British “Pseudo-Gang” Terrorists Exposed in Basra

jjw1965

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Jul 8, 2005
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Kurt Nimmo | September 21 2005

Baghdad Dweller, writing for Uruknet, reports two British soldiers held by “Iraqi authorities” in Basra (also described as “Shiite militiamen” in the corporate media), and subsequently freed after the British stormed a police jail, were working undercover as bombers. Baghdad Dweller includes a link to the Washington Post, where the following appears: “Iraqi security officials on Monday variously accused the two Britons they detained of shooting at Iraqi forces or trying to plant explosives. Photographs of the two men in custody showed them in civilian clothes.” The Herald notes the following: “Sources say the British soldiers, possibly members of the new Special Reconnaissance Regiment formed earlier this month to provide intelligence for SAS operations, were looking at infiltration of the city’s police by the followers of the outspoken Shi’ite cleric, Moqtada al Sadr,” thus admitting the soldiers worked undercover.

The “Special Reconnaissance Regiment,” according to Regiments.org, “formed with HQ at Hereford from volunteers of other units to support international expeditionary operations in the fight against international terrorism, absorbing 14th Intelligence Company (formed for operations against Ulster terrorists), Intelligence Corps, and releasing the SAS and SBS for the ‘hard end’ of missions.” Is it possible the “hard end” of the “mission” in Iraq is to discredit the resistance and sow chaos in the country by fronting pseudo-gang terrorist groups (or the variant “pseudo-guerilla operations”), as the British have ample experience with elsewhere, notably in Kenya during the Mau Mau uprising and in Malaya? “Pseudo operations are those in which government forces disguised as guerrillas, normally along with guerrilla defectors, operate as teams to infiltrate insurgent areas,” writes Lawrence E. Cline for the U.S. Army War College External Research Associates Program. “This technique has been used by the security forces of several other countries in their operations, and typically it has been very successful.” Indeed, one long running pseudo op, Gladio, was so successful it managed to render a nominal Italian terrorist group, the Red Brigades (Brigate Rosse), into an excuse (after proper infiltration by agents provocateurs) to increase the power of reactionary forces in Italy and discredit socialist, communist, and even labor movements.

The British SAS honed its “counter-insurgency” techniques in Northern Ireland and there is no reason to believe it has refrained from doing so in Iraq. “Formed to perform acts of sabotage and assassination behind enemy lines during World War 2, the SAS evolved into a counter-insurgency regiment after the war,” writes Sean Mac Mathuna. Mathuna cites a 1969 Army Training manual (British Army Land Operations Manual, volume 3, counter-revolutionary operations) that enumerates several “tasks,” including:

the ambush and harassment of insurgents, the infiltration of sabotage, assassination and demolition parties into insurgent-held areas, border surveillance … liaison with, and organization of friendly guerrilla forces operating against the common enemy.

Examples “were found during the Mau-Mau rebellion in Kenya during the mid-fifties,” Mathuna explains, “when SAS officers commanded some of the infamous ‘pseudo gangs’ that terrorized the civilian population,” and

in Borneo, where they used cross-border operations to attack and destroy guerrilla bases; and in Aden in 1967, where they dressed as Arabs and would use an Army officer to lure Arab gunmen into a trap and kill them. To defeat the insurgents counter-terror must be deployed back at them—described by Ken Livingstone as “subverting the subverters”….

In order to “subvert the subverters” and discredit the IRA in Northern Ireland, the SAS formed the Military Reconnaissance Force (MRF), a covert pseudo-gang. “During the 1972 [IRA] ceasefire the MRF shot civilians from unmarked cars using IRA weapons,” writes Mathuna. “In November 1972 the Army admitted that the MRF had done this one three occasions. One of these incidents happened on 22nd June 1972—the day the IRA announced its intention to introduce a ceasefire. The shootings appear to have been done to discredit the IRA…”

It is clear now, that because elements within the security forces did not want a political deal with the IRA in the mid-seventies, and the military solution was only possible with a change at the top of the Labour leadership, MI5 and the SAS were prepared to use the same methods the IRA are condemned for - civilian deaths, assassinations, bombings and black propaganda—to bring this about.

