Persian Gulf & Middle East Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

TerraN_EmpirE said:

Okay a much clearer screen shot yeah that is an Abrams but again no proof of absolute destruction only knocked out with a figure leaving the tank.

Click to expand...

Two men successfully exit the turret : the first man comes out of the turret @1:42, the second man comes out @1:57, the first man can be seen running away from the tank (on the right) @2:03
So, there are at least two survivors.

There is no fire coming out of the driver's hatch, it is an error of perspective, the fire is on the ground behind the tank. The driver was the furthest away from the point of impact, if he could exit the tank through his hatch, he should have survived the attack.

In my opinion, three survivors very likely and the tank is “recoverable”?. Impressive fire, though.


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Pakistan purchasing eight submarines of the class S20 China


(Defensa.com) The Pakistan government had signed a purchase agreement with China for a total of eight submarines of diesel / electric propulsion of the S20 class, which is the export variant of the Yuan class, but endowed with the system AIP (Air Independent Propulsion).

The agreement would have been signed during a meeting in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, between the president of the company macro China Shipbuilding & Offshore International Company Limited (SCOC) and Minister of Finance (Hacienda) Pakistan, Ishaq Dar. Under the agreement, Pakistan would effect the payment in up to four installments. Deliveries, whose dates have not been specified, help to strengthen the Pakistani fleet in naval defense planning understands that having a powerful submarine fleet would be the best deterrent to increasing the fleet from neighboring India.

Pakistan currently has a fleet of five submarines of French design, two are from the Hashmat class, built in France, which are basically the Agosta class, as has the Spanish Armada. Later, in 1994, a contract whereby DCN, the state-owned shipbuilding gala (now DCNS), developed for Pakistan improved the earlier version was signed. In this new class, the French designated Agosta 90B and the client as Khalid class, was built three, the first in Cherbourg in 1999, and then two others in Karachi (Pakistan) in 2002 and 2006 with assistance from the French company. Note that the French technical team traveled to Karachi was the subject of a suicide bombing that killed 11 French engineers and two Pakistanis, in addition to the bomber, the May 8, 2002.

The idea of reinforcing material submarine fleet with China is not new, in fact, Beijing is the main supplier of defense equipment to Pakistan, and it is clear that the Pakistan Navy will have to limit its operating life, like Spain, two Agosta class submarines and submarine commissioned needs several years to run. Turning to the Asian media information, review the contract logically would include the training of crews and technical staff of Pakistan and a wide technical and logistical support.

Coinciding with the negotiations of the acquisition last May, a Chinese Yuan class submarine, he would have visited the Pakistani port of Karachi. The scale occurred in the course of a deployment of the ship in the Indian Ocean that led to the Gulf of Aden where Chinese forces operating against Somali piracy.

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Syria's Assad 'confident' of Iranian and Russian support
The Syrian President, Bashar al-Assad, has said he is confident he has the continuing support of key allies Iran and Russia.

A fresh push is under way to resolve Syria's four-year conflict, leading to speculation Mr Assad could be forced out to reach a settlement.

But Mr Assad said Russia and Iran did not abandon their friends.

Meanwhile France has said that the "neutralisation" of the Syrian leader was essential to ending the crisis.

French President Francois Hollande said: "We must reduce the terrorist influence without maintaining Assad. The two are bound up together."


Iran and Russia though have maintained he needs to be part of a political solution.

The flurry of diplomatic activity on Syria has followed the recent nuclear deal reached between Iran and world powers.

But Mr Assad, speaking to Al-Manar, a Lebanese TV station run by his Hezbollah allies, said there was no imminent breakthrough in sight.

He said a solution was only possible if the outside world stopped supporting "terrorism", a term he has used to describe both opposition activists and organised jihadist groups.

The BBC Beirut correspondent, Jim Muir, says the positions spelt out by Mr Assad remain unchanged, despite the dire situation his forces face on the ground


Syria's conflict began with anti-government demonstrations in 2011, but morphed into a bloody multi-party conflict that has left more than 250,000 dead.

The UN's envoy to the Syrian crisis, Staffan de Mistura, has proposed a series of consultations between key parties as a means towards formal peace talks.

But in his interview Mr Assad called the UN envoy biased.

