Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter said Wednesday, Russia is “taking on the whole rest of the country that’s fighting Assad.” Some of those groups, he added, are supported by the United States and need to be part of a political resolution in Syria.
WASHINGTON — Russian aircraft carried out a bombing attack against Syrian opposition fighters on Wednesday, including at least one group trained by the C.I.A., eliciting angry protests from American officials and plunging the complex sectarian war there into dangerous new territory.
Mr. Kerry told reporters that the two sides had agreed to begin talks on avoiding unintended confrontations in Syria and clarifying which targets the Russians are picking as soon as possible, maybe even Thursday.
“It is one thing, obviously, to be targeting ISIL,” Mr. Kerry said. “We are concerned, obviously, that is not what’s happening.”
At least one and possibly more Syrian opposition groups that have been secretly armed and trained by the C.I.A. were among the rebel groups targeted by the Russian airstrikes, a senior United States official said. The official would not identify which group or groups were attacked or where they were located. Nor would he assess the damages or casualties suffered by the Syrian fighters other than to say, “It was not minor.” American officials said they were still sorting through the battle damage reports coming in from the field.
While the Pentagon’s $500 million program to train and equip Syrian fighters has largely failed — at one point this month only four or five American-trained combatants were in the fight in Syria — the C.I.A.’s covert program to train other fighters has weathered some setbacks to produce 3,000 to 5,000 fighters in the nearly two years it has been operating.
Mr. Kerry said that the Obama administration would welcome “any genuine effort” by Moscow to target the Islamic State and the Nusra Front, Al Qaeda’s branch in Syria.
But Mr. Kerry made clear that the United States would have “grave concerns” if the Russians bombed other moderate rebel groups, and he repeated the American position that Mr. Assad would eventually need to leave power as part of a political transition that would be intended to bring peace to Syria. He also said that the United States-led coalition is poised “to dramatically accelerate” airstrikes against the Islamic State.
When a reporter asked Mr. Lavrov about Mr. Carter’s assertion that the Russian airstrikes appeared to have been directed at parts of Syria not known to be under the control of the Islamic State, he said, “Don’t listen to the Pentagon about the Russian strikes.”
“We need the Russians to understand that in coming to defense of the regime to attack ISIL, what they will do is forge a single united force under ISIL leadership against the regime,” said the British foreign secretary, Philip Hammond. “That’s the huge danger we face.”
A spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, said its pilots were engaged in precision strikes “against the military equipment, communication centers, transport vehicles, arms depots, ammunition and fuels and lubricant materials belonging to ISIS terrorists.”
But in a video on YouTube, a rebel commander in Hama Province, Jamil al-Saleh, said that his forces had eavesdropped on communications between Syrian Air Force pilots and their bases, which confirmed that Russian warplanes were aloft. His group, the Izza Gathering, is one of the remaining fragments of the loosely knit Free Syrian Army, relatively secular groups that have received some Western support.
Mr. Putin harbors both international and domestic reasons for interfering in Syria. On the international front, he wants to restore Russian influence as a global power and try to force an end to the diplomatic and financial isolation the West imposed after Moscow seized Crimea and supported separatists in southeastern Ukraine. He also wants to maintain control over Russia’s naval station at Tartus, in Syria, its only remaining overseas military base outside the former Soviet Union.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/01/world ... .html?_r=0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Russia has targeted Syrian rebel groups backed by the Central Intelligence Agency in a string of airstrikes running for days, leading the U.S. to conclude that it is an intentional effort by Moscow, American officials said.
The assessment, which is shared by commanders on the ground, has deepened U.S. anger at Moscow and sparked a debate within the administration over how the U.S. can come to the aid of its proxy forces without getting sucked deeper into a proxy war that President Barack Obama says he doesn’t want. The White House has so far been noncommittal about coming to the aid of CIA-backed rebels, wary of taking steps that could trigger a broader conflict.
“On day one, you can say it was a one-time mistake,” a senior U.S. official said of Russia’s strike on one of the allied rebel group’s headquarters. “But on day three and day four, there’s no question it’s intentional. They know what they’re hitting.”
U.S. officials say they now believe the Russians have been directly targeting CIA-backed rebel groups that pose the most direct threat to Mr. Assad since the campaign began on Wednesday, both to firm up regime positions and to send a message to Mr. Obama’s administration.
A spokesman for Russia’s Embassy in Washington said: “Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has made it clear on multiple occasions that the airstrikes are targeted at ISIL [Islamic State], Nusra, and other terrorist groups.”
One of Russia’s first targets was a CIA-backed group known as Tajamu al-Ezzeh or the Ezzeh Gathering in Hama province in central Syria, U.S. and rebel officials said.
