Darkhorse Marine Decorated for Valor
Marine Corps News | Mark Sixbey | May 22, 2006
Camp Fallujah, Iraq - A Darkhorse Marine was decorated with the nation�s fourth highest award for valor by the 1st Marine Division commanding general here, May 19.
Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski presented the Bronze Star Medal with Combat Distinguishing Device to 1st Lt. Alfred L. Butler IV, Weapons Company executive officer, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment outside the battalion�s command post.
�I knew his father, and I think he�s following in his footsteps,� Natonski said. �This is his third deployment to Iraq, and he�s done a marvelous job over here.�
The 27-year-old from Jacksonville, N.C., earned the award for his actions and leadership while commanding an 81mm Mortar Platoon on Dec. 23, 2004 during combat operations in Fallujah. He is currently on duty in Iraq with Regimental Combat Team 5.
�It was one of those days when everyone ran out of ammo,� said Butler, a graduate of Western Carolina University. �We even used AK-47�s.�
According to the award citation, as insurgents ambushed his platoon, Butler rushed to the attack where he found several men pinned under heavy automatic weapons fire on a stairwell. He evacuated them from the house and learned insurgents isolated additional men on the second floor. He quickly organized an assault force and raced to an adjacent house under constant small arms fire to recover the men.
Cpl. Justin Butler, a mortarman in the platoon, saw his platoon commander from across the street while laying suppressive fire.
�When we were on the roof, he was the first one I saw standing up to see the situation while everyone was getting shot at,� said the 21-year-old from Dyer, Ind. �It pumped everybody up that he would do that just to know everything that�s going on.�
The platoon commander led his team as they cleared two buildings, jumping from roof-to-roof to reach them. He shielded the bodies of the fallen Marines when a grenade landed nearby with complete disregard for his own safety, then threw two grenades into a room filled with insurgents.
While delivering cover fire, Butler moved the men across to an adjacent rooftop, personally evacuating a wounded Marine under constant small arms fire and grenade attacks. His actions preserved the lives of the men.
Butler credited the decoration to the Marines under his command.
�I owe those Marines my life,� he said. �The things they did that day are the sort of things you read about in books. What they do for each other and what they sacrifice for each other makes you not want to leave the Marine Corps. They hold up the tradition of 3/5 and live up to the legacy.�
Alfred Butler III, was a Marine major who was killed in Beirut when his son was only five-years-old. Butler said most of what he knows of his father he learned from Marines who served with him.
�It�s nice that he knew my father and served with him,� he said. �My knowledge of him as a person is through people like General Natonski and what they say about him and the man he was. From what I understand, he was a great man, great Marine, husband and father. If I can be half of that, I think I�ll be fine.�
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
1957 Beirut Marine has a unique hobby
When he saw the first statue, the crusty old Marine had tears in his eyes.
He bought it right away, took it home and set it up in his front yard. Then Lloyd Seekamp told his wife, "I'm going to get them all."
And that's why you can find a line of five saluting, flag-holding statues in the Seekamp front yard in west Greeley. And that's why Eaton Grove Nursery north of Greeley is temporarily out of the military statues. Lloyd bought all they had.
The concrete military statues are about four feet tall, with a coating that makes them appear to be bronze. Represented are the Marines, Navy, Army, Air Force and a female Army officer.
For Lloyd and Zola Seekamp, they are more than just statues. Lloyd was a U.S. Marine for seven years beginning in 1950. He was just off the coast of Korea when the armistice that ended that war was signed.
In 1957, he was one of only 11 Marines in Beirut, Lebanon, guarding the U.S. Embassy, when he met an embassy secretary, Zola Estep. Three months later, they were married.
"We really don't talk about how quickly we got married," Zola said. "But we've been married 49 years, so I guess it worked."
Lloyd was the oldest of 14 kids in a dairy farm family in Wisconsin; Zola grew up in Lamar. He got to Lebanon after other assignments as a Marine. Zola joined the U.S. State Department in 1954 and went to London before Beirut.
"Beirut was beautiful in those days," Zola said. "That was before the problems in the Middle East, and it was very quiet."
After they married, the couple returned to the U.S., and Lloyd went into the agricultural feed business. He's been doing it now for 40 years.
In 1981, after living in Greeley seven years, the Seekamps started a seed business in their basement. It grew into a good living, and Lloyd retired a few years ago.
Now 74, Lloyd still goes to work each day, but this time he's working with his son-in-law's Peterson Pet Food business.
"I'm on the road a lot," Lloyd said, "doing what I do best -- selling."
And he comes home each evening, greeted by the five military statues in his front yard. "It still breaks me up a little when I see them," Lloyd said. "We need to show support for our military and remember what they've done for us."
They worry about vandals or thieves stealing the statues, so they keep a close eye on them. They don't want their address in the paper, fearing it will be an invitation for someone who doesn't like the military.
But they've been surprised, by the people who stop in front to view the statues or the people who come to the door to ask about their display.
"It's good to see so many people who care about the soldiers," Zola said.
It even makes the crusty old Marine smile.
Staff writer Mike Peters' column about Weld County people appears Mondays in the Tribune. His humor column, the Gnarly Trombone, appears Saturdays. Contact him by e-mail at mpeters@greeleytribune.com
If you live here, you get it!
For the most up to date news and information in Weld County, subscribe to the Greeley Tribune.
He bought it right away, took it home and set it up in his front yard. Then Lloyd Seekamp told his wife, "I'm going to get them all."
And that's why you can find a line of five saluting, flag-holding statues in the Seekamp front yard in west Greeley. And that's why Eaton Grove Nursery north of Greeley is temporarily out of the military statues. Lloyd bought all they had.
The concrete military statues are about four feet tall, with a coating that makes them appear to be bronze. Represented are the Marines, Navy, Army, Air Force and a female Army officer.
For Lloyd and Zola Seekamp, they are more than just statues. Lloyd was a U.S. Marine for seven years beginning in 1950. He was just off the coast of Korea when the armistice that ended that war was signed.
In 1957, he was one of only 11 Marines in Beirut, Lebanon, guarding the U.S. Embassy, when he met an embassy secretary, Zola Estep. Three months later, they were married.
"We really don't talk about how quickly we got married," Zola said. "But we've been married 49 years, so I guess it worked."
Lloyd was the oldest of 14 kids in a dairy farm family in Wisconsin; Zola grew up in Lamar. He got to Lebanon after other assignments as a Marine. Zola joined the U.S. State Department in 1954 and went to London before Beirut.
"Beirut was beautiful in those days," Zola said. "That was before the problems in the Middle East, and it was very quiet."
After they married, the couple returned to the U.S., and Lloyd went into the agricultural feed business. He's been doing it now for 40 years.
In 1981, after living in Greeley seven years, the Seekamps started a seed business in their basement. It grew into a good living, and Lloyd retired a few years ago.
Now 74, Lloyd still goes to work each day, but this time he's working with his son-in-law's Peterson Pet Food business.
"I'm on the road a lot," Lloyd said, "doing what I do best -- selling."
And he comes home each evening, greeted by the five military statues in his front yard. "It still breaks me up a little when I see them," Lloyd said. "We need to show support for our military and remember what they've done for us."
They worry about vandals or thieves stealing the statues, so they keep a close eye on them. They don't want their address in the paper, fearing it will be an invitation for someone who doesn't like the military.
But they've been surprised, by the people who stop in front to view the statues or the people who come to the door to ask about their display.
"It's good to see so many people who care about the soldiers," Zola said.
It even makes the crusty old Marine smile.
Staff writer Mike Peters' column about Weld County people appears Mondays in the Tribune. His humor column, the Gnarly Trombone, appears Saturdays. Contact him by e-mail at mpeters@greeleytribune.com
If you live here, you get it!
