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Israel, USA claim Egyptian missile links with N Korea national |
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news report
 Friday April 04, 2003 11:44 by kokomero
 Will this accusation be used as a pretext to attack Egypt next? While these accusations are not new, their significance is increased given the Al Samoud missiles were one of the pretexts the US/K used for going to war on Iraq. It will be interesting to see if they are trundled out as a pretext for action against Egypt once the war in Iraq is over? How involved is Israel in developing US military strategy and targeting? US and Israeli intelligence sources allege that Western and US technology obtained by Egyptian government-owned companies is being sent to Pyongyang and is adapted and returned as advanced missile components for Egypt's medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) programme. The same Israeli sources claim that Egypt has 'Scud C' missiles with a range of 500km. The missiles Cairo is now developing, the sources said, are believed to nearly double that range. Israeli and US officials differ over the extent of Egypt's missile programme and its threat to the Posted: 23 February 2000 Israel, USA claim Egyptian missile links with N Korea Some sources in Israel and in the USA are concerned about what they believe is the Egyptian transfer of US missile technology to North Korea. US and Israeli intelligence sources allege that Western and US technology obtained by Egyptian government-owned companies is being sent to Pyongyang and is adapted and returned as advanced missile components for Egypt's medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) programme. The same Israeli sources claim that Egypt has 'Scud C' missiles with a range of 500km. The missiles Cairo is now developing, the sources said, are believed to nearly double that range. If Cairo is, with North Korean help, developing an MRBM with chemical and biological warheads, this would threaten Israel. Israeli and US officials differ over the extent of Egypt's missile programme and its threat to the region. A senior Israeli defence source told Jane's Defence Weekly that the differences stem from Washington's appraisal of Egypt as its leading Arab ally in the Middle East. "They don't see Egypt the same way we do. It seems that the US does not want to do anything that will jeopardise its alliance with Egypt," he said. "The project is so important to Egypt that it is prepared to confront the United States on the issue," a US intelligence source said. "They are taking risks." Three Egyptian companies were sanctioned on 23 March 1999 by the US State Department for transferring dual-use US technology and missile components to Pyongyang. "This is quietly becoming a major concern," a former US defence official involved in the issue said. The Clinton administration denied Arab-British Dynamics, Helwan Machinery and Equipment Co and the Kader Factory for Developed Industries the right to export licences for items listed in the 1987 Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), as well as US government contracts for MTCR items. Egypt refuses to abide by the agreement, which bans the export of missiles with a range of more than 300km and a 500kg warhead. "The companies were found to have sent dual-use items banned by the MTCR to North Korea," a State Department official told JDW. A senior congressional analyst said that the Clinton administration has been urged by several members of Congress to impose sanctions on Egypt which receives more than $1.3 billion a year in US military aid. He told JDW that co-operation between Egypt and North Korea, which began in the late 1970s, has increased over the past two years. "We are watching Egyptian companies make all sorts of requests for technology and components and subsystems for its missile programme and transferring them to North Korea," the analyst said. "We are pressing for more to be done but nobody is willing to come out and say this publicly at this time. In 1981, Egypt provided North Korea with a small number of Soviet 'Scud B' missiles, which Pyongyang reverse-engineered to gain knowledge needed for a self-sufficient missile programme," said a November 1999 report by the North Korea Advisory Group, comprised of nine senior members of Congress. "Egypt has co-operated with North Korea in missile development and is reportedly able to produce a version of the 'Scud B' missile." The analyst said the US intelligence community is concerned that technology sent by Egypt has been employed in the North Korean Taepo Dong long-range missile programme. US officials said Pyongyang hopes to export the Taepo Dong 1 medium-range ballistic missile to Iran and eventually other Middle East countries while developing the Taepo Dong 2 missile, with a range of up to 5,500km. Israeli and US intelligence sources told JDW that Egypt is also believed to have sent technology acquired during the Condor missile programme that was ended by Egypt under US pressure in the late 1980s. The Condor project was led by Argentina and included Iraqi co-operation. The Condor had an estimated range of between 800km and 1,000km. US sources said Egypt continued developing the Condor II, or the Vector missile, as well as an improved version of the 'Scud C'. The sources also allege that Egypt has gained access to the No Dong missile and perhaps the Taepo Dong. "I ended up working to help stop the Condor II programme being worked on by Argentina, Iraq and Egypt," Robert Walpole, the CIA national intelligence officer for strategic and nuclear programmes told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on 16 September. "Had it come to fruition, it would have made the No Dong and the Taepo Dong I look like toys. It would have been a much better system." US officials said US Secretary of Defense William Cohen raised the issue of Egyptian-North Korean co-operation during talks in Cairo in mid-1999. Egyptian Defence Minister Hussein Tantawi said Egypt would not agree to the MTCR as long as Israel refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and divest itself of its purported nuclear and other strategic weapons. Israel has asked the USA for the Tomahawk cruise missile as part of any US military compensation for withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Israeli sources said the USA has refused to approve the request, citing restrictions by the MTCR.
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Comments (5 of 5)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5Syria Missile Update, 2000
The Risk Report
Volume 7 Number 1 (January-February 2001).
Syria continues to maintain one of the largest ballistic missile forces in the Middle East. Syria's missile inventory mainly consists of several hundred Scud-B and -C missiles as well as Russian-supplied SS-21 and FROG missiles.
Recent developments
On May 29, 2000, the Israeli daily Ha'aretz reported that Syria had acquired an unknown number of Scud-D missiles from North Korea. The report came on the heels of an April 15 meeting between Syrian and North Korean defense officials in Damascus. According to Israeli sources, the Scud-D has a range of 700 kilometers with a payload of 350-450 kilograms.