American officials and the allied commanders said several other rebel groups covertly backed by the U.S. and its coalition allies have also been targeted by the Russians. They include the First Coastal Division, whose base in northern Latakia province near the Turkish border was struck twice on Oct. 2 starting at 9:45 p.m., according to the group’s commander, Capt. Muhammad Haj Ali.
CIA-backed rebels in southern Syria and near the capital Damascus fared better. CIA-backed rebel groups gradually regained footholds in northern Syria and, combined with a parallel campaign by larger radical groups, began to increase pressure on Mr. Assad, U.S. officials said.
The Pentagon, which is trying to stand up a parallel training program to the CIA’s operation, has pledged to defend its rebels should they come under attack from the Assad regime. The Pentagon program is designed to go after Islamic State exclusively. The same level of protection hasn’t been extended to groups supported covertly by the CIA, officials said.
U.S. officials said Russian attacks could make it harder for the White House to keep antiaircraft weapons out of Syria in the future because rebel groups, left to struggle on their own, may reach outside of approved U.S.-backed channels for supplies.
“These groups are talking about the possibility of introducing Manpads in an uncontrolled way into areas where al Qaeda operates to respond to the Russians since we won’t respond,” said a senior U.S. official. “That’s the nightmare right now.”
http://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-conclud ... 1444088319" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The third U.S. tactic seems to be "containment" -- that old standby: a massive information war is underway to suggest that the Russians committed themselves only to attack ISIS, and nobody else (when Russia never made any such undertaking). Lavrov is explicit: Russia is targeting ISIS and "other terrorist groups," as they had always "said they would do." Nonetheless, the info war campaign continues in order to put pressure on Russia, and to contain its military campaign. American officials have been on record saying that "moderates" turned out to be as rare as mythical unicorns amongst the Syrian armed opposition, and that only "four or five" were in the field now -- and yet suddenly it seems that there are all these "moderate CIA trainees" under attack now. In fact, there are no "moderate jihadists." The term is an oxymoron: there are only jihadists who are more -- or less -- close to ISIS or al Qaeda. It is a parsing of definitions that simply does not interest Russia.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alastair- ... 59870.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
It is very important to remember that every CIA war has at least three basis components:
a) the covert policy target: e.g. overthrow of Assad;
b) the exploitation of the covert economy: weapons, drugs/ contraband, and shadow finance;
c) the ideological/ political manipulation of the “white” population (US and/ or Europe). This means that the covert policy target may enjoy support of different regime factions.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-war-on ... da/5479691" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
AUSTIN, Texas — Osama bin Laden’s original al Qaeda network remains a major long-term national security threat and could surge back into global prominence even as the appeal of the newer, rival Islamic State movement spreads in the heart of the Middle East, CIA Director John Brennan said Tuesday.
But while it would only take one grand operation to launch the so-called “al Qaeda prime” back into the global spotlight, Mr. Brennan warned that it is the Islamic State, also known as ISIL or Daesh, that has established itself as “the epitome of a cancer that’s metastasizing.”
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... /?page=all" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Hillary Clinton ADMITS The CIA Started & Funded Al Qaeda
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJLR1LhxiN0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
https://youtu.be/xd0fLAbV1cA" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
It was revealed in today’s Benghazi hearing that on the day he was killed, Ambassador Chris Stevens reported in a wire to the State Department that he had met with Wissam bin Hamid, a warlord with al-Qaeda connections. When Representative Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.) confronted Hillary Clinton with a picture of Bin Hamid and the head of the al-Qaeda’s Ansar al Sharia group, Mohammed al-Zawahari, Clinton said she had no knowledge such a meeting took place. “Were you aware that our folks were either wittingly or unwittingly meeting on the ground with members of al-Qaeda hours before the attack?” Pompeo asked. “I know nothing about this, congressman,” Clinton replied.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/4 ... is-stevens" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
CNN bombshell: Dozens of CIA operatives were on the ground during the Benghazi attack, agency in panic over revelations
http://hotair.com/archives/2013/08/01/c ... velations/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Hillary Clinton’s 5 Biggest Lies in Her Benghazi Testimony
http://www.breitbart.com/national-secur ... testimony/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Rep. Jim Jordan vs. Hillary Clinton: Why Did You Tell Egyptians Benghazi Was a Terrorist Attack But Not The American People?
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/ ... eople.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Any serious investigation of Benghazi would have to look closely at the role of Abdel Hakim Belhadj, the founder of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group and, after the overthrow of Ghaddafi, the commander of the Tripoli Military Council. As the founder of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, he is the superior of Bin Qumu, head of Ansar al-Sharia, and Wisam bin Hamid, head of Libya Shield, both of whom clearly participated in the attack.
