Terrorist attack thwarted

[donnaplease]

Did you know that Charles Krauthammer is paralyzed and in a whelchair from a diving accident during College?

No, I didn't. Don't I feel like an ass...

I'm sorry.

[donnaplease]

Did you know that Charles Krauthammer is paralyzed and in a whelchair from a diving accident during College?

No, I didn't. Don't I feel like an ass...

I'm sorry.

Didn't mean to make you feel like an ass, it's just that most people don't know about Charles condition. It's remarkable what he's done with his life despite his adversity. Google him up and you'll see a remarkable man.

Thanks, I'll do that.

[G.I.Jim]

I guess one of the many things that concerns me is that with all of these breaches in security, I think eventually one of our leaders, if not Obama himself, will be a victim. As much as I disagree with his stance on this, and disapprove of most of what he's doing to our country, I do not want to see him assasinated by an 'alleged' man-made disaster-maker. I believe that what Krauthammer said is exactly right, that we will become much weaker in the eyes of those that want to harm us because of our response to this.

People may have thought/said that Bush was not smart enough to be president, a rebel, whatever, but I think there's one thing that he made clear to the world... he would do whatever was necessary to ensure that OUR people are as safe as possible. As commander-in-chief, and a REAL leader, IMO he did a great job at that. Granted, there are many around the world that resented him for it, which also had a price. I think he was known to say it was a price he was willing to pay to ensure our safety. That's what I respected most about him for the 8 years he was in office. The other striking difference I see between Bush & Obama is how Obama is constantly blaming the Bush/Cheney administration for things. Maybe I'm wrong (and if so I'm sure someone will point it out to me) but I don't really recall Bush blaming the administration before his for things that happened on his watch. Sure, there were lots of people who linked Clinton to the 9/11 attack, but I just don't recall Bush himself stepping in front of a camera saying "I inherited this mess from Clinton, it's all his fault" (instead what I recall is him not really answering directly, which may have been part of what made him seem less intelligent - we all agree that speaking in front of the camera really wasn't one of his stong points). While it certainly was an effective strategy for BO during the campaign, I just think it's time to hang up that line for good now. You wanted the job, you asked the Americans for it, and they gave it to you. Now STFU, stop whining about the conditions you got it in, and go to work. Make me feel safe, CIC, cause I'm not having a lot of confidence in that right now.

On another note, isn't funny how turnabout really is fair play? It's hilarious to watch people attack others for the same types of things that they had to defend just a few years ago. It's on both sides, no one party/group is innocent. I'm sure it's nothing new, I just never really paid much attention to politics or politicians themselves before 2000. It's a shame it has to be this way, whatever happened to 'two wrongs don't make a right'? Obviously it doesn't exist in the political arena.

Outstanding post!

[strangegrey]

I guess one of the many things that concerns me is that with all of these breaches in security, I think eventually one of our leaders, if not Obama himself, will be a victim. As much as I disagree with his stance on this, and disapprove of most of what he's doing to our country, I do not want to see him assasinated by an 'alleged' man-made disaster-maker. I believe that what Krauthammer said is exactly right, that we will become much weaker in the eyes of those that want to harm us because of our response to this.

People may have thought/said that Bush was not smart enough to be president, a rebel, whatever, but I think there's one thing that he made clear to the world... he would do whatever was necessary to ensure that OUR people are as safe as possible. As commander-in-chief, and a REAL leader, IMO he did a great job at that. Granted, there are many around the world that resented him for it, which also had a price. I think he was known to say it was a price he was willing to pay to ensure our safety. That's what I respected most about him for the 8 years he was in office. The other striking difference I see between Bush & Obama is how Obama is constantly blaming the Bush/Cheney administration for things. Maybe I'm wrong (and if so I'm sure someone will point it out to me) but I don't really recall Bush blaming the administration before his for things that happened on his watch. Sure, there were lots of people who linked Clinton to the 9/11 attack, but I just don't recall Bush himself stepping in front of a camera saying "I inherited this mess from Clinton, it's all his fault" (instead what I recall is him not really answering directly, which may have been part of what made him seem less intelligent - we all agree that speaking in front of the camera really wasn't one of his stong points). While it certainly was an effective strategy for BO during the campaign, I just think it's time to hang up that line for good now. You wanted the job, you asked the Americans for it, and they gave it to you. Now STFU, stop whining about the conditions you got it in, and go to work. Make me feel safe, CIC, cause I'm not having a lot of confidence in that right now.

On another note, isn't funny how turnabout really is fair play? It's hilarious to watch people attack others for the same types of things that they had to defend just a few years ago. It's on both sides, no one party/group is innocent. I'm sure it's nothing new, I just never really paid much attention to politics or politicians themselves before 2000. It's a shame it has to be this way, whatever happened to 'two wrongs don't make a right'? Obviously it doesn't exist in the political arena.

Outstanding post!

I agree, DP hit a line drive with this one...