For the most up to date news and information in Weld County, subscribe to the Greeley Tribune.
Friday, March 24, 2006
Today's terrorist could be tomorrow's world leader
Hamas. with it's recent victory in the Gaza Strip, has taken hold of the "New" Palestinian State. Long a member of the Bush Administration's terrorist Watch list, it will be interesting to watch the events that follow in the long embattled Middle East. They, (Hamas) have yet to recognize Israel , nor are they willing to give up their terrorism in the Middle East, or elsewhere. Millions of US Dollars have been sent to the Palestinians over the years. These funds have been squandered for the lifestyle of the now deceased Arafat. Now, the money flow will be stopped or will it?
There are some in the Bush Administration who want to find peace in the Middle east at any cost. Getting much needed funds to the Hamas would be a great way to gain intelligence and stabilize the area. I have to say, this has been tried by Israel's Prime Minister Sharon by giving the Gaza Strip back to the Palestinians. The effect of which is continued warfare against Israel. It didn't work and I don't think it ever will.
As long as the Palestinians align themselves with Moslem Extremists there is no chance for peace, as the quotes listed below attest to:
Israelis have no history in the Land - because they are "Khazars, who are not connected to the land but to the words of the Torah".
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 16, 2003]
This is the root cause of the violence in the Middle East. Each side has bloody hands, but Hamas has their entire organization committed to not only Israel's destruction but the West as well.
As Veterans of Beirut we all know the problems of the Middle East. It all seems so clear to us. Why not the rest of world?
There are some in the Bush Administration who want to find peace in the Middle east at any cost. Getting much needed funds to the Hamas would be a great way to gain intelligence and stabilize the area. I have to say, this has been tried by Israel's Prime Minister Sharon by giving the Gaza Strip back to the Palestinians. The effect of which is continued warfare against Israel. It didn't work and I don't think it ever will.
As long as the Palestinians align themselves with Moslem Extremists there is no chance for peace, as the quotes listed below attest to:
On the Jews 'raising the number' of Holocaust victims:
"Having more victims meant greater rights and stronger privilege to join the negotiation table for dividing the spoils of war once it was over. However, since Zionism was not a fighting partner - suffering victims in a battle - it had no escape but to offer up human beings, under any name, to raise the number of victims, which they could then boast of at the moment of accounting."
"It seems that the interest of the Zionist movement ... is to inflate this figure so that their gains will be greater. This led them to emphasize this figure in order to gain the solidarity of international public opinion with Zionism. Many scholars have debated the figure of six million and reached stunning conclusions - fixing the number of Jewish victims at only a few hundred thousand."
[The Other Side: The secret relations between Nazism and the leadership of the Zionist movement, Mahmoud Abbas, 1983, Translation by Simon Wiesenthal Center.]
Israelis have no history in the Land - because they are "Khazars, who are not connected to the land but to the words of the Torah".
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 16, 2003]
Half a month after its electoral victory, a Hamas website presented the parting video messages of two Hamas suicide terrorists. One message was for Jews, whose blood Hamas promises to drink until Jews "leave the Muslim countries," and the second to a mother, as she helps dress her son for battle prior to his suicide terror mission.
"My message to the loathed Jews is that there is no god but Allah, we will chase you everywhere! We are a nation that drinks blood, and we know that there is no blood better than the blood of Jews. We will not leave you alone until we have quenched our thirst with your blood, and our children's thirst with your blood. We will not leave until you leave the Muslim countries.""In the name of Allah, we will destroy you, blow you up, take revenge against you, purify the land of you, pigs that have defiled our country... This operation is revenge against the sons of monkeys and pigs."
"I dedicate this wedding [i.e. death for Allah] to all of those who have chosen Allah as their goal, the Quran as their constitution and the Prophet [Muhammad] as their role model. Jihad is the only way to liberate Palestine - all of Palestine - from the impurity of the Jews...
"My dear mother, you who have cared for me, today I sacrifice my life to be your intercessor [on Judgment Day]. O my love and soul, wipe your tears, don't be saddened. In the name of Allah, I've achieve all that I've aspired. Don't let me see you sad on my wedding day with the Maidens of Paradise. So be happy and not sad, because in the name of Allah, after death is merciful Allah's paradise."
"My dear mother, don't cry over us
We have to seek, my mother, the help of Allah
My dear mother, don't cry over us
We have to seek, my mother, the help of Allah"
[Hamas website, February 12, 2006]
This is the root cause of the violence in the Middle East. Each side has bloody hands, but Hamas has their entire organization committed to not only Israel's destruction but the West as well.
As Veterans of Beirut we all know the problems of the Middle East. It all seems so clear to us. Why not the rest of world?
Friday, March 17, 2006
MAJ GENERAL SMITH TO SPEAK
NEWS RELEASE
PUBLIC INFORMATION DEPARTMENT
PO Box 567, Buies Creek, NC 27506
Tel: (910) 893-1224 w Fax: (910) 893-1922
Marine Corps general and author to be Barden lecturer
Maj.Gen.Ray L. Smith, USMC (Ret.) will be the featured speaker at Campbell University’s Barden Forum, Monday, Mar. 20, at 7:30 p.m. in the Hartness Lecture Hall of the Science building. Smith is the author of “The March Up: Taking Baghdad with the 1st Marine Division.” Free and open to the public, the lecture is sponsored by Campbell’s Department of Government, History and Justice.
A native of Oklahoma, Smith enlisted in the Marine Corps in Dec. 1965 and graduated as the Platoon and Series Honorman at San Diego in 1966. He graduated from Officers Candidate School in 1967. He was also selected to participate in the Bootstrap Program in 1978. Smith earned his bachelor’s degree in Asian Studies in 1980 and his master’s degree in Military Science from the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. He also received a master’s degree in International Relations.
A decorated war veteran, Smith’s duty assignments included two tours in Vietnam. He also led troops into Grenada and Beirut as the commander of 2nd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment. In addition, his assignments included Japan and Korea. Smith ended his military career as commanding general of the Marine Corps base at Camp Lejeune N.C. He retired from the Marines in 1999. On his last day of active duty, Smith was a convocation speaker and received an Honorary Doctor of Laws from Campbell University.
Smith currently serves as president of the board of directors of the Marine Corps Museum of the Carolinas and as a member of the board of Caring Communities. He has also served on the Jacksonville USO Executive Council and the board of directors of the Jacksonville-Onslow Area Chamber of Commerce. He was inducted into the Oklahoma Military Hall of Fame and received the Mack McKinney Award. In addition, he is a member of the North Carolina Advisory Commission on Military Affairs.
For more information about the General Smith lecture, contact Vicki Crowell (910) 893-1480 or (800) 334-4111, ext.1480.
Monday, March 06, 2006
MARINE VET PART OF BEIRUT HONOR GUARD
Duty still calls for former Marine at PTI
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GREENSBORO — Despite the planning, cutting through red tape and security clearances, Jim Carter encounters what the military calls the SNAFUs.
Recently, at Piedmont Triad International Airport, Carter arranged for the mother of a female Marine to get around the security screening and be poised at the gate to embrace her daughter, who was arriving for a break from Iraq.
Carter and the mother were supposed to meet at a certain place. They missed connections. Once they linked, the daughter had already reached the baggage carousel.
The emotional moment had been missed.
But that hasn't happened often, says Carter, who runs a virtual USO at PTI, although it's not in his mission statement as director of security, chief of communications and airport police reserve officer.
He tries to make reunions joyous for troops returning for brief breaks from the war. He seeks to dignify sad occasions for families whose loved ones arrive in caskets.
"Picture a former Marine carrying an Army captain's duffle bag to the car," Bettie Stocks Rhodes, of Reidsville, says in an e-mail to the News & Record after her son-in-law, Capt. Ben Shepherd, arrived from Iraq recently for a two-week stay.
