Presence of U.S. bombers in England seen as advance signals!!

[AGENDA21]

Snip....

"The need for an element of surprise in any attack on Iran makes it difficult to gage exactly when it might be imminent," he wrote.

Fairford offers two possible advance signals. The first is a more coordinated presence of B-2s at the base. Training for an attack may involve deployments of B-2 aircraft there for a few days to familiarize air and ground crew with the details of combat operations from a new base, according to Rodgers.

"It is likely that the first such exercise took place last week when three B-2s flew into Fairford within a few days in what appears to be the first orchestrated deployment of this kind. This may well be an indicator of training now underway," Rodgers wrote.

The second signal is a sudden increase in base security at Fairford, including the policing of an extended cordon and closure of local roads to minimize any external observation of activities there. If and when that happens, the countdown to war with Iran will almost certainly be well underway. The moment may arrive at any time in the next year or more, quite possibly when it is least expected, according to Rodgers.

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?article_class=3&no=284740&rel_no=1

[magellan]

1. OhMyNews, indeed

Do any Brits here live near Fairford and can verify this? It'd be hard to miss a few B-2s coming in for a landing any time of the day....

[HereSince1628]

2. I was looking for this last month...when is this month's new moon?

Not to say that they aren't just doing a training cycle, but this is more of the sort of saber rattling that pushes choices off the table and leaves both sides with fewer options.

[Theres-a]

3. April 27 nt

[HereSince1628]

6. So about 3 weeks til a completely moonless night

There's still plenty of the infotainment sources time to worry about baseball, missing blondes, and falling cats.

[NYC]

5. New moon. Moon calendar.

http://stardate.org/nightsky/moon/

Looks like April 27th to me.

[acmejack]

4. Doesn't anyone see this as a response to Iran's military exercise?

And their demonstrations of all their new weapons? Coupled with all the pronouncements of US Psyops being undertaken, this seems like it is just a bunch of gamesmanship (I hope). Murtha said that we could be sure that there was no way that they would mess with Iran. I desperately want to believe him!

[HereSince1628]

7. On this Murtha is just an observer, maybe with a better seat

but I doubt they are going to tell anyone accept the leaderships on both sides and I doubt they will do that before the long distance flights are well on their way.

[Squatch]

8. B-2s can strike anywhere in the world from their base in Missouri

Why would they be positioned forward in the UK?

More sabre rattling.

[HereSince1628]

9. They'll need bases for "recovery" of damaged planes.

And they need people trained to be able to "drop in" on a new base and set up operations. England is politically a much better place to do such exercises than Turkey, Kazakstan, or India, where a recovery could take place.

You are right about the planes' flight range, but that's for an intact aircraft.

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. According to Rogers' original article, there are now 4 B2 bases

The critical requirement of avoiding aircrew casualties or prisoners means that a key component of US action would be a strong dependence on the B-2 long-range stealth-bomber. This plane can carry sixteen individually-targeted, highly accurate bombs; thus, a single aircraft can attack sixteen separate targets in just one operation. The basing of the B-2 far from the region is useful in preserving secrecy, but the plane's dependence on specialised servicing equipment to maintain its "stealth" radar-avoidance ability puts the only four bases worldwide where these are available at an absolute premium.

These four bases are in the United States itself, Guam (Pacific), Diego Garcia (Indian Ocean), and RAF Fairford (Gloucestershire, England). The stealth support facilities already available in the first three locations were joined by Fairford, a major United States air force (Usaf) standby base, in December 2004. This serves as a forward operating facility, especially for heavy bombers such as the B-1B, the B-2 and the B-52. In the approach to the Iraq war, Usaf's 457th air expeditionary wing was based at Fairford; fourteen B-52s flew in from Minot (North Dakota) and deployed there for seven weeks while conducting more than a hundred bombing sorties over Iraq.

Fairford underwent a major two-year development and reconstruction programme, completed in May 2002. Another building project started barely a year later to equip the base with a specialised hangar to accommodate the B-2; the fifteen months since its it came into operation have seen occasional visits by individual planes (the B-2's immense costs and specialised facilities means that only twenty-one have been built and perhaps only fifteen can be deployed at any one time).

http://www.opendemocracy.net/conflict/countdown_3426.jsp

I'd have thought it could easily be worth cutting what could be 6000 miles off a round trip. Having said that, I'd have thought Diego Garcia would be more likely to be used - closer, and with no problems about overflying countries that wouldn't support bombing Iran. The B2s in the UK may just be part of a general "ready to bomb anyone, anytime" policy.

[LiberalEsto]

10. Where are the F-14s?

In Iraq, F-14s did bombing runs from Navy ships, many months before the actual invasion. They were "softening" targets - taking out strategic bridges, etc.

Has this been happening in Iran too?

[HereSince1628]

11. In Iraq, there had been US bombing for years. The situation is very

different in Iran. The international community is not going to accept unilateral bombing without huge protests. In Iran, any US bombing raid will be like dropping a lighted match to a puddle of gasoline. If you are going to set such a fire you don't do it with the intention of lighting cigarettes.

[LiberalEsto]

12. According to Sy Hersh's article in the New Yorker:

"Some operations, apparently aimed in part at intimidating Iran, are already under way. American Naval tactical aircraft, operating from carriers in the Arabian Sea, have been flying simulated nuclear-weapons delivery missions—rapid ascending maneuvers known as “over the shoulder” bombing—since last summer, the former official said, within range of Iranian coastal radars."

I wish I'd seen this article before posting my earlier comment.

You're right, Iraq was a differentsituation. In Iraq, Naval planes were enforcing a "no-fly" demilitarized zone - or at least that was the excuse for the target-softening pre-war bombing campaign. They couldn't get away with the same thing in Iran.

[The Stranger]

14. The international community will accept what PNAC tells it to accept.

They could do nothing to stop PNAC's influence and control of the U.S. in leading an unprecedented, unprovoked attack on Iraq, and they will be unable to stop PNAC from doing the same with Iran.

[HereSince1628]

16. They might not stop it, but I doubt they'd accept it.

The balance of support for a unilateral strike is going to be rather different this time, and to allow the US to simply go on attacking and expanding its empire is not something that the EU, Russia or China can continue to do nothing about.

[The Stranger]

17. I don't think they accepted it last time, but there was nothing they could

do about it. Some European countries actually dared to say something and were brutally demonized in the media (remember "Freedom Fries"?) and threatened by the maladministration.

[Squatch]

15. F-14s are being retired this year.

In favor of the F-18 Hornet and F-18E Super Hornet.