Belhadj had fought with Osama bin Laden from 1988 to 1992 in Afghanistan. He then moved to Sudan with Osama bin Laden. The LIFG was founded in the early 1990s with the intention of overthrowing Ghaddafi. MI6 approached the LIFG in 1995 to carry out a coup against Ghaddafi. After the coup and four assassination attempts against Ghaddafi failed, Balhajd again left Libya. In 2004, he was captured in Asia by the CIA and the British and rendered to Libya, where he was jailed in the Abu Salim prison in Tripoli.
Soon after entering Tripoli, Belhadj was named the commander of the Tripoli Military Council, in charge of, among other things, providing security for all of the foreign embassies, including that of the U.S.
According to documents obtained and released by former Muslim Brotherhood member Walid Shoebat, as reported by WND.com, an array of records provided to Libyan expatriates from sources inside the Libyan government establish that al-Qaeda operatives in Libya are facilitating the passage of jihadists through Libya to Syria.
Furthermore, Shoebat reports that Abdel Hakim Belhadj is the al-Qaeda operative that the Libyan expatriates claim was the principal organizer who directed the Sept. 11 terrorist attack in Benghazi.
Belhadj broke his silence on Radio Darnah on the Samir Shalwi program, one day after Stevens was killed, proclaiming:
"I am indeed a member of the fighting in Jemmah Islamiyah; I'm proud of it; I will not deny that. For this, I have spent the best years of my life in the prisons, under torture, and I'm still a member of this group. I will not give up on its edicts. Everyone must know this in the West, before the East. I've committed Jihad operations in all parts of the globe from Morrocco to Yemen to Somalia to Algeria, even to Afghanistan and Pakistan. I give great respect to Sheik Ayman al-Zawahri and to the first teacher, Abu Musaab al-Zarkawi. I was saddened when Hassan al-Qaidi in Pakistan was martyred.
"Me and my brothers Sheik Khalid al-Sharif, Sheik Al-Mahdi, Al-Haradi, Sheik Hassem, Baher, Abdul Rauf, Karah have formed a committee in Tripoli and we will not allow any foreigner, no matter who he is, to dictate what we do.
"We give thanks to the Mujahed, Sheik Ismail al-Salabi, for his daring proclamation to the Darnah television station, and we tell him that we are with you in every word you spoke, that there is no place for America, Great Britain and all the West in Libya. Libya is a nation of Islam and Jihad.
"The light of Islam will shine forth from it despite the noses of everyone. The weapons are here and the Mujahideen from every corner of the earth are here with us and we have all the weaponry that was prohibited before with us now. We will not hesitate to use it against anyone who touches the land of Libya and that is the end of this discussion."
http://archive.larouchepac.com/node/24806" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Without political asylum in the UK, Tunisian leader Rachid Ghadnouchi could have been buried alive in prison. The same goes for Kamal Helbawy, current leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo; or even worst, the Libyan rebel military commander, Abdul Hakim Belhad, a well-known jihadist who was one of the suspects involved in the Madrid train bombing of March 2004.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/45600052" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
...more on Belhadj in a minute or two...
The Obama administration will overhaul the Pentagon’s $500 million program to equip and train moderate Syrian rebels fighting the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, U.S.. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said at a news conference on Friday. Carter provided few details about the program’s ending, other than to say “we have devised a number of different approaches,” The New York Times reported.
The announcement comes as an acknowledgement that the program largely failed to meet its goal of training 5,400 rebels a year, and 15,000 over the next three years. Instead, the program produced fewer than 80 soldiers, the Associated Press reported, many of whom fled soon after entering combat, were captured or killed.
http://www.newsweek.com/pentagons-ends- ... sis-381554" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
...that's a cost of what...$6+ million per soldier? If you believe that one I've got some ocean front property in North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, etc to sell you....a whole lot of it!
Around 70 of a brand-new batch of US-trained rebels in Syria have reportedly defected to the Al-Qaeda affiliate the al-Nusra Front.
https://www.rt.com/op-edge/316397-crisi ... sm-syrian/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
ISIS reportedly continues to hold major Iraqi cities despite the more than 7,300 airstrikes and more than $4-billion spent on operations and training local forces.
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/2 ... /68390.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
...and somehow they just keep hanging in there...
Joe Biden changes story on Osama bin Laden raid
http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/20/politics/ ... aden-raid/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Joe Biden’s Account of Stance on Bin Laden Raid Conflicts With Others
http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-d ... th