Al Qaeda's Opening Shot-Terrorists Assassinate 4 Generals of pro-US Kurdistan Militia

DEBKA ^ | February 8, 2003 | Military Intelligence Exclusive

[ewing]

Al Qaeda and Iraq military intelligence has fired the first shot of the Iraq-US war by assassination.

They used their shared surrogate, the extremist Kurdish Ansar al Islam of northeast Iraq to eliminate the top command of the pro-American Patriotic Union of Iraqi/Kurdistan fighting militia.

The three way collaboration between Baghdad, al Qaeda and the Kurdish fundematilist terrorists provided a live and incontrovertible smoking gun.

DEBKA's Military Anlysts compare the murder to the assassination of the Afghan Northen Alliance Commander Shah Massoud two days beofre the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

[ewing]

Looks like the opposition is warming up in the bullpen

[TrappedInLiberalHell]

DEBKA's Military Anlysts

For some reason, I don't think these 'analysts' are as impressive as they sound. I picture a bunch of guys who look like the comic book store owner on "The Simpsons", who sit around all day playing games like "Risk" and "Stratego".

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Why the excerpt?

Al Qaeda’s Opening Shot in Iraq War

DEBKAfile Military-Intelligence Exclusive

February 9, 2003, 5:50 PM (GMT+02:00)

	Ansar al-Islam fighters - down-at-heel but dangerous

Saturday night, February 8, in the Iraqi-Kurdish city of Suleimaniyeh, al Qaeda and Iraqi military intelligence fired their first shot of the US-Iraq war - by assassination. They used their shared surrogate, the extremist Kurdish Ansar al-Islam of northeast Iraq, to eliminate the top command of the pro-American Patriotic Union of Iraqi Kurdistan’s fighting militia.

The three-way collaboration between Baghdad, al Qaeda and the Kurdish fundamentalist terrorists provided a live and incontrovertible smoking gun. The price was heavy, a grave setback for US war plans.

DEBKAfile’s military analysts compare the murders to the assassination of the Afghan Northern Alliance commander Shah Massoud two days before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

Then, the killers posed as journalists; this time, they pretended to be defectors.

Ansar al Islam, which has been fighting the PUK for two years and whose members trained in Afghanistan, used double agents to convince the Kurdish commanders of this strategic northeastern corner of Iraq that top Ansar commanders were willing to defect. The defectors, it was promised, would bring fresh evidence of the collaboration between Iraqi military intelligence and al Qaeda.

The offer came just after secretary of state Colin Powell spoke of this collaboration at his Security Council presentation of America’s case against Iraq on February 5. According to DEBKAfile’s military sources, the Ansar offer was relayed to officers of the US special forces and CIA working alongside the PUK militia. According to some local sources, the Ansar intermediaries also offered to produce captive Iraqi military agents or al Qaeda operatives as hostages.

Suleimaniyah, the hub town of eastern Kurdistan, is also the headquarters of the PUK high command in the region. It is ruled by the PUK leader Jalal Talabani, who has been short-listed in Washington for the post of Iraqi prime minister after Saddam Hussein’s ouster.

Suleimaniyeh also commands the highway from eastern Kurdistan to the important oil town of Kirkuk. The intermediaries’ choice of this city for the Ansar defection was intended to inspire trust. Any defectors guilty of treachery would be at the mercy of the PUK.

Believing they were safe, therefore, the top PUK commanders turned up to await the defectors. Instead of defecting, the Ansar arrivals pulled from their robes Kalashnikov assault guns and grenades. They killed Gen. Shawkat Haji Mushir, PUK leadership member, Hekmat Osman, security chief of the Sirwan district and Sardar Qafoor, military commander of the same district, as well as Sheik Kaffar Mustafa and three civilians. Mohamad Tawfiq, security chief of Halabja was seriously injured.

The Ansar killers used the noise and confusion to make their escape.

DEBKAfile’s counter-terror experts note the features common to these murders and al Qaeda’s assassination of the legendary Northern Alliance leader, Ahmad Shah Massoud, by two suiciders who detonated bomb belts just two days before the Islamic terrorist network struck in New York and Washington. Today it is generally believed that al Qaeda, predicting America’s response to the terror attacks, struck in advance of the Afghanistan War to eliminate America’s most gifted and formidable military ally.

The wiping out the PUK high command in Suleimaniyeh has alerted Western counter-terror agencies to the possibility of its being the precursor for another massive al Qaeda strike against the United States or its allies. Al Qaeda has taken advantage of the presence of its operatives in a given territory to hit pro-American military leaders present in the same place. One such operative is Abu Musaab al Zarqawi, who is in charge of terrorist activity in Europe and the Middle East, as well as the worldwide distribution of the network’s stock of chemical, biological and radioactive weapons. It is therefore possible that the murder of the Kurdish commanders signals the next major al Qaeda outrage.

According to our sources, Ansar al-Islam is rife both with Zarqawi’s men and also Iraqi military intelligence officers, under the command Colonel Abu Wale. These officers have been training al Qaeda operatives in the use of forbidden weapons. In a special DEBKAfile report published on Saturday, February 8, the secret al Qaeda base for its joint operations with Iraqi military intelligence was revealed as being located in the town of Tajdori, 150 km northeast of Baghdad.

