Exploding pagers

[alx]

Epic… and one surely for the textbooks.

I do not believe the batteries alone in the pagers were the source of the explosion. There had to be a small charge also inside. Maybe there is no detonator and overheating the battery provides the go juice for the explosive, but battery alone is unlikely…. Which means that the Israelis were able to intercept the shipment or even the manufacturing source and install the explosives and the required firmware changes to trigger them one way or another. The logistics and maintaining secrecy alone must have been staggering and apparently perfectly executed

 

[Lowbird]

 

[alx]

View attachment 918960

… and his brothers- Eli Copter and Bom Pagerski

 

[LuvDog]

 

[walter62]

what I don't quite get is why didn't they make the pagers EXTRA killy?
Seems like they missed a perfect opportunity to just wipe 'em out.

Add some ball bearings dipped in anti-coagulant so the Hezi's DIE, not just
injured?

Maybe they can just shoot any young men limping or on crutches

 

[cams]

US used a similar tactic in Vietnam with different types of ammunition. They’d leave behind a case or a belt on a trail as though it fell off a truck or they left in a hurry and didn’t take it with, but many of the rounds would be stuffed with explosives and repackaged.

 

[alx]

what I don't quite get is why didn't they make the pagers EXTRA killy?
Seems like they missed a perfect opportunity to just wipe 'em out.

Add some ball bearings dipped in anti-coagulant so the Hezi's DIE, not just
injured?

I assume- to prevent collateral damage. A small charge near some of the biggest arteries in the body … you know- placement is ideal actually. I am sure they also had space constrictions- pagers are pretty tightly packed with battery, pcb, screen… just some considerations

 

[walter62]

I agree but the operation does seem to have a low ROI but the psy-op
value is huge.

 

[Lowbird]

 

[alx]

I agree but the operation does seem to have a low ROI but the psy-op
value is huge.

Agreed. The fallout is huge- their trust in telecom equipment is broken and the pagers was their plan B. I am sure they will come up with another option, but their command and control ability is severely compromised.

 

[lowbuckbob]

Israel sent a message

 

[Spartan65]

what I don't quite get is why didn't they make the pagers EXTRA killy?
Seems like they missed a perfect opportunity to just wipe 'em out.

Add some ball bearings dipped in anti-coagulant so the Hezi's DIE, not just
injured?

Maybe they can just shoot any young men limping or on crutches

A pager is a messaging device. They sent a message. We can reach out and touch you. Even when you think your safe.

 

[lancecolonel]

Anyone else wondering if all the “cheap” Chinese electronics in our houses can have the same thing happen?

 

[Tinkermatic]

I assume- to prevent collateral damage. A small charge near some of the biggest arteries in the body … you know- placement is ideal actually. I am sure they also had space constrictions- pagers are pretty tightly packed with battery, pcb, screen… just some considerations

Also to prevent suspicion?
“Akhmed, why does muh new beeper weigh nearly a kilo? Seems odd, yeah?”
Adding an ounce or two of explosives isn’t going to draw much attention, I’m hypothesizing that adding anything much more than a few ounces would double the weight of an already very light pager.

 

[Andy in NH]

Now they have to question every electronic devise. Pagers, phones, laptops, TV's maybe headphones?

That's how al-Qaeda assassinated Ahmad Shah Massoud - with a television camera and battery belt, packed with explosives.

Also: Bad Boys (1983).


View: https://youtu.be/dpah2-N1coo?t=15

 

[Kevin_NH]

what I don't quite get is why didn't they make the pagers EXTRA killy? ...Add some ball bearings...

The elegance of the approach taken is that a teardown or other close inspection, basically everything short of putting a sample of the battery in a mass spectrometer, wouldn't give away the plot -- no observable physical indication of the extra capability.

CT scan of "a" pager from a reputable brand, not "the" pager model used in Lebanon.

 

[walter62]

Anyone else wondering if all the “cheap” Chinese electronics in our houses can have the same thing happen?

Only if you piss off the Mossad.

