Sasha Uzunov is an Australian journalist who has visited the Balkans region many times over a 20 year period.
His article 'Reverse Balkan blowback' reveals the behind the scenes intrigues in the early years of the war in the former Yugoslavia and of the unintended involvement of Islamic terrorists, initially funded by the United States's CIA during the cold war but who later turned against their paymaster.
One bizarre case involves a former good guy turned bad guy turned good guy now willing to spill the beans on Osama Bin Laden and help beat Al Qaida in Afghanistan
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=8558&page=0
On Line Opinion - Australia's e-journal of social and political debate
'Reverse Balkan blowback': good guys become bad then good
By Sasha Uzunov - Thursday, 19 February 2009
The Americans love coming up with catchy and punchy terms. Take for instance “blowback”, a term used in espionage to describe the unintended consequences of covert operations. In the war on terror context it means former Mujahaddin Islamic holy war warriors once sponsored by the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) during the cold war who have now turned against their former paymaster.
I have travelled to the Balkans region four times, including spending a 12-month stint as a stringer for a major British newspaper in 2002 at the tail end of the war in tiny Macedonia. In my time in the volatile Balkans, perhaps the research laboratory for world destruction, I learnt three valuable lessons: everyone believes in conspiracy theories; never take things at face value; and good guys can become bad guys and vice versa in an instant.
So it comes as no great surprise to discover that there is an incredible Balkan example of “Reverse Blowback” now hitting the media in both Serbia and in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
A report titled, Jihad, bought and sold on January 26, 2009 by ISA Consulting, a non-profit international think tank reveals an interesting individual offering his services in the fight on terror:
He is an Islamic warrior who fought in Bosnia during the war, a fierce follower of jihad who has pledged to die in the name of God, a convicted terrorist and proclaimed al-Qaida commander. Ali Ahmed Ali Hamad is now trying to sell information about atrocities committed by his warriors in Bosnia in return for asylum.
The report adds:
A native of Bahrain, Ali Ahmed Ali Hamad, known during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war as “Ubaidah al-Bahraini”, was released on 30 December 2008 from a Bosnian prison where he served a 12-year sentence for robbery and terrorism.
Ali Hamad was a high-ranking officer of the notorious El-Mujahid unit, composed of foreign fighters from Islamic countries, and under the command of the Bosnian Army. El-Mujahid committed war crimes against ethnic Serbs and Croats in Bosnia. In 1997 Ali Hamad was eventually locked up for masterminding a terrorist car bomb attack in the Bosnian town of Mostar (Old Bridge) aimed against the ethnic Croat population.
Irony of ironies, he is now seeking asylum in Serbia, his former enemy in the Bosnian war, after his Bosnian citizenship was revoked and with deportation to his native Bahrain on the cards.
The ISA report explains:
Ali Hamad told local media that he is since "reformed" and is now ready to help "fight terrorism" and Osama bin Laden, admitting that he did "bad things" as an al-Qaida fighter. He also revealed that he was preparing to release a book containing secrets about al-Qaida based on his experiences in Bahrain, Afghanistan and Bosnia.
The Bosnian war was a result of the break up of the former Yugoslavia and in a three-way struggle which pitted Muslim Bosnians (Bosnjaks) against ethnic Serbs, against ethnic Croats, in a bid to control the former Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina (Bosna-Hercegovina). No one can forget the images of the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo being bombarded constantly by Serb artillery or the infamous Serb concentration camp with emaciated Muslim Bosnian prisoners or the UN’s inability to stop the slaughter of Muslim Bosnians at Srebrenica. The war ended with the US-brokered Dayton Agreement in 1995.
But let us go back in time so that we can understand this bizarre Reverse Balkan Blowback involving Ali Ahmed Ali Hamad.
From 1945 to 1991, Yugoslavia was a communist federation consisting of six republics: Serbia (Srbija), Croatia (Hrvatska), Slovenia (Slovenija), Macedonia (Makedonija), Montenegro (Crna Gora) and Bosnia-Herzegovina (Bosna-Hercegovina). In 1974, two autonomous regions, Vojvodina and Kosovo-Metohija, were created within Serbia. Up until his death in 1980 Marshal Josip Broz Tito, a half Croat, half Slovene, managed an incredible balancing act by a ruthless crackdown on any form of ethnic separatism and as well as keeping Yugoslavia free from Soviet Russian domination.
In 1989 the President of the Republic of Serbia, a communist banker by the name of Slobodan Milosevic, riding on a wave of nationalism, revoked the special status of Vojvodina, which had a large ethnic Hungarian population, and Kosovo, with its 90 per cent ethnic Albanian majority. Milosevic’s ambition was to keep Yugoslavia intact but under Serbian hegemony.
In an article titled, “Yugoslavia supplying arms to Iraq, published in the Croatian Herald, Melbourne, on January 25, 1991, I wrote, as it turned out five months in advance that war in Yugoslavia would break out:
It is believed that the US may have given tacit approval for JNA [Yugoslav People’s Army-Jugoslovenska Narodna Army] to intervene in Slovenia, Croatia … In return the Yugoslav government pledged to stop supplying Iraq with weapons [first gulf war 1990-91].
Eleven years later British journalists, Nicholas Wood and Ian Traynor, wrote in the Guardian newspaper, "Yugoslavia the hub of arms sales to Saddam," November 26, 2002.
On June 25, 1991, tanks from the Serbian dominated JNA rolled into Slovenia after it seceded from Yugoslavia. War broke out that was to tear apart the Balkans region for a decade.
Maud Beelman, an Associated Press foreign correspondent, wrote in Hear No Evil, See No Evil: Early U.S. Policy in Yugoslavia, for the Alicia Patterson Foundation:
Preoccupied with the Gulf War and concern over the future of the Soviet Union, the United States did not deploy its diplomatic big guns until June 1991, just days before the long-announced secession of Slovenia and Croatia and the outbreak of war.
Secretary of State James Baker flew to Belgrade for a one-day marathon of meetings with the leaders of federal Yugoslavia and the various republics. Baker declined to be interviewed, but in his autobiography, "The Politics of Diplomacy," he said his message was clear.
“While we supported the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia and existing republic borders and would not accept unilateral changes, the international community, of course, recognized that if the republics wanted to change borders by peaceful, consensual means, that was an altogether different matter,“ he wrote.
A U.S. diplomat with Baker said the Serbs took his comments as a green light for sending in the federal army, while all the Croats and Slovenes heard was democratize. War erupted in less than a week. Pointedly, Baker did not threaten any U.S. intervention should the Serbs use the army to quell secessionist attempts, only "ostracism" for the Serbs and a refusal by the West to recognize breakaway republics.
Slovenia won its independence after 10 days, and the JNA withdrew to attack Croatia and later Bosnia.
In October 1992, I was an Australian journalist hired by the MILS news agency, specialising in Macedonian and Balkan affairs, to train young Macedonian reporters and to fine tune its daily news wire service, which was being supplied to subscribers: foreign embassies and international media agencies. MILS Managing Director, was Dr Ljupco Naumovski, a former diplomat in the Federal Yugoslav and later the Macedonian Foreign Affairs Offices.
MILS's headquarters was in Brussels, Belgium, and had a branch in Skopje, the Macedonian capital. Skopje was manned by respected local journalist Saso Ordanoski, who is on a first name basis with ex-Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans from Evan’s time as the President of the International Crisis Group (ICG), a strategic think tank dedicated to ending world conflict and based in Brussels.
One day in late 1992 a fit looking man in his late 30s or early 40s walked into MILS's Brussels office. He had very short blonde hair and an upright military bearing. He introduced himself as Andreas Renatus Hartmann, German political advisor to the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) in the European Parliament.
Down the track, Mr Hartmann invited Dr Naumovski and myself to dinner at a swanky Moroccan restaurant. The dinner went well. We talked about a wide variety of subjects but the attention inevitably turned to the Balkans. I was enjoying eating the Moroccan couscous and almost choked when Mr Hartmann said matter of factly that German Intelligence (BND) was about to open its first "station" in Tirana, Albania since World War II, and the British were not impressed at being beaten to the punch.
I thought to myself, why is this guy telling me this? He dropped more bombshells when he said that Europe, in particular German and France, did not want an Islamic state in the Balkans - namely Bosnia-Herzegovina or a Greater Albania. The German and French right wing parties wanted to strengthen Macedonia to act as a buffer state against possible Islamic fundamentalist terrorism, he claimed.
In the early stages of the war in Bosnia both the United States and the European Community (EC now European Union) were not interested in the plight of Muslims, other than supporting a token UN peacekeeping force. So why did the US change its policy and “permit” the use of former Islamic Mujahaddin warriors from the Afghan conflict with the Soviets to fight on the side of the Muslim Bosnians?
First, there was a change in President: George H. Bush was voted out after one term to be replaced by William Jefferson “Bill” Clinton in 1992. Second, and this is speculation on my part, there was a fear of post-Soviet Russia playing a big role in the Balkans again.
When Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence from Yugoslavia, Germany broke ranks with the EC, to grant recognition. In Serbia’s camp was Russia, its traditional Orthodox ally. Could the US about-turn on Bosnia have been prompted by the possibility of the Russians eager to flex their diplomatic muscle after losing their communist empire?
