Nobody saw her coming. Not even satellites. The transponders that were supposed to signal it to the other side of the Universe were strictly turned off. I turned it back on almost by mistake close to the Saras, a reverent homage to the "oil god". After all, the route is exactly that of black gold. This time, however, on that ship, with the indecipherable hieroglyphics of Arabia, there is something else entirely. The mission is covered like few others. When the offshore telegraph makes the first radio communications towards the mainland you have the immediate perception that something is about to happen in the Gulf of Angels.

Fake technical stop

The “vergato” just written is ambiguous: technical stop at Porto Canale in Cagliari. In reality, the commander had had the mooring coordinates with him for some time and knew perfectly well where to dock that giant of the seas. The first sun had already cast its dawn on the lagoon, the salt of Santa Gilla had already been white for a while when, with the indifference of a deflated dinghy, the gigantic blue ship plows through the funnel of the former Container Terminal escorted like never before by pilots and tugs. They would have wanted to hide it, along with its cargo. The ropes, in fact, hook it to the end of the port, in the busiest dock, the bulk dock, despite the fact that they have no durum wheat stowed on board.

Ship of death

The "Arabic" writing stands out on a 220 meter long side, as an indelible mark of a foreign power that has just landed on the land of Sardinia: Bahri Jedda. The symbol printed on the flag that beats on the breeze of Macchiareddu, for professionals, is an indelible mark: Saudi Arabia. Not just a commercial company, but rather an imposing fleet of state ships destined for the most disturbing of traffics: those of death. The justifications for that sudden docking multiply, from refueling to checking for anomalies on board. The first documents that end up in our hands, however, tell a completely different story. Not just any ship, not a provenance like others, not a load of twigs.

Five years of blockade

The memory stops at five years ago, May 2019, when the twin, the Bahri Tabuk, crossed Giorgino to collect tons of death, loaded into steel casings to explode on schools, hospitals, children, women and men in the poorest and the distant edge of the world, Yemen. Since then, the global uprising of consciences against that arms trafficking imposed another agenda on international politics and on the Italian state itself. Everything stopped, almost by magic, from the United States to Italy. An unexpected stop to a real genocide that was taking place with the bombs "branded" Sardinia, produced in poor Sulcis by rich Germany, to be sold to the very rich Saudi Arabia which was exploding them without appeal against the "extremely poor" populations of Yemen.

The about-face

Italy was forced to revoke those sales contracts between Rwm, the Sardinian arm of the German Rheinmetall, due to violations of the law which prevented the export of war material from its territory to states at war, such as Saudi Arabia in that case. The United States did the same, despite the greed of the American war industry driven by an unrestrained Donald Trump . Five years later, with a Middle Eastern war poised between regional and global conflict, Italy and the United States resume funding, in general silence, one of the most aggressive and warmongering powers in the Middle East, the "compulsive" regime of the "sovereign ” Saudi Mohammed bin Salman , the same one who a few years ago had ordered the bombing of schools and hospitals in Yemen.

“Secret” trip

The "secret" journey, the "canceled" satellite surveys, the spent fuel stratagems come to light on international investigative data that leaves no doubt. The ship, unlike the missions of five years ago, this time did not arrive from the Middle East, on the contrary. The reports in our possession record an unprecedented starting point: the Black River in North Carolina, the largest arsenal base in the United States of America, Sunny Point, the military ocean terminal. From here, in this strip of sea wedged south of Washington, all the weapons for the great wars began, from Vietnam to Iraq. On April 24, according to confidential reports, the ship left the ocean coast to head towards the "gap" of Gibraltar, the gateway to the Mediterranean.

16 day gap

In the documents, however, there is a gap of 16 days, where two fictitious stages appear, those of Baltimore and Genoa, both of which were not received, canceled with a hyphen. In their place, they don't write it, but there is Cagliari, the undeclared stage, denied and camouflaged by a surreal "technical stop". When the first telephoto lenses begin to scrutinize the hold of the "Persian Blue" ship, it becomes clear that when it docks at the bulk dock it is not empty. The waterline reveals a "heavy" load, from every point of view. And it certainly hasn't loaded any wheat into the American arsenal. That the "technical" stop in the port of Giorgino was a diversion to mislead is understood when on the "Pedemontana", the one furthest from prying eyes, the first anonymous trucks begin to pass by, without a single sign, but with a recognizable small car at the later equipped with silent and invisible flashing light, to be used only in emergency cases. The entry into the Macchiareddu flyover, towards a free zone that never took off, is confirmation of what was taking place close to the Gulf of Angels. They could camouflage everything, but not that symbol as eloquent as a confession: 3 , or explosive load, the most powerful, the most dangerous.

Giorgino's Marines

In the armored gate of the Canal Port, on the bulk side, the agents of a private company are dressed like the Marines of Sunny Point , with the difference that here the only incursions are those of the acrobatic patrols of " Genti Arrubia ", the flamingos of Santa Gilla in pink trim. The concern is for that camera that enters his house, revealing that secret that should have remained a secret. Proof queen, without the possibility of denial, for those who aimed to hide everything. In an instant all the "justice" in uniform rushes onto the port arena to collect the useless complaints of those who did not want to be classified. The tension is sky-high, but the phone calls with the higher-ups suggest that it is not advisable to identify who is responsible for identifying facts and misdeeds in Sardinia.

2000 bombs

On the containers, on board the Bahri Jedda they will load no less than a dozen of 36 thousand kilos each, there is a total potential of two thousand bombs, those used by Bin Salman against the ramshackle school buses of Sana'a, the capital of Yemen. For two days the ship was surrounded. Army, Navy and other helicopters take flight. After five years of revocation of authorizations, Italy, with the input of the Council of Ministers last July, has reinstated, to the great joy of the German armourers, a contract for the sale of bombs for a colossal sum of 400 million euros per year. Saudi Arabia. Nothing matters if the Middle Eastern scenario can reverse in an instant, as recent events have demonstrated.

Security risk

Certainly the resumption of the export of weapons from Sardinia to that theater of war raises not only an important moral issue, but also one of security, given that Iran and the Houthi rebels have repeatedly called Italy into question. There is a theme, that of the potential "prospective" conflict, which should have suggested to the Italian State to refrain from "providing" with new supplies a regime which is certainly not characterized by a democratic and pacifist spirit. Arming with 400 million euros of bombs produced in Sardinia a regime that had journalists killed, see the dramatic end of Jamal Khashoggi, blown to pieces in the Saudi embassy in Turkey, or the criminal violence against the defenseless Yemeni populations, means not taking account of the scenario and the dangerous repercussions.

Cagliari & Red Sea

One thing is certain: in these hours the American government is making every effort, Joe Biden in particular, to support the blocking of the sending of weapons to the Middle East, to Israel in particular. In the early hours of this morning, however, first in the port of Alexandria in Egypt and then in that of Jeddah, in the heart of Saudi Arabia, a ship loaded with death will arrive. With a disturbing journey: Sunny Point, Cagliari, up to Middle Eastern hell. The war industries, it is demonstrated, count more than conscience and common sense. From today Sardinia returns to being a crossroads of weapons, a nefarious bridge between the United States and the Red Sea.

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