"Efficiently, quietly and humbly, Jim Carter honors and assists soldiers arriving ...
"My deepest gratitude goes to Jim Carter, who continues to serve his country."
Carter was a sergeant and later a warrant officer in the Marines.
In helping military people and parents, he wants them to avoid what he encountered upon returning from a second tour in Vietnam in 1969.
At the airport in Los Angeles, a "flower child," he says, tried to cram a flower into the medals and ribbons on his uniform.
"Don't touch me or the uniform, and don't spit on me, and we'll get along fine," he recalled saying.
She uttered something about him being a baby killer.
Thousands of returning Vietnam veterans experienced similar hostility. Or they felt ignored.
Even though the war in Iraq may be as unpopular to some people as Vietnam, Carter hasn't witnessed the same hostility toward those fighting it.
He felt goose bumps when he watched a uniformed Marine lieutenant, his ankle broken from a chopper crash, refuse a wheelchair. He hobbled on crutches the length of the concourse. Travelers at gates arose in applause.
"I am glad people finally woke up," Carter says. "The troops out there are not the enemy."
He says his eyes welled when an airline pilot delayed departure until Marines in dress blues finished lifting a casket covered with an American flag and carried it to a hearse.
Carter always arranges for grieving families to be near the plane.
One woman, he says, ran "and kissed her son's casket."
The father of another dead Marine kept repeating: "I should have never let him out of my sight."
Later, Carter says, the man conceded that his son, who had re-enlisted, "died doing what he wanted to do."
Carter gave the Marines 27 years.
"I miss the heck out of the Corps," he says.
That's obvious from his office decor -- outfitted in Marine red and gold. It beats any Marine recruiting station. It's jammed with Marine plaques, figurines, models of the Iwo Jima statue, photos of his old units, recruiting posters, one of his former uniform jackets in a frame and posters bearing gung-ho slogans.
"It's God's job to judge the terrorists. It's our mission to arrange the meeting," a sticker on a desk drawer says.
He gets irritated at the geographical illiteracy of young Marines. They land at PTI and seek a cab to Camp Lejeune. They think the base is nearby, not 200 miles away.
"Do you have $300 for a cab to Lejeune," Carter asks them.
A dozen times he has driven Marines to the bus station and bought them a ticket to Lejeune. He warns they'd better repay him next payday. Only two have stiffed him.
The Alabama native quit high school to join the Marines in 1960, rose to sergeant and became a warrant officer in 1969. Later, he spent five years on the inspector and instructor staff with the Greensboro Marine Corps Reserve unit. The I&I staff are regular Marines who assist reservists.
During that time, 241 Marines were killed in 1983 during a terrorist attack on a barracks in Beirut, He and the I&I staff knocked on doors to tell two Greensboro-area parents their sons were dead. The staff served as honor guards at the casket arrivals and at the burials.
Parental reactions, he says, range from emotional outbreaks and anger to quiet acceptance. In the Beirut bombing, one woman believed that because her son's finger had been found, the rest of him was in a hospital recovering.
When Carter retired from the Marines in 1988, he returned to the area to a house he bought while on I&I duty and went to work for the airport police.
Homecomings on furloughs and leaves from Iraq are happy times, though the returns two weeks afterward aren't. When Shepherd, the captain whose duffel bag Carter had carried to the car when he arrived, had to return to the war, Carter was there. He says the captain slid a letter into the stroller of the baby he had seen for the first time when he came home.
Carter says he couldn't do what he does without the cooperation of airport manager Ted Johnson and others. He wishes he could do more -- and wishes some parents would, too.
"I'll see a soldier up there," he says, "and no one is with him. Someone should be there to see that person off."
Contact Jim Schlosser at 373-7081 or jschlosser@new-record.com
Print this Article Print this article Email this Article Email this Article
GREENSBORO — Despite the planning, cutting through red tape and security clearances, Jim Carter encounters what the military calls the SNAFUs.
Recently, at Piedmont Triad International Airport, Carter arranged for the mother of a female Marine to get around the security screening and be poised at the gate to embrace her daughter, who was arriving for a break from Iraq.
Carter and the mother were supposed to meet at a certain place. They missed connections. Once they linked, the daughter had already reached the baggage carousel.
The emotional moment had been missed.
But that hasn't happened often, says Carter, who runs a virtual USO at PTI, although it's not in his mission statement as director of security, chief of communications and airport police reserve officer.
He tries to make reunions joyous for troops returning for brief breaks from the war. He seeks to dignify sad occasions for families whose loved ones arrive in caskets.
"Picture a former Marine carrying an Army captain's duffle bag to the car," Bettie Stocks Rhodes, of Reidsville, says in an e-mail to the News & Record after her son-in-law, Capt. Ben Shepherd, arrived from Iraq recently for a two-week stay.
"Efficiently, quietly and humbly, Jim Carter honors and assists soldiers arriving ...
"My deepest gratitude goes to Jim Carter, who continues to serve his country."
Carter was a sergeant and later a warrant officer in the Marines.
In helping military people and parents, he wants them to avoid what he encountered upon returning from a second tour in Vietnam in 1969.
At the airport in Los Angeles, a "flower child," he says, tried to cram a flower into the medals and ribbons on his uniform.
"Don't touch me or the uniform, and don't spit on me, and we'll get along fine," he recalled saying.
She uttered something about him being a baby killer.
Thousands of returning Vietnam veterans experienced similar hostility. Or they felt ignored.
Even though the war in Iraq may be as unpopular to some people as Vietnam, Carter hasn't witnessed the same hostility toward those fighting it.
He felt goose bumps when he watched a uniformed Marine lieutenant, his ankle broken from a chopper crash, refuse a wheelchair. He hobbled on crutches the length of the concourse. Travelers at gates arose in applause.
"I am glad people finally woke up," Carter says. "The troops out there are not the enemy."
He says his eyes welled when an airline pilot delayed departure until Marines in dress blues finished lifting a casket covered with an American flag and carried it to a hearse.
Carter always arranges for grieving families to be near the plane.
One woman, he says, ran "and kissed her son's casket."
The father of another dead Marine kept repeating: "I should have never let him out of my sight."
Later, Carter says, the man conceded that his son, who had re-enlisted, "died doing what he wanted to do."
Carter gave the Marines 27 years.
"I miss the heck out of the Corps," he says.
That's obvious from his office decor -- outfitted in Marine red and gold. It beats any Marine recruiting station. It's jammed with Marine plaques, figurines, models of the Iwo Jima statue, photos of his old units, recruiting posters, one of his former uniform jackets in a frame and posters bearing gung-ho slogans.
"It's God's job to judge the terrorists. It's our mission to arrange the meeting," a sticker on a desk drawer says.
He gets irritated at the geographical illiteracy of young Marines. They land at PTI and seek a cab to Camp Lejeune. They think the base is nearby, not 200 miles away.
"Do you have $300 for a cab to Lejeune," Carter asks them.
A dozen times he has driven Marines to the bus station and bought them a ticket to Lejeune. He warns they'd better repay him next payday. Only two have stiffed him.
The Alabama native quit high school to join the Marines in 1960, rose to sergeant and became a warrant officer in 1969. Later, he spent five years on the inspector and instructor staff with the Greensboro Marine Corps Reserve unit. The I&I staff are regular Marines who assist reservists.
During that time, 241 Marines were killed in 1983 during a terrorist attack on a barracks in Beirut, He and the I&I staff knocked on doors to tell two Greensboro-area parents their sons were dead. The staff served as honor guards at the casket arrivals and at the burials.
Parental reactions, he says, range from emotional outbreaks and anger to quiet acceptance. In the Beirut bombing, one woman believed that because her son's finger had been found, the rest of him was in a hospital recovering.
