War Iran-United States Military Crisis of 2020 - US Baghdad embassy under siege, rocket fire in US Baghdad green zone, Ukrainian Airlines flight 752 crash, and more!

January 10th:
Exclusive: Informants in Iraq, Syria helped U.S. kill Iran's Soleimani - sources (archive)(post)
Iraqi Shia cleric whose militia killed American troops says crisis is over following Iran strike and Trump speech (archive)(post)
Iraqi PM tells US to decide mechanism for troop withdrawal (archive)(post)
Mike Pence says Congress might 'compromise sources and methods' if fully briefed on the Soleimani strike (archive)(post)
Unidentified planes hit Iraqi militiamen in Syria, killing 8 (archive)(post)
Iraq: The Master Of Mayhem Meets A Missile (archive)(post)
Eliminating Qasem Soleimani was Donald Trump’s Middle East farewell letter (archive)(post)
Iran uses BULLDOZERS to clear debris from plane crash site while accusing US of ‘big lie’ that they shot it down (archive)(post)
Swiss Back Channel Helped Defuse U.S.-Iran Crisis (post)

January 11th:
UKRAINIAN AIRCRAFT WAS BROUGHT DOWN IN IRAN DUE TO 'HUMAN ERROR' (archive)(post)
Iran minister says 'human error' caused by 'US adventurism' led to deadly crash of Ukrainian jetliner (archive)(post)
Ukrainian aircraft was brought down in Iran due to 'human error' (archive)(post)
Trump, at Ohio rally, says Democrats would have leaked Soleimani attack plans (archive)(post)
The Atlantic's David Frum blames Trump for downing of plane in Iran, deaths of 176 (archive)(post)
Associated Press changes ‘shockingly bad’ headline about Soleimani, Ukrainian plane crash after backlash (archive)(post)
GOP Rep. Doug Collins apologizes for saying Democrats are 'in love with terrorists' (archive)(post)
Iran demands West 'show findings' as new video reveals aircraft was struck before fiery crash (archive)(post)
Warren town hall interrupted by angry protester accusing her of ‘siding with terrorists’ (archive)(post)
Trump administration announces new sanctions on Iran (archive)(post)
Prepare For the Worst From Iran Cyber Attacks, As DHS Issues Warning: Experts (archive)(post)
Trump tells Fox News' Laura Ingraham 'four embassies' were targeted in imminent threat from Iran (archive)(post)
Trump tweets support for Iranian protesters as they demand Khamenei quit (archive)(post)
Trump warns Iran against ‘another massacre’ as protests flare over downed jet (archive)(post)

January 12th:
Trump tweet in Farsi 'the most liked Persian tweet' in history of Twitter (archive)(post)
Iraq warned to keep US troops or risk financial blow-WSJ (archive)(post)
Iran arrests UK ambassador in what Britain calls ‘flagrant violation of international law’ (archive)(post)

January 13th:
Trump authorized Soleimani's killing 7 months ago, with conditions (archive)(post)

edit: This is a WIP. All links are posted in the order they appear in the thread, not in chronological order of their publication.


---Original OP before the merge---
Iraqi supporters of Iran-backed militia attack US Embassy
https://apnews.com/75228a8a607a44863b57021ac33264dc (http://archive.vn/ljm9Y)

By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA12 minutes ago

BAGHDAD (AP) — Dozens of angry Iraqi Shiite militia supporters broke into the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad on Tuesday after smashing a main door and setting fire to a reception area, prompting tear gas and sounds of gunfire.

An Associated Press reporter at the scene saw flames rising from inside the compound and at least three U.S. soldiers on the roof of the main building inside embassy. It was not clear what caused the fire at the reception area near the parking lot of the compound. A man on a loudspeaker urged the mob not to enter the compound, saying: “The message was delivered.”

The embassy attack followed deadly U.S. airstrikes on Sunday that killed 25 fighters of the Iran-backed militia in Iraq, the Kataeb Hezbollah. The U.S. military said it was in retaliation for last week’s killing of an American contractor in a rocket attack on an Iraqi military base that it had blamed on the militia.