Has the rivalry between the US and Russia since the end of World War II really stopped? The Russian showdown against the West in Georgia last year proves that the Russian bear is alive and well after licking its wounds at the end of the Cold War (1946-89).
Meanwhile, Ali Ahmed Ali Hamad would be an interesting character to interview about the inner workings of al-Qaida.
Author
Sasha Uzunov is a freelance photo journalist, blogger, and budding film maker whose mission is to return Australia's national defence/ security debate to its rightful owner, the taxpayer. He also likes paparazzi photography! He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in 1991. He served as a professional soldier in the Australian Army from 1995 to 2002, and completed two tours of duty in East Timor. As a journalist he has worked in the Balkans, Iraq and Afghanistan. His blog is at Team Uzunov.
Other articles by this Author
» VC winner heralds a new era of heroes - January 23, 2009
» Out-'talibaning' the Taliban: can the US ‘win’ in Afghanistan? - December 30, 2008
» Generals and Diggers saved the day in Timor - November 20, 2008
» Remembrance Day: remembering all - November 10, 2008
» A James Bond other life - October 28, 2008
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Thursday, February 12, 2009
New book by Scott Taylor
Sasha Uzunov, Australian journalist and war reporter mentioned in new book by award winning Canadian reporter Scott Taylor.
http://www.dmpibooks.com/book/978155365292
Douglas & McIntyre
Unembedded: Two Decades of Maverick War Reporting
By: Scott Taylor
Excerpt
from Chapter 9: Among the Mujahedeen
On June 16, 2005, I received a telephone call from Zeynep Tugrul asking me to have a look at the photograph on the front page of the International Herald Tribune. In the photograph, four Iraqi men, identified as insurgent suspects captured in the city of Tal Afar, were huddled together in the back of an American vehicle. The individual on the left of the photograph—even with B-5 scrawled on his forehead in grease pencil—was instantly recognizable as one of the mujahedeen who had beaten me during my captivity the previous September.
On the morning of June 18, I was still trying to figure out whom to provide with this information when I received a phone call from Major Gary Dangerfield of the U.S. 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Tal Afar, inviting me to make an “all-expenses-paid visit” back to Iraq. As a result of the regiment’s commanding officer having read my book Among the Others: Encounters with theForgotten Turkmen of Iraq, I was being asked to come and provide a briefing to the 3rd Armored Cavalry.
After accepting the proposal and being assured that I would have “more fucking protection than the president,” I pointed out to Dangerfield that his regiment had arrested one of my tormentors. Although he was aware of my having been taken hostage, Dangerfield was not aware that prisoner B-5 had been involved. As a result, B-5 was relocated and isolated from the other prisoners until I could arrive to give a 100 per cent identification and statement. True to their word, the Americans sent a Black Hawk helicopter and an Apache gunship to pick us up at the Iraq-Turkey border.
Sasha Uzunov had agreed to accompany me on this trip, and Stefan Nitoslawski was filming the entire venture for a CBC documentary entitled Targets: Reporters in Iraq. I had already signed a contract and begun participating in Targets before receiving the call from Dangerfield. The producers had wanted me to venture to Iraq on my own for the movie, but after two sleepless nights of anxiety at the prospect I told them I could not do it. I was prepared to travel right up to the border but not beyond it.
The offer of flying in by helicopter changed all that. Almost immediately after the chopper had delivered us to Forward Operations Base Sykes, we were issued with protective gear and sent out on a patrol into the centre of Tal Afar. The gunner in the rear hatch suddenly ducked down inside the armoured fighting vehicle and hand-signalled me to do the same. When our column of five Bradley personnel carriers had rumbled along this narrow street just thirty minutes earlier, a large number of Iraqi civilians had been clustered in doorways. Dozens of young children had waved enthusiastically at the U.S. soldiers, running beside the vehicles in hopes of having candy or toys tossed in their direction.
By the time we returned along this same route, all evidence of the local citizenry had disappeared behind closed doors and shuttered windows. Sensing that Iraqi insurgents in the vicinity had prompted the exodus, the patrol commander ordered all the troops to duck down as we sped through the now ominously quiet streets.
Thankfully, our patrol returned to the U.S. base without receiving any hostile fire. The troops of the 3rd Armored Cavalry explained that spending a day in Tal Afar without being attacked was a rarity. The purpose of our trip into this volatile northern Iraqi city was to retrace the route taken by my captors when I had been abducted and held hostage the previous September.
Although I could make general presumptions about locations based on my memory and satellite imagery, once I returned to the site, a lot of landmarks came rushing back to mind. Many changes had occurred in the past eleven months because of the continual fighting and the shifting political fortunes, and the police checkpoint where Zeynep and I were first taken had long since been dismantled.
Nevertheless, after viewing the same approach road we had taken from Mosul, I remembered the large Hitachi neon sign that stood in the centre of the checkpoint. Once this vital starting point could be confirmed, it was amazing how the detailed memories came flooding back. Our armoured patrol followed the main boulevard that the terrorists had used, and I could recall where they had crossed the median and then driven uphill into a tightly packed suburb on the outskirts of town.
At that point, our patrol veered back onto the main route. Before our departure I had been told that there were still two large areas in Tal Afar that the U.S. military would enter only with a full combat mission, including tanks and helicopter gunships. To know that after eleven months of often heavy fighting the area in which I had been held hostage remained a heavily contested zone brought home the magnitude of the good fortune that I had been released alive.
That evening I met my host, Colonel H.R. McMaster, the commander of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, who explained that I would be making a special presentation to at least three hundred members of his regiment on the following day. After McMaster excused himself from the table, his executive officer, Lieutenant Colonel Joe Armstrong, said he wanted a private discussion with me in his office. Once the door had been closed, Armstrong got straight to the point.
“The boys here love Colonel McMaster, and I want you to assure me that he didn’t make a mistake in bringing you here,” he said. “I’ve read your stuff—all of your stuff, including the Al Jazeera features—and I know you’re not a believer in this intervention.” I was surprised at how much research Armstrong had conducted, and was shocked to learn just how far McMaster had stuck his neck out to arrange this trip.
“The Pentagon would never have approved this, so the Old Man [McMaster] did this on his own hook,” Armstrong said. That certainly explained the confusion at the Iraq-Turkey border when we had shown up at the American military office and said we were expecting a helicopter pickup. The U.S. soldiers had been amused and had explained that American helicopters were not authorized to operate in this airspace. Their smugness had turned to awe when an Apache suddenly swept in over the border checkpoint, and a Black Hawk landed at a nearby soccer field.
There were plenty of curious stares from the Kurdish and Turkish border guards as Sasha, Stefan and I strutted out to the Black Hawk, carrying a briefcase and camera bags. I assured Armstrong that I respected McMaster’s initiative in bringing me to Tal Afar, and I promised him I would not use the opportunity to do anything but tell the story of what had happened to Zeynep and me the previous year. It was just after lunch, and the mess hall had been converted into a mini-auditorium. At least three hundred U.S. soldiers filed in to take their seats.
When Colonel McMaster strode into the room, the entire assembly stood to attention. In introducing me, the colonel praised my courage for returning to Iraq and instructed his officers to pay close attention to my tale. Stefan Nitoslawski was filming the whole thing, and I’m sure that most of these soldiers were wondering, Just who the hell is this Canadian civvy who brings his own cameraman to tape his performance?
Always a nervous public speaker, I mumbled my way through an opening joke—I likened my thanking them for being there to the way the padre always thanked us for attending the church parades that we had no option but to attend. Once I started telling the story, though, I had their undivided attention. I started by telling them a little bit about my previous involvement with the Turkmen of Iraq and how in September 2004 I had found myself in Ankara to discuss the details of publishing and shipping my recently completed book Among the Others.
While conducting business in Turkey, I heard a couple of sketchy news reports about a violent flare-up in Tal Afar between insurgents and U.S. troops. The reports from Baghdad claimed that foreign fighters were responsible for the violence—and most media outlets had no idea where Tal Afar was. I had a five-day window in my schedule, and through the Iraqi Turkmen Front I arranged yet another trip into Iraq. As a matter of mutual convenience, Zeynep Tugrul joined me on this fact-finding mission into Tal Afar. The Turkish media were certainly keen to learn more about the possible suffering of the Turkmen, and there was absolutely no reliable news coming out of that region.
From their sources, the Iraqi Turkmen Front knew that things were very dangerous, and promises were made to provide us with an armed escort. Zeynep and I made an uneventful border crossing and arrived in Mosul at around noon on September 7. Our driver dropped us off at the U.S.-controlled green zone at the airport, where I had made prior arrangements to meet with Phil Atkinson for lunch. Phil was a retired Canadian soldier and a subscriber to Esprit de Corps. He had taken a job working with General Dynamics Land Systems in London, Ontario, where the Stryker light armoured vehicles are manufactured.
The twenty-two-ton wheeled personnel carriers were the controversial new addition to the U.S. Army inventory, and this was the first time the newly formed Stryker Brigade had deployed to Iraq. Atkinson’s job wasn’t just to repair any battle damage suffered by the vehicles; he was also required to recommend possible improvements to the armour protection. On my previous visits, Phil’s workshops in Mosul had been beehives of activity, but on this day when Zeynep and I visited, the place was like a ghost town. I asked him if there was a special holiday, and Phil dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
“Can you guys keep a secret?” Assuring him that that’s what journalists do best, he proceeded to tell us that everything had been moved forward to Tal Afar.
