EU Attacks Somali pirates... On Land!

EU mans up; strikes Somali pirates on land.

The European Union naval force patrolling the Indian Ocean on Tuesday carried out its first air strikes against pirate targets on shore, with a pirate reporting that the raid destroyed speed boats, fuel depots and an arms store.
Bile Hussein, a pirate commander, said Tuesday the attack on Handulle village in the Mudug region of Somalia's central coastline will cause a setback to pirate operations. The village lies about 18 kilometers (11 miles) north of Haradheere town, a key pirate lair. There were no reports of deaths in the attack.
Maritime aircraft and attack helicopters took part in the attacks early in the morning on the mainland, an EU spokesman said.
The EU is the main donor to the Somali transitional government. It is also trains Somali army troops, and is reinforcing the navies of five neighboring countries to enable them to counter piracy themselves. The long coastline of war-ravaged Somalia provides a perfect haven for pirate gangs preying on shipping off the East African coast.

If anyone can find out more, we'd love to hear about what maritime attack planes were involved, and what ships they were launched from.

By: Brant

Proving That No One Does Stupidity Like The EU

We're going non-military here for a minute... because this is too stupid to ignore. You can ridicule the US Congress for claiming pizza is a vegetable - it's not and we all know it - but at least there are vegetable components to it.

However, the EU has to exceed the US in every known measure of stupidity and is now threatening jail sentences for bottled water companies that advertise that water can prevent dehydration.

EU bans claim that water can prevent dehydration
Brussels bureaucrats were ridiculed yesterday after banning drink manufacturers from claiming that water can prevent dehydration.

By: Brant

Stuck Between the EU and a Hard Place

So you're the EU's "foreign minister"... and you are supposed to represent the organization... but the organization is taking an action that your own government opposes... and now the EU is telling you to make an end run around your own government to implement an EU policy... Man, I'll bet the Baroness never expected these sorts of headaches for what was originally deemed a largely ceremonial position.

The "big five" has told the EU foreign minister that she must set up a European "Operational HQ" by any means necessary, including a legal mechanism, created by the Lisbon Treaty that bypasses a British veto.
William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, threatened in July to veto a proposed military HQ to "command and control" troops, including British forces, taking part in EU operations, such as the current antipiracy naval force off the coast of Somalia.
But in a confidential letter, dated September 2, foreign ministers from the five countries create a powerful alliance against an isolated Britain by pledging their "strong political will to continue" as a "matter of urgency".
"France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Spain remain at your disposal to support your work in this regard," says the letter to Lady Ashton, seen by The Daily Telegraph.
"We believe it remains the most comprehensive basis for further work on all the issues: capabilities, including civil-military planning and conduct capability, battle groups and EU/Nato relations."

By: Brant

Dutch Marines Captured In Libya

Rescue missions aimed at extracting foreign nationals from Libya are not without risk for the rescuers, as a Dutch helicopter crew recently discovered.

Talks are under way to free a Dutch helicopter crew captured in Libya trying to evacuate foreign citizens, the Netherlands' defence ministry says.

The three marines landed their Lynx near the port of Sirte on Sunday, flying in from the Dutch warship Tromp, which is anchored off the Libyan coast.

"Intensive negotiations" were under way, a ministry spokesman said.

The ministry was in contact with the marines who were "doing well under the circumstances", he added.

"We hope they will be released as quickly as possible," Otte Beeksma told the Associated Press news agency.

Asked if the Dutch government considered the marines hostages, he replied: "They are being held by Libyan authorities."

Two people the marines were trying to rescue - one Dutch person and another European - were captured but have since been released and have left Libya, Dutch media say.

By: Shelldrake

Order Of Battle: EuroCorps

Ah yes, the vaunted EuroCorps...

Eurocorps is a multinational army corps within the framework of the Western European Union common defence initiatives. Headquartered in Strasbourg, France, the force was established in 1992 and declared operational in 1995, though it draws from European defence initiatives as far back as the 1960s.
Five countries participate in Eurocorps as "framework nations": Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg and Spain. A further seven countries have pledged troops or contribute operational staff: Austria, Greece, Italy, Poland, Romania, Turkey, and the USA. Most of these countries are members of the EU (with the exception of Turkey and the USA) and of NATO (with the exception of Austria).
Eurocorps comprises approximately 1,000 soldiers stationed in Strasbourg and up to 60,000 troops pledged for deployment in EU or NATO rapid-response missions. The nucleus of the force is the Franco-German Brigade established in 1987.

