Al-Qaeda – Page 24 – Infinite Unknown

President orders air strikes on villages in tribal area

January 24, 2009 by Infinite

Barack Obama gave the go-ahead for his first military action yesterday, missile strikes against suspected militants in Pakistan which killed at least 18 people.

Four days after assuming the presidency, he was consulted by US commanders before they launched the two attacks. Although Obama has abandoned many of the “war on terror” policies of George Bush while he was president, he is not retreating from the hunt for Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaida leaders.

The US believes they are hiding in the tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan, and made 30 strikes last year in which more than 200 people were killed. In the election, Obama hinted at increased operations in Pakistan, saying he thought Bush had made a mistake in switching to Iraq before completing the job against al-Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The US marine corp commander said yesterday that his 22,000 troops should be redeployed from Iraq to Afghanistan. Gen James Conway said “the time is right” to leave Iraq now the war had become largely nation-building rather than the pitched fighting in which the corps excelled; he wanted the marines in Afghanistan, especially in the south where insurgents, and the Taliban and al-Qaida, benefit from both a nearby safe haven in Pakistan and a booming trade in narcotics.

Obama has warned that he is prepared to bomb inside Pakistan if he gets relevant intelligence about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden. He had also said he would act against militants along the border if the Pakistan government failed to.

The US missiles were fired by unmanned Predator drones, which hang in the sky gathering intelligence through surveillance and, when commanded and directed by remote control, to launch attacks.

US will give free weapons to Afghan civilians

December 28, 2008 by Infinite

One way to quell a violent and deteriorating situation, according to the U.S. military, is to flood the place with guns.

That’s exactly what is planned for Afghanistan, where a rising tide of chaos is slowly pushing the country past Iraq as the most dangerous battlefield Americans tread upon.

“The U.S. military plans to help the Afghanistan government recruit, train and arm local Afghans to fight a resurgent Taliban,” reported CNN’s Barbara Starr.

“For the United States, the most sensitive part of the proposal will be the use of American military funds to purchase small arms, most likely AK-47 rifles, that will be given to local Afghans, according to a U.S. military official.”

“There are worries,” Starr continued, “putting even more weapons in the hands of local communities could lead to tribes fighting each other instead of the Taliban. U.S. troops could get caught in the middle.” The plan would also hinge upon the weak Afghan government to maintain the loyalties of the newly armed populace.

The last time the U.S. poured weapons into Afghanistan was during the administration of Ronald Reagen, who opted to back the Mujahadeen against occupying Soviet Union forces. The CIA spent billions arming the Afghans through the Pakistani and Saudi intelligence services, finally resulting in driving the Soviets out.

Ultimately, the wealth of destructive force and financial heft given to the Afghans concentrated around two groups: Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda, and the Taliban.

This ‘new’ strategy will be presented for President-elect Obama’s consideration, Starr said.

This video is from CNN’s American Morning, broadcast Dec. 26, 2008.

Download video via RawReplay.com

David Edwards and Stephen C. Webster
Published: Saturday December 27, 2008

Source: The Raw Story

German intel head threatens whistleblower site

December 23, 2008 by Infinite

The BND is just a subunit of the CIA.

Der Präsident des Bundesnachrichtendienstes (BND), Ernst Uhrlau

In the latest twist in a scandal involving the presence of the German intelligence service or Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) in the Balkan nation of Kosovo, the head of the BND has ordered whistleblower website Wikileaks to remove all BND-related files under threat of “immediate prosecution.”

Wikileaks has responded with a press release noting that the demands have no legal force outside Germany, so the order “must be assumed to be an attempt to engage Wikileaks via its German component — or does Mr. Uhrlau suggest it is now BND policy to kidnap foreign journalists and try them before German courts?”

According to Wikileaks, “The threats, made by BND President Ernst Uhrlau, were triggered by the Wikileaks publication of an article by Tom Burghardt, a US journalist, on the BND’s bungled Kosovo operation, together with a classified BND dossier on senior Kosovo figures from 2005 — both of which were specifically named by Mr. Uhrlau.”