This joint enterprise and the al Qaeda-Iraqi activities among the Ansar have not been lost on US intelligence in northern Iraq. Before he was murdered, PUK commander, Gen. Mushir received heavy cannons for his militia, supplied by the Turkish army at the request of the Americans, for the purpose of mounting action to capture the Ansar enclave. This operation has meanwhile been called off.

[Tamzee]

Can't be...
there IS no link between Iraq and Al Qaeda... the liberals said so.


Thanks for the sad update.

[IronJack]

This sounds mysteriously like the assassination of Commander Ahmed Shah Massoud of the Northern Alliance two days before 9/11. The terrorists like to make sure that if nothing else, the lines of succession are blurred when the dust finally settles.

However, the assassination of Massoud proved counterproductive to the Taliban, since his successor was Gen. Rashid Dostum, a hard-drinking Uzbek warlord who crushed them at Mazar-e-Sharif.

[GVnana]

Looks like the same ploy they used on Massood.

[estjohn]

VOA has a blurb about it: http://www.voanews.com/article.cfm?objectID=7850573D-4A9C-439B-BAC4BF9DA22839A0

A senior military commander with one of the main factions running Iraqi Kurdistan was assassinated late Saturday night by members of Ansar-al-Islam, an Islamic extremist group accused of having links to Iraq and the terrorist group al-Qaida. Shaukat Haji Mushir, a leading member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, was killed along with five other people near the Iraqi Kurdish zone's southeastern town of Halabja as he met with Ansar members to negotiate their defection. Ansar-al-Islam opposes the secular government of the Patriotic Union, which has been fighting for two years to drive Ansar from the eastern edge of the Kurdish autonomous zone in northeastern Iraq. Last week, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell accused Ansar-al-Islam of being connected to the al-Qaida terrorist network and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

ALSO:

ATTACKERS opened fire on a group of senior Kurdish figures, killing a political leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and two others, a party military commander said. The commander blamed Islamic extremists from the Ansar al-Islam organisation for the attack last night on General Shawkat Haji Mushir, a member of the political leadership of the party, which controls the eastern section of the Kurdish autonomous region of northeast Iraq. Sheik Jaffar Mustafa, PUK military commander of the nearby town of Halabja said the three attackers also killed Hekmat Osman, PUK security chief of the Sirwan district, and Sardar Qafoor, military commander of Sirwan district, and three civilians - a man, a woman and a child. Mohamad Tawfiq, security chief of Halabja was seriously injured, he said. Ansar al-Islam has been at war with the PUK for two years. Mustafa said Mushir had been expecting to receive an Ansar defector at the house at about 10.20pm, when the attack occurred. Instead of defecting, the Ansar member and two other Ansar men opened fire with Kalashnikov semi-automatic weapons and grenades.

http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,5960070%255E401,00.html

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

These men would have helped immensely in our war to free the Iraqis and get rid of Saddam. I hate the leftist media right now..the smug Clinton apologists on the Sunday morning shows who side with our enemies, risking our troops, and the Kurds who have been waiting for 12 years for our help.

[theFIRMbss]

>Al Qaeda's Opening Shot-Terrorists Assassinate 4 Generals of pro-US Kurdistan Militia

But, but, they didn't
ask the United Nations
if this was proper!

And they didn't forge
a global coalition
to do this for them!

These damn terrorist!
All they do is take action!
They're so out-of-touch...

[eno_]

Actually, the main reason I'll wait for confirmation on this on is that a Kalashnikov under the robe is a pretty lame ploy compared with the bomb in the "camera." This is a pretty bad breach of security if it happened as reported.

[ChadGore]

DEBKA's Military Anlysts
DEBKA's Military Anlysts

[Fitzcarraldo]

You pulled my post http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/839279/posts

I understand you pulled it because it was "duplicated" in Breaking News, but don't appreciate that it was totally deleted, especially after others and myself took the time to research and post relevent background material (which took some time to do).

Please restore it, if possible.

I mean, we are not discussing Rush Limbaugh's golf technique or Michael Jackson's nose here.

Thank you.

[Dog]

What did they do???

Delete that thread......come on restore it...

[mhking]

[Dog]

It is confirmed but the Mods deleted the thread from a reliable source..

[Admin Moderator]

Sorry about that. my bad. i restored it.

[Dog]

Thank you.....people just don't believe DEBKA..

You the man!

[Sparta]

This is bad news, for the Iraqis that is. The successor will kick Iraq's for payback for this.

[Fitzcarraldo]

Turns out Debka is right on in this case.

http://www.voanews.com/article.cfm?objectID=7850573D-4A9C-439B-BAC4BF9DA22839A0

Iraqi Kurd Leader Assassinated by Extremist Group VOA News

09 Feb 2003, 17:59 UTC

A senior military commander with one of the main factions running Iraqi Kurdistan was assassinated late Saturday night by members of Ansar-al-Islam, an Islamic extremist group accused of having links to Iraq and the terrorist group al-Qaida.

Shaukat Haji Mushir, a leading member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, was killed along with five other people near the Iraqi Kurdish zone's southeastern town of Halabja as he met with Ansar members to negotiate their defection.

Ansar-al-Islam opposes the secular government of the Patriotic Union, which has been fighting for two years to drive Ansar from the eastern edge of the Kurdish autonomous zone in northeastern Iraq.

Last week, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell accused Ansar-al-Islam of being connected to the al-Qaida terrorist network and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

[Admin Moderator]

;)