Dozens of protesters marched inside the compound after smashing the gate used by cars to enter the embassy. The protesters, many in militia uniform, stopped in a corridor after about 5 meters (16 feet), and were only about 200 meters away from the main building. Half a dozen U.S. soldiers were seen on the roof of the main building, their guns were pointed at the protesters.

Smoke from the tear gas rose in the area, and at least three of the protesters appeared to have difficulties breathing. It wasn’t immediately known whether the embassy staff had remained inside the main building.

The protesters hanged a poster on the wall: “America is an aggressor.”

Shouting “Down, Down USA,” the crowd tried to push inside the embassy grounds, hurling water and stones over its walls. They raised yellow militia flags and taunted the embassy’s security staff who remained behind the glass windows in the gates’ reception area. They sprayed graffiti on the wall and windows in red in support of the Kataeb Hezbollah militia: “Closed in the name of the resistance.”

Hundreds of angry protesters, some in militia uniforms, set up tents outside the embassy. As tempers rose, the mob set fire to three trailers used by security guards along the embassy wall.

No one was immediately reported hurt in the rampage and security staff had withdrawn to inside the embassy earlier, soon after protesters gathered outside.

The U.S. attack — the largest targeting an Iraqi state-sanctioned militia in recent years — and the subsequent calls by the militia for retaliation, represent a new escalation in the proxy war between the U.S. and Iran playing out in the Middle East.

Tuesday’s attempted embassy storming took place after mourners and supporters held funerals for the militia fighters killed in a Baghdad neighborhood, after which they marched on to the heavily fortified Green Zone and kept walking till they reached the sprawling U.S. Embassy there.

AP journalists then saw the crowd as they tried to scale the walls of the embassy, in what appeared to be an attempt to storm it, shouting “Down, down USA!” and “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.”

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday’s strikes send the message that the U.S. will not tolerate actions by Iran that jeopardize American lives.

The Iranian-backed Iraqi militia had vowed Monday to retaliate for the U.S. military strikes. The attack and vows for revenge raised concerns of new attacks that could threaten American interests in the region.

The U.S. attack also outraged both the militias and the Iraqi government, which said it will reconsider its relationship with the U.S.-led coalition — the first time it has said it will do so since an agreement was struck to keep some U.S. troops in the country. It called the attack a “flagrant violation” of its sovereignty.

In a partly televised meeting Monday, Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi told Cabinet members that he had tried to stop the U.S. operation “but there was insistence” from American officials.

The U.S. military said “precision defensive strikes” were conducted against five sites of Kataeb Hezbollah, or Hezbollah Brigades in Iraq and Syria. The group, which is a separate force from the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, operates under the umbrella of the state-sanctioned militias known collectively as the Popular Mobilization Forces. Many of them are supported by Iran.

.

 

[LetThemEatCake]

Stormed the US embassy and took 52 American embassy workers hostage for 444 days, hence Trumps response of 52 targets to Iran's threat of 35.

After all these years and despite his being dead for years now I have a pretty strong reaction to pictures of Khomenei. It's culturally ingrained and it's wierd and kind of stupid.

They keep orchestrating attacks on our embassies and hoping for more hostages because they know we do nothing.

Also see: the Lebanon hostage crisis which had Iran's fingerprints all over it.

During the Lebanese civil war, endless people from the U.S. as well as the UK and various European nationals, including journalists, diplomats, aid workers, and hostage negotiators. were kidnapped and held for ransom in terrible conditions for years on end by Hezbollah, the then minority Shia insurgent group which is now a major power player in the Lebanese Parliament. Hezbollah (means 'Party of God') has been an Iranian regime funded and backed Islamist puppet from the start and the kidnappings which were extremely high profile in the 80s, were essentially thus all Iranian backed. One of those kidnapped and then murdered was the CIA Beirut Station Chief, William Francis Buckley. Just to give you a flavour of what Hezbollah got up to, let's grab some text from wiki:

According to the United States, Buckley had undergone 15 months of torture by Hezbollah before his death. After Buckley's kidnapping, three videos of Buckley being tortured were sent to the CIA in Athens. Interpreters noticed puncture marks indicating he was injected with narcotics. According to several sources, as a result of his torture, he signed a 400-page statement detailing his CIA activities.[7][14][17] In a video taken approximately seven months after the kidnapping, his appearance was described as follows:

Buckley was close to a gibbering wretch. His words were often incoherent; he slobbered and drooled and, most unnerving of all, he would suddenly scream in terror, his eyes rolling helplessly and his body shaking. The CIA consensus was that he would be blindfolded and chained at the ankles and wrists and kept in a cell little bigger than a coffin.[7]

Iran was also known as a state sponsor of terror throughout the 80s. As were Libya, Syria etc. It really pays to work your way through the history surrounding the Iranian Revolution, and the Lebanese Civil War from 1975 to 1990, and dig into all the players to get a flavour of how internecine the conflicts were and still are.

 

[Spooky Bones]

View attachment 1085772

AFP and Reuters are both saying the letter is legit.

I doubt it though.

Top general says letter suggesting US would withdraw troops from Iraq was a ‘mistake’
Ryan Browne

Top general says letter suggesting US would withdraw troops from Iraq was a 'mistake'

The top US general said Monday a letter suggesting the US would withdraw troops from Iraq was released by mistake and poorly worded, telling reporters "that's not what's happening."

www.cnn.com

The top US general said Monday a letter suggesting the US would withdraw troops from Iraq was released by mistake and poorly worded, telling reporters "that's not what's happening."

Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley sought to address the confusion that began after the leak of aletter to the Iraqi government from US Command in Baghdad suggesting US troops would be withdrawn from the country.

"That letter is a draft. It was a mistake, it was unsigned, it should not have been released ... (it was) poorly worded, implies withdrawal, that is not what's happening," Milley said.

"It's an honest mistake ... it should not have been sent," he added.

This story is breaking and will be updated.

 

[Overly Serious]

Stormed the US embassy and took 52 American embassy workers hostage for 444 days, hence Trumps response of 52 targets to Iran's threat of 35.

After all these years and despite his being dead for years now I have a pretty strong reaction to pictures of Khomenei. It's culturally ingrained and it's wierd and kind of stupid.

They keep orchestrating attacks on our embassies and hoping for more hostages because they know we do nothing.

I'd add the PanAm / Lockerbie plane bombing which was very likely Iran's response to the US shooting down an airliner of their own not long before. To this day people still seem to think Libya was behind it but likely culprit was Iran. (Yes, I know Gaddafi accepted responsibility - that was the price of being allowed to enter a trade deal. He withdrew it again when the West refused to deliver).

 

[Freya]

my favorite thing to come from this is realizing Trump is stupid enough to think a tweet counts as an official notice to Congress

 

[Feline Supremacist]

I'd add the PanAm / Lockerbie plane bombing which was very likely Iran's response to the US shooting down an airliner of their own not long before. To this day people still seem to think Libya was behind it but likely culprit was Iran. (Yes, I know Gaddafi accepted responsibility - that was the price of being allowed to enter a trade deal. He withdrew it again when the West refused to deliver).

Well they're doubling down.

Hassan Rouhani on Twitter

“Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655 Never threaten the Iranian nation.”

twitter.com

 

[LetThemEatCake]

I'd add the PanAm / Lockerbie plane bombing which was very likely Iran's response to the US shooting down an airliner of their own not long before. To this day people still seem to think Libya was behind it but likely culprit was Iran. (Yes, I know Gaddafi accepted responsibility - that was the price of being allowed to enter a trade deal. He withdrew it again when the West refused to deliver).

The CIA seemed to think it was Syria, at least operationally.

The CIA secretly held Syrian militants, rather than Libya, responsible for the Lockerbie bombing, according to newly unearthed testimony from a former US spy in the Middle East.

Dr Richard Fuisz said in a sworn deposition in 2001 that he was told by up to 15 senior Syrian officials that the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) had carried out the attack.