“We’re gonna mount a major offensive up there in the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours, and you guys won’t want to be anywhere near that place when that happens.” Of course, that’s exactly where we headed as soon as we left the Mosul airport’s front gate.
As I explained this part of the story, I saw an American captain’s hand shoot up in the front row. Although it had been explained beforehand that I would field questions at the end of my talk, I could see this guy’s query wasn’t going to wait that long. As I acknowledged him, the captain asked,
“Why the hell would you do that? Why wouldn’t you listen to his advice?” I explained that as a Turk and as a Canadian, Zeynep and I were unembedded and that both our countries were neutral in the conflict. Our plan had been to push down the highway as far as we could. If the Americans were about to attack, we thought they would have the city cordoned off and would deny us entry into Tal Afar.
If that was the case, we planned to wait behind the U.S. troops and follow their attack from behind. If we actually got inside the city, we were going to look up Doctor Yashar Talafarli and hole up at the hospital throughout the American attacks. In the past, I had found the hospitals to be about the safest places to gain up-to-date and accurate assessments of the fighting. In April 2004, when the United States announced its intention to arrest Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, spontaneous violent attacks against American troops erupted in Baghdad and Najaf. My driver had called his Shiite contacts to ensure us safe passage, and he drove us to the hospitals in both locations.
When the United States launched counter-strikes against the Shiite militia, we had seen the dead and wounded civilians and insurgents being rushed in for treatment. I explained to the audience that this really wasn’t as dangerous as it sounded and that the toughest challenge we faced as unembedded journalists was the fact that the U.S. military did not like to admit its own setbacks. Bristling at this suggestion, the captain asked me to give an example.
I told him of an occasion in November 2003 when Sacha Trudeau and I had teamed up again in Baghdad. Trudeau had been anxious to get embedded with the U.S. 82nd Airborne division that was reportedly having a hairy time securing the city of Fallujah. He was becoming frustrated as the Americans kept putting off his request. I convinced Anmar and Sacha that we should just drive out to this hotbed of insurgency and visit the 82nd Airborne on our own initiative. We spent a considerable amount of time driving around the streets of Fallujah, observed by increasingly hostile crowds of locals, but saw no sign of any U.S. presence.
In fact, all we found was a padlocked compound where the paratroopers used to reside. The American army in Baghdad was telling journalists that they were on a waiting list to be embedded in Fallujah, instead of admitting that its troops had already abandoned the city. Only weeks later, when the Americans tried to re-enter Fallujah, did it become apparent how lucky we had been to get in and out alive. I explained that it had been a similar situation in Tal Afar for Zeynep and me on September 7, 2004. It was nearly dusk when we arrived at the outskirts of Tal Afar.
On the highway to Mosul, a checkpoint had been set up, and about a dozen Iraqi policemen were supervising a frightened exodus of civilian refugees. Over the past week there had been local reports of escalating violence between resistance fighters and U.S. troops in Tal Afar, and many of the residents were fleeing the embattled city. It had not been easy to find a taxi driver willing to take us to Tal Afar. All the drivers in Mosul had been warned that the mujahedeen were in control of the city and that it was too dangerous. One Kurdish fellow disagreed with his colleagues and said that their fears were unfounded. With daylight fading, we quickly made a bargain on the fare and set off. The sight of U.S.-paid Iraqi police forces monitoring traffic had seemed like a good sign that things were still under control, despite the recent fighting. Since I did not have an exact address for my contact, I approached a police checkpoint to ask for assistance.
When I asked the policemen about contacting Doctor Talafarli, they recognized his name as that of a prominent local Turkmen official. A senior police officer was summoned, and he instructed Zeynep and me to climb into a nearby car containing four armed and masked men. As we clambered into the back seat, one of the gunmen said in excellent English, “We will take you to Doctor Talafarli. Please do not be afraid.” I had presumed these men were part of some sort of special police force—our own Canadian Joint Task Force 2 counterterrorist teams often wear ski masks—so I had no immediate cause for concern. As soon as we entered the city, however, I saw that the streets were full of similarly masked resistance fighters armed with Kalashnikov rifles and rocket-propelled grenades. I suddenly realized that we were in the hands of the resistance.
Still believing that they were taking us to Doctor Talafarli’s house, we were instead ushered into a small courtyard outside a walled two-storey building. There were about a half-dozen armed men inside. None of them was smiling.
As soon as the metal door had clanged shut behind us, the English-speaking leader said, “You are spies . . . and now you are prisoners.” All of our cameras, other equipment and identification were taken from us, and we were told to sit on a mat with our backs to the wall.
“The Americans will attack soon, and I have to see to my men,” said our captor.
“I will deal with you when I return.”
Shortly after nightfall they brought a platter of food into the compound and, in what would soon become a routine pattern, served us first before eating dinner themselves. I did not have much of an appetite. The plates had just been cleared away when another car pulled up outside and four more gunmen came quickly through the door.
Before I could react, I was pulled to my feet and pressed with my face against the wall and my hands on top of my head. Almost immediately I heard the distinct sound of a Kalashnikov being cocked about a metre behind me.
Realizing that they were about to execute me, Zeynep screamed in Turkish, “Don’t shoot him . . . He has a son!”
The outburst was enough to distract them, and they began to explain to her the necessity of killing a “Jewish spy.”
Thankfully, I had no idea what was being said. The brief discussion was still taking place when our original captor returned. Harsh words were exchanged between the two groups of gunmen, and it seemed as though my fate was in the hands of those who had made the capture. The would-be executioners left.
Now Zeynep was blindfolded and taken away for questioning. The remaining guards—their ages ranging from fifteen to fifty— took turns watching me and crouching behind the second-floor parapet, looking at the sky for signs of a U.S. attack. About two hours later it was my turn to be blindfolded and roughly manhandled into what felt like an suv or a Land Rover. At the second house I was rushed through several doorways and up several stairs. With my hands tied behind my back and unable to see, I stumbled and fell several times, only to be pulled forcibly back to my feet and once again shoved forward.
“Hurry, hurry, you bastard Jew,” one of my guards whispered as he slammed my head into a door frame. I was forced to lie face down on a mat, and two men carefully searched through my pockets.
Finding my money inside my sock (about us$700), they laughed and said, “Your money is our money. You won’t need cash in heaven.”
It was difficult to gauge how long I lay there in the dark, but my shoulders were aching when my hands were finally untied and I was brought to another room for interrogation. They removed my blindfold and shone a bright flashlight directly into my eyes.
Two men were questioning me: “Which intelligence agency are you working for?”
For about an hour I did my best to answer all their allegations and explain to them that my intention in going to Tal Afar was as a journalist. In what seemed like a bad Hollywood comedy, when someone started a generator outside, the lights came on immediately and the two interrogators clumsily tried to pull their ski masks back on before I could see their faces. The one who identified himself as the emir actually started to laugh and, with the tension broken, left his mask off.
This man had been among the group who took us at the police checkpoint.
“Sleep now, and I will check your story,” he said. “If you are telling the truth, we will release you. If not, you die.”
© 2009 D&M Publishers Inc.
http://www.dmpibooks.com/book/978155365292
Douglas & McIntyre
Unembedded: Two Decades of Maverick War Reporting
By: Scott Taylor
Excerpt
from Chapter 9: Among the Mujahedeen
On June 16, 2005, I received a telephone call from Zeynep Tugrul asking me to have a look at the photograph on the front page of the International Herald Tribune. In the photograph, four Iraqi men, identified as insurgent suspects captured in the city of Tal Afar, were huddled together in the back of an American vehicle. The individual on the left of the photograph—even with B-5 scrawled on his forehead in grease pencil—was instantly recognizable as one of the mujahedeen who had beaten me during my captivity the previous September.
On the morning of June 18, I was still trying to figure out whom to provide with this information when I received a phone call from Major Gary Dangerfield of the U.S. 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Tal Afar, inviting me to make an “all-expenses-paid visit” back to Iraq. As a result of the regiment’s commanding officer having read my book Among the Others: Encounters with theForgotten Turkmen of Iraq, I was being asked to come and provide a briefing to the 3rd Armored Cavalry.
After accepting the proposal and being assured that I would have “more fucking protection than the president,” I pointed out to Dangerfield that his regiment had arrested one of my tormentors. Although he was aware of my having been taken hostage, Dangerfield was not aware that prisoner B-5 had been involved. As a result, B-5 was relocated and isolated from the other prisoners until I could arrive to give a 100 per cent identification and statement. True to their word, the Americans sent a Black Hawk helicopter and an Apache gunship to pick us up at the Iraq-Turkey border.
Sasha Uzunov had agreed to accompany me on this trip, and Stefan Nitoslawski was filming the entire venture for a CBC documentary entitled Targets: Reporters in Iraq. I had already signed a contract and begun participating in Targets before receiving the call from Dangerfield. The producers had wanted me to venture to Iraq on my own for the movie, but after two sleepless nights of anxiety at the prospect I told them I could not do it. I was prepared to travel right up to the border but not beyond it.