So there's 60,000 troops pledged - corps-sized, got it. But only 1000 actually assigned? What's in that 1000? Let's consult the official Eurocorps website.

Multinational Command Support Brigade

Besides staff support, these capabilities are: information management, communications, command and control information systems within the HQ and between the headquarters and subordinate units, other supporting functions necessary to ensure the deployment, the strengthening and the protection of the headquarters' echelons and finally Real Life Support (RLS) such as food, lighting, ablutions, fuel, office equipment and administration.

The Multinational Command Support Brigade (MNCS Bde) is under direct Command of COMEC and performs its daily activities with the HQ Spt Bn and the CIS Coy, that are its only subordinated units.

Headquarters Support Battalion

Headquarters Company (HQ Coy)

This company provides Moral and Welfare (MWA), Billeting, In/Out processing, Laundry services, including campament material and sanitarian products, warehouse services, food, supply and storage to support the deployment. Catering and messing are provided in garrison in peacetime and for the EC CPs and the Home Base during operations. The company is also responsible for the storage of light weapons for EC HQ personnel in garrison and is able to support the Home Base and two CPs in terms of medical matters.

Transport Company (Trans Coy)

Under MNCS Bde guidance, the Trans Coy organizes the transportation of EC HQ personnel and their personal equipment during high and low intensity operations. It provides specialized transportation and a shuttle system using busses. The company executes the maintenance of all kinds of equipment (vehicles, weapons, NBC equipment, signal assets, power generators).

CP set-up Company (CP Coy)

The Coy is able to setup two EC CPs (ADV/RSC). It performs the CP's physical security by establishing an inner perimeter depending on the concept imposed. Training on fire prevention and fire fighting capacity is conducted by the CP Setup Coy.

So yeah, right now, the 60,000 strong EuroCorps, has a firefighting team, some commo weenies, and a bunch of truck-drivers assigned full-time.

By: Brant

GrogNews Daily Headlines

Is ASSange fighting a war on 'secrecy'? If so, where are the deep, dark, diplomatic secrets of anyone not named "United States of America"? Meanwhile, Sweden is upholding their warrant and wants him in connection with a rape case.

Wow. The South Koreans had advance intel on Nork attack? Ooof. We're also finding out about the Norks' tempestuous relationship with China.

Israel refuses to talk about building with the Palestinians, which Abbas considers to be not talking about anything.

The EU says they need to spend more to fight terrorism.

Ah, so Chavez and Cuba are the Axis of "Mischief"?

The DoD is trying to get together a group hug for the tanker contract. Good luck with that.

There are clashes in Africa after the Ivory Coast's recent election.

There's a US soldier in jail in connection with the Afghanistan "death squad" investigation.

By: Brant

GrogNews Morning Headlines

So there are reports of Karzai's office getting "bags of cash" from the Iranians, which the Karzai government says is completely legit. Really? Then why go through all the trouble of defending it?

The EU is deploying to the Balkans again. This time, they're trying to help defend the Greek border against an invasion of illegal kimmigrants. Hmmmm...

China is trying to use the WikiLeaks drama to bang on the US about human rights. Really? Let's talk Tibet there buckos. Oh, and let's talk about locking up political dissidents before we ever talk about the US letting a sovereign nation govern themselves. And the rest of tbe world is piling on after the WikiLeaks allegations, too.


Muslims attacking Muslims in Pakistan again.

By: Brant

Danish Navy Celebrates 500th Anniversary

The Royal Danish Navy is 500 years old this year. The Dane's small navy has been an effective participant in the campaign against Somali pirates; recently, a Danish destroyer sank a pirate mothership.

Hundreds of people and 21 ships assembled at Copenhagen Harbour yesterday to celebrate the Royal Navy’s 500th anniversary.

Queen Margrethe II hosted the festivities, joined by her husband Prince Henrik and the Crown Prince and Princess on the deck of the warship Absalon, back from its pirate-battling mission in the Gulf of Aden.

A short ceremony for Crown Prince Frederik was also held during the celebration, officially promoting him to the rank of navy captain.

The large crowd included many navy veterans, some of whom served during the Second World War. But their grandchildren and great-grandchildren also watched the parade of giant ships in awe from the pier, plugging their ears for the 27 canon shots fired as a salute to the queen.

