by seemslikeadream » Sun Sep 17, 2006 9:15 pm
<!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/9/17/192156/448" target="top">www.dailykos.com/story/2006/9/17/192156/448</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br><br>Ominous: Hints of an October Surprise <br>by souldrift <br>Sun Sep 17, 2006 at 04:21:56 PM PDT<br>I'm not sure what's up here, folks, but something is starting to smell.<br><br><br>First we have allegations--continued allegations--on the rightist puke-rag WorldNetDaily alleging that American Muslims have been warned to leave New York and Washington--and the original article quoted by WND and dated yesterday is even more sensationalist:<br><br><br>Urgent news from Abu Dawood, the newly appointed commander of the al Qaeda forces in Afghanistan:<br><br><br>Final preparations have been made for the American Hiroshima, a major attack on the U.S.<br><br>Muslims living in the United States should leave the country without further warning.....The al Qaeda operatives who will launch this attack are awaiting final orders. They remain in place in cities throughout the country. Many are masquerading as Christians and have adopted Christian names.<br><br><br>Second, within a Time cover story attempting to forecast what a war with Iran would look like, there are indications that the Navy has sent "Prepare to Deploy" orders to get equipment and personnel ready by October 1.<br><br>Thoughts after the jump.<br><br>souldrift's diary :: :: <br>The "American Hiroshima" warning is tied into the Mexican border-security/immigration scare with the following text:<br><br><br>Bush is aware that brother Adnan has smuggled deadly materials inside America from the Mexican border. Bush is silent about him, because he doesn't want to panic his people.<br><br>So readers of WND--typically the more conservative of our opposition--are being led to believe that something is "about to happen." They're likely to be hyper-sensitive, worried and perhaps trigger happy.<br><br><br>That's where this other news fits in. The Time article grounds itself by observing that planners always plan--and it stands to reason that even if nothing is imminent, plans are often drawn up and/or changed all the time. But let's look at the orders that were sent.<br><br><br>Before we proceed, here's a bonus order:<br><br><br>...a second request, from the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), asked for fresh eyes on long-standing U.S. plans to blockade two Iranian oil ports on the Persian Gulf. <br><br>The original "ready to deploy" orders were allegedly sent to "a submarine, an Aegis-class cruiser, two minesweepers and two mine hunters." The analysis in the article is understated but accurate:<br><br><br>There are only a few places in the world where minesweepers top the list of U.S. naval requirements. And every sailor, petroleum engineer and hedge-fund manager knows the name of the most important: the Strait of Hormuz, the 20-mile-wide bottleneck in the Persian Gulf through which roughly 40% of the world's oil needs to pass each day. Coupled with the CNO's request for a blockade review, a deployment of minesweepers to the west coast of Iran would seem to suggest that a much discussed--but until now largely theoretical--prospect has become real: that the U.S. may be preparing for war with Iran.<br><br>This is going on under cover of the post-September 11 speeches arguing for more flexibility regarding detainee treatment, obviously a known issue among progressives.<br><br>IF--and this is a big if--the WND report is to be considered even hypothetically possible, we just need to read that article to determine how our current strategy is winning the hearts and minds:<br><br><br>"You have witnessed the brutality of the Israelis in the recent 34-day war against Lebanese civilians," said Dawood. "9/11 was a revenge of Palestinian children, killed by the U.S.-made weapons, supplied to Israel. The next attack on America would be a revenge of Lebanese children killed by U.S.-made cluster bombs. Bush and (British Prime Minister Tony) Blair are the Crusaders, and Muslim leaders, like (Pakistani President Pervez) Musharraf and (Afghani President Hamid) Karzai are their collaborators. We will teach a lesson to all of them."<br><br>If the administration is considering this a credible threat, it may well be that they've determined we need to "Strike first" in order to preclude this from happening.<br><br><br>Are these hints pointing towards an "October Surprise"?<br> <p></p><i></i>