I just disagree with one thing. I'm not so sure our fears should rest with Obmaa getting hit. Seriously. If such a dreadful thing would happen, Obama's policies would likely be carried out by Say it Aint So Joe....and that would be worse than having Obama carry out his own policies. A martyr, we do NOT need.

Regardless, I really think that if every american was afforded the same securities that our elected executive has, we'd have far less terrorism to worry about...so really, I dont think it's worth losing sleep over.


Getting back to the whole Blame bush.....Its not in Obama's best interest. He continues to do that, and he will see democrat control of both houses evaporate in front of his eyes and he will be a lame duck within 11 months.

[Behshad]

Starting a war that lead into our people dying daily over in Iraq takes real leaders like Bush.





If you could truly predict and prevent terrorism and if Bush was such a great leader that truly cared about our people, then 9/11 wouldn't have happened.

Also , if Bush was a true leader thinking about people of America , he had PLENTY of time to capture Bin Laden and punished him . Starting multiple wars just to get even with those who pissed your dad of is far far from protecting the people and/or minimizing terrorist threats.

[Behshad]

Bush didn't put fear into the terrorists heart. He put fear into American homes.
Creating safety by scaring your own people. That's not how this country became independent now was it ,?!
To debate FF-style.

Yesterday's revelation from former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge that he was pressured to raise the terror alert level to assist President George W. Bush win re-election in 2004 was widely greeted by Bush critics as the confirmation of longstanding suspicions. And everyone who contended that the silly Terror Color Chart could have not possibly served any other purpose than a political one should take a victory lap, right? Atlantic's Marc Ambinder didn't seem to think so (at least not at first), telling his readers:
Journalists, including myself, were very skeptical when anti-Bush liberals insisted that what Ridge now says is true, was true. We were wrong. Our skepticism about the activists' conclusions was warranted because these folks based their assumption on gut hatred for President Bush, and not on any evaluation of the raw intelligence. But journalists should have been even more skeptical about the administration's pronouncements.
I can do very little to add what Marcy Wheeler and Glenn Greenwald have contributed to the discussion, nevertheless I feel the need to get a few licks in about Ambinder's prejudice. What Ambinder needs to admit, here -- and he is not alone -- is that he erred in assuming that skepticism about Bush's conduct only originated from "gut hatred of Bush." Certainly, some did. But, Ambinder's view completely eliminates the possibility that skepticism could originate from reason or from seriousness.
This is the difference between, say, skepticism that the Obama administration has not provided sufficient oversight of TARP -- versus skepticism that Obama is an American citizen.
Ridge's confession also reminds us about our colorful terror alert chart, and its colorful history. Most of our experience with the Terror Alert System came from periodic vacillations between the yellow "Elevated" level and the orange "Guarded" during the Bush years. The alert level escalations were rarely specific in terms of providing useful information to American citizens. Most, in fact, had to do with vague feelings of unease over anniversaries, holidays, and events abroad. Consider:

--September 11, 2002, the Terror Alert was raised to Orange because of the 9/11 Anniversary
--February 7, 2003, the alert level was raised because the end of a Muslim religious holiday threatened "apartment buildings, hotels, and other soft or lightly secured targets," for some reason.
--March 17, 2003, we went to war with Iraq, so it was time to raise the alert level!
--May 20, 2003, raised in response to bombings in Riyadh and Casablanca
--December 2003 through January 2004, the alert level was raised because of vague suspicions of threats associated with the Christmas holiday.
--July 7, 2005: The Terror Alert level is raised in response to the London Underground bombings.
--August 10, 2006: The one occasion where the Alert Level was raised to Red, in response to the news that British officials had thwarted an attack. The alert level stayed Red for four days, and applied only to flights emanating from the United Kingdom.

And then there was the one instance in which the description of the threat was curiously specific: In August of 2004, just days after the Democratic National Convention, and
three months before the general election, Homeland Security warned of "possible terrorist attacks against "iconic" financial institutions in New York City, Washington and Newark, N.J., saying a confluence of intelligence over the weekend pointed to a car or truck bomb." Specific buildings were listed as potential targets. It stood out as a uniquely useful alert. It was also, complete bunk:

Even the Washington Post indicated as much at the time. From August 4, 2004:

Bush administration officials acknowledged yesterday that the latest terrorism alert was based primarily on information that is three to four years old, but they aggressively defended the decision to warn financial sectors in Washington, New York and Newark because of the continuing threat posed by al Qaeda. [...]
...authorities did not publicly make it clear until yesterday that the information compiled during that surveillance, contained on computer disks and documents seized during raids in Pakistan, was created in
2000 and 2001 or, in some cases, undated. Much of the information was also obtained from the Internet or other public sources, officials said.
Authorities issued somewhat conflicting signals yesterday about the timing of the surveillance. Frances Fragos Townsend, the White House deputy national security adviser for terrorism, said in a television
interview that "the casings were done in 2000 and 2001." Ridge said the information "might be two or three years old," adding that "there's no evidence of recent surveillance."