Of the 21 ships in the harbour, 18 were Danish. But during the course of the week, around 30 foreign ships – including the historic Amerigo Vespucci cutter – are expected to sail through the city’s harbour. Events in connection with the Navy’s 500th anniversary are scheduled up until the end of October.

According to most history books, the Danish Royal Navy was founded during the reign of Queen Margrethe I in the early 1400s.

By: Shelldrake

A400M takes off, lands, manages to avoid cost over-runs for a day

Following up our earlier story, the A400M made a successful and safe flight , and managed to land without going another $17b over budget in the process.

The much-delayed Airbus A400M military transporter made its inaugural test flight on Friday, as the seven governments backing it put off committing additional funds to the €20 billion project for at least another month.

Shortly after the plane completed the three-hour-and-47-minute flight at an airport outside the Spanish city of Seville, the German deputy defense minister, Rüdiger Wolf, told reporters that the countries — Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Spain and Turkey — had agreed to a final set of specifications and requirements, which they had set down in a confidential letter presented Friday to Airbus and its parent company, European Aeronautic Defense & Space.

By: Brant

EU Training Somalis?

There's a report that the EU may send a training team to Somalia

The European Union plans to send some 100 troops to Uganda next year to train Somali government forces who are fighting Islamist insurgents, European officials said on Tuesday.

The mission still needs final approval but could start in the first half of next year, and is likely to be led by Spain, which takes over the EU presidency for six months from January.

French Defence Minister Herve Morin said Paris intended to contribute 30 soldiers. Spain has also committed troops and Britain, Slovenia, Hungary and Greece may also contribute.

"We agreed today that the EU as a whole can participate ... but we will take this decision in the next weeks when we have an operational plan," said Cristina Gallach, spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

"It can be done rather quickly."

The intention is to train up to 2,000 Somali troops, which will complement other training missions and bring the total number of better-trained Somali soldiers to 6,000.

View Larger Map

By: Brant

Guess What? Another Hijacking!

Somali pirates now have a Greek merchant tanker:

Somali pirates have seized another ship, a Greek bulk carrier, despite a large international naval presence in the waters off their lawless country, a regional maritime group said on Wednesday.
The vessel was the second they have taken since the weekend's spectacular capture of a Saudi supertanker carrying $100 million of oil that was the largest hijack in history.
It was the latest attack in a wave of Somali piracy this year that has driven up insurance costs, made some shipping companies change their routes and prompted an unprecedented military response from NATO, the European Union and others.
'The pirates are sending out a message to the world that we can do what we want, we can think the unthinkable, do the unexpected',' Andrew Mwangura, coordinator of the East African Seafarers' Assistance Programme, told Reuters in Mombasa.
His group said the Greek ship was taken on Tuesday in the Gulf of Aden with between 23 and 25 crew on board. This followed the hijacking of a Hong Kong-flagged ship carrying grain and bound for Iran.

No word what's on the tanker, but since the Somalis already have 30+ tanks, a tanker of fuel, a boatload of wheat, maybe they've got irrigation pipes, or a disassembled hospital, or a load of toxic Chinese toys.

By: Brant

EU finally steps up to anti-piracy mission

The European Union is finally bothering to sanction a mission off the coast of Somalia:

The European Union's anti-piracy operation off the coast of Somalia - its first-ever naval mission - will begin on December 8, France's defence minister said on Wednesday.
Five or six warships will begin patrolling the pirate-infested waters of the Gulf of Aden from that date, said Herve Morin, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency.
The EU's operation dubbed EUNAVOR will include contributions from several countries including France, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands and Spain, with Portugal, Sweden and non-EU nation Norway also likely to take part.

By: Brant

Georgia-South Ossetia, Round 2 coming?

Apparently the South Ossetians are feeling their oats, flush with Russian-imported confidence. There's word that militants are crossing the interior cease-fire lines monitored by the EU:

Georgian officials say about 70 militants from the breakaway province of South Ossetia illegally entered a village in Georgia.
Shota Utiashvili, a spokesman for Georgia's Interior Ministry, said Sunday that the armed militants began to enter Perevi, a village of about 1,000 people, on Saturday. It sits on the western border of the breakaway region of South Ossetia.
The European Union's observer mission in Georgia voiced concern about the situation, saying the move could exacerbate tensions in the area.
South Ossetia's separatist leader, Eduard Kokoity, said that part of the village is located in South Ossetia and its forces legitimately entered it, the Interfax news agency reported.
Utiashvili said that the gunmen had not attacked civilians, but some of the village residents fled fearing violence. He said that Georgian authorities have protested the intrusion to the European Union observers who are deployed in Georgia to monitor a French-brokered truce that ended Russia's war with Georgia in August.