When Carter retired from the Marines in 1988, he returned to the area to a house he bought while on I&I duty and went to work for the airport police.
Homecomings on furloughs and leaves from Iraq are happy times, though the returns two weeks afterward aren't. When Shepherd, the captain whose duffel bag Carter had carried to the car when he arrived, had to return to the war, Carter was there. He says the captain slid a letter into the stroller of the baby he had seen for the first time when he came home.
Carter says he couldn't do what he does without the cooperation of airport manager Ted Johnson and others. He wishes he could do more -- and wishes some parents would, too.
"I'll see a soldier up there," he says, "and no one is with him. Someone should be there to see that person off."
Contact Jim Schlosser at 373-7081 or jschlosser@new-record.com
Saturday, February 18, 2006
Iraq-Bound Marine Leaders Cram on Civics and Economics
Maj Gen Zilmer was Fox Company Captain in 1982 when we first went into Beirut.
By ERIC SCHMITT
Published: February 13, 2006
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif., Feb. 7 — Maj. Gen. Richard C. Zilmer is busy these days poring over classified intelligence reports on the insurgency in Iraq's restive Anbar Province.
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The Reach of War
Go to Complete Coverage
But as General Zilmer, a 53-year-old veteran of the Persian Gulf war in 1991, prepares to take command this month of 30,000 marines and soldiers in what may be the most dangerous region in Iraq, he is also focusing on some less obvious projects.
Those include collecting information on the 10 largest employers in the province, the vast desert area west of Baghdad, trying to figure out how to ensure that local police officers and health workers there are being paid and thinking about the region's business challenges like an entrepreneur.
As new Marine commanders prepare to head to Iraq for a yearlong tour and gird for new battles there with insurgents, they say they must also put greater emphasis on helping the new Iraqi government provide essential city services, create jobs and promote local governmental control.
"Our focus of operations has been along security lines in the past, and they'll remain imperative," said General Zilmer, who as a young officer in the 1980's served in the Marine peacekeeping mission in Beirut. "That said, we think there are other things that also require attention to be successful, including economics and governance. These are all happening at once."
That philosophy fits neatly under the strategy of Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli of the Army, the new overall commander of daily operations in Iraq, who says the military must not shortchange reconstruction and democratization efforts even while it battles insurgents.
Here at this sprawling base north of San Diego, General Zilmer's 700-member staff from the First Marine Expeditionary Force has been taking that guidance to heart.
Last month, General Zilmer sponsored a two-day conference here to develop ideas on how to help speed reconstruction and the growth of civic organizations in Anbar, a contested region about the size of Arkansas that includes Falluja and Ramadi.
The 75 participants in the conference included military civil affairs specialists, specialists from the State and Commerce Departments, Iraqi business groups and an array of American private contractors who are working in Iraq. Practical tips, like those General Zilmer is studying, flowed from the meeting. Marines said they met contacts who could help them in Iraq.
"They'll be working in the most dangerous part of Iraq, and will need to have a lot of flexibility on the ground," said Frederick D. Barton, a specialist on reconstruction at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, who attended the conference.
General Zilmer said an officer might be assigned to Amman, Jordan, to help promote job growth and business development in western Iraq. Marine commanders expressed support for establishing military-civilian provincial reconstruction teams in Anbar similar to those operating in Afghanistan and other parts of Iraq.
The Marines express hope that promoting economic gains and political growth in the impoverished region will dissuade Sunnis in Anbar from supporting the insurgency.
"This is all about converting those Iraqis on the fence," said Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, who oversees all marines in Southwest Asia, including Iraq, from his headquarters here.
But Marine commanders say they face a shrinking window of opportunity. American influence is expected to diminish as Iraq's new government takes control. If Sunnis feel shut out of the political process by Shiite and Kurdish leaders, insurgent attacks are expected to increase, despite a series of operations last summer and fall in the Euphrates River Valley that commanders say disrupted the insurgents' ability to send suicide bombers into Baghdad and other major cities.
The 30,000 marines and soldiers in Anbar have represented about 20 percent of the total American force in Iraq since last April, but they also have suffered about 35 percent of the combat deaths in that period. Homemade bombs remain the No. 1 killer.
"I don't see it decreasing," said Brig. Gen. Robert B. Neller, a veteran of American military missions in Panama, Somalia and Bosnia and General Zilmer's deputy for operations, referring to the number of bombs. "It's clearly the weapon of choice."
To combat the insurgency, the Marines plan to increase the training of Iraqi soldiers, border guards and the police force, whose numbers in the province have grown to about 24,000 from a few thousand a year ago. "Some of them still have a long way to go," General Zilmer said, referring to the recruits.
With growing domestic pressure to reduce the number of American forces in Iraq, General Zilmer will command a staff that is about 500 marines smaller than that of the headquarters he is replacing. He and his deputies have been talking regularly with the departing command under Maj. Gen. Stephen T. Johnson in Anbar since last summer, and they visited Iraq in October.
More than 60 percent of the marines under General Zilmer have previously served in Iraq or Afghanistan. They conducted training exercises in mock Iraqi villages in the nearby Mojave Desert, including tactics to counter roadside bombings. For his headquarters staff, General Zilmer had briefings prepared on Iraqi culture, geography and politics.
For now, General Zilmer discounts fears that simmering sectarian strife in Anbar could boil into civil war.
"The challenge," he said, "will be to demonstrate to them that there's some benefit to being a single people, to being an Iraqi people."
By ERIC SCHMITT
Published: February 13, 2006
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif., Feb. 7 — Maj. Gen. Richard C. Zilmer is busy these days poring over classified intelligence reports on the insurgency in Iraq's restive Anbar Province.
Skip to next paragraph
The Reach of War
Go to Complete Coverage
But as General Zilmer, a 53-year-old veteran of the Persian Gulf war in 1991, prepares to take command this month of 30,000 marines and soldiers in what may be the most dangerous region in Iraq, he is also focusing on some less obvious projects.
Those include collecting information on the 10 largest employers in the province, the vast desert area west of Baghdad, trying to figure out how to ensure that local police officers and health workers there are being paid and thinking about the region's business challenges like an entrepreneur.
As new Marine commanders prepare to head to Iraq for a yearlong tour and gird for new battles there with insurgents, they say they must also put greater emphasis on helping the new Iraqi government provide essential city services, create jobs and promote local governmental control.
"Our focus of operations has been along security lines in the past, and they'll remain imperative," said General Zilmer, who as a young officer in the 1980's served in the Marine peacekeeping mission in Beirut. "That said, we think there are other things that also require attention to be successful, including economics and governance. These are all happening at once."
That philosophy fits neatly under the strategy of Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli of the Army, the new overall commander of daily operations in Iraq, who says the military must not shortchange reconstruction and democratization efforts even while it battles insurgents.
Here at this sprawling base north of San Diego, General Zilmer's 700-member staff from the First Marine Expeditionary Force has been taking that guidance to heart.
Last month, General Zilmer sponsored a two-day conference here to develop ideas on how to help speed reconstruction and the growth of civic organizations in Anbar, a contested region about the size of Arkansas that includes Falluja and Ramadi.
The 75 participants in the conference included military civil affairs specialists, specialists from the State and Commerce Departments, Iraqi business groups and an array of American private contractors who are working in Iraq. Practical tips, like those General Zilmer is studying, flowed from the meeting. Marines said they met contacts who could help them in Iraq.
"They'll be working in the most dangerous part of Iraq, and will need to have a lot of flexibility on the ground," said Frederick D. Barton, a specialist on reconstruction at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, who attended the conference.
General Zilmer said an officer might be assigned to Amman, Jordan, to help promote job growth and business development in western Iraq. Marine commanders expressed support for establishing military-civilian provincial reconstruction teams in Anbar similar to those operating in Afghanistan and other parts of Iraq.
