"You don't have to move in any way except on a cloudy and covered day." Rigid provisions such as orders are written on a piece of paper that is not quite satin. The letter was intended for the kidnappers of an Afghan diplomatic official who was detained from September 2008 to the end of 2010 in a rented house in the Pakistani city of Peshawar. The uncertain and incomprehensible handwriting has the signature of terror: Osama Bin Laden. The papyrus is in an imposing bundle of secret papers and cables that the CIA, the largest intelligence organization in the world, first seized and then entrusted to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the American department of secret services. The peremptory order of the creator of the attack on the twin towers in New York, that of “not moving except under the clouds”, is cataloged in the chapter: armed kamikaze drones. Immediately after the killing of Bin Laden, on May 2, 2011, the men of Operation Neptune Spear emptied every shell of camp life of the world's number one terrorist. For weeks, American analysts searched far and wide all the recovered digital and paper tracks in search of clues to reconstruct the strategies and movements of the terrorists. A fact emerges with an obsessive concern in the provisions of the supreme leader of al-Qaida: neutralize the action of armed drones in every way, the American ones first of all.

Bin Laden's dream

Then, in those secret papers, Bin Laden's hidden and recounted dream: to own those armed drones to be launched over the border, between supermarkets and squares crowded with people. It is the other face of the endless race for "stray ammunition", those unmanned drones that chase targets for tens of kilometers, capable of hitting the target, as well as ending up on helpless innocent families, hospitals and schools. Yet the race to those ruthless remote-controlled aircraft, launched from the ground, risks revolutionizing conflicts, capable of transforming themselves into a veritable massacre of innocents. They all fled from Afghanistan: the Americans with an escape treaty signed under the aegis of the enemies of Qatar and the Europeans without the need for farce agreements. The Taliban have returned to that disputed land, terrorists in their home, now, however, with the most advanced weapons, those of the West. Bin Laden's dream materializes: state-of-the-art drones, armed with lethal ammunition, in the hands of al-Qaida's great grandchildren. The Latins told it, "Si vis pacem, para bellum", if you want peace, prepare for war. The men of the war industries have translated it into the "gospel": for them the important thing is to produce instruments of death, better if they manage to unleash some conflict, just to fill the large arms market. It matters little if those lethal tools end up on a school bus loaded with children, whether they are Afghans or Yemenis, Westerners or Americans.

Civil extermination

Last August, for example, the Americans, fleeing from Afghanistan besieged by the Taliban, thought they were fighting against that advance by playing guard and robbers. A drone armed with stars and stripes, complete with a missile, first chased and then lacerated a poor man, Ezmarai Ahmadi, an employee of Nutrition and Education International, an international humanitarian aid organization. Together with him an entire family was killed, in all 10 civilians, including 7 children. Biden, the President of the States, in an attempt to make a remedial gesture, offered to repay the Kabul family with compensation. Nothing, however, taught that Afghan overthrow. In the hands of the Taliban, weapons, ammunition, sophisticated equipment complete with night vision goggles, 2000 armored jeeps, airplanes and above all American armed drones have ended up. The great advantage of the Afghan army, which fled like hell, ended up out of the blue in the hands of the Taliban, the enemies of the West. Now the international warning, unheard and ignored, rises from the crystal palace in New York, the headquarters of the UN.

The warning from the UN

To speak is the lawyer Christof Heyns, UN rapporteur for counterterrorism: "With the use of drones fifty years of international law are put at risk". Yet, despite the international community agitating in the face of these new weapons already declared de facto outlawed by the UN, there are those who do not stop before the dream of arming states for remote guided missions, complete with kamikaze drones. It is the new frontier of profitable gains for the military industries, the only ones that in order to multiply their income must "hope" in real wars capable of replenishing, without end, company arsenals and safes. The silent and secret undergrowth of the war industry has already begun the great maneuvers to indulge the hidden dream of generals and warmongers from around the world to equip themselves with armed drones to run around with missiles in the sky in pursuit of terrorists, with the risk of end up on school buses, families and hospitals.