In fact, so effective were these “military solution” pseudo-gang terrorist techniques the French employed them in Algeria and Vietnam. “The most widespread use of pseudo type operations was during the ‘Battle of Algiers’ in 1957,” explains Lawrence E. Cline. “The principal French employer of covert agents in Algiers was the Fifth Bureau, the psychological warfare branch.” The Fifth Bureau “planted incriminating forged documents, spread false rumours of treachery and fomented distrust among the [FLN, the National Liberation Front] … As a frenzy of throat-cutting and disemboweling broke out among confused and suspicious FLN cadres, nationalist slaughtered nationalist from April to September 1957 and did France’s work for her,” notes Cline, quoting Martin S. Alexander and J. F. V. Kieger (“France and the Algerian War: Strategy, Operations, and Diplomacy,” Journal of Strategic Studies, Vol. 25, No. 2, June 2002, pp. 6-7).

Even though the Washington Post mentions two Brits were detained, apparently caught red-handed shooting Iraqi police and planting explosives, it does not bother to mention the SAS or its long and sordid history of engaging in covert pseudo-gang behavior and conclude the obvious: Britain, and the United States—the latter having admitted formulating the Proactive Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG) in 2002, a brain child of neocons staffing the Pentagon’s Defense Science Board, designed to “stimulate reactions” on the part of “terrorists” (in Iraq, that would be the resistance)—are intimately involved in sowing chaos and spreading violence in Iraq and more than likely soon enough in Iran and Syria.

Of course, this unfortunate and embarrassing incident in Basra will fall off the front page of corporate newspapers and websites soon enough, replaced with more appropriate, if fantastical, propaganda implicating the Iraqi resistance and intel ops such as al-Zarqawi for the violence, obviously engineered to create a civil war in Iraq and thus divide the country and accomplish the neocon-Likudite plan to destroy Islamic culture and society.

Addendum

It is not surprising the corporate media in the United States and Britain would omit crucial details on this story. In order to get the whole story, we have to go elsewhere—for instance, China’s Xinhuanet news agency. “Two persons wearing Arab uniforms [see the M.O. cited above] opened fire at a police station in Basra. A police patrol followed the attackers and captured them to discover they were two British soldiers,” an Interior Ministry source told Xinhua. “The two soldiers were using a civilian car packed with explosives, the source said.”

So, the next time you read or hear about crazed “al-Qaeda in Iraq” terrorists blowing up children or desperate job applicants, keep in mind, according to the Iraqi Interior Ministry, the perpetrators may very well be British SAS goons who cut their teeth killing Irish citizens.
 

mrmom2

Senate Member
Mar 8, 2005
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Kamloops BC
I read a few different versions of this story and its huge news but yet again the media ignores it :x Heres the British goverment comitting terorism and nobody seems to care .This is the smoking gun see what our goverments are doing .There killing people so the corporations can MAKE MORE MONEY HERES YOUR PROOF IN BLACK AND WHITE 8O What makes you think they wouldn't do it to there own countrys :evil:
 

Just the Facts

House Member
Oct 15, 2004
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The only thing "exposed" is that there were two British guys working under cover (like that's news).

Everything else is wild-eyed conjecture, and well, just embarrassing for the author, really.

Kenya? Malaya? Algiers?

Please. This has effall to do with what actually happened.

It's obvious what your gun is smoking.
 

jjw1965

Electoral Member
Jul 8, 2005
722
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The only thing "exposed" is that there were two British guys working under cover (like that's news).

Dressed in arab outfits firing on a police station, yeah no big deal!
Flying planes into buildings and blaming Irag, bombing subways and blaming al-cia-duh,all really no big deal. :roll:
 

Ocean Breeze

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Jun 5, 2005
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policy of absolute barbarism?

