|
Syria: Jabhat al-Nusra, Not The FSA, Fighting With ISIS
The infighting between several foreign sponsored jihadist insurgency groups in northern and eastern Syria is sold by some as a fight of the “moderate” Free Syrian Army against the al-Qaeda affiliate ISIS. But this does not seem to be the reality. While there is some showing of the FSA flag over conquered ISIS territory this is likely just a fake to hide the real group behind the fighting, the al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhad al Nusra and a new, probably fictitious, Army of the Mujahideen.
A similar fake was reported from southern Syria where Jabhat al-Nusra successes get sold to “western” supporters as sole FSA operations:
“The FSA and Al Nusra join together for operations but they have an agreement to let the FSA lead for public reasons, because they don’t want to frighten Jordan or the West,” said an activist who works with opposition groups in Deraa.
“Operations that were really carried out by Al Nusra are publicly presented by the FSA as their own,” he said.
A leading FSA commander involved in operations in Deraa said Al Nusra had strengthened FSA units and played a decisive role in key rebel victories in the south.
“The face of Al Nusra cannot be to the front. It must be behind the FSA, for the sake of Jordan and the international community,” he said.
Whether this infighting between the two al-Qaeda affiliates Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS is about, money or other issues, is not yet clear. ISIS seems not be putting up a real fight but is mostly just retreating when challenged. Something is fishy in this. Whatever it may be it is for now good news for the Syrian government. It may even open a chance to kick those fake “revolutionaries” out of Aleppo.
126)
Germany was in undeclared war against Iran back then (including mass crimes against humanity, and Iranians in particular), and all you can say “but Schmidt was no war monger”?
I would not call it undeclared war, and Helmut Schmidt was definitively no war monger. But yes, West German firms were in the business of building Saddam Hussein’s chemical weapons program, and the “international community” was completely useless, mainly supporting Iraq but sometimes both sides.
But how did that Iran-Iraq war come about? It was not an international plot.
Tensions between Iraq and Iran were fueled by Iran’s Islamic revolution and its appearance of being a Pan-Islamic force, in contrast to Iraq’s Arab nationalism. Despite Iraq’s goals of regaining the Shatt al-Arab,[note 1] the Iraqi government seemed to initially welcome Iran’s Revolution, which overthrew Iran’s Shah, who was seen as a common enemy.[45][51] It is difficult to pinpoint when tensions began to build, but there were some cross border skirmishes, including when Iraqi aircraft bombed an Iranian village that anti-Iraqi Kurds allegedly hid in on June 1979.[52]
After this incident, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called on Iraqis to overthrow the Ba’ath government, and it was received with considerable anger in Baghdad.[45] On 17 July 1979, despite Khomeini’s call, Saddam gave a speech praising the Iranian Revolution and called for an Iraqi-Iranian friendship based on non-interference in each other’s internal affairs.[45] When Khomeini rejected Saddam’s overture by calling for Islamic revolution [37] in Iraq, Saddam was alarmed.[45] Iran’s new Islamic administration was regarded in Baghdad as an irrational, existential threat to the Ba’ath government, especially because the Ba’ath party, having a secular nature, discriminated and posed a threat to the Shia movement in Iraq, whose clerics were Iran’s allies within Iraq and whom Khomeini saw as oppressed.[45] Some scholars have argued that Iranian-backed attacks and cross-border raids on Iraqi territory compelled Iraq to launch a preemptive invasion.[53]
However, Iraq’s regime was very politically secure, and in little danger of being overthrown by alleged plots of revolution-wracked Iran.[37] According to some sources, Khomeini’s hostility towards Saddam was actually milder than his Arab neighbors hostility towards Saddam.[54] Saddam’s primary interest in war stemmed from his desire to right the supposed “wrong” of the Algiers Agreement, in addition to finally achieving his desire of annexing Khuzestan and becoming the regional superpower.[37] Saddam’s goal was to replace Egypt as the “leader of the Arab world” and to achieve hegemony over the Persian Gulf.[55] He saw Iran’s increased weakness due to revolution, sanctions, and international isolation.[47] Saddam had heavily invested in Iraq’s military since his defeat against Iran in 1975, buying large amounts of weaponry from the Soviet Union and France. By 1980, Iraq possessed 200,000 soldiers, 2,000 tanks and 450 aircraft.[51]:1 Watching the powerful Iranian army that frustrated him in 1974–1975 disintegrate, he saw an opportunity to attack, using the threat of Islamic Revolution as a pretext.[51][56]