The Marines express hope that promoting economic gains and political growth in the impoverished region will dissuade Sunnis in Anbar from supporting the insurgency.
"This is all about converting those Iraqis on the fence," said Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, who oversees all marines in Southwest Asia, including Iraq, from his headquarters here.
But Marine commanders say they face a shrinking window of opportunity. American influence is expected to diminish as Iraq's new government takes control. If Sunnis feel shut out of the political process by Shiite and Kurdish leaders, insurgent attacks are expected to increase, despite a series of operations last summer and fall in the Euphrates River Valley that commanders say disrupted the insurgents' ability to send suicide bombers into Baghdad and other major cities.
The 30,000 marines and soldiers in Anbar have represented about 20 percent of the total American force in Iraq since last April, but they also have suffered about 35 percent of the combat deaths in that period. Homemade bombs remain the No. 1 killer.
"I don't see it decreasing," said Brig. Gen. Robert B. Neller, a veteran of American military missions in Panama, Somalia and Bosnia and General Zilmer's deputy for operations, referring to the number of bombs. "It's clearly the weapon of choice."
To combat the insurgency, the Marines plan to increase the training of Iraqi soldiers, border guards and the police force, whose numbers in the province have grown to about 24,000 from a few thousand a year ago. "Some of them still have a long way to go," General Zilmer said, referring to the recruits.
With growing domestic pressure to reduce the number of American forces in Iraq, General Zilmer will command a staff that is about 500 marines smaller than that of the headquarters he is replacing. He and his deputies have been talking regularly with the departing command under Maj. Gen. Stephen T. Johnson in Anbar since last summer, and they visited Iraq in October.
More than 60 percent of the marines under General Zilmer have previously served in Iraq or Afghanistan. They conducted training exercises in mock Iraqi villages in the nearby Mojave Desert, including tactics to counter roadside bombings. For his headquarters staff, General Zilmer had briefings prepared on Iraqi culture, geography and politics.
For now, General Zilmer discounts fears that simmering sectarian strife in Anbar could boil into civil war.
"The challenge," he said, "will be to demonstrate to them that there's some benefit to being a single people, to being an Iraqi people."
Thursday, January 19, 2006
Hezbollah Boasts about Marine Killings!
Must-See Hezbollah TV: Part III
The MEMRI Report
By STEVEN STALINSKY
January 18, 2006
The 1983 attack on American Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 241 was Hezbollah's coming-out party. To this day, the attack is lauded on its TV channel Al-Manar. A Hezbollah "poet," Atef Moussa, appeared on May 22, 2005, and said,"Who says we are afraid of war? ... Who can compare to the men of Hezbollah? ... These enemies [the American military] turned out to be as light as cardboard. Bush knows it. Beirut remains dangerous for the Marines. Our proof is here, they left in shame. Our people sail the seas of martyrdom."
In an anti-American speech mocking the American military on March 8, 2005, Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Nasrallah, also referred to the attack: "I address the following to America ... to President Bush ... to Condoleezza Rice ... and to American-Lebanese field commander Satterfield ... Lebanon will not ... throw its heart to your soldiers' dogs so they will eat it ... You can make yourself heard by the commander of the American forces in the region, who is of Lebanese origin, John Abizaid ... Are you Lebanese afraid of the American naval fleets? These naval fleets have come in the past, and were defeated, and if they come again, they will be defeated again..."
As reported in the NY Sun direct quotes from Hezbollah TV
The MEMRI Report
By STEVEN STALINSKY
January 18, 2006
The 1983 attack on American Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 241 was Hezbollah's coming-out party. To this day, the attack is lauded on its TV channel Al-Manar. A Hezbollah "poet," Atef Moussa, appeared on May 22, 2005, and said,"Who says we are afraid of war? ... Who can compare to the men of Hezbollah? ... These enemies [the American military] turned out to be as light as cardboard. Bush knows it. Beirut remains dangerous for the Marines. Our proof is here, they left in shame. Our people sail the seas of martyrdom."
In an anti-American speech mocking the American military on March 8, 2005, Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Nasrallah, also referred to the attack: "I address the following to America ... to President Bush ... to Condoleezza Rice ... and to American-Lebanese field commander Satterfield ... Lebanon will not ... throw its heart to your soldiers' dogs so they will eat it ... You can make yourself heard by the commander of the American forces in the region, who is of Lebanese origin, John Abizaid ... Are you Lebanese afraid of the American naval fleets? These naval fleets have come in the past, and were defeated, and if they come again, they will be defeated again..."
As reported in the NY Sun direct quotes from Hezbollah TV
Sunday, January 15, 2006
TWO TERRIORIST GROUPS CANNOT FIT INTO ONE COUNTRY
al-Qaeda Branching into Lebanon, Hezbollah Unimpressed
'The enemy of my enemy is cramping my style'
By Steve Schippert
Following al-Qaeda in Iraq’s recent claim of responsibility for late-December rocket attacks on Israel from Lebanon, it appears that Lebanese security is taking steps with some haste to counter al-Qaeda’s ability to establish a foothold in Lebanon. It was reported Friday that Lebanese authorities had arrested 13 Al-Qaeda suspects in a sweep that netted them in different parts of the country. They were charged by a Lebanese military court with “establishing a gang to carry out terrorist acts, forging official and private documents and possessing unlicensed arms.”
Among the thirteen al-Qaeda suspects were seven Syrians, three Lebanese, a Saudi Arabian, a Jordanian and a Palestinian. Their statements under custody have been contradictory, as they appear to shift from claiming al-Qaeda membership to Jund al-Islam (the group claiming responsibility for the assassination of Rafik Hariri and twenty others in a February 2005 Beirut bombing) and vice versa. Their particular membership in one or the other group, at least in principle, should mean little, as neither of the groups issue membership badges, but rather are bonded by a shared ideology without a physical brand.
As al-Qaeda (including Zarqawi’s al-Qaeda in Iraq) has increasingly indicated an intent to directly attack Israel, the leadership has chosen to establish a foothold in Lebanon and Gaza. Beirut’s Daily Star reported of an alleged al-Qaeda statement that warned the Palestinian camps of Sabra and Shatila in Lebanon that they would face attacks from al-Qaeda if they did not conform to their ideology.
“We have been trying hard to enter the Sabra and Shatila camp, which is considered the symbol of Palestinian camps in Lebanon … Since this camp needs reform, you have to take these warnings seriously, because today we warn but tomorrow we will liquidate dozens of people…Our suicide bombings will target all the United Nations buildings inside and outside the camp, as well as agents such as [Palestinian officials] Abbas Zaki and Khaled Aref and several foreign embassies.”
The Palestinian residents of the camps seem to be summarily unimpressed with al-Qaeda’s apparent attempt to take control of reforming the camps in order to instill a Taliban-like rule. Said one Palestinian resident, “Osama bin Laden should go and fight the Zionists before coming here to reform the camps. We don’t live in an extremist Islamic country; Shatila is the camp of the martyrs, the camp of the struggle.” Regarding the direct threat to the UN buildings in the camps (clinics and schools), the man retorted, “Do they want to destroy them too?”
Hezbollah Shias also views the encroachment of Sunni al-Qaeda in Lebanon with wary eyes, quite happy to have another hand in attacking Israel, but quite displeased with the rise of militant Sunni Islam, especially on their own turf.
Sheikh Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s deputy secretary general, warned al-Qaeda about setting up shop in Hezbollah-controlled southern Lebanon. Qassem said, “We don’t know how many [al-Qaeda are in Lebanon] and we don’t know their plans or if they intend to do operations here. It’s important to caution everyone not to make Lebanon an arena for settling scores. It will be a dangerous development if that happens.”
