Gal Hirsch and his "Defensive Shield" sent Georgians to their death - unprepared - IDF secrets are now in the hands of the Russians.

Shortly after the outset of the foolhardy attacks on South Ossettia we posted Monday, August 11, 2008 Israel's part in arming Georgia, and the risky game of Russian Roulette they have been playing .

Brigadier General (Res.) Gal Hirsch was the inept and vainglorious commander of Division 91 in the IDF. He resigned (?) after the Almog Committee (which preceded Winograd) named him as responsible for the kidnapping of IDF soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev at the outset of the Second Lebanon War in July 2006.

Now if a source of ynet named "Tomer" (said to be from an elite IDF unit - are there any that are not "elite" ?)is to be believed, he was working for Brig.-Gen. Hirsch's Defensive Shield, a company of mercenaries owned and operated by Brigadier General (Res.) Gal Hirsch, to help train Georgian soldiers he fucked up big style.

Not only for himself, his company but for the IDF and effectively the State of Israel and it's citizens.

Tomer and his colleagues were initially briefed about what could be revealed to the Georgians , covert mterials to be used etc . ...effectively he claims, the Georgians were told top secret information.

"When I arrived in the operations room I saw a book of IDF safety instructions that shouldn't have been there," he said. "There were IDF CDs that explicitly said, 'Confidential' documenting army activities, charts from special units' operations, and officers' names." He added that the room was not guarded, making this information easily obtainable to everyone.

"Tomer" said these lapses were based on profit making.. "The training companies wanted to finish the projects as quickly as possible in order to create more projects and make more money," he said. "We knew the training had to be completed quickly because the soldiers would soon have to get into real military activity."

"Tomer "says the Georgian officers told their soldiers they would be going to help NATO forces in Iraq, but the objective was Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Gal Hirsch ocassionally hove into view to visit the trainers , but was mostly absent.

At the completion of training , Tomer says that he didn't feel that his soldiers were ready for war. "By Israeli standards, the soldiers had almost zero capability and the officers were mediocre," he said. "It was clear that taking that army to war was illogical."

By keeping in touch with one of his soldiers, Tomer discovered that most of the men he had trained had indeed been killed in the war. "Some of them became good friends of mine and invited me into their homes. It's hard to digest that these people have suddenly vanished from the face of the earth," he lamented.

When asked about these claims Defense Shield stated "all of the company's actions were approved by the Defense Ministry, including the materials transferred to the training companies. The information security standards were set, emphasized, and maintained by experienced security officers, and we have no knowledge of these claims." Hmmmmm....

By implication these materials will be now in the hands of Mr Putin's men, helped by the blindfolded soldiers seen being taken captive, after some persuasion , suggests Israel Matzav. Not to mention the African - American mercenary and NATO instructor and ordnance specialist. who has been transferred to the Russian base of Vladikavkaz.

A commentator adds ....." you can bet your tuchis Carl, that much of that material will make it way into the hands of Iran and subsequently, Hezbollah. Its not telling example of Israelis' inability to put their country's national interests first, abroad. "

Kommersant adds that ,“The Russian Task force has annihilated a few groups of mercenaries. Some of mercenaries have been captured, and investigators are working (sic) with them, the source said.”

“We have detained 10 agents of the Georgian special services who were spying on military facilities and preparing terrorist attacks, including on Russian territory,” Alexander Bortnikov the new head of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), said at a meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on August 11th.