But, I can't tell you how many Li-Ion batteries fires there have been and how difficult they are to manage.

 

[lancecolonel]

Only if you piss off the Mossad.

But, I can't tell you how many Li-Ion batteries fires there have been and how difficult they are to manage.

Correct. But it doesn’t have to be explosives or battery fires….imagine the chicoms remotely overheating toasters and tvs……

 

[Andy in NH]

US used a similar tactic in Vietnam with different types of ammunition. They’d leave behind a case or a belt on a trail as though it fell off a truck or they left in a hurry and didn’t take it with, but many of the rounds would be stuffed with explosives and repackaged.

Causalty creator and morale crusher!

Project Eldest Son - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[drgrant]

Epic… and one surely for the textbooks.

I do not believe the batteries alone in the pagers were the source of the explosion. There had to be a small charge also inside. Maybe there is no detonator and overheating the battery provides the go juice for the explosive, but battery alone is unlikely…. Which means that the Israelis were able to intercept the shipment or even the manufacturing source and install the explosives and the required firmware changes to trigger them one way or another. The logistics and maintaining secrecy alone must have been staggering and apparently perfectly executed

Thats one thing mossad et al are very good at. Another fun techical thing.... you know that pager was keyed to blow up with one specific piece of code/phone number. That means they hacked the firmware or something too, or tapped into it somehow. This is probably an idea they'd been working on for years.

It's also fun that supply chain management has been a hot topic in computer security the past 5 years or so, but particularly hot in the past year. Lots of warnings about "be careful where you buy your shit from. " If I was going to make a wag, a double actually set this whole thing up. There's likely Lebanese people who have grown sick of Hezbollah and Hamas dragging their country into bullshit.

 

[Garys]

My dryer has been looking at me suspiciously over the last week.

Correct. But it doesn’t have to be explosives or battery fires….imagine the chicoms remotely overheating toasters and tvs……

 

[vicorjh]

be careful where you buy your shit from.

No pagers off EBay

 

[LuvDog]

Time to go back to my StarTac

 

[not new guy]

War coming?

War Preparations Build After 9 Killed, 2700+ Wounded In Israel's Pager Attack On Hezbollah | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

 

[cockpitbob]

An insider said Hezbollah changed from phones to Motorola pagers just a few months ago. Israel worked fast.

This is like James Bond supervillain stuff, but done for good, not evil. It takes real genius to come up with something this simple. I'm in awe.

 

[Dadstoys]

The wife said this is what she thought of when I told her about it.

 

[safetyfirst2125]

Now they have to question every electronic devise. Pagers, phones, laptops, TV's maybe headphones?

Ooooh. Headphones.

 

[chris_1001]

Anyone else wondering if all the “cheap” Chinese electronics in our houses can have the same thing happen?

 

[TBK]

I wonder if there was a page, a delay for the recipient to pick up the page, or an immediate remote detonation. That would determine which direction a shaped charge would be directed.

NYT reporting lack of eye surgeons. That sounds like your suggestion is spot on. Page, delay until the person looks at it, then boom. Blinding all the terrorists could be as effective as killing them without hurting others. As someone else said--a big message was sent.

 

[drgrant]

Also to prevent suspicion?
“Akhmed, why does muh new beeper weigh nearly a kilo? Seems odd, yeah?”
Adding an ounce or two of explosives isn’t going to draw much attention, I’m hypothesizing that adding anything much more than a few ounces would double the weight of an already very light pager.

If you go on valgear on youtube (Ukrainian weapons channel) you quickly discover that if you take the shrapnel jacket off a grenade (like you can with a German DM51) the weight of the device isn't that much. Especially if you cut the yield down. The relative lack of deaths tells me the lethal radius isn't that high.

An insider said Hezbollah changed from phones to Motorola pagers just a few months ago. Israel worked fast.

This is like James Bond supervillain stuff, but done for good, not evil. It takes real genius to come up with something this simple. I'm in awe.

I'd hate to be the hezbollah guy that went to leadership and "pitched this switch" unless the same guy is the double, in which case he's probably been extracted.