US uses Iraqis as suicide bombers to provoke civil war

Robert Fisk is one of the most respected Middle East reporters there is. He is one of the few people to have interviewed Bin Laden, he's met Ariel Sharon and pretty much everyone who is anyone in that strife-torn corner of the world. Now he's coming across testimony that the US is using Iraqis as unwitting suicide bombers.

The Americans, my interlocutor suspected, are trying to provoke an Iraqi civil war so that Sunni Muslim insurgents spend their energies killing their Shia co-religionists rather than soldiers of the Western occupation forces. "I swear to you that we have very good information," my source says, finger stabbing the air in front of him. "One young Iraqi man told us that he was trained by the Americans as a policeman in Baghdad and he spent 70 per cent of his time learning to drive and 30 per cent in weapons training. They said to him: 'Come back in a week.' When he went back, they gave him a mobile phone and told him to drive into a crowded area near a mosque and phone them. He waited in the car but couldn't get the right mobile signal. So he got out of the car to where he received a better signal. Then his car blew up."

Impossible, I think to myself. But then I remember how many times Iraqis in Baghdad have told me similar stories.

There have been stories circulating of this for some time now. For Fisk to report it means that he's heard a lot of them.

Yeah hes heard of them, because the Iraqis are denying that Muslims would attack other Muslims. Even though theres proof that they done it many times. Shiites versus Sunnis. Thats why they say it had to be Americans who are making them do it.

Wouldn't surprise me at all.

I guess P20G isn't stirring the Muslims up enough as planned. Time to get more hands on with the tactics...

P2OG? Can you explain that, please? That went a bit over my head, I'm afraid.

But, right on cue, Joseph Biden is suggesting Iraq is partitioned into three regions:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Iraq should be divided into three largely autonomous regions -- Kurd, Sunni Arab and Shiite Arab -- with a weaker central government in Baghdad, Sen. Joseph Biden said on Monday.

In an op-ed article in The New York Times, Biden, the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee's top Democrat, said the Bush administration's effort to establish a strong central government in Baghdad had been a failure, doomed by ethnic rivalry that had spawned widespread sectarian violence.

"It is increasingly clear that President Bush does not have a strategy for victory in Iraq. Rather, he hopes to prevent defeat and pass the problem along to his successor," said Biden and co-author Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Split the oil-rich part and give it to the Kurds, then keep the sunnis and shiites apart. Except for the ones who've intermarried. Which is lots and lots of them.

[edit on 1-5-2006 by rich23]

"US uses suicide bombers"?

Hey rich23, before you go off asking someone to explain something, you need to do some explaining yourself.

I just read that article and have yet to see the words "US uses suicide bombers." Accordingly, can you cite those such mentions or are you simply untruthfully sensationalizing this articles title and content? Do not assume.





seekerof

[edit on 1-5-2006 by Seekerof]

It would not surprise me if true, the CIA reportedly carried out some car bombings in Vietnam in populated areas to give the Viet Cong a bad name.

Why not Iraq, to give Iraqi insurgents a bad name.

And added bonus in turning Iraqis against each other rather than the occupying troops to lessen casualties, weakening the Iranian backed Iraqi government if formenting chaos?

If true, it's not worked well. Nearly 70 US Soldiers died in Iraq in April.

I would say car bombings would be an easier 'black op' to carry out, suicide bombings means being the puppetmaster of a handler of a suicide bomber would be easiest, which in operation terms would mean the US would be allowing a bombing with knowledge rather than direct involvement.

Still involvement through knowledge though.

I dunno Rich. Maybe Fisk is an honest guy , but I definitly would not trust the word of a Syrian security source too much. I'd take it with a grain of salt. I dunno if the CIA or our Military would do such a thing but maybe outside security contractors looking to keep their jobs in a nice long contract might do such a thing. That I would probably tend to believe more.


Pie

PieMan has a point - as they say ..."follow the money" if you want the truth.

Could someone point out to me where it says Americans are using Iraqis as suicide bombers in that article? If they cant...I am changing the title, because unless I missed something the title is, at best, misleading.

[edit on 2-5-2006 by Amuk]

I think there is reason enough to think that US are responsible for alot of carbombings, the british special forces soldiers that were cought with a van full of explosives by iraqi security, and later were freed with force by the british forces is a good example.

Also an american soldier that was caught for the same.

These are very disturbing incidents that point very well in the direction that the US and British forces are behind alot of bombings for one reason or another.

These are very dirty tactics indeed but not really suprising to me..

Originally posted by deltaboy
the Iraqis are denying that Muslims would attack other Muslims.

Amazing when they do this, isn't it? Muslims kill muslims all
over the world and in huge numbers. Muslims rape muslims. Muslims
terrorize and torture muslims. It happens everywhere and all the time.
But of course the violence in Iraq MUST be the Americans.
Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight. These are the same yahoos who believed Bagdad Bob.
They are either embarrassed that their fellow muslims are committing
muslim on muslim crimes or they are deluded and can't believe
the truth of it. Either way they are wrong.