In late September 2000, Syria test-launched at least one Scud-D. The missile reportedly flew 600 kilometers and was detected by the Israeli Green Pine anti-ballistic missile radar, an element of the Arrow-2 anti ballistic missile system.
In late December 1999, an Israeli paper reported that Syria was carrying out tests on solid fuel rocket engines.
Foreign Assistance
In an August 2000 report to Congress, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) stated that Syria has "continued work on establishing a solid-propellant rocket motor development and production capability." The CIA also said that "equipment and assistance" from North Korean and Russian entities will "continue to be essential" to Syria's efforts to develop liquid propellant missiles.
It has been reported that in April 1999 China provided Syria with a special aluminum alloy that could be used for missile applications. It has also been reported that North Korea supplied Syria with 10 tons of aluminum powder that North Korea had obtained from China.
For more information see, "Syria: Missile Development," Volume 3, Number 2 (March-April 1997), of the Risk Report.
Please define the difference between 'Pretext' and 'Legitimate Concern'.
A pretext according to the Oxford English dictionary means:
"That which is put forward to cover the real purpose or object; the ostensible reason or motive of action; an excuse, pretence, specious plea. "
Legitimate (adverb)
2. a. Conformable to law or rule; sanctioned or authorized by law or right; lawful; proper.
Concern (verb)
4. a. To be of importance to; to be the concern or business of. (Often with quasi-impers. const., the subject being a phrase or clause.)
The question is under what legal system if any (given the breach of international law in invading Iraq) the US and her allies believe the defence-related internal affairs of states are their business?
Surely if they are legimately concerned with the posession of weapons with trans-national implications (missile range, nuclear/chemical/biological) which are by definition offensive by one state, they should not be blind to the their possession by their own allies.
To be specific Israel possesses weapons in all of these classes, but chooses to define them as defensive weapons.
It must be remembered however that Israel has an interesting interpretation of defence which includes pre-emptive attack (such as that currently underway in Iraq).
Is it safe to leave such weapons in the hands of a state which practices the doctrine of pre-emption? I think not.
If Israels neighbours are disarmed will the state of Israel also disarm and give up such weapons ... I think not!
In the context of Middle East politics, only Zionists have legitimate concerns.
Everybody else hides behind pretexts ... especially the anti-semites .....
http://www.marxists.de/middleast/isrpalndx.htm
Hey kokomero you joker !
"If Israels neighbours are disarmed will the state of Israel also disarm and give up such weapons ... I think not!"
Israel disarm ... ? The mere suggestion of it (even as a rhetorical flourish) !
Have you ever read The Iron Wall, one of the fundamental texts of Zionism written in 1923 ?
"There can be no discussion of voluntary reconciliation between us and the Arabs, not now, and not in the foreseeable future. All well-meaning people, with the exception of those blind from birth, understood long ago the complete impossibility of arriving at a voluntary agreement with the Arabs of Palestine for the transformation of Palestine from an Arab country to a country with a Jewish majority. Each of you has some general understanding of the history of colonization. Try to find even one example when the colonization of a country took place with the agreement of the native population. Such an event has never occurred.
The natives will always struggle obstinately against the colonists – and it is all the same whether they are cultured or uncultured. The comrades in arms of [Hernan] Cortez or [Francisco] Pizarro conducted themselves like brigands. The Redskins fought with uncompromising fervor against both evil and good-hearted colonizers. The natives struggled because any kind of colonization anywhere at anytime is inadmissible to any native people.
Any native people view their country as their national home, of which they will be complete masters. They will never voluntarily allow a new master. So it is for the Arabs. Compromisers among us try to convince us that the Arabs are some kind of fools who can be tricked with hidden formulations of our basic goals. I flatly refuse to accept this view of the Palestinian Arabs.
They have the precise psychology that we have. They look upon Palestine with the same instinctive love and true fervor that any Aztec looked upon his Mexico or any Sioux upon his prairie. Each people will struggle against colonizers until the last spark of hope that they can avoid the dangers of conquest and colonization is extinguished. The Palestinians will struggle in this way until there is hardly a spark of hope.
It matters not what kind of words we use to explain our colonization. Colonization has its own integral and inescapable meaning understood by every Jew and by every Arab. Colonization has only one goal. This is in the nature of things. To change that nature is impossible. It has been necessary to carry on colonization against the will of the Palestinian Arabs and the same condition exists now.
Even an agreement with non-Palestinians represents the same kind of fantasy. In order for Arab nationalists of Baghdad and Mecca and Damascus to agree to pay so serious a price they would have to refuse to maintain the Arab character of Palestine.
We cannot give any compensation for Palestine, neither to the Palestinians nor to other Arabs. Therefore, a voluntary agreement is inconceivable. All colonization, even the most restricted, must continue in defiance of the will of the native population. Therefore, it can continue and develop only under the shield of force which comprises an Iron Wall through which the local population can never break through. This is our Arab policy. To formulate it any other way would be hypocrisy.
Whether through the Balfour Declaration or the Mandate, external force is a necessity for establishing in the country conditions of rule and defense through which the local population, regardless of what it wishes, will be deprived of the possibility of impeding our colonization, administratively or physically. Force must play its role – with strength and without indulgence. In this, there are no meaningful differences between our militarists and our vegetarians. One prefers an Iron Wall of Jewish bayonets; the other an Iron Wall of English bayonets.
To the hackneyed reproach that this point of view is unethical, I answer, ’absolutely untrue.’ This is our ethic. There is no other ethic. As long as there is the faintest spark of hope for the Arabs to impede us, they will not sell these hopes – not for any sweet words nor for any tasty morsel, because this is not a rabble but a people, a living people. And no people makes such enormous concessions on such fateful questions, except when there is no hope left, until we have removed every opening visible in the Iron Wall."
http://www.marxists.de/middleast/schoenman/ch02.htm