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Real Middle East Analysis: Not Authorized for Release – by Gordon Duff
Prelude
to World War III Outlined
Today, Azerbaijan announced it would allow Israeli planes to use
their air bases to attack Iran. Reuters published the press release from
Baku, one originally released in Veterans Today 27 months ago. From Reuters:
BAKU
(Reuters) – Israel’s “go-it-alone” option to attack Iran’s nuclear sites has
set the Middle East on edge and unsettled its main ally at the height of a U.S.
presidential election campaign.
Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu exudes impatience, saying Tehran is barely a year
from a “red line” for atomic capacity. Many fellow Israelis, however, fear a
unilateral strike, lacking U.S. forces, would fail against such a large and
distant enemy. But what if, even without Washington, Israel were not alone?
Azerbaijan,
the oil-rich ex-Soviet republic on Iran’s far northern border, has, say local
sources with knowledge of its military policy, explored with Israel how Azeri
air bases and spy drones might help Israeli jets pull off a long-range attack.
An
investigation done by independent intelligence
organizations made up of former CIA,
Army Intelligence and FBI personnel as published on June 18, 2010, discovered a
plot between Israel, Georgia, Turkey and Azerbaijan to attack Iran.
At
that time, Israeli planes were training in Turkey on terrain meant to simulate
Iran. Israel would send over 8 planes at a time and 6 would return.
Sources report that two would fly to Azerbaijan where Israel now occupies two
former Soviet fighter bases.
Israel was building a secret air force in Azerbaijan. That
“secret air force” is now no longer secret, it is public knowledge but few know
its history or the threat to world peace this irresponsible act represents.
The
bases were supplied through the Georgian port of Poti with cluster and
bunker-buster bombs being delivered beginning June 10, 2010. Units of the Russian Navy observed the deliveries and
reported the incident to a world press that suppressed the story. The
ship delivering the illegal arms were flagged American, the USS Grapple.
In
consultation with intelligence operatives, it was found that the USS Grapple had been leased to
Germany who had then allowed Israel to use it to deliver bombs to the Black Sea
port under American naval identity.
We have since learned that Turkey, despite what they claim is a
hostile relationship with Israel, has allowed over flight by Israeli military
planes who are using Turkish air space to relocate to Azerbaijan after a two
year period of disagreement.
This relationship, negotiated between Israeli Prime Minister
Netanyahu and Turkish President Erdogan includes provision for Turkey to assume
partial territorial control of a border region inside Syria. Turkey is
planning to seize this territory and call it a “buffer zone” but the “buffer”
may include up to 30% of Syrian territory.
Israel and Turkey have agreed to “Balkanize” Syria.
However, the roots of today’s announcement were known some time ago.
On June 18, 2010, over two years ago, this columnist released
the following information:
“A
week ago, Israel leaked to the press that they had permission from Saudi Arabia
to use their air space to attack Iran. The Saudi’s quickly denied this.
The effort on Israel’s part was a ruse to cover their real
plans, to attack from the Republic of Georgia, close to Iran’s northern border.
[How will the recent Georgian election affect this plan, one in
which Empire appears to have lost control? ~J]
However,
the breakdown in relations with Turkey after miscalculating the response to
their Flotilla raid on a Turkish ship in international waters may have ended
this operation.
Israel,
whose arms agreements with Turkey mounted to nearly 5 billion dollars over a
period of years, had been training pilots in Turkey for bombing attacks on
Iran. During these training missions, Israel was smuggling aircraft through
Turkish airspace.
Sources
indicate that Georgia has become a major transshipment point for narcotics from
Afghanistan and other countries in the region. Both a land route through Turkey
and into Northern Cyprus and air and sea routes directly into Europe and North
America have been cited.
Turkey had allowed Israel to use their air space for training
because their terrain closely resembled areas of Iran that Israel planned to
attack. However, Turkey was unaware that planes involved in this effort were
being relocated to forward staging areas in the Republic of Georgia, making
Turkey, technically, fully complicit in this planned illegal attack.
Helping
coordinate the attack are intelligence units forward stationed in Azerbaijan,
under the guise of technicians, trainers and advisors under the broad armaments
agreements with that small nation.
Supply
operations, moving necessary ordnance, much of it supplied by the United States
under ammunition storage agreements, is being moved through the Black Sea to
the Georgian Port of Poti, a major site for exporting coal and manganese ore.
Cover
for the supply operations is being performed by the Georgian Coast Guard, set
up by Israel and manned with Israeli observers. Their job is to keep Russian
surveillance craft away from supply operations under the guise of a “Gaza type”
naval blockade of Abkhazia, a separatist province supported by Russia.”
Reuters,
in its story published today indicated confirmed sources within the military
intelligence community of Azerbaijan. Reuters goes further:
“Yet
despite official denials by Azerbaijan and Israel, two Azeri former military
officers with links to serving personnel and two Russian intelligence sources
all told Reuters that Azerbaijan and Israel have been looking at how Azeri
bases and intelligence could serve in a possible strike on Iran.
