http://www.gq.com/news-politics/big-issues/201101/the-dubai-job-mossad-assassination-hamas?printable=true
A friend of mine that worked with various "specialists" from around the world once told me Mossad agents would kill their own mothers for the state. I guess they have their ups and downs.
You have to watch those Isrealies, they are a tricky bunch, Saudi Arabia is on to them though:
Not exactly the same, but we had Spooks in the sub service. These were higher rank officers with very high clearances, usually wearing enlisted clothing.
When the Italian Communists were displeased with the presence of a nuclear sub in their port they staged a rally at the head of the pier. Threats were made, weapons were handed out but no one on our side popped out the hatch.
The CO brought these guys into a very small room, handed a 45 to someone and said "If you hear the word to "Repel Boarders", shoot these people.
They knew a lot.
I grew up a bit that day. 
"The sequence of events described here is based largely on the exhaustive investigation conducted by the Dubai chief of police, Lieutenant General Dhahi Khalfan Tamim."
I would guess an A+ job would have been where everyone thought it was natural causes. You know, for a guy like that on vacation, that would be hookers, booze and coke. An F would be where the guy lives (or wrong guy whacked) and the team is caught, like mentioned in the article with the Norwegian Ooopsie. So, I'd give this one a B. Dead target, escaped team, but blown operation after the event with political fallout. Maybe a B-. It's pretty easy to nit-pick things like 2 guys standing around for 4 hours with tennis rackets in the lobby, but at the time, no one noticed. And there were over 20 people in country on this job. That's a lot of coordinating and a lot of potential for loose ends.
An A- or B+ job was when someone whacked the long range artillary expert guy. Can't remember his name, but cannons were his life's work. I think he was Canadian. No one here wanted his super cannons, so he sold them to whoever he could. He designed Saddam H's cannons, which could shoot further than our cannons. He was building Saddam a super cannon capable of hitting anything, including Isreal and maybe putting something in orbit when for some unknown reason, he turned up dead with like 8 22LR bullets in the back of his head in front of his apartment door.
914Driver wrote: Not exactly the same, but we had Spooks in the sub service. These were higher rank officers with very high clearances, usually wearing enlisted clothing. When the Italian Communists were displeased with the presence of a nuclear sub in their port they staged a rally at the head of the pier. Threats were made, weapons were handed out but no one on our side popped out the hatch. The CO brought these guys into a very small room, handed a 45 to someone and said "If you hear the word to "Repel Boarders", shoot these people. They knew a lot. I grew up a bit that day.
Spooks are everywhere. Good ones don't even let on that they're there.
Tom Heath wrote: Spooks are everywhere. Good ones don't even let on that they're there.
Bad ones drive around Miami in conspicuous black Dodge Chargers.
the first duty station for me was a Guided Missile Cruiser... on station in the Med....
at the time ( late '60's) the cold war tensions were running pretty high and we (Americans) weren't well liked in many places (not much different from today)
one liberty port was Izmir Turkey..... the students were rioting (somewhat violently) "against" Americans.... rocks and bottles etc any time they saw anything that was American.... the only liberty we were allowed was by armored bus to the AF base
but there was one day where (in conjunction with the AF boys) we were invited on a staged wild boar hunt......
shoot guns, M1 Garand's , M14's etc were issued ... there were hundreds of "students" waiting for us behind the barricades ...... as we exited the busses you've never seen people disappear like those folk... one moment they were there the next they were gone
amazing what real weaponry can do as a deterrent 
I could tell you but I would have to ......
( I was never here, you didn't see anything)
Dr. Hess wrote: IAn A- or B+ job was when _someone_ whacked the long range artillary expert guy. Can't remember his name, but cannons were his life's work. I think he was Canadian. ... he turned up dead with like 8 22LR bullets in the back of his head in front of his apartment door.
That would be Gerald Bull
BTW, the Mossad sometimes used Beretta pocket pistols chambered for .22 Short. It seems that bunches of little bitty bullets, fired in rapid succession by multiple shooters at contact distance can be very effective and relatively quiet.
Rumor has it the Israelis use a .22 round similar to the Aguila SSS for certain jobs as well.
Small caliber weapons have always been effective for the types of operations we are discussing here because quite frankly as slantvaliant mentioned they tend to be up close and personal where a larger caliber just isn't needed. Actually if you watch the movie "Spy Game" there are some very good points in there about how a well operated spook would work. There is one scene where they are starting training and "Boy Scout" is told that most of the time all he will need is basically his brain and I think it was a lighter (way to break the ice). I also liked that they used him being a photographer as his cover at one point (fairly common along with various researchers). Many people only know of spies what they see in a James Bond movie.
I remember on one photography forum we had gotten into a discussion about taking photos of locations and being hassled by security or police (this is becoming a larger problem and several photographers have been arrested for taking photos in the wrong places). Anyway the discussion got into the realm of how to beat the security and I wrote a post describing methods and tactics for "covertly" obtaining the photos they wanted while avoiding detection or even how to evade security officers that might try and take your gear (trust me it happens). Anyway you would not believe the uproar that post created I had people calling me a spy, a terrorist and who knows what else. Others then came to my defense basically saying that all I had written was tactics that are commonly used and know, and that they could be looked up easily on the internet. Several that came to my defense were photojournalists that had used some of the same tactics in their daily work. 
914Driver wrote: Not exactly the same, but we had Spooks in the sub service. These were higher rank officers with very high clearances, usually wearing enlisted clothing. When the Italian Communists were displeased with the presence of a nuclear sub in their port they staged a rally at the head of the pier. Threats were made, weapons were handed out but no one on our side popped out the hatch. The CO brought these guys into a very small room, handed a 45 to someone and said "If you hear the word to "Repel Boarders", shoot these people. They knew a lot. I grew up a bit that day.
I just got done reading a book about sub Spooks. The Ivy Bell and Golmar Explorer missions were heady stuff.
I saw on the history channel about a month ago, the guy that found the titanic basically did that while being a spook. He knew the technology needed to find the wreck, but couldn't fund it. Enter the US gov't. They really needed to find a sunk soviet sub with nukes. He secretly finds the two subs the gov't wanted, then used the equipment to find the titanic. Either he was a very shrewd man, or extremely luck(maybe both).
Glomar Explorer. I used to take the launch past it twice a month in Long Beach, before they scrapped it.
In reply to Appleseed:
Could you post the title? I need some fresh reading material, that sounds interesting as hell!
I had to work with an unknown agency in Iraq for awhile. I would get a call, no name or greeting, telling me to go pick up one of my Linguists at the front gate. I would, and when I got back to my building there would be a truck waiting. Again, not a single introduction, wave, or anything. They only thing they ever told me was, "That's close enough Sarge". My linguist would disappear for a few days, and then just appear again. Then one day they called me and told me to fire him. And when I hadn't done it the next day, an E-7 walked down and made colorful threats if I didn't get done in one hour.
Great read though. Mossad is one of those almost mythic groups, you know they can't be as good as you've heard. I guess this proves any agency can make mistakes.
You'll need to log in to post.