By: Brant

EU to Congo: Here We (Might) Come to Save the Day!

The EU is talking about sending troops to the Congo:

The European Union would send troops to the Democratic Republic of Congo as a last resort if the existing United Nations force needs to be reinforced and peace efforts fail, a British minister said on Saturday.

Well, they apparently need to be reinforced by at least one Spanish commander.

One only hopes they send actual troops, though, rather than Mad Mike Hoare and 5 Commando


By: Brant

Updates
The British have landed!:

David Miliband faced the toughest diplomatic challenge of his career yesterday as he departed on an emergency Anglo-French peace mission to end the violence in eastern Congo.
Mr. Miliband and his French counterpart, Bernard Kouchner, flew to Congo and Rwanda at just a few hours notice as warnings grew of a “humanitarian catastrophe” with tens of thousands of civilians fleeing fighting, looting and raping by armed groups.
“The situation is catastrophic, there is no other word,” Pierre Emmauel Ducre, the Red Cross’ spokesman in the Democratic Republic of Congo said as fresh reports emerged that Rwandan-backed Tutsi rebels had forced 50,000 civilians from the camps where they had taken refugee and burned them to the ground.

Ukraine Volunteers for EU Force; Putin Spit Take Sprays Coffee on Newspaper

So apparently the Ukrainians are volunteering to join an EU battle group, despite not belonging to the EU, and knowing that it'll probably tweak the Ruskies (which may be a bonus):

Ukraine has formally broached the possibility of joining an EU battle group, a suggestion that would, if approved, make Ukraine only the third non-EU country – after Norway and Turkey – to be incorporated into the military system, European Voice reported.
The topic was raised at a meeting on 29 October between the commander-in-chief of Ukraine`s armed forces, Serhiy Kyrychenko, and the chairman of the EU Military Committee (EUMC), General Henri Bentégeat.
The current concept of the EU`s battle groups is relatively new, and the EU`s 15 battle groups reached full operational capacity only in January 2007. Battle groups rotate actively, so that two are ready for deployment at all times.
Ukraine has already held consultations with Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia, which are considering forming a battle group. There were also been consultations with the commanders of the armed forces of Greece regarding a Ukrainian contribution of the EU battle group Helbrok, in which military units from Bulgaria, Cyprus, Romania and Slovenia also participate. Helbrok was on deployment during the second half of 2007 and might be deployed again in the first half of 2009.

Boy, I can't imagine the Russians enjoying this one at all.

By: Brant

EU Standing Military Getting Closer?

Britain's new defense secretary won't make a lot of friends on the glorious isle with his support for a standing EU military force:

The freshly appointed UK defence secretary has publicly supported the idea of a European army, a key ambition of the French EU presidency.
Speaking to the country's Sunday Times newspaper yesterday (26 October), John Hutton, who took on the defence portfolio on 3 October, was asked about the prospects for an EU force.
He said: 'I think we've got to be pragmatic about those things. I think that's perfectly sensible. France is one of our closest allies, and the French believe very strongly in this type of role. If we can support it, we should.'
French President Nicholas Sarkozy, whose country currently chairs the EU's six-month rotating presidency, wants the bloc's existing military framework to have a new headquarters and each member state to commit 1,500 troops to rapid reaction forces.

So is this being supported on its own merits, or because they're trying to play nice with the French?

By: Brant

Corruption Investigation Snares Brits

A forthcoming report has a few unflattering things to say about British contractors and their government oversight of their contracts:

The report, by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), is thought likely to attack Britain's record on prosecuting companies and individuals who have allegedly paid bribes to foreign officials in order to secure contracts.
The OECD's anti-bribery working group began its review following the Serious Fraud Office's decision in 2006 to end its investigation into BAE's Al Yamamah contract with Saudi Arabia. Earlier this year the Law Lords rules that the SFO acted lawfully in stopping the probe on national security grounds.

It's not that they're the only ones bribing Middle Eastern officials for arms deals. They're just the only ones that got caught.

By: Brant