2014: American Under Siege and Languid Due to President Clinton's Negligence or the Bush Family's Subterfuge?
During the 1990s when I was a teenager, Dad always listened daily to Rush Limbaugh while traveling from one area of East Tennessee to many others, into Kentucky. While I often rode with him on his business trips during my summers off from school made me develop a rich appreciation for the beauty that was Main Street U.S.A. whenever I visited Stafford in Garrard County, Kentucky. If anyone reading this has ever visited Tennessee or, more specifically, East Tennessee where I reside, you will quickly grasp just how breathtaking our natural scenery truly is, and how blessed I consider myself to live along the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains. My home community of Powell is a growing, bustling area of the Greater Knoxville area just ten minutes north of downtown on I-75, because Tennessee is considered to be one of the top three best state to do business. Knoxville specifically was named the best place to live and work in America last year, as it serves as the home of the University of Tennessee, TVA, Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Y-12 also in Oak Ridge, ALCOA's main factory under the large single roof in the world, Pilot/Flying J Travel Centers, Regal Cinemas Corp., the headquarters of DiY and Home and Gardening Channel, Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the Big South Fork National Park and Cumberland Gap National Park. We do not pretend to be perfect; Pilot/Flying J, which is run by its president Jimmy Haslam, brother of Gov. Bill Haslam and currently owns the Cleveland Browns, just negotiated with the Justice Department a $90 million settlement to avoid facing criminal charges for fraud, and in recent weeks leading to the UAW successfully subverting the will of the employees of the Chattanooga Volkswagen plant where a cousin's husband is employed, records indicate that some $300 million in bribes may have been exchanged from the union to the governor's office in order to defy the democratic processes by way of its borderline Marxist ideations for subterfuge and sabotaging liberty, freedom and the natural rights to self-determination. As the Volkswagen corporation actually championed unionization and had its hand in the pot of hundreds of millions to billion to aid the UAW in sweetening the pot for Nashville to lighten up on unionization. Sen. Bob Corker (R - TN), the former mayor of Chattanooga, was furious as he worked diligently to stop the UAW. It is unfortunate when our own governor chooses to ignore popular democracy in favor of his crony capitalists; or with the UAW, communist manifestations which have destroyed an entire region's economy and rendered these cities into ghost towns.
Atop of my concerns that unions will continue to grow unimpeded and unchecked and prohibitive to any balance of true power will always involve our national security, defense initiatives and the birthright for all Americans to live secure in the knowledge of its life, liberty and the rights to own property and pursuance of their own idealized happiness. The American Dream we first grasped of our new nations in 1782 within the literature of Hector St. John De Crevecoeur's Letters of an American Farmer has been subverted and robbed from all Americans poor or rich and all races and lifestyles, since for those who voted in opposition are declared today as terrorists or crazies by one Lois Lerner upon the location of a few of her E-mails previously claimed to be lost, they are considered enemies to the state. For those who shamefully voted a second time for President Obama who were already well-aware of Operation: Fast and Furious, they too face the threat of persecution, first with the Holder-led raids on various adult entertainment stars' bank accounts, and recently with New York State insisting homosexuals register with Albany "in order provide services." Unfortunately, homosexuals in the state are trading away their rights to privacy as granted by the Fourth Amendment for Albany officials to monitor what transpires between the sheets in the bedrooms. As I wish to finally address these since I have either had no time to do so before or my health was not well, I will in this article even if they may be out of place with the rest of the content.
Among conservatives, the adult entertainment industry is a divisive issue. Within the evangelical movement lies the virulent disapproval of women and men engaging in objectivized sexual promiscuity on camera. A dear friend of mine, in fact, is a retired porn star and at 40 years old, she is attending college in Southern California to become a graphic design technician and is a near-4.0 student. I could not be prouder of her than I am today or more than a year ago because she is the hardest worker between school and maintaining her last remnants of her old career online in order to earn a modest living. I never miss any opportunity to praise her, to provide her constant encouragement and recurrences in reassurance that what she is doing is not only noble, but just and everlasting in its rewards. She is a brilliant lady by my estimation, and I marvel how she maintains such a near-perfect balance while remaining centered interiorly and grounded by her own humility. And as I have provided her with one link discussing the issues with porn star bank accounts being raided, she never has commented nor replied; she usually stays away from direct conversations over politics. For you, however, I will discuss this in full detail, and how the Obama administration apparently is targeting the industry due to its declarations of the business' vices.
Glenn Reynolds, law professor at my collegiate alma mater the University of Tennessee and political commentator of his renowned blog Instapundit, commented about the porn industry as a prime target of Operation: Choke Point, which targets industries which the Obama administration does not approve:
Justice Department shuts down porn money:
Column
Glenn Harlan Reynolds 6:07 p.m. EDT May 26, 2014
They told me if I voted for Mitt Romney, our moralistic Department of Justice would be trying to shut down porn stars. And they were right: I voted for Romney, and sure enough, the Department of Justice is trying to shut down porn stars. Along with a lot of other, perfectly legal businesses. But I'll bet if Romney were in the White House, there'd be more coverage in the press.
A while back, some adult performers noticed that banks were terminating their accounts. The reason, it turned out, was a Justice Department program called "Operation Choke Point." This program, apparently, seeks to target businesses regarded as undesirable — like porn — by hitting them at a financial "choke point": their bank accounts.
Though the Justice Department can't prosecute people for making porn, because the First Amendment prohibits that, and too many people would think of them as blue-nosed morality police, which is politically undesirable, it can use its power to put them out of business extra-legally, by pressuring banks to cut off their accounts. Prosecutors and regulators have a lot of discretion, and the threat to use (or abuse) that discretion in ways that make banks uncomfortable provides a lot of leverage. Sure, banks make money off of the accounts of porn performers (and other targeted businesses), but not enough to make up for the hassle of being targeted for harassment by the feds.
As Timothy Geigner of TechDirt puts it:
"Let's not mince words: A program that was built upon the goals of stopping financial fraud has devolved into a massive government overreach into private businesses that are operating within the law. The way it works is that the DOJ informs financial institutions that certain industries are more likely than others to be involved in unauthorized charges of consumer credit and bank cards. They likewise inform the banks that the DOJ is going to keep a special super-awesome close-eye on these industries, with the implication being that there will be a great deal of prosecutorial action, subpoenas, and scrutiny on those industries, not to mention penalties on the institutions that work with them. The intention of the government, it would seem, is to make the banks unwilling to deal with the government harassment and simply cut anyone in those industries off from the financial institutions."
It's not only adult stars that are being targeted. Justice Department targets include industries as diverse as ammunition sales, coin dealers, payday loans, "racist materials," etc. And, again, these are all legal businesses that haven't been charged with breaking any laws — the Justice Department just doesn't like them.
So what we have under "Operation Choke Point" is the government deciding it wants to put the squeeze on certain lines of (legal) business, for no other reason than that the Department of Justice doesn't favor them. It seems almost like some sort of conspiracy to deprive people of their civil rights.
As Prof. Todd Zywicki observes in the Washington Post's lawblog:
The ability to destroy legal industries through secret actions to deprive them of banking services has obvious political consequences. . . . In principle, of course, the logic of Operation Choke Point could be extended to groups not currently targeted. Notably absent from the FDIC's hit list, for example, are abortion clinics, radical environmental groups, or, well, marijuana shops, for that matter. Something similar was done to cut off credit-card payments to support the operation of WikiLeaks .
Personally, I don't think that regulators should be able to abuse their discretion — and this certainly looks abusive to me — in order to pressure banks to shut down the accounts of legal businesses. (As Sen. David Vitter, R-La., noted in March, the Justice Department has no statutory authority to do this). And while abortion clinics and environmental groups are probably safe under the Obama administration, if this sort of thing stands, they will be vulnerable to the same tactics if a different administration adopts this same thuggish approach toward the businesses that it dislikes. And why wouldn't it, if the Justice Department gets away with this?
Congress, and the courts, and the press, need to bring the Justice Department to heel. And, in fact, I think that the officials involved should be named, shamed, and disciplined. Because what's going on here doesn't look much like justice at all.
Glenn Harlan Reynolds, a University of Tennessee law professor, is the author of The New School: How the Information Age Will Save American Education from Itself.
In addition to its own editorials, USA TODAY publishes diverse opinions from outside writers, including our Board of Contributors. To read more columns like this, go to the opinion front page or follow us on twitter @USATopinion or Facebook.
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I can just hear socialists militant head of Moms Demand Action Shannon Watts pump her clenched fists high above her body and decry "But what about the children? How will they be protected from such vile websites as those within the adult entertainment industry?" It really is quite simple: You do your job as a parent. I have never met a socialist who has remained consistent with regards to the value of life. Read this comment from one of the valedictorians of my high school three years prior to my graduation:
To think I once had so much respect for this gentleman when I was 15 years old for being a solid example for me when he was a senior in my high school band! I lost all that two nights ago, however. He is major racist simply for wanting to ensure that so long as the rich are less rich, he would rather that the black community and all others comprised of the downtrodden population demographics were far poorer. And the saddest issue is that while most socialists honestly believe this, they fail to consider that while the rest of the 99% of the American population grow poorer by the year, the entertainment industry and our Silicon Valley and most media moguls have grown exponentially wealthier. Indeed, Margaret Thatcher was correct when stating the full statement above about keeping the poor poor. What she did not say was how the rich were far richer as under Obama for their patronage and via subsidies.
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Bill Clinton on 9/10/01: "I could have killed bin Laden"
Bill Clinton, also to be nicknamed "The Artist Formerly Known as 'Slick Willie'". He remains to this day the rock star president of the modern Democratic Party. No one considered this to be true of JFK; he was raised with a silver spoon in his mouth while residing in the lap of luxury on illegally-racketeered earnings by his father Joseph Sr., who make his fortunate off bootlegging alcohol illegally during Prohibition. And because Clinton was considered a dashing, energetic middle-aged man by many within the feminist establishment and those who were non-aligned with any particular party, he played the role as the heir-apparent to the throne of legendary party president, John F. Kennedy. The sad thing is Clinton was not then, nor is he now, Jack Kennedy, but rather the greatest charlatan and sell-out in modern U.S. history for providing the Chinese government under President Jiang Zemin classified military secrets and documentation, including unconfirmed numbers of nuclear weapon technologies and advanced means for which they could begin to launch a massive military buildup of their own. And that is exactly what China has embarked upon, if you read of the global rankings among nations in military expenditures:
Russia still heavily relies upon old Soviet-era combat technology. China, however, is the nation most worrisome. A quarter century ago, President George H.W. Bush placed Beijing under economic sanctions in condemnation over the June Fourth Incident in 1989. Within four years, Clinton during his campaign chastised his incumbent opponent for being too soft. But like any good Democrat, it is not enough to merely appease rogue nations in opposition, but rather to empower them militarily and economically at the cost of cuts in our own defense initiatives and amassing trade deficits that may never be paid in full if tougher measures for using force to bring Beijing to the table to atone for their expansionist foreign policy and poor record on human rights are not curtailed; President Obama is currently funding Hamas, ISIS and Qatar billions for arms and munitions to wipe out Israel. Russia is certainly in cahoots with Beijing, having recently signed a protectionist agreement on more natural gas lines to run through Central Asia, Siberia and northern China that is worth in total $400 billion, or more than the majority of the world's nations, including those within portions of Europe. There will be more in another blog to share, but for tonight, my purpose is to address the most grievous violation of America's national security and now sovereignty ever committed by a U.S. president during postwar America.
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Of course, in true form as one of the ultimate sycophants of the Far Left, Brian Williams of NBC played the violin of apologism ever so brilliantly. In addressing the issue, President Clinton stated that he would have been no better than bin Laden had he destroyed Kandahar in order to kill him. Oddly, when our Navy SEALs took out bin Laden, a woman was grabbed by bin Laden and held as a human shield at gunpoint, which did not phase the SEAL who shot her to lodge a bullet in bin Laden's head. The courts, however, ruled in favor of the administration in its policy to confiscate all known photographs of bin Laden's body. The New York Daily News report is below:
Special ops leader ordered Osama Bin Laden death photos destroyed after AP request for documents
Adm. William McRaven told subordinates in a May 13, 2011 email to destroy or hand over photos of Bin Laden's remains. The Associated Press requested pictures, emails and other documents 10 days prior - the day after Bin Laden was killed.THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Monday, February 10, 2014, 6:32 PMWASHINGTON — A newly-released email shows that 11 days after the killing of terror leader Osama bin Laden in 2011, the U.S. military’s top special operations officer ordered subordinates to destroy any photographs of the al-Qaida founder’s corpse or turn them over to the CIA.The email was obtained under a freedom of information request by the conservative legal group Judicial Watch. The document, released Monday by the group, shows that Adm. William McRaven, who heads the U.S. Special Operations Command, told military officers on May 13, 2011 that photos of bin Laden’s remains should have been sent to the CIA or already destroyed. Bin Laden was killed by a special operations team in Pakistan on May 2, 2011.McRaven’s order to purge the bin Laden material came 10 days after The Associated Press asked for the photos and other documents under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act. Typically, when a freedom of information request is filed to a government agency, the agency is obliged to preserve the material sought — even if the agency later denies the request.On May 3, 2011, the AP asked Special Operations Command’s Freedom of Information/Privacy Act Division office for “copies of all e-mails sent from and to the U.S. government account or accounts” of McRaven referencing bin Laden. McRaven was then vice admiral.
A May 4, 2011 response from the command’s FOIA office to the AP acknowledged the bin Laden document request and said it had been assigned for processing. AP did not receive a copy of the McRaven email obtained by Judicial Watch.
Last July, a draft report by the Pentagon’s inspector general first disclosed McRaven’s secret order, but the reference was not contained in the inspector general’s final report. The email that surfaced Monday was the first evidence showing the actual order.
In a heavily blacked-out email addressed to “gentlemen,” McRaven told his unnamed subordinates: “One particular item that I want to emphasize is photos; particularly UBLs remains. At this point - all photos should have been turned over to the CIA; if you still have them destroy them immediately or get them” a blacked-out location. UBL refers to bin Laden.
At the time the inspector general’s report came out, a spokesman for the Special Operations Command referred questions back to the inspector general.
A CIA spokesman said at the time that “documents related to the raid were handled in a manner consistent with the fact that the operation was conducted under the direction of the CIA director,” then Leon Panetta. The CIA statement also said “records of a CIA operation such as the raid, which were created during the conduct of the operation by persons acting under the authority of the CIA director, are CIA records.”
In a Jan. 31, 2014 letter to Judicial Watch in response to its request for all records relating to McRaven’s “directive to purge,” the Pentagon’s office of general counsel said it had been able to locate only document — Raven’s redacted email.
Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton said Monday that the email “is a smoking gun, revealing both contempt for the rule of law and the American people’s right to know.”
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There are of course photographs of who is involved in the report - bin Laden, Jay Carney and Admiral McRaven - and at the bottom of the page, an article on famous lesbians who married men to demonstrate how trifling our Far Left mainstream media really is. This is what our nation has devolved into. When stories do not fit the agendas of the mainstream press, they simply ignore them and run articles about Hollywood celebrities discussing why Hamas needs to be supported since Israel is out to commit genocide against an entire area of the world where 400 million Arabs and others in Persia are bent upon unleashing a new holocaust not against just Jews, but as we see today in Iraq and Syria, Christians, who are being slaughtered by the thousands weekly.
We must never forget SEAL Team 6, who were killed by a grenade launcher on August 6, 2011, a few days shy of three months since the raid on the bin Laden compound. Family members to this day believe it was a government inside job, subterfuge from our own interior to perhaps cover their tracks regarding the raid, and The Washington Times presented these details two years later:
We must never forget SEAL Team 6, who were killed by a grenade launcher on August 6, 2011, a few days shy of three months since the raid on the bin Laden compound. Family members to this day believe it was a government inside job, subterfuge from our own interior to perhaps cover their tracks regarding the raid, and The Washington Times presented these details two years later:
Families suspect SEAL Team 6 crash was inside job on worst day in Afghanistan
Questions haunt the families of Extortion 17, the 2011 helicopter mission in Afghanistan that suffered the most U.S. military deaths in a single day in the war on terrorism.
The investigative file made available to The Washington Times shows that the helicopter’s landing zone was not properly vetted for threats nor protected by gunships, while commanders criticized the mission as too rushed and the conventional Chinook chopper as ill-suited for a dangerous troop infiltration.
PHOTOS: Families suspect SEAL Team 6 crash was inside job
Every day, Charlie Strange, the father of one of the 30 Americans who died Aug. 6, 2011, in the flash of a rocket-propelled grenade, asks himself whether his son, Michael, was set up by someone inside the Afghan government wanting revenge on Osama bin Laden’s killers — SEAL Team 6.
“Somebody was leaking to the Taliban,” said Mr. Strange, whose son intercepted communications as a Navy cryptologist. “They knew. Somebody tipped them off. There were guys in a tower. Guys on the bush line. They were sitting there, waiting. And they sent our guys right into the middle.”
Doug Hamburger’s son, Patrick, an Army staff sergeant, also perished when the CH-47D Chinook descended to a spot less than 150 yards from where armed Taliban fighters watched from a turret.
He asks why the command sent his son into Tangi Valley toward a “hot landing zone” in a cargo airship instead of a special operations helicopter. The souped-up choppers — the MH-47 and the MH-60 Black Hawk, which SEAL Team 6 rode the stealth version of to kill bin Laden — are flown by Night Stalker pilots skilled in fast, ground-hugging maneuvers to avoid detection.
“When you want to fly them into a valley, when you’ve got hillsides on both sides of it with houses built into sides of the valley, that is an extremely dangerous mission,” Mr. Hamburger said. “The MH, the new model, they’ve got radar that will pick up an incoming missile or incoming RPG. They’re faster. They’re quicker on attack. They’re more agile. So there was every reason in the world to use the MH that night.”
Sith Douangdara, whose 26-year-old son, John, was a Navy expeditionary specialist who handled warrior dog Bart, said he has lots of unanswered questions.
PHOTOS: Inside the U.S. Navy SEALs: See America's elite warriors unleashed
“I want to know why so many U.S. servicemen, especially SEALs, were assembled on one aircraft,” he said. “I want to know why the black box of the helicopter has not been found. I want to know many things.”
Not all families believe the fact-finding investigation, conducted by Army Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Colt covered all issues. Gen. Colt, who has since been promoted to major general, told commanders that his job was not to find fault and his report did not criticize any person or decision.
“I want people held accountable,” said Mr. Strange, a former union construction worker who deals blackjack in a Philadelphia casino.
A spokesman for U.S. Central Command, which overseas the war and conducted the probe, declined to answer the families’ questions and referred a reporter to Gen. Colt’s report.
Congress gets involved
More than two years later, more answers may be forthcoming.
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, led by Rep. Darrell E. Issa, California Republican, is making inquiries after meeting with some families.
Larry Klayman, who runs the nonprofit watchdog group Freedom Watch, has filed suit in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia against the Pentagon, as well as the Air Force, Army and Navy. He wants a judge to order the military to turn over an array of documents under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act. He said the Defense Department stonewalled his written requests, so Freedom Watch went to court last month and succeeded in forcing the government to turn over records.
For the first time, Mr. Klayman allowed The Washington Times to view the military’s investigative files turned over to family members two years ago.
“The families of our fallen heroes, who I am proud to represent, need closure to this tragedy,” Mr. Klayman said. “There are many unanswered questions and the military’s explanations of the causes of the crash do not add up.”
He said families also want changes to the military’s restrictive rules of engagement that made it more difficult for U.S. helicopter pilots to fire back at the Taliban fighters they believed brought down the Chinook.
“The families also want our military’s rules of engagement to be changed, as a testament to and in honor of their dead sons,” Mr. Klayman said. “When our nation enters into battle, it must be to win the battle, not the ‘hearts and minds’ of the Islamic jihadist enemy and the Muslim civilian population it uses as human shields.”
He also wants to know the identities of Afghan soldiers onboard, and why the aircraft’s black box, washed away in a fierce rainstorm, was never found — even though it has a homing device.
“We want to make sure our fallen heroes are respected and that answers are provided,” he said.
About an possible insider betrayal, he says: “We’re not saying that happened, but it needs to be explored because increasingly Americans are being killed at the hands of Afghans.”
Even some military personnel involved that night questioned the operations afterward.
The navigator aboard the AC-130 gunship that loitered for three hours over Tangi Valley expressed in 2011 what the families are thinking today.
“One of the other things that we did talk about — kind of what you’re hitting on, sir, is about the fact that, you know, for three hours we had been burning holes in the sky,” the officer told Gen. Colt’s team. “You’ve got [Apaches] flying around, so there’s a lot of noise going on and, basically, this entire valley knows that there’s something happening in this area. So, to do an infil on the X or Y, you know, having that element of surprise in the beginning of an operation is good, but by the time we’ve been there for three hours, and the party’s up, bringing in another aircraft like that, you know, may not be the most tactically sound decision.”