The Kosovo scandal began on November 19, when three Germans were arrested in Kosovo’s capital of Pristina on suspicion of throwing explosives at the European Union office. The men, who said they were not behind the incident but were merely observing the crime scene, were identied by the German paper Spiegel as BND agents.

Keith Olbermann refers to Bush 9/11 ‘lies’ as ‘Insult the Dead-gate’

December 20, 2008 by Infinite

As the departing Bush administration frantically attempts to shore up its place in history, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann stands ready to kick the props out from under it again. A renewed claim that “no one could have anticipated” the attacks of 9/11 attracted his scorn in particular on Thursday’s Countdown.

“This is a White House talking point still, even though your average three-year-old could disprove it using an etch-a-sketch.” Olbermann sneered on Thursday, over the heading, “Insult the Dead-gate.”

Olbermann’s specific target was White House press spokesman Tony Fratto, who responded to a Fox News interviewer’s suggestion on Wednesday that before 9/11, “nobody was thinking that there’d be terrorists flying 767s into buildings” by agreeing, “No one could have anticipated that kind of attack — or very few people.”

“Yeah, well, it ain’t true,” Olbermann remarked, with open contempt dripping from his words, “and out of respect for the people who died that day you damn well better stop saying it.”

Olbermann then ran through a list of pre-9/11 warnings of potential al Qaeda hijackings, noting, “A president’s daily brief as far back as December 1998 said bin Laden was ‘preparing to hijack US aircraft in hopes of trading hostages for jailed radicals.’ … The August 6, 2001 brief, of course, told President Bush — if he read it — that there were ‘patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings.'”

Olbermann did not mention either the use of airplanes as weapons by the Japanese kamikaze suicide pilots during World War II or the abortive al Qaeda plot of the 1990’s known as Project Bojinka, which would have involved both blowing up airliners and crashing a plane into CIA headquarters in Virginia and which may have been the inspiration for 9/11.

“That Mr. Fratto’s employers might not have been expected to know the exact hour of these attacks,” concluded Olbermann, “does not give him or anybody else the right to perpetuate the lie that 9/11 was impossible to conceive. Clearly, many inside this nation’s government anticipated it. It was Mr. Bush and his gang who chose to ignore them.”

This video is from MSNBC’s Countdown, broadcast Dec. 18, 2008.

Download video via RawReplay.com

CIA, Heroin Still Rule Day in Afghanistan

December 8, 2008 by Infinite

Afghanistan now supplies over 90 percent of the world’s heroin, generating nearly $200 billion in revenue. Since the U.S. invasion on Oct. 7, 2001, opium output has increased 33-fold (to over 8,250 metric tons a year).

The U.S. has been in Afghanistan for over seven years, has spent $177 billion in that country alone, and has the most powerful and technologically advanced military on Earth. GPS tracking devices can locate any spot imaginable by simply pushing a few buttons.

Still, bumper crops keep flourishing year after year, even though heroin production is a laborious, intricate process. The poppies must be planted, grown and harvested; then after the morphine is extracted it has to be cooked, refined, packaged into bricks and transported from rural locales across national borders.

To make heroin from morphine requires another 12-14 hours of laborious chemical reactions. Thousands of people are involved, yet-despite the massive resources at our disposal-heroin keeps flowing at record levels.

Common sense suggests that such prolific trade over an extended period of time is no accident, especially when the history of what has transpired in that region is considered. While the CIA ran its operations during the Vietnam War, the Golden Triangle supplied the world with most of its heroin.After that war ended in 1975, an intriguing event took place in 1979 when Zbigniew Brzezinski covertly manipulated the Soviet Union into invading Afghanistan.