A successful invasion of Iran would enlarge Iraq’s petroleum reserves and make Iraq the region’s dominant power. With Iran engulfed in chaos, an opportunity for Iraq to annex the oil-rich Khuzestan Province materialized.[50]:261 In addition, Khuzestan’s large ethnic Arab population would allow Saddam to pose as a liberator for Arabs from Persian rule.[50]:260 Fellow Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait (despite being hostile to Iraq) encouraged Iraq to attack, as they feared that an Islamic revolution would take place within their own borders. Certain Iranian exiles also helped convince Saddam that if he invaded, the fledgling Islamic republic would quickly collapse.[37]
In 1979–80, Iraq was the beneficiary of an oil boom that saw it take in US$33 billion, which allowed Iraq’s government to go on a spending spree on both civilian and military projects.[45] On several occasions, Saddam alluded to the Islamic conquest of Iran in promoting his position against Iran. For example, on 2 April 1980, half a year before the war’s outbreak, in a visit to Baghdad’s al-Mustansiriya University, he drew parallels to Persia’s defeat at the 7th century Battle of al-Qādisiyyah:
In your name, brothers, and on behalf of the Iraqis and Arabs everywhere we tell those Persian cowards and dwarfs who try to avenge al-Qadisiyah that the spirit of al-Qadisiyah as well as the blood and honor of the people of al-Qadisiyah who carried the message on their spearheads are greater than their attempts.[57]
[58][59]
In 1979–1980, anti-Ba’ath riots arose in the Iraq’s Shia areas by groups who were workings toward an Islamic revolution in their country.[45] Saddam and his deputies believed that the riots had been inspired by the Iranian Revolution and instigated by Iran’s government.[37] On 10 March 1980, when Iraq declared Iran’s ambassador persona non-grata, and demanded his withdrawal from Iraq by 15 March,[60] Iran replied by downgrading its diplomatic ties to the charge d’affaires level, and demanded that Iraq withdraw their ambassador from Iran. In April 1980, Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir al-Sadr and his sister Amina Haydar (better known as Bint al-Huda) were hanged as part of a crackdown to restore Saddam’s control. The execution of Iraq’s most senior Ayatollah caused outrage throughout the Islamic world, especially among Shias.[45]
Iraq soon after expropriated the properties of 70,000 civilians believed to be of Iranian origin and expelled them from its territory.[54] Many, if not most, of those expelled were in fact Arabic-speaking Iraqi Shias who had little to no family ties with Iran.[61] This caused tensions between the two nations to increase further.[54]
Map of Baathist Iraq’s hegemonic, ideological and territorial ambitions. Saddam Hussein wanted Iraq to be the leader of the Arab World and the Persian Gulf
In April 1980, Shia militants assassinated 20 Ba’ath officials, and Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz was almost assassinated on 1 April;[45] Aziz survived, but 11 students were killed in the attack.[37] Three days later, the funeral procession being held to bury the students was bombed.[62] Iraqi Information Minister Latif Nusseif al-Jasim also barely survived assassination by Shia militants.[45] The Shias’ repeated calls for the overthrow of the Ba’ath party and the support they allegedly received from Iran’s new government led Saddam to increasingly perceive Iran as a threat that, if ignored, might one day overthrow him;[45] he thus used the attacks as pretext for attacking Iran later that September,[62] though skirmishes along the Iran–Iraq border had already become a daily event by May that year.[45]
Iraq also helped to instigate riots among Iranian Arabs in Khuzestan province,[51] supporting them in their labor disputes,[51] and turning uprisings into armed battles between Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and militants, killing over 100 on both sides.[clarification needed] At times, Iraq also supported armed rebellion by the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran in Kurdistan.[63][64] The most notable of such events was the Iranian Embassy siege in London, in which six armed Khuzestani Arab insurgents took the Iranian Embassy’s staff as hostages,[65][66] resulting in an armed siege that was finally ended by Britain’s Special Air Service.
Posted by: somebody | Jan 9 2014 20:24 utc | 128
|