Basra; another milestone in war on terror

"What our police found in their car was very disturbing - weapons, explosives, and a remote control detonator. These are the weapons of terrorists. We believe these soldiers were planning an attack on a market or other civilian targets." Sheik Hassan al-Zarqani, spokesman for the Mehdi Army

By Mike Whitney

09/24/05 "ICH" -- -- We are only interested in one thing regarding the melee that broke out in Basra following the arrest of two British commandoes on September 20: whether or not the car they were driving contained explosives? The answer to that question could decide the future of Iraq as well as the fate of Bush's war on terror. Nothing should deter us from getting to the bottom of this crucial question and no extraneous fact or fiction should divert our attention from uncovering the answer.

If it can be clearly established that there were explosives in that vehicle then we can say with some degree of certainty that the wave of terrorism that is spreading across Iraq is, at least, in part the work of British and American Intelligence. That would imply that current counterinsurgency efforts now involve the premeditated killing of innocent people to achieve the stated policy objectives. This is the very definition of terrorism.

Early news reports from both the BBC and the Washington Post confirmed allegations that bomb-making material was discovered in the captured vehicle. The Post's Ellen Knickmeyer stated, "The Iraqi security officials on Monday variously accused two Britons they detained of shooting at Iraqi forces or TRYING TO PLANT EXPLOSIVES." (Washington Post, 9-20-05; "British Smash into Jail to Free Two Detained Soldiers) Neither the Post nor the BBC have printed retractions or clarifications on this story even though it has swept across the internet with a fury not seen since the Downing Street memo. In fact, this story is significantly more important. The entire war on terror is predicated on the belief that the murdering of innocent people cannot be rationalized. The incident in Basra puts all that into question.

Bush has marshaled the public fear from 9-11 into a rallying cry for his global-onslaught. He has waved the bloody-shirt of terror to enhance his power as executive and declare a permanent state of war. Terror has provided the foundation for savaging civil liberties, imprisoning American citizens, and acting with complete impunity.

"The deliberate and deadly attacks which were carried out on September 11 were more than acts of terror. They were acts of war", Bush boomed. The powers of the "war president" depend entirely on his nebulous war on terror.

The same is true for Tony Blair. The British PM has acted-out the same rituals as Bush; railing against the "evil ideology" of Muslim fanaticism saying, "We must confront and deal head on with the extremism that is based on a perversion of the true faith of Islam."

Blair's fulminations have resulted in the most extraordinary attack on civil liberties in the last 100 years. His pretentious rhetoric has produced a de facto state of martial law for Muslims living in England.

Now his muddled justification for endless war and butchery is facing its greatest challenge; a Ford Cressida packed with a trunk-load of explosives on the streets of Basra. If proof emerges that the car contained bombs then Bush's war of terror will fall apart like a mobile home in a Texas hurricane.

The Chinese news service Xinhuanet reported that, "A police patrol followed the attackers and captured them to discover that they were two British soldiers. The soldiers were using a civilian car packed with explosives." (Xinhuanet 9-20-05) The same basic story appeared on Syrian and Turkish TV, and in other news reports in the Gulf States

The Washington Post's foreign office filed a similar report by Jonathan Finer stating that, "Monday's clashes stemmed from the arrest by Iraqi police on Sunday of two Britons, WHOM IRAQI POLICE ACCUSED OF PLANTING BOMBS".

And then there was this from Syrian correspondent in Baghdad Ziyad al-Munajjid:

"Many analysts and observers here had suspicions that the occupation was involved in some armed operations against civilians and places of worship and in the killing of scientists. But those were only suspicions that lacked proof. The proof came today through the arrest of the two British soldiers while they were planting explosives in one of the Basra streets. This proves, according to observers, that the occupation is not far from many operations that seek to sow sedition and maintain disorder, as this would give the occupation the justification to stay in Iraq for a longer period." Abdel al-Daraji, Muslim cleric in Baghdad told the UK Telegraph that "Britain was plotting to start an ethnic war by carrying out mass-casualty bombings targeting Shia civilians and then blaming the attacks on Sunni groups."