The mission
After Gen. Colt’s report became public in September 2011, the military arranged for him to brief next of kin Oct. 12 in Little Creek, Va., home to Naval Special Warfare Development Group, popularly called SEAL Team 6. The crash took the lives of 17 SEALs and five special warfare development group operators, making it the worst one-day loss in the history of U.S. naval special operations.
The chopper’s manifest included five Army soldiers, three Air Force airmen, seven Afghan soldiers and one Afghan interpreter. All 38 died. Twenty-two of them, such as Petty Officer Strange, were thrown from the aircraft. The rest died inside the fireball.
The military morgue at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware reported that all succumbed within seconds. Gen. Colt said they were “most likely rapid fatalities.”
President Obama went to Dover to receive the fallen and console the families.
“‘Your son changed America,’” Mr. Strange said the president told him. “I grabbed the president by the shoulders and said, ‘I don’t need to know about my son. I need to know what happened.’”
The nation mourned as 30 funerals were held across the country, many in small-town America.
The public was transfixed by the service in Rockford, Iowa, for Petty Officer 1st Class Jon Tumilson, a SEAL. His beloved Labrador, Hawkeye, stayed loyal to the end, lying at the casket as more than 50 SEALs sat in attendance.
The military probe
Gen. Colt had the right experience to lead the probe: He is a decorated Iraq and Afghanistan veteran and career helicopter pilot, including time in the storied 160th Special Operations Regiment. He is now deputy commander of Fort Bragg, N.C.
For the families on Oct. 12, he went over his main conclusions, then his staff handed out DVDs.
But the questions the next of kin have today did not materialize until they began poring over 1,300 pages of maps, charts, briefings and interview transcripts of task force commanders and planners connected to the incident.
The tragedy unfolded at 10:55 p.m. on Aug. 5, 2011, when 47 Army Rangers set down in two CH-47 Chinooks in high ground overlooking Afghanistan’s Tangi Valley. The mission was part of an intensified campaign to kill or capture Taliban leaders, a drive that put tremendous demands on the helicopter fleet and left newer special “ops” models in short supply.
That night, the quarry was Qari Tahir, identified as the top leader in that critical area south of Kabul where the enemy moved in and out of Pakistan.
The Rangers raided a house thought to hold Tahir. The fleeing enemy — the military calls them “squirters” — escaped through a back door. The Rangers’ leader then made a pivotal decision: He asked the special operations task force to send an immediate reaction force to help catch the squirters, though whether any of them was Tahir was not known. It turned out he was in another village.
Commanders assembled the reaction force in 50 minutes and loaded them on one conventional CH-47, call sign Extortion 17, for the brief flight piloted by a seasoned National Guardsman and a younger reservist.
At that point, it was a far more risky flight than the insertion of Rangers 3 hours earlier. The Rangers had the benefit of surprise. Extortion 17 did not. It was flying into a firefight, with the noise of Apache attack helicopters, AC-130 gunships and drones above telling everyone in the valley that a military operation was underway.
It lifted off a forward operating base at 2:22 a.m., held for several minutes at one point, then announced it was one minute out at 2:38. At that moment, Extortion 17 slowed to 58 mph, at no more than 150 feet, approaching a spot framed by trees and mud-brick huts, and “sparkled” by the infrared designator on an AC-130 gunship.
In darkness, the Taliban fired two or three rocket-propelled grenades, a Soviet-designed OG-7 anti-personnel version that is accurate inside 170 yards. The shooter had positioned himself well within the weapon’s effective range.
One of the rocket-propelled grenades clipped a rotor blade and sent the Chinook into a violent spin, then fiery crash. Within 30 minutes, bragging about the hit from Taliban fighters started appearing on communications nets.
The command press office in Kabul at first told reporters that Extortion 17 was on a rescue mission. But the Rangers did not need rescuing. They had secured the target compound and were chasing squirters.
“A reactionary force is usually sent in as a rescue, meaning our guys are in trouble and you send them in,” Mr. Hamburger said. “You don’t send a reaction force to stop a group of the enemy escaping out the back side of the village, especially in a dangerous valley in a dangerous entry like they were doing.”
The Colt report supports Mr. Hamburger’s position. The special operations command in Afghanistan rarely assembled a reaction force, much less the elite SEAL Team 6, for the chore of chasing fleeing Taliban fighters.
A Colt investigator asked the task force operations officer, “How often do [you] employ the [immediate reaction force] on a target?”
“Rarely sir,” he answered. “It is rare to have a separate IRF element that is planned like this one.”
Likewise, an officer in the combat aviation brigade that provided Extortion 17 said he knew of no previous mission to send a reaction force to catch squirters.
“It has not happened sir,” he told Gen. Colt.
This officer said Extortion 17 already had taken off before he had a chance to tell the brigade’s top officer. There was little intelligence information about the landing area, except that it was 2.5 miles from the compound raided by the Rangers.
“I think he [the commander] called directly to try to get more information,” the officer told Gen. Colt.
The officer then acknowledged that the brigade never fully assessed the possible dangers that could await Extortion 17.
“But the immediacy of it, we didn’t delve as much as we needed to into the threat at that location,” he said.
Betrayal?
Some family members believe the Americans were betrayed by the Afghan government, that someone tipped off the Taliban.
One reason they cite is that the Taliban had begun planting loyalists inside the international security force to kill Americans, a practice known as “green on blue” assassinations.
They say SEAL Team 6 had a target on its back since it became known through various Obama administration leaks to the press that the unit killed bin Laden three months earlier.
Commanders told Gen. Colt’s investigation team that the Taliban put 100 fighters into Tangi Valley for the express purpose of bringing down U.S. aircraft. A flight with 17 SEALs would be a coveted target.
Then there is the fact that a group of Taliban fighters, equipped with hand-held radios, shifted positions and gathered near Extortion 17’s landing zone — a spot never before used by the Americans.
Two Taliban fighters armed with rocket-propelled grenades just happened to be stationed in a high turret less than 150 yards from Chinook’s “hot landing zone,” or (HLZ).
One paragraph in the Colt report grabbed the families’ attention. In it, crash investigators were interviewing the top leadership of the joint special operations task force that put together the mission. One of them was asked about a manifest.
“Yes, sir,” a commander answered. “And I’m sure you know by now the manifest was accurate with the exception of the [redacted] personnel that were on. So the [redacted] personnel, they were incorrect — all seven names were incorrect. And I cannot talk to the back story of why.”
The “seven,” family members say, refers to the Afghan soldiers. The open Colt report makes no reference about why the manifest was inaccurate. Military censors redacted any reference to the Afghans. Some families believe the task force at the last moment was forced to remove seven Afghans whose names remained on the manifest and replace them with seven others.
Senior Afghans had been aware of the mission because each operation must be approved by a joint operational coordination group made up of Americans and Afghan national security forces.
A Central Command spokesman declined to discuss the issue.
“My thought is they were being set up by the Afghanistan military,” Mr. Hamburger said. “I really have a feeling that is why the Afghans were switched at the last minute. That is why they were not on the manifest. I think that our military discovered that and did not want to disclose that truth to the families. I don’t know that for sure, but you just add everything up that wasn’t right with the mission that night, it really worries you.”
Gen. Colt wrote that he believes the Taliban stood ready to fire for one simple reason: The 3-hour Ranger operation, with aircraft continually buzzing overhead, alerted every enemy in the area that more helicopters might be on the way.
“The [Apache helicopters’] early arrival at both HLZ [redacted] coupled with earlier kinetic engagements of enemy elements, likely provided early warning to Taliban fighters that additional helicopters may be inboard to the area,” he wrote.
The wrong aircraft
Family members also believe the SEALs took off in the wrong aircraft.
The CH-47D, a conventional helicopter flown by a non-special operations pilot and co-pilot, is fine for ferrying cargo and troops to uncontested areas.
But to insert commandos into a “hot” zone, specialized choppers such as the MH-47 and MH-60 flown by special operations pilots should have been used, family members say. Army Special Operations Aviation aircraft fly fast and low, while the CH-47D descends to a landing zone from a significant height, making it an easy target.
A special operations commander told Gen. Colt that, of the CH-47D, his “comfort level is low because they don’t fly like ARSOA. They don’t plan like ARSOA. They don’t land like ARSOA. They will either, you know, kind of do a runway landing. Or if it’s a different crew that trains different areas, they will do the pinnacle landing.”
The officer said conventional choppers make commandos less effective.
“It’s tough,” he told Gen. Colt. “I mean, and I gave them guidance to make it work. And they were making it work. But it limited our effectiveness. It made our options and our tactical flexibility — our agility was clearly limited by our air platform infil — where we could go. How quickly we could get there.”
Unlike the MH models, the CH-47D was not equipped with any defensive alert system against rocket-propelled grenades.
Gen. Colt’s own final report shows that MHs have a better track record, at least in the 45 days before the shoot-down.
On June 6, two CH-47s inserting troops into Tangi Valley aborted the mission after encountering fire from rocket-propelled grenades. Later that night, an ARSOA MH-47G encountered the fire while inserting troops to the same landing zone and reported no damage.
It is notable that the command sent the combat rescue, and ordnance disposal teams, to the crash site in MH-47s, not CHs, and that the 47 Rangers left the Tangi Valley in special operations choppers.
Mr. Hamburger said he was told that no MH models were available when Extortion 17 was tapped for its doomed flight.
The Colt report states that surveillance aircraft, likely a Predator drone, stayed fixed on the squirters and did not shift to 17’s landing spot to look for the enemy.
But Mr. Hamburger said a soldier told him he watched a Predator video feed of the shoot-down at a nearby base. If true, the father wants Central Command to turn over the video.
Mr. Hamburger cites as another motive for his push to obtain more information the rules of engagement for U.S. troops. He wants them changed.
Gunship crews cannot fire on fleeing Afghans before confirming they are carrying weapons, even though they obviously are Taliban fighters.
Such rules inhibited the Apaches and the C-130 gunship that night. The special operations commander in Kabul wanted to authorize a strike on the squirters, “but was unable to determine whether the group was armed,” the Colt report says. The commander then ordered the ill-fated SEAL mission to help the Rangers round up every one. More aggressive rules of engagement might have removed any need for the mission.
Moments after the shoot-down, an Apache pilot pinpointed the source of the rocket-propelled grenade, but could not fire.
“Due to [rules of engagement] and tactical directives, I couldn’t fire at the building where I thought the [shooter] was, so I aimed directly to the west of the building,” the pilot told Gen. Colt.
Mr. Hamburger also said the mission did not follow protocol. The flight included no “stacked” escort of Apaches and a C-130 gunship that would put more eyes on the landing zone to look for shooters. The command relied on the gunships that had been sent with the Ranger team, but they had two tasks and paid more attention to the first — watching the squirters.
There appears to be a discrepancy between Gen. Colt’s public 27-page report and what Apache pilots told him during his probe.
The AH-64 Apaches serve as the Chinooks’ bodyguards during a typical troop insertion, escorting them to the landing zone and then targeting enemy on the ground.
But Extortion 17 had no Apache escorts.
Gen. Colt’s report said that special operations commander at headquarters did not order the Rangers’ two Apaches, equipped with night-vision goggles and night-gun sights, to move to Extortion 17’s landing zone. A Ranger commander on the ground took it on himself to issue that order, he wrote.
But the interview transcripts show a more complete story, one that troubles the families who believe Gen. Colt left the wrong impression.
During his investigation, Gen. Colt himself told the special operations commander: “I’m just going to give you the feedback. The [Apache] guys, they really thought that their primary task was continuing to monitor these guys. That’s where their focus was. And as far as the amount of attention that they paid to the [hot landing zone] and the [infiltration] route, it was a secondary task to them.”
The pilot of one of two Apaches, called Gun 1 and Gun 2, assigned to protect the Rangers told Gen. Colt they never broke off to inspect the landing zone for threats as Extortion 17 got closer — until it was just three minutes out.
“Honestly, sir, I don’t think anybody had really looked at the LZ,” said the pilot of Gun 1. “I mean, at any time if we would have found these squirters, or they would have found weapons, we were — the way I was understanding it, we were going to be clear to engage due to the fact that they had weapons, but we had to [positively identify] them first.
“So we hadn’t started looking at the LZ yet, just due to there was so much more of a threat to the east with the squirters,” the pilot said. “I would say that on the three-minute call is when Gun 2 started. looking at the LZ, giving an LZ brief op. I would say that was the first time that we really had eyes on the LZ.”
Planning for an immediate reaction force is supposed to be in conjunction with the main mission. It was not. Planning began at shortly after 1 a.m. and lasted less than an hour.
The AC-130 commander said no one properly coordinated who would watch the squirters on the valley’s east side and who would move west to watch Extortion 17’s back.
“That coordination probably could have gone better, could have been better and, I think, I’m not sure, it just appeared to us the whole plan for getting into this area was rushed, I guess,” he said. “I don’t know if that’s the case, but that’s kind of one thing that I thought might have been done a little bit better.”
The gunship’s sensor operator said, “It just didn’t feel comfortable to us to bring another helo in, especially not having a ground team down there securing an LZ for them.”
Assessment
In the families’ eyes, the mission was snakebit from the start: using sing the wrong aircraft; flying into an uninspected and unwatched landing zone infested with Taliban fighters assembling a plan and a reaction team in minutes for an action that should have been conducted hours earlier.
The Times asked a special operations officer for his opinion. He is on active duty and cannot speak on the record.
“In this case, the CH-47 was used in a completely inappropriate manner given its design and the result was the deaths of everyone aboard,” the officer said.
“Tier 1 personnel must be employed with careful planning,” he added. “The cost and time to train them means that using them in such a haphazard manner as a reaction force in this context places critical personnel at too great a risk, especially in this concentration on such a noncritical mission.”
SEAL Team 6 and Army Delta Force are considered Tier 1 personnel as the armed forces’ most elite counterterrorism units.
Asked how a Taliban at night could hit the 98-foot-long Chinook, he said, “I never questioned how he could aim. There’s is no such thing as ‘pitch black’ and the CH-47 airframe is a loud, enormous target.”
Gen. Colt’s legal adviser began one interview session with ground troops by saying, “Obviously, we got a general officer appointed duty investigation by CENTCOM to make sure we have all the i’s dotted and the t’s crossed and our report is going to be as accurate and complete and unlikely to be second-guessed by a bunch of folks outside the military.”
A month after the worst day in the war, the U.S. gained revenge of a sort. The NATO command in Kabul announced that it had killed Tahir with a precise airstrike as he stood outside with a fellow terrorist.
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Not knowing him personally but having worked in his district for the Walgreen Company of drugstore chains, Doug Hamburger is the district manager for the Knoxville, TN region where I reside and is also my father's supervisor above his store manager. Dad spoke briefly on the subject, describing Mr. Hamburger's anger and despair, and his demand to learn the truth, or what the federal government would allow to be told. As you read, most of what was divulged amounted to little more than mere smoke and mirrors, but not enough apocrypha to constitute a return ticket to their homes with little more than a medal and a .50 cup of coffee for their trouble. Such is life with the federal government, as it always has, but most especially under the Obama administration. The chances of a zombie apocalypse transpiring as is being funded by Homeland Security to prepare for is far more likely to materialize. After all, all you need to do is check the election commission in Chicago to see how many people who have been dead for decades voted and how many times each.
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In conflicting reports about the fate of Osama bin Laden, the following information was disseminated to the world media about his actual time of death by natural causes. If you read and consider the question Global Research poses, did we ever kill bin Laden? Or was this a case of wag the dog?:
What the public were told by the US government via the corporate media, and what actually happened during the White House’s much-celebrated “Bin Laden Raid” in 2011 – are not the same.One thing which becomes clearer by the day about the fabled Bin Laden Raid which took place in Abbotabad, Pakistan, is that the US government has intentionally deceived the public about what happened. In other words, what President Obama described when he addressed the American people following “the raid” – was a work of pure fiction.The following interview appeared on Pakistani broadcast channel, Sama TV, and includes a translation in English from an eye witness on the scene.If the translation is accurate, then this eye witness blows the lid off of another plank in the White House’s fictional drama.The following is an interview with Muhammad Bashir, who lives next door to the alleged ”compound” of Osama bin Laden. He claims that the first US helicopter suffered an explosion, which killed all of its US military occupants, somewhere between 10 and 20 men.Based on this man’s testimony, we have to ask the question: did the White House cover this up in order to protect the Dear Leader from a devastating “Jimmy Carter moment” (1979 Iran hostage rescue cock-up).That’s certainly what this looks like at first glance. Would Obama lie to protect his and his party’s political legacy? We’ll let the readers answer that question.“It seems that although initially, the TV station was overjoyed with this interview, they changed their tune, twenty four hours later (for some unknown reason)”. You decide why…So the original lie, the 9/11 Operation, was covered up by the next lie – the Bin Laden Raid. Following on to this, it only stands to reason that the Abbotabad lie should be concealed by the next lie. The next lie is that no one knows where Bin Laden’s body is. In stark contrast to President Obama’s declaration that bin Laden was “buried at sea”, US Navy Sailors on the USS Carl Vinson have stated on record did not witness an at-sea burial of Osama bin Laden. Therefore, someone is lying. Did Barack Obama chop down the cherry tree?So if Osama bin Laden was not at Abbotabad, or on the USS Carl Vinson – as the evidence, and lack thereof, dictates, then where is he? More than likely, he was dead years before Obama’s glorious raid, but it served two US Administrations to keep his image alive in order to justify the unprecedented military, and security police state build-up which ensued following 9/11. In case readers aren’t aware, there are many high ranking official statements that back up this claim, and at least one of those who spoke of this in public, Benazir Bhutto, was assassinated shortly after saying it.Hollywood even made a blockbuster propaganda film to back-up the US government’s tall tale. It was called Zero Dark Thirty, and it was a big money maker too. So everyone is happy, right? No really, as the can must be kicked down the road one more time…One more lie, before we wrap this up. According to the same government sources from the first two lies listed, on August 6, 2011, a U.S. Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopter, with the call sign Extortion 17, was shot down in Wardak province, west of Kabul, Afghanistan, amazingly, killing all 38 people on board including 25 American special operations personnel. The US claimed that the bodies were so badly burnt that they were forced to cremate them immediately, as if on some sort of deadline to make them disappear. Again, and with both 9/11 and the Bin Laden raid, there are no survivors, no bodies, no photos, and no real evidence available that prove the government’s creative version of events. How do we even know those men actually died in that same Chinook crash? Will we ever know? Not if the US government is allowed to tell its people endless lies, all in the name of national security.After viewing Pakistani TV interview (above), former Assistant US Treasury Secretary Paul Craig Roberts explains, “I am confident that no news organization believes that it could confront such an important US national myth in this way. The killing of bin Laden satisfies the emotional need for revenge and justice. In the least, a news organization that challenged the government’s story would be cut off from all government sources and be denounced by politicians and a large percentage of the gullible US population as an anti-American terrorist-serving organization.”Read full transcript of the Pakistani news translation here.By the way, no one in Abbotabad, or in Pakistan it seems, actually believes the fictional Bin Laden raid drama either. Watch:-
Seeing is not always believing, nor can you guarantee that what you hear is at all the truth. As one history professor at the University of Tennessee used to have posted on his shingle, "Truth can be stranger than fiction." And apparently, we live in a world so convoluted with conflicting details that unless you work at the very top of the chains of command, any capacity to be in the circle of knowledge is indeed impossible.
Is Mohammad Bashir still alive? So far as I have been able to ascertain in terms of information without attempting to access what records are available from the central government in Islamabad, I do not know. There was, however, an interview with the late former prime minister of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto, which may have inferred to the foreshadowed September 11, 2001 attacks:
Recall this interview was conducted with the late David Frost on November 2, 2007. To briefly summarize the YouTube account of what occurred, I will provide you the following. If you choose to watched either or both these videos (I did not post them for my benefit, but for the world's), all accounts will be verified:
Uploaded on May 2, 2011
'Bin Laden was killed years ago'A 2007 Benazir Bhutto interview in which she says the al-Qaeda leader was 'murdered' years ago contributes to the uncertainty surrounding US claims about Osama bin Laden's death.On Monday, US President Barack Obama announced that the al-Qaeda leader was killed by US forces after he was found hiding in a compound in Pakistan.This is while in an interview following a failed assassination attempt on Pakistan's former premier in October 2007, Bhutto says bin Laden has already been killed.In the interview, she identifies the man who killed the notorious al-Qaeda leader as one Omar Sheikh , excerpts of which was sent to Press TV's UReport.In response to a question whether any of the assassins had links with the government, Bhutto said, "Yes but one of them is a very key figure in security, he is a former military officer ... and had dealings with Omar Sheikh, the man who murdered Osama bin Laden."Bhutto was assassinated on December 27, 2007 in a bomb attack as she was leaving an election rally in Rawalpindi when a gunman shot her in the neck and set off a bomb.The announcement of bin Laden's death comes almost ten years after the September 11 attacks on the United States.Meanwhile, a US official says bin Laden's body has been buried at sea, alleging that his hasty burial was in accordance with Islamic law, which requires burial within 24 hours of death.This is while burial at sea is not an Islamic practice and Islam does not determine a timeframe for burial.The official added that finding a country willing to accept the remains of the world's most wanted man was difficult, so the US decided to bury him at sea.