The offer of flying in by helicopter changed all that. Almost immediately after the chopper had delivered us to Forward Operations Base Sykes, we were issued with protective gear and sent out on a patrol into the centre of Tal Afar. The gunner in the rear hatch suddenly ducked down inside the armoured fighting vehicle and hand-signalled me to do the same. When our column of five Bradley personnel carriers had rumbled along this narrow street just thirty minutes earlier, a large number of Iraqi civilians had been clustered in doorways. Dozens of young children had waved enthusiastically at the U.S. soldiers, running beside the vehicles in hopes of having candy or toys tossed in their direction.
By the time we returned along this same route, all evidence of the local citizenry had disappeared behind closed doors and shuttered windows. Sensing that Iraqi insurgents in the vicinity had prompted the exodus, the patrol commander ordered all the troops to duck down as we sped through the now ominously quiet streets.
Thankfully, our patrol returned to the U.S. base without receiving any hostile fire. The troops of the 3rd Armored Cavalry explained that spending a day in Tal Afar without being attacked was a rarity. The purpose of our trip into this volatile northern Iraqi city was to retrace the route taken by my captors when I had been abducted and held hostage the previous September.
Although I could make general presumptions about locations based on my memory and satellite imagery, once I returned to the site, a lot of landmarks came rushing back to mind. Many changes had occurred in the past eleven months because of the continual fighting and the shifting political fortunes, and the police checkpoint where Zeynep and I were first taken had long since been dismantled.
Nevertheless, after viewing the same approach road we had taken from Mosul, I remembered the large Hitachi neon sign that stood in the centre of the checkpoint. Once this vital starting point could be confirmed, it was amazing how the detailed memories came flooding back. Our armoured patrol followed the main boulevard that the terrorists had used, and I could recall where they had crossed the median and then driven uphill into a tightly packed suburb on the outskirts of town.
At that point, our patrol veered back onto the main route. Before our departure I had been told that there were still two large areas in Tal Afar that the U.S. military would enter only with a full combat mission, including tanks and helicopter gunships. To know that after eleven months of often heavy fighting the area in which I had been held hostage remained a heavily contested zone brought home the magnitude of the good fortune that I had been released alive.
That evening I met my host, Colonel H.R. McMaster, the commander of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, who explained that I would be making a special presentation to at least three hundred members of his regiment on the following day. After McMaster excused himself from the table, his executive officer, Lieutenant Colonel Joe Armstrong, said he wanted a private discussion with me in his office. Once the door had been closed, Armstrong got straight to the point.
“The boys here love Colonel McMaster, and I want you to assure me that he didn’t make a mistake in bringing you here,” he said. “I’ve read your stuff—all of your stuff, including the Al Jazeera features—and I know you’re not a believer in this intervention.” I was surprised at how much research Armstrong had conducted, and was shocked to learn just how far McMaster had stuck his neck out to arrange this trip.
“The Pentagon would never have approved this, so the Old Man [McMaster] did this on his own hook,” Armstrong said. That certainly explained the confusion at the Iraq-Turkey border when we had shown up at the American military office and said we were expecting a helicopter pickup. The U.S. soldiers had been amused and had explained that American helicopters were not authorized to operate in this airspace. Their smugness had turned to awe when an Apache suddenly swept in over the border checkpoint, and a Black Hawk landed at a nearby soccer field.
There were plenty of curious stares from the Kurdish and Turkish border guards as Sasha, Stefan and I strutted out to the Black Hawk, carrying a briefcase and camera bags. I assured Armstrong that I respected McMaster’s initiative in bringing me to Tal Afar, and I promised him I would not use the opportunity to do anything but tell the story of what had happened to Zeynep and me the previous year. It was just after lunch, and the mess hall had been converted into a mini-auditorium. At least three hundred U.S. soldiers filed in to take their seats.
When Colonel McMaster strode into the room, the entire assembly stood to attention. In introducing me, the colonel praised my courage for returning to Iraq and instructed his officers to pay close attention to my tale. Stefan Nitoslawski was filming the whole thing, and I’m sure that most of these soldiers were wondering, Just who the hell is this Canadian civvy who brings his own cameraman to tape his performance?
Always a nervous public speaker, I mumbled my way through an opening joke—I likened my thanking them for being there to the way the padre always thanked us for attending the church parades that we had no option but to attend. Once I started telling the story, though, I had their undivided attention. I started by telling them a little bit about my previous involvement with the Turkmen of Iraq and how in September 2004 I had found myself in Ankara to discuss the details of publishing and shipping my recently completed book Among the Others.
While conducting business in Turkey, I heard a couple of sketchy news reports about a violent flare-up in Tal Afar between insurgents and U.S. troops. The reports from Baghdad claimed that foreign fighters were responsible for the violence—and most media outlets had no idea where Tal Afar was. I had a five-day window in my schedule, and through the Iraqi Turkmen Front I arranged yet another trip into Iraq. As a matter of mutual convenience, Zeynep Tugrul joined me on this fact-finding mission into Tal Afar. The Turkish media were certainly keen to learn more about the possible suffering of the Turkmen, and there was absolutely no reliable news coming out of that region.
From their sources, the Iraqi Turkmen Front knew that things were very dangerous, and promises were made to provide us with an armed escort. Zeynep and I made an uneventful border crossing and arrived in Mosul at around noon on September 7. Our driver dropped us off at the U.S.-controlled green zone at the airport, where I had made prior arrangements to meet with Phil Atkinson for lunch. Phil was a retired Canadian soldier and a subscriber to Esprit de Corps. He had taken a job working with General Dynamics Land Systems in London, Ontario, where the Stryker light armoured vehicles are manufactured.
The twenty-two-ton wheeled personnel carriers were the controversial new addition to the U.S. Army inventory, and this was the first time the newly formed Stryker Brigade had deployed to Iraq. Atkinson’s job wasn’t just to repair any battle damage suffered by the vehicles; he was also required to recommend possible improvements to the armour protection. On my previous visits, Phil’s workshops in Mosul had been beehives of activity, but on this day when Zeynep and I visited, the place was like a ghost town. I asked him if there was a special holiday, and Phil dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
“Can you guys keep a secret?” Assuring him that that’s what journalists do best, he proceeded to tell us that everything had been moved forward to Tal Afar.
“We’re gonna mount a major offensive up there in the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours, and you guys won’t want to be anywhere near that place when that happens.” Of course, that’s exactly where we headed as soon as we left the Mosul airport’s front gate.
As I explained this part of the story, I saw an American captain’s hand shoot up in the front row. Although it had been explained beforehand that I would field questions at the end of my talk, I could see this guy’s query wasn’t going to wait that long. As I acknowledged him, the captain asked,
“Why the hell would you do that? Why wouldn’t you listen to his advice?” I explained that as a Turk and as a Canadian, Zeynep and I were unembedded and that both our countries were neutral in the conflict. Our plan had been to push down the highway as far as we could. If the Americans were about to attack, we thought they would have the city cordoned off and would deny us entry into Tal Afar.
If that was the case, we planned to wait behind the U.S. troops and follow their attack from behind. If we actually got inside the city, we were going to look up Doctor Yashar Talafarli and hole up at the hospital throughout the American attacks. In the past, I had found the hospitals to be about the safest places to gain up-to-date and accurate assessments of the fighting. In April 2004, when the United States announced its intention to arrest Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, spontaneous violent attacks against American troops erupted in Baghdad and Najaf. My driver had called his Shiite contacts to ensure us safe passage, and he drove us to the hospitals in both locations.
When the United States launched counter-strikes against the Shiite militia, we had seen the dead and wounded civilians and insurgents being rushed in for treatment. I explained to the audience that this really wasn’t as dangerous as it sounded and that the toughest challenge we faced as unembedded journalists was the fact that the U.S. military did not like to admit its own setbacks. Bristling at this suggestion, the captain asked me to give an example.
I told him of an occasion in November 2003 when Sacha Trudeau and I had teamed up again in Baghdad. Trudeau had been anxious to get embedded with the U.S. 82nd Airborne division that was reportedly having a hairy time securing the city of Fallujah. He was becoming frustrated as the Americans kept putting off his request. I convinced Anmar and Sacha that we should just drive out to this hotbed of insurgency and visit the 82nd Airborne on our own initiative. We spent a considerable amount of time driving around the streets of Fallujah, observed by increasingly hostile crowds of locals, but saw no sign of any U.S. presence.
In fact, all we found was a padlocked compound where the paratroopers used to reside. The American army in Baghdad was telling journalists that they were on a waiting list to be embedded in Fallujah, instead of admitting that its troops had already abandoned the city. Only weeks later, when the Americans tried to re-enter Fallujah, did it become apparent how lucky we had been to get in and out alive. I explained that it had been a similar situation in Tal Afar for Zeynep and me on September 7, 2004. It was nearly dusk when we arrived at the outskirts of Tal Afar.
On the highway to Mosul, a checkpoint had been set up, and about a dozen Iraqi policemen were supervising a frightened exodus of civilian refugees. Over the past week there had been local reports of escalating violence between resistance fighters and U.S. troops in Tal Afar, and many of the residents were fleeing the embattled city. It had not been easy to find a taxi driver willing to take us to Tal Afar. All the drivers in Mosul had been warned that the mujahedeen were in control of the city and that it was too dangerous. One Kurdish fellow disagreed with his colleagues and said that their fears were unfounded. With daylight fading, we quickly made a bargain on the fare and set off. The sight of U.S.-paid Iraqi police forces monitoring traffic had seemed like a good sign that things were still under control, despite the recent fighting. Since I did not have an exact address for my contact, I approached a police checkpoint to ask for assistance.
