Communist Bloc Military Updates: Joint Russian-Belarusian exercises observed by neo-Soviet defense ministers

Communism's "dead," so now the West sleeps while the Not-So-Former republics of the Soviet Union conduct joint military exercises to repel a NATO counterstrike following Russia's preemptive attack on Western Europe . . . Putin and his poodle Lukashenko are picture here.



Russia Says Exercises Have No Direct Focus
The Associated Press
Thursday, June 22, 2006; 4:22 PM
MINSK, Belarus

Military exercises between Russian and Belarusian forces, the largest ever for the two former Soviet republics, are not directed toward any nation, alliance or enemy in particular, Russia's defense minister said Thursday.

Sergei Ivanov spoke as defense ministers from the six-nation Collective Security Treaty Organization gathered in the Belarusian capital of Minsk on the sixth day of the military drills which feature about 7,000 Belarusian and 1,800 Russian troops."

This Russian-Belarusian exercise does not have an aggressive nature and is not directed toward anyone," Ivanov told a news conference.

Ivanov also said Russia and Kazakhstan would stage another military exercise under the framework of treaty organization later this year.

The exercises envisage a joint response to an unnamed, outside military threat. Russian MiG-29 fighter jets practiced intercepting enemy planes over western Belarus over the weekend, as part of the drills.

Belarus' authoritarian president, Alexander Lukashenko, who has been dubbed "Europe's last dictator" by the United States and other Western nations for his relentless crackdown on dissent, has repeatedly accused the West of harboring aggressive intentions.

Russia, meanwhile, has watched warily as former Soviet bloc countries bordering Belarus, Poland, Latvia and Lithuania, have joined NATO. Russian military officials have announced plans to set up a permanent air base in Belarus and deploy air defense missiles there.

Russia and Belarus signed a union agreement in 1996 providing for close political, economic and military ties, and their armed forces have held frequent joint drills.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and leaders of the other four nations in the defense and security cooperation pact, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, will visit Belarus to watch the exercise Saturday.

Link: Washington Post

North Korea File: USA activates new missile defense shield in response to impending North Korean test

Our relocation from Beautiful British Columbia to Alberta, otherwise known as Wild Rose Country, is almost complete and we are ready to resume our battle against international communism and its Islamo-Marxist proxies . . .

N. Korean threat activates shield
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
June 20, 2006

The Pentagon activated its new U.S. ground-based interceptor missile defense system, and officials announced yesterday that any long-range missile launch by North Korea would be considered a "provocative act."

Poor weather conditions above where the missile site was located by U.S. intelligence satellites indicates that an immediate launch is unlikely, said officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

However, intelligence officials said preparations have advanced to the point where a launch could take place within several days to a month.

Two Navy Aegis warships are patrolling near North Korea as part of the global missile defense and would be among the first sensors that would trigger the use of interceptors, the officials said yesterday.

The U.S. missile defense system includes 11 long-range interceptor missiles, including nine deployed at Fort Greeley, Alaska, and two at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The system was switched from test to operational mode within the past two weeks, the officials said.

One senior Bush administration official told The Washington Times that an option being considered would be to shoot down the Taepodong missile with responding interceptors.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice added that any launch would be a serious matter and "would be taken with utmost seriousness and indeed a provocative act."

White House spokesman Tony Snow declined to comment when asked if shooting down a launched missile was being considered as an option.

President Bush had telephoned more than a dozen heads of state regarding North Korea's launch preparations, Mr. Snow said. He did not identify the leaders who were called by Mr. Bush.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the U.S. has made it clear to North Korea that the communist regime should abide by the missile-test ban it imposed in 1999 and reaffirmed in a pact with Japan in 2002.

"The United States has a limited missile defense system," Mr. Whitman said. He declined to say if the system is operational or whether it would be used.

"U.S. Northern Command continues to monitor the situation, and we are prepared to defend the country in any way necessary," said spokesman Michael Kucharek.

Any decision to shoot down a missile would be made at the highest command levels, which includes the president, secretary of defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

In Tokyo, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said Japan and South Korea are trying to avert a launch.

"Even now, we hope that they will not do this," Mr. Koizumi said. "But if they ignore our views and launch a missile, then the Japanese government, consulting with the United States, would have to respond harshly."

John R. Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said the Bush administration is consulting with other Security Council members on how to respond to a Taepodong launch.

In Australia, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said North Korea's ambassador had been summoned and told any missile launch would result in "serious consequences."