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Isis militants routed from village in Northern Iraq by Kurdish forces
Kurdish forces attacked Islamic State insurgents in a cluster of villages in Iraq's northern province of Kirkuk on Wednesday, bent on securing territory they have gained in the course of rolling back the jihadists since last summer.

The assault began overnight south of Daquq, a town about 175 km (108 miles) north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad. The front line between the regional Kurdish peshmerga forces and Islamic State in northern Iraq has hardly budged for months.

The Kurds already control most of the territory they claim as their own, and have little incentive to push further into predominantly Sunni Muslim Arab towns and villages.


Kurdish Peshmerga fighters stand guard on the outskirts of Mosul January 26, 2015.By mid-morning, Islamic State militants had been routed from the village of Albu Najm, according to a source within the peshmerga forces. Fighting continued in another village nearby, he said.

A Kurdish officer with the rank of captain was killed by an improvised explosive device, a source in the Kirkuk morgue said.

The peshmerga have emerged as an important partner for the United States in its aerial campaign against Islamic State.

They have pushed back the ultra-radical Sunni insurgents in northern Iraq, effectively expanding the area of their autonomous region in the process. Large parts of Kirkuk province remain in Islamic State hands.

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Isis in Palmyra: Militants release first images showing destruction of Baalshamin Temple


The militant group has released a series of images purporting to show the destruction of .

Images posted online and shared by Isis-affiliated social media accounts showed fighters, whose faces were cropped out of the photographs, lining the 2,000-year-old monument with explosives.

Explosives can be seen wired together both inside and outside the structure of the building, which experts said was one of the best-preserved and most completely intact examples of Greco-Roman architecture at the ancient site.

Other pictures appeared to show the moment of the detonation, followed by the rubble left behind.


Experts have condemned Isis's destruction of ancient relics in the Syrian city, which was designated a Unesco World Heritage site in 1980.

Unesco's Director-General, Irina Bokova, said the destruction of the Baalshamin Temple was "an immense loss for the Syrian people and for humanity".

She said Isis's practice of "cleansing" other cultures from the lands it occupies amounted to a "war crime".


Staff at the British Museum, who once worked with , said they were "deeply distressed" by Isis's activities at the ancient site, once described as the Pearl of the Desert.

Syria's national antiquities chief, Maamoun Abdulkarim, said Isis blew up the Baalshamin Temple on Sunday. Activists from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the explosives themselves may have been placed around the site as much as month beforehand.

Believed to date back to 17AD, the temple was 500 metres from Palmyra's famous amphitheatre, where Isis murdered more than 20 captive Syrian soldiers after they took the historic town in May.

The temple was dedicated to Baalshamin, the Phoenician sky god associated with storms and fertilising rains – sometimes equated to the ancient Greek god Zeus.


British writer and historian Tom Holland said: “I always feared Baalshamin’s temple was doomed. He was paired with Allat, the only deity to be mentioned in both Herodotus and the Koran – and condemned by name in the latter.”

Mr Abdulkarim said he and other experts had warned that Isis would not be satisfied with .

He said: "We have said repeatedly the next phase would be one of terrorising people and when they have time they will begin destroying temples.

"I am seeing Palmyra being destroyed in front of my eyes."

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The Middle East Is Falling Apart
America isn’t to blame. There's no easy fix



Very long Article see link below:

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World Maritime News said:

An Italian-flagged merchant vessel MV Roberto Rizzo received much needed help from an Italian navy ship ITS Libeccio after it became adrift 55 nautical miles off the coast of Somalia, on Thursday, 18 June.

MV Roberto Rizzo had been en route to China when it issued a distress call, after developing serious engine problems.

Its close proximity to the coast made it vulnerable to potential pirate attack, the statement from the EURNAVFOR said.

As ITS Libeccio’s helicopter hovered overhead while Italian Navy engineers carried out repairs on the stricken engine.

”I wish to express my sincere gratitude to the crew of ITS Libeccio for their timely assistance,’‘ the master of MV Roberto Rizzo, Nicolae Anthofie, said.

MV Roberto Rizzo is a 2009-built, 176,189 dwt Capesize bulk carrier operated by the Napoli-based Rizzo-Bottiglieri-De Carlini.

Click to expand...

So, you are off the coast of Somalia and your engine fails and you are adrift.