When I asked the policemen about contacting Doctor Talafarli, they recognized his name as that of a prominent local Turkmen official. A senior police officer was summoned, and he instructed Zeynep and me to climb into a nearby car containing four armed and masked men. As we clambered into the back seat, one of the gunmen said in excellent English, “We will take you to Doctor Talafarli. Please do not be afraid.” I had presumed these men were part of some sort of special police force—our own Canadian Joint Task Force 2 counterterrorist teams often wear ski masks—so I had no immediate cause for concern. As soon as we entered the city, however, I saw that the streets were full of similarly masked resistance fighters armed with Kalashnikov rifles and rocket-propelled grenades. I suddenly realized that we were in the hands of the resistance.
Still believing that they were taking us to Doctor Talafarli’s house, we were instead ushered into a small courtyard outside a walled two-storey building. There were about a half-dozen armed men inside. None of them was smiling.
As soon as the metal door had clanged shut behind us, the English-speaking leader said, “You are spies . . . and now you are prisoners.” All of our cameras, other equipment and identification were taken from us, and we were told to sit on a mat with our backs to the wall.
“The Americans will attack soon, and I have to see to my men,” said our captor.
“I will deal with you when I return.”
Shortly after nightfall they brought a platter of food into the compound and, in what would soon become a routine pattern, served us first before eating dinner themselves. I did not have much of an appetite. The plates had just been cleared away when another car pulled up outside and four more gunmen came quickly through the door.
Before I could react, I was pulled to my feet and pressed with my face against the wall and my hands on top of my head. Almost immediately I heard the distinct sound of a Kalashnikov being cocked about a metre behind me.
Realizing that they were about to execute me, Zeynep screamed in Turkish, “Don’t shoot him . . . He has a son!”
The outburst was enough to distract them, and they began to explain to her the necessity of killing a “Jewish spy.”
Thankfully, I had no idea what was being said. The brief discussion was still taking place when our original captor returned. Harsh words were exchanged between the two groups of gunmen, and it seemed as though my fate was in the hands of those who had made the capture. The would-be executioners left.
Now Zeynep was blindfolded and taken away for questioning. The remaining guards—their ages ranging from fifteen to fifty— took turns watching me and crouching behind the second-floor parapet, looking at the sky for signs of a U.S. attack. About two hours later it was my turn to be blindfolded and roughly manhandled into what felt like an suv or a Land Rover. At the second house I was rushed through several doorways and up several stairs. With my hands tied behind my back and unable to see, I stumbled and fell several times, only to be pulled forcibly back to my feet and once again shoved forward.
“Hurry, hurry, you bastard Jew,” one of my guards whispered as he slammed my head into a door frame. I was forced to lie face down on a mat, and two men carefully searched through my pockets.
Finding my money inside my sock (about us$700), they laughed and said, “Your money is our money. You won’t need cash in heaven.”
It was difficult to gauge how long I lay there in the dark, but my shoulders were aching when my hands were finally untied and I was brought to another room for interrogation. They removed my blindfold and shone a bright flashlight directly into my eyes.
Two men were questioning me: “Which intelligence agency are you working for?”
For about an hour I did my best to answer all their allegations and explain to them that my intention in going to Tal Afar was as a journalist. In what seemed like a bad Hollywood comedy, when someone started a generator outside, the lights came on immediately and the two interrogators clumsily tried to pull their ski masks back on before I could see their faces. The one who identified himself as the emir actually started to laugh and, with the tension broken, left his mask off.
This man had been among the group who took us at the police checkpoint.
“Sleep now, and I will check your story,” he said. “If you are telling the truth, we will release you. If not, you die.”
© 2009 D&M Publishers Inc.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
MINISTER ON AFGHAN FACT FINDING TRIP?
Exclusive
Tim Holding - Brumby’s man turned PM Rudd’s international man of mystery?
VIC MINISTER WON’T CONFIRM OR DENY AFGHAN TRIP
By Sasha Uzunov
Copyright 2009
Mr Tim Holding, a Victorian State government minister who is a former Australian Army Reserve Special Forces soldier, will not confirm nor deny speculation about him undertaking a short fact finding mission to Afghanistan on behalf of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
A prominent strategic analyst, who has the close ear of governments, and speaking on the condition of anonymity, said he wanted to “float the idea of Mr Holding undertaking a fact finding mission to the Australian base in Tarin Kowt province [in Southern Afghanistan].”
“Mr Holding is an intelligent young politician with links to Special Forces. The Australian media underestimate his ability, which is why he would be ideal for the mission: he would slip under the media radar,” the strategic analyst said. “Mr Holding has not been informed of the proposed trip.”
The analyst said Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was not happy with the flow of information about Afghanistan coming from the army chain of command and needed his own “eyes and ears” on the ground for a couple of weeks to assess the situation.
Mr Holding’s office was contacted a week ago to confirm or deny if Mr Holding knew the speculation about the Afghanistan trip. But no comment has been forthcoming.
Mr Holding served as a Signaller or communications expert with the elite Army Reserve Special Forces unit, 126 Commando Signals Squadron, then attached to 1 Commando Regiment, 2nd Company, at Fort Gellibrand, Williamstown, Melbourne, Victoria from 1991 to 1993.
Greg Sher the eighth and most recent Australian soldier killed in Afghanistan was also a member of 1 Commando Regiment (1 CDO Regt).
Mr Holding is the Minister for Finance, WorkCover and Transport Accident Commission, and Minister for Water, Minister for Tourism and Major Events in the John Brumby ALP state government.
A former Australian intelligence agent, with extensive Middle East experience, and also speaking on the condition of anonymity, said he believed that Prime Minister Rudd would change Australia’s current military policy and commit a regular army infantry battalion (about 500 soldiers) to Afghanistan very soon.
Current military policy is for Australia’s Special Forces units, SASR and 4RAR (Commando) to do the frontline fighting in Afghanistan, which according to standard doctrine should be carried out by regular infantry.
SASR and 4RAR (Cdo)’s traditional roles include surveillance of the enemy, information gathering or carrying out raids against targets or securing entry and exits points for other army units.
SASR, 4RAR (Cdo) and 1 CDO Regt fall under the Australian Army's Special Operations Command (SOCOMD).
In contrast the Canadian army, after decades of peacekeeping, has regular infantry fighting the Taliban in the dangerous southern Afghanistan province of Kandahar. But over 100 Canadian soldiers have been killed.
(end)
- UPDATED - 3 February 2009
Link:
Paul Daley in the excellent article below tells of the Australian Defence Minister's frustration at not being able to go outside the wire in Afghanistan and have a look for himself
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/are-our-troops-really-helping-in-afghanistan-20090131-7ued.html?skin=text-only
Are our troops really helping in Afghanistan?
The Sunday Age
Date: February 1 2009
By Paul Daley
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Older Links:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23995986-5000117,00.html
Herald Sun newspaper
New options to blunt Taliban
by Sasha Uzunov
July 10, 2008 12:00am
-------------------------------------
2005 UZUNOV STORY ON THE OVER USE OF THE SAS (extract):
The Herald Sun newspaper
A grand political warrior
by Sasha Uzunov21 January 2005
...Some have criticised General (Peter) Cosgrove on his over reliance on the SAS to do the fighting in East Timor that would normally have been taken up by the regular infantry.But I think this criticism is unjustified.
Criticism should be aimed at the government of the day (Howard 1996-2007) and those at home squeamish about seeing a 19 year old lad away from home for the first time fighting a war. Better to send the SAS, whose identity cannot be revealed...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Holding - Brumby’s man turned PM Rudd’s international man of mystery?
VIC MINISTER WON’T CONFIRM OR DENY AFGHAN TRIP
By Sasha Uzunov
Copyright 2009
Mr Tim Holding, a Victorian State government minister who is a former Australian Army Reserve Special Forces soldier, will not confirm nor deny speculation about him undertaking a short fact finding mission to Afghanistan on behalf of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
A prominent strategic analyst, who has the close ear of governments, and speaking on the condition of anonymity, said he wanted to “float the idea of Mr Holding undertaking a fact finding mission to the Australian base in Tarin Kowt province [in Southern Afghanistan].”
“Mr Holding is an intelligent young politician with links to Special Forces. The Australian media underestimate his ability, which is why he would be ideal for the mission: he would slip under the media radar,” the strategic analyst said. “Mr Holding has not been informed of the proposed trip.”
The analyst said Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was not happy with the flow of information about Afghanistan coming from the army chain of command and needed his own “eyes and ears” on the ground for a couple of weeks to assess the situation.
Mr Holding’s office was contacted a week ago to confirm or deny if Mr Holding knew the speculation about the Afghanistan trip. But no comment has been forthcoming.
Mr Holding served as a Signaller or communications expert with the elite Army Reserve Special Forces unit, 126 Commando Signals Squadron, then attached to 1 Commando Regiment, 2nd Company, at Fort Gellibrand, Williamstown, Melbourne, Victoria from 1991 to 1993.