U.S. intelligence officials said there are signs that the North Koreans recently began fueling the Taepodong with highly corrosive rocket fuel. Normally, when liquid fuel is loaded into missiles the missile must be fired within five to 10 days, or it must be de-fueled and the motors cleaned, a difficult and hazardous process.

The Taepodong was first tested in August 1998, and North Korea claimed that it was a space launch vehicle that orbited a satellite. U.S. intelligence officials said the last stage of the missile was powered but did not reach orbit. A new test would likely be a more advanced version.

"Our concerns about missile activity in North Korea are long-standing and well-documented," said Mr. Whitman, the Pentagon spokesman.

The test preparations began several weeks after the Bush administration imposed new rules on U.S. companies that prohibit American or foreign firms incorporated in the United States from flying North Korea's flag on merchant ships.

According to the Treasury Department, Korean War-era sanctions were loosened in 2000 in order to entice North Korea into abiding by the missile flight test ban.

One reason for the concerns about a launch is that North Korea has issued threatening statements through its official press and broadcast organs that it is ready to go to war with states such as Japan and the United States that impose economic sanctions.

• This article is based in part on wire service reports.

Link: Washington Times

Communism with Canadian Characteristics: Islamic terrorist cell busted in Canada; cased multiple targets, possessed three tons of ammonium nitrate

It is fitting that our last blog for the next six to eight weeks exposes an Islamic terrorist cell in Canada on the eve of plotting major terrorist acts in Toronto and Ottawa. For too long now Canadians have imagined themselves immune to international terrorism. Perhaps the new Conservative government, which has expressed greater solidarity with the USA in the War on Terror, accelerated this cell's plans to wreak havoc in Canada. It is very disturbing, too, that this group was even targeting the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, the very agency tasked with preventing such subversion and sabotage.

There may be a relationship between the current arrests in Canada, a recent inexplicable blast near Matheson, Ontario, and the botched suicide bombing that occurred at a Toronto Tim Hortons in April. The Northeast Intelligence Network and the Canada Free Press are two sources that have endeavored to penetrate the lies and myopia of the MSM "analysis." On May 29 the Canada Free Press carried a story by NEIN director Douglas Hagmann exposing the activities of a terrorist training camp operated by Jamaat ul Fuqra near Combermere, Ontario. Jamaat ul Fuqra was founded by Pakistani cleric Sheikh Syed Mubarik 'Ali Gilani.

According to a CBS News report, US authorities are scrutinizing events in Canada warily and, in another report by the Washington Post, preparing for another mass-casualty terror attack on their soil by conducting a massive "continuity of government" exercise on June 19.

As noted several days ago your resident blogger is moving from British Columbia to Alberta. As a result, our blogging will diminish until we resettle.

TSX prime target in bomb plot
Tue, June 6, 2006

Test explosion near Matheson in northern Ontario linked to alleged terror plot, Sun told

By BRIAN GRAY AND BRODIE FENLON, TORONTO SUN

An alleged terrorist cell was setting off test explosions with designs on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) as a primary target, a source close to the investigation has told the Toronto Sun.

A recent explosion near Matheson -- a town of about 3,000 people 600 km northwest of Toronto -- was linked to the terror plot, according to the source.

OPP in Matheson would not comment on any investigation into an explosion.

The primary target of the alleged cell was not Parliament Hill, CSIS Toronto offices or the CN Tower but the Toronto Stock Exchange, the source said.

The TSX is Canada's most important stock exchange and traded an average of $4.3 billion worth of securities every day last year. Its offices are at King and York Sts. in the heart of the city's financial district.

Ten men and five youths are scheduled to appear in Brampton court this morning on terror charges. Two others facing related charges are in Kingston prisons and will not be in court.

SERIES OF RAIDS

Sources said the arrest of 17 men Friday night in a series of co-ordinated raids led by CSIS and the RCMP was spurred on because police believed that one or more of the men was about to leave Canada.

Police said the men were in possession of three tons of ammonium nitrate, commonly used in fertilizer.

About one-third of that amount of the same chemical was used in the 1995 bombing of a U.S. federal office building in Oklahoma City that killed 168 people.

TSX spokesman Steve Kee would not discuss security arrangements at the exchange, nor would he comment on whether the exchange had been contacted by police about security concerns.

Six of the men arrested Friday night in Canada's largest ever counterterrorism operation allegedly wanted to "cause an explosion of an explosive substance" that would result in death, bodily harm or serious damage to property, court documents say.