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And again, this is the key portion of what was a 14-minute interview at around the six minute point:
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What happened to Prime Minister Bhutto can be described as nothing less than tragic; it must be condemned. George W. Bush was still in office December 27, 2007 when she was assassinated. The key question now is who is Omar Sheikh? Well, this is him:
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| Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh |
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Daniel Pearl's convicted killer. His full name is Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh. He has been in prison since 2002, and the interview where Prime Minister Bhutto revealed that bin Laden had been dead six years was filmed in 2007. What is not yet clear is exactly what month bin Laden must have died. Omar Sheikh is a British national. The British newspaper The Daily Mail reported of his attempted suicide and, what on the surface is known about him, including the crime for which he was "convicted":
For those needing help recalling Daniel Pearl, this is a photograph from his captivity:
British former public school boy serving life for beheading U.S. reporter Daniel Pearl attempts to commit suicide in Pakistani prisonBritish-born Omar Saeed Sheikh convicted of Daniel Pearl's murder in 2002Police officials have now said he has tried to commit suicide in prisonReporter had been investigating militant groups when he was abducted in Karachi in January, 2002By DAILY MAIL REPORTERPUBLISHED: 05:46 EST, 17 February 2014 | UPDATED: 07:10 EST, 17 February 2014
A British man serving life imprisonment in Pakistan for the killing of American reporter Daniel Pearl has tried to commit suicide, police have said.
Omar Saeed Sheikh was convicted in 2002 of the murder of Pearl, who was the South Asia bureau chief for The Wall Street Journal when he was kidnapped and beheaded in Pakistan.
The 38-year-old reporter had been investigating militant groups when he was abducted in Karachi in January , 2002.
On February 21, 2002, a shocking video of his killing was delivered to U.S. officials in Pakistan.
His remains were found in a shallow grave on Karachi's outskirts three months later.
British-Pakistani Sheikh, who attended Forest School in Snaresbrook, east London, and three others were arrested and convicted in June 2002.
Sheikh has now tried to hang himself in prison, Senior police official Akram Naeem has told the AFP news agency.
Mr Naeem said he was rescued after he was spotted by officials.
He said: 'His condition is stable now and a case has been filed against him in the local police station.'
In January 2011, a report by the Pearl Project at Georgetown University suggested the wrong men had been convicted of the murder.
The investigation claimed the alleged mastermind behind 9/11, Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, was responsible for the murder.
Days before he was abducted, Pearl had learned that his wife Mariane was expecting a baby boy.
Mariane remained in Pakistan and campaigned for her husband's release throughout his capture.
Daniel Pearl's death was confirmed on February 21, 2002. There were outpourings of grief from political and religious leaders, along with ordinary people around the world, who had campaigned for his release.
Three months later, Mariane gave birth to the couple's son Adam.
Marianne Pearl wrote a memoir entitled A Mighty Heart about her late husband's life which was adapted into a film starring Angelina Jolie as Mariane Pearl and Dan Futterman as the journalist.
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For those needing help recalling Daniel Pearl, this is a photograph from his captivity:
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| Journalist Daniel Pearl, confirmed dead by convicted killer Omar Saeed Sheikh |
From all accounts to date, Sheikh was an indispensable figure within the global banking networks. History Commons posted this regarding his life's history:
Saeed’s BackgroundSaeed Sheikh would eventually become deeply involved in the world of the ISI, as well as al-Qaeda. But initially he seemed an unlikely candidate for a career in espionage and terrorism. He was born in Britain with the name Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the son of a wealthy Pakistani clothing manufacturer. He grew up in London, a brilliant student attending the best private schools. He studied mathematics and statistics at the London School of Economics. While still at school, he started a successful shares and equities business and also was a chess champion, world class arm wrestler, and martial arts expert—a rare combination of physical and mental prowess. [Rediff, 2/6/02, South Asian Outlook, 3/02]His life took a turn when he volunteered for charity work in Bosnia in late 1992. The Bosnian war was raging, and he saw atrocities committed by Serbians on Bosnian Muslims. He returned to Britain a committed Muslim radical. Because of his impressive abilities in economics and mathematics, as well as fluency in English and complete understanding of Western society, he was a very valuable asset to any terrorist group. [ABC News, 2/7/02]In 1993 he emerged in Pakistan as a member of a militant group fighting for the liberation of Kashmir from India. Pakistan has been fighting India for years over control of Kashmir, and it appears Saeed was put on the ISI payroll around this time, to help the Pakistani cause in Kashmir. [ABC News, 2/7/02] In 1994, Saeed began training at a training camp in Afghanistan. He soon was teaching the classes. [Los Angeles Times, 2/9/02] He developed close ties with al-Qaeda while training there. By the end of the year he was known as Osama bin Laden’s “favored son” or “my special son.” [London Times, 8/21/02, Vanity Fair, 8/02]
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The bin Laden family is one well-known publicly, but according to sources, he was not the one who ran the operation, but rather at most at tertiary figure. History Commons continues with more about Omar Sheikh as it discusses a mysterious organization known as the ISI, or what it refers to as a "Secret Government":
The ISI: “The Invisible Government”As the London Times has put it, Saeed Sheikh “is no ordinary terrorist but a man who has connections that reach high into Pakistan’s military and intelligence elite and into the innermost circles of Osama Bin Laden and the al-Qaeda organization.” [London Times, 4/21/02] To understand why Saeed is so important in understanding 9/11, it is necessary to first understand the Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The ISI plays a much more significant role in the Pakistani government than do its counterparts in other countries. Time Magazine has noted, “Even by the shadowy standards of spy agencies, the ISI is notorious. It is commonly branded ‘a state within the state,’ or Pakistan’s ‘invisible government.’” [Time, 5/6/02] The ISI grew into its present form during the war between the Soviet Union and mujaheddin guerrillas in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The CIA thought the Afghan war could be Russia’s own costly Vietnam War, and they funneled billions to the mujaheddin resistance to keep them a thorn in Russia’s side. The strategy worked: Soviet soldiers withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, and the Soviet Union collapsed two years later, partly due to the costs of the war. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 9/23/01]
But the costs to keep the mujaheddin fighting were staggering, with estimates ranging between $6 billion and $40 billion. [New York Times, 8/24/98, Nation, 2/15/99] While a substantial portion of this amount came from the CIA and the Saudi Arabian government, who were both funneling the money through the ISI, much of the cost was deferred by Afghanistan’s opium trade. The Sydney Morning Herald notes, “Opium cultivation and heroin production in Pakistan’s northern tribal belt and adjoining Afghanistan were a vital offshoot of the ISI-CIA cooperation. It succeeded in turning some of the Soviet troops into addicts. Heroin sales in Europe and the US, carried out through an elaborate web of deception, transport networks, couriers and payoffs, offset the cost of the decade-long war in Afghanistan.” [Sydney Morning Herald, 9/27/01] Afghan opium production ballooned from 250 tons in 1982 at the start of the war to 2,000 tons in 1991 just after its end. The Minneapolis Star Tribune observed, “If their local allies were involved in narcotics trafficking”—the ISI and their allies in Afghanistan—“it didn’t trouble CIA.” [Star Tribune, 9/30/01]
Although the Afghan war has ended, the ISI has continued to profit from opium. In 1999, the United Nations Drug Control Programme estimated that the ISI was making around $2.5 billion annually from the sale of illegal drugs. [Times of India, 11/29/99] The drug trade helped unite the ISI and Osama bin Laden, who was said to have taken a 15% cut of the Afghan drug trade money in exchange for protecting smugglers and laundering their profits. [Star Tribune, 9/30/01]By 1994, the Taliban, a group of Muslim radicals studying in Pakistan, began conquering Afghanistan. The Taliban had been recruited by the ISI and molded into a fanatical force that conquered Afghanistan’s capital by 1996. CNN reported, “The Taliban are widely alleged to be the creation of Pakistan’s military intelligence [the ISI]. Experts say that explains the Taliban’s swift military successes.” [CNN, 10/5/96] This support continued. For instance, in early 2001, a leading US expert on South Asia claimed that the Taliban were still “on the payroll of the ISI.” [Times of India, 3/7/01]
The ISI didn’t create the Taliban simply for strategic reasons; they shared the Taliban’s extreme radical vision. As the Wall Street Journal remarked in November 2001, “Despite their clean chins and pressed uniforms, the ISI men are as deeply fundamentalist as any bearded fanatic; the ISI created the Taliban as their own instrument and still supports it.” [Asia Times, 11/15/01]
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The Reagan Doctrine of funding mujahideen fighters to wage a proxy war versus the Soviet Union indeed worked, but once Gorbachev ordered the Red Army's retreated back into Soviet territory, the problems initiated. There was a power vacuum, no tiered state infrastructure, and what on the surface appeared to be a cleared situation was, in fact, an anarchy destined to be a powder keg for disaster. The question then was when this would transpire, and not when. The Soviet Union indeed collapsed officially on December 31, 1991; they did not retreat from Afghanistan until February 1989, about one month following President Reagan leaving the White House. As I posted information about Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto's assassination on December 27, 2007 less than to months following her "slip" of the detail of bin Laden's assassination by Omar Sheikh some six years earlier, the ISI, or to refresh your memory "the Inter-State Intelligence" which governs Pakistan and created the Taliban government nearly a generation ago, never should have been allowed to exist, but in fact it did. In fact, the Taliban is just the tip of the iceberg according to the Asia Time; in early 2001, a leading U.S. expert on South Asia revealed how the Taliban still remained on the payroll of the ISI.
More details are available about Omar Sheikh, including his arrest in 1994 in India:
Prison and Escape
Saeed Sheikh was arrested in India in 1994 while on a kidnapping mission designed to trade Western tourists for Kashmiri separatists. [ABC News, 2/7/02] The ISI paid his legal fees, but he was nonetheless sentenced to a long prison term in an Indian jail. [Washington Post, 5/3/02] While in prison, his natural abilities soon allowed him to become the leader of the jail’s large Muslim population. By his own admission, he “lived practically like a Mafia don.” [London Times, 8/21/02] It has been claimed that in 1999, British intelligence secretly offered Saeed an amnesty and the ability to “live in London a free man” if he would reveal his links to al-Qaeda. He apparently refused. [Daily Mail, 7/16/02, London Times, 7/16/02] Even more curiously, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review suggested in March 2002, “There are many in Musharraf’s government who believe that Saeed Sheikh’s power comes not from the ISI, but from his connections with our own CIA. The theory is that… Saeed Sheikh was bought and paid for.” [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02]
In December 1999, terrorists hijacked an Indian Airlines aircraft and flew it to Kandahar, Afghanistan. After an eight-day standoff, the 155 hostages were released in exchange for Saeed and two other three Pakistani terrorists held by India. [BBC, 12/31/99] He must have been already highly valued by al-Qaeda, because the hijacking appears to have been largely funded and carried out by them. [CNN, 6/13/02, New York Times, 12/6/01] Saeed stayed at a Kandahar guesthouse for several days, conferring with Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar and Osama bin Laden. An ISI colonel then escorted him to a safe house in Pakistan. [Vanity Fair, 8/02]
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"It has been claimed that in 1999, British intelligence secretly offered Saeed an amnesty and the ability to “live in London a free man” if he would reveal his links to al-Qaeda. He apparently refused." [Daily Mail, 7/16/02, London Times, 7/16/02] More frightening is the issue of the government of Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan believing that Omar Sheikh's mandate for power is not derived from ISI, but rather an insider or a chain of insiders within the CIA. So, did the Clinton administration use Omar Sheikh as a paid puppet? Did he take the fall for the murder of Daniel Pearl because his usefulness had run its course? Did his usefulness come to an abrupt conclusion once he assassination Osama bin Laden in what is believed to be December of 2001, or three months following the September 11 attacks? The web of entanglements continue to grow more opaque and furthermore convoluted.
Just as did Nelson Mandela while imprisoned, so too did Omar Sheikh live like a Mafia don. And as you would expect while he ran his operations in the prison within India for his illicit drug trafficking operations and other illegal activities, more interesting details are available:
Just as did Nelson Mandela while imprisoned, so too did Omar Sheikh live like a Mafia don. And as you would expect while he ran his operations in the prison within India for his illicit drug trafficking operations and other illegal activities, more interesting details are available:
Saeed Keeps Busy
In his roughly two years of freedom before 9/11, Saeed was a very busy terrorist. According to Newsweek, once in Pakistan, Saeed “lived openly—and opulently—in a wealthy Lahore neighborhood. US sources say he did little to hide his connections to terrorist organizations, and even attended swanky parties attended by senior Pakistani government officials.” The US government inferred that he was a “protected asset” of the ISI. [Newsweek, 3/13/02] In fact, his house was given to him by the ISI. [Vanity Fair, 8/02] Even more remarkably, the media reported that Saeed was freely able to return to Britain [Press Trust of India, 1/3/00], just as if he had accepted Britain’s secret amnesty offer. He visited his parents in Britain in 2000 and again in early 2001. [Vanity Fair, 8/02, BBC, 7/16/02, Telegraph, 7/16/02] The British citizens kidnapped by Saeed in 1994 called the government’s decision not to try him a “disgrace” and “scandalous.” [Press Trust of India, 1/3/00]
It as been reported that Saeed helped train the hijackers. [Telegraph, 9/30/01] Presumably this happened in Afghanistan, where he trained others and where he traveled regularly. [New York Times, 2/25/02, National Post, 2/26/02, Guardian, 7/16/02, India Today, 2/25/02] He also reportedly helped devise a secure, encrypted Web-based communications system for al-Qaeda. “His future in the network seemed limitless; there was even talk of one day succeeding bin Laden.” [Vanity Fair, 8/02, Telegraph, 7/16/02]
But at the same time, much of his time was spent working with the ISI. He worked with Ijaz Shah, a former ISI official in charge of handling two terrorist groups, Lieutenant-General Mohammad Aziz Khan, also a former deputy chief of the ISI in charge of relations with Jaish-e-Mohammad, and Brigadier Abdullah, a former ISI officer. He was well known to other senior ISI officers. [National Post, 2/26/02, Guardian, 7/16/02, India Today, 2/25/02] How much of his work with al-Qaeda was done on the orders of the ISI is not known.
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During the training and planning stages, Omar Sheikh travelled to and from his home in Britain, and from 1997 through 2007, Tony Blair of the Labour Party was the prime minister. Blair currently is facing potential legal action for his role in misleading the public on the cause for entry into the War on Terror, particularly in Iraq. As Britain was willing to provide him sanctuary again had he confessed to being an operative for al Qaeda but then curiously allowed him to return years later as if he had confessed, London is indeed involved, and you can imagine the MI:6 as well.
The first pieces of data about Omar Sheikh's involvement in the September 11, 2001 attacks are then recounted according to History Commons:
Saeed’s 9/11 Role is First Revealed
By now, the al-Qaeda 9/11 plot was in motion. Someone in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), using an alias, periodically wired money to and from hijackers Mohamed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi between June 2000 and the day before 9/11. [MSNBC, 12/11/01] The identity of this person has been a highly disputed subject. On September 23, 2001, it was first reported that authorities were now (finally) looking for Saeed Sheikh, though it wasn’t explained why. [London Times, 9/23/01] The next day, it was reported that the 9/11 “paymaster” had been found, using the alias “Mustafa Ahmed.” [Newsweek, 9/24/01] On October 1, 2001, the Guardian reported, “The man at the center of the financial web is believed to be Sheikh Saeed, also known as Mustafa Mohamed Ahmad,” but it wasn’t immediately clear who this person was. [Guardian, 10/1/01] On October 6, CNN revealed that “US investigators now believe Sheik Syed, using the alias Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad, sent more than $100,000 from Pakistan to Mohamed Atta.” More importantly, CNN confirmed that this was in fact the same Saeed Sheikh who had been released from an Indian prison in 1999. [CNN, 10/6/01]
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At the very least, Omar Sheikh was the conduit for the attacks. At worst, he actually was the center of the plot. Still further we may recall the media only divulging more details about the life and crimes of bin Laden by each additional day, and yet I have no recollection at that point of ever reading about nor hearing of Omar Sheikh on television or the online news.
More still needs to be fully understood about Omar Sheikh. I will continue providing more below:
Enter Lt. Gen. Mahmood and the ISI
On October 7, 2001, Pakistani President Musharraf fired Lt. Gen. Mahmood Ahmed, the head of the ISI. The next day, some newspapers, mostly in India but also in Pakistan, shockingly said he was fired for his role in the 9/11 attacks. [Press Trust of India, 10/8/01] For instance, a Pakistani newspaper stated, “Lt. Gen. Mahmood Ahmed has been replaced after the FBI investigators established credible links between him and Umar Sheikh, one of the three militants released in exchange for passengers of the hijacked Indian Airlines plane in 1999… Informed sources said there were enough indications with the US intelligence agencies that it was at Gen. Mahmood’s instruction that Sheikh had transferred 100,000 US dollars into the account of Mohammed Atta…” [Dawn, 10/9/01] Indian newspapers claimed that Indian intelligence had been instrumental in helping to establish the connection. [Times of India, 10/9/01, India Today, 10/15/01, Agence France-Presse, 10/10/01, Daily Excelsior, 10/18/01] Yet this explosive story was barely mentioned in the West. [Australian, 10/10/01, AFP, 10/10/01] In the US, surprisingly, the only mention was in a one short piece in the Wall Street Journal, mentioning that, “The US authorities… confirm[ed] the fact that $100,000 [was] wired to WTC hijacker Mohammed Atta from Pakistan by Ahmad Umar Sheikh at the insistence of General Mahmood.” [Wall Street Journal, 10/10/01] Most other Western accounts simply explained Mahmood was fired for being too close to the Taliban. [London Times, 10/9/01,Guardian, 10/9/01]
If true, the story would strongly suggest that the ISI played a very large role in the 9/11 attacks. Why the silence on such an important story? One might credit skepticism that the story was merely Indian propaganda. But a larger pattern, detailed below, suggests there is something more to the media’s attitude: a strong reluctance to print any evidence suggesting Pakistan was behind the 9/11 attacks.
Mahmood’s sudden and complete disappearance also seems curious. He is reportedly living under “virtual house arrest” [Asia Times, 1/5/02], and has refused to speak to reporters since being fired. [AP, 2/21/02] Other former ISI Directors living in Pakistan seemingly even more supportive of the Taliban continue to be very vocal (such as Lt. Gen. Hamid Gul, for instance [New Yorker, 12/3/01]), and numerous other ISI officers have supported the Taliban in seeming defiance of Musharraf’s wishes and not faced house arrest. [Guardian, 5/25/02]
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Again, the media not just in the U.S. but in the rest of the Western world opted to largely bury the story of possible Pakistani involvement or serving as the central planners in some capacity alongside Omar Sheikh and others within the ISI ruling apparatus. And as Pakistan was strongly pressured by the George W. Bush presidency to participate in our intent to invade Afghanistan to first topple the Taliban - which served as the puppet for the Pakistanis under the ISI should this story be true - at the cost of a virtual geopolitical isolationism at our implementation, it reads like political blackmail. In a sense, one might consider this the Bush administration's measure for the Musharraf government atoning for its sin. The truth is had Musharraf not complied with President Bush, the latter likely would involve India in the invasion and in real terms, relegate Pakistan into a political island state.
