Tag: Jordan

Sue The Bastards!

Staff Sgts. Matt Lewellen, Kevin McEnroe and Jimmy Moriarty….do those names mean anything to you?

Unless you read a lot those names mean nothing.

They are the names of Green Berets killed in Jordan by an ally…they were gunned down returning from a training mission…..well the families are suing Jordan for their deaths…..

The families of three Green Berets killed by a member of the Jordanian Air Force as they entered a base in Jordan filed a lawsuit against that country’s government, charging it attempted to cover up the incident and slander their fallen sons.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Washington seeks monetary damages from the Kingdom of Jordan, where the Special Forces soldiers were stationed when they were gunned down Nov. 4, 2016 by Jordanian Air Force 1st Sgt. Maarik al-Tawayha. The Green Berets – Staff Sgts. Matt Lewellen, Kevin McEnroe and Jimmy Moriarty – were driving onto King Faisal Air Base in southern Jordan midday after training Syrian rebel forces when al-Tawayha inexplicably opened fire on them.

https://www.stripes.com/news/families-of-slain-green-berets-sue-jordan-charging-a-cover-up-attempt-in-2016-deaths-1.556931

More useless deaths in a war that should have ended years ago.

I hope the families get satisfaction for their loved ones deaths…..deaths that did not need to be a statistic….endless wars and preparations are what killed these men…..and the country shrugs and allows the stupid to continue.

US Troops Just Keep Dying

It is always a sad story when news of more US troops are killed….especially in a war that has never been voted on…..just last week 3 more American soldiers were killed in Jordan….why they were killed has not been released just yet….but it is odd because Jordan is a staunch ally of the US…..

Two American military trainers were killed and a third wounded in a shootout with security guards at a Jordanian military base south of the capital, reports the AP. No official explanation has emerged about what happened, but a Jordanian military source tells Reuters that the Americans failed to heed orders to stop at the base’s entrance gate. A source confirms that version of events to CBS News, which notes that Jordan is a strong US ally and attacks on Americans there are rare. A Jordanian military officer was reportedly wounded in the shootout. No identities have been released.

Since this report was issued the 3rd soldier that was wounded has died…..

In a statement, it identified the dead soldiers as Staff Sergeants Matthew C. Lewellen, 27, of Lawrence, Kansas; Kevin J. McEnroe, 30, of Tucson, Arizona; and James F. Moriarty, 27, of Kerrville, Texas.

IST offers our deepest sympathy for the families and pray that no more have to die for whatever reason they offer.

Death Comes To Jordan

Do you recall the deaths of two Americans in Jordan just last week?

In case you have forgotten…..I know how quickly we Americans can forget stuff……

Two American instructors and a South African were killed by a police officer at a training center in Jordan on Monday before the shooter was killed by security forces, reports CNN. Two Americans and four Jordanians were also wounded in the incident, which took place in the cafeteria of the US-backed Jordan International Police Training Center in Muwaqqar, outside the capital of Amman, per NBC News. One Jordanian died later in the hospital, reports Al Jazeera; a government rep says one of the wounded Americans is in critical condition. The Guardian reports the facility is used by security officers from across the Middle East, while the BBC notes it hosts mainly Palestinian and Iraqi officers.

Though details of the incident are still sketchy, the timing has raised concerns of a link to the al-Qaeda suicide bombing attacks on hotels in Amman, which left almost 60 people dead exactly 10 years ago, reports the New York Times. Jordanian media initially reported the incident as “accidental,” but the government rep now calls the shooting a “crime.” He adds an investigation is underway. A government-run newspaper identifies the shooter as a veteran police officer who formerly served as a captain in the criminal investigation department before being moved to the training center.