The chilling accusation is one of six specific charges made against 12 adults in a court "information" sworn by an RCMP sergeant and made public yesterday.

Court documents on five youths charged in the probe were not released.* Fahim Ahmad, 21, Zakaria Amara, 20, Asad Ansari, 21, Shareef Abdelhaleen, 30, Qayyum Abdul Jamal, 43, and Saad Khalid, 19, are charged with doing "anything with intent" to cause a terrorism-related explosion that would be likely to cause serious bodily harm or death, the document says. No details are given.

The men are all accused of participating in a terrorist group. Very few specifics are given, but the documents show that:* Ahmad, Mohammed Dirie, 22, and Yasim Abdi Mohamed, 24, are alleged to have imported three guns and 182 rounds of ammunition "for the purpose of facilitating or carrying out a terrorist activity," or for the purpose of helping someone else carry out a terrorist activity.

Dirie and Mohamed, were convicted of gun smuggling after their arrest in Fort Erie in August 2005 and are serving two-year sentences, but no terrorism-related charges were laid until now.* Several of the men allegedly received terrorism training from Nov. 27 to Dec. 31, 2005. Ahmad, Amara, Amin Mohamed Durrani and Steven Vikash Chand, 25, are also charged with providing training or recruitment on behalf of a terrorist group.

The documents specify that all alleged criminal activity took place in Mississauga, Toronto, Fort Erie, Ramara Township and "elsewhere in the province of Ontario."

Several of the men attended the Al-Raham Islamic Centre for Islamic Education on Montevideo Rd. in Missisauga, including Qayyum Abdul Jamal, who lives nearby and volunteered at the strip mall mosque.

He was rebuked by the management of the mosque for making radical anti-Western statements, said Tariq Shah, a lawyer who took calls yesterday on behalf of the centre.

The remarks reportedly centred on Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan and the rape of local women there.

"The management is equally shocked and dismayed by the events ... We feel betrayed by the suspects," Shah said.

Link: Canoe

Communist Bloc Military Updates: Kommersant report: Russia may relocate Black Sea Fleet to Syrian port

This must be a comfortable arrangement for the Arab neofascist-communist regime in Damascus . . . I'm sure the Israelis must be thrilled at the prospect of a neo-Soviet naval base in Syria.

Russia may relocate Black Sea Fleet to Syrian port - paper
02/ 06/ 2006

MOSCOW, June 2 (RIA Novosti) - Russia has started dredging at a Syrian port where it maintains a logistical supply point with a possible eye to turning it into a full-fledged naval base, a respected Russian business daily said Friday.

Tartus, the second most important Syrian port on the Mediterranean, could be transformed into a base for Black Sea Fleet warships when they are redeployed from the Ukrainian port of Sevastopol, Kommersant daily said, quoting sources in Russia's diplomatic service and the Defense Ministry.

Vladimir Zimin, a senior economic advisor at the Russian Embassy to Syria, said Russia had simultaneously launched a modernization project at the port of Latakia, 90 km to the north of Tartus.

The paper quoted an anonymous source at the Defense Ministry as saying that Moscow was planning to form a squadron led by the Moskva missile cruiser within the next three years to operate in the Mediterranean Sea on a permanent basis, in particular for joint antiterrorist exercises with NATO forces.

Russia's Black Sea Fleet currently uses a range of naval facilities in the Crimea under a 1997 agreement that allowed Russia to continue its presence in its neighboring former Soviet republic for rent of $93 million per year.

The fleet is scheduled to withdraw in 2017, but Ukraine has recently voiced concerns that Russia is not paying enough for the facilities and also demanded that a new agreement be signed on inventorizing the bases. Russia has said it will make no concessions over rent or withdrawing the fleet and talks have stalled.

The Defense Ministry source told Kommersant that a Russian naval base in the Mediterranean would not only help Moscow strengthen its position in the Middle East - where it is currently also involved in negotiations on the Iranian nuclear crisis and the Israel/Palestinian issue - but also ensure Syria's security.

Moscow plans to deploy an S-300PMU-2 Favorit air-defense system to protect the base, the paper said, adding that the system will be operated by Russian servicemen and not be handed over to Syria.

At the same time, sources close to the matter said Moscow and Damascus had reached an agreement to modernize Syria's antiaircraft system using medium-range S-125 missile complexes that were deployed in the 1980s.

Link: Novosti