As mentioned, Omar Sheikh served his purpose, but for who? Who did he work for? Did he work for the CIA or ISI? Do the lines intersect and become extraordinarily indiscernible between the two? I continue with more information below:
Distractions Away From Saeed
Not only did Mahmood suddenly become persona non grata, but so did Saeed Sheikh, now that he was implicated in Mahmood’s story. He was again mentioned as the 9/11 paymaster the day before the Mahmood story broke [CNN, 10/8/01], and then suddenly, all mention of him ceased (with one exception [CNN, 10/28/01]). Since then, the FBI has put forth a variety of alternates for the identity of the person in the 9/11 paymaster role. The story is too complicated to greatly detail here, but the FBI and media have variously filled Saeed Sheikh’s shoes with an Egyptian named Shaykh Saiid [Sydney Morning Herald, 9/28/01, New York Times, 10/15/01, Los Angeles Times, 10/20/01], a Saudi named Sa’d Al-Sharif, said to be bin Laden’s brother-in-law [Newsweek, 11/11/01, AP, 12/18/01], a Kenyan named Sheik Sayyid el Masry [CNN, 10/16/01, Trial Transcript, 2/20/01, Trial Transcript, 2/21/01], a Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi or al-Hisawi (suggesting no alias was used) [MSNBC, 12/11/01, Wall Street Journal, 6/17/02], a Shaikh Saiid al-Sharif [AP, 6/4/02], an Ali Abdul Aziz Ali (for some of the money transfers) [Congressional Intelligence Committee, 9/26/02], and so on. Most recently, the FBI said the most well-known candidate, Shaikh Saiid al-Sharif, doesn’t actually exist, but is probably a composite of Mustafa Ahmed Al-Hisawi, Shaikh Saiid al-Masri, and Saad al-Sharif. [AP, 12/26/02] Newsweek, in describing yet another name variation, Mustafa Ahmad Adin Al-Husawi, says the person “remains almost a total mystery,” and no one is sure of his name or even if he is one person. [Newsweek, 9/4/02] (Note that Saeed appears to be a master of disguise, as can be seen by the bewildering number of names he is referred to in the media: Sheik Syed, Ahmad Umar Sheikh, Umar Sheikh, Sheik Omar Saeed, Omar Saiid Sheikh, Sheikh Omar, etc… He opened bank accounts using many of his name variations, or even completely unrelated names. [The News, 2/13/02])
While the FBI and media have been putting forth a series of names sounding remarkably similar to Saeed Sheikh or the aliases he used, they have been ignoring or forgetting solid evidence that links Saeed Sheikh to the funding of 9/11. To do so would mean confronting Saeed’s ISI ties, and the possibility that he was acting on orders from Mahmood, or even President Musharraf.
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Recall in past blog articles my discussion regarding muruna. It again is the Islamic means for achieving the element of deception, or in direct translating into Arabic, "flexibility". I will again provide you with the detailing below, with each of the four key terms all Christians and Jews must know to grasp Islam's means to achieve their terroristic ends, courtesy of Islam Watch:
Takiyya
Takiyya is defined as dissimulation about ones Muslim identity. It comes from the verse in the Quran that says, “Let believers not make friends with infidels in preference to the faithful – he that does has nothing to hope for from Allah – except in self-defense (illaa an-tattaqu minhum tuqah) (Surah 3:28). This “self-defense” justifies dissimulation. Islamic Sharia Law provides, “When it is possible to achieve an aim by lying but not by telling the truth, it is permissible to lie if attaining the goal is permissible, and lying is obligatory if the goal is obligatory.” (Reliance of the Traveler, Para r8.2) Examples include lying to protect Islam or a Muslim.
Tawriya
Tawriya is defined as concealing, and it could be called “creative lying”. It is OK to break the intent of the oath, as long as you don’t break the letter of the oath. (Reliance of the Traveler, sections o19.1 and o19.5) How does this work? Suppose someone protests that Surah 1 of the Quran demeans Christians and Jews, because it is a supplication Muslims make to Allah seventeen times a day to keep them from the path of “those with whom God is angry” and “those who have lost their way”. A Muslim might respond, “Surah 1 never mentions Jews or Christians.” He is practicing tawriya, because while Surah 1 does not mention Jews and Christians by name, but he knows full-well that the words “those” refer to Jews and Christians.
Another example would be when a Muslim responds to your greeting of “Merry Christmas!” He might say, “I wish you the best.” In your mind, you think he has returned a Christmas greeting. In actuality, he has expressed his wish for you to convert to Islam; he wishes the best for you which, in his view, is becoming a Muslim.
Kitman
Kitman is characterized by someone telling only part of the truth. The most common example of this is when a Muslim says that jihad really refers to an internal, spiritual struggle. He is not telling “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth”, as witnesses are sworn to do in U.S. courts. Often, kitman results in a gross distortion of the truth. In the example given, the Quran uses jihad and its derivatives 59 times. Of those, only 16 (27%) could be considered “internal” with no object as the target of the struggle based on the context of the surah.
Another common form of kitman is to quote only the few peaceful passages from the Quran, knowing full-well that that passage was later abrogated by a more militant, contradictory verse. Here is an example:
“There is no compulsion in religion” (Surah 2:256) Early Medina
“Are they seeking a religion other than Allah’s, when every soul in the heavens and earth has submitted to Him, willingly or by compulsion?” (Surah 3:83 Later Medina)
Another example:
“Permission to take up arms is hereby given to those who are attacked, because they have been wronged.” (Surah 22:39) Late Mecca
“When the sacred months are over, slay the idolaters wherever you find them. Arrest them, besiege them and lie in ambush everywhere for them.” (Surah 9:5) Late Medina
Muruna
Muruna means using “flexibility” to blend in with the enemy or the surroundings. The justification for this kind of deception is a somewhat bizarre interpretation of Surah 2:106, which says, “If we abrogate a verse or cause it to be forgotten, We will replace it by a better one or similar.” Thus, Muslims may forget some of the commands in the Quran, as long as they are pursuing a better command. Muslims striving to advance Islam, therefore, can deviate from their Islamic laws in order to cause non-Muslims to lower their guard and place their trust in their Muslim counterpart.
At times, Muslims practice muruna in the same way a chameleon changes colors to avoid detection. Muslims will sometimes shave off their beards, wear western clothing, or even drink alcohol to blend in with non-Muslims. Nothing is more valuable these days to the Islamists than a blue-eyed Caucasian Muslim willing to engage in terrorism.
Another common way of using muruna is for a Muslim to marry a non-Muslim or to behave like a non-Muslim so their true agenda will not be suspected. The 9/11 hijackers visited strip clubs and bars during their off-times while taking classes in the U.S. to fly airplanes into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the White House. Many Americans believe Hillary Clinton’s aide, Huma Abedin, married Jewish Congressman Anthony Weiner at least in part to burnish her security credentials so she could infiltrate the highest levels of the Administration.
The implications of these highly-honed tactics of deception could be enormous for unassuming Western societies. Twenty years ago, psychologist Paul Ekman wrote an insightful book, “Telling Lies”, which demonstrated that people give off recognizable clues when they are practicing deceit. Their consciences cause them, involuntarily, to sweat or raise their voices or make other recognizable gestures. However, Dr. Ekman’s research was exclusively with people from Western cultures. Muslims, on the other hand, show no discernible signs when they are being deceitful because there is no feeling of guilt. In their minds they are doing exactly what Allah wants them to do to advance Islam. Because any Western person who has raised children knows almost intuitively when someone is lying, so they assume they can do that in all cases. Unfortunately, those same Western people can be easily duped by Islamic deceit because there are no tell-tale signs in the deceiver.
Hopefully, this article will be a wake-up call to the unsuspecting infidels. Trust but verify – as was an old American strategy in dealing with potentially hostile parties – is the way to go in dealing with Islamists.
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In the planning of the September 11, 2001 attacks as well as nearly all others, these four tactics were used. Islam is, in fact, the singular faith of lies, for advocating lying, and for subterfuge and espionage of all who fail to adhere to the standards set forth by Allah and his prophet, Muhammad. And more still needs to be explained about Omar Sheikh and who exactly it is his employer:
Saeed, Working With Underworld Figures, Gives Money to Mohamed Atta
During the five years Saeed spent in an Indian prison, he developed friendships with some very unsavory people. One such person was Aftab Ansari. Ansari is an Indian gangster who was released on bail near the end of 1999 and then skipped the country. [India Today, 2/25/02] Saeed additionally met a prisoner named Asif Raza Khan, also released in 1999. [Rediff, 11/17/01] Ansari moved to Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), and began expanding his Indian-based criminal network with Asif Raza Khan and others. [Los Angeles Times, 1/23/02] By early 2001, they had organized a kidnapping network. They would kidnap rich Indian businessmen and use the money to fund other illegal activities. [India Today, 2/14/02, Times of India, 2/14/02] Mutual friend Saeed, drawing on his previous terrorist training expertise, provided training and weapons to the kidnappers in return for a percentage of the profits. [Frontline, 2/2/02, India Today, 2/25/02] Ansari’s criminal underground network would also assist the ISI in conducting terrorist attacks inside India. [Press Trust of India, 5/13/02]
In late July 2001, a wealthy Indian shoe manufacturer was kidnapped in Calcutta, India. In early August, his ransom was paid to Ansari’s group, and the victim was let go. Ansari gave about $100,000 of the approximately $830,000 in ransom money to Saeed, who sent it to hijacker Mohamed Atta. [Los Angeles Times, 1/23/02, Independent, 1/24/02] A series of recovered e-mails shows the money was sent just after August 11, 2001. [India Today, 2/14/02, Times of India, 2/14/02]
Note that this $100,000 is the same amount ISI Director Mahmood supposedly told Saeed to send to Atta. The timing of Mahmood’s order isn’t known, however. It may refer to this early August 2001 transaction, or it could refer to a separate approximately $100,000 sent to Atta from Dubai, UAE between June and September 2000. [MSNBC, 12/11/01, Newsweek, 12/2/01] There were probably other transactions, since it is believed the hijackers spent between $500,000—$600,000 in the US. At least $325,000 came from the person using the alias “Mustafa Ahmed” and variants on that name. [New York Times, 7/10/02] The lack of banking regulations in the UAE and the secrecy of the Middle Eastern “hawala” money transfer system has apparently kept details of these other money transfers unknown. [Los Angeles Times, 1/20/02] But it stands to reason that Saeed wouldn’t have sent only one money transfer on orders of Mahmood and the rest on his own initiative. Presumably, Saeed used Ansari’s money because it would leave even less of a paper trail than money from a legitimate banking account.
The FBI has reported that many of the hijackers passed through Dubai and met with the 9/11 paymaster. They would be given Visa credit cards, travelers checks, and help in opening bank accounts. [Washington Post, 12/13/01, MSNBC, 12/11/01, Congressional Intelligence Committee, 9/26/02,London Times, 12/1/01, Congressional Intelligence Committee, 9/26/02] This further suggests that the paymaster was Saeed, since he was making frequent trips to Dubai at this time. [Guardian, 2/9/02]
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Dubai is the largest city of the United Arab Emirates. Its primary means for national tax revenue is through tourism, but oil is still a vital portion of the economy. With the very complex networks for transferring and wiring money from multiple international banks in the Middle East which utilize Islam's "hawala" means have stifled anti-terrorist organizations capacities to simply track transactions and exchanges. The matter that Qatar, which has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood as the wealthiest nation globally in per capita income and which received more than $50 billion in aid from President Obama less than two weeks ago on July 21 is most discouraging, not to mention thought and inquiry-provocative. Still, more needs to be discussed, and I will continue with more:
Pakistan’s Support of Terrorism
Why would Pakistan’s secret service openly back someone like Saeed? Pakistan’s population is only a fraction of their arch-rival, India, and in a conventional war they likely would fare badly. Several wars have been fought between the two countries over the disputed territory of Kashmir. Because Pakistan’s army cannot compete with India’s in Kashmir, it has resorted to guerrilla attacks using radical Muslim terrorists to make up for their lack of numbers. The ISI directs the terrorist groups fighting in Kashmir, but tries to maintain a certain level of distance and plausible deniability. [New York Times, 10/29/01]
It is usually maintained that the terror groups fighting in Kashmir have nothing to do with other terrorist groups fighting other enemies of Islam around the world. However, this distinction does not exist in reality. For instance, terrorist leader Maulana Masood Azhar was freed with al-Qaeda help in the same 1999 airplane hijacking swap that freed Saeed. Azhar quickly returned to Pakistan in January 2000, but didn’t face arrest. Instead, a few days after being freed, he told a cheering Pakistani crowd of 10,000 supporters, “I have come here because this is my duty to tell you that Muslims should not rest in peace until we have destroyed America and India.” [AP, 1/5/00] He then toured Pakistan for weeks under the protection of the ISI. [Vanity Fair, 8/02] Saeed had grown close to Azhar in Indian prison. In early 2000, Saeed and the ISI helped Azhar form a new terrorist group called Jaish-e-Mohammad, and soon Azhar was behind more terrorist acts, mostly in Kashmir. [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02, Guardian, 7/16/02, Washington Post, 2/8/03] Jaish-e-Mohammad worked with the ISI, Saeed and Ansari in their numerous attacks. For instance, shortly after the October 2001 Kashmir bombing, Indian intelligence claims that Pakistani President Musharraf was given a recording of a phone call between Jaish-e-Mohammad leader Maulana Masood Azhar and ISI Director Mahmood in which Azhar reported the bombing is a “success.” [UPI, 10/10/01, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02] In early January 2002, the FBI was interested in questioning Azhar, and a Pakistani official stated that, “The Americans are aware Azhar met bin Laden often, and are convinced he can give important information about bin Laden’s present whereabouts and even the September 11 attacks.” [Gulf News, 1/5/02]
The ISI, mainly through these proxy terrorist groups, has deep ties to al-Qaeda. In 1993, the same Azhar helped al-Qaeda train and fund Somali warlord forces so they could kill US soldiers stationed in Somalia. These attacks forced the US to withdraw from that country. [PBS Frontline, 10/3/02, Los Angeles Times, 2/25/02] For years, the ISI has had Kashmiri terrorist groups like Jaish-e-Mohammad train in the same Afghanistan training camps used by bin Laden. [New York Times, 10/29/01, Time, 5/6/02] In fact, in August 1998 when Clinton launched missiles to kill bin Laden in one of his training camps, the missiles accidentally killed five ISI officers and some twenty of their trainees. [Observer, 8/23/98, New Yorker, 1/24/00]
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In the event that war breaks out, it is crucial that the U.S. court India, the world's second largest nation and military. It ranks globally fourth per the information I provide in the past, and for manpower, would be a vital tool in terms of isolating Pakistan.
Now is where Osama bin Laden becomes the key mystery in this picture:
Now is where Osama bin Laden becomes the key mystery in this picture:
Protecting bin Laden
The Pakistani government not only assisted al-Qaeda, they were instrumental in keeping bin Laden alive. It has been widely rumored that bin Laden suffers severe medical problems. On July 2, 2001, an Indian newspaper reported that “bin Laden, who suffers from renal deficiency, has been periodically undergoing dialysis in a Peshawar military hospital with the knowledge and approval of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), if not of [Pakistani President] Musharraf himself.” [SARPA, 7/2/01] The highly respected intelligence newsletter, Jane’s Intelligence Digest, later reported the same story, and came close to confirming it: “None of [these details] will be unfamiliar to US intelligence operatives who have been compiling extensive reports on these alleged activities.” [Jane’s Intelligence Digest, 9/20/01] CBS later reported bin Laden had emergency medical care in Pakistan the day before September 11. He was spirited into a military hospital in Rawalpindi for kidney dialysis treatment. Pakistani military forces guarded him. They also moved out all the regular staff in the urology department and sent in a secret team to replace them. [CBS News, 01/28/02] The Jane’s article added, “It is becoming clear that both the Taliban and al-Qaeda would have found it difficult to have continued functioning—including the latter group’s terrorist activities—without substantial aid and support from [Pakistan].” [Jane’s Intelligence Digest, 9/20/01]
Without a doubt, bin Laden’s safe haven in Afghanistan would not have existed without the ISI. Two days before 9/11, the Taliban preemptively took out their main enemy is anticipation of a post-9/11 backlash. [St. Petersburg Times, 9/9/02] Two men posing as journalists assassinated Northern Alliance leader General Ahmed Shah Massoud, the one opposition leader with broad popular support in Afghanistan.[BBC, 9/10/01, BBC, 9/10/01] His assassins had ties to both al-Qaeda and the ISI. [Radio Free Europe, 9/10/01, Newsday, 9/15/01, Reuters, 10/4/01] The Taliban’s army had been massing for an attack against the Northern Alliance for weeks, but didn’t attack until hours after Massoud’s assassination. A large portion of this force was actually made of Pakistani soldiers. [Time, 8/4/02] When the US attacked Afghanistan after 9/11, the ISI secretly supported the Taliban with military advisors and weapon shipments, despite promising the US not to. [Telegraph, 10/10/01, Knight Ridder, 11/3/01, New York Times, 12/8/01,UPI, 11/1/01, Time, 5/6/02] A anonymous Western diplomat later stated, “We did not fully understand the significance of Pakistan’s role in propping up the Taliban until their guys withdrew and things went to hell fast for the Talibs.” [New York Times, 12/8/01] But why this would not be understood is a mystery. In June 2001, UPI reporters noted, “Despite Pakistan’s official denials, Taliban is entirely dependent on Pakistani aid. This was verified on the ground by UPI. Everything from bottled water to oil, gasoline and aviation fuel, and from telephone equipment to military supplies, comes from Pakistan.” [UPI, 6/14/01]
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Ladies and gentlemen, Osama bin Laden was dying from renal failure and was hospitalized in Pakistan the day of the September 11, 2001 attacks. As his health was in dire straits and public knew this from what little bits were reported, just how mentally-equipped was he in serving as the central planner in the attacks if his mind might have been affected due to poisoning from failing kidneys? Regardless of what long-term chronic illness from which one might suffer, the pain is usually debilitating not simply to the body, but also the mind. Bin Laden could not have planned this, or at least never as the central mastermind. He was too convenient in his weakened capacity to use as what Lee Harvey Oswald referred to himself as someone's patsy. And bin Laden was a patsy in this plot.
Seven days prior to the attacks, or September 4, 2001, a very intriguing visitor arrived in Washington:
A Curious Visit
The relationship between the US and the ISI is hard to fathom. On September 4, 2001, ISI Director Mahmood Ahmed arrived in Washington, D.C. On September 10, a Pakistani newspaper reported on the visit, saying that it had “triggered speculation about the agenda of his mysterious meetings at the Pentagon and National Security Council” as well as meetings with CIA Director George Tenet, unspecified officials at the White House and the Pentagon, and his “most important meeting” with Marc Grossman, US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs. The article suggested that “of course, Osama bin Laden” was the focus of some discussions. Prophetically, the article added, “What added interest to his visit is the history of such visits. Last time [his] predecessor was here, the domestic [Pakistani] politics turned topsy-turvy within days. That this is not the first visit by Mahmood in the last three months shows the urgency of the ongoing parleys.” [Karachi News, 9/10/01] In May 2001, both CIA Director George Tenet and Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage had visited South Asia. It’s not known if they met with Mahmood or anyone else in the ISI, but according to credible news reports, Tenet had “unusually long” consultations with President Musharraf. It is also worth noting that Armitage is known for his “large circle of friends in the Pakistani military and ISI” [SAPRA, 5/22/01] as well as his connections to the Iran-Contra affair.
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The CIA is in and of itself a virtual "state-within-a-state" in the federal government. Operations have been carried out for decades under its authority, most of the time with the president in power having little input or knowledge as to what occurs. Many people claim the CIA, headed by George H.W. Bush at the time, was a key conspirator in the assassination of John F. Kennedy alongside the FBI and national Mafia syndicates, perhaps even communist representatives from Cuba and the Soviet Union. This was most certainly the case with the Iran-Contra Scandal, as multiple officials within the Reagan White House stated he knew nothing at all regarding what was occurring since no reports had been forwarded to him. At some point, one had to have considered this true with what now has been 35 years of U.S. involvement in anti-terrorism activities. As most of the die was cast during the Clinton administration, there is certainly a reason to question just with the director of the CIA (George Tenet) and Deputy State Secretary Richard Armitage had any reason to associate with a key ISI figure, a state-sponsored terrorist intelligentsia within the Pakistani government. More information is necessary for full comprehension:
Of course everyone knows that politics did turn very “topsy-turvy” one day after the Karachi News article on September 10. But what many don’t know is that on the morning of September 11, Lt. Gen. Mahmood was at a breakfast meeting at the Capitol with the chairmen of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, Senator Bob Graham (D) and Representative Porter Goss (R). The meeting was said to have lasted at least until the second plane hit the World Trade Center. Goss is a self-admitted 10-year veteran of the CIA’s clandestine operations wing. [Washington Post, 5/18/02] Goss and Graham were later the heads of the joint House-Senate investigation into the September 11 attacks, and Goss in particular made headlines for saying there was no “smoking gun” indicating that the government had sufficient foreknowledge to prevent the September 11 attacks. [Washington Post, 7/11/02] Also present at the meeting were Senator John Kyl (R) and the Pakistani ambassador to the US, Maleeha Lodhi (note that all or virtually all of the people in this meeting also met Lt. Gen. Mahmood in Pakistan a few weeks earlier [Salon, 9/14/01]). Senator Graham later said of the meeting: “We were talking about terrorism, specifically terrorism generated from Afghanistan,” and the New York Times mentioned that bin Laden was specifically being discussed. [Vero Beach Press Journal, 9/12/01, Salon, 9/14/01, New York Times, 6/3/02] The fact that these people were meeting at the time of the attacks is a strange coincidence at the very least, not to mention the topic of their conversation!