Behind the scenes, the CIA, along with Pakistan’s ISI, were secretly funding Afghanistan’s mujahideen to fight their Russian foes. Prior to this war, opium production in Afghanistan was minimal. But according to historian Alfred McCoy, an expert on the subject, a shift in focus took place. “Within two years of the onslaught of the CIA operation in Afghanistan, the Pakistan-Afghanistan borderlands became the world’s top heroin producer.”

Soon, as Professor Michel Chossudovsky notes, “CIA assets again controlled the heroin trade. As the mujahideen guerrillas seized territory inside Afghanistan, they ordered peasants to plant poppies as a revolutionary tax. Across the border in Pakistan, Afghan leaders and local syndicates under the protection of Pakistan intelligence operated hundreds of heroin laboratories.”

Al-Qaeda is a front organization of CIA and MOSSAD : Mumbai based group of intellectuals and human rights activists

December 7, 2008December 5, 2008 by Infinite

Media Release Jun. 13, 2007

The Mumbai based group alleged that Al-Qaeda is a front organization of CIA and MOSSAD. “There is enough evidence that the Al-Qaeda is a front organization of the CIA and MOSSAD.

The Bush junta has used the bogey of terror and of Al Qaeda to justify his unending and ever expanding Global War on Terror, which is only a means of capturing the resources of the world and of establishing the sole hegemony of Israel in West Asia,” said the group of activists and intellectuals.

The group is holding a press conference in Mumbai on Wednesday to “expose the links between Al-Qaeda and the CIA-MOSSAD”.

Holding American-Israeli operation accomplices of the 9/11 attack on the WTC, the spokesman of the group said that this has been widely written about in USA and Europe itself and more than 50% of the American people and far more Europeans, now believe and are convinced about this fact.

He said that sections of the Indian ruling political and military elite are importing the same Bush-Olmert formula into India. “The increasing terror attacks only serve the cause of the Indian elite and divide the masses along communal lines.

It is only the ordinary Indians who are the victims of terror either in temples, mosques, buses or trains,” he said adding that practically no political leader suffers a similar fate, where the terrorists are apprehended and killed in “encounters”.

“Every terror attack is meant to push and drag the Indian masses further into the waiting arms of Uncle Sam and the Israeli Goliath.

Every terror attack spreads further hatred for Muslims and Islam and weakens the Indian Muslim community,” he said.

Source: India Daily

Afghan president wishes he could down U.S. planes

November 28, 2008 by Infinite

Afghan President Hamid Karzai speaks during a meeting of the General Assembly on the Culture of Peace at the United Nations in New York November 12, 2008.
REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

KABUL (Reuters) – Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Wednesday he would bring down U.S. planes bombing villages if he could, in a sign of growing tension between Afghanistan and its Western backers as the Taliban insurgency grows in strength.

As Western dissatisfaction with Karzai has grown over his failure to crack down on corruption and govern effectively, the Afghan president, facing elections next year, has hit back over the killing of dozens of civilians in foreign air strikes.

In recent weeks, Karzai has repeatedly blamed the West for the worsening security in Afghanistan, saying NATO failed to target Taliban and al Qaeda sanctuaries in Pakistan and calling for the war to be taken out of Afghan villages.

“We have no other choice, we have no power to stop the planes, if we could, if I could … we would stop them and bring them down,” Karzai told a news conference.

He said that if he had something like the rock attached to a piece of string, known as a chelak in Dari, used to bring down kites in Afghanistan, he would use it.

“If we had a chelak, we would throw it and stop the American aircraft. We have no radar to stop them in the sky, we have no planes,” he said. “I wish I could intercept the planes that are going to bomb Afghan villages, but that’s not in my hands.”

Pakistan army practises shooting drone aircraft

November 21, 2008 by Infinite

Pakistani soldiers practised shooting at pilotless “drone” aircraft on Friday, the military said a day after the government lodged a protest with the U.S. ambassador over drone missile strikes in Pakistani territory.

Anti-aircraft guns and short-range surface-to-air missiles were used during the exercise conducted at a desert range near the city of Muzaffargarh in the central Pubjab province.

