Saturday, June 11, 2011

Missile Strikes Kill and Kill Again

They even kill the same "Al-CIA-Duhs" over and over!

"Key Pakistani militant believed killed by US drone; Suspected of plotting several deadly attacks" by Carlotta Gall, New York Times / June 5, 2011

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — One of Pakistan’s most wanted militant commanders, Ilyas Kashmiri, was killed in an American drone strike in the tribal territory of South Waziristan, residents and a militant active in the area said yesterday. But Pakistani and American officials cautioned that they have not been able to confirm his death.

Kashmiri is considered one of the most dangerous and highly trained Pakistani militants, allied with Al Qaeda. A former member of Pakistan’s special forces, the Special Services Group, Kashmiri was suspected of being behind several attacks, including the May 22 battle at the Mehran naval base in Karachi that deeply embarrassed Pakistani officials. He has also been implicated in the 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai in which at least 163 people were killed, including some American citizens.

What crap.

He was reported to have been killed Friday in a strike on a compound in Laman, near Wana, the main town of South Waziristan. A senior government official in Wana, Atifur Rehman, said the strike killed nine people....

A sharp increase in drone flights over the area had been noticed in the past few days.

A known Taliban militant in Wana contacted by telephone confirmed that Kashmiri had been killed.  

So know the Taliban spokesman is to be believed without question?   

Even though they exaggerate?

But an intelligence official in the capital, Islamabad, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he had not received any independent confirmation of the report. And American officials, who cautioned that previous reports of Kashmiri’s death had turned out to be false, including a Pakistani claim he had died in a drone strike in September 2009, said they were trying to confirm the new reports.

Kashmiri’s death would certainly be welcomed by both American and Pakistani intelligence agencies, and could help alleviate the strained relations between the two countries that have developed in recent months....  

Oh, now we see why this particular bit of propaganda was put out at this time.

The attack on the navy base in Karachi, conducted by half a dozen commando militants, lasted 16 hours before security forces regained control of the base.

Six guys held down a whole base for hours?

Kashmiri, 45, has a long history of waging guerrilla operations. As a Pakistani Army trainer of Afghan mujahedeen fighters, he lost an eye battling Russian forces in Afghanistan in the 1980s. 

Oh, so he WAS an "Al-CIA-Duh" asset! 

Later, while working with Kashmiri militants attacking India, Pakistan’s archrival, he earned renown in Pakistan after escaping from an Indian jail where he had been imprisoned for two years.  

Or was he released?

But he turned against the state when President Pervez Musharraf banned his group after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He was arrested four years later in connection with an attempted assassination of Musharraf in December 2003, but released because of a lack of evidence.  

Definitely an intelligence agency asset.

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Can the AP report from Saturday add anything?

"Al-Qaida militant said killed by US in Pakistan" by Chris Brummitt and Ishtiaq Mehsud Associated Press / June 4, 2011

ISLAMABAD—The purported death of Ilyas Kashmiri -- who also was accused of killing many Pakistanis -- could help soothe US-Pakistan ties that nearly unraveled after the May 2 bin Laden raid. While it was unclear how Kashmiri was tracked, his name was on a list of militants that both countries recently agreed to jointly target as part of measures to restore trust, officials have said.

It also would be a major victory for U.S. intelligence, particularly the controversial CIA-run drone program, which began in 2005 but has been increasingly criticized by the Pakistanis amid rising anti-American sentiment in the country.

Senior U.S. officials in Washington, Islamabad and the Afghan capital, Kabul, said they could not confirm that Kashmiri was killed. Other Pakistani officials also said they couldn't confirm it....

A fax purportedly sent by the militant group he was heading -- Harakat-ul-Jihad al-Islami's feared "313 Brigade" -- confirmed Kashmiri was "martyred" in Friday's 11:15 p.m. strike. It was sent to journalists in Peshawar, and its authenticity could not be independently confirmed. The group, which has not previously communicated with the media, promised revenge against America in the handwritten statement on a white page bearing its name of the group....  

What do you know, ANOTHER INTELLIGENCE AGENCY CREATION! 

They REALLY THINK we are still STOO-PID ENOUGH to believe their lies!

In an ongoing terror trial in Chicago, an admitted American-Pakistani militant has testified that Kashmiri helped plan the Mumbai siege and wanted to attack U.S. defense contractor Lockheed Martin. Kashmiri had been angry over U.S. drone attacks inside Pakistan and wanted to target the company, according to David Coleman Headley.  

He must have hacked them before he died.