There has been a wealth of chatter about the deaths of 2 Americans in Jordan……most of it by people that are upset that these deaths were American and they set about throwing all sorts of accusations about the region and its inhabitant’s hate for Americans…..I wish they had shown the same amount of concern when another American of Arab descent was brutally beaten by Israeli officials……but that was another day and after all he was a Palestinian-American visiting his grandparents in the country they lived….(sad that anyone would think like that…but it is the times we live).  (Makes me think of the attack on the USS Liberty)……

First, these people were not American troops….they were in fact private “security consultants”…..in real life they are mercenaries,  that term they hate so to be political correct, you know that term that most Righties despise, working with the Jordanians on a defense contract……in case there is some confusion….I detest people that use the term “political correctness” as some sort of argument because they have nothing else to use….these are the same people that find one incident and use it as a sample of what the entire issue is about….

Sorry…I digress…..

The big question is why would Jordanians, our friends, turn on a couple of Americans?

Preliminary investigations indicate that the perpetrator, a former officer in an investigations department who was sent to the camp, has no known ties to terrorist organizations. On the other hand, the incident, in which several others were injured, occurred on the 10th anniversary of Al-Qaida attacks on three hotels in Amman, which killed more than 60 people.

“It’s hard to ignore that connection – especially on a day in which newspapers in Jordan are mentioning the country’s determination to combat terrorism and its successes so far,” one Jordanian analyst told Haaretz. “I hope the investigation shows that this was a madman and not a deliberate attack by Al-Qaida or ISIS.”

One could, perhaps, look for a link between the shooting attack and ISIS. For years this particular police camp has trained Iraqi fighters and Libyan and Yemeni rebels, as well as Syrian opposition forces. Three years ago there was a “revolt” by Libyan trainees who complained of the harsh conditions and the food there. They broke equipment and furniture, and threatened to hurt their instructors if they were not moved to luxurious hotels and chauffeured to camp. Since then there have been no incidents there.

ISIS has no reason to attack the camp since Jordan has since stopped training Syrian fighters there, mainly for lack of volunteers. This followed a U.S. admission that its ambitious program to train 3,000 Syrian rebels had failed. Al-Qaida does indeed have a score to settle with Jordan, but this attack was not its style.

(Haaretz.com)

So the reason for the attack is still unclear….but it may be nothing more than a pay back….a debt that these people had to pay for with their lives….

Will we ever get the rest of the story on this attack?  My guess will be……NO!

News From The Middle East

After the ghastly execution of the Jordanian pilot by ISIS…..Jordan has retaliated…….

Jordanian officials have announced that they will carry out a “revenge as huge as the loss of the Jordanians” after the execution of pilot Moaz al-Kasaesbeh, who was captured by ISIS in December.

And they did just that…..hung 2 convicted terrorists….

US is hoping that Jordan will be resolved to carry the fight to ISIS……

But in other news…it seems that the UAE is not as committed as we once thought…..even with the notoriety that they got with the female pilot fighting ISIS…..

Did I miss something?  Please read this and tell me what you see in this article…..

 

United Arab Emirates, Key U.S. Ally in ISIS Effort, Disengaged in December – NYTimes.com.

Don’t Look Now

While the whole world was focused on the massacre and subsequent manhunt in Boston….there was a little reported occurrence…..

Source:StratRisks

The Pentagon is sending about 200 soldiers from a U.S. Army headquarters unit to Jordan to assist efforts to contain violence along the Syrian border and plan for any operations needed to ensure the safety of chemical weapons in Syria, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told Congress Wednesday.

The decision to dispatch the 1st Armored Division troops of planners and specialists in intelligence, logistics and operations comes as several lawmakers pressed the Obama administration for even more aggressive steps to end the two-year civil war.

Hagel and Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, faced persistent questions from senior members of the Armed Services Committee about efforts to force out Syrian President Bashar Assad. The Pentagon leaders made clear that the situation is extremely complicated and they must be certain of the endgame before any military step to try to end the bloodshed.

“You better be damned sure. No-fly zone, safe zone. Once you’re in, you can’t unwind it,” Hagel said.

Dempsey said he has spent a significant portion of his adult life trying to figure out the Mideast. “This is the toughest of all,” he said.