“The elements of Army Air Defence demonstrated their shooting skills by targeting the drones flying at different altitudes,” the military said in a statement.

Air defence commander Lieutenant-General Ashraf Saleem praised the “precision and agility” of the gunners.

Pakistan is bristling over a series of missile strikes by U.S. drones targeting al Qaeda and Taliban militants in the lawless tribal regions along the Afghan border in recent weeks.

The U.S. forces have carried out more than 20 such drone attacks in the last three months, reflecting U.S. impatience over militants from Pakistan fuelling the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan and fears that al Qaeda fighters in northwest Pakistan could plan attacks in the West.

A U.S. commando raid on September 3 led to a diplomatic storm, and there has not been any subsequent incursion by ground troops.

Suspected U.S. Missiles Strike Deep Inside Pakistan

November 20, 2008 by Infinite

Residents stand on the rubble of shops and a house damaged in the fighting between Pakistan army and militants in Kanju, a troubled area of Pakistan’s Swat Valley, Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008. Pakistani security forces are engaged in fierce fighting against militants and Talibans in various areas including Swat Valley, a northwest region that used to be beloved tourist destination. (AP Photo/Sherin Zada) (Sherin Zada – AP)

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The U.S. military apparently struck at Islamic militants outside Pakistan’s lawless tribal belt for the first time Wednesday, firing a missile that killed six suspected insurgents taking refuge away from the conflict zone along the Afghan border.

The government denounced the attack as yet another “grave provocation” amid a series of U.S. military operations in the country that have enflamed widespread anger among ordinary Pakistanis.

The harsh words were a sharp contrast to comments Tuesday by U.S. and NATO officials who reported increased cooperation from Pakistan in the fight against militant groups. Tens of thousands of U.S. and NATO troops are stationed in neighboring Afghanistan.

“It looks like the Americans are not listening, but this is such a great provocation that it will bring a strong response from the government of Pakistan that will dissuade them,” presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar said of the latest missile strike.

He declined to say what the response would be.

The government, which relies heavily on U.S. financial aid, has not gone beyond criticizing raids. Some experts question whether the leadership secretly condones the attacks while speaking out publicly against them, but the government denies that.

Al-Qaeda vows to hurt Obama’s US

November 19, 2008 by Infinite

A clip from al-Qaeda’s message

The second-in-command of Islamic militant network al-Qaeda has called on Muslims to harm “criminal” America.

In a message purportedly from Ayman al-Zawahiri, the al-Qaeda deputy accused US President-elect Barack Obama of betraying his Muslim roots.

He likened him to a “house slave” – who had chosen to align himself with the “enemies” of Islam.

Mr Obama has said stamping out al-Qaeda “once and for all” will be a top priority during his administration.

On Sunday, he said capturing or killing Osama Bin Laden was “critical” to US security.

He has also promised to bolster the US presence in Afghanistan – a policy that would fail, said the al-Qaeda deputy.

The US said the message did not signal any increased threat against America.

You were born to a Muslim father, but you chose to stand in the ranks of the enemies of the Muslims, and pray the prayer of the Jews

Al-Qaeda message

This is undoubtedly a message aimed at sustaining anti-American sentiment among Muslims in the face of Barack Obama’s election, says the BBC’s defence correspondent Rob Watson.

But it is a risky approach, our correspondent says.

Barack Obama is hugely popular world-wide and his colour and background make him a much tougher target to attack than President George W Bush in the eyes of a global audience, he says.

Barack Obama is warned to beware of a ‘huge threat’ from al-Qaeda

November 15, 2008 by Infinite

Security officials fear a ‘spectacular’ during the transition period

Tom Baldwin in Washington and Michael Evans, Defence Editor

Barack Obama is being given ominous advice from leaders on both sides of the Atlantic to brace himself for an early assault from terrorists.

