Russian warships off Syria, US carriers near Iran

Big power gunboat diplomacy is in full spate in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf. Washington is underscoring its military option against Iran's nuclear program, while Russia is demonstrating its resolve to prevent NATO attacking Syria after Libya and defending Bashar Assad's regime. Monday, Nov. 21,

Russia's foreign minister Sergey Lavrov accused Western nations of "political provocation" by urging the Syrian opposition to refuse to negotiate a settlement with Assad.

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, for his part, advised Assad: "You can only continue with tanks and guns to a certain point, the day will come when you will go."
debkafile's military sources note that Russia and America adopted aggressive postures on Nov. 12, when two American carriers, the USS Bush and USS Stennis sailed through the Strait of Hormuz side by side and took up position opposite the Iranian coast.

That was also the day when a mysterious explosion at the Revolutionary Guards base near Tehran wiped out the entire leadership of Iran's ballistic missile program.

Five days later, on Nov. 17, the Syrian news agency reported three Russian naval vessels on the Mediterranean were heading toward Syria.

Monday, Nov. 21, presidential sources in Damascus announced three warships had entered Syrian territorial waters outside Tartus port.
Those sources stressed the Russian ships would not anchor in the Syrian port, indicating that their mission was not just to show the flag for the Assad regime but was on operational duty along its coasts to resist any foreign intervention in Syria unrest.
Our military sources are watching to see whether the Russian flotilla targets the small craft transporting arms from Lebanon and Turkey to Syrian rebels fighting the regime. If so, Moscow would be able to present these strikes as actions against piracy which would fall under a UN Security Council resolution.

While Moscow and Damascus kept the identity of the Russian warships dark, Arab sources said at least two of them are equipped for gathering intelligence and electronic warfare.
As the Russian warships entered Syrian territorial waters, Canadian Defense Minister Peter McKay announced that in the light of the Syrian crisis, the Royal Canadian Navy would keep back in the Mediterranean until the end of 2012 certain vessels which took part in the Libyan campaign.

debkafile's military sources report he was referring to two frigates:

HMCS Vancouver will stay in the Mediterranean Sea until early next year," he said, taking part in "locating, tracking, reporting (and) boarding vessels of interest suspected of international terrorism." It would be relieved by HMCS Charlottetown until the end of 2012.

Defense Minister Mckay explained: "…a lot of dictators are on notice that this type of behavior isn't going to be tolerated. How we go about it and what comes next is done on… an escalating scale before making any final decisions about intervention."
The Canadian defense minister was the first prominent Western official to admit the possibility of Western military intervention in Syria.

Three more events affecting the fate of the Assad regime, Tehran's closest ally, followed in quick succession Monday:
British Foreign Secretary William Hague received a delegation of the opposition Syrian National Council in London. Shortly before the interview the SNC published its plan for the transition of power from the Assad regime in Damascus, calling also for "international protection for Syrian civilians."

In Syria itself, three buses carrying Turkish pilgrims home from Mecca were accosted by a Syrian checkpoint at Cizre near Homs. The passengers were ordered to disembark for their papers to be inspected. The Syrian soldiers then started shooting at them, injuring a passenger and one of the drivers.

This incident will not be treated lightly by the Erdogan government.
Until now, despite vocal threats, Ankara has not intervened directly in the nine-month Syrian uprising aside from arming and training rebels.

Also Monday, Jordan's King Abdullah II paid a surprise visit to Ramallah for talks with the Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas. One of the items on his agenda was an attempt to find out where the Palestinian leader stands vis-à-vis the Arab Revolt, especially on the conflict in Syria.

http://www.debka.com/article/21504/

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/23772 ... -Explosion
A source close to Iran's clerical regime claims to have "information" that the Israeli Mossad is behind the explosion at a Tehran base.

After previously claiming that the mysterious explosion that took place on Saturday at a military base south of Tehran was an accident, the Iranians might have changed their minds.

A source close to Iran's clerical regime told Britain's The Guardian on Monday that the blast was a result of an operation by the Mossad, the Israeli international intelligence agency.

The source, a former director of an Iranian state-run organization with close links to the regime, spoke to The Guardian on condition of anonymity. He said, "I believe that Saturday's explosion was part of the covert war against Iran, led by Israel."

The former official compared the incident to a similar blast in October 2010 at a Revolutionary Guards missile base near the city of Khorramabad.

"I have information that both these incidents were the work of sabotage by agents of Israel, aimed at halting Iran's missile program," he told The Guardian.

He did not specify whether the Iranian regime believes Israel is indeed behind the explosion despite its earlier claims that it was an accident.

Among the 17 people killed in the blast was Brigadier Hassan Moghadam, a senior Iranian Revolutionary Guards missile expert. Moghadam, who headed the Revolutionary Guards missile development, was a researcher at a Tehran university and headed the "Jihad Self-Reliance" unit.

