Nightmare in Libya: 20,000 Surface-to-Air Missiles Missing

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The nightmare has been made real with the discovery in Libya that an estimated 20,000 portable, heat-seeking missiles have gone missing from unguarded Army weapons warehouses.

The missiles, four to six-feet long and Russian-made, can weigh just 55 pounds with launcher. They lock on to the heat generated by the engines of aircraft, can be fired from a vehicle or from a combatant's shoulder, and are accurate and deadly at a range of more than two miles.

...

The ease with which rebels and other unknown parties have snatched thousands of the missiles has raised alarms that the weapons could end up in the hands of al Qaeda, which is active in Libya.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/nightmare-libya-20000-surface-air-missiles-missing/story?id=14610199

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

I hear they can also part the Sea of Reeds, as they make their way across the Sinai. Michele Bachmann thinks they are sailing to Cuba along with the remnants of Qaddafi's army.

Edited September 27, 2011 by Crusty Old Perv

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I hear they can also part the Sea of Reeds, as they make their way across the Sinai. Michele Bachmann thinks they are sailing to Cuba.

Now that is hilarious I don't care what anyone says.

[mawilson 2,133]

Soon to be "found" in Gaza.

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

Air travel could get a lot more adventurous.

[Sofiyya 1,687]

Kip can see them from Alaska.

Soon to be "found" in Gaza.

Sounds like a plan

[lostinblue 1,989]

The Mexican border became a lot more dangerous. The arms trade is an international problem no matter what ATF wants you to think.

[Nagishkaw 510]

Egypt uncovers Libyan SA-24 anti-air missiles and sea mines bound for Gaza

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report September 26, 2011, 2:14 PM (GMT+02:00) Tags: Hamas Hizballah Israel Iran Libyan rebels arms traffic

SA-24 infrared missile from Libya to Gaza

Helped by highly sophisticated contraband weapons smuggled out of Libya, Iran and Hizballah are getting the Palestinian Hamas equipped for another round of hostilities with Israel. DEBKAfile's military sources report that Sunday, Sept. 25, Egyptian security forces, acting on information from a Western intelligence source, homed in near Ismailia on a large half-empty buried cache of advanced SA-24 anti-air infrared missiles (a version of the US Stinger) stored there en route from Libya to Gaza.

The information came too late to block delivery; most of the crates were found empty of their contents of missiles and other military equipment which must already be on their way to Sinai or Gaza. Some of the empty containers were found to have contained Russian-made MDM-3 sea mines, of the type Muammar Qaddafi scattered around Libyan ports in May to keep NATO vessels at bay.

Our North African sources report that many of Qaddafi's weapons stores were seized by the rebels and their contents sold by some of the officers to the highest bidders.

Tripoli today is under the sway of several rival militias belonging to the rebel National Transitional Council. An oversight committee of American, British, French and Italian delegates is trying to track down the advanced weaponry which the rebels seized during the NATO-led advance into the capital on Aug. 21. They have been questioning the Libyan rebel officers placed in charge of the arms stores and Libyan weapons dealers for information.

The CIA agents on the committee are aware that Hizballah and Hamas purchasing missions armed with Iranian petrodollars established a presence some months ago in Benghazi, seat of the NTC which has not yet moved to Tripoli. Those agents elude discovery in the mayhem prevailing in rebel ranks and may be hiding in one of the rebel commands operating outside Benghazi.

But the NATO commission has managed to find out roughly what happens to the smuggled arms after they are spirited out of Tripoli, DEBKAfile's counter-terror sources report. Some are bound for southern Libya and Niger, where Qaddafi loyalists holed up in the Sahel desert on the fringes of the Sahara take delivery: The second destination is Algeria for Al Qaeda in the Maghreb; and the third is the Gaza Strip through Egypt and Sinai.

The introduction of sophisticated anti-air infrared missiles and sea mines into areas abutting on Israel's land and sea borders has given its army chiefs and strategists a serious headache. The SA-24s would give the Hamas an anti-air capability on a par with that of the Hizballah and consists three elements:

- The SA-24s which are portable air defense missiles with a range of 5.2 kilometers, an operational ceiling of 3.5 kilometers and Mach 2.3 speed.

Depending mainly on visual scanning, they can also be fired at night and are effective against fighter planes, armored helicopters, drones and diverse surface-to surface missiles, including cruise missiles.

- SA-14 (Strela-3) has a small and very precise solid propellant guided missile as well as an improved system for overcoming countermeasures. Its range is 4.5 kilometers and operational ceiling 3 kilometers.

- The SA-7 (Strela-2) has a 3.6 kilometer range, operational ceiling from 15 meters to 1.5 kilometers and Mach 1.75.

Hamas is therefore armed with weapons capable of attacking high-, medium- and low-flying objects, including planes, helicopters and drones over and outside the Gaza Strip in southwest Israel including the port towns of Ashdod and Ashkelon.

