American raid and arrests set scene for capture of marines

American raid and arrests set scene for capture of marines

news.independent.co.uk

At 3am on 11 January US military forces raided the Iranian liaison office in the Kurdish capital Arbil and detained five Iranian officials who are still prisoners. The attack marked a significant escalation in the confrontation between the US and Iran.

Britain is inevitably involved in this as America's only important foreign ally in Iraq. In fact the US raid could have had even more significant consequences if the Americans had captured the Iranian official they were targeting.

(visit the link for the full news article)



Related AboveTopSecret.com Discussion Threads:
UK troops captured by Iran
Military confirms attack by Iranian forces last year
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[edit on 26/3/07 by Souljah]

Certainly an interesting piece of information in this situation, when UK marines are being captured by Iranian army. Looks like US forces have captured Iranian officials before this incident - yet nobody talks about that. But in the case of captured UK marines, suddenly that story becomes headline news everywhere.

Does anybody even remember allegations made by Iran, that Israel and US forces have Captured their general? I bet people already forgot about that in this time, when the only topic everybody is talking about, how poor UK marines were captured by Iran, even if they were violating their territorial integrity. Perhaps this is all about the prisoner exchange - kind of like "if you can capture them, why can't we?" statement...

news.independent.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 26/3/07 by Souljah]

Or perhaps this has something to do with the recent capture of UK marines:

Hardliners Want to Trade UK Sailors for Jailed Iranian 'Spies'

Hardliners who seized 15 British sailors and marines will demand a "prisoners swap" of Iranian agents to secure their release.

Up to 50 Iranian "spies" have been captured and imprisoned by British troops in secret operations in southern Iraq in the last four years.

Now Government officials are having to consider setting them free to save the eight sailors - one a woman - and seven Royal Marines held by Iranians.

The Iranians who were "kidnapped" by US forces in Iraq were also there at the invitation of the Iraqi government. The fact that their office (a consular one at that) was raided by americans and NOT Iraqis speaks volumes about the reason for the raid. It was nothing more than a blatant provocative move by the US to further stoke tensions with Iran in the hope of reprisals.
I use the word kidnapped because that is exactly what it was. The British miltary personnel in this case were not kidnapped, they were detained by another military force. Of course, for the armchair generals, politicians and their compliant press, the word kidnapped sounds so much better.

I just get the feeling that this whole episode with the British forces capture is staged. They were set up to be captured to create an "Incident", much like the crew and passengers of the 747 that flew on and landed in Kuwait while the invasion was taking place. Those people were deliberately allowed to be detained by our own government to whip up public anger at home and justify military action.

The capture of Iranians inside Iraq was indeed heavily covered in the headlines (amd here on ATS). To my knowledge all persons operating lawfully in Iraq under proper diplomatic passports were released. Zebari made it very clear, early-on, the office in Erbil did not enjoy diplomatic protection as it was merely a liaison office and not a consulate (despite what is often relayed).

Asghari has been widely reported as a defector with several reasons given as to why he would defect in recent articles…given what happened to the recent colonel in Iran that was tried and executed in suspicion of collaboration with the West, I would want to disappear too…

Concerning the British soldiers…it has yet to be proven that they were in fact operating in Iranian waters, furthermore; they were operating under a UN mandate…


mg

Originally posted by Britguy
The Iranians who were "kidnapped" by US forces in Iraq were also there at the invitation of the Iraqi government. The fact that their office (a consular one at that) was raided by americans and NOT Iraqis speaks volumes about the reason for the raid. It was nothing more than a blatant provocative move by the US to further stoke tensions with Iran in the hope of reprisals.
I use the word kidnapped because that is exactly what it was. The British miltary personnel in this case were not kidnapped, they were detained by another military force. Of course, for the armchair generals, politicians and their compliant press, the word kidnapped sounds so much better.

I agree with you.

Question is, if those Iranians were captured just because they were from Iran - or was there really something fishy going on. But if you ask me, they were captured just because they were from Iran - which means that they are terrorists of some kind at once.

I just get the feeling that this whole episode with the British forces capture is staged. They were set up to be captured to create an "Incident", much like the crew and passengers of the 747 that flew on and landed in Kuwait while the invasion was taking place. Those people were deliberately allowed to be detained by our own government to whip up public anger at home and justify military action.

I have the same feeling too Mate!

Slowly things are piling up against Iran and sometimes soon something is going to happen, which shall result in a conflict of some kind. Remember those "kidnapped" Israeli soldiers by Hizb'Allah, which later resulted in an aggression of Israel over Lebanon? Now this is like ALMOST THE SAME! Funny thing is, that nobody remembers those soldiers anymore - or were they never captured?

[edit on 26/3/07 by Souljah]

As i said in the other thread about this same topic there are some facts which are being hidden by the original poster of this thread.. such as the fact that the director of operations of the Quds force is one of those Iranian officers arrested in Iraq...

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - The U.S. ambassador said Wednesday that one of the Iranians detained by U.S. forces in Iraq during two raids over the past month was the director of operations for Iran's Revolutionary Guard Quds faction, the organization responsible for funding and arming Iraqi militants.

Zalmay Khalilzad said the recent raids were part of a "new strategy" to "go after their networks that are active here."
.............
Some of those we've arrested are Quds Force operatives. One of them was director of operations for the Quds Force" who was in the country without the knowledge of Iraqi security officials, he said.

www.iranfocus.com...

I wonder why would the Iranian director of operations of the al Quds force would be doing in Iraq without the knowledge of the Iraqi government? The main function of the Quds force is, and I quote:

The Quds (Jerusalem) Force, also called Qods Force, is an elite unit of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The unit’s name, "Quds", is the Arabic word for Jerusalem. According to FAS, the primary mission of the Quds Force is to organize, train, equip, and finance Islamic movements. [1] Although it is said that the Quds Force mainly provides support to Shi‘ite groups like Hezbollah, the Mahdi Army, and the Badr Organization, it also helps Sunni Islamist groups like Hamas.[2] [3] FAS further states that the Quds Force maintains and builds contacts with underground Islamic militant organizations throughout the Arab World.[1] It collects global strategic and military intelligence, possibly having operatives in the United States. Major General Michael Barbero alleges that the Quds force is tasked with exporting Iran’s Islamic revolution to other countries.[4]. The Quds Force reports directly to the Supreme Leader of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.[5][6] Its current commander is Brigadier General Qassem Suleimani.

en.wikipedia.org...



[edit on 3-4-2007 by Muaddib]

Originally posted by Muaddib
As i said in the other thread about this same topic there are some facts which are being hidden by the original poster of this thread.. such as the fact that the director of operations of the Quds force is one of those Iranian officers arrested in Iraq...

Soooooooooooo - what about this;

U.S. Sponsoring Kurdish Guerilla Attacks Inside Iran

We speak with independent journalist Reese Erlich about his report on Iranian Kurdish guerillas based among their Kurdish bretheren in northern Iraq. Erlich writes, “Kurdish and American sources say the United States has been supporting guerilla raids against Iran, channeling the money through organizations in Iraqi Kurdistan.”

By secretly funding militant ethnic separatist groups in and around Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on the Islamic regime to give up its nuclear programme. Although Washington officially denies involvement in such activity, Teheran has long claimed to detect the hand of both America and Britain in attacks by guerrilla groups on its internal security forces.

So what do we call that?