Headley, who pleaded guilty to laying the groundwork for the Mumbai attacks, also testified during the trial of his longtime friend Chicago businessman Tahawwur Rana that he worked with Kashmiri to plot the attack against the Danish newspaper. Headley said he traveled to Copenhagen to conduct surveillance. The attack was never carried out and Kashmiri was charged in absentia along with several others in the case.  

No mention of Headley being a U.S. intelligence agent, huh?  

Related: Defense rests in Mumbai terror trial

Chicago businessman gets split verdict in terror trial

No mention there, either.  

Also see: Sending Signals to Pakistan

I didn't miss them.

Kashmiri has most recently been linked to last month's 18-hour assault on a naval base in Karachi.

Related: AmeriKan Media Pulling Prank on Pakistan

He is also accused of masterminding several raids on Pakistan police and intelligence buildings in 2009, as well as a failed assassination attempt against then-President Pervez Musharraf in 2003.

Pakistani leaders did not immediately comment on Friday's attack, but Kashmiri's alleged involvement in attacks on Pakistanis was likely to mute the public reaction....

With fresh leverage, American officials made it clear they expected Pakistan to boost efforts to locate other al-Qaida leaders in the country. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in Islamabad two weeks ago she expected Pakistan to "take decisive steps" in the days ahead....

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And they really got him this time!

"2 bomb attacks kill 24 in Pakistan" by Associated Press / June 6, 2011

ISLAMABAD — Also yesterday, a Pakistani security official said authorities are nearly certain that a recent US missile strike killed Al Qaeda commander Ilyas Kashmiri....

Kashmiri is the latest Al Qaeda leader to be killed, though there were still lingering doubts after the missile strike late Friday....

95 percent confirmed.’’  

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"Al Qaeda chief’s death confirmed; Target considered possible successor to bin Laden" June 07, 2011|By Asif Shahzad, Associated Press  

And we should believe them now because.... ??

ISLAMABAD — Pakistan’s interior minister said yesterday that he was “100 percent’’ certain that wanted Al Qaeda commander Ilyas Kashmiri was killed in a US drone strike.

Rehman Malik’s claim came as suspected American missiles targeted hideouts in the militant sanctuaries near Afghan border, killing at least 16 people.

Malik did not say how his government knew that Kashmiri was killed Friday by a missile, or if it had evidence of his death.

Kashmiri, wanted for attacks in Pakistan and India as well European plots, was wrongly reported to have been killed in a similar strike in Sept 2009. US officials have described Kashmiri as Al Qaeda’s military operations chief in Pakistan. He was rumored to be a contender to replace Osama bin Laden as the terror network’s chief....

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani told reporters in the southern city of Quetta that America had confirmed the death. He did not say who in the US administration told him.

Malik has previously claimed the deaths of some Taliban leaders and been proven wrong later.

Getting definitive confirmation about who has died in missile strikes is difficult, especially if no body is retrieved.

Earlier in the day, the United States fired missiles at three suspected militant targets near the Afghan border, killing 16 people, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The identities of the dead in the unusually intense volley of drone-fired strikes in the South Waziristan tribal region were not known. Several Arabs were said to be among the victims of one of them, according to the officials, who did not give their names in line with agency policy.

Since the US raid that killed bin Laden on May 2 in northwest Pakistan, missile strikes have picked up after a relative lull in the year’s first half. Anger at the bin Laden operation, seen here as a violation of Pakistani sovereignty, has led to fresh calls on Washington to stop the attacks.

Before dawn, one set of missiles hit a compound in Wucha Dana village, killing seven people. The second set exploded about the same time at a Muslim seminary there, killing five people, two Pakistani intelligence officials said.  

Now it is just mass murder.

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"US strikes kill 23 in Pakistan; Aim at militants in border area" by Rasool Dawar, Associated Press / June 9, 2011

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A pair of US missile strikes hit a vehicle and an alleged insurgent training facility yesterday in a tribal region near the Afghan border, killing 23 suspected Islamist militants, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The two missile strikes bring this week’s count to five. They are the latest sign that the United States has no intention of abandoning the tactic despite public disapproval in Pakistan and a downturn in relations between Islamabad and Washington following the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

Yesterday’s strikes occurred within minutes of each other, the four intelligence officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to brief the media....

Meanwhile, Pakistan’s army has sent home two-thirds of the US military personnel who were training its forces in counterinsurgency skills along the porous border with Afghanistan.

A senior Pakistan military official said late Tuesday that 90 of an estimated 135 US trainers have left the country, the latest setback in the deeply troubled relationship between the United States and Pakistan’s military following the May 2 raid that killed the Al Qaeda leader....

The May 2 raid that killed bin Laden....  

Really beating the dead guy, aren't they?

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