I...I.Feel your pain...Or...GEE YA THINK YA GETTIN IT YET???

PatPatriot · May 29, 2004

Saudi TV features denunciations of terror
Bakersfield Californian ^ | 5/29/04 | AP- Riyadh

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) - Saudi state television turned to interviewing everyone from children to intellectuals to try to rally citizens against terrorism as it reported Saturday on the latest outburst of extremist violence in the kingdom.

Suspected Islamic militants fired inside two office compounds in the oil city of Khobar, 250 miles northeast of Riyadh, Saturday morning, killing at least 10 people before taking dozens of hostages at a luxury resort.

As the hostage standoff continued into the night, Saudi TV's last newscast of the day included brief interviews with six men, apparently security officers, injured in Khobar. They all denounced the attacks and said they were wounded doing their national duty - protecting the country.

Since car bomb attacks that killed 35 people, including nine suicide bombers, at three Riyadh compounds housing foreigners last year, Saudi Arabia has launched public relations campaign aimed at discouraging Saudis from offering any kind of support to extremists.

It has also led to an unprecedented public discussion in Saudi Arabia about whether the austere version of Islam expounded in the kingdom might contribute to extremist violence.

On Saturday, Saudi television broadcast patriotic anthems and interviewed a number of Saudis and foreigners living here, who all denounced the latest attacks. The citizens called upon the government to deal with the militants firmly, with some calling the perpetrators the "deviant bunch," one of the labels Saudi authorities have used to describe militants. The interviews appeared with the caption "The Street Pulse."

Children were also interviewed, and many described the attacks as "terrorism."

On an hour-long talk show aired Saturday, intellectuals called upon the nation to stand up to terrorists.
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[This message was edited by Patriot on May 30, 2004 at 02:58 AM.]

[This message was edited by Patriot on May 30, 2004 at 03:02 AM.]

wilheim · May 29, 2004

All as a result of Bush aggression in Iraq. He is breeding more terrorists by his outrageous foreign policy. The whole middle east is getting closer to blowing up every day. Afganistan is escalating four troops killed today, Pakistan is testing nuclear ballistic missles, Libya was cought recieving nuke reactor materiel from Turkey. Israel is killing Arabs every day. Take a good look.

wil.

PatPatriot · May 29, 2004

Oh...Oh so you mean they didn't hate us before???...This is all new?...what happened on 9/11 was an aboration that could not and would not happen again???...It happened from in action.
4 soliders getting killed their is better than innosesne being slaughtered here.

Isralis killed terrorist not Arabs today, get that straight.
The good news is the dumb shit Saudis are starting to see who the enemy is...finally after all these years....it the wac pots they help and let breed.

wilheim · May 30, 2004

Colombo Bay sounds like it might be a novel by Joseph Conrad. It is instead a story by Richard Pollak about his voyage from Hong Kong to New York on a container ship named the Colombo Bay, which indeed stopped at the capital of Sri Lanka. The Colombo Bay also reveals just how badly the real war on terror has been compromised by the Iraq war.

We've all seen railroad flatcars loaded with freight-truck containers. These are carried to ports and loaded on thousands of container ships, which carry them around the world. The Colombo Bay carries more than 3,000 such containers, and it is not the largest of the container ships.

These vast ships are the tramp steamers of our era. They travel from port to port at speeds of 22 knots, unloading some containers and picking up other containers. Their turnaround times are much less leisurely than in Conrad's era, although the similarity to his stories is striking. Container ships have become the lifeblood of global trade and have added a trillion dollars to the U.S. annual business inventory. We couldn't do without them.

But think of the possibility for terrorists in those 3,000 containers on The Colombo Bay. When it docked off New York, the crew discovered that the seal had been broken on a container that carried missile warheads manufactured in Germany and shipped by rail to a French port for transit to the Raytheon Corp. The French authorities had broken the seal to inspect the contents and (with characteristic French efficiency) had placed a makeshift lock on the container and made no annotations on the shipping papers.

The Coast Guard spent two days clearing the container. Pollak comments that the Coast Guard's equipment is obsolescent (helicopters 20 years old) and its computers a generation behind -- and unable to communicate with the computers of the FBI, CIA and INS. Terrorists would have seen that a proper seal was on one of their containers.

Pollak adds that in 2003, Sen. Ernest Hollings, author of the Maritime Transportation Security Act, requested $1 billion for the Coast Guard for port security as an amendment to the $87 billion appropriation for the war in Iraq. The amendment was rejected. It was a classic example of how the administration's distraction with Iraq interfered with a critical component of homeland security -- which is not the same thing as President Bush's Frankenstein monster Department of Homeland Security.