On September 12 and 13, Lt. Gen. Mahmood met with Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, Senator Joseph Biden, the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Secretary of State Colin Powell. An agreement on Pakistan’s collaboration in the new “war on terror” was negotiated between Mahmood and Armitage. [Miami Herald, 9/16/01] All these meetings coordinated Pakistan’s response to September 11. [New York Times, 9/13/01, Reuters, 9/13/01, Associated Press, 9/13/01] Isn’t it strange that the terms of Pakistan’s commitment to fight al-Qaeda were negotiated with the man who may have given orders to send $100,000 to the September 11 hijackers?
What would happen if Saeed told all that he knew?
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The matter most disturbing in this situation is not the actual meeting, which is of course troublesome. The presence of current Vice President Joe Biden on the following two days after the attacks is, as I now continue to link what occurred that week around the September 11, 2001 attacks and what I am watching over the news or reading constantly today. He was the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Sec. of State Colin Powell was present as well. This line, "An agreement on Pakistan’s collaboration in the new 'war on terror' was negotiated between Mahmood and Armitage," was negotiated before the 3,000 or so dead within the rubble at the World Trade Center, Pentagon and in the open field in Pennsylvania had gone cold from rigor mortis. And if Gen. Mahmood, who is believed again to have been the potential employer of Omar Sheikh, brokered the deal to fight the war on terror, then who is the arbiter of geopolitical power militarily and via foreign trade and investment? Most Americans are well aware how within days of the attacks, President Bush announced that he had discussed the issue with Musharraf and had agreed in principle that he would serve as a partner in America's intent to invade Afghanistan. Even at 20 years old in September 2001, I questioned what the Pakistanis had to gain or what stake in these issues would serve their purposes. The order of the status quo in Middle East and Islamic terrorism had been radically altered by then.
Meanwhile, Omar Sheikh still resided in Pakistan:
Meanwhile, Omar Sheikh still resided in Pakistan:
Saeed Still Lives Openly in Pakistan
In the days right before September 11, a flurry of money transfers occurred between the 9/11 paymaster in the UAE—presumably Saeed—and the hijackers. Between September 6 and 10, $26,315 was wired from the hijackers back to the UAE—leftover money from the September 11 plot. [MSNBC, 12/11/01, Guardian, 10/1/01] On September 11, in the hours before the attacks, the paymaster transferred $40,871 from his UAE bank accounts to his Visa card, and caught a plane flight from the UAE to Pakistan. There are records of him making six ATM withdrawals in Karachi on September 13, and then his trail goes cold. [MSNBC, 12/11/01] Saeed later claims to have met with Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan a few days after September 11 (but has said nothing about a 9/11 role). [Washington Post, 2/18/02, London Times, 2/25/02]
Saeed then continued to live openly in his ISI house in Lahore, Pakistan. He was “frequently seen” at local parties hosted by government leaders and “made no secret” of his whereabouts. In January 2002, he celebrated the birth of his baby at a party he hosted in the city. [USA Today, 2/25/02] It has been suggested that after September 11 he acted as a “go-between” for bin Laden and the ISI, which makes perfect sense given his involvement in both groups. [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02] Furthermore, “It is believed he helped produce bin Laden’s latest taped interview” in early 2002. [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02]
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Omar Sheikh served as an apparent mole, or double agent, between bin Laden and al Qaeda and the ISI ruling body within Pakistan. He lived lavishly, like a sultan. But I find most curious is this line within the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: "It is believed he helped produce bin Laden’s latest taped interview' in early 2002." And so the question must be asked: Was this really the last tape ever produced of Osama bin Laden alive?
The plot thickens, and apparently so too did the inevitable toppling of a now-useless Omar Sheikh:
Meanwhile, the partnership between Saeed and the ISI on one hand and Ansari and his Indian criminal underground on the other, continued to prove profitable and productive. On October 1, 2001, a suicide truck-bomb attack on the provincial parliamentary assembly in Indian-controlled Kashmir killed 36 people. On December 13, 2001, the Indian Parliament building in New Delhi was attacked by terrorists. Fourteen people, including the five attackers, were killed. On January 22, 2002, a crowd of mostly unarmed Indian police near the US Information Service building in Calcutta, India, were attacked by gunmen; four policemen were killed and 21 people injured. It appears that Saeed and Ansari were behind all of these attacks. [Vanity Fair, 8/02, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02] Ansari even called from Dubai to take credit for the Calcutta attack. [Telegraph, 1/24/02] Jaish-e-Mohammad, Maulana Masood Azhar’s group, is also involved in these attacks. [Vanity Fair, 8/02]
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Understand how on December 13, 2001, the Indian Parliament in New Delhi was attacked by terrorist, that five of the fourteen killed were the attackers. On January 22, 2002, Indian police were attacked by gunmen, with four officers killed and 21 injured. Omar Sheikh and his associate Ansari, the latter of whom called Dubai to take credit for the attacks, appeared guilty.
British authorities then initiated a search for Omar Sheikh:
Slow Justice
As previously mentioned, it was first reported that authorities were looking for Saeed on September 23, 2001. In fact, it appears British intelligence began asking for legal assistance in catching Saeed Sheikh sometime during August 2001. It isn’t clear if they were finally starting to punish him for his 1994 kidnapping of Britons, or if this was spurred by some new activity. [London Times, 4/21/02, Vanity Fair, 8/02] Saeed’s role in 9/11 began to be reported in late September and early October, but an Indian magazine would note, “Curiously, there seems to have been little international pressure on Pakistan to hand him over.” [Frontline, 10/6/01]
The strange slowness in catching Saeed continued. In November 2001, a US grand jury finally secretly indicted Saeed Sheikh for his kidnapping of a US citizen seven years earlier. [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02] The US later claimed it began asking Pakistan for help in finding Saeed in late November 2001. [AP, 2/26/02, Newsweek, 3/13/02] However, it took until January 9, 2002 for Wendy Chamberlin, the US ambassador to Pakistan, to officially ask the Pakistani government for help in arresting and extraditing Saeed. [AP, 2/24/02, CNN, 2/24/02, Los Angeles Times, 2/25/02] Saeed was still seen partying with Pakistani government officials well into January 2002. The Los Angeles Times later noted that Saeed “moved about Pakistan without apparent impediments from authorities” into February. [Los Angeles Times, 2/13/02] The London Times said, “It is inconceivable that the Pakistani authorities did not know where he was” before then. [London Times, 4/21/02] It took the events relating to Daniel Pearl for Pakistan to finally “discover” Saeed’s location.
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In politics, there are no accidents nor curiosities to be questioned as to understand a large government, which each one today has, having its agenda. And if Daniel Pearl was to be the smoking in Omar Sheikh's final downfall, what and who killed Mr. Pearl, and what involvement, if any, did Omar Sheikh have in the matter?
Enter Daniel Pearl… and Robert Mueller
The ever-busy Saeed meanwhile was taking part in another kidnapping. The target was Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. Pearl had become fascinated in a number of stories involving the ISI. On December 24, 2001, he reported about ties between the ISI and a Pakistani organization that was working on giving bin Laden nuclear secrets before 9/11. A few days later, he reported that Jaish-e-Mohammad still had its office running and bank accounts working, even after President Musharraf claimed to have banned the group. [Vanity Fair, 8/02, Guardian, 7/16/02] He began investigating links between shoe bomber Richard Reid and Pakistani militants connected to the ISI [Washington Post, 2/23/02], investigating Dawood Ibrahim, a powerful terrorist and gangster protected by the ISI [Newsweek, 2/4/02,Vanity Fair, 8/02], and may also have been investigating the US training and backing of the ISI. [Gulf News, 3/25/02] Former CIA agent Robert Baer later claimed he was working with Pearl on investigating 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. [UPI, 9/30/02] It is later suggested that Mohammed masterminded Reid’s shoe bomb attempt and has connections to both Pakistani gangsters and the ISI, so some of these explanations could fit together. [UPI, 9/30/02, Asia Times, 10/30/02, CNN, 1/30/03] Kidnapper Saeed later said of Pearl, “because of his hyperactivity he caught our interest.” [The News, 2/15/02]
The attempt to lure Pearl into a position where he could be kidnapped began on January 11, 2002. [Vanity Fair, 8/02, Wall Street Journal, 1/23/03] On January 22, FBI Director Robert Mueller visited India, and was told by Indian investigators that Saeed Sheikh sent ransom money to hijacker Mohamed Atta in the US. This story now broke into the press, even being reported some in the US and Britain. [Los Angeles Times, 1/23/02,Independent, 2/24/02, AFP, 1/27/02, Telegraph, 1/27/02] On January 23, Saeed helped kidnap reporter Daniel Pearl. Also on January 23, Saeed’s criminal partner Aftab Ansari was placed under surveillance in Dubai, UAE. The next day, Mueller went to Pakistan and discussed Saeed at a previously scheduled meeting with President Musharraf. Apparently Saeed’s role in Pearl’s kidnapping was not yet known. [AP, 2/24/02] Mueller then flew to Dubai on his way back to the US to pressure the government there to arrest Ansari and deport him to India. Ansari was arrested on February 5 and deported four days later. [AP, 2/10/02, Frontline, 2/16/02, India Today, 2/25/02]
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Rarely do Islamists engage in kidnapping journalists because they traditionally use their capacity to disseminate the news in order to issue their propaganda and their message. Mr. Pearl frightened Omar Sheikh and Ansari due to what appeared to be his colluding with FBI Director Robert Mueller. I rarely read of journalists directly serving as government informants; most are used to post editorials or articles with uncovered dossiers and declassified information about international issues or criminal evidence regarding a politician or major bureaucrat domestically. This brings to the foray that very question: In what capacity did Mr. Pearl serve? Seeing is not always believing, and fact is often stranger than fiction.
Omar Sheikh apparently was a man who knew too much, and he was, in fact, a danger to the Musharraf regime. When a figure who once was a spy like Edward Snowden while working for the NSA either knows too much to be free or like Snowden and provides classified documents to British newspapers and to Russia and China, they are then enemies of the state, and must be exterminated or disappear:
Pakistani President Musharraf must have decided that Saeed knew too much, and needed to die before he could be extradited to the US. Around January 31, 2002, Daniel Pearl was murdered by his kidnappers. Police investigators say “there were at least eight to 10 people present on the scene,” and at least 15 who participated in his kidnapping and murder. “Despite issuing a series of political demands shortly after Pearl’s abduction four weeks ago, it now seems clear that the kidnappers planned to kill Pearl all along.” [Washington Post, 2/23/02] Musharraf even brazenly stated, “Perhaps Daniel Pearl was over-intrusive. A mediaperson should be aware of the dangers of getting into dangerous areas. Unfortunately, he got over-involved.” [Hindu, 3/8/02] in “intelligence games.” [Washington Post, 5/3/02] At the same time he could eliminate the overly-nosy Pearl, Musharraf could punish Saeed for the deed to make sure he would keep quiet about the ISI’s connections to 9/11.
The timing of Mueller’s visits certainly is curious. After months of doing little to catch Saeed, suddenly Mueller is traveling all over Asia and both Saeed and Ansari are arrested within days? Did Mueller act with Musharraf to silence Saeed so the Indian reports of Saeed’s involvement in 9/11 could be quashed? As shown below, the US government has acted as if this was the case ever since.
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The issue again of Omar Sheikh as a potential CIA operative or foreign informat must be questioned. Why suddenly was it necessary for the ISI to decapitate Daniel Pearl? The FBI is on near-equal footing with the CIA, often collaborating and in essence, is an overlapping fail-safe in the case the CIA misses crucial details. There also is the NSA, which we are reading even today with regards to targeting conservative, Christian religious and pro-Israeli organizations, who are embroiled in these issues, and we must never forget the rather curious manifestation by George W. Bush of Homeland Security as all others and many more serve in some manner a near identical purpose. Daniel Pearl seems to smell like the nauseating stench of, again, Lee Harvey Oswald in the probable conspiracy to assassination President Kennedy. He served what appears to be the role of a decoy or, better still, patsy, in order for him to appear as if he is the male Mata Hari in this conference or collaboration. He died perhaps believing he sacrificed his life at the end for his country. Instead, he was the sacrificial cow.
The noose tightened to hang Omar Sheikh, and as you will read, the issue becomes far clearer:
The Net Closes
To capture Saeed, it appears the police simply rounded up all of his family members and likely threatened to kill or harm them unless Saeed gave himself up. [AP, 2/9/02, Karachi News, 2/13/02] On February 5, Saeed turned himself in, not to the police, but to his ISI boss Ijaz Shah. [Boston Globe, 2/7/02, Vanity Fair, 8/02] For the next week, Saeed and the ISI worked “out a deal for how little he would say about the ISI’s support for terrorist groups in Kashmir and Pakistan in exchange for not being extradited to the United States. Neither the Pakistani police nor the US Embassy nor the FBI who were in Islamabad investigating the kidnapping were informed that Saeed was being ‘held’ by the ISI during this period.” [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02] During this time, President Musharraf was traveling in the US. Reporter Seymour Hersh claims Musharraf knew Saeed was being held by the ISI, but publicly claimed ignorance. [NOW with Bill Moyers, 2/21/03]
“The deal done, a brazen Saeed Sheikh gave himself up to police, telling them of Pearl’s capture but misleading them on every possible fact—including his ISI linkage.” [Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02] When asked by the FBI about his connection to the ISI, Saeed replied, “I will not discuss this subject… I do not want my family to be killed.” He cryptically added, “I know people in the government and they know me and my work.” [Newsweek, 3/13/02, Vanity Fair, 8/02] He did admit to his ties to Ansari, just as Ansari later admitted his ties to Saeed and the ISI, but both refused to discuss 9/11. [Washington Post, 2/18/02, Deutsche Presse-Agentur, 2/11/02, Press Trust of India, 5/13/02]
Saeed’s surrender was made public on February 13. [Newsweek, 3/11/02] He then confessed to the murder of Daniel Pearl. Yet, as Newsweek put it, he remained, “confident, even cocky.” He told his interrogators that he was “sure” he wouldn’t be extradited to the US and said he wouldn’t serve more than “three or four years” in a Pakistan prison. [Newsweek, 3/13/02] Several others were also arrested for their part in Pearl’s murder. Like Saeed, most had ties to both the ISI and al-Qaeda. [Washington Post, 2/23/02, London Times, 2/25/02] One even boasted of having once flown bin Laden’s personal airplane. [PakNews, 2/11/02]
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Omar Sheikh "murdered" Daniel Pearl on January 31, 2002 reported; two weeks later exactly, he was arrested. Few crimes of such a magnitude are solved in so quick a time even in foreign nations without the state arresting a suspect on what likely are "trumped-up" charges. There is no doubt that Omar Sheikh was at least a conspirator in the September 11, 2001 attacks; this is indeed clear since he handled much of the financial planning and handling. But, did he plan those attacks, and did he orchestrated Daniel Pearl's death? I believe the answer to both to be no. I also do not believe Osama bin Laden served as the core conspirator in those attacks.
Another key name is Colin Powell, who attended the meetings with ISI operatives prior to the September 11, 2001 attacks. His name will again be brought to the foray:
Double Cross
But Saeed and the others were tricked. Musharraf had no intention to extradite Saeed to the US. The US Ambassador to Pakistan even reported that Musharraf privately said, “I’d rather hang him myself” than extradite him. [Washington Post, 3/28/02] He was simply too risky to keep him alive; his connections to both the ISI and the September 11 hijackers were too obvious. As the Washington Post put it, “The [ISI] is a house of horrors waiting to break open. Saeed has tales to tell.” [Washington Post, 3/28/02] So the prosecution sought the death sentence for Saeed, not a light sentence. Saeed withdrew his confession. On April 5, in an article titled, “A Certain Outcome for Pearl Trial: Death Sentences Expected, Despite Lack of Evidence,” NBC reported, “Some in Pakistan’s government also are very concerned about what Saeed might say in court. His organization and other militant groups here have ties to Pakistan’s secret intelligence agency [the ISI]. There are concerns he could try to implicate that government agency in the Pearl case, or other questionable dealings that could be at the very least embarrassing, or worse.” [MSNBC, 4/5/02]
On March 3, US Secretary of State Colin Powell ruled out any links between “elements of the ISI” and the murderers of reporter Daniel Pearl. [Dawn, 3/3/02] The Guardian was a rare voice in calling Powell on this obvious lie. They called Powell’s comment “shocking,” given the overwhelming evidence that the main suspect, Saeed Sheikh, worked for the ISI: “If he was extradited to Washington and decided to talk, the entire story would unravel. His family are fearful. They think he might be tried by a summary court and executed to prevent the identity of his confederates being revealed.” [Guardian, 4/5/02] A week before Powell’s comment, even Powell’s colleague Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld “acknowledged reports that Omar Sheikh may have been an ‘asset’” for the ISI. [London Times, 2/25/02]
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At this point, the nail protruding from the proverbial two-by-four is Colin Powell. Understand today how he bitterly resents George W. Bush and blames him for what he referred to the debacle in Iraq. To the contrary, however, the Iraqi occupation became a great success, with violence and even crime decreasing by the time of Bush leaving the White House in January 2009. This, however, escalated again upon Obama's rise to power and now as one watches daily over the television, thousands of Christians have be slaughtered in Iraq and Syria. And as Colin Powell is in diametric opposition and perhaps is poised to join the Democratic Party as he supports every policy it has implemented under Obama, his role in this issue was most crucial and pernicious to the GOP's political cause.
Still, more is to be understood:
Still, more is to be understood:
Collective Amnesia
Given all of the above, one might think that the story of Daniel Pearl’s murderer’s ties to both the ISI and the 9/11 hijackers would be the subjectABC News, 2/7/02, Boston Globe, 2/7/02, AP, 2/24/02,Los Angeles Times, 3/15/02], including his financing of 9/11 [New York Daily News, 2/7/02, CNN, 2/8/02, AP, 2/9/02, Guardian, 2/9/02, Independent, 2/10/02, Time, 2/10/02, New York Post, 2/10/02, Evening Standard, 2/12/02, Los Angeles Times, 2/13/02, New York Post, 2/22/02, Sunday Herald, 2/24/02, USA Today, 3/8/02], and at least 16 articles mentioned his links to the ISI. [Cox News, 2/21/02, Observer, 2/24/02, Telegraph, 2/24/02, Newsweek, 2/25/02, New York Times, 2/25/02, USA Today, 2/25/02, National Post, 2/26/02, Boston Globe, 2/28/02, Newsweek, 3/11/02, Newsweek, 3/13/02, Guardian, 4/5/02, MSNBC, 4/5/02] But only three articles considered that Saeed could have been connected to both groups at the same time [London Times, 2/25/02, London Times, 4/21/02,Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 3/3/02], and only one of these mentioned he could be involved in the ISI, al-Qaeda and financing 9/11 all at the same time. [London Times, 4/21/02]
And while Omar Sheikh may well have been the key to the attacks, he was not the sole nor the chief arbiter of power, and I suspect that Musharraf might not have been either since ISI was the power behind his serving as the public relations face. The trial was something else entirely:
The Trial
Efforts to eliminate Saeed and forget the past moved forward. In late February, Time reported that the second highest Taliban official in US custody, Mullah Haji Abdul Samat Khaksar, had been waiting for months to be interviewed by the CIA. Even two weeks after Time informed US officials that he wanted to talk, no one had bothered to give him a proper interview. Time noted that “he claims to have information about al-Qaeda links to the ISI.” [Time, 2/25/02] In March, the editor of an important Pakistani newspaper had to flee the country after being threatened by the ISI. His paper had reported on connections between Saeed, the ISI, and the recent attacks on the Indian parliament in Delhi and Kashmir. [The News, 2/18/02, Washington Post, 3/10/02, London Times, 4/21/02, Guardian, 7/16/02]
Saeed’s trial began in April. It was decided by a secret “anti-terrorism” court known for its handpicked judges, [MSNBC, 4/5/02] and took place in a bunker underneath a prison. Furthermore, no reporters were allowed to attend. “Fear lay heavily over the court,” reported one paper. [Independent, 7/16/02] The venue had to change three times because of bomb threats and security concerns. [BBC, 5/7/02, BBC, 7/16/02] The trial judge also changed three times. The trial, by law, had to finish within seven days, yet it took over three months. [BBC, 7/16/02] “Forensic scientists initially refused to attend the exhumation of the court” for fear they would be murdered. Saeed himself threatened the judge: “I will see whether who wants to kill me will kill me first, or get himself killed.” [Independent, 7/16/02] The key witness was supposedly a taxi driver, but turned out to be a head constable policeman. Immediately after the trial, the government announced new suspects and new evidence that contradicted the Saeed verdict. [Guardian, 7/18/02] One of the new suspects was said by Pakistani police and intelligence officials to be the true mastermind of Pearl’s murder (Saeed’s role was luring in Pearl). But the “arrests were made when the trial was already in its final stage and the official confirmation of these crucial arrests would have completely derailed the prosecution’s case,” a senior police official said. [Washington Post, 7/15/02] When the verdict came down on July 15, Saeed, as the supposed “mastermind,” of course was sentenced to death, and three others were given life in prison. [AP, 7/15/02] Saeed has appealed the decision but a second trial has yet to begin. [AP, 8/18/02]
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Unless more has happened since January 2014 following Omar Sheikh's attempted suicide, he is not dead. Someone is keeping him alive. And I would suspect it is President Obama except Omar Sheikh has been in prison for over 12 years.