General Michael Hayden, director of the CIA, this week acknowledged that there were dangers during a presidential transition when new officials were coming in and getting accustomed to the challenges. But he added that no “real or artificial spike” in intercepted transmissions from terror suspects had been detected.

President Bush has repeatedly described the acute vulnerability of the US during a transition. The Bush Administration has been defined largely by the 9/11 attacks, which came within a year of his taking office.

Read moreBarack Obama is warned to beware of a ‘huge threat’ from al-Qaeda

Guantanamo Closure Called Obama Priority

November 12, 2008 by Infinite

There are about 250 detainees at the U.S. facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. President-elect Barack Obama has said he wants to close the detention center. (By Brennan Linsley — Associated Press)

The Obama administration will launch a review of the classified files of the approximately 250 detainees at Guantanamo Bay immediately after taking office, as part of an intensive effort to close the U.S. prison in Cuba, according to people who advised the campaign on detainee issues.

Announcing the closure of the controversial detention facility would be among the most potent signals the incoming administration could send of its sharp break with the Bush era, according to the advisers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak for the president-elect. They believe the move would create a global wave of diplomatic and popular goodwill that could accelerate the transfer of some detainees to other countries.

But the advisers, as well as outside national security and legal experts, said the new administration will face a thicket of legal, diplomatic, political and logistical challenges to closing the prison and prosecuting the most serious offenders in the United States — an effort that could take many months or longer. Among the thorniest issues will be how to build effective cases without using evidence obtained by torture, an issue that attorneys for the detainees will almost certainly seek to exploit.

Report: Secret order OKs U.S. raids overseas

November 10, 2008 by Infinite

N.Y. Times: U.S. targeted al-Qaida fighters in Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere

WASHINGTON – The U.S. military has conducted nearly a dozen secret operations against al-Qaida and other terrorist groups in Syria, Pakistan and other countries since 2004, The New York Times reported in Monday editions.

Meantime, Pakistan’s president said he expects U.S. President-elect Barack Obama to re-evaluate American military strikes on al-Qaida and Taliban targets on its side of the Afghan border.

Citing anonymous U.S. officials, the Times story said the operations were authorized by a broad classified order that then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld signed and President Bush approved in spring 2004. The order gave the military authority to attack al-Qaida anywhere in the world and to conduct operations in countries that were not at war with the United States.

One such operation was the Oct. 26 raid inside Syria, the Times reported. Washington hasn’t formally acknowledged the raid, but U.S. officials have said the target was a top al-Qaida in Iraq figure. Syria has asked for proof and said eight civilians were killed in the attack.

In another mission, in 2006, Navy SEALs raided a suspected terrorist compound in Pakistan’s tribal areas.

The raids have typically been conducted by U.S. Special Forces, often in conjunction with the Central Intelligence Agency, the newspaper said. Even though the process has been streamlined, specific missions have to be approved by the defense secretary or, in the cases of Syria and Pakistan, by the president.

US admits raiding Syria to kill terrorist leader

October 28, 2008 by Infinite

Syrian men carry the body of a relative killed in the raid on Sukkariya yesterday

Senior US officials claimed last night that the head of a Syrian network responsible for smuggling foreign fighters, weapons and cash into Iraq had been killed in Syria during a raid by US special forces that sparked strong condemnation from Damascus.

The Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moualem said the raid had killed eight civilians and was an act of “criminal and terrorist aggression.” Speaking at a news conference in London, he warned that Damascus would defend itself against any such future attack.

Sunday’s raid, 10km from the Iraqi border, took place in daylight and therefore was “not a mistake,” he said.

The rare attack into Syria marks an unexpected expansion of the war in Iraq and comes as the level of fighting drops to its lowest level for four years.

“We are taking matters into our own hands,” said a US officer in Washington, confirming that American commandos had entered Syria on Sunday evening to attack a network of guerrillas linked to al-Qa’ida.