"Everyone knows the occupiers agenda, said al-Daraji. "Their intention is to keep Iraq an unstable battlefield so they can exploit their interests in Iraq."

Whether the reports are accurate or not is almost irrelevant. They feed the widespread dissatisfaction with the occupation and contribute to the conspiracy theories that animate the national discourse. The belief that the British and American black-ops are behind the violence has captured the popular imagination and will be impossible to dispel. The damage to the occupation is incalculable.

As the story spreads through Iraq, support for the al-Jaafari government is certain to wane and the Shi'ites will increasingly drift towards the resistance. The occupation leaders will have to devise a strategy to restore confidence in their legitimacy or face the steady erosion of support. If that proves to be impossible, then we're bound to see more radicalized Shi'ites entering the rival camp. A massive movement of Shi'ites into the resistance would pose a serious challenge to the ongoing American-British presence.

The Basra incident is a fatal blow to the Pentagon's narrative of foreign terrorists stirring up trouble in Iraq. The military depends heavily on the al-Zarqawi myth to feed public fears and divert attention from a brutish occupation. From this point forward every terrorist bombing and random act of violence will be scrutinized as (potentially) the work of British or American agents.

How can Bush and Blair hope to allay the suspicions of Iraqi people after Basra?

What can they possibly do to rebuild faith in the stated goals of the occupation?

The Basra incident is another milestone in the faltering war on terror. The questions that emerge are fundamental to understanding whether we are engaged in a noble effort to liberate and democratize the Iraqi people, or complicit in the deliberate murder of innocent civilians.

If the car driven by the two commandos was loaded with explosives, then we can assume that it would have been used to kill civilians.

Why does this surprise us?

We've already seen the "Shock and Awe" invasion that cost tens of thousands of lives. We've already seen the horrific photos of tortured and sadistically abused prisoners at Abu Ghraib. We've already heard the news of the 200 prisoners at Guantanamo who are starving themselves to death under the Pentagon's watchful eye. We've already chronicled the calculated destruction of Iraqi society and the daily assault on their main cities. We've already read of the use of napalm, cluster-bombs, unidentified chemicals and other banned weapons on civilian enclaves. And, we've already noted the growing number of young Sunni men who bob-along the Euphrates River after being shot in the back of the head by the CIA-trained goons at the Interior Ministry.

Is it so hard to believe that Special Forces are now directly involved in attacks on civilians?

Aren't we seeing the logical extension of a policy that rejects all ethical and moral constraints? A policy of absolute barbarism?

Basra will tell.
 

Ocean Breeze

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Were British Special Forces Soldiers Planting Bombs in Basra?
Suspicions Strengthened by Earlier Reports
Michael Keefer, GlobalResearch.ca...Given the increasing desperation of the American and British governments in the face of an insurgency that their tactics of mass arbitrary arrest and torture, Phoenix-Program or "Salvadoran-option" death squads, unrestrained use of overwhelming military force, and murderous collective punishment have failed to suppress, it comes as no surprise that in rec! ent military actions such as the assault on Tal Afar the U.S. army has been deploying Kurdish peshmerga troops and Shiite militias in a manner that seems designed to inflame ethnic hatreds. No one, I should hope, is surprised any longer by the fact that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi—that fictional construct of the Pentagon’s serried ranks of little Tom Clancies, that one-legged Dalek, that Scarlet Pimpernel of terrorism, who manages to be here, there, and everywhere at once—should be so ferociously devoted to the terrorizing and extermination of his Shiite co-religionists. hould we be any more surprised, then, to see evidence emerging in Iraq of false-flag terrorist bombings conducted by the major occupying powers?...


hmmm.