By contrast, in 2005, the Bush administration received actionable, current intelligence about al Qaeda efforts to set up a "terrorist cell in Iraq to strike targets in America." But in this case, the administration's response was very different:
As the Associated Press reported in 2007:

Bush said intelligence showed that in January 2005, bin Laden tasked Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, his senior operative in Iraq, to organize a terrorist cell and use Iraq as a staging ground for attacking the United States.
This information expanded on a classified bulletin the Homeland Security Department issued in March 2005. The bulletin, which warned that bin Laden had enlisted al-Zarqawi to plan potential strikes in the United States, was described at the time as credible but not specific. It did not prompt the administration to raise its national terror alert level.

When you really examine the confused and often out-of-sync way the terror alert device was misapplied, the overall disingenuousness at work is readily discernible to anyone with a brain. It's not a product of Bush derangement syndrome. By applying rudimentary scrutiny, it is impossible to conclude that this system was not blatantly manipulated for political purposes. And now, thanks to Tom Ridge, former Secretary of Homeland Security, this purpose has been confirmed. To continue to believe otherwise -- in the face of logic, history, and Ridge's admission -- is to be, as they say, "bats," and it's time for journalists to consider recalibrating their definitions of who is, and who isn't, "serious."

[Saint John]

Starting a war that lead into our people dying daily over in Iraq takes real leaders like Bush.





If you could truly predict and prevent terrorism and if Bush was such a great leader that truly cared about our people, then 9/11 wouldn't have happened.

Also , if Bush was a true leader thinking about people of America , he had PLENTY of time to capture Bin Laden and punished him . Starting multiple wars just to get even with those who pissed your dad of is far far from protecting the people and/or minimizing terrorist threats.

9-11 was a done deal by the time Bush took office. The pilots were trained, the test runs had been made and the planned hijacking was actually a legal one from the standpoint of what was used. This is like bringing in a defense when the other team has the ball on the one yard line and blaming the guys that just stepped on the field for the 80 yard drive. Besides, Bill Clinton passed on numerous opportunities to assassinate bin laden ... he didn't deem him a threat. The attacks were all there as well ... the WTC when it was attacked in 1993, the soldiers killed in Mogadishu, the Khobar Towers bombing, the USS Cole, the bombing in Saudi Arabia and the US embassies bombing in Africa. His response to each and every one of these attacks was the same ... nothing.

I've said it before and I'll say it again ... Obama has no interest in denouncing, fighting or killing these fuckers. These are his brothers and his ultimate goal is to destroy this country. It's just inconvenient that our from of government will take him some time to do so ... buit he's off to a great fucking start. Doesn't it bother anyone on the left that he refuses to call this guy a "terrorist" and that he keeps calling him the "alleged suspect"??? He's too worried about the redistribution of wealth, passing a truly horrible health care plan, and making sure those that do the least (or nothing) close the gap with those that do the most.

[Ehwmatt]

Starting a war that lead into our people dying daily over in Iraq takes real leaders like Bush.





If you could truly predict and prevent terrorism and if Bush was such a great leader that truly cared about our people, then 9/11 wouldn't have happened.

Also , if Bush was a true leader thinking about people of America , he had PLENTY of time to capture Bin Laden and punished him . Starting multiple wars just to get even with those who pissed your dad of is far far from protecting the people and/or minimizing terrorist threats.

Doesn't it bother anyone on the left that he refuses to call this guy a "terrorist" and that he keeps calling him the "alleged suspect"???

This is the question I would like answered without any Bush references, Clinton comparisons, any other president comparisons, or anti-war sentiment. Just a nice, direct answer - if it doesn't bother you or you think it's good for him to use this rhetoric/word choice, tell us why?

[Behshad]

Starting a war that lead into our people dying daily over in Iraq takes real leaders like Bush.





If you could truly predict and prevent terrorism and if Bush was such a great leader that truly cared about our people, then 9/11 wouldn't have happened.

Also , if Bush was a true leader thinking about people of America , he had PLENTY of time to capture Bin Laden and punished him . Starting multiple wars just to get even with those who pissed your dad of is far far from protecting the people and/or minimizing terrorist threats.

9-11 was a done deal by the time Bush took office. The pilots were trained, the test runs had been made and the planned hijacking was actually a legal one from the standpoint of what was used. This is like bringing in a defense when the other team has the ball on the one yard line and blaming the guys that just stepped on the field for the 80 yard drive. Besides, Bill Clinton passed on numerous opportunities to assassinate bin laden ... he didn't deem him a threat. The attacks were all there as well ... the WTC when it was attacked in 1993, the soldiers killed in Mogadishu, the Khobar Towers bombing, the USS Cole, the bombing in Saudi Arabia and the US embassies bombing in Africa. His response to each and every one of these attacks was the same ... nothing.

I've said it before and I'll say it again ... Obama has no interest in denouncing, fighting or killing these fuckers. These are his brothers and his ultimate goal is to destroy this country. It's just inconvenient that our from of government will take him some time to do so ... buit he's off to a great fucking start. Doesn't it bother anyone on the left that he refuses to call this guy a "terrorist" and that he keeps calling him the "alleged suspect"??? He's too worried about the redistribution of wealth, passing a truly horrible health care plan, and making sure those that do the least (or nothing) close the gap with those that do the most.