The public reaction is as befuddled as is the evidence provided by U.S., British and Pakistani officials together. What more may be added? Read below, as I finally am poised to actually conclude this article:
Reaction
The American and British governments approved the verdicts. [BBC, 7/15/02] Said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer, “The Bush administration welcomes Pakistan’s verdict in this matter… Daniel Pearl was brutally executed, and Pakistan’s… court system has now ruled. This is a further example of Pakistan showing leadership in the war against terror.” [Wall Street Journal, 7/15/02] In fact, “the government’s case rest[ed] heavily on technical FBI evidence.” [AP, 7/1/02] On May 16, Pearl’s body was found and identified, but the FBI didn’t officially release the DNA results because official confirmation of the body would have meant a new trial. [Independent, 7/16/02] Pakistani officials admit they waited to release the results until after the verdict. [Guardian, 7/18/02] So it seems the US was complicit in gaining a quick conviction in a kangaroo court.
The mainstream media slipped further into amnesia regarding Saeed’s connections. The conviction story made headlines, and there was room for lengthy background information and even special background articles on Saeed. However no story in the US mentioned his al-Qaeda or ISI connections, much less his 9/11 connections. [AP, 7/15/02, AP, 7/15/02,CBS, 7/15/02, CNN, 7/15/02, Los Angeles Times, 7/15/02, MSNBC, 7/15/02,New York Times, 7/15/02, Reuters, 7/15/02, USA Today, 7/15/02, Wall Street Journal, 7/15/02, Washington Post, 7/15/02] By comparison, in Britain, articles connected Saeed to the ISI [Guardian, 7/16/02, Guardian, 7/16/02, Daily Mail, 7/16/02], al-Qaeda [Independent, 7/16/02], the 9/11 attacks [Scotsman, 7/16/02], or some combination of the three [London Times, 7/16/02, Daily Mail, 7/16/02, Telegraph, 7/16/02] (with one exception: [BBC, 7/16/02, BBC, 7/16/02]). Many British newspapers also strongly questioned the justice of the verdict, [Guardian, 7/18/02,Independent, 7/16/02, [Independent, 7/21/02, BBC, 7/16/02] while only the Washington Post did in the US. [Washington Post, 7/15/02, Washington Post, 7/16/02] As the Wall Street Journal delicately put it, “The prosecution overcame some significant weaknesses in the case to obtain the conviction.” [Wall Street Journal, 7/15/02]
A month after the verdict, a remarkable story in Vanity Fair explored all of Saeed’s connections, but the article seemed to make no impact at all. [Vanity Fair, 8/02] In the months since, Saeed’s connections seem to have been forgotten even in the British media. Most recently, it has been suggested that 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the mastermind of the Daniel Pearl murder as well, and may even have cut Pearl’s throat himself. [Time, 1/26/03, CNN, 1/30/03] This not only shows al-Qaeda working to benefit the ISI in silencing Pearl, but also helps confirm the theory that Mohammed has been supported by the ISI. Since Mohammed has been “linked to almost every attack against the United States since the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993” [Los Angeles Times, 6/16/02], that in turn raises the possibility that the ISI has also been involved in all of those attacks, at the very least by not helping to arrest Mohammed.
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With regards to ISI, the following is known:
The ISI Muzzled? No
Musharraf has been hailed for his firing on ISI Director Mahmood, and generally has been presented as a pro-Western figure trying to root of pro-terrorist factions of the ISI. But The Observer has called this “The Myth of the Good General Musharraf.” [Observer, 3/31/02] On January 12, 2002, in the face of US pressure, Musharraf made a forceful speech condemning Islamic extremism, and arrested about 2,000 extremists around the same time. Yet, by the end of the month, at least 800 had been quietly released. [Washington Post, 3/28/02] Since then, “almost all” of those arrested have been released. Even the most prominent terrorist leaders, such as Saeed’s friend Maulana Masood Azhar, leader of Jaish-e-Mohammed, have been released. Remarkably, the US has not protested despite Azhar’s role in killing US soldiers in Somalia and other terrorist acts. Old terrorist organizations are running strongly again, often under new names. [Christian Science Monitor, 12/16/02, Washington Post, 2/8/03] Reforms have been abandoned. As one US regional expert put it, “It is no longer a question of whether Pakistan is going backwards or forwards. It’s a question of how rapidly it’s going backwards.” [Financial Times, 2/8/03]
So many other countries—Argentina, Britain, Cayman Islands, Egypt, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Morocco, Russia, even a Taliban cabinet minister—warned the US about an impending attack (see the They Tried to Warn Us essay). How it is possible that Pakistan, in the best position to know, gave no warning? If Musharraf is in control of the ISI, then how could he not have known of the 9/11 attack, and if he isn’t in control and didn’t know, then what good is he as a leader?
A UPI editorial stated, “Al-Qaeda terrorists have long since scattered deep inside Pakistan and in Pakistani-controlled Kashmir where they enjoy the protection of the [ISI]… The unspeakable is that Pakistan is the new Afghanistan, a privileged sanctuary for hundreds of al-Qaeda fighters and Taliban operatives. Some estimates go as high as 5,000… The Pakistani—al-Qaeda connection is visible to all but the geopolitically challenged.” [UPI, 8/28/02] Prominent Taliban leaders wanted by the US have been living openly in Pakistani cities and yet the US does nothing about them. [Guardian, 12/24/01, Time, 5/6/02] It is now widely reported that Osama bin Laden, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and most other prominent al-Qaeda leaders are believed to be living in Pakistan, some of them living in the open and in luxury, with the protection of the ISI. It is frequently pointed out that Pakistan’s efforts to find them are mostly a charade. [Los Angeles Times, 4/6/02, Christian Science Monitor, 7/2/02, Los Angeles Times, 6/16/02, Time 7/29/02, Washington Post, 8/4/02, New York Times, 9/15/02,AP, 11/12/02, Los Angeles Times, 11/17/02] But still, the situation doesn’t change. As an example of Bush’s seemingly inexplicable response to terrorism in Pakistan, Azhar’s group Jaish-e-Mohammed had its assets frozen shortly after 9/11, but the group simply changed its name and over a year later the US has not frozen the assets of this “new” group. [Financial Times, 2/8/03, Washington Post, 2/8/03]The US government and media has had an astonishing ability to turn a blind eye when it comes to Pakistan. For instance, in late September 2001, Pakistani officials went to Afghanistan and secretly advised the Taliban to not turn over bin Laden, but stand up and fight the US. [Knight Ridder, 11/3/01, AP, 2/21/02, Time, 5/6/02] In November 2001, it was reported that the US was mainly relying on the ISI for its intelligence information on the war against the Taliban, even as the ISI was secretly supplying the Taliban with supplies and military advisors. [Knight Ridder, 11/3/01] That same month, the US allowed Pakistan to airlift thousands of its soldiers, who had been fighting alongside the Taliban, out of the besieged Afghan town of Kunduz. In so doing, a large number of Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders were “accidentally” airlifted out as well. One US official commented that the US was supposed to be able to interview the Taliban leaders when they arrived in Pakistan, but were not. [New Yorker, 1/21/02] This suggests the presence of the Taliban, at least, was hardly an accident. It has been recently suggested that even members of bin Laden’s immediate family were airlifted out. [NOW with Bill Moyers, 2/21/03]
Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Since 1997, Pakistan has been secretly supplying North Korea with nuclear technology, in return for long-range missile technology. Seymour Hersh has suggested that it is likely Pakistan is giving nuclear technology to other countries as well. [NOW with Bill Moyers, 2/21/03] Even at the end of the Clinton administration this link between Pakistan and North Korea was known, but neither Clinton nor Bush stopped it. [San Jose Mercury News, 10/24/02] As the Guardian put it, “If George Bush’s ‘war on terror’ were remotely rational, or even roughly reasoned, then its next target might be Pakistan, not Iraq. It should be said that the US is not justified in pre-emptively and unilaterally attacking either country—or any other sovereign state for that matter. But on the basis of Mr. Bush’s own ‘axis of evil’ criteria at least, Pakistan sits squarely in the theoretical firing line.” [Guardian, 10/8/02]
There is no evidence that the US has questioned Saeed about 9/11. Indian newspapers have pointed out that if the US were to pressure its close ally Pakistan so Saeed could to be interrogated in his Pakistani prison, they could not only learn more about the financing of the 9/11 attacks, but also gain valuable information about the structure of al-Qaeda cells in Pakistan. [Indian Express, 7/19/02] Needless to say, there’s no evidence Lt. Gen. Mahmood has been questioned, either.
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Have we here a case of see no evil, hear no evil? This is indeed no coincidence why particularly George W. Bush opted to not invade Pakistan. Pakistan and India have for the near 70 years since their independence been at constantly war with India, and the U.S. likely feared of a far less stable region than what already was present. With both possessing nuclear weapons and Pakistan providing North Korea among many others with vital technology to start atomic programs, the matter of a face-off then involving New Delhi was too great to risk. The means justified the ends. The U.S. did not merely acquire a goodwill partner out of President Pervez Musharraf in the war on terror; the government blackmailed him.
Lastly, was Omar Saeed Sheikh a British MI:6 operative or did he work for the CIA? The issue was brought forth by a Pakistani news agency, AWAZToday:
Lastly, was Omar Saeed Sheikh a British MI:6 operative or did he work for the CIA? The issue was brought forth by a Pakistani news agency, AWAZToday:
Pervez Musharraf Nailed Top Pakistani Terrorist and Kidnapper As MI6 Agent
20 December 2008
The British-Pakistani terrorist who was tried and convicted for the kidnapping and murder of reporter Daniel Pearl, was identified as an MI-6 agent in 2006 by the then-President of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf.The British-born terrorist in question, Omar Saeed Sheikh, is also featured in the article by Jeffrey Steinberg, "Shut Down Anglo-Saudi Global Terror Apparatus Behind Mumbai Attack," appearing on the LPAC website and the Dec. 19 issue of EIR.In his 2006 memoir In the Line of Fire, President Musharraf recounted that Omar Sheik "is a British national born to Pakistani parents in London" in December 1973. His early education was in the UK, then he spent four years at Lahore's Aitcheson College. He then went back to the UK to attend the London School of Economics."It is believed in some quarters that while Omar Sheikh was at the LSE he was recruited by the British intelligence agency MI-6," Musharraf wrote. "It is said that MI-6 persuaded him to take an active part in demonstrations against Serbian aggression in Bosnia and even sent him to Kosovo to join the jihad. At some point he probably became a rogue or double agent."Musharraf says that on Sheikh's return from Bosnia, he went to Pakistan and met Maulana Abdul Jabbar, who took him to Khost for guerrilla training. Then in 1994 he went to India to try to secure the release of Maulana Masood Azhar, who was serving a seven-year prison sentence in India for instigating conflict in Kashmir. To attempt to get Azhazr released, Sheikh and three others kidnapped three Britons and an American in 1994; the four were later released. Sheikh was arrested and imprisoned, but was then released in 1999 along with Azhar, in exchange for release of the hijacked Indian airplane.While in jail in India, Sheikh had numerous visits from a "British diplomat," according to the Los Angeles Times, which wrote: "The large ledger where the names of Tihar jail visitors are registered lists nine meetings between Sheikh, his lawyer and a British diplomat identified as `Mr. Greenhall.'"The London Times reported that while Sheikh was in jail in India, British intelligence secretly offered him amnesty and the ability to live in London as a free man, if he would reveal his links to al-Qaeda -- an offer Sheikh supposedly refused.Nonetheless, after Sheikh was released in the hostage swap deal engineered by Dawood Ibrahim in December, 1999, he was allowed to travel freely to Britain, where he visited his parents in Britain in 2000 and again in early 2001, according to accounts in both the Indian and British press. Also, during this period he is believed to have wired money to the 9/11 hijackers.Although Sheikh was sentenced in a secret court proceeding in July 2002 to hang for the kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl, he is still apparently quite alive. At the time of the Daniel Pearl kidnapping, the Wall Street Journal reporter was investigating various facets of the Pakistani ISI intelligence service and its ties to terrorism. He was also preparing a story on Dawood Ibrahim.
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Curiosity at times kills cats; some say this will to me eventually. But as far as Osama bin Laden, he is dead. The matter is not at all if, but rather when it happened and by whom. And if you believe PressTV of Iran - its state-run English language network - bin Laden did not die in the raid by our SEAL Team 6, but rather of natural causes, according to a former CIA operative:
Ironically, Laowai said the following rather curious oxymoron:
Finally, the South Asia Analysis Group discussed the following regarding the Daniel Pearl case, Omar Sheikh, and Osama bin Laden:
You decide how Osama bin Laden died. One thing is certain, however: No one outside of Washington, London, Kabul and Islamabad are talking, but rather shattering the large glass of geopolitical transparency. Daniel Pearl is dead, likely from a conspiracy involving for certain ISI and perhaps even the CIA or FBI. As Vladimir Putin once remarked that the U.S. was responsible for the September 11, 2001 attacks, I now question just who and when were facts known but obviously ignored, and why as I read these articles I get the sense that while George H.W. Bush initiated the foreign policy with Afghanistan once President Reagan left office, neither he nor President Clinton acted accordingly to the situations as they arose. Political intrigue is an interesting concept to read about in literature, but as I stated above, the facts behind a terrible true might be far stranger than any fiction novel. The question of how reliable any or all of these sources might be cannot yet be determined by even the classification of an apocrypha. As the future cannot yet be chronicled in textbooks, we must await the next day's storylines.
It should be noted, not ironically, that Pervez Musharraf is on trial facing treason charges. Many of the names mentioned earlier are involved in the case, per The New Yorker:
In November 2007, Musharraf suspended the Pakistani constitution. On December 27, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated. Did Musharraf order the assassination of Prime Minister Bhutto?
Bin Laden died of natural causes: Former CIA agent
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| Osama bin Laden |
A former agent of the CIA has revealed that al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has died of natural causes five years before the US announced his death.In an interview with Russia’s Channel One, Berkan Yashar, who is also a Turkish politician, said the US has not killed the al-Qaeda leader.“In September of 1992, I was in Chechnya, that’s when I first met the man whose name was Bin Laden. This meeting took place in a two-story house in the city of Grozny; on the top floor was a family of Gamsakhurdia, the Georgian president, who then was kicked out of his country. We met on the bottom floor; Osama lived in the same building,” Yashar said.According to the former CIA agent, he personally knew Bin Laden’s three Chechen bodyguards, who had protected him until his death and witnessed his death on June 26, 2006.“Even if the entire world believed, I could not possibly believe it,” Yashar said. “I personally know the Chechens who protected him, they are Sami, Mahmood, and Ayub, and they were with him until the very end.”“Only three Chechens buried him, according to his will” in the mountains on the Pakistan-Afghan border, he said.Yashar added that the CIA abducted one of the bodyguards, Sami, before the announced killing of Bin Laden last year.He says the bodyguard disclosed to the US the exact place of burial in the mountains.“There was no assault. I know the American operations from the inside: they find the grave, dig out bin Laden and tell everyone about this. They need to show how technologically the security services worked, how each step was controlled, and then present it as a great victory to show that taxpayers are not paying taxes for nothing,” he said.Washington announced on May 2, 2011 that Bin Laden was killed by US forces in his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.The lack of transparency over bin Laden's death has cast further doubt over the announcement.AGB/PKH/IS
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In echoing what I and many scores of civilians in the Arab League and other major Islamic states believe, this gentlemen who apparently resides in Guangdong, China stated the following, which encloses the circularity of the debate:
Laowai in Guangdong
Aug 31, 2012 3:26 AM
People do not need to be geniuses to know that Bin (actually Ibn) Ladin had been dead for 6 years before the news of his murder by the US Army was announced.It is not only Benazir Bhuto, but quite a few other people in the know who have made this public knowledge. And one should not really think that she was killed because she said what she said, though some revengeful person in a high enough place in the Pentagon probably did tell his murderer minyons that she should be made to keep her mouth shut. Bhuto as a person in such a position in politics was not supposed to speak the truth -- she was showing a worrying level of inability to control herself and those who had reasons to fear that she might blurt some other, much more damaging facts, wanted her out of the picture, so they use easily manipulable fanatic.As for Bissonnette, he sounds ludicrous to be a real person, so he is obviously a part of the Pentagon plot to give publicity to this book that they (the Pentagon) authored.
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Ironically, Laowai said the following rather curious oxymoron:
People do not need to be geniuses to know that Bin (actually Ibn) Ladin had been dead for 6 years before the news of his murder by the US Army was announced. It is not only Benazir Bhuto, but quite a few other people in the know who have made this public knowledge. And one should not really think that she was killed because she said what she said, though some revengeful person in a high enough place in the Pentagon probably did tell his murderer minyons that she should be made to keep her mouth shut. Bhuto as a person in such a position in politics was not supposed to speak the truth -- she was showing a worrying level of inability to control herself and those who had reasons to fear that she might blurt some other, much more damaging facts, wanted her out of the picture, so they use easily manipulable fanatic.How odd he would contradict himself in such a manner.