U.S. confirms strike on Syria that killed eight

October 26, 2008 by Infinite

A U.S. military official confirmed late Sunday an American helicopter attack in an area along Syria’s border with Iraq, which left 8 people dead and three people wounded.

Syria condemned the attack, which it called “serious aggression.”

The raid indicated the desert frontier between the two countries remains a key battleground, more than five years into the Iraq war. The U.S. official said the attack targeted elements of a robust foreign fighter logistics network and that due to Syrian inaction the U.S. was now “taking matters into our own hands.”

A government statement carried by the official Syrian Arab News Agency said the attack occurred at the Sukkariyeh Farm near the town of Abu Kamal, five miles (eight kilometers) inside the Syrian border. Four helicopters attacked a civilian building under construction, firing at the workers inside shortly before sundown, the statement said.

$13 Billion in Iraq Aid Wasted Or Stolen, Ex-Investigator Says

September 23, 2008 by Infinite

Salam Adhoob, former investigator for Iraq’s Commission on Public Integrity, at the Democratic Policy Committee hearing on waste and fraud in Iraq. (By Susan Walsh — Associated Press)

A former Iraqi official estimated yesterday that more than $13 billion meant for reconstruction projects in Iraq was wasted or stolen through elaborate fraud schemes.

Salam Adhoob, a former chief investigator for Iraq’s Commission on Public Integrity, told the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, an arm of the Democratic caucus, that an Iraqi auditing bureau “could not properly account for” the money.

While many of the projects audited “were not needed — and many were never built,” he said, “this very real fact remains: Billions of American dollars that paid for these projects are now gone.”

He said a report that went to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other top Iraqi officials was never published because “nobody cares” about investigating such cases. Many investigators, he said, feared for their safety because 32 of his co-workers have been murdered.

Pakistan president Zardari warns US forces in attacks across border on al-Qaeda

September 22, 2008 by Infinite

Pakistan will not tolerate any infringement of its territory in the name of the war on terror, president Asif Ali Zardari said today in a clear warning to US forces who in recent months have increasingly crossed the border to kill Taliban and al-Qaeda terrorists.

Mr Zardari was making his first major address since being elected president earlier this month. He also pledged that Pakistan would fight terrorists based on its soil, and he promised that his own powers would be cut back.

In recent weeks unmanned Predator drones and even special forces have staged a number of attacks across the border from Afghanistan on terrorist targets, a sign of growing US frustration at the training camps and sanctuaries which have been out of their reach and, for the most part, untroubled by Pakistan’s own military.

Pakistani leaders should have been at bombed hotel

September 22, 2008 by Infinite

The Pakistani President, Prime Minister and military chief of staff were due to attend a banquet at the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, where bombers killed at least 53 people, but a last-minute change of venue saved them.

The disclosure that the leadership of the country was the likely target of the attack on Saturday came as militants kidnapped Afghanistan’s top diplomat in the country and British Airways suspended all flights to and from Pakistan because of security concerns.

16 Are Killed in Attack on U.S. Embassy in Yemen

September 17, 2008 by Infinite

Yemen News Agency, via Reuters: Smoke rose near the U.S. Embassy in Sana, Yemen, on Wednesday after armed militants detonated a car bomb at its gates.

BEIRUT, Lebanon – Heavily armed militants opened fire on the United States Embassy in Sana, Yemen, on Wednesday and detonated a car bomb at its gates, in an attack that left at least 16 people dead including six of the attackers, Yemeni officials said.

No Americans were killed or wounded in the blast or when guards began to return fire, said a Yemeni official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter.

Yemeni security officials and witnesses said the death toll was at least 16, including four bystanders, one of them an Indian woman. The other dead were six attackers and six security guards, the Yemeni officials said, speaking in return for anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters.

Yemen’s official Saba news agency also reported that 16 people were killed.

Cheney Misled GOP Leaders, New Book Says

September 16, 2008 by Infinite

A GOP congressional leader who was wavering on giving President Bush authority to wage war in late 2002 said Vice President Cheney misled him by saying that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had direct personal ties to al-Qaeda terrorists and was making rapid progress toward a suitcase nuclear weapon.

Pakistan orders troops to open fire if US raids

September 16, 2008 by Infinite

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) – Pakistan’s military has ordered its forces to open fire if U.S. troops launch another air or ground raid across the Afghan border, an army spokesman said Tuesday.

The orders, which come in response to a highly unusual Sept. 3 ground attack by U.S. commandos, are certain to heighten tensions between Washington and a key ally against terrorism. Although the ground attack was rare, there have been repeated reports of U.S. drone aircraft striking militant targets, most recently on Sept. 12.

Pakistani officials warn that stepped-up cross-border raids will accomplish little while fueling violent religious extremism in nuclear-armed Pakistan. Some complain that the country is a scapegoat for the failure to stabilize Afghanistan.

Pakistani troops fire on US soldiers near Afghan border, reports say

September 15, 2008 by Infinite

Security officials say soldiers were trying to enter South Waziristan by helicopter

Pakistani soldiers near the Afghan border. Photograph: Matiullah Achakzai/EPA

Pakistani troops opened fire on US soldiers trying to enter the country’s lawless tribal area today, according to reports, marking a dangerous further deterioration in relations between the two anti-terror allies.

Details of the incident, in South Waziristan, are unclear. According to local security officials and tribesmen, however, two US helicopters breached Pakistani airspace in the early hours but were forced to retreat when they came under fire.

The US forces were likely to have been on a hit-and-withdraw mission against suspected militants in the area, similar to the first documented US ground raid into the tribal territory earlier this month, when choppers flew in commandos. That enraged the Pakistani army and public.

Pakistan order to kill US invaders

September 14, 2008 by Infinite

KEY corps commanders of Pakistan’s 600,000-strong army issued orders last night to retaliate against “invading” US forces that enter the country to attack militant targets.

The move has plunged relations between Islamabad and Washington into deep crisis over how to deal with al-Qa’ida and the Taliban

What amounts to a dramatic order to “kill the invaders”, as one senior officer put it last night, was disclosed after the commanders – who control the army’s deployments at divisional level – met at their headquarters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi under the chairmanship of army chief and former ISI spy agency boss Ashfaq Kayani.

Leading English-language newspaper The News warned in an editorial that the US determination to attack targets inside Pakistan was likely to be “the best recruiting sergeant that the extremists ever had”, with even “moderates” outraged by it.

Terror Plan Would Give F.B.I. More Power

September 13, 2008 by Infinite

WASHINGTON – The Justice Department made public on Friday a plan to expand the tools the Federal Bureau of Investigation can use to investigate suspicions of terrorism inside the United States, even without any direct evidence of wrongdoing.

Justice Department officials said the plan, which is likely to be completed by the end of the month despite criticism from civil rights advocates, is intended to allow F.B.I. agents to be more aggressive and pre-emptive in assessing possible threats to national security.

It would allow an agent, for instance, to pursue an anonymous tip about terrorism by conducting an undercover interview or watching someone in a public place. Such steps are now prohibited unless there is more specific evidence of wrongdoing.

Bush Said to Give Orders Allowing Raids in Pakistan

September 11, 2008 by Infinite

WASHINGTON – President Bush secretly approved orders in July that for the first time allow American Special Operations forces to carry out ground assaults inside Pakistan without the prior approval of the Pakistani government, according to senior American officials.

The classified orders signal a watershed for the Bush administration after nearly seven years of trying to work with Pakistan to combat the Taliban and Al Qaeda, and after months of high-level stalemate about how to challenge the militants’ increasingly secure base in Pakistan’s tribal areas.

American officials say that they will notify Pakistan when they conduct limited ground attacks like the Special Operations raid last Wednesday in a Pakistani village near the Afghanistan border, but that they will not ask for its permission.