OH ... and the name of that 'news' article is 'seen through the Syrian lens' ...
Syria, eh?? Like they are really unbiased when it comes to America being
in Iraq. They are probably still ticked that we shut off the illegal oil flow
that was coming in from IRaq. You remember don't you. All that illegal
oil flowing into Syria from Iraq. Nice and cheap. America shut it off.
They wouldn't have any hard feelings now would they?

[edit on 5/2/2006 by FlyersFan]

LOL,

This is bunk. Read this line "...my interlocutor suspected..."


So, let me understand this: A guy he met has suspected?


Yeah, you post this as "fact" from a "respectable" reporter, but in reality its just a reporter repeating SUSPICIONS some guy told him.

Well, I SUSPECT a great deal myself about a great many things too, all those fact?

Look at Dictionry.com's second definition of "interlocutor":

2. The performer in a minstrel show who is placed midway between the end men and engages in banter with them.

But of course, this story as all true....


[edit on 2-5-2006 by skippytjc]

For those who can't find references to Americans - who, let's face it, are certainly training the Iraqi police and military, right, that's the idea, so the US can "stand down" (if you believe that, with permanent bases there) - using Iraqis as suicide bombers, here's a part of my original quotation with the relevant parts in bold:

"One young Iraqi man told us that he was trained by the Americans as a policeman in Baghdad and he spent 70 per cent of his time learning to drive and 30 per cent in weapons training. They said to him: 'Come back in a week.' When he went back, they gave him a mobile phone and told him to drive into a crowded area near a mosque and phone them. He waited in the car but couldn't get the right mobile signal. So he got out of the car to where he received a better signal. Then his car blew up."

And just to get this clear... another quotation from the article:

"There was another man, trained by the Americans for the police. He too was given a mobile and told to drive to an area where there was a crowd - maybe a protest - and to call them and tell them what was happening. Again, his new mobile was not working. So he went to a landline phone and called the Americans and told them: 'Here I am, in the place you sent me and I can tell you what's happening here.' And at that moment there was a big explosion in his car."

Just who these "Americans" might be, my source did not say. In the anarchic and panic-stricken world of Iraq, there are many US groups - including countless outfits supposedly working for the American military and the new Western-backed Iraqi Interior Ministry - who operate outside any laws or rules. No one can account for the murder of 191 university teachers and professors since the 2003 invasion - nor the fact that more than 50 former Iraqi fighter-bomber pilots who attacked Iran in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war have been assassinated in their home towns in Iraq in the past three years.

Whether you believe it or not is up to you. But it's certainly in the article, and it fits the pattern - and as another poster mentioned, there were two UK soldiers arrested by Iraqi police after they were discovered driving around disguised as Arabs and with a car full of explosives.

It makes a lot of sense for the US to be trying to play one side against the other, especially if they want to divide up the country. Let's just see how this one plays out.

A little while ago on BBC radio they interviewed a guy who was in the British Army in Cyprus in the seventies. There were problems between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and his job was to be a diplomat and sort out problems as they arose. One day he happened to be chatting with a group of his superiors, both British and American, who were visiting. One of them said to him, "Of course, you won't succeed in your job. Our plan is for partition." As fast as he could run around fighting fires and sorting out complaints between villagers, there were other more secretive types clandestinely stirring up trouble. The UK and US wanted to keep their bases in Cyprus and were worried about an outbreak of inconvenient nationalism. Partition, as we know, was duly achieved.

And all through the time Saddam was in power, Sunni and Shia lived alongside each other, and even intermarried, without any problems. But if someone started bombing Catholic churches in America and blaming it on Southern Baptists and vice versa, and kept it up for a couple of years, what do you think would be the result?

Originally posted by rich23
Whether you believe it or not is up to you. But it's certainly in the article, and it fits the pattern - and as another poster mentioned, there were two UK soldiers arrested by Iraqi police after they were discovered driving around disguised as Arabs and with a car full of explosives.

It makes a lot of sense for the US to be trying to play one side against the other, especially if they want to divide up the country. Let's just see how this one plays out.

Explained and written like a true New York Times Pulitzer prize winning reporter, rich23.

In retrospect, how many of them have gotten their stories right based on patterns, conjecture, and sources that claim "Americans"?

At any rate, time will tell on this matter, as you have already indicated.





seekerof

This doesn't seem very probable to me. These Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds are going to be in unresting civil war until someone wins. They are constantly, and have constantly been fighting for a long time. They don't need these supposed suicide bombers to provoke this war. All we would have to do is remove our troops for the country, and large scale civil war would naturally occur anyways; this is why some people argued that Saddam Hussein's method of dictatorship was the most effective way to rule that country. He may of done some bad things, but the bottom line is, he kept the Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds in line.

These Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds are going to be in unresting civil war until someone wins. They are constantly, and have constantly been fighting for a long time. They don't need these supposed suicide bombers to provoke this war.

This is an impression the Administration would like to foster, but it's not true. In the first days of the occupation there was very little trouble.