It's not a done deal till they actually attack.
So when one train guy with bomb attached to his dick gets through security it's Obsmas weakness not catching it. But when planes hit New York left and right , it wasn't Bushs fault cause it was already planned during Clintons administration ?!


DP , you see how people blame the previous administration when things went wrong during Bush's presidency ?!?!

[Saint John]

Starting a war that lead into our people dying daily over in Iraq takes real leaders like Bush.





If you could truly predict and prevent terrorism and if Bush was such a great leader that truly cared about our people, then 9/11 wouldn't have happened.

Also , if Bush was a true leader thinking about people of America , he had PLENTY of time to capture Bin Laden and punished him . Starting multiple wars just to get even with those who pissed your dad of is far far from protecting the people and/or minimizing terrorist threats.

Doesn't it bother anyone on the left that he refuses to call this guy a "terrorist" and that he keeps calling him the "alleged suspect"???

This is the question I would like answered without any Bush references, Clinton comparisons, any other president comparisons, or anti-war sentiment. Just a nice, direct answer - if it doesn't bother you or you think it's good for him to use this rhetoric/word choice, tell us why?

I'll go first ... this Curious George looking, leg-legged motherfucker won't refer to them as terrorists because he doesn't view them as terrorists. He views them as the oppressed ones fighting back because of decades (or centuries) of injustices. His preacher and spiritual advisor of 20+ years felt that way and so did his buddy Bill Ayers. It's only logical to take the views of his closest friends and add to that his recent statements and come to this conclusion.

[Saint John]

It's not a done deal till they actually attack.
So when one train guy with bomb attached to his dick gets through security it's Obsmas weakness not catching it. But when planes hit New York left and right , it wasn't Bushs fault cause it was already planned during Clintons administration ?!


DP , you see how people blame the previous administration when things went wrong during Bush's presidency ?!?!

You're missing the entire point. When someone known to hate the U.S. and to be a known sponsor of terrorism and prior attacks againt the U.S. (bin laden) is ignored by Clinton, and his foot soldiers are allowed to waltz into the country and study how to fly planes and take "trial" runs for months on end then, yes, blame has to be put on the administration that deemed the guy insignificant. You prove to me that this latest dune coon was flying around on planes with C-4 in his underwear under the Bush administration and this incredibly lucky failed attack would fall right into the prior administration's lap. In the end, 9-11 was all about an incredibly ingenius, yet simple, plan that needed only a few (at the time) legal carry on items and some trained young men willing to die. It was a one-time event that will hopefully never happen again. This says it all:

A former figure in American counterterrorist intelligence claims, however, that there was "clear and convincing" proof of Bin Laden's conspiracy against America. In May, 1996, American diplomats were informed in a Sudanese government fax that Bin Laden was about to be expelled — giving Washington another chance to seize him. The decision not to do so went to the very top of the White House, according to former administration sources.

They say that the clear focus of American policy was to discourage the state sponsorship of terrorism. So persuading Khartoum to expel Bin Laden was in itself counted as a clear victory. The administration was "delighted".

Bin Laden took off from Khartoum on May 18 in a chartered C-130 plane with 150 of his followers, including his wives. He was bound for Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan. On the way the plane refuelled in the Gulf state of Qatar, which has friendly relations with Washington, but he was allowed to proceed unhindered.

Barely a month later, on June 25, a 5,000lb truck bomb ripped apart the front of Khobar Towers, a US military housing complex in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. The explosion killed 19 American servicemen. Bin Laden was immediately suspected.

Clinton is reported to have admitted how things went wrong in Sudan at a private dinner at a Manhattan restaurant shortly after September 11 last year. According to a witness, Clinton told a dinner companion that the decision to let Bin Laden go was probably "the biggest mistake of my presidency".

[Behshad]

Osama bin Laden's Bush family
Business Connections

Alliance With Pakistan Will Stimulate Drug Trade, Bring Revenues Under U.S. Control -
Colombian Opium Production Will Soar

The Taliban's Biggest Economic Attack on the U.S. Came in February With The Destruction
of Its Opium Crop

by

Michael C. Ruppert

[© Copyright 2001, Michael C. Ruppert and From The Wilderness Publications. All Rights Reserved. May be reprinted and distributed for non-profit purposes only]

From the September 18, issue of From The Wilderness

FTW - Money connections between Bush Republicans and Osama bin Laden go way back and the political and economic connections have remained unbroken for 20 years. And what appears to be a "new" alliance with Pakistan is merely a new manifestation of a decades-long partnership in the heroin trade.