Hagel said the fresh troops will replace a similar number of U.S. forces that have been in Jordan for some months. They also will provide leadership personnel that could command additional forces if it’s determined they are needed in the future.

See More @ Source

And then there is even more disturbing news…..

These are now astonishingly the very areas the US CIA is overseeing the flow of thousands of tons of weapons and aid – aid that is clearly falling almost entirely into the hands of Al Qaeda’s Syrian franchise, Jabhat al-Nusra.

The New York Times in their article titled, “Arms Airlift to Syria Rebels Expands, With C.I.A. Aid,” admits that:

With help from the C.I.A., Arab governments and Turkey have sharply increased their military aid to Syria’s opposition fighters in recent months, expanding a secret airlift of arms and equipment for the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, according to air traffic data, interviews with officials in several countries and the accounts of rebel commanders.

The airlift, which began on a small scale in early 2012 and continued intermittently through last fall, expanded into a steady and much heavier flow late last year, the data shows. It has grown to include more than 160 military cargo flights by Jordanian, Saudi and Qatari military-style cargo planes landing at Esenboga Airport near Ankara, and, to a lesser degree, at other Turkish and Jordanian airports.

While the West attempts to claim these weapons are being sent to “moderates,” the US State Department itselfadmits that Al Qaeda is operating in every major city in Syria, carrying out hundreds of terrorist attacks, and is by far the most highly organized, most prominent militant front in the conflict. If the West via Saudi Arabia and Qatar is sending thousands of tons of weapons to “moderates,” who is sending more weapons to Jabhat al-Nusra?

I have said all along that the war in Syria would eventually spill out to bordering countries like Lebanon, Jordan and eventually Israel………we are now getting close to that prediction……

We need to worry!  For this could come back to bite us in the ass like Afghanistan…….

What About Jordan?

With all the uprisings across the Middle East I have people ask me about Jordan…….it seems that things are pretty quiet there…..no as much as you would think……there have been many small protests and the King has handled it like any king would….put them down as quickly as possible and under the radar of the media…….

Jordan is located in the middle of crisis…..on one side is Israel…on another is Syria on another is Iraq and then there is the continuous hot spot…Lebanon…..Jordan is simmering……

A good analysis has been written by Medhi Hasan………

The truth is that Jordan’s royal rulers have tended to use the country’s politicians and bureaucrats to deflect attention from their own failings; the four Hashemite kings have changed prime ministers almost 70 times since the establishment of modern Jordan in 1921 and the current king, Abdullah, has appointed 10 different prime ministers since coming to power in 1999 – three of them in the past 12 months alone. As I asked Mohammed Halaikah, a former deputy prime minister under Abdullah: Is there something wrong with every single Jordanian premier or perhaps something wrong with the king himself?

I was surprised, in fact, to find criticism of King Abdullah, and his wife, the glamorous Queen Rania, commonplace in Amman, the country’s capital – despite the fact that insulting the king is punishable by three years in prison. Abdullah, however, lacks the charisma and charm of his late father, Hussein; many Jordanians may continue to harbour a nationalist and Islamic attachment to their Hashemite ruling family but plenty of others, for example, openly mock the Western-educated monarch’s poor command of Arabic. Rania, who is of Palestinian descent, is particularly unpopular with the East Bankers and her lavish lifestyle and extravagant spending has prompted ominous comparisons with Marie Antoinette.

Lest we forget, however, tiny, impoverished Jordan is a key strategic ally of the US and one of only two Arab nations (the other being Egypt) to have signed a peace treaty with the state of Israel. If the Arab Spring were to spread to the Hashemite kingdom and the ruling family fell, after almost a century in power, it would have a massive, almost unquantifiable impact on the wider region and on the Muslim world as a whole.

I think that the small kingdom will erupt after the Syrian crisis is resolved……activists are waiting….waiting for the chance to make a case to the world media….that is not saying that small pockets of resistance will not appear , just a massive push is out of the question…..for now.