World War 3 fears as Russia frets over ISIS - F. Michael Maloof -
http://www.wnd.com/2015/12/world-war-3-fears-as-russia-frets-over-isis/
U.S. intel officer: Moscow aims to divide, conquer Afghanistan
Fearful that Islamic State fighters - many from the North Caucasus - will return to their homeland and wage jihad in the Russian Federation, Moscow now is focusing its military action in Syria on killing those potential sources of bombings, shootings and massacres, according to a new report in Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.
But a Russian official has told G2 Bulletin that there is another, more immediate, concern - of jihadist fighters coming from Afghanistan and infiltrating Russia through Central Asia.
And a U.S. military intelligence source independently has confirmed to G2 Bulletin what the Russian official said, because he's already seeing the Russians taking action to make sure there is a buffer between ISIS in Afghanistan and Russia.
That would be by exerting its influence in the northern part of the country.
Both officials insisted on anonymity to speak about the issue.
"Our concern is that ISIS is increasing in Afghanistan and could enter through Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and then through Kazakhstan where the borders are virtually unprotected," the Russian official said.
The Russian said ISIS is training militants from Russia in Afghanistan and there are an increasing number of foreign fighters providing the training. He added that among the captured or killed ISIS fighters, some had American and British passports.
And he said there also are instructors from Arab countries and Pakistan to train people from Central Asia and the North Caucasus region of Russia.
The Kremlin estimates that there are some 3,500 ISIS militants now in Afghanistan, with that number quickly rising.
The concern also has been the speed at which ISIS showed up in Afghanistan, starting only a year ago, turning the jihadist fighters a high-priority threat.
Russian Army Gen. Valery Gerasimov, who heads the Russian general staff, estimates that there are some 50,000 fighters in Afghanistan.
The Afghan Taliban number some 40,000 in Afghanistan and are Sunni Muslims, like ISIS, and have begun to join ISIS ranks, officials said.
At a recent conference in Moscow, RT reported that Col. Gen. Igor Sergun, who heads Russia's main intelligence directorate of its military intelligence agency, said ISIS is using the worsening of the political situation in Afghanistan to strengthen its position.
"We estimate that ISIS gets new troops by bribing field commanders of Taliban, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and other radical religious organizations operating on Afghan territory," Sergun said.
Is this how World War III begins? Religion, end times, terror and the frightening new Middle East tinderbox - Phil Torres - http://www.salon.com
Apocalyptic worldviews and non-state actors make the wars in Syria and on terror all the more dangerous
Has World War III begun? Some world leaders and journalists seem to think so. For example, Jordan's King Abdullah recently said at a news conference that "we are facing a Third World War against humanity," and that we must "act fast to tackle the response to interconnected threats." Similarly, Roger Cohen at the New York Times wrote a poignant article in which he draws a number of parallels between the Syrian war and the beginning of World War I. And last September, Pope Francis visited a military cemetery in Italy and warned that "perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction."
The idea that World War III has started isn't crazy - although neither is it obviously true. The fact is that the Syrian conflict is an international tangle of competing interests and strange alliances. Russia and Iran, for example, both support the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria. Meanwhile, the U.S. supports the Kurds and Syrian rebels fighting against al-Assad's forces. The U.S. is also leading a coalition of over 60 countries, and France recently started its own coalition to fight the Islamic State, as did Russia. Making matters even more complicated, Turkey is fighting against the Kurds, and the Syrian rebels are receiving additional help from Jordan, Turkey and the Gulf states.
These are just the state actors - there's also a number of non-state entities engaged in this conflict. For example, the Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah is on the side of Syria, Russia, and Iran, while the al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra is fighting to topple Assad's regime and replace it with an Islamic government. There have also been numerous Shia militia roaming around Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led preemptive invasion, including the Mahdi Army and the Promised Day Brigade. According to the former director of the CIA, David Petraeus, such militias constitute an even greater long-term threat to the region than the Islamic State.
And then, of course, pretty much everyone is at war with the Islamic State, which has grown into the largest and best-funded terrorist organization in human history. It now controls a huge area of real estate in Iraq and Syria (on which some 5 million people live), and has affiliates in countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Libya, and Nigeria. This juggernaut of terrorism has also attracted foreign fighters from countries as geographically distant as Denmark, Ireland, Australia, and the US. While its initial aim, after rising to prominence in 2014, was to establish a strong caliphate in Iraq and Syria, it recently expanded its strategy by bombing a Russian commercial plane over the Sinai Peninsula and perpetrating the Paris attacks that left 130 people dead.
So, this is clearly an international war - and a messy one at that. But it's not the first conflict of the sort since World War II. The Cold War involved countries from around the globe, divided into the Eastern and Western blocs, and the Korean War can be seen as a proxy war between the U.S. and China, backed by the UN and Soviet Union, respectively. Furthermore, the Second Congo War, which is sometimes dubbed the African World War, involved nine African nations and roughly twenty different militias. Our global village has witnessed multiple international confrontations in the seven decades since 1945. The Syrian war is just another in this series.
