Posted on 03/17/2005 6:45:02 PM PST by Straight Vermonter
NAIROBI : The United States is advising western shipping firms and other maritime interests of a possible terrorist attack on vessels off the coast of east Africa, according to a government warning.
The so-called "special warning" refers to intelligence indicating that terrorists may use speedboats to attack a western ship in east African waters and has been broadcast over an open channel to seafarers since last week.
"As of early 2005, the United States government has received unconfirmed information that terrorists may attempt to mount a maritime attack using speedboats against a western ship possibly in East Africa," it says.
"This information is unconfirmed and the United States is not aware of additional information on the planning, timing or intended targets of the maritime attack," the warning says.
The threat applies to inland channels, ports, territorial and international waters in and off the coasts of the Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, the Seychelles, Somalia, Sudan and Tanzania, according to the warning.
In August 1998, two car bombs went off almost simultaneously outside the embassies of the United States in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam in neighbouring Tanzania.
The attacks, the bloodiest of their kind in sub-Saharan Africa either before or since, killed 224 people -- 213 in Kenya and 11 in Tanzania -- and injured around 5,000, almost all of them Africans.
And in November 2002, an vehicle packed with bombs rammed into the the lobby of an Israeli-owned Paradise hotel near the Kenyan port city of Mombasa, killing 18 people including three presumed bombers.
On the same day, an Israeli passenger jet leaving the city's Moi International Airport, narrowly escaped being hit by two missiles.
In 2003, the United Nations warned that free-for-all arms in Somalia, a nation wracked by anarchy since 1991, makes it a convenient springboard for groups such as al-Qaeda, which used a cell based there to stage the deadly bombing in Kenya.
The threat information contained in the warning was compiled by the US State Department in coordination with the departments of defense and commerce and the Central Intelligence Agency.
It has been broadcast to US military ships, the Coast Guard and US shipping companies over an open-channel satellite since March 11, according to the US National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency which disseminates "special warnings."
Special warnings "are issued in response to extraordinary political threats to US shipping, including war, terrorist threats and seizure and harassment of vessel by government authorities," according to the State Department.
The last special warning to be issued by US authorities was in March 2003 after the start of the US-led invasion of Iraq, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency says on its website.
A cruise liner?
Good find SV.
((( TM ping )))
Cruise ship? Who would take a cruise to East Africa? Those knuckleheads still drink their own urine. I believe they mean cargo ships.
thanks for the ping---it might be high time for us to bring back gunners on US flagged vessels.
If they decide they wanna sink one of our ships---the skipper blows then to hell.
Interesting.
I just saw a couple of somewhat related articles posted here earlier today.
Terrorists Train for Seaborne Attacks
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1365024/posts
and
Pirates hijack Indonesian chemical tanker
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1365030/posts
Supposedly we destroyed AQ's Navy or most of it, but it would be easy enough for them to hijack or steal some other ships.
Next to the Malacca straits and S.E. Asia, the area between Yeman and Somalia is the next most pirate infested water in the world.
08.03.2005 at 1700 LT in position 13:28N - 048:07E, 30 miles off the coast of Yemen, Gulf of Aden.
Two fast boats with four men in each boat approached two yachts underway and opened fire aiming at cockpits. Crew of one yacht returned fire and wounded one pirate. One yacht rammed one of the pirate boats and pirates aborted attempt and fled. Both yachts sustained bullet holes and damage to hull. Description of pirate boats – 30 ft length, blue hulled rib cage with outboard motors.
What US flagged vessels? Liberia and Panama are about the only countries anyone does business with.
I haven't seen anything on that at all. Do you have a link?
I did see the story about 125 arrests made in the Persian Gulf.
true--we still do have a few, though.
We need to protect what Merchant Marine we still have.
MSC Ship InventoryMilitary Sealift Command currently daily operates an average of 110 non-combatant, civilian-crewed ships worldwide. In addition, the command has access to 71 other ships that are kept in reduced operating status, ready to be activated if needed.
Many of the MSC ships are getting a bit long in the tooth. Still others are long-term charters.
Some are actually former Navy Auxiliaries that were tranferred to the MSC to show that the Navy had "gotten rid" of certain ships to show a reduction (most of them are tugs)
We are still pretty deficient in modern vessels---a shame.
Did Bush Drop Ball on Usama bin Laden? (WE CAPTURED BIN LADEN's "NAVY" of 15 SHIPS)
Oct. 5, 2004
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1242259/posts
"They are just things that are just not getting reported. One example, the Al Qaeda admiral, his name is Abd Rahim al Nashiri (search). He commanded a fleet of up to 15 cargo ships that were used to transport bombs or terrorists. We captured him in a place called Umm Qasr, one of the United Emirates last year. He's now talking.
And we dismantled an entire operation to make attacks on the United States and Americans abroad by sea. We defeated attempts to blow up warships in the Straits of Gibraltar. We defeated attempts to blow up oil tankers in the Straits of Malacca, and so on. And that's just one set of attacks that we've prevented."
Ping
This pulls links to stories that we may have missed.
http://www.google.com/search?client=googlet&q=terrorists%20may%20attempt%20to%20mount%20a%0D%0Amaritime%20attack
Thanks!
Thanks for the ping.
Thanks AD , Indie has left FR, you may want to take him off ping list ;(
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