On Monday, TIME Magazine also suggested that the Mossad may be behind the explosion, quoting in a report an official Western intelligence who said, "Don't believe the Iranians that it was an accident."

In an interview with Army Radio on Sunday, Defense Minister Ehud Barak would not speculate about the cause and nature of the explosion. When asked about the extent of the damage caused by the explosion he replied, "I do not know, but may there be more such explosions."

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-d ... n-1.395924

Iran officials: Israel not behind deadly military base explosion

Iran parliament speaker Ali Larijani denies press speculation about Israeli involvement in blast near Tehran that killed high-ranking Revolutionary Guard commander, calling it 'fiction.'
Iran on Wednesday denied press speculation that Israel was behind the explosion at a military base near Tehran which killed 17 members of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC).

"Whatever the enemies say about the IRGC base incident is fiction and therefore not important," Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani told Fars news agency.

Time Magazine quoted a Western intelligence official speculating that Israel was behind Saturday's blast in the ammunition depot at Malard and Shahriar base, west of Tehran.
Media reports focused on General Hassan Moqaddam, a high-ranking IRGC commander and chief of the logistic research unit, who was killed in the blast.

Moqaddam was involved in Iran's missile program.

A number of senior Iranian officials, including Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, attended Moqaddam's funeral. In an unusual move, pictures from the funeral were broadcast on Iranian television.

The Shahab-3 and Zelzal missiles reportedly have sufficient range to reach any part of Israel. Iran has several times warned that if its nuclear sites were attacked by Israel, the missiles would be used against Israel.

While praising Moqaddam as "one of the shining members of the IRGC," speaker Larijani said that "there are tens of thousands who would continue the way of martyr Moqaddam."
Hassan Firouzabadi, the chief of staff of Iran's armed forces, also on Wednesday denied that Israel was involved in the blast.

"This recent incident and blast has no link to Israel or America but the outcome of the research, of which the incident happened as a consequence, could be a strong smack to the mouth of Israel and its occupying regime," Firouzabadi was quoted as saying by the student news agency ISNA.

http://theintelhub.com/2011/11/14/israe ... sile-base/

By Karl Vick
Time.com
November 14, 2011

Israeli newspapers on Sunday were thick with innuendo, the front pages of the three largest dailies dominated by variations on the headline “Mysterious Explosion in Iranian Missile Base.” Turn the page, and the mystery is answered with a wink.
“Who Is Responsible for Attacks on the Iranian Army?” asks Maariv, and the paper lists without further comment a half-dozen other violent setbacks to Iran’s nuclear and military nexus.
For Israeli readers, the coy implication is that their own government was behind Saturday’s massive blast just outside Tehran.

It is an assumption a Western intelligence source insists is correct: the Mossad — the Israeli agency charged with covert operations — did it. “Don’t believe the Iranians that it was an accident,” the official tells TIME, adding that other sabotage is being planned to impede the Iranian ability to develop and deliver a nuclear weapon.

“There are more bullets in the magazine,” the official says

The powerful blast or series of blasts — reports described an initial explosion followed by a much larger one — devastated a missile base in the gritty urban sprawl to the west of the Iranian capital. The base housed Shahab missiles, which, at their longest range, can reach Israel. Last week's report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Iran had experimented with removing the conventional warhead on the Shahab-3 and replacing it with one that would hold a nuclear device. Iran says the explosion was an accident that came while troops were transferring ammunition out of the depot "toward the appropriate site." (See why ties between the U.S. and Iran are under threat.)

The explosion killed at least 17 people, including Major General Hassan Moqqadam, described by Iranian state media as a pioneer in Iranian missile development and the Revolutionary Guard commander in charge of "ensuring self-sufficiency" in armaments, a challenging task in light of international sanctions.

Coming the weekend after the release of the unusually critical IAEA report, which laid out page upon page of evidence that Iran is moving toward a nuclear weapon, the blast naturally sharpened concern over Israel's threat to launch airstrikes on Iran's nuclear facilities. Half the stories on the Tehran Times website on Sunday referenced the possibility of a military strike, most warning of dire repercussions.

But the incident also argued, maybe even augured, against an outright strike. If Israel — perhaps in concert with Washington and other allies — can continue to inflict damage to the Iranian nuclear effort through covert actions, the need diminishes for overt, incendiary moves like air strikes. The Stuxnet computer worm bollixed Iran's centrifuges for months, wreaking havoc on the crucial process of uranium enrichment.

And in Sunday's editions, the Hebrew press coyly listed what Yedioth Ahronoth called "Iran's Mysterious Mishaps." The tallies ran from the November 2007 explosion at a missile base south of Tehran to the October 2010 blast at a Shahab facility in southwestern Iran, to the assassinations of three Iranian scientists working in the nuclear program — two last year and one in July. (See photos of the semiofficial view of Iran.)

