U.S. Navy: Iran prepares suicide bomb boats in Gulf

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

U.S. Navy: Iran prepares suicide bomb boats in Gulf

By Warda Al-Jawahiry

MANAMA | Sun Feb 12, 2012 4:42pm EST

(Reuters) - Iran has built up its naval forces in the Gulf and prepared boats that could be used in suicide attacks, but the U.S. Navy can prevent it from blocking the Strait of Hormuz, the commander of U.S. naval forces in the region said on Sunday.

Iran has made a series of threats in recent weeks to disrupt shipping in the Gulf or strike U.S. forces in retaliation if its oil trade is shut down by sanctions, or if its disputed nuclear program comes under attack.

"They have increased the number of submarines ... they increased the number of fast attack craft," Vice Admiral Mark Fox told reporters. "Some of the small boats have been outfitted with a large warhead that could be used as a suicide explosive device. The Iranians have a large mine inventory."

"We have watched with interest their development of long range rockets and short, medium and long range ballistic missiles and of course ... the development of their nuclear program," Fox, who heads the U.S. Fifth Fleet, said at a briefing on the fleet's base in the Gulf state of Bahrain.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/12/us-gulf-usa-iran-idUSTRE81B0V220120212

[quakerboy]

1. I wonder if its cheaper

over, say, 25 years, to go to war with Iran, or to put a solar panel on every roof in the US?

[krispos42]

4. Yeah, but solar panels don't get the blood pumping and live coverage on cable news. n/t

[quakerboy]

5. We can build them

so that there is a random chance they will suddenly detach from the roof, slide down, and decapitate people. Problem solved.

[krispos42]

6. Mmmm... hmmm. Can we somehow tie "Fear Factor" into this?

Can the solar panels be on a giant spinning wheel and covered with ejaculate and spiders?

[quakerboy]

8. As long as we build them

and stop needing to import so damn much oil(which we end up having to kill for), I am fine with that.

[BiggJawn]

2. Each one loaded with Weapons of Mass Distraction...

Fool me once, shame on you...
Fool me twice...

[provis99]

3. the Iranians obviously learned the lessons of Millenium Challenge 2002.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millenium_Challenge

The US Navy didn't.

[krispos42]

7. Yikes.

Just... yikes.

[bemildred]

9. Not this shit again. nt

[yahp]

10. Extremely important but off-topic!

Hey, new user here.

Apologies for being entirely off-topic, but I'm kinda baffled by the board layout. I couldn't find related topics that were still allowing replies - and it won't let me post a new thread until I've replied to others (how many times?)!

Frustrating!

Perhaps just this once, someone could forgive the faux pas, and re-post this in the appropriate place...?

Thanks!


****

Fascinating article from the Asia Times, Feb 11 2012:

9/11 Revisited: Was Saudi Arabia involved?

At 9:37 Eastern Daylight Time on September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 77 slammed into the western side of the Pentagon, killing all 59 passengers and 125 others in the building. News of the crash went global within minutes; yet another symbol of American power was ablaze. For the few still struggling to believe that the United States was under attack, doubt evaporated like the bodies of the many dead.

Conspiracists have puzzled for a decade over the failure to intercept the aircraft - or indeed, take even the elementary step of phoning the Pentagon to warn them of the approach. But only recently has wider attention been paid to the failure of the Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA's) Bin Laden unit to tell anyone that "muscle" hijackers, Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, were in the country.

The chairman of the 9/11 Commission, Thomas Keane, is now on record [1] as calling this "one of the most troubling aspects of our entire report". How is it that, despite having known for several months about al-Midhar and al-Hazmi, nobody at Alec Station saw fit to mention them to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the counter-terrorism policy board in Washington, Immigration or the Defense Department?

The Bin Laden Issue Station - codenamed Alec by insiders such as US Army Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer - was the CIA unit dedicated to reporting on al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and militants in Afghanistan. It was this unit that had called on authorities in Malaysia to monitor the Kuala Lumpur "terror summit" at which plans for 9/11 were probably finalized. Both al-Midhar and al-Hazmi were at that meeting.

Accounts differ as to exactly when the CIA became aware of the hijackers' presence in America. But specific orders were issued not to share the information: Doug Miller, an FBI agent loaned to the Bin Laden unit, was among those who received the instructions. In his book Pretext for War, author James Bamford quotes another FBI agent loaned to Alec: "[T]hey didn't want the bureau meddling in their business - that's why they didn't tell ... that's why September 11 happened."

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/NB11Ak03.html