The president talks about homeland security but, under the malign influence of the vice president and the ''neo-con'' intellectuals, he has made the war in Iraq a substitute for the real war on terrorism. Almost three years after the World Trade Center attack, O'Hare Airport does not have the equipment necessary to inspect checked luggage because the Transportation Safety Administration does not have the money to pay for the equipment.

But $25 billion more is going to his criminal war. The public still gives the president high marks on his success in the war on terror, mostly because they are judging by the war in Afghanistan and the early success in Iraq. However, our airports and our seaports are still not safe. How many more years will it take?

And how many years to straighten out the messes at the FBI and the CIA? A recent estimate was six years. When will that start?

Thus, despite all the talk about security during the years since the bombing of the World Trade Center, very little has been done to improve the security of our republic, other than talk. The majority of Americans expect another attack. They are wise to do so.

Because the terrorists will almost certainly try something before the presidential election, the container ships and airport checked baggage are perfect targets -- and not much better defended than was Logan Airport in September 2001. Think of a ''dirty" bomb exploded in New York or Long Beach Harbor.

If all the time and money and energy expended on finding ''weapons of mass destruction'' and capturing Saddam Hussein had been spent on protecting this country by measures besides harassing air travelers, the country would be much safer.

Chicago Times.

PatPatriot · May 30, 2004

"Unfortunately, Kerry is not offering a clear alternative or anything really original," Pena said. "It's a lot of recycled Clinton-era stuff, and we need a new and different foreign policy in the 21st Century and post-9/11 world."

"There is not a huge difference on Iraq," Michael O'Hanlon, national security analyst at the Brookings Institution said by e-mail. "There is not a huge difference on using military force and intelligence in the war on terror.

"There is not yet a big difference on homeland security policy as best I can tell," he added. "There is not yet even a huge difference on policy towards the Islamic world, though Kerry would be more engaged in the Arab-Israeli negotiations."

wilheim · May 30, 2004

Thus, despite all the talk about security during the years since the bombing of the World Trade Center, very little has been done to improve the security of our republic, other than talk. The majority of Americans expect another attack. They are wise to do so

You missed some. wil.

PatPatriot · May 30, 2004

Don't worry will I do less editing than most...lol.

Oceans11 · May 30, 2004

Eyewitness reports from Saudi city

BBC News Online users have been e-mailing in with accounts of the violence in Khobar, eastern Saudi Arabia.
One resident of the Oasis compound, who hid in a cupboard and phoned relatives in the US from her mobile phone, gave a graphic account of events there on Saturday.

Her brother-in-law, Oliver Alabaster, told BBC News Online: "She awoke to see black-hooded men enter a house across the street. She then saw her neighbour run out (of) the back door, and then saw her shot in the legs.

"Now the gunmen are holed up in the house next to hers, and there is continued gunfire between the attackers and the security forces.

I heard five or six shots and saw a couple of guys fall over in the distance - I thought I'd better get out of there

Colin Hewetson
expatriate

Send us your comments
"Her greatest fear is that there may be more militants roaming the compound, that bullets could penetrate the walls where she is hiding, and that they could shoot their way into her house."

British expatriate Colin Hewetson told BBC News Online he saw some of the violence as he drove to work on Saturday morning.

"I heard five or six shots and saw a couple of guys fall over in the distance," he said. "I thought I'd better get out of there, so I turned around and headed back to my compound."

"The light armoured personnel carriers, which normally patrol the area, were dashing all over the place. Soldiers were fanning out around the building and closing off access on both sides of the dual carriageway."

'Devastating'

Ali, another Khobar resident who was driving to work, saw police in a car shooting at gunmen in another vehicle.

"They both exchanged heavy firing and then (I saw the gunmen) throw a bag containing a man's body and run away," he wrote.

They went into the company offices and fired around randomly

Ali H
"I was shocked seeing firing for the first time in my life. This is totally devastating for me."

Ali H, from London, received a call from his father, who lives on the compound.

"The gunmen went into my father's neighbour's flat, a Sudanese guy, and asked him where the Americans were. He didn't know and they left him unharmed," Ali said.

"They went into the company offices, in the compound, and fired around randomly, then escaped."

Hostages

Expatriate Diana Ras-Rongen was sitting outside her home when she heard gunshots. When a hostage-taking was reported she became worried about a Dutch couple living in the Oasis compound.

"My neighbour called them to ask if there was a hostage situation going on and they said they were actually the hostages!" she wrote in her e-mail.

"The other residents of the compound were brought to a safe location where soldiers are protecting them."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3760475.stm

kayaman+ · May 30, 2004

Why don't conservs get it? Force against force doesn't work when your enemy believes he gets a free ticket to heaven if he dies fighting you.