At the very least, the list burnishes the mystique of the Mossad, Israel's overseas spy agency. Whatever the case-by-case reality, the popular notion that, through the Mossad, Israel knows everything and can reach anywhere is one of the most valuable assets available to a state whose entire doctrine of defense can be summed up in the word deterrence. But it doesn't mean Israel is the only country with a foreign intelligence operation inside Iran. The most recent IAEA report included intelligence from 10 governments on details of the Iranian nuclear effort. And in previous interviews, Western security sources have indicated that U.S. and other Western intelligence agencies have partnered with Israel on covert operations inside Iran. Sometimes the partner brings specific expertise or access. In other cases, Iranian agents on the ground who might harbor misgivings about Israel are allowed to believe they are working only with another government altogether.

Saturday's blast was so powerful it was felt 25 miles away in Tehran, and so loud that one nearby resident with combat experience thought he had just heard the detonation of an aerial bomb. "Frankly it did not sound like an arms depot from where I was because when one of those goes off, it is multiple explosions over minutes, even hours depending on the size of the facility," the resident says. "All I heard was one big boom. I was sure from the quality of the noise that anyone in its immediate vicinity was dead. Something definitely happened, but I would not trust the [Revolutionary] Guards to be absolutely forthcoming as to what it was."

— With reporting by Aaron J. Klein / Tel Aviv

(I am not familiar with Dr. Steve Pieczenik, but saw a couple of posts on the GT where people voiced confidence in his information and reliability - but TIFWIW)

Former State Dept. Veteran Drops Bombshell: WWIII Starts Sept. 25

....former Assistant Deputy Secretary of State Dr. Steve Pieczenik says Israel plans to attack Iran before the U.S. elections of Nov. 6., and, that an attack on Iran will assuredly kickoff WWIII, according to him.

Moreover, Pieczenik, a man whose career inspired the character Jack Ryan of the Tom Clancy book series, says the ‘October Surprise’ will not take place in October. Instead, the big surprise will come earlier, in late September.

Dr. Pieczenik says the specific date of the strike on Iran is Sept. 25th or 26th, Yom Kippur—the Jewish holiday, which commences in the year 2012 at sundown on the 25th, and ends at nightfall, the following day.

snip

Pieczenik says it’s clear to him that Israeli prime minister Bibi Netanyahu has already planned to attack Iran and has been desperately trying to enlist the U.S. to back him up. But, with or without U.S. direct help, Pieczenik is certain that Israel will attack Iran.

Moreover, he says Netanyahu is an extremest, who will “lie” for his personal and selfish cause, a conclusion also drawn by many Israelis who protest his regime.

“Everything Bibi is saying to the Americans and the American Jews is an absolute, unmitigated lie,” Pieczenik, a Jew, himself, says forcefully.

snip

“In a couple of weeks, they [Israel, Saudi and neocons] will try to initiate another war, unless their ex-Mossad operatives and their ex-Shin Bet will take out Netanyahu, and do to Netanyahu what happened to Rabin,” exclaims Pieczenik. “They know what I’m talking about. Otherwise he will bring down Israel, the world, and there will be a third world war.”.....

snip

“The killing of the ambassador is to precipitate war, so that Israel can finally get into Iran and try to destroy Iran,” he (Pieczenik) says. “It will be the beginning of the end of Israel. It’s Armageddon for Israel,” if it attacks Iran.

“The Pentagon source informed me the distance between the Libyan embassy, where the ambassador was, and where the rioters were, was so large, and two days of delay in response . . ., simply that they [the killers of Stevens and three other embassy employees] were professionals ready to take out our ambassador,” he adds, and with the “approval from Saudi Arabia.”

snip

U.S. intelligence was behind the uprising in Libya, the assassination of Libyan president Muammar al-Gaddafi, and the murder of U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens, according to Pieczenik.

“Why this particular ambassador,” Pieczenik asks, rhetorically. “I think it’s very important for your audience to understand . . . Stevens was an ‘Arabist’. . . ”

More here, including some info on what Pieczenik believes re: 9/11 and other incidents:
http://www2.thestockmarketwatch.com/sto ... z26phg1pzU

U.S. Leads Biggest Persian Gulf Mine Exercise in Signal to Iran

The U.S. and 29 other nations have begun the biggest mine-clearing exercise in the Persian Gulf region, a show of force as tensions escalate over a threatened Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

The 12-day exercise that started yesterday involves Western nations such as the U.K. and France, as well as participants as varied as Japan, Yemen, Jordan, New Zealand and Estonia, according to the U.S. Navy. In an effort to avoid a showdown with the Islamic Republic, it won’t extend into the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway between Iran and Oman through which as much as a fifth of the world’s traded oil is shipped daily.

In addition to serving as a warning to Iran, the display of power will “signal to Israel that the United States has a military option available” and show “U.S. resolve to its Persian Gulf allies, especially in the face of repeated Iranian threats to try to close the Strait of Hormuz,” according to Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East specialist for the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service in Washington.

Con. http://www.sfgate.com/business/bloomber ... 875111.php