Meanwhile, Iraq’s Moqtada Sadr called for a settling of differences between Shi’ite and Sunni terrorist groups in an interview on Saudi Arabia’s al-Arabiya channel. He said, “The Islamic world is being subjected to a strong Western aggression that requires us to join forces…I am with any movement that is dedicated to the principles of Islam and justice and rejects oppression whether it is Hizbullah or Hamas.” Whether or not he would cede control of any territory he may hold dominance over to achieve that, as Hezbollah refuses to do, he did not say.
It is worthy of note the increasing level of Red-on-Red infighting throughout the region: In Iraq, in the West Bank and Gaza, and now, potentially, in Lebanon. As it continues to develop, al-Qaeda’s recent moves to diversify from Iraq and seek new targets appears to include direct moves on Israel, which means establishing and recruiting from areas that are already controlled by other groups, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades (among others) in the Palestinian Territories. Many also expect that the first move by Iran in any hot conflict with the West will be to export terrorist attacks throughout the Middle East and enflame the entire region.
With all of them, the convergence point is Israel. But as diverse Sunni and Shi’ite groups of varying flavors of jihad begin to increasingly share the same battlespace, rather than the widely expected cooperation under the unifying Sun Tzu precept of ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’, it is more likely that what will be quite commonly heard and seen is ‘The enemy of my enemy is cramping my style.’ Sheikh Naim Qassem revealed as much, tipping Hezbollah’s hand in advance.
'The enemy of my enemy is cramping my style'
By Steve Schippert
Following al-Qaeda in Iraq’s recent claim of responsibility for late-December rocket attacks on Israel from Lebanon, it appears that Lebanese security is taking steps with some haste to counter al-Qaeda’s ability to establish a foothold in Lebanon. It was reported Friday that Lebanese authorities had arrested 13 Al-Qaeda suspects in a sweep that netted them in different parts of the country. They were charged by a Lebanese military court with “establishing a gang to carry out terrorist acts, forging official and private documents and possessing unlicensed arms.”
Among the thirteen al-Qaeda suspects were seven Syrians, three Lebanese, a Saudi Arabian, a Jordanian and a Palestinian. Their statements under custody have been contradictory, as they appear to shift from claiming al-Qaeda membership to Jund al-Islam (the group claiming responsibility for the assassination of Rafik Hariri and twenty others in a February 2005 Beirut bombing) and vice versa. Their particular membership in one or the other group, at least in principle, should mean little, as neither of the groups issue membership badges, but rather are bonded by a shared ideology without a physical brand.
As al-Qaeda (including Zarqawi’s al-Qaeda in Iraq) has increasingly indicated an intent to directly attack Israel, the leadership has chosen to establish a foothold in Lebanon and Gaza. Beirut’s Daily Star reported of an alleged al-Qaeda statement that warned the Palestinian camps of Sabra and Shatila in Lebanon that they would face attacks from al-Qaeda if they did not conform to their ideology.
“We have been trying hard to enter the Sabra and Shatila camp, which is considered the symbol of Palestinian camps in Lebanon … Since this camp needs reform, you have to take these warnings seriously, because today we warn but tomorrow we will liquidate dozens of people…Our suicide bombings will target all the United Nations buildings inside and outside the camp, as well as agents such as [Palestinian officials] Abbas Zaki and Khaled Aref and several foreign embassies.”
The Palestinian residents of the camps seem to be summarily unimpressed with al-Qaeda’s apparent attempt to take control of reforming the camps in order to instill a Taliban-like rule. Said one Palestinian resident, “Osama bin Laden should go and fight the Zionists before coming here to reform the camps. We don’t live in an extremist Islamic country; Shatila is the camp of the martyrs, the camp of the struggle.” Regarding the direct threat to the UN buildings in the camps (clinics and schools), the man retorted, “Do they want to destroy them too?”
Hezbollah Shias also views the encroachment of Sunni al-Qaeda in Lebanon with wary eyes, quite happy to have another hand in attacking Israel, but quite displeased with the rise of militant Sunni Islam, especially on their own turf.
Sheikh Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s deputy secretary general, warned al-Qaeda about setting up shop in Hezbollah-controlled southern Lebanon. Qassem said, “We don’t know how many [al-Qaeda are in Lebanon] and we don’t know their plans or if they intend to do operations here. It’s important to caution everyone not to make Lebanon an arena for settling scores. It will be a dangerous development if that happens.”
Meanwhile, Iraq’s Moqtada Sadr called for a settling of differences between Shi’ite and Sunni terrorist groups in an interview on Saudi Arabia’s al-Arabiya channel. He said, “The Islamic world is being subjected to a strong Western aggression that requires us to join forces…I am with any movement that is dedicated to the principles of Islam and justice and rejects oppression whether it is Hizbullah or Hamas.” Whether or not he would cede control of any territory he may hold dominance over to achieve that, as Hezbollah refuses to do, he did not say.
It is worthy of note the increasing level of Red-on-Red infighting throughout the region: In Iraq, in the West Bank and Gaza, and now, potentially, in Lebanon. As it continues to develop, al-Qaeda’s recent moves to diversify from Iraq and seek new targets appears to include direct moves on Israel, which means establishing and recruiting from areas that are already controlled by other groups, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades (among others) in the Palestinian Territories. Many also expect that the first move by Iran in any hot conflict with the West will be to export terrorist attacks throughout the Middle East and enflame the entire region.
With all of them, the convergence point is Israel. But as diverse Sunni and Shi’ite groups of varying flavors of jihad begin to increasingly share the same battlespace, rather than the widely expected cooperation under the unifying Sun Tzu precept of ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’, it is more likely that what will be quite commonly heard and seen is ‘The enemy of my enemy is cramping my style.’ Sheikh Naim Qassem revealed as much, tipping Hezbollah’s hand in advance.
Sunday, January 08, 2006
An Old Enemy Resurfaces again in Lebanon
Wallid Jumblatt was active during the Beirut War, causing deaths , and injuries to the US Marines stationed in Beirut. Mr. Jumblatt, and his Druze faction, jump on whatever side appears to be winning. Mr. Jumblatt sided with the Syrians during the Marines time in Beirut, and actively fought against the United States. Now Mr. Jumblatt, seeing that the tide is turning, is making overtures towards the U.S. No thanks Mr. Jumblatt, you, and your Hezbollah cousins , will always be remembered as enemies of the United States Marines.
"No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy".
Jumblat Calls on America to Do in Syria What it Did in Iraq
CGGL Staff
Local Media
01/05/2006
Beirut, January 5: A syndicated columnist reported in an opinion piece published today in the Beirut Daily Star and partly carried in Arabic by other Beirut daily newspapers that Walid Jumblatt told him in a telephone interview, when asked what he wanted from America: "You came to Iraq & you can do the same thing in Syria."
The piece was written by David Ignatius, who opened up by referring to gangster movies. He spoke first of the television interview by former Syrian VP Abdel Halim Khaddam, whom he called an old mafia don and a turncoat, then turned his attention to Jumblatt.
To understand the latest turns of the screw in Syria and Lebanon, Ignatius wrote, I spoke by telephone yesterday with Walid Jumblatt, the leader of Lebanon's Druze community and something of a warlord himself.
Ignatius added: The Druze leader is holed up in his ancestral fortress of Moukhtara, in the Chouf Mountains. Like other Lebanese I spoke with this week, he fears a deadly new attack by the Syrians that would attempt to trigger sectarian conflict in Lebanon -- and take the heat off Damascus. Jumblatt argues that the only stable outcome will be regime change in Syria -- a "Milosevic solution" that will bring Assad to justice through the United Nations.
What makes the Syria-Lebanon situation especially volatile, Jumblatt explained to Ignatius, is that it is linked to the radical new Iranian regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Jumblatt argued that Iran is using its alliance with Assad and Hezbollah in its larger strategic battles against Israel and the United States. "It's as if we are defending Iranian nuclear facilities from the border of Lebanon," he said.