He also testified that CIA bosses told him the PFLP-GC was responsible, according to a lawyer's note of a second deposition. Ahmed Jibril, the group's founder leader, who is still alive at 75, was singled out as being to blame for the downing of Pan Am flight 103 over Scotland in December 1988, killing 270 people.

"Numerous high officials in the Syrian government were quite affirmative on Jibril's involvement in Pan Am 103," Dr Fuisz told lawyers, during his deposition in Virginia in 2001.

Dr Fuisz gave his depositions in 2000 and 2001 at the request of Megrahi's defence lawyers. However, the evidence came too late to be used in the trial. They were first published by Channel 4 News.The CIA declined to comment.

Muammar Gaddafi's Libyan regime was publicly blamed by the US for the attack, and Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted of the bombing in 2001. He was later released and died last year in Libya.

But serious doubts about the conviction have been raised by investigative journalists for several years, centring on forensic evidence, and Libya has strenuously denied involvement.

The PFLP-GC were in fact the first prime suspects in the investigation.

Experts suggested it may have been ordered by the Iranian government as revenge for the accidental shooting down of an Iranian passenger jet by a US battleship months earlier, killing 290.

They added that blame may have been diverted from Iran in order to protect secret and delicate negotiations by George Bush's US administration over western hostages.

Dr Fuisz, a businessman who is said to have been a senior US intelligence asset in the Middle East in the 1980s and 90s, said that the Syrian officials he spoke to interacted with Jibril "on a constant basis" and that he was widely regarded to be the mastermind behind the bombing.
Asked who the Syrian officials cited as their source for the information, he said: "My recollection is they were direct. They were not hearsay sources on their part." Asked if that he understood that to mean that he was "being told by members of the Syrian government that Jibril, and or members of the PFLGC were taking credit for the bombing," he replied: "Yes".

Although who the fuck knows with 'former spies' and intelligence agencies. Wheels within wheels with this stuff on every side. Disinformation and misdirection is a standard tool of intelliegence agencies.

ETA: Is Rouhani admitting they dun Pan Am 103 then? Awkward! I may remind him that the golden age of airline terror is well and truly over anyway. The door shut for good on that on Sept. 12th 2001.

 

[Feline Supremacist]

I believe the Iranian ayatollahs don't grasp how much the average American absolutely hate them and would fully support the glassing of Iran. Celebrities don't represent American's feelings on this.

Edit; Americans who even give Iran a passing thought that is.

 

[Orion Balls]

Well they're doubling down.
View attachment 1085956

Hassan Rouhani on Twitter

“Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655 Never threaten the Iranian nation.”

twitter.com

This means that the leaders of two countries are officially having a Twitter spat. How wonderfully mature, and what a great use of technology. Ugh. Wake me when the grown ups arrive.

 

[Honka Honka Burning Love]

Well they're doubling down.
View attachment 1085956

Hassan Rouhani on Twitter

“Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655 Never threaten the Iranian nation.”

twitter.com

I know I say this a lot in this thread but. 290? Sounds like the number of bombs we should drop on your head. I think the Iran Leadership have become the first official Lolgoats.

 

[It's HK-47]

This means that the leaders of two countries are officially having a Twitter spat. How wonderfully mature, and what a great use of technology. Ugh. Wake me when the grown ups arrive.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

 

[somefuckingchimp]

The CIA seemed to think it was Syria, at least operationally.



Although who the fuck knows with 'former spies' and intelligence agencies. Wheels within wheels with this stuff on every side.

ETA: Is Rouhani admitting they dun Pan Am 103 then? Awkward! I may remind him that the golden age of airline terror is well and truly over anyway. The door shut for good on that on Sept. 12th 2001.

Rouhani is referencing the Iranian flight that was downed by USS Vincennes.

 

[BONE_Buddy]

More about that wrongly published withdrawal paper:

Pentagon mistakenly releases draft memo promising withdrawal from Iraq

This isn't your standard Trump administration memo leak. No, the memo released Monday that signifies the U.S's plan to exit Iraq is a full-fledged 'mistake,' Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley said more than an hour after it came out. It's a 'draft' and 'implies withdrawal,' which 'is...

theweek.com

Pentagon mistakenly releases draft memo promising withdrawal from Iraq


This isn't your standard Trump administration memo leak.