Conveniently ignored in all of the press coverage since the tragic events of Sept. 11 is the fact that on May 17 Secretary of State Colin Powell announced a gift of $43 million to the Taliban as a purported reward for its eradication of Afghanistan's opium crop this February. That, in effect, made the U.S. the Taliban's largest financial benefactor according to syndicated columnist Robert Scheer writing in The Los Angeles times on May 22. But -- as we described in FTW's March 2001 issue -- the Taliban's destruction of that crop was apparently the single most important act of economic warfare against U.S. economic interests that the Taliban had ever committed. So why the gift?

Critics of the Gulf War well recall how, just prior to Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, President Bush (Sr.) dispatched Ambassador April Glaspie to visit Saddam with a letter and a "wink and a nod" telling the Iraqi leader that it was OK to invade his smaller neighbor. The May gift from Uncle Sam could well have been sending the same kind of message, along with necessary funds to complete the attacks. Drugs and terrorism go hand in hand.

Until February, Afghanistan had been the world's largest producer of opium/heroin, claiming close to 70% of the world's total production. That opium, consumed largely in Western Europe and smuggled through the Balkans, was a direct source of cash deposits in Western financial institutions and markets.

I specifically commented on this at an economic crisis conference in Moscow, Russia on March 7. In my formal statement to the Russian conference I said,

"Just before coming to this conference I read in the Associated Press, Agence France Press and other reliable sources that the Taliban has recently eradicated most of its 3000 ton opium crop in Afghanistan. If true, I view this as a form of economic warfare against Russia [and the U.S.] because it would drive opium production more into Southeast Asia and Colombia. However, I now suspect that this will result in a shift of opium production to the Caucasus under the Kurds which will see an increase in smuggling through Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan. I should note that both Vice President Richard Cheney and the designated Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage are members of the US-Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce. Such a move would have the effect of drastically shortening smuggling routes and costs into Western Europe and of bypassing unstable areas of the Balkans.

I have received additional reports that Uzbekistan is now awash in the opium poppy and, as in the US with the CIA, that Russian military and intelligence agencies facilitate the trade as a means of protecting access to hard currency. The point here is not that the US it totally evil or the only country doing these things. But the US is far and away the most advanced nation when it comes to the use of such methods to achieve superiority. As [Russian economist Michael] Khazin has noted, the US and Britain and Germany started the conflict in Kosovo in 1999 to stave off a collapse of western markets following the Asian collapse of 1997-8. Now Colombia is a last-ditch effort to protect the US markets and European opposition is jeopardizing that plan."

The Taliban's actions this year severed the ruling military junta in Pakistan from its primary source of foreign revenues and made bin Laden and the Taliban completely expendable in the eyes of the Pakistani government. It also cut off billions of dollars in revenues that had been previously laundered through western banks and Russian financial institutions connected to them.

Now as US military action will replace the Taliban government and fresh crops will be planted in Afghanistan, the slack in cash flow will assuredly be replaced by dramatically increased opium production in Colombia; the revenues from that effort being needed to maintain the revenue streams into Wall Street. Prior to the WTC attacks, credible sources, including the U.S. government, the IMF, Le Monde and the U.S. Senate placed the amount of drug cash flowing into Wall Street and U.S. banks at around $250-$300 billion a year.

In that context, the real history of Osama bin Laden, as America's useful terrorist-du-jour reveals a long and continuous history, interwoven with the drug trade and the Bush family, of supporting conflicts that have benefited U.S. military and economic interests.

bin Laden

There are direct historical links between Osama bin Laden's business interests and those of the Bush family. On September 15 I received the following message from FTW subscriber, Professor John Metzger of Michigan State University:

"We should revisit the history of BCCI, a bank used by the legendary Palestinian terrorist known as Abu Nidal. BCCI was closely tied to American and Pakistan intelligence. Its clients included the Afghan rebels, and the brother of Osama bin Laden, Salem. Salem bin Laden named Houston investment broker James R. Bath as his business representative in Texas, right after George W. BushÕs father became CIA director in 1976. By 1977, Bath invested $50,000 into juniorÕs first business, Arbusto Energy, while Osama bin Laden would soon become a CIA asset. George W. BushÕs FBI director Robert Mueller was part of the Justice DepartmentÕs questionable investigation of BCCI. (On BCCI, the bin Ladens, and the Bushes, see the books, The Outlaw Bank, A Full Service Bank, and Fortunate Son)." Further details of the business and financial relationships between the Bush and bin Laden family are found in Peter Brewton's 1992 book The Mafia, CIA and George Bush. BCCI, incidentally, was founded by a Pakistani.

Economics Professor Michel Chossudovsky of the University of Ottawa has just completed a detailed history of bin Laden's career detailing his secret funding and logistical support to terrorist organizations beginning from his early CIA-supported roots in the 1980s as a "freedom fighter" through to the present day. Chossudovsky's compelling and well documented article, Who Is Osama Bin Laden? dated Sept 12, 2001 can be found on the Internet at: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO109C.html.

Bin Laden's role has not just been as a practitioner of terrorist acts but as a trainer and supplier of terrorist organizations around the world. Included in bin Laden's coterie are terrorist groups linked to the Balkans, Albania, the KLA (a U.S. ally), and rebel groups leading the insurrection against Russia in Chechnya.