Finally, the South Asia Analysis Group discussed the following regarding the Daniel Pearl case, Omar Sheikh, and Osama bin Laden:
Home DANIEL PEARL'S CASE: More Twists and Turns
DANIEL PEARL'S CASE: More Twists and Turns
Paper No. 497 22.07.2002by B. Raman(This is to be read in continuation of my earlier article titled "The Daniel Pearl Case: Curiouser and Curiouser & Murkier & Murkier", which is available at www.saag.org )The one-judge Anti-Terrorism Court in Hyderabad, Sindh, constituted by Judge Syed Ali Ashraf Shah, pronounced judgement on July 15, 2002, finding guilty Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh and three others in the case relating to the kidnapping of Daniel Pearl, the American journalist of the "Wall Street Journal", on January 23, 2002, at Karachi and his subsequent murder in custody.2. While Omar Sheikh, the prime accused, was awarded the death sentence, the other three co-accused --- Salman Saqib, Fahad Nasim and Shaikh Muhammad Adil-- were each sentenced to life imprisonment. All the four of them have since appealed to the Sindh High Court against their conviction. If the Sindh High Court rejects their appeal, they could appeal further to the Pakistan Supreme Court. Simultaneously, the State too has appealed to the Sindh High Court to enhance the life imprisonment awarded to the three co-accused to death penalty.3. Under Pakistan's anti-terrorism laws, recording of evidence has to be completed by the anti-terrorism courts within a week on a day-to-day basis without granting any adjournment and the sentence pronounced within a week of the completion of the recording. These regulations were not strictly followed in this case and the accused were granted many adjournments. As a result, the case went on for more than three months. If a similar laxity is followed during the hearing of the appeals also, the case may not reach its logical conclusion at least for another six months.4. Omar Sheikh had voluntarily surrendered on February 5, 2002, to the Home Secretary of Punjab, an ex- officer of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), but his arrest was officially shown only on February 12, 2002, and he was handed over to the Karachi Police, which was investigating the Pearl case. During this period, he was reportedly taken to Rawalpindi, where Gen. Mohammad Aziz Khan, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, and serving ISI officers persuaded him not to disclose to the police details of his past association with the ISI and bin Laden. He was handed over to the Karachi Police, after he had reportedly promised to remain silent.5. After his transfer to the Karachi Police, he went back on his promise to Gen. Aziz and made a complete confession to the police of his past contacts with the ISI and bin Laden and of his orchestration from Pakistan of the terrorist attacks on the Jammu & Kashmir Legislative Assembly at Srinagar on October,1, 2001, on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi on December,13,2001 and on the security personnel guarding the American Centre in Kolkata (Calcutta) on January 22, 2002. He also confessed about his involvement in the planning for the kidnapping of Pearl and in the execution of the plan.6. During the trial, he totally retracted from his confession and denied any role in any of the above-mentioned terrorist attacks. However, he and his father, who testified as a witness, admitted his role in the kidnapping of a group of British and American tourists in India in 1994 in an attempt to secure the release of Maulana Masood Azhar, presently the leader of the banned Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM), who was then in an Indian jail. They also admitted that an Indian Airlines aircraft was hijacked by his supporters to Kandahar in December, 1999, to secure his release as well as that of Azhar. Omar Sheikh also admitted that after his release he had met bin Laden in Kandahar.7. Omar Sheikh did not retract from his previous statement that he had voluntarily surrendered on February 5, 2002. Throughout the trial, he, his father and a maternal uncle, who had accompanied him when he surrendered to the Home Secretary of Punjab in Lahore, maintained that the claim of the Karachi Police that they arrested him on February 12, 2002, was a lie. However, the court did not accept his version.8. In the face of his retraction of the confession, the only direct evidence available to the court was the statement of a driver who testified that on the day Pearl was kidnapped he (Pearl) and Omar Sheikh had travelled in his taxi. Despite the absence of any other significant direct evidence, the court held the charge of being a terrorist proved against him. There was no evidence to connect Omar Sheikh with the murder of Pearl after he was kidnapped. Despite this, the court took cognisance of the statement of his father about his involvement in the kidnapping incident in India in 1994 to prove that he was a habitual terrorist and sentenced him to death.9. After the verdict was pronounced, the Advocate-General of Sindh, Raja Qureshi, who conducted the prosecution, was asked by pressmen what convinced the court that it was a fit case for the death penalty. He replied that it was the cross-examination of Raoof Sheikh, the maternal uncle, and Saeed Ahmed Sheikh, the father, of Omar Sheikh. According to the Advocate-General, in the cross-examination both these witnesses conceded that Omer Sheikh was involved in the kidnapping of four foreigners in India and he was released from Tihar Jail on the demands of the hijackers of an Indian airliner.10. The defence lawyers have strongly criticised the verdict on the ground that it was politically motivated and pronounced under American pressure. They have also alleged that the English language used in the judgement differed from the language used by the same judge in his past judgements and that this showed that he merely read out a judgement, which had been drafted in Islamabad. They also cited comments made by Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's military dictator, during media interviews about the possibility of Omar Sheikh being hanged after the trial thereby rendering pointless the question of his possible extradition to the US and contended that these showed that the order to award the death penalty came from Musharraf himself.11. It was clear from the day in February, 2002, when the "News", the prestigious daily newspaper of Pakistan, reported the details of Omar Sheikh's confession to the Karachi Police that the military-intelligence establishment was determined not to extradite him to the US, whatever the pressure from Washington DC, lest he talk to the US authorities about his links with Musharraf, the ISI and bin Laden and about what transpired between February 5 and 12,2002, when he was reportedly in the informal custody of the ISI.12. The anxiety to go ahead with the trial even before the investigation was complete, the decision not to suspend the trial when new evidence on the involvement of the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ) in the murder of Pearl emerged leading to the recovery from an isolated plot in Karachi of the dismembered parts of a dead body, which have since been reportedly identified by forensic experts as those of Pearl, the total silence maintained by the police and the military-intelligence establishment on the presence in their informal custody of one Fazal Karim and some others of the LJ, who have confessed to their involvement in the murder all show that a major objective of Musharraf in the devious manner in which the case has been handled was to pre-empt any legal move for the extradition of Omar Sheikh by having the trial started, even prematurely, in order to show the case as sub-judice and, hence, beyond his control and by having him convicted in order to be able to take up the stand subsequently that the legal bar on double jeopardy would not permit his extradition.13. Interestingly, the USA was reported to have sought his extradition not in connection with the kidnapping and murder of Pearl ,but in connection with the 1994 kidnapping incident, in which one of the persons kidnapped was an American national. The surprising action of the judge in taking cognisance of the 1994 incident too while awarding the sentence is probably meant to enable the military-intelligence establishment to invoke the double jeopardy bar in respect of an extradition request in connection with the 1994 case too.14. It remains to be seen how Musharraf now handles the fresh evidence of the involvement of the LJ leading to the recovery of the dead body of Pearl, and what view the Sindh High Court takes of the conscious failure of the anti-terrorism court to take notice of the reports in the Pakistani media about the informal detention of some LJ cadres leading to the recovery of the dead body and of the deliberate failure of the State not to bring these fresh facts to the notice of the court during the trial. The speculation in the Pakistani media is that the Sindh High court may order a re-trial, provided it does not succumb to the pressure of the military-intelligence establishment.15. While the devious handling of the case by Musharraf is not a surprise, what is surprising and beyond comprehension is the seeming willingness of the US to go along with him in his devious efforts. After the announcement of the verdict, the Pakistani media has reported that even when the dismembered parts of a dead body were recovered it was clear that the dead body was that of Pearl, that the forensic examination reports subsequently confirmed this, and that the US authorities had informed Marianne, the widow of Pearl, about the forensic finding, but requested her not to disclose it to the public till the trial was over.16. From this, one finds it difficult not to suspect that the US itself is not really keen on the extradition of Omar Sheikh lest his interrogation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the US lead to his admission of his links with Musharraf, the ISI and bin Laden and of his involvement in the terrorist incidents in India, thereby calling into question the US policy of backing Musharraf.17. This case takes one's mind back to the early 1990s when the Government of India repeatedly pressed Washington DC to declare Pakistan a state-sponsor of international terrorism, but the US rejected every Indian dossier on the subject as based on interrogation reports. It contended that since the Indian Police was widely known to be using torture during interrogation, their evidence was not trustworthy.18. In 1992, Lal Singh alias Manjit Singh of the International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF), Canada, who was wanted by the USA in connection with a terrorist case in the US and had escaped to Pakistan, was caught by the Gujarat Police when he entered India from Pakistan to organise a series of terrorist incidents. For more than five years, he had been living in a safe house of the ISI in Lahore and orchestrating terrorist incidents in Indian Punjab from there. During his interrogation by the Indian authorities, he gave details of his links with the ISI and the role of the ISI in sponsoring terrorism in Punjab.19. The Government of India suggested that US officials could interrogate him in India without the presence of the Indian Police so that they could satisfy themselves that no torture was used and that, if necessary, the Government of India could consider extraditing him to the US so that he could be prosecuted there in connection with the case pending against him. The USA did not avail of the offer. It was obvious that Washington DC was afraid that if Lal Singh told the FBI during an independent interrogation about the sponsorship of terrorism by Pakistan, the US could be faced with the dilemma of having to declare Pakistan a state-sponsor of terrorism.(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical studies, Chennai. E-Mail:corde@vsnl.com )Category:Topics:
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Lastly, Fox News reported on December 26, 2001 that in fact, Osama bin Laden had already passed away. According to a Taliban official, he witnessed his passing:
Report: Bin Laden Already Dead
Usama bin Laden has died a peaceful death due to an untreated lung complication, the Pakistan Observer reported, citing a Taliban leader who allegedly attended the funeral of the Al Qaeda leader.
"The Coalition troops are engaged in a mad search operation but they would never be able to fulfill their cherished goal of getting Usama alive or dead," the source said.
Bin Laden, according to the source, was suffering from a serious lung complication and succumbed to the disease in mid-December, in the vicinity of the Tora Bora mountains. The source claimed that bin Laden was laid to rest honorably in his last abode and his grave was made as per his Wahabi belief.
About 30 close associates of bin Laden in Al Qaeda, including his most trusted and personal bodyguards, his family members and some "Taliban friends," attended the funeral rites. A volley of bullets was also fired to pay final tribute to the "great leader."
The Taliban source who claims to have seen bin Laden's face before burial said "he looked pale ... but calm, relaxed and confident."
Asked whether bin Laden had any feelings of remorse before death, the source vehemently said "no." Instead, he said, bin Laden was proud that he succeeded in his mission of igniting awareness amongst Muslims about hegemonistic designs and conspiracies of "pagans" against Islam. Bin Laden, he said, held the view that the sacrifice of a few hundred people in Afghanistan was nothing, as those who laid their lives in creating an atmosphere of resistance will be adequately rewarded by Almighty Allah.
When asked where bin Laden was buried, the source said, "I am sure that like other places in Tora Bora, that particular place too must have vanished."And, in closing, the Asia Times Online produced this critique of French author and philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy:
South Asia
BOOK REVIEW
Who killed Daniel Pearl?
Qui a tue Daniel Pearl?, by Bernard-Henri Levy
Reviewed by Pepe Escobar
The subject was not breached when "courageous leader" Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf was received by George W Bush at Camp David this week. They talked of the Hizb-i-Islami leading the anti-American jihad in Afghanistan, they talked of jihadis not crossing the Line of Control in Kashmir, they talked of Osama bin Laden hiding in the tribal areas. "Indispensable ally" Musharraf received a promise of US$3 billion - but no F-16s. But had Bush asked Musharraf who killed American journalist Daniel Pearl, one wonders whether Musharraf would have come up with a proper answer.
Bernard-Henri Levy's Qui a tue Daniel Pearl? (Grasset) is guaranteed to shake the foundations of neo-conservative land when an English translation is released before the end of the year. The book has become a best-seller in France, and subject to considerable media frenzy. No wonder: since his debut as a nouveau philosophe in the 1970s, BHL - a trademark signature - has meticulously fashioned himself to the status of dandy and arbiter supreme of the Parisian Left Bank intelligentsia. A brilliant, prolific writer coupled with shameless self-promotion, BHL always switched at ease from essay to film making, from Jean Paul Sartre to the gulag, from Bosnia to Charles Baudelaire, from trophy wife to a holiday palace in Marrakesh. Inevitably, he had to confront the top subject of the times - political Islam.
BHL starts his book on January 31, 2002, when Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was tortured and decapitated in Karachi, Pakistan, after being kidnapped by a bunch of jihadis. BHL describes his book as a romanquete - an investigative novel. It's in fact a variation on Tom Wolfe's and Guy Talese's new journalism: investigative journalism turbocharged by literature - sprinkled with a chic dash of metaphysical self-doubt. The literary influences are clear: Fyodor Dostoyevski and Baudelaire. BHL is fascinated by two main themes: the flower of evil (personified by Omar Sheikh, the intellectual mastermind of Pearl's ordeal); and the double (Omar the killer as the double of the sacrificial lamb Pearl). Most of all, BHL is fascinated by Pearl as his own double. Pearl was an American Jewish journalist trying to come to grips with radical Islam. BHL is an French Jewish writer trying to deconstruct radical Islam.
BHL had one year, plenty of time and resources and at least four trips to Pakistan to weave his plot. The agenda couldn't be more ambitious: BHL asks rhetorically "what, in the beginning of a new century, turns abjection into desire and destiny?" He tries to decode radical Islam, Osama bin Laden's "new terrorism", the "shock or non-shock" of cultures and civilizations; he wants to know whether "the crusader spirit and the combat against the 'axis of evil' are the adequate response to the current theological-political madness".
This all makes for gripping reading. BHL himself had already defined the best journalism as a mix of "urgency and exigence". He is a hell of a writer. But his whole journalistic-literary voyage - as fascinating as it turns out to be - ends up undermined by a fatal flaw. Stripped of ethnic, historical and political prejudice, BHL simply didn't get what Pakistan is all about. Something's wrong when a sophisticated philosopher and thinker tells us that Pakistan is nothing less than "the house of the devil".
Maybe this had something to do with his fixers. Every journalist working in Karachi, Islamabad and Peshawar since the heady days of the anti-USSR jihad in the 1980s knows that a good fixer is the key to open Pakistan's multilayered Pandora's boxes. Alternatively, maybe this had something to do with BHL psychedelically identifying himself so much with his double Pearl ("my equal, my brother" - Baudelaire once again) that his hallucinations took over the narrative. For BHL, Pearl is a sublime martyr - while for many in South Asia he was little else than a Jewish American writer for the Wall Street Journal who landed in Muslim Pakistan from a spell in India without carefully assessing his new role.
BHL's first hypothesis is that between "the jihadis and the great liberal journalist, tolerant, open to the cultures of the world and a friend of Islam, there was a relationship of trust, almost of bonding". During the first part of the investigation, BHL tries to enter the mind of the sacrificial lamb; the next part is flowers of evil territory, BHL trying to understand Omar Sheikh's motives. BHL meticulously reconstitutes the last days and minutes of Daniel Pearl before he was beheaded by three subcontracted Yemenites in a desolate Karachi suburb. Omar Sheikh was to arrange the interview Daniel Pearl was so obsessed with: the interviewee would be Sheikh Mubarak Gilani, the leader of the al-Fuqrah subsect to which belonged the notorious shoe bomber Richard Reid.
From a literary point of view, the complex, secretive, tortured Omar character is infinitely more appealing than golden boy Pearl. But BHL chooses to interpret Omar as the Western double of Pearl: Omar himself was a Westernized Muslim, born in England and having received a perfectly English education. Omar's "master of terrorism" was Masoud Azhar, the leader of the Pakistani jihadi group Jaish e-Mohammed, "a mix of saint and serial killer", a definition that could also be applied to Omar himself.
In perfect Oscar Wilde mode ("Each man kills the thing he loves"), one of BHL's best intuitions is when he tells us where Omar - the personification of "evil" radical Islam - is coming from: "This enemy of the West is a product of the West. This ardent jihadi was formed in the school of the enlightenment and progress. This Islamist who will yell at his trial that he kidnapped Daniel Pearl because he could not stand the hairdressers of Guantanamo shaving the skulls of Arab prisoners ... is the product of the best English education ... So might terrorism be a natural son of a diabolical couple - Islam and Europe?
As Omar Sheikh is painted as a villain of anti-Christ proportions, there is also a sexual explanation for his rage: "Islamism and women ... This fear and sometimes this vertigo facing the female sex, I always thought they were the very basis of the fundamentalist desire ... the proof by Omar." BHL amplifies the sexual trauma of Islamists by probing Omar's "secret": he suffers because he is caught in a double culture, switching from Pakistan in England to England in Pakistan. His desire is to belong. One thinks of the Saudis who lived quietly for years in the West and a few hours before September 11, 2001, were going to a sex shop, flirting with a Mexican whore and window-shopping lingerie.
The book picks up speed when BHL starts making the inevitable connections between jihadis and the Pakistani intelligence services. An example is the famous September 11, 2002 raid by a "Pakistani power in panic that a "satanic interview" about to be broadcast by al-Jazeera proved that there was an al-Qaeda cell in the heart of Karachi. Khalid Shaikh Muhammad, the all-important al-Qaeda operations chief, was not there at the moment and once again evaded capture. The operation against the alleged brains behind September 11, again on a September 11, was supposed to be a "birthday gift" from the Pakistani government to the US. This leads BHL to proclaim that the kidnapping, then the murder of Daniel Pearl was an initial response from dissatisfied sectors of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to an America-accommodating Musharraf: "Omar Sheikh, the Londoner who became a warrior of Allah, was instrumentalized by a branch of the ISI hostile to the evolution of Musharraf." A few pages later, we're entitled to a little more nuance: "Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and then murdered by Islamist groups manipulated, yes, by a faction of the services - the most radical, the most violent, the most anti-American ... This faction, from the beginning to the end of the affair, behaved itself as if it was very much at home in Musharraf's Pakistan."
The next step could only be the inevitable connection between ISI and al-Qaeda. An informant tells BHL "how everything started by the dismantling ... of a cell making fake papers for al-Qaeda clandestines"; and how the investigation led to "a trafficker specialized not only in fake papers but in the export of clandestine workers to Riyadh, 11 or 12-year-old kids selected in Karachi and Dacca to work as jockeys in camel races on the beaches of Dubai and, last but not least, al-Qaeda combatants exported, through the Oman Straits, to the Emirates, Yemen and other Middle East countries". This man, the real target of the anti-terrorist operation of September 11, 2002, was not Ramzi bin al-Shibh (who was arrested) or alleged September mastermind Khalid Shaikh (who was not there), but Saud Memon, the owner of the lot where Pearl was kept captive, tortured, executed and buried. BHL describes it as "a house belonging to a fake welfare organization which served as a front for bin Laden". He is referring to the Islamic NGO al-Rashid Trust, which after September 11 made it to the US list of terrorist organizations.
For BHL, the "house of the devil" - or "the terrorist Vatican" - par excellence is the legendary Binori town mosque in Karachi, which has educated many a Taliban. He takes us on a guided tour. The mosque is where Masoud Azhar, Omar Sheikh's mentor, founded Jaish e-Mohammed in the beginning of 2000, an "organization that would lend its elite battalions to al-Qaeda". The famous audio cassette of November 2002 where bin Laden talks about the attacks in Yemen, Kuwait, Bali and Moscow and renews his calls for jihad against the West, came from Binori town. For American, Indian and British intelligence, as well as for BHL, probably a raid on Binori town would be enough to dismantle most of radical Islam in Pakistan.
It will come as no surprise to anyone covering and following the "war on terror" that the best of BHL's sources reveals himself to be a Saudi lawyer in Dubai - the Arab capital of big money and privileged Oriental crossroads. The lawyer paints a striking picture of Islamism as pure business: after all "we draft the papers. We establish the contracts. And I can tell you that most of them don't give a damn about Allah. They enter Islamism because, especially in Pakistan, it's nothing other than a source of power and wealth." The Saudi lawyer confirms that "very few people in Pakistan become Islamists by conviction or fanaticism. They are just looking for a family, a mafia, capable of protecting them from hard times."
BHL is scandalized by these "jihad golden boys". And there's no doubt these Islamist golden boys are very much aware of Omar Sheikh when he leaves Indian jails - as he was one of the three militants exchanged for the passengers of an Indian Airlines jet that was hijacked and landed in Kandahar in Afghanistan in December 1999.
When BHL starts to follow the money, his investigation really takes off. It all starts with the famous $100,000 wired to September 11's chief operative Mohammed Atta's account in the US by one Ahmad Umar Sheikh, following instructions by Pakistani General Ahmad Mehmoud - the ISI director general at the time. General Mehmoud was removed by Musharraf less than a month after September 11. The Pakistani press reported at the time that Mehmoud was removed because US investigations had proved a liaison between himself and none other than Omar Sheikh. So BHL then arrives at an even juicier hypothesis: "Not only an Omar linked to al-Qaeda through its most spectacular terrorist operation - but of a collusion ... between al-Qaeda and ISI working together to destroy the Towers. For the Indian services, there's no doubt about the association."
Neo-conservatives may eventually be tortured by self-doubt, but Indian and Israeli intelligence will certainly love the fact that the information they shared led BHL to an explosive conclusion: "The possible Pakistani responsibility in the September 11 attack remains the great unsaid in George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld's America ... to admit that Ahmad is Omar and he wired the money ... wouldn't it be to question the whole foreign policy which, already at the time, made Iraq as the enemy and Pakistan as an ally?"
Not only because of Saud Memon - the murder scene was on his property - and Binori town - the "terrorist Vatican" - BHL slowly becomes convinced that Daniel Pearl's murder was ordered by al-Qaeda. It may be no more than fascinating literature, but BHL is persuasive. Omar, an unknown jihadi, is freed against the passengers of the hijacked Indian Airlines jet. He arrives in Kandahar as a hero - and is received by Taliban leader Mullah Omar himself, who presents him to none other than bin Laden. Bin Laden is vividly impressed by "this rare mix of faith and culture, of fanaticism and competence". So bin Laden starts thinking how he can profit from "an ardent jihadi who doubles as an unrivalled financier, an expert in electronics and the Internet, as well as a connoisseur of the West and its mechanisms".
One of BHL's sources - as well as, he admits, Indian intelligence - tells him that Omar successively enters the Majlis al-Shura, al-Qaeda's political council; conceives and operates al-Qaeda's web sites; and in the role of a hungry trader installs a computer terminal in a Kandahar house permanently linked to the world's major financial capitals: so the short selling that al-Qaeda profited from - and paid for - September 11 might have been the brainchild not of bin Laden, but Omar. BHL's conclusions: "Omar liberated by al-Qaeda and the ISI; Omar as an agent, very soon, of both al-Qaeda and the ISI; Omar as a precocious link between both organizations." No one has ever been able to verify it, but according to one of BHL's sources, bin Laden called Omar "my favored son". So here we have Omar - the flower of evil who masterminded the killing of Daniel Pearl - as the spiritual son of bin Laden.
What about Daniel Pearl himself? The truth about his death may be much less heroic and more pedestrian than BHL claims. If we analyze what happened from a journalistic point of view, Pearl may have been merely a victim of media wars - of information treated as merchandise. He was a reporter unfamiliar with such an extremely complex beat as Pakistan, under pressure from the Wall Street Journal main office to find scoops capable of beating the New York Times or the Washington Post. What led him to his fate was a story in a rival American paper about the obscure Sheikh Gilani, leader of the Al-Fuqrah sect and alleged mentor of shoe bomber Richard Reid.
Pearl may have thought that he got a break to build a story on banned Islamist groups. For Asia Times Online's own Pakistan-based Syed Saleem Shahzad, as well as for this correspondent, it is easy to see what happened next. He asked his fixer to try to get a meeting or an interview with Gilani. The fixer calls a journalist friend with close contacts with jihadi groups acting in Afghanistan and Kashmir. The journalist remembers a contact he saw a few times. He calls and sets up a meeting. Pearl and his fixer go to the meeting. Then they go to a house to see somebody who can lead them to Gilani. But the house is empty. They have to keep trying other leads. Then one day they call the same contact again and he says that he knows somebody who can take Pearl to Gilani. Pearl goes to yet another meeting and he finds the enigmatic Omar. It's in the course of this tortuous process that a Western journalist operating in an Islamic hothouse has to proceed with ultimate care. If anything feels remotely weird, the whole enterprise has to be called off. Pearl was doing anything to get his scoop. When Omar saw him he immediately knew that he had found the perfect, gullible sacrificial lamb.