PatPatriot · May 30, 2004

Kaya... with that logic that means we should all be under the control of the Japenese

How did that kamikaze thing work out for them??

wilheim · May 30, 2004

The kamikaze or Divine Wind strategy was a last ditch effort by Japan to stave off swelling American fleets from reaching their homeland. Japon never used the tactic until October of 1944 when it became clear that the air force had become ineffective. Lack of experienced pilots and materiel for maintenance convinced Jap brass that their planes would be more effective as bombs. They did some damage and had a very profound psychological effect on US forces in the Pacific. Had the tactic been used early in the war there is no telling what might have happened.

wil.

American · May 30, 2004

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote">quote:<HR>Originally posted by kaya man:
Why don't conservs get it? Force against force doesn't work when your enemy believes he gets a free ticket to heaven if he dies fighting you.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

You actually think these scumbags are invincible. I completely disagree. Sooner or later we're going to get down to the ones who don't want to die. In the mean time, evil needs to be confronted with a different kind of evil, and that's what we'll be doing.

American · May 30, 2004

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote">quote:<HR>Originally posted by wilheim:
The kamikaze or Divine Wind strategy was a last ditch effort by Japan to stave off swelling American fleets from reaching their homeland. Japon never used the tactic until October of 1944 when it became clear that the air force had become ineffective. Lack of experienced pilots and materiel for maintenance convinced Jap brass that their planes would be more effective as bombs. They did some damage and had a very profound psychological effect on US forces in the Pacific. Had the tactic been used early in the war there is no telling what might have happened.

wil.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

They would have run out of planes and pilots a little sooner, nothing more in my opinion.

wilheim · May 30, 2004

American - I don't know how much you know about WW2 but if Japan had embarked on a Muslim like suicidal strategy from the beginning there is a very good chance that Midway would never have happened, and a negotiated peace between Japan and the US may have ensued in late 1942 or early 1943. Japan never wanted to invade the US. they only wanted to be left alone to carry out it's plan for a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. One where colonial powers that had dominated the region for centuries were expelled, and replaced by Japanese rule.

wil.

American · May 30, 2004

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote">quote:<HR>Originally posted by wilheim:
American - I don't know how much you know about WW2 but if Japan had embarked on a Muslim like suicidal strategy from the beginning there is a very good chance that Midway would never have happened, and a negotiated peace between Japan and the US may have ensued in late 1942 or early 1943. Japan never wanted to invade the US. they only wanted to be left alone to carry out it's plan for a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. One where colonial powers that had dominated the region for centuries were expelled, and replaced by Japanese rule.

wil.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

FDR and then Truman insisted on unconditional surrender, as Japan wanted to surrender for the better part of the last year of the war, but didn't want to do so "unconditionally."

I don't believe kamakazees would have resulted in a negociated peace 18 months after Pearl Harbor.

American · May 30, 2004

As far as radical Muslims being willing to die in their fight against evil America, AMERICA has a million that are willing to die fighting also. Don't forget that.

This suicide mystique is not an edge for these radical idiots. They don't actually become suicide attackers until they kill themselves. After they kill themselves, they're just plain dead.

If suicide attackers or kamakazees is such a superior tactic, why isn't a nation of such people ruling the world?

[This message was edited by American on May 31, 2004 at 02:07 AM.]

[This message was edited by American on May 31, 2004 at 02:08 AM.]

wilheim · May 30, 2004

I am not saying that tactic has to be succesful, but it is effective for radical fundamentalists. As far as WW2 goes the climate would have been very different in 1942 had certain battles gone differently. However arguing about what might have been is a waste of time. The war played out like it did and that is that. Today's suicide bomber caused fatalities are just another example of the poor strategic planning by the Bush administration.

wil.

American · May 31, 2004

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote">quote:<HR>Originally posted by wilheim:
I am not saying that tactic has to be succesful, but it is effective for radical fundamentalists.
wil.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Suicide attacks and hitting "soft" targets are just about the only moves they have. It doesn't take much to walk into a grocery store or a hotel and start shooting people, and it can't be stopped. It's not going to win any wars, though.

xpanda · May 31, 2004

These guys have hated you long before Bush. I'd say the extreme hatred began during the Reagan years ... the thing is, you've got a handful of admin people now who are throwbacks to this era. At any rate, this isn't going to go away, you can't just 'erase' the violent jihadist's hatred against you with a happy go lucky foreign policy. Not at this point. But certainly putting your own in the line of fire is irresponsible, don't you think? Why make it worse? Does Bush actually welcome a clash of civilisations? Seems to me he does.

PatPatriot · May 31, 2004

X...True....How do you avoid it?...I think its inevitible...Ireally think its a clash of the radical mideast.and the moderate progressive mideast as much as anything except now the moderate mideast now has to confront it wether they want to or not.
...you think once the kids of the mideast get a taste of nintendo their going to want to live like a flintstone everyday...I don't think so.