As FTW described in 1998, and as confirmed by Chossudovsky, the key to understanding U.S. support of bin Laden is to grasp that he has always been controlled by a cutout, the Pakistani government and its intelligence service the ISI. In this manner there has been virtually no direct contact between bin Laden and the CIA. This has served the dual purpose of maintaining his apparent "purity" with his followers and providing plausible deniability for the CIA. The whole underlying pretext for this relationship evaporated with the Taliban's destruction of the opium crop in February.

Chossudovsky writes:

"The history of the drug trade in Central Asia is intimately related to the CIA's covert operations. Prior to the Soviet-Afghan war, opium production in Afghanistan and Pakistan was directed to small regional markets. There was no local production of heroin. In this regard [Professor] Alfred McCoy's study confirms that within two years of the onslaught of the CIA operation in Afghanistan, 'the Pakistan-Afghanistan borderlands became the world's top heroin producer, supplying 60 per sent of the U.S. demandÉ

"With the disintegration of the Soviet Union, a new surge in opium production has unfolded. (According to UN estimates, the production of opium in Afghanistan in 1998-99 -- coinciding with the build up of armed insurgencies in the former Soviet republics -- reached a record high of 4600 metric tons. Powerful business syndicates in the former Soviet Union allied with organized crime are competing for the strategic control over the heroin routes.

"The ISI's extensive intelligence military-network was not dismantled in the wake of the Cold War. The CIA continued to support the Islamic "jihad" out of PakistanÉ"

"É The Golden Crescent drug trade was also being used to finance and equip the Bosnian Muslim Army (starting in the early 1990s) and the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). In the last few months there is evidence that Mujhideen mercenaries are fighting in the ranks of the KLA-NLA terrorists in their assaults into MacedoniaÉ

"É With regard to Chechnya, the main rebel leaders Shamil Basayev and Al Khattab were trained and indoctrinated in CIA sponsored camps in Afghanistan and PakistanÉ In this regard, the involvement of Pakistan's ISI and its radical Islamic proxies are actually calling the shots in this war.

"Russia's main pipeline route transits through Chechnya and Dagestan. Despite Washington's perfunctory condemnation of Islamic terrorism, the indirect beneficiaries of the Chechen war are the Anglo-American oil conglomerates which are vying for control over oil resources and pipeline corridors out of the Caspian Sea basin."

The oil and drug connections were the subject of FTW's story, The Bush-Cheney drug Empire in October, 2000. That story is online at http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/c ... drugs.html. Both Bush and Cheney are oil men.

George Bush, Sr. was Vice President and, by virtue of executive Order 12333, in charge of all U.S. intelligence and narcotics operations from 1981 through 1989. As President from 1989 through 1993, he continued and expanded his control in these areas. Thus, it was Bush (the elder) who directly nourished and nurtured bin Laden's evolution.

Dramatic Confirmation From Indian Government

The web site of the Indian Embassy in Washington contains dramatic confirmation for these positions. On September 4, 2000, B. Raman, Director of India's Institute for Topical Studies wrote an open letter to the U.S. Congress entitled Pakistan's Noriega's. That eight-page article exposed the depth of Pakistani government involvement in the drug trade. It may be viewed at:

www.indianembassy.org/int_media/
saag_september_04_2000.html.

The letter said, in part:

"For more than a decade, the people of India have been living in a state of half-war and half-peace due to the depredations of a large number of terrorists, outrageously called jehadists, who have been trained, armed and funded and infiltrated into the State of Jammu & Kashmir and other parts of India by Pakistan in order to make the people of India and its security forces bleed in the name of religion.

"More people belonging to different religions -- Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and others -- have been killed in India by these mercenary-terrorists sponsored by the State of Pakistan than by any other terrorist groups anywhere else in the worldÉ"

"ÉMany other States have suffered and have been suffering due to the depredations of terrorists, made in and exported from Pakistan and the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan -- [these include] Algeria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Central Asian Republics, the Chechnya and Dagestan areas of Russia, the Xinjiang province of China, Bangladesh, the Arakan area of Burma and the southern Philippines..."

"After his [1993] removal, [as official head of Pakistani intelligence, trusted advisor to Pakistani leader Gen. Pervez Musharraf] Lt. Gen. Nasir traveled to Somalia, Chechnya, Dagestan, the Central Asian Republics, ÉChina, and the Southern Philippines as a preacherÉ and helped Islamic organizations, including the group which killed U.S. troopsÉ in Somalia."

"ÉIt was he, who, during his tenure as the DG [Director General] of the ISIÉ has entered into an agreement with the LTTE of Sri Lanka [which secured] LTTE's assistance in smuggling Afghanistan produced heroin in its ships to West Europe, the USA and CanadaÉ"

"ÉAnother reason for the ISI's helping the LTTE, despite its anti-Muslim policies, was to use it for smuggling heroin to West Europe, the U.S. and Canada. During Zia-ul-Haq's regime in the 1980s, heroin had become a major source of extra revenue not only for the State of Pakistan, especially the ISI and Pakistan's nuclear and missile establishment, but also to many senior officers of the Pakistan Army, including [Musharraf et al]É"

"The way Mr. Sharif before October 1999 and Gen. Musharraf since then have been using the heroin money to prevent the Pakistani economy from collapsing has not received due attention in the U.S. ..."

