains its fighter was shot down without warning in international airspace. Ankara also has said the jet was hit too far from Syrian territory to have been engaged by an antiaircraft gun.
Damascus has said it shot down the plane with an antiaircraft battery with an effective range of about 1.5 miles.
"We see no indication that it was shot down by a surface-to-air missile" as Turkey says, said a senior defense official. Officials declined to specify the sources of their information. The senior U.S. defense official cautioned that much remains unknown about the incident.
A Turkish official said he wasn't aware of the American doubts, and reiterated the government's position that a Syrian missile downed the plane in international airspace.
...
The use of antiaircraft fire would suggest the Turkish plane was flying low to the ground, and slowly, U.S. officials said—though Syria said the jet was traveling at 480 miles an hour.
If hit by antiaircraft fire, the jet likely came closer to the Syrian shoreline than Turkey says, U.S. officials said.
...
If the plane had been struck by a missile, a senior military official said, it would be an indication that Damascus had authorized the action. But the use of antiaircraft fire may mean a local commander decided on his own initiative to fire at the Turkish plane, according to officials and analysts.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