Greg Sher the eighth and most recent Australian soldier killed in Afghanistan was also a member of 1 Commando Regiment (1 CDO Regt).
Mr Holding is the Minister for Finance, WorkCover and Transport Accident Commission, and Minister for Water, Minister for Tourism and Major Events in the John Brumby ALP state government.
A former Australian intelligence agent, with extensive Middle East experience, and also speaking on the condition of anonymity, said he believed that Prime Minister Rudd would change Australia’s current military policy and commit a regular army infantry battalion (about 500 soldiers) to Afghanistan very soon.
Current military policy is for Australia’s Special Forces units, SASR and 4RAR (Commando) to do the frontline fighting in Afghanistan, which according to standard doctrine should be carried out by regular infantry.
SASR and 4RAR (Cdo)’s traditional roles include surveillance of the enemy, information gathering or carrying out raids against targets or securing entry and exits points for other army units.
SASR, 4RAR (Cdo) and 1 CDO Regt fall under the Australian Army's Special Operations Command (SOCOMD).
In contrast the Canadian army, after decades of peacekeeping, has regular infantry fighting the Taliban in the dangerous southern Afghanistan province of Kandahar. But over 100 Canadian soldiers have been killed.
(end)
- UPDATED - 3 February 2009
Link:
Paul Daley in the excellent article below tells of the Australian Defence Minister's frustration at not being able to go outside the wire in Afghanistan and have a look for himself
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/are-our-troops-really-helping-in-afghanistan-20090131-7ued.html?skin=text-only
Are our troops really helping in Afghanistan?
The Sunday Age
Date: February 1 2009
By Paul Daley
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Older Links:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23995986-5000117,00.html
Herald Sun newspaper
New options to blunt Taliban
by Sasha Uzunov
July 10, 2008 12:00am
-------------------------------------
2005 UZUNOV STORY ON THE OVER USE OF THE SAS (extract):
The Herald Sun newspaper
A grand political warrior
by Sasha Uzunov21 January 2005
...Some have criticised General (Peter) Cosgrove on his over reliance on the SAS to do the fighting in East Timor that would normally have been taken up by the regular infantry.But I think this criticism is unjustified.
Criticism should be aimed at the government of the day (Howard 1996-2007) and those at home squeamish about seeing a 19 year old lad away from home for the first time fighting a war. Better to send the SAS, whose identity cannot be revealed...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday, January 22, 2009
VICTORIA CROSS - NEW ERA OF HEROES
photo: Defence DeptFriday, 23 January 2009
VC WINNER HERALDS NEW ERA OF HEROES
By Sasha Uzunov
The award of the highly prestigious Victoria Cross to SASR Trooper Mark Donaldson for outstanding bravery under fire in Afghanistan is not only significant because it is the first time in forty years since the Vietnam War but it heralds the end of one era and the beginning of another in Australian society.
“Trooper Donaldson's bravery will forever be engraved in Australian history,” the Prime Minister Mr Kevin Rudd said.
“Generations of schoolchildren will now know of the story of Trooper Mark Donaldson.”
Society now has heroes to look up to who are not media creations. As more and more heroes emerge from Australia’s war in Afghanistan the need for the media tough guy surrogate hero is probably finished.
Those who are highly paid observers or futurologists such as the well respected Bernard Salt should be taking note of this trend and passing it on to those powerful people who shape our media agenda such as news bosses John Westacott of the Nine Network and his Seven Network counterpart Peter Meakin.
The 1960s were a turbulent time in Australia’s history with Vietnam seen as a controversial war and a conservative society undergoing dramatic change. The notion of strong young men undergoing military service as a rite of passage was seen as anachronistic and this view probably lasted until the 1980s. Moreover, some within Australian society felt strongly that Australia and America were simply wrong to get involved in Vietnam.
Author Michael Caulfield, in his excellent book “The Vietnam Years” from the jungle to the Australian suburbs,” wrote of the 1960s:
“What was ‘now’, what was ‘happening’, was the photograph of a long-haired dissenter, courageously resisting a phalanx of overweight cops as they dragged him away to jail. He looked vaguely like one of Christ‘s apostles, definitely ‘cool’, a modern icon.”
A clever newsman Gerald Stone, a former US Army artillery officer and famous war reporter in his own right, probably sensed an Australian society needing strong masculine heroes to fill the void. Stone recruited three journalists, Ray Martin, Ian Leslie and George Negus.
As canny Mark Day, a newspaperman of the old school, observed:
“I guess we can blame Gerald Stone and George Negus for the emergence of the celebrity journalist--at least in Australia. “Stone was executive producer of the Nine (TV network) clone of CBS’s 60 Minutes when it launched here in 1979 with the premise that the reporter was the story.
“George, along with Ray Martin and Ian Leslie were sent into war zones, deep jungles, and dark places in search of ripper yarns, and the cameras tracked them tracking down the story.
“George, coat slung over his shoulder, embraced this role with a particular gusto, adding his idiosyncratic commentary into which he wove his personal beliefs.
“It wasn’t long before George was a bigger celeb than any of the news makers he pursued, even after being savaged by the likes of Margaret Thatcher.”
George Negus was dubbed the Balmain Cowboy after a tough working class inner Sydney suburb because of his macho image, even though he never served in Vietnam but was a school teacher who dabbled in journalism and later became a press secretary to a politician.
But with the resurgence of the Anzac Legend and in particular a new respect for those who serve in uniform, where does that leave the war reporter in society’s eyes after having fulfilled the role of surrogate “warrior” stereotype during the 1970s and 80s?
Rival Australian television networks, in a game of one up-manship, have inadvertently brought the notion of the warrior as reporter to the surface. A famous case involved veteran Nine Network reporter Jim Waley, who coincidently did not serve in the military in Vietnam, wearing a flak jacket in Iraq in 2004 as opposed to his competitor Adrian Brown of the Seven Network who did not. Both were metres away from each other in Baghdad.
Trooper Donaldson’s award of the VC has now well and truly put an end to the era of the media tough guy as society’s hero.
(end)
Monday, December 29, 2008
BEATING THE TALIBAN?
Above: Wily Afghan General Abdul Rashid Dostum (left) pictured with Canadian journalist Scott Taylor in 2007. Dostum claims he can put together a 5,000 strong army and clean out the Taliban but is being stopped by NATO from doing so.
Australian freelance photo journalist Sasha Uzunov in local Afghan attire meets charismatic and unorthodox American woman Sarah Chayes who lives outside the wire in Kandahar, Afghanistan
On-Line Opinion - Australia's e-journal of social and political debate
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=8328&page=0
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=8328&page=0
Out-'talibaning' the Taliban:
can the US ‘win’ in Afghanistan?
By Sasha Uzunov - 30 December 2008
The late David “Hack” Hackworth, the most decorated American soldier from the Korean and Vietnam Wars and a respected military critic, once said that to beat the guerrilla or insurgent you have to “out-g the g” or out-guerrilla the guerrilla! That is you have to use his tactics against him.
The United States - and by extension the “Free World” including Australia - now finds itself poised for a make or break year 2009 in the Afghanistan War. The Taliban has become resurgent in more than 50 per cent of the country. Some are claiming more than 70 per cent.
But can the US really win the war in Afghanistan? It depends how you define winning. It has been easy for commentators to compare the Vietnam War and Afghanistan - with the focus on beating an elusive enemy that comes and goes: the Viet Cong in Vietnam and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
By Sasha Uzunov - 30 December 2008
The late David “Hack” Hackworth, the most decorated American soldier from the Korean and Vietnam Wars and a respected military critic, once said that to beat the guerrilla or insurgent you have to “out-g the g” or out-guerrilla the guerrilla! That is you have to use his tactics against him.
The United States - and by extension the “Free World” including Australia - now finds itself poised for a make or break year 2009 in the Afghanistan War. The Taliban has become resurgent in more than 50 per cent of the country. Some are claiming more than 70 per cent.
But can the US really win the war in Afghanistan? It depends how you define winning. It has been easy for commentators to compare the Vietnam War and Afghanistan - with the focus on beating an elusive enemy that comes and goes: the Viet Cong in Vietnam and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
With any counter-insurgency war, the key to winning is a two-pronged attack - political and military. That is removing the support for the insurgent or guerrilla from the people. The most obvious way from a political angle is to provide the local people with clean running water, sanitation, health, jobs and education and combat corruption within the government.
The sad truth is that much of the western aid in Kandahar, the Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan, is not getting through. Canadian journalist Scott Taylor and I had the opportunity to see for ourselves, outside the wire in June 2008, that local schools did not have books or computers. Literacy is at the heart of weaning the locals from the need for the Taliban.
One brave woman, Sarah Chayse, a former American journalist, lives outside the comfortable NATO base or western style compounds in Kandahar. She has gained street credibility by running a simple soap factory that employs local men and woman. She is Afghanistan’s version of John Paul Vann, the famous American advisor from the Vietnam War. The Commander of Canadian Forces, Brigadier-General Denis Thompson even paid her visit while we were her guests earlier this year.
Moreover, at some point the Taliban will probably have to be brought to the negotiating table. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has left the door open for such a possibility.