But there is something that makes the Syrian war unique. Whereas many of the conflicts after World War I were driven by differences in political and economic ideologies - think fascism, communism, and liberal democracy - the war in Syria involves several actors that appear to hold genuinely apocalyptic worldviews.
The Islamic State is perhaps the most obvious example. As the U.S. General Martin Dempsey noted during a 2014 press conference, the Islamic State is motivated by "an apocalyptic, end-of-days strategic vision" according to which its current leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, is the eighth of 12 caliphs in total before the world ends. It also believes that a grand battle - essentially Armageddon - between the Muslims and "Romans," i.e., the Western forces, will soon occur in the small Syrian town of Dabiq. This is why the Islamic State "fought ferociously" for control of Dabiq in 2014, despite its military insignificance, and it's why the Islamic State named its online propaganda magazine Dabiq. Each issue of this magazine opens with the quote: "The spark has been lit here in Iraq, and its heat will continue to intensify - by Allah's permission - until it burns the crusader armies in Dabiq." For the Islamic State, the Syrian war is one stage in an apocalyptic narrative that's unfolding before our very eyes.
"Iran provokes the world as Obama does nothing." Who said this? You might be surprised - Joel C. Rosenberg - https://flashtrafficblog.wordpress.com/2015/12/23/iran-provokes-the-world-as-obama-does-nothing-who-said-this-you-might-be-surprised/
"Iran is following through on the nuclear deal it struck with a U.S.-led coalition in an utterly predictable way: It is racing to fulfill those parts of the accord that will allow it to collect $100 billion in frozen funds and end sanctions on its oil exports and banking system, while expanding its belligerent and illegal activities in other areas - and daring the West to respond. Unfortunately, the Obama administration's response to these provocations has also been familiar. It is doing its best to downplay them - and thereby encouraging Tehran to press for still-greater advantage."
Who said this? You might be surprised. It wasn't Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It wasn't one of the GOP presidential candidates. Nor was it the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal or a conservative foreign policy analyst.
These are actually the opening lines of a Washington Post editorial published on December 20. The liberal editors of the Post go on to blast the Obama administration's "fecklessness" in willfully "ignoring" Iran's blatant violations of the nuclear accord.
Consider the rest of the editorial:
We've pointed out how the regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has unjustly sentenced Post correspondent Jason Rezaian to prison and arrested two businessmen with U.S. citizenship or residence since signing the nuclear accord. There have been no penalties for those outrageous violations of human rights. Now a United Nations panel has determined that Iran test-fired a nuclear-capable missile on Oct. 10 with a range of at least 600 miles, in violation of a U.N. resolution that prohibits such launches. Moreover, it appears likely that a second missile launch occurred on Nov. 21, also in violation of Security Council Resolution 1929.
The U.S. response? "We are now actively considering the appropriate consequences to that launch in October," State Department official Stephen Mull testified at a Senate committee hearing Thursday. In other words, there have so far been none - other than a speech by the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations blaming the Security Council for the lack of action. As for the second missile launch, the administration claims to be investigating it, though it likely has in its possession the intelligence necessary to make a judgment.
It's not hard to guess the reasons for this fecklessness. President Obama is reluctant to do anything that might derail the nuclear deal before Iran carries out its commitments, including uninstalling thousands of centrifuges and diluting or removing tons of enriched uranium. The same logic prompted him to tolerate Iran's malign interventions in Syria, Yemen and elsewhere, along with the arrest of Mr. Rezaian, while the pact was under negotiation.
U.S. officials argue that Iran's nonnuclear violations make it all the more important that the nuclear deal be implemented. But that ignores the clear connections between the missile launches and Tehran's ambitions to become a nuclear power. The only practical military purpose of the missiles the regime is testing is to carry atomic warheads. And while missile launches are not prohibited by the nuclear pact itself, the separate resolution banning them remains in effect until the deal is implemented, after which a new resolution takes effect that calls on Iran not to develop such missiles for eight years.
By flouting the U.N. resolutions, Iran is clearly testing the will of the United States and its allies to enforce the overall regime limiting its nuclear ambitions. If there is no serious response, it will press the boundaries in other areas - such as the inspection regime. It will take maximum advantage of Mr. Obama's fear of undoing a legacy achievement, unless and until its bluff is called. That's why the administration would be wise to take firm action now in response to the missile tests rather than trying to sweep them under the carpet.
I don't often say this, but it's true: the editors of the Washington Post are correct in their observations and analysis. The White House and State Department are ignoring the Iranian regime's willful disregard of the nuclear accord.
What the Post editors don't say - but should - is that this refusal to require Iran to keep the agreement is making a dangerous situation far more dangerous. Why? Because Iran's leaders are not just driven by Radical Islam. They are driven by Apocalyptic Islam. They believe the End of Days has come. They believe their savior or messiah known as the "Mahdi" or the "Twelfth Imam" is coming at any moment to establish a global Islamic kingdom or caliphate. And they believe they must develop a nuclear weapons arsenal to help pave the way for a world without Jews and Christians. Western leaders ignore the threat of Apocalyptic Islam at their peril, and ours.
I once wrote a trilogy of novels about such a nightmare scenario. This is far more frightening...because it's true.
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