“Where
planes would fly from – from here, from there, to where? – that’s what’s being
planned now,” a security consultant with contacts at Azeri defense headquarters
in Baku said. “The Israelis … would like to gain access to bases in Azerbaijan.”
“ICEBERG”
RELATIONSHIP
That
Aliyev, an autocratic ally of Western governments and oil firms, has become a
rare Muslim friend of the Jewish state – and an object of scorn in Tehran – is
no secret; a $1.6-billion arms deal involving dozens of Israeli drones, and
Israel’s thirst for Azerbaijan’s Caspian Sea crude, are well documented.
Israel’s
foreign minister visited Baku in April this year.
But
a leaked U.S. diplomatic cable from 2009 quoted Aliyev, who succeeded his
father in 2003, describing relations with Israel as “like an iceberg, nine
tenths … below the surface”.
The
unknown factor is Azerbaijan’s ability to withstand a massive and immediate
ground assault from Iran. US Army experts on the region indicate that
Iran has a “superhighway direct to Baku,” the capitol of Azerbaijan and
keystone to the massive Baku/Ceyhan pipeline.
Azerbaijan’s
military, 45,000 active duty, a few thousand reserves and an unarmed and
untrained inactive reserve of 300,000 veterans is extremely small in comparison
to Iran’s military. A reasonable estimate is that, under the best of
cases with support from both Turkey and Israel, that Baku could fall in 48
hours or less, should they choose to participate in an unprovoked attack on
Iran.
Azerbaijan
is closely aligned with Turkey. However, they fought and lost a war in
the early 1990’s against Armenia. Azerbaijan lost 16% of their territory
at that time.
During
that war, Azerbaijan turned to Al Qaeda and Chechen forces for support, an act
that angered Russia. Azerbaijan is still a “safe haven” for terrorists
and is commonly used to transit narcotics from Afghanistan and is a “way
station” in human trafficking.
It
is believed that an Israeli attack launched from Azerbaijan would unleash an
immediate response from Armenia against Azerbaijan. The two nations have
been at the verge of hostilities for nearly two decades.
A
recent estimate of regional forces paints a very dark picture for Azerbaijan:
Since
the fall of the Soviet Union, Armenia has followed a policy of developing its
armed forces into a professional, well trained, and mobile military. In 2000,
Centre for International Studies and Research reported that at that time the
Armenian Army had the strongest combat capability of the three Caucasus
countries’ armies (the other two being Georgia and Azerbaijan.
CSTO
Secretary, Nikolay Bordyuzha, came to a similar conclusion after collective
military drills in 2007 when he stated that, “the Armenian Army is the most
efficient one in the post-Soviet space”.
This
was echoed more recently by Igor Korotchenko, a member of the Public Council,
Russian Ministry of Defense, in a March 2011 interview with Voice of Russia
radio.
CASPIAN
OIL SUPPLIES AT RISK
The
1100 mile pipeline is the only outlet for oil from the Caspian basin to outlets
on the Mediterranean. A branch of the pipeline services the massive
Kirkuk oil fields of Northern Iraq.
The
pipeline is owned by a number of companies with BP having a 30 percent
stake. The 25% stake theoretically held by SOCAR, the state oil company
of Azerbaijan is under Israeli control, as collateral to underwrite Israeli
weapons sales.
Israel
has an agreement to link to the pipeline through Iraq, a deal negotiated
between the Elat Ashkian Pipeline Company of Israel and the US backed Chalabi
government that assumed control of Iraq after the 2003 invasion.
It
is no longer clear as to whether the current government in Baghdad is still
interested in this project.
Additional
threats to the pipeline are in Armenia, where it may also be intercepted and in
Turkey, where the PKK, a Kurdish separatist group, has put the pipeline out of
commission many times.
The
significance of the pipeline is great in that, even if Iran has no rationale to
cut oil supplies through the Straits of Hormuz, it could easily gain control of
5% of the world’s oil output and put all Caspian Basin oil off the market
without in any way interfering with free transit of sea-lanes.
Additionally,
the transit fees charged for use of the pipeline are a major source of revenue
for both Georgia and Turkey, a source that would immediately end.
Two
“wild card” issues are Russia and Iraq. As Iraq’s government is now under
Shiite control and Azerbaijan’s relations with, not just Armenia but Russia
have been extremely poor, the chances for this move by Israel turning into a
regional conflict or world war are very high.
Taking
into account Turkey’s “ham handed” plotting with Israel against Syria and their
attempts to spread influence into Central Asia, their short lived position as a
potential leader in the Islamic World has clearly taken a “back seat” to Iran,
Egypt, Pakistan and Indonesia.
Israel’s
timetable to attack from Azerbaijan is entirely dependent on the risks their
long time but highly secretive ally is willing to accept.
Minimally,
Azerbaijan might actually disappear. In a best case scenario, they would
lose additional territory to Armenia and suffer total devastation of their oil
production and processing facilities and destruction of their armed forces.
For
the rest of the world, the result, as expected, higher gasoline prices, higher
food prices and more threats to currencies already nearing collapse.
The views expressed herein are the
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