Gilani may not have been worth so much trouble. He was indeed the leader of al-Fuqrah - almost a subsect, with nothing to do with the big jihadi organizations. Even Moinuddin Haider, Pakistan's Interior Minister, had never heard of al-Fuqrah before the Pearl affair - although some sources say that Gilani was Osama's most committed follower in Pakistan. Al-Qaeda is a purely Arab organization. The International Islamic Front is an international organization - a de-territorialized federation of groups linked to emir bin Laden. Gilani was a member of neither. But according to some sources, he had spiritual ascendancy - maybe even ideological - over bin Laden: he is a pir, "venerated master" in urdu. Anyone familiar with Pakistan knows that a pir would never discuss such matters with an unknown, unchecked Western journalist.
BHL also advances the hypothesis that Daniel Pearl was investigating al-Qaeda's American network - based on the fact that Gilani was linked to the ISI, but maybe also to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA): "Could the key to the mystery of his death be found in the hard disks of agencies in Washington?" What then: a nosy Pearl eliminated by an ISI-CIA tandem?
BHL writes that he was against Bush's war on Iraq - but at the same time he blamed the world's masses who claimed that "it's better to live as a slave under Saddam than to be free thanks to Bush". This basic misunderstanding from his part will endear him to neo-conservatives, Americans or otherwise, as much as it will discredit him to anybody around the world whose principles opposed an illegal war.
BHL is certain that "Pakistan is the roguest of all of today's rogue states". He is certain that "between Islamabad and Karachi, a real black void is being formed, compared to which the Baghdad of Saddam Hussein was just a depot of out-of-date weapons". BHL is dead sure that Pakistan is Apocalypse Now. This configures BHL as a Western darling of Indian intelligence. But one wonders how will this all be played out when the book is published in the US. Preemptive war against a nuclear Islamabad, anyone? Maybe Washington should wait to read an investigative novel by the flower of evil himself, the spiritual son of Osama bin Laden, the unfathomable Omar Sheikh.
Qui a tue Daniel Pearl? by Bernard-Henri Levy, Grasset et Fasquelle April, 2003. ISBN: 2246650518, Price: US$25, 538 pages.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for information on our sales and syndication policies.)
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The article and its critiquer are no doubt geared in sheer opposition to all which Levy penned. Pepe Escobar is the critic's name, a Brazilian national, Far Left-leaning journalist and literary critic with a history of residence in Afghanistan at one point. But most peculiarly about Mr. Escobar is the following quotation in an August 30, 2001 article against within the Asia Times Online:
"Osama bin Laden - also the No 1 target of the CIA's counter-terrorism center - is now a superstar playing the bad guy in some sort of planetary Hollywood fiction. Yet inside Afghanistan today, where the Saudi Arabian lives in exile, Osama is a minor character. He is ill and always in hiding - usually "somewhere near Kabul". Once in a while he travels incognito to Peshawar. His organization, the Al Qa'Ida, is split, and in tatters. The Taliban owe him a lot for his past deeds towards the movement and in putting them in power in Afghanistan - contributing with a stack of his own personal fortune of millions of dollars. But no longer an asset, he has become a liability."The article will be reproduced and hyperlink provided below. I hope to soon cover Iraq and why George W. Bush was interested with the exception of the recently-located large caches of weapons of mass destruction (chemical and biological warfare agents, nuclear weapons) some twelve years following the conclusion of the Gulf War to liberate Kuwait.
THE ROVING EYE
Get Osama! Now! Or else ...
By Pepe Escobar
PESHAWAR, Pakistan - American commandos likely to descend on Pakistan's tribal areas may not be too keen on acquiring the supreme fashion accessory of 2001 in the region, the Osama bin Laden T-shirt, boasting such inscriptions as "World Hero" and "The Great Mujahid of Jihad". They're selling briskly in Peshawar's Saddar bazaar for less than US$2 a pop.
The US special forces guys could also take back home a few examples of Osama rappin', available on cassette tapes. They could collect Osama mug shots with lovely psychedelic overtones, and even an Osama video - where the No 1 on the FBI's most wanted list on charges of international terrorism preaches from a mosque and talks to his faithful jihadis in the field. Osama says, "You gotta leave all these places run by 'allies of Jews and Christians' and come to me to do the jihad." He calls for "blood, blood and destruction, destruction" - referring to an array of Muslim victims from Palestine to Chechnya, from Lebanon to Kashmir.
Osama bin Laden - also the No 1 target of the CIA's counter-terrorism center - is now a superstar playing the bad guy in some sort of planetary Hollywood fiction. Yet inside Afghanistan today, where the Saudi Arabian lives in exile, Osama is a minor character. He is ill and always in hiding - usually "somewhere near Kabul". Once in a while he travels incognito to Peshawar. His organization, the Al Qa'Ida, is split, and in tatters. The Taliban owe him a lot for his past deeds towards the movement and in putting them in power in Afghanistan - contributing with a stack of his own personal fortune of millions of dollars. But no longer an asset, he has become a liability.
General President (or vice-versa) Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan is not sleeping very well these days since the full force of the George W administration requested his direct input into a high-tech "Get Osama" operation any time soon. Peshawar is full of rumors concerning an American commando infiltrating Afghanistan from Pakistan, supported by formidable airpower.
Call Jerry Bruckheimer! This is the stuff Hollywood is made of - and also the stuff of debacles such as Jimmy Carter's attempted rescue of US hostages in Iran. Any Mujahid worth his Kalashnikov in Afghanistan these days - up to commander Ahmadshah Masoud himself - is on the record as saying that Cruise missile attacks will cause no damage whatsoever to the already ravaged country.
Officially, Musharraf has rejected his support for this latest Hollywood ploy, and has been frantically trying to convince the Americans any brutal action against Osama or his so-called "terrorist sanctuaries" will fuel a radical Islamic backlash in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia of "burn, baby, burn" proportions. It doesn't matter that the strike would have the full approval of the United Nations and the G-8 countries - this would be an added reason for a series of Islamic counter-strikes across the industrialized world.
Under an army of spinners, this nifty "George W does Rambo" number will be played to the galleries as one of the latest American foreign policy initiatives concerning Afghanistan. It's no secret America wants even more sanctions against the Taliban - and maybe against Pakistan. But as many people either in the Pashto belt on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border or in the Tajik-speaking areas have been saying out loud for months, there is no Western policy concerning Afghanistan - except the UN sanctions, which among others, call on the Taliban to hand over bin Laden.
The UN has now posted more than 20 monitors in countries bordering Afghanistan - part of a sanctions enforcement support team - to ensure full implementation. This means, in practice, a lot of electronic surveillance on the very porous 1,200 kilometer Pakistan-Afghanistan border, and a lot of "counter-terrorism tactics". An array of hardcore Islamic parties in Pakistan have already announced that they will make the life of the "Team" as miserable as possible.
Most of all, Musharraf cannot sleep well because one thing he doesn't need in Pakistan right now is more trouble from Islamic hardliners. What he needs is a lot of cash from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank to keep the economy afloat. If he says yes to the Americans, all hell will break loose concerning the radicals, but he will certainly bag a crucial US$3.5 billion Poverty Reduction Growth Fund from the IMF, as well as other loans from Western nations. There are some signs that the Musharraf administration is at least doing something to restrain the hardliners. It has frozen all the accounts of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan held with the State Bank of Pakistan, and also all the accounts held by jihadi outfits inside Pakistan.
Pakistani government officials, though, remain afraid. They know that even a semblance of minimal cooperation with the "Get Osama" scheme will be devastating for the Musharraf government. They know that since 1996 the Taliban have become masters at using any kind of conflict inside the Pakistani establishment to their full advantage. They always extract maximum benefit from Pakistan without any political concessions.
The Taliban are closely intertwined with Pakistani society. Their ultra-conservative - and for the West, demented form of Islam - is widely admired by a young generation of Pakistani madrassas (fundamentalist religious school) students. All it takes to understand the process is a visit to one of the thousands of madrassas in the tribal areas where Osama is the "World Hero of jihad."It is quite clear that one way or another the jihad T-shirt vendors in the Peshawar bazaars will keep on rollin' - with or without customers from the land of George W.Next: Tajikistan, the reluctant republic((c)2001 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for information on our sales and syndication policies.)
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Conclusion; Fact Can be Stranger than Fiction:
You decide how Osama bin Laden died. One thing is certain, however: No one outside of Washington, London, Kabul and Islamabad are talking, but rather shattering the large glass of geopolitical transparency. Daniel Pearl is dead, likely from a conspiracy involving for certain ISI and perhaps even the CIA or FBI. As Vladimir Putin once remarked that the U.S. was responsible for the September 11, 2001 attacks, I now question just who and when were facts known but obviously ignored, and why as I read these articles I get the sense that while George H.W. Bush initiated the foreign policy with Afghanistan once President Reagan left office, neither he nor President Clinton acted accordingly to the situations as they arose. Political intrigue is an interesting concept to read about in literature, but as I stated above, the facts behind a terrible true might be far stranger than any fiction novel. The question of how reliable any or all of these sources might be cannot yet be determined by even the classification of an apocrypha. As the future cannot yet be chronicled in textbooks, we must await the next day's storylines.
It should be noted, not ironically, that Pervez Musharraf is on trial facing treason charges. Many of the names mentioned earlier are involved in the case, per The New Yorker:
There is an Urdu proverb often used to greet Pakistanis who display an elastic relationship with time: “You have arrived late,” it says, roughly translated, “but it is good that you arrived.” The three judges presiding over the trial of General Pervez Musharraf may have had that saying in mind on Tuesday, when, after months of delay, Musharraf finally appeared before them. Pakistan’s former military ruler has been charged with treason for his decision, in November, 2007, to suspend the constitution and impose a state of emergency—a desperate, and ultimately unsuccessful, attempt to hold on to power. The panel of judges, which was named last November, had already met twenty-two times without the General’s participation.Many previous appointments had been frustrated at the last minute. On both Christmas Eve and New Year’s Day, Musharraf’s appearances were cancelled after the suspicious discovery of explosives near his Mediterranean-style villa on the outskirts of Islamabad. The explosives were somehow both amateurishly rigged and expertly unearthed. Six weeks ago, when he did manage to leave his home for another court hearing, Musharraf suddenly fell ill on the way; his car was swiftly diverted to a military hospital, where he has remained since.The nature of his illness is still disputed. Musharraf’s lawyers argued that their client was in need of immediate medical attention abroad, an excuse long favored by Pakistani politicians eager to evade prosecution. But other medical experts said that, at seventy, Musharraf was merely suffering the gentle depredations of age. Details from a leaked medical report said that he was beset by nine different ailments, including hypertension, a clogged artery, a rickety knee, and some trouble with his spine.The withering response to these reports provides some sense of Musharraf’s badly diminished stature in Pakistan: one well-known journalist, Murtaza Solangi, seized on the last detail with a stinging proclamation of disbelief. “How can you have spinal issues,” he tweeted, “when you don’t have a spine to begin with?” Musharraf’s lawyers have not taken kindly to the widespread suggestions that their client was afraid to face the court. At an earlier hearing, a journalist asked one lawyer, “Where is your commando?”—a reference to Musharraf’s service, forty years ago, in an elite special-forces unit. The lawyer, Ahmed Raza Kasuri, responded with characteristic pugilism, angrily calling the reporter a “paid” Indian agent.Musharraf’s lawyers have become well practiced in the tactics of diversion and delay. On Tuesday, their client strode into court, wearing a black jacket and looking well rested, the worst of his illness apparently behind him. Twenty minutes later, Musharraf left the courtroom without receiving the indictment that had been expected: his lawyers pleaded that the court first had to rule on whether a case against a former Army chief could be heard in a civilian rather than a military court. The judges, who have earned a reputation for studied caution, suggested that the trial reconvene on Friday, when Musharraf is expected to be read the charges against him. Among local reporters, who have covered every dramatic postponement in the case, the staggered court proceedings were likened to an interminable Turkish soap opera.After leaving the court, the former Army chief slipped back into one of the seventeen vehicles in his heavily-guarded cavalcade and drove, past more than one thousand policemen lining the road, back to the military hospital. Musharraf faces serious threats to his life from an array of dangerous militants, and he deserves adequate protection. But the ostentatious display of force also suggests that his powerful successors in the Army have taken him under their protection. According to many military analysts, they are deeply uncomfortable with one of their longest-serving chiefs being put on trial—raising the prospect of a possible clash between Pakistan’s generals and its elected civilian leaders if Musharraf is ultimately convicted.Musharraf’s greatest misfortune is that Nawaz Sharif, the man he ousted when he seized power in a military coup in October, 1999, has returned to government. Last year, Sharif was elected Prime Minister for an unprecedented third time, still bearing the scars of his ignominious exit fourteen years before. Soon after taking office, last June, Sharif appeared in Parliament to announce that the government would try Musharraf for “high treason”—defined as any attempt to subvert or suspend the constitution. After Musharraf deposed him, Sharif was hurled into a cell in a sixteenth-century fort along with some of his closest political lieutenants, and later dispatched into exile, where he remained for seven years. Critics argue that Sharif is motivated solely by revenge and that, given the circumstances, Musharraf cannot possibly obtain a fair trial.But Musharraf’s detractors are not only in the parliament: the judiciary is similarly ill-disposed toward the former military ruler. In 2007, Musharraf triggered his own downfall by sacking the sitting chief justice, Iftikhar Chaudhry. When the country’s lawyers united behind a massive movement to restore the judge to the bench, Musharraf’s public support plummeted. A few months later, fearing that Chaudhry would retaliate by challenging his hold on power through the courts, Musharraf—acting as Army chief—suspended the constitution, sacked Chaudhry again, and put sixty other judges under house arrest.This declaration of emergency, on November 3rd, 2007, is what Musharraf is now being tried for. “It was a unique kind of constitutional subversion,” said Salman Akram Raja, a leading lawyer and constitutional expert. “A coup against his own government.” That evening, clutches of policemen cradling rusty rifles toured Islamabad in trucks, scooping up troublesome lawyers and politicians. The lively private television news channels that had also turned against Musharraf went blank. There were no tanks on the street, but the Islamabad police dropped barriers athwart government buildings. In a blunt display of symbolism, Constitution Avenue was blocked.Musharraf appears to have few regrets. In the final week of 2013, days before he was due to appear in court, the pensioned dictator invited sympathetic interviewers to question him on television. “Everything I did was for the country, for Pakistan,” Musharraf said in one interview, slipping into his favored bullet-point style. “I was at the helm of affairs,” he boomed, raising a clenched fist. “The state of the country is one way, the constitution is the other. What should I have done? Should I have run?”In the interview, Musharraf displayed few signs of the incipient illness that would prevent him from appearing in court a month later. His only visible symptom was an inflamed sense of self-importance. “First thing, number one: I’m no ordinary citizen,” he said, rather modestly. “This is something to be understood. From where did God raise me? From a middle-class home, he made me Army chief, chairman, Prime Minister, President.”Musharraf seems to be propelled by the belief that he is still his country’s savior: there is no other explanation for his decision to return to Pakistan last year from his comfortable exile in London, despite the best advice of his erstwhile allies in both government and the Army. When he arrived in Karachi, Musharraf told a modest-sized welcoming crowd that he had come to “save Pakistan.” The world, however, had moved on. At the elections, his party won just a single seat. The supporters who had once crowded around him at the height of his popularity fled to rival parties.The Pakistani Army had long urged Musharraf not to return. The former Army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who stepped down last November, believed that his predecessor’s plunge back into politics would invite legal troubles and damage the Army’s image. In this, he was correct: the Army is now trying to fend off a crisis it never wanted in the first place. However much it has since distanced itself from Musharraf’s ruinous legacy, it nevertheless cannot abide one of its own former chiefs being convicted for treason.According to Pakistan’s constitution, anyone found guilty of suspending the constitution is, by definition, a traitor. The army finds this language inflammatory, and particularly galling when applied to the former chief of an institution that has long seen itself as the ultimate guardian of Pakistan’s security. Furthermore, the new Army chief, General Raheel Sharif (no relation to the Prime Minister), has a longstanding family connection to Musharraf. His brother, the war hero Major Shabbir Sharif, was a close friend of the man now on trial. To honor that bond, one senior politician told me, General Sharif ordered the Army to take Musharraf under its protection.To complicate matters further, the army remains uneasy with the government’s decision to pursue negotiations with the Pakistani Taliban, particularly at a moment when the militants are killing Pakistani troops. Last month, when twenty soldiers were killed in the frontier town of Bannu, General Sharif responded with immense force. For a moment, it looked as if Pakistan was about to mount a sweeping offensive against the Taliban. But the government used the threat of further force to lure the militants to the negotiating table.The Taliban have been quick to exploit the new space yielded to them. Their chosen interlocutors have spent much of the past fortnight diverting attention away from the question of terrorism and toward the far more urgent matter of whether Pakistan has a truly “Islamic” form of government. Meanwhile, the bombings have continued: in Peshawar, cinemas and pro-government tribal elders have been attacked. In Karachi, eleven policemen were killed. Three different media organizations were either attacked by bombs or threatened with them. And on Sunday night, the Taliban beheaded twenty-three soldiers in their custody.This last act of savagery frayed the military’s patience with what it has long seen as a dangerous inclination to indulge the Taliban. Just after midnight on Thursday, fighter jets bombed targets in North Waziristan, a tribal area along the Afghan border notorious for its concentration of militants, while gunship helicopters strafed their allies in the nearby Khyber agency. The new fighting, which signals the end of talks with the Taliban, and perhaps a wider military offensive, diminishes the odds of Musharraf’s trial continuing.As one retired general told me, soldiers cannot be expected to die for the country while their former chief is on trial for treason. “If the offensive against the Taliban starts,” he said, “the Army will be pulled in two different directions. It will be fighting on one front and facing a media trial of their former chief on the other. That will make the situation very tense.” Many observers feel that Pakistan faces too many other problems right now—terrorism, a crushing energy crisis, a torpid economy—to devote its attention to punishing an already-chastened Musharraf.Members of Prime Minister Sharif’s government say that he doesn’t want to prolong Musharraf’s ordeal. He merely wants a conviction for the record: something that helps him to even the score, and that will stand as a warning to any future generals tempted to promote themselves into power. If Musharraf is convicted, Sharif may opt to issue a swift pardon, clearing a route for Musharraf from his maze of legal miseries straight to Islamabad’s international airport.
Either way, it seems, Musharraf will soon leave Pakistan once again and return to his life as a discarded strongman in exile. As his failed attempt to restore himself to glory in Pakistan nears its undignfied end, it is hard to avoid thinking of Gabriel García Márquez’s fictional account of the last days of Simón Bolívar—a once-admired general who had been fêted around the world but spent his last days yearning for exile in Europe. “Let’s go, as fast as we can,” the forlorn protagonist tells his companion on the first page of “The General in His Labyrinth.” “Nobody loves us here.”Omar Waraich is a foreign correspondent covering Pakistan. He tweets at @OmarWaraich.Above: Photograph by Anjum Naveed
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In November 2007, Musharraf suspended the Pakistani constitution. On December 27, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated. Did Musharraf order the assassination of Prime Minister Bhutto?
Is former military leader Pervez Musharraf, who was charged with the murder, conspiracy to murder and facilitation of murder Benazir Bhutto, being victimized? ‘‘Victimized is a strong word,’’ said Ispahani, although she added, ‘‘There were security lapses, the UN Commission Report proved that. Benazir Bhutto had been promised safety in Pakistan, by Musharraf himself. That promise was not kept. The charges against Musharraf are not 'victimising' him in anyway.’’Good relationships with neighbouring countries is the way forward for Pakistan, she said. ‘‘Nawaz Sharif for instance, is determined to let the military know who is boss, by developing relationships with other regional nations. Less terror, more trade!’’Does the PPP have a future under Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, or will it fall apart as the Congress did, when the bastion was handed to Rahul Gandhi? ‘‘For one, Bilawal is only 25, not 45, like Rahul Gandhi,’’ Ispahani retorted with a laugh. ‘‘The two do have a lot in common, though, they’re both bound by dynasty politics, both have lost a parent to terror, they're both moderate voices. That said, Bilawal is a remarkable young man, and he can help restore the party, but there is much to be done still. Pakistan needs to put its intolerance aside, like the Afghans did. They said that whoever you are, whatever your religious beliefs, Afghanistan comes first. That is the Pakistan we want to see.’’ (Courtesy of The Deccan Chronicle)
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It looks like the answer may be provided by Benazir Bhutto from her side of the open grave and eternity. And as the famous Latin phrase goes, "Sic semper tyrannis!"
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Again, I will be covering Iraq alongside Saddam Hussein and the Ba'ath Party representations in both Syria and Baghdad, alongside ISIS, soon. 
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