Critics always point out that the US is not good at winning counter-insurgency war with Vietnam cited ad nauseam as the example; that US military doctrine is geared towards set piece battles with enormous fire power. The irony of all this is that US has the answers staring it right in the face. The Whitehouse and the Pentagon need only go back into the history pages, back into the time of the founding of the US in the late 18th century.
Rogers Rangers or Petraeus' Patriots
Rogers Rangers were a group of irregular colonial American soldiers recruited by the British in the late 1700s to fight the competing French Empire and Indians in North America. They were famous for using what has now become known as guerrilla tactics, ambushing, hit and run and so on. Later, some of these tactics were used by the Americans fighting for Independence against the British. Those ex-Rogers Rangers that remained loyal to the British Empire during the American War of Independence moved to Canada.
Both the United States and Canadian Armies claim the legacy of Rogers Rangers. The present day 1st Battalion, 119th Field Artillery (United States) and the Canadian The Queen's York Rangers (1st American Regiment) trace their roots back to Rogers Rangers.
Both countries are now fighting side by side in Afghanistan. The Canadians have taken many casualties, with a hundred soldiers killed already.
Perhaps the US military might want to re-create a 21st century version of Rogers’s Rangers and call it Petraeus’ Patriots, after the famous US Army General David Petraeus from the Iraq War known for thinking outside the box.
Another man who could help the US is an articulate and fighting Colonel, HR McMaster, who in 2005 was successful in counter-insurgency operations in Northern Iraq. I had the good fortune to meet Colonel McMaster in Tal Afar, Northern Iraq in 2005.
Perhaps promoting him to Brigadier-General and giving him a command in Afghanistan should be considered top priority by incoming US President Barak Obama
The US, Australia and Canada, have their Special Forces units operating in Afghanistan. The Commander of Australia’s Special Operations Command, Major General Tim McOwan has claimed during a recent media meet and greet and slide show in Canberra that the elite SASR (Special Air Service Regiment) and 4RAR (Commando) were beating the Taliban at its own game.
"In many instances your Special Forces soldiers are able to clandestinely capture these leaders without ever firing a shot. On one occasion the commandos infiltrated undetected into the heart of a Taliban safe haven to capture the Taliban leader Ahmad Shah in his bed," he said.
General McOwan has not revealed in great detail what tactics the SASR and Commandos are using but it does not take a genius to work out that the key to any operations is to remain unpredictable - the enemy not knowing where and when you will strike. Moreover, not leaving a signature, that is the enemy does not know how you will strike: will you enter (insert) the battle with helicopters, armoured vehicles or just walk in?
The Black Hawk down episode in Somalia in 1993 saw a band of militia with cheap but effective weapons, Kalashnikov assault rifles, RPG rocket launchers, bring down two very expensive American Black Hawk helicopters and inflict casualties on US Army Specials Forces (Green Berets, Delta Force and Rangers). The political result was President Clinton withdrew from the mission. The Somali militias had learnt when and where the US military would strike because it had become routine in its operations and left a “signature”.
In 2001 when the US invaded Afghanistan and successfully removed the Taliban from power, Green Berets joined forces with Northern Alliance rebels, namely ethnic Uzbek forces led by the wily General Abdul Rashid Dostum. One of the traditional ways they travelled into the battlefield was by horse because of the hostile terrain.
Irregular and radical tactics
As a suggestion, and if it has not been already been adopted, why not have a brigade or regiment (over 1,500 soldiers) of US Army Green Berets or Petraeus Patriots dressed as local Afghanis, full beards, using traditional weapons such Kalashnikovs and RPGs supplemented but not dominated by the high-tech gadgets that the US likes to use in warfare, hunt down the Taliban. Throw in some tracker dogs as well. We could have a contingent of Canadian Special Forces, JTF 2, along for the ride. They could be nicknamed Hilliers’ Harrassers, in honour of the hugely popular Canadian Defence Chief, General Ricky “The Big Cod” Hillier.
In 2,000 years no one, including the British or the Russians has been able to subdue Afghanistan. History is against the US. However, history can also find the answers.
Afghanistan is a nation made up of various ethnic groups, Pushtuns namely in the south, Tajiks, Uzbeks, and Hazaras, the descendents of the Mongols, and two strands of Islam, Sunni and Shiite. Trying to keep Afghanistan, like multi-ethnic Iraq, as a central state is downright crazy. Some kind of federation should be considered, devolving power as a safety mechanism.
Pushtuns have their kinsmen living in neighbouring northern Pakistan. It comes as no great surprise that the Taliban, which draws its support from the Pushtuns, has safe heavens across the border in Pakistan. To revisit the Vietnam War, the communist North Vietnam used neighbouring Cambodia as part of its Ho Chi Minh trail as a supply line to the Viet Cong (Communist insurgent forces) in the South.
The US now has to also cut off the “Osama bin Laden Pass” connecting Afghanistan and Pakistan.
A federal Afghanistan with the national army complemented by regional forces - and private armies run by warlords are a fact of life in Afghanistan today as they were centuries ago - would act as a counter to the Taliban.
In June 2008, Canadian journalist Scott Taylor and I were told by Dostum in Kabul, the Afghan capital that he could round up an army of 5,000 fighters and clean out the Taliban. Similarly, leader Pocha Khan Zadran said he could do the same in the East alongside the border with Pakistan.
Critics, pundits, defence experts, armchair generals, and the media constantly bombards us with the notion that we need to be able to think outside the box, and have a willingness to try something unorthodox. But it seems many of these groups are set in their ways.
(end)
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Brisbane Courier Mail newspaper article, Australia
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,24814541-27197,00.html
Holiday hypocrisy
by Sasha Uzunov
December 17, 2008 11:00pm
UNION protest at dropping the long weekend rankles with Vietnam War veterans stung by past anti-war action.
For some of Queensland's Vietnam veterans who watched this week as the Queensland Council of Unions jumped on the Anzac legend bandwagon to keep a public holiday next year, painful memories have been dredged up.
Anzac Day falls on a Saturday in 2009 and the Queensland Government will not be giving either the Friday before or Monday after in lieu of April 25 as a public holiday.
As one veteran quipped on a website: "After striking during the Vietnam War and withholding supplies destined for troops, the unions now want to benefit from their shame, I think not."
Keith Tennent, a Rockhampton veteran and editor of influential website,
www.theaussiedigger.com, added his thoughts on the issue by writing:
"Anzac Day is a day of solemn remembrance, not an excuse for a barbecue and a beer."
Not all trade unions are the same and cannot be blamed for the past actions of other unions. But you can understand Vietnam veterans' anger at the hypocrisy of those who opposed our involvement in the Vietnam War, and now all of a sudden are flag-waving super-patriots when it suits them.
Paul Ham, in his excellent book, Vietnam –The Australian War, reveals:
"In November 1969, the Sydney branch of the Waterside Workers Federation refused to load the Jeparit, the military supply ship that shuttled between Sydney and Vung Tau (Vietnam). This time the ACTU (Australian Council of Trade Unions) did nothing to restrain them . . . vital supplies were delayed. The postal unions urged their members to take industrial action."
A staunch supporter of the massive national anti-Vietnam War moratorium protests in 1970 was the Queensland Trades and Labor Council.
Bob Hawke was the ACTU president at the time of the fierce opposition to the Vietnam War. That didn't stop him, as prime minister, from basking in the limelight at the welcome-home parade for Vietnam veterans in 1987.
Now, having said all that, I understand that allowing an Anzac Day long weekend for many would be great.
We are constantly bombarded, by social scientists and other experts, with the fact that we Australians work longer hours than ever before and are dedicated to our careers.
We are made to feel guilty about not spending quality time with our family or loved ones because of work. Marriages and relationships are put under strain.
Doctors and psychologists warn us constantly of stress that could damage our physical and mental health because of over-work in trying to keep up with mortgage repayments and paying the bills.
Time off would be great, but is it really so bad if we miss one public holiday on a rare occasion when it falls on a weekend. It's not the end of the world, but missing an arm or a leg because of a war wound is close.
The Queensland Council of Unions needs to put things into perspective.
If we want to pay our respects to those who made the ultimate sacrifice in war then let us honour April 25, Anzac Day, on whatever day it falls.
Sasha Uzunov is a journalist who has worked in Iraq and Afghanistan and a former Australian soldier who served two tours of duty in East Timor.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,24814541-27197,00.html
Holiday hypocrisy
by Sasha Uzunov
December 17, 2008 11:00pm
UNION protest at dropping the long weekend rankles with Vietnam War veterans stung by past anti-war action.
For some of Queensland's Vietnam veterans who watched this week as the Queensland Council of Unions jumped on the Anzac legend bandwagon to keep a public holiday next year, painful memories have been dredged up.
Anzac Day falls on a Saturday in 2009 and the Queensland Government will not be giving either the Friday before or Monday after in lieu of April 25 as a public holiday.
As one veteran quipped on a website: "After striking during the Vietnam War and withholding supplies destined for troops, the unions now want to benefit from their shame, I think not."
Keith Tennent, a Rockhampton veteran and editor of influential website,
www.theaussiedigger.com, added his thoughts on the issue by writing:
"Anzac Day is a day of solemn remembrance, not an excuse for a barbecue and a beer."
Not all trade unions are the same and cannot be blamed for the past actions of other unions. But you can understand Vietnam veterans' anger at the hypocrisy of those who opposed our involvement in the Vietnam War, and now all of a sudden are flag-waving super-patriots when it suits them.