Sea mines if Hamas can sow them in eastern Mediterranean waters would severely impair the Israeli and Egyptian navies' freedom of navigation. There is the additional danger of mines drifting ashore.

Our military sources report that Iran, Hizballah and Hamas employ experts with specialist knowledge of deep Mediterranean currents. They use them for Iranian freighters to skirt Israel's naval blockade against the Gaza Strip and throw arms consignments overboard for Hizballah and Hamas to be carried ashore by currents.

Both radical terrorist groups are now in possession of a stock of Libyan sea mines which can be used with the help of these experts for striking precise locations on the Israeli coast..

http://www.debka.com/article/21342/

[Danno 1,228]

Q; Did our intelligence know of their existence.... and where these highly effective weapons were, when we helped destabilize the country?

DId our lack of "boots on the ground" prevent them from being secured?

This might get the troops out of Afghanistan pretty quick if our rotor winged aircraft become sitting ducks.

[lostinblue 1,989]

Q; Did our intelligence know of their existence.... and where these highly effective weapons were, when we helped destabilize the country?

DId our lack of "boots on the ground" prevent them from being secured?

This might get the troops out of Afghanistan pretty quick if our rotor winged aircraft become sitting ducks.

CNN finds uranium ‘yellow cake’ being guarded by Libyan teens

Posted on 09.22.11

By David Edwards

Categories: Featured, World

CNN’s Ben Wedeman reported Thursday that his team had found two warehouses full of what appeared to be radioactive material on a military base near the Libya town of Sabha.

“We’ve come across two warehouses full of thousands of blue barrels — some of them marked radioactive — on the ground,” Wedeman told CNN’s Kyra Phillips. “In one of the warehouses, we found several large plastic bags full of what appears to be yellow powder, which had been closed also with this radioactive tape.”

The team also found dosimeters and film that can be used to detect radiation.

“It was lightly guarded — I stress the lightly — by about three to four guys in their late teens, early 20s,” he reported.

In a subsequent report, Wedeman described the materials as uranium yellow cake, a concentrated powder used in an intermediate step of manufacturing fuel for nuclear reactors and weapons-grade uranium.

“What it appears to be is yellow cake which is sort of one of the rudimentary — is a uranium oxide compound that is one of the precursors which after a lot of refining can become radioactive material or nuclear material for a weapon,” he explained.

“According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), they are aware or were aware of this site, that it contained nuclear material or atomic material. In fact, we did find one piece of hand-written paper that said, ’350,000 tons declared,’ which would indicate that this is somehow what Libya’s government in 2004 when it decided to come clean on its nuclear weapons program, declared that they possessed this material, this yellow cake.”

Prior to the invasion of Iraq in 2002, President George W. Bush bolstered his case for war by making the false claim that then-Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had sought significant quantities of yellow cake from Africa.

Watch this video from CNN’s Newsroom, broadcast Sept. 22, 2011.

http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/09/cnn-finds-uranium-yellow-cake-being-guarded-by-libyan-teens/

Watch this video on iPhone/iPad

[Danno 1,228]

CNN finds uranium ‘yellow cake’ being guarded by Libyan teens

Posted on 09.22.11

By David Edwards

Categories: Featured, World

CNN’s Ben Wedeman reported Thursday that his team had found two warehouses full of what appeared to be radioactive material on a military base near the Libya town of Sabha.

“We’ve come across two warehouses full of thousands of blue barrels — some of them marked radioactive — on the ground,” Wedeman told CNN’s Kyra Phillips. “In one of the warehouses, we found several large plastic bags full of what appears to be yellow powder, which had been closed also with this radioactive tape.”

The team also found dosimeters and film that can be used to detect radiation.

“It was lightly guarded — I stress the lightly — by about three to four guys in their late teens, early 20s,” he reported.

In a subsequent report, Wedeman described the materials as uranium yellow cake, a concentrated powder used in an intermediate step of manufacturing fuel for nuclear reactors and weapons-grade uranium.

“What it appears to be is yellow cake which is sort of one of the rudimentary — is a uranium oxide compound that is one of the precursors which after a lot of refining can become radioactive material or nuclear material for a weapon,” he explained.

“According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), they are aware or were aware of this site, that it contained nuclear material or atomic material. In fact, we did find one piece of hand-written paper that said, ’350,000 tons declared,’ which would indicate that this is somehow what Libya’s government in 2004 when it decided to come clean on its nuclear weapons program, declared that they possessed this material, this yellow cake.”

Prior to the invasion of Iraq in 2002, President George W. Bush bolstered his case for war by making the false claim that then-Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had sought significant quantities of yellow cake from Africa.

Watch this video from CNN’s Newsroom, broadcast Sept. 22, 2011.

http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/09/cnn-finds-uranium-yellow-cake-being-guarded-by-libyan-teens/

Watch this video on iPhone/iPad

So Bush was prepared to confiscate what wasn't in Iraq while Obama Wasn't prepared to confiscate what Was in Libya?