"If one goes purely by economic indicators, Pakistan's must be in as bad a shape as that of Russia, or even worse, since Russia has been in receipt of Western and IMF assistanceÉ"

"Where does the money come from? From the smuggling of heroin to West Europe, the U.S. and Canada. The U.S. Government might have stopped economic assistanceÉ from the taxpayers' money. But why should the Noriegas of Pakistan be worried when they get billions of dollars from the heroin sale in the U.S.?É "

Vice President Dick Cheney's recent comment that the CIA needs to get in bed with "unsavory characters" is a joke. That's a bed that the CIA has never left. And it's a marriage vow that President Bush has just reaffirmed for all the world to see.

[Behshad]

So Bush kissing those Saudi leaders and protecting the bin laden family is also part of him being a great leader or just fighting terror with friendship ?!

[Behshad]

Bush adminstration could've captured terrorist Osama Bin Laden in December 2001: Senate report
BY TINA MOORE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Sunday, November 29th 2009, 4:00 AM

A new Senate report says Osama Bin Laden was within military reach in December 2001, when the terrorist was at his most vulnerable point.
RELATED NEWS
ARTICLES
Bush keeps quiet on criticisms of Obama
Osama Bin Laden was within military reach when the Bush administration allowed him to disappear into the mountains of Afghanistan rather than pursue him with a massive military force, a new Senate report says.
The report asserts that the failure to get the terrorist leader when he was at his most vulnerable in December 2001 - three months after the 9/11 attacks - led to today's reinvigorated insurgency in Afghanistan.
Sen. John Kerry, Massachusetts senator and 2004 Democratic presidential candidate, requested the report, which came as President Obama prepares to send as many as 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan.
Kerry has long argued the Bush administration botched an opportunity to capture the Al Qaeda leader and his top deputies when they were holed up in the forbidding mountainous area of Tora Bora.
The report calls then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Gen. Tommy Franks, the top military commander at the time, to the carpet and asserts the U.S. had the means to mount a rapid assault on Bin Laden with several thousand troops.
Instead, fewer than 100 commandoes, working with Afghan militias, tried to capitalize on air strikes and track down the ragged band of terrorists.
At the time, Rumsfeld expressed concern over the backlash that could be created by a large U.S. troop presence, and he and others said evidence of Bin Laden's location was inconclusive.
"The vast array of American military power, from sniper teams to the most mobile divisions of the Marine Corps and the Army, was kept on the sidelines," the report states.
On or about Dec. 16, 2001, Bin Laden and bodyguards "walked unmolested out of Tora Bora and disappeared into Pakistan's unregulated tribal area," where he is still believed to be, the report says.With News Wire Services

[strangegrey]

It's not a done deal till they actually attack.
So when one train guy with bomb attached to his dick gets through security it's Obsmas weakness not catching it. But when planes hit New York left and right , it wasn't Bushs fault cause it was already planned during Clintons administration ?!

Flawed logic. Pre-911, I don't think anyone considered terorrism to be a serious issue here in the US. Sure, Tom Clancy did...but no one else did. That's a fact, you can NOT dispute that.

After 911, no president will every have an excuse for not being on top of it. Seriously.

If this were 2005 and the same idiocy that came out of Napolitano's mouth came out of Tom Ridge's mouth, Bush would be just as culpable as Obama should be held now (but clearly isnt).



Regardless, I don't hold Clinton responsible for 911 anymore than I hold bush....both of them disregarded the seriousness of the threat of terrorism...and acted accordingly.


Post 911, like him or not, Bush never acted in any of the ways to convey weakness the way Obama is currently acting. That's a fact.

Clinton had an excuse.....dispite whatever warning that anyone would think the 93-WTC bombing would convey.
Bush had an excuse prior to 9/11/01.




Obama has no fucking excuse.


From a national defense standpoint, he's a fucking embarassment.

[Ehwmatt]

It's not a done deal till they actually attack.
So when one train guy with bomb attached to his dick gets through security it's Obsmas weakness not catching it. But when planes hit New York left and right , it wasn't Bushs fault cause it was already planned during Clintons administration ?!

From a national defense standpoint, he's a fucking embarassment.

That's an unnecessary modifier

[Behshad]

So pre 9/11 , Bush didn't know better. However after the attack He really showed the world how to treat those who are our enemies.

[Saint John]

So Bush kissing those Saudi leaders and protecting the bin laden family is also part of him being a great leader or just fighting terror with friendship ?!

It's no secret that bin laden was, in part, funded by the U.S. to fend off the Russians in Afghanistan. This is common knowledge. Besides, osama bin laden is a rogue figure out of an essentially successful family.