Paul Ham, in his excellent book, Vietnam –The Australian War, reveals:
"In November 1969, the Sydney branch of the Waterside Workers Federation refused to load the Jeparit, the military supply ship that shuttled between Sydney and Vung Tau (Vietnam). This time the ACTU (Australian Council of Trade Unions) did nothing to restrain them . . . vital supplies were delayed. The postal unions urged their members to take industrial action."
A staunch supporter of the massive national anti-Vietnam War moratorium protests in 1970 was the Queensland Trades and Labor Council.
Bob Hawke was the ACTU president at the time of the fierce opposition to the Vietnam War. That didn't stop him, as prime minister, from basking in the limelight at the welcome-home parade for Vietnam veterans in 1987.
Now, having said all that, I understand that allowing an Anzac Day long weekend for many would be great.
We are constantly bombarded, by social scientists and other experts, with the fact that we Australians work longer hours than ever before and are dedicated to our careers.
We are made to feel guilty about not spending quality time with our family or loved ones because of work. Marriages and relationships are put under strain.
Doctors and psychologists warn us constantly of stress that could damage our physical and mental health because of over-work in trying to keep up with mortgage repayments and paying the bills.
Time off would be great, but is it really so bad if we miss one public holiday on a rare occasion when it falls on a weekend. It's not the end of the world, but missing an arm or a leg because of a war wound is close.
The Queensland Council of Unions needs to put things into perspective.
If we want to pay our respects to those who made the ultimate sacrifice in war then let us honour April 25, Anzac Day, on whatever day it falls.
Sasha Uzunov is a journalist who has worked in Iraq and Afghanistan and a former Australian soldier who served two tours of duty in East Timor.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
KOKODA HERO MONUMENT
DAREBIN CITY HEROES
Private Bruce Kingsbury VC - Kokoda WWII 
Private Les Farren - Vietnam
KOKODA TRACK HERO --
PROPOSAL FOR KINGSBURY VC MONUMENT
Sasha Uzunov, a Reservoir freelance photo journalist and former Australian soldier who served in East Timor, says he wants to propose to Darebin City Council that they place a statue of one of Australia’s greatest World War II heroes Private Bruce Kingsbury VC at the Reservoir Cenotaph in Edwardes Street, Reservoir, Melbourne, Australia.
Sasha Uzunov spent 15 years campaigning for a memorial plaque for Victoria’s first National Serviceman (conscript) killed in Vietnam, Pte Leslie Farren of the northern Melbourne suburb Reservoir, (within Darebin City). Sasha was eventually successful and a plaque was placed at the Reservoir Cenotaph in 2006 amidst great fanfare by the Darebin Council and the media.
Private Kingsbury lived in the City of Darebin (covering the suburbs of Northcote, Thornbury, Preston, Reservoir, Regent and Kingsbury).
See link: below:
Bruce Kingsbury VC (1918-42)
Bruce Kingsbury was born in Armadale in 1918. After working interstate for a while he joined his fathers real estate business in Northcote. Kingsbury lived in Gilbert Road in West Preston.
When the World War II broke out Kingsbury quickly enlisted. Sent to Palestine Kingsbury saw action in both Egypt and Syria. In 1942, Kingsbury’s unit, the 2/14th Battalion was posted to Port Moresby.
On 29th August 1942, the 2/14 was involved in heavy fighting on the Kokoda trail. Japanese attacks were successful in pushing back the Australians. With the Battalion Headquarters in danger of being overrun it was vital that a counter attack was made. Kingsbury’s unit had been severely handled by the Japanese so Kingsbury joined another platoon assigned to make the counter attack.
Charging the enemy, firing his machine gun from his hip, Kingsbury inflicted heavy causalities upon the Japanese defenders. Taken by surprise by his attack the Japanese defenders scattered and the Australians were able to regain a precious 100 yards of territory.
But the cost was high. Kingsbury was now about 15 yards in front of his colleagues. A Japanese sniper fired a single shot, killing Kingsbury, before fleeing into the jungle.
In sacrificing his life Kingsbury had saved the headquarters and prevented the Japanese from taking a decisive dominance in the battle for the Kokoda trail. Bruce Kingsbury is buried in the Kokoda War Cemetery.
-----------------------------
Mr Pete Crockett - Secretary of The Kingsbury Society is seeking to have created by renowned local sculptor, Peter Corlett, a full-sized bronze statue of Bruce Kingsbury, to cost approximately $100,000 and to be located in Melbourne's City of Darebin.
“Unfortunately we are many years away from reaching that target of funding,” Mr Crockett said.
“Darebin Council had rejected a proposal to place a life-sized statute of Kingsbury VC outside the Preston Town Hall on the corner of High Street and Gower Streets, Preston.”
The Reservoir Cenotaph would be an ideal place for the Kingsbury monument, Sasha Uzunov said. But we would need to get permission from the Reservoir RSL, which administers the site. Hopefully we can get DVA to fund the project.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LINKS:
PETER CROCKETT - Secretary of The Kingsbury Society. To contact him call 0404 560 424
Email: bsk@alphalink.com.au
5RAR - Pte L.T. Farren memorial plaque / ceremony
http://www.5rar.asn.au/tributes/farren_plaque.htm
Leslie Thomas Farren. Killed in Action, 10 June 1966
A First Angry Shot Remembered (The Melbourne Herald Sun, page 20)
by Sasha UzunovAugust 24, 2006 12:00am
Bank teller Les Farren did not live to hear Prime Minister John Howard's apology for the reception his mates received from a disillusioned public when they returned home from Vietnam.
This little-known soldier from the Melbourne suburb of Reservoir was the first Victorian National Serviceman to die in that controversial war.
But he will be remembered when his 86-year-old mother, Lillian Farren, unveils a plaque on Monday at the Reservoir Cenotaph.Forty years after his death, Mrs Farren still grieves for her son.
"It was awful to see Les go and never see him again", said Mrs Farren. "This way he will be remembered."
Les was always in the shadow of another Melbourne suburbs boy when he went to Vietnam. The 1960s Australian pop legend, Normie Rowe, was one of his schoolmates at the Northcote High School before they were called up for Vietnam.
Les, two years older than Normie, was quietly spoken and looking forward to being an accountant in the suburbs.Normie, in the era of Beatlemania, was being mobbed by screaming hysterical teenage girls and had the music world at his feet.
But Vietnam changed their lives. Pte Leslie Thomas Farren was conscripted in 1965 and posted to 10 Platoon, Delta Company, 5th Battalion, the Royal Australian Regiment, Infantry Corps.
He was also a keen amateur photographer and the only son of Thomas and Lillian Farren.On June 10, 1966, while on patrol in South Vietnam, Pte Farren was severely wounded by Viet Cong mortar fire.
He was 19 days short of his 21st birthday. Cpl Frank Donovan was the army medic who tried to help Les."Les Farren actually died in my arms from massive lower body wounds," said Cpl Donovan. The extent of his wounds and loss of blood made survival impossible.
Trooper Norman J. Rowe got the call up in 1968 and went to Vietnam in 1969 with A Squadron, 3rd Cavalry Regiment, Armoured Corps.He survived but it almost ended his musical career.
I took an interest in Les Farren after reading about him in a newspaper more than 15 years ago.
I was surprised no one had acknowledged his service. Les was one of the unsung people who do
their duty without fuss or fanfare.Len Barlow, secretary of the Victorian branch of the Vietnam Veterans Association of Australia helped me to lobby Darebin Council for the commemorative plaque that will be unveiled by his mother.
To its credit, the council quickly approved the proposal. Les Farren has not been forgotten but it has taken too long to acknowledge his service.
Following the Prime Minister's words on Vietnam Veterans Day last Friday, the sacrifice of these veterans might now be better remembered.
Videos and photos of Private Leslie Farren (10 Platoon, D Company, 5 RAR) Memorial Plaque Ceremony First Victorian National Serviceman to be killed in Vietnam War on 10 June 1966. - MONDAY 28 August 2006, Reservoir Cenotaph, Reservoir, City of Darebin, Victoria.
Photographs of the Occasion
Mr Bob Elworthy, President of Australian Vietnam Veterans Association - Victorian Branch, chats to some 5RAR veterans at the Leslie Farren memorial plaque ceremony. VVAA - Vic Branch sponsored the plaque.
Mr Frank Donovan, then an Army Medic with 5RAR, who held Leslie Farren, as he died of his wounds, giving a speech. Next to him is Councillor Stanley Chiang, the Mayor of Darebin City Council, which lent his support behind the memorial.
Cr Stanley Chiang, lays a wreath at the Reservoir cenotaph
The last surviving next of kin, Mrs Lillian Farren, aged 86, unveils the plaque to her son. Cr Chiang is on hand to help.
The memorial plaque, kindly sponsored by the VVAA - Vic Branch, and with technical support from the Darebin City Council. The plaque inscription reads: "
In Memory of 3786921 Leslie Thomas Farren - First Victorian National Serviceman Killed in the Vietnam War, 10 June 1966. Sponsored by: VVAA - Vic Branch 28 August 2006
Sasha Uzunov, freelance photo journalist and East Timor veteran, who proposed the plaque.
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