Jumblatt said: "If Bush considers Lebanon one of his major achievements, now is the time to protect Lebanon," He told Ignatius: What can the United States do, realistically, to keep the Syria-Lebanon situation from exploding? The answer partly is to stick with the U.N. investigation that is slowly wrenching out the truth about Hariri's murder. The challenge for the United States, said Jumblat, is to help Lebanon become strong enough to resist Syrian hegemony. A potential breakthrough would be a U.S.-brokered agreement for Israeli withdrawal from the Shebaa Farms area along the Lebanon border, under a U.N. agreement that the territory belongs to Lebanon. That would give the struggling Lebanese government a symbolic victory -- and would undercut Hezbollah's rationale for maintaining its militia. That issue should be at the top of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's in-box as she starts the new year -- perhaps along with an old tape of "The Godfather."
"No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy".
Jumblat Calls on America to Do in Syria What it Did in Iraq
CGGL Staff
Local Media
01/05/2006
Beirut, January 5: A syndicated columnist reported in an opinion piece published today in the Beirut Daily Star and partly carried in Arabic by other Beirut daily newspapers that Walid Jumblatt told him in a telephone interview, when asked what he wanted from America: "You came to Iraq & you can do the same thing in Syria."
The piece was written by David Ignatius, who opened up by referring to gangster movies. He spoke first of the television interview by former Syrian VP Abdel Halim Khaddam, whom he called an old mafia don and a turncoat, then turned his attention to Jumblatt.
To understand the latest turns of the screw in Syria and Lebanon, Ignatius wrote, I spoke by telephone yesterday with Walid Jumblatt, the leader of Lebanon's Druze community and something of a warlord himself.
Ignatius added: The Druze leader is holed up in his ancestral fortress of Moukhtara, in the Chouf Mountains. Like other Lebanese I spoke with this week, he fears a deadly new attack by the Syrians that would attempt to trigger sectarian conflict in Lebanon -- and take the heat off Damascus. Jumblatt argues that the only stable outcome will be regime change in Syria -- a "Milosevic solution" that will bring Assad to justice through the United Nations.
What makes the Syria-Lebanon situation especially volatile, Jumblatt explained to Ignatius, is that it is linked to the radical new Iranian regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Jumblatt argued that Iran is using its alliance with Assad and Hezbollah in its larger strategic battles against Israel and the United States. "It's as if we are defending Iranian nuclear facilities from the border of Lebanon," he said.
Jumblatt said: "If Bush considers Lebanon one of his major achievements, now is the time to protect Lebanon," He told Ignatius: What can the United States do, realistically, to keep the Syria-Lebanon situation from exploding? The answer partly is to stick with the U.N. investigation that is slowly wrenching out the truth about Hariri's murder. The challenge for the United States, said Jumblat, is to help Lebanon become strong enough to resist Syrian hegemony. A potential breakthrough would be a U.S.-brokered agreement for Israeli withdrawal from the Shebaa Farms area along the Lebanon border, under a U.N. agreement that the territory belongs to Lebanon. That would give the struggling Lebanese government a symbolic victory -- and would undercut Hezbollah's rationale for maintaining its militia. That issue should be at the top of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's in-box as she starts the new year -- perhaps along with an old tape of "The Godfather."
Thursday, December 29, 2005
Germany Frees Killer!!!!
Germany Frees Terrorist: Vielen Danken, Angela!
Dr. Joseph Hitti - 12/26/2005
That the German government has decided to release the Hezbollah terrorist Mohammad Ali Hamadi, one of two hijackers of TWA flight 847 who beat, shot to death, and dumped the body of unarmed, off-duty U.S. Navy serviceman Robert Dean Stethem in the summer of 1985 in Beirut, comes as no surprise. We have grown accustomed to European governments kissing the hands of criminals and appeasing them to no end, supposedly to confront violence with love, barbarity with civility, but really to appease, to trade one criminal for a hostage, and thus always cower in the face of terrorism.
What is unacceptable is for the new German government of Chancellor Angela Merkel to secretly take this action without in the least informing the US government, which has sought to extradite Hamadi to the US to stand trial for the murder of serviceman Stethem. The German government also trashed its own justice system by releasing Hamadi after he served only 17 years of a life sentence without possibility of parole. This smacks of the lowliest form of international diplomacy and is a deplorable retreat in the fight against terrorism.
We need only remember that Hezbollah was for the most of the past two decades an Iranian terrorist organization operating mainly from South Lebanon, but with tentacles in Africa where it raised money in the diamond trade, in Latin America where it carried out such terrorist acts as the bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, and elsewhere. Now we learn that the quid pro quo of releasing the German hostage in Baghdad at the same time as Hamadi was let go in Germany is evidence that Hezbollah also has tentacles in the insurgency movement in Iraq. Not to mention the 1980s spate of bombings in Beirut against the US Embassy (twice), the French Embassy, the US Marines barracks, the French paratroopers compound, and the notorious kidnappings, murders, and occasional barterings – thanks to the good offices of the Syrian occupation – of Western hostages who were held in sub-humane conditions for years and years. Yes, we also hear and read that Hezbollah is eager to turn that “page” of its history and wants to become a respected political party with representatives in the Lebanese Parliament and ministers in the Lebanese government. But we thought that there are no statutes of limitations for crimes of this magnitude. Where is the conscience of the German people and the German government? Has the German nation sunk so low as to allow a murderer to go free only as in spite to George Bush’s policies? Is this where German diplomacy has ended? In fear of threats against Detlev Mehlis, the German investigator whose reports blamed Syria – whose only remaining ally in Lebanon today is Hezbollah – for the Hariri assassination?
We thought that, now that Lebanon is free of the Israeli and Syrian occupations, peace will return to this tormented country. Yet, of all Syria’s former allies in Lebanon – Jumblatt, Hariri himself, and all the other profiteers and high-flying pirates during the Syrian occupation – only Hezbollah and its sister organization Amal (who incidentally “negotiated” in 1985 the end of the TWA flight hijack) remain steadfast in their defense of Syria. In fact, the current Lebanese government is fractured today because the Hezbollah ministers refused last week to endorse the continuation of the UN investigations into the string of car bombings that have racked Lebanon and killed a number of prominent politicians and journalists. Hezbollah remains the only organization in Lebanon to reject progress towards a peaceful resolution of Lebanon’s border disputes between its two former occupiers, Israel and Syria. Those disputes center mainly on the Shebaa Farms, an outpost of a barren hill at the junction of the borders between the three countries. Belonging to Lebanon originally, the Shebaa Farms were annexed by Syria in the 1950s, back when Syria did not even recognize Lebanon’s right to exist as a sovereign and independent nation. Lebanon let it go, because it had no back to fight the Syrians over a barren hill. Then Israel conquered the Golan Heights, and with them the Shebaa Farms. Neither Syria nor Lebanon made any move to contest the status quo from 1956 to 1967 when the Farms turned from Syrian to Israeli hands, then again from 1967 to 2000 when Israel withdrew behind the 1949 Armistice Line – the official border between Lebanon and Israel. But suddenly, in 2000, having now lost the justification of its own occupation of Lebanon, Syria “remembered” that it pilfered the Shebaa Farms from Lebanon and decided to return them, thus implying that the Israeli occupation of south Lebanon was not complete.