[Behshad]

So Bush kissing those Saudi leaders and protecting the bin laden family is also part of him being a great leader or just fighting terror with friendship ?!

It's no secret that bin laden was, in part, funded by the U.S. to fend off the Russians in Afghanistan. This is common knowledge. Besides, osama bin laden is a rogue figure out of an essentially successful family.

Much like G W Bush is s rogue figure of a successful family as well.

[Saint John]

So pre 9/11 , Bush didn't know better. However after the attack He really showed the world how to treat those who are our enemies.

The democrats, the filthy white liberals and the wide-eyed college goofs put one of them (see above ... but far worse) in the oval office. You'll all soon come to realize that we have someone in office that hates this country and is an ardent supporter of radical Islam.

[Behshad]

So pre 9/11 , Bush didn't know better. However after the attack He really showed the world how to treat those who are our enemies.

The democrats, the filthy white liberals and the wide-eyed college goofs put one of them (see above ... but far worse) in the oval office. You'll all soon come to realize that we have someone in office that hates this country and is an ardent supporter of radical Islam.

Care to make it more interesting by betting a case of Heineken Premiums ?!
Obama wasn't dealt the best hands when he took over , but I guarantee you , he will turn things around. I'll enjoy my Heineys while you tell me " sorry B , you were right "

[Saint John]

So pre 9/11 , Bush didn't know better. However after the attack He really showed the world how to treat those who are our enemies.

The democrats, the filthy white liberals and the wide-eyed college goofs put one of them (see above ... but far worse) in the oval office. You'll all soon come to realize that we have someone in office that hates this country and is an ardent supporter of radical Islam.

Care to make it more interesting by betting a case of Heineken Premiums ?!
Obama wasn't dealt the best hands when he took over , but I guarantee you , he will turn things around. I'll enjoy my Heineys while you tell me " sorry B , you were right "

You're on!

[donnaplease]

DP , you see how people blame the previous administration when things went wrong during Bush's presidency ?!?!

That's pretty much what I was saying. I can handle it more when it's said here, though, than when people like the POTUS or his cronies do it. It's a never ending, revolving door. The libs don't want the conservatives pushing blame on Clinton, yet it's perfectly ok for them to annihilate Bush repeatedly in the same manner (and similarly with the Obama/Bush comparisons). One of my former favorites, Sean Hannity, is now someone I can hardly stomach because he's relentless with his never-ending attacks, and Fox news tends to repeat the same thing over and over and over... They used to be the champions of the underdog, so to speak, by being the only news outlet to be 'fair & balanced' when it came to treatment of then-prez Bush. What's good for the goose is good for the gander??? Maybe, maybe not. I just don't know. For as many here as don't like Glen Beck, I do see him as an equal-opportunity butthole, meaning that when he disagrees with something, he'll let ya know in no uncertain terms. He was often critical of Bush (it used to irritate the hell outta me!).

Certainly, Behshad, you can see Dan's point about the planning and preparing of the 9/11 attacks versus this recent attack. I think he has made his case very clearly with regard to the amount of work that went into seeing each of these attacks carried out. The 9/11 tragedy took months/years to implement, simply due to the enormity of it. I don't personally believe that Bin Laden or Al Quaida saw the election results of 2000 and said 'oh, here's that dipshit Bush, now's the time to attack'. It would've occurred regardless of who was in office at the time. They were espousing ideals against our way of life, not against an individual. Now, on the flip side, how long did it take for this dude to strap an explosive to his willy and step onto a plane? Two totally different situations, IMO, but I believe it is possible that Obama's apologies to the world for the big, bad Americans' treatment of them may have emboldened some to attempt to carry out more threats.

I think there is potential for action for either way of thinking... Bush's "rebel" personna certainly could lead to resentment and desire to attack, or Obama's "soft" personna could lead to our enemies thinking we may be an easy target again. Like I said before, for me personally, I'd rather err on the side of safety for the American people. But that's just me.

[Rockindeano]

So pre 9/11 , Bush didn't know better. However after the attack He really showed the world how to treat those who are our enemies.

The democrats, the filthy white liberals and the wide-eyed college goofs put one of them (see above ... but far worse) in the oval office. You'll all soon come to realize that we have someone in office that hates this country and is an ardent supporter of radical Islam.

What an ABSURD comment. I guess I am a filthy white liberal.

[7 Wishes]

This just in...Barney Frank is a Satanist, and Trent Lott secretly worships in the Church of Chris O'Donnell. True story.

[Sarah]

I know we're no longer talking about airports, but I just wanted to note that airport security is nothing more than a pain in the ass to me (I've had my car randomly inspected, had my carryons disassembled, had the "random" patdown etc. while they probably let other people's questionable items through) and I've also never been afraid of ever being on a hijacked plane. A couple of increasingly inventive failed terrorists a year ruins air travel for the rest of us, I hate it. No shoes, no water or food, your family can't meet you at the gate... I understand ~the need~ but dammit, I want flying to be fun again.