Fake pacifist

It is in this scenario that the secret dossiers bring out acts and contracts that transform a constitutionally pacifist Italy into a fierce competitor in the affair of flying kamikazes. And, as often happens, Sardinia becomes the promised land for these new lethal weapons, capable of annihilating, at considerable distances, all kinds of targets, chasing them and tearing them apart without a tomorrow. Operation Sardinia and kamikaze drones is classified. The most shining article of the Italian Constitution, Eleven, is as clear as few: "Italy repudiates war as an instrument of offense against the freedom of other peoples and as a means of resolving international disputes". Unaware of the sovereign provision, at the end of 2021, in full Covid emergency, before the New Year's Eve, the Government, with the Ministry of Defense, sent an armored decree to the Chambers: title and summary descriptions only. The incipit, however, leaves no room for doubt: ministerial decree A / R n. SMD 6/2021, relating to the purchase of remote guided ammunition for the Special Forces sector. Translated armed drones, loitering ammunitions, stray ammunition. The decree is "urgent", writes the Government. In practice, "kamikaze drones or suicide drones". The purchase mandate is a foretaste: immediately 3.9 million euros. Between the lines of the secret document we read the urgency of the supply: the purchase responds to "immediate operational needs of the Special Operations component "and the" self-defense of Special Forces units isolated in operational theaters. "Which are the operational theaters and where Italy is engaged in borderline missions between war and peace, however, is not known.

Purchase prohibited

Certainly the Constitution, the law of laws, prohibits Italy from any war action, let alone the use of remote-controlled drones not listed in any of the provisions of the United Nations and considered outside any rule of international engagement. It doesn't matter, the Constitution can wait for these purchases. After all, the Defense General Staff has very clear ideas about where and from whom to buy those flying ammunition. Those drones, destined to become a full-fledged weapon to be tested in Sardinian shooting ranges, are Israelis in all respects. The official supplier of the Italian defense is the Israeli Uvision. The armed drones will be theirs: the Hero-30s. The Italian purchase of the “kamikaze” of the sky, capable of making the most irreverent constitutionalists think about military power, hides, however, disturbing backgrounds, on an international scale and beyond, all projected towards Sardinia. The financial, business-military operation is absolutely silent. The Italian delivery is to keep it under wraps, given what happened with the sale of the deadly Mk 82-83-84 bombs to the Saudi regime, used, with impunity, against the defenseless populations of Yemen. In recent days, in fact, an agreement was signed between the Israelis of UVision and the Germans of Rheinmetall. A pact, however, that speaks Sardinian in all respects. In the corporate communications to the German shareholders of the multinational, which owns 100% of the Rwm of Domusnovas, in the South of Sardinia, the news is brief enough: a strategic partnership agreement has been signed with UVision for the development and production of Hero stray ammunition aimed at creating a medium-term joint venture. There is a detail, however: the German parliament has been discussing this type of weaponry for weeks. In the end it was peremptory: no to the production of armed drones in Germany, yes to the production of strictly unarmed patrol and monitoring drones.

Production in Sardinia

The conclusion of the communication is explicit: kamikaze drones will be developed and armed in Sardinia. The message is loud and clear: Sardinia, through the Rwm of Domusnovas, will be the bridgehead to produce what the Germans do not want to produce at home. The aim is to inundate both NATO and Europe's arsenals with "suicide drones". And they declare it openly. Romano Ricca, head of business development at Rwm Italia, said without half words: "The strategic partnership with the Israelis of UVision will be implemented by the subsidiary Rheinmetall Rwm Italia SpA with the aim of addressing the market for this type of weapons. precision in Europe and NATO ». Convinced that he had to sell the "killer drones" to the diners of the German meeting, the Israeli counterpart Dagan Lev Ari, sales and marketing director of UVision, was more explicit: "Our Hero (the armed drone that will be produced in Sardinia) can be launched from ships during amphibious landings of the marines. Ships can fire Hero ammunition 20 km from the coast out of range of anti-tank guided missiles and behind tall buildings ». How to say: buy them that are safe, you can use them with the ease of a water gun. In the meeting in Bonn last week, the men of Rheinmetall, the masters of the Sardinian Rwm, tried to mitigate the impact with the German public opinion: "the type of weapon with stray ammunition can be used both in low intensity with various threats, such as from the civilian environment, both in high intensity fights against an equal or even superior opponent ».

More drones for everyone

The Berlin managers, however, were explicit: do not worry, the operation concerns the Sardinian plant of the Rwm. The Germans like to win easy: they earn millionaires and an intact conscience, so poor Sulcis will take care of producing the kamikaze drones. Unemployment and low-cost quarterly hiring in Sardinia are also fertile ground for German war industries. Therefore, more killer drones for everyone, they are so much made in Sardinia. Just as bin Laden dreamed of.

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