Bad place to be adrift if you are a large container/cargo/tanker these days.

Luckily for them, their own Navy's Maestral class frigate, ITS Lebeccio, F572, was near enough to render them aid.

I bet they were glad to see them coming.

Islamic State accused of using mustard gas in the battle around Aleppo in Syria
Doctors say they treated patients with suppurating blisters, raising fears Isil are using chemical stockpiles belonging to Saddam Hussein and Bashar al-Assad


Militants from have been accused of using mustard gas in the battle around ’s shattered second city of Aleppo.

Doctors working in Marea, 25km north of the city, said they had treated more than 30 patients with suppurating blisters in the wake of Isil shelling.

have launched a series of small-scale chemical attacks on Kurdish forces in in recent weeks, raising .

The attack follows a similar one the week before last, in which complained of symptoms similar to .

Photographs from Marea showed a pile of artillery shells, apparently from the site of the attack. “The fact that they are fairly undamaged clearly shows they didn't contain a large explosive payload, which suggests another payload, possibly a chemical agent,” said Elliot Higgins, a British blogger specialising in open source weapons identification.


A doctor working at a Syrian-American Medical Society clinic in Aleppo said that 30 of his patients had experienced blistering, as well as swollen eyes and breathing difficulties. Photographs released later showed bulbous blisters pushing out from a victim's back.

"If they are real, the injury photos look straight out of a textbook," said Colonel Hamish de Bretton Gordon, a chemical weapons expert who advises the British government.

On Friday, US official confirmed that the Isil had used "a class-one chemical agent" against . Military sources had previously told American media that the substance was a mustard agent.

Weapons experts and defence officials have long warned that the security breakdown that accompanied popular protests across the and North Africa has left stockpiles of conventional weapons dangerously vulnerable. The fear now is that the same was true for chemical stockpiles in Iraq and Syria.

As part of its lightning takeover of northern Iraq in June last year, Isil occupied what was once Saddam Hussein's premier chemical-weapons production facility, a complex that still contains a stockpile of old weapons.

Mr Assad is also believed to maintain a stockpile on Syrian soil, despite last year’s highly public handover of what was meant to be the entire supply.

The fear now will be that the weapons can be put to immediate use as part of Isil’s campaign of psychological terror, Mr Bretton Gordon said. “If you have mustard agent, it is already weaponised. If you have got a shell, you can just fire it.”

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Men in Afghan uniforms kill 2 American NATO soldiers in base attack

KABUL, Afghanistan – Two men wearing Afghan National Defense and Security Force uniforms opened fire Wednesday inside a military base in southern Afghanistan, killing two US NATO service members before being shot dead themselves, the international force said.

At the Pentagon Wednesday, Captain Jeff Davis told reporters he would not release their names or service citing notifications of next of kin and a 24 hour waiting period.

NATO offered few details about the shooting in Afghanistan's southern Helmand province, which appeared to be the latest so-called "insider attack" to target foreign troops or contractors in the country. Afghan officials said they had no immediate details about the attack.

In a statement, NATO said the men opened fire on a vehicle with international troops inside it. The forces includes military and border patrol. Both shooters were killed when NATO forces returned fire.

The motive for the attack was not immediately known and no group claimed responsibility for the assault. In past attacks, Taliban insurgents have been known to wear Afghan police or military uniforms to stage attacks on the international troops. Others have opened fire apparently on the own accord, like an Afghan soldier who last year killed Maj. Gen. Harold J. Greene, the highest-ranked U.S. officer to be slain in combat since 1970 in the Vietnam War.

The shooting is the third "insider attack" on foreign forces this year. In January, three American civilian contractors were shot dead at Kabul airport by an Afghan soldier who was also killed. In April, an American soldier was killed by an Afghan soldier inside the compound of the governor of eastern Nangarhar province's city of Jalalabad.

Meanwhile Wednesday, Taliban insurgents overran the Musa Qala district in Helmand province, said Mohammad Sharif Musa, the district's administrative chief. He said Afghan security forces had been resisting the Taliban attack for more than a week.

"We tried hard in the past days to fight the Taliban, but we didn't get any support from the government and finally we lost control of the district," Sharif said.

He said there were casualties among the Afghan security forces, though he couldn't provide casualty figures.

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