No, the memo released Monday that signifies the U.S's plan to exit Iraq is a full-fledged "mistake," Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley said more than an hour after it came out. It's a "draft" and "implies withdrawal," which "is not what happening," Milley said after the memo promised the opposite.

A memo from the U.S. to an Iraqi leader of the two countries' joint operations in Baghdad started circulating Monday afternoon. U.S. forces in Iraq would soon be "repositioning," "as requested by the Iraqi Parliament and the Prime Minister," the letter from Brig. Gen. William Seely, U.S. director of Iraqi joint operations, read. "We respect your sovereign decision to order our departure," the letter concluded.

#Breaking: US military tells Iraqi Joint operations command that they are preparing to move out. pic.twitter.com/yqoFiEIHBD
— Mustafa Salim (@Mustafa_salimb) January 6, 2020

Given that Iraq's Parliament had just voted to expel U.S. forces from the country, the letter sounds like the Pentagon was quickly adhering to the decision. And according to The Washington Post reporter Mustafa Salim, the office of Iraq's prime minister also interpreted the letter that way — or at least willfully misinterpreted it — and then leaked it. But as Milley made clear even after some Pentagon officials verified the letter was sent, it was "unsigned" and "it should not have been released" in the first place. Kathryn Krawczyk

-End of Article-​

It was unsigned and the truly exceptional Iraqi caretaker government willfully misinterpreted a draft version. They were the ones that leaked it.

 

[Extremist Frank]

I wouldn't be surprised if it was intentionally "accidentally" released to gauge the Iraqi, Iranian, and Int'l reactions.

 

[LetThemEatCake]

I know I say this a lot in this thread but. 290? Sounds like the number of bombs we should drop on your head. I think the Iran Leadership have become the first official Lolgoats.

I am quite enjoying the autistic number fight. I imagine everyone has their team on it, desperately combing through history to find Muh Symbolic Numbers. It's like a very weird game of angry geopolitical bingo.

 

[Disc]

So this is trending. At ten times the volume of Australia's bushfire tweets right now - and considering half of Australia's on fire right now, that's no small potatoes.

 

[LetThemEatCake]

Rouhani is referencing the Iranian flight that was downed by USS Vincennes.

Yes, I know. 290 people died on it. He's using it as an implied threat though, given it's generally held that the bombing of Pan Am 103 was revenge for that incredible whoopsy-doopsy by the US.

 

[MrTickles]

I'm not interested in the partisan bickering and fake twitter trends here because the real thing is so eventful. Pentagon generals blind sighting the President with an 'accidental' Iraq withdrawal, which becomes a draft even though the document has no draft indicators written on it, followed by a pentagon official resigning followed by the US breaking its signatory UN commitment by blocking iranian diplomat from visiting UN hq, (last time it tried this in 89 against arafat UN threatened to move to geneva and the US promptly backed down-here's hoping trump lets the UN migrate to Beijing). The hilarity goes on to the detriment of cancer ridden uncle sam.

 

[MembersSchoolPizza]

my favorite thing to come from this is realizing Trump is stupid enough to think a tweet counts as an official notice to Congress

That tweet was a response to certain members of Congress complaining that he did not give them forwarning of the strike. Which he is not required to, only within a certain length of time after the fact as a formality.

 

[XYZpdq]

This means that the leaders of two countries are officially having a Twitter spat. How wonderfully mature, and what a great use of technology. Ugh. Wake me when the grown ups arrive.

sorry, two years ago in the cyberfuture shitposting on twitter including caps lock and simpsons gifs became legit tools of statecraft

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

we are not so different, you and I...

Also related to Trumps "lol 52 amirite" I forgot to snitch on BBC World radio services being gay and unrealistic by using "over fifty" rather than citing the exact number

 

[WonderWino]

This just in: MrRepzion is proving what a dumbass he is with this extra hot take

Trump totally did it cause he is insecure guys

Repzion has no fucking clue what he is talking about, as usual