So the endless limbo in which Lebanon finds itself today is still the making of a recalcitrant, disgruntled, foreign-paid Hezbollah who has no cards left to play: Terrorism has become too dangerous today; kidnapping foreign hostages isn’t cool either; even shelling northern Israeli villages does not pay any more. As a result, the importance, respectability and notoriety that Hezbollah garnered over decades of mayhem, lies, terror, of setting up a fiefdom within the Lebanese state and denying the Lebanese government access to the south of the country, of kidnapping ordinary Lebanese citizens and handing them to Syrian Intelligence where they continue to rot in jail to this day…all the exploits and feats on Hezbollah’s resume have become uncovered, and the emperor today has no clothes. There is nothing left for Lebanon to do to recover and begin the long road of rehabilitation and rebuilding but somehow get rid of the cancer and the nightmare that is Hezbollah. With its autonomous islands of training camps and military zones to which the Lebanese government has no access, Hezbollah continues to provide cover for Syrian operatives to proceed apace with their bombings of anti-Syrian politicians and journalists. Hezbollah has become the Trojan horse for the Syrian occupation of Lebanon to continue under a different guise.
Except that the “New European” German government of Angela Merkel has decided to give Hezbollah a fig leaf, to provide it with a lifeline for its waning respectability and a shot in the arm…Why? Out of fear. Out of the pragmatism of dealing and negotiating with terrorists that has shown time and again that it is a failed policy. Out of spite of George Bush. In protest over the American occupation of Iraq. All the reasons that once can conjure up at moments of anger such as this one cannot justify the abysmal moral delinquency of releasing the terrorist Hamadi and dispatching him straight to Beirut where Hezbollah will claim victory, where it will be vindicated yet again that terror pays and that Western nations are paper dolls. Remember that Arafat played the same cards and won. He bombed Western interests and burned Lebanon to the ground during the 1970s and 1980s, and was rewarded with Madrid and Oslo in the 1990s, and a Nobel Prize to boot! I imagine Abu-Musab Al-Zarqawi discussing this latest example of German diplomacy with his henchmen as a vindication of their strategy. Some people never learn. Vielen Danken, Angela!
Dr. Joseph Hitti - 12/26/2005
That the German government has decided to release the Hezbollah terrorist Mohammad Ali Hamadi, one of two hijackers of TWA flight 847 who beat, shot to death, and dumped the body of unarmed, off-duty U.S. Navy serviceman Robert Dean Stethem in the summer of 1985 in Beirut, comes as no surprise. We have grown accustomed to European governments kissing the hands of criminals and appeasing them to no end, supposedly to confront violence with love, barbarity with civility, but really to appease, to trade one criminal for a hostage, and thus always cower in the face of terrorism.
What is unacceptable is for the new German government of Chancellor Angela Merkel to secretly take this action without in the least informing the US government, which has sought to extradite Hamadi to the US to stand trial for the murder of serviceman Stethem. The German government also trashed its own justice system by releasing Hamadi after he served only 17 years of a life sentence without possibility of parole. This smacks of the lowliest form of international diplomacy and is a deplorable retreat in the fight against terrorism.
We need only remember that Hezbollah was for the most of the past two decades an Iranian terrorist organization operating mainly from South Lebanon, but with tentacles in Africa where it raised money in the diamond trade, in Latin America where it carried out such terrorist acts as the bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, and elsewhere. Now we learn that the quid pro quo of releasing the German hostage in Baghdad at the same time as Hamadi was let go in Germany is evidence that Hezbollah also has tentacles in the insurgency movement in Iraq. Not to mention the 1980s spate of bombings in Beirut against the US Embassy (twice), the French Embassy, the US Marines barracks, the French paratroopers compound, and the notorious kidnappings, murders, and occasional barterings – thanks to the good offices of the Syrian occupation – of Western hostages who were held in sub-humane conditions for years and years. Yes, we also hear and read that Hezbollah is eager to turn that “page” of its history and wants to become a respected political party with representatives in the Lebanese Parliament and ministers in the Lebanese government. But we thought that there are no statutes of limitations for crimes of this magnitude. Where is the conscience of the German people and the German government? Has the German nation sunk so low as to allow a murderer to go free only as in spite to George Bush’s policies? Is this where German diplomacy has ended? In fear of threats against Detlev Mehlis, the German investigator whose reports blamed Syria – whose only remaining ally in Lebanon today is Hezbollah – for the Hariri assassination?
We thought that, now that Lebanon is free of the Israeli and Syrian occupations, peace will return to this tormented country. Yet, of all Syria’s former allies in Lebanon – Jumblatt, Hariri himself, and all the other profiteers and high-flying pirates during the Syrian occupation – only Hezbollah and its sister organization Amal (who incidentally “negotiated” in 1985 the end of the TWA flight hijack) remain steadfast in their defense of Syria. In fact, the current Lebanese government is fractured today because the Hezbollah ministers refused last week to endorse the continuation of the UN investigations into the string of car bombings that have racked Lebanon and killed a number of prominent politicians and journalists. Hezbollah remains the only organization in Lebanon to reject progress towards a peaceful resolution of Lebanon’s border disputes between its two former occupiers, Israel and Syria. Those disputes center mainly on the Shebaa Farms, an outpost of a barren hill at the junction of the borders between the three countries. Belonging to Lebanon originally, the Shebaa Farms were annexed by Syria in the 1950s, back when Syria did not even recognize Lebanon’s right to exist as a sovereign and independent nation. Lebanon let it go, because it had no back to fight the Syrians over a barren hill. Then Israel conquered the Golan Heights, and with them the Shebaa Farms. Neither Syria nor Lebanon made any move to contest the status quo from 1956 to 1967 when the Farms turned from Syrian to Israeli hands, then again from 1967 to 2000 when Israel withdrew behind the 1949 Armistice Line – the official border between Lebanon and Israel. But suddenly, in 2000, having now lost the justification of its own occupation of Lebanon, Syria “remembered” that it pilfered the Shebaa Farms from Lebanon and decided to return them, thus implying that the Israeli occupation of south Lebanon was not complete.
So the endless limbo in which Lebanon finds itself today is still the making of a recalcitrant, disgruntled, foreign-paid Hezbollah who has no cards left to play: Terrorism has become too dangerous today; kidnapping foreign hostages isn’t cool either; even shelling northern Israeli villages does not pay any more. As a result, the importance, respectability and notoriety that Hezbollah garnered over decades of mayhem, lies, terror, of setting up a fiefdom within the Lebanese state and denying the Lebanese government access to the south of the country, of kidnapping ordinary Lebanese citizens and handing them to Syrian Intelligence where they continue to rot in jail to this day…all the exploits and feats on Hezbollah’s resume have become uncovered, and the emperor today has no clothes. There is nothing left for Lebanon to do to recover and begin the long road of rehabilitation and rebuilding but somehow get rid of the cancer and the nightmare that is Hezbollah. With its autonomous islands of training camps and military zones to which the Lebanese government has no access, Hezbollah continues to provide cover for Syrian operatives to proceed apace with their bombings of anti-Syrian politicians and journalists. Hezbollah has become the Trojan horse for the Syrian occupation of Lebanon to continue under a different guise.
Except that the “New European” German government of Angela Merkel has decided to give Hezbollah a fig leaf, to provide it with a lifeline for its waning respectability and a shot in the arm…Why? Out of fear. Out of the pragmatism of dealing and negotiating with terrorists that has shown time and again that it is a failed policy. Out of spite of George Bush. In protest over the American occupation of Iraq. All the reasons that once can conjure up at moments of anger such as this one cannot justify the abysmal moral delinquency of releasing the terrorist Hamadi and dispatching him straight to Beirut where Hezbollah will claim victory, where it will be vindicated yet again that terror pays and that Western nations are paper dolls. Remember that Arafat played the same cards and won. He bombed Western interests and burned Lebanon to the ground during the 1970s and 1980s, and was rewarded with Madrid and Oslo in the 1990s, and a Nobel Prize to boot! I imagine Abu-Musab Al-Zarqawi discussing this latest example of German diplomacy with his henchmen as a vindication of their strategy. Some people never learn. Vielen Danken, Angela!
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