There's a girl who's been blogging since the early days of the conflict in Iraq. She was, under the bad old days of Saddam, able to hold down a job, go to work without wearing the hijab, and live pretty much peacefully under the evil dictator. Not saying that Hussein was a great guy, but he did keep things stable for most people. Now, she can't leave the house without an escort, she is 'not welcome' at her old job thanks to the revival of the fundamentalists, and if she does wear the house she'd better cover up or there will be trouble. Anyway, her latest despatches make interesting reading. She talks about how Iranian fundamentalists have infiltrated the country and are poised to make things much more difficult for the US should Iran be attacked, which is interesting and yet not surprising... but she also talks about how Sunni and Shia intermarried, and basically got on fine until the recent wave of mosque bombing...

The real fear is the mentality of so many people lately- the rift that seems to have worked it’s way through the very heart of the country, dividing people. It’s disheartening to talk to acquaintances- sophisticated, civilized people- and hear how Sunnis are like this, and Shia are like that… To watch people pick up their things to move to “Sunni neighborhoods” or “Shia neighborhoods”. How did this happen?

I read constantly analyses mostly written by foreigners or Iraqis who’ve been abroad for decades talking about how there was always a divide between Sunnis and Shia in Iraq (which, ironically, only becomes apparent when you're not actually living amongst Iraqis they claim)… but how under a dictator, nobody saw it or nobody wanted to see it. That is simply not true- if there was a divide, it was between the fanatics on both ends. The extreme Shia and extreme Sunnis. Most people simply didn’t go around making friends or socializing with neighbors based on their sect. People didn't care- you could ask that question, but everyone would look at you like you were silly and rude.

I remember as a child, during a visit, I was playing outside with one of the neighbors children... We were laughing at a silly joke and suddenly she turned and asked coyly, “Are you Sanafir or Shanakil?”

“What???” I asked, half smiling. She laughed and asked me whether I prayed with my hands to my sides or folded against my stomach. I shrugged, not very interested and a little bit ashamed to admit that I still didn’t really know how to pray properly, at the tender age of 10.

Later that evening ... I explained [what] Amal, our Shanakil neighbor, had asked me earlier that day. “Well tell Amal we’re not Shanakil and we’re not Sanafir- we’re Muslims- there’s no difference.”

It was years later before I learned that half the family were Sanafir, and the other half were Shanakil, but nobody cared. We didn’t sit around during family reunions or family dinners and argue Sunni Islam or Shia Islam. The family didn’t care about how this cousin prayed with his hands at his side and that one prayed with her hands folded across her stomach. Many Iraqis of my generation have that attitude. We were brought up to believe that people who discriminated in any way- positively or negatively- based on sect or ethnicity were backward, uneducated and uncivilized.

...For the average educated Iraqi in Baghdad, there is still scorn for all the Sunni/Shia talk. Sadly though, people are being pushed into claiming to be this or that because political parties are promoting it with every speech and every newspaper- the whole ‘us’ / ‘them’. We read constantly about how ‘We Sunnis should unite with our Shia brothers…’ or how ‘We Shia should forgive our Sunni brothers…’ (note how us Sunni and Shia sisters don’t really fit into either equation at thispoint). Politicians and religious figures seem to forget at the end of the day that we’re all simply Iraqis.

And what role are the occupiers playing in all of this? It’s very convenient for them, I believe. It’s all very good if Iraqis are abducting and killing each other- then they can be the neutral foreign party trying to promote peace and understanding between people who, up until the occupation, were very peaceful and understanding.

Come on, who in their right mind would stick up for this jerk other then a select few?

Here from the other thread created by another supporter of insurgents who swears this guy is an outstanding journalist. here is the truth.

-------------

Originally posted by Souljah
Do you know anything about mister Frisk?

Frisk is nothing but a terrorist disguised as a journalist. He was the one who released the trail judges name for the Saddam trial who was killed after Frisk did his number on him. :shk:




Yeah real fine upstanding journalist :shk: :shk: :shk:


That thread has now been closed so I am moving my post from there to here since it shows what a jerk this guy Frisk is.



Originaly posted here



[edit on 5/20/2006 by shots]

Originally posted by shots
That thread has now been closed so I am moving my post from there to here since it shows what a jerk this guy Frisk is.

I guess everyone, that Speaks openly against US or UK administration RESPONSIBLE for the Disaster called the "Liberation of Iraq" is called a Jerk, right?

Seriously tho - I trust the word of mister Frisk before ANY goverment of this Planet!

Originally posted by Souljah
I guess everyone, that Speaks openly against US or UK administration RESPONSIBLE for the Disaster called the "Liberation of Iraq" is called a Jerk, right?

Say what? In this case he did not talk about the US or UK he got a man killed is what he did.

And Yes any man who gets another killed when asked not to reveal his identity is a jerk.

Originally posted by shots
And Yes any man who gets another killed when asked not to reveal his identity is a jerk.

Hey - how many People has President Bush got Killed?!?

A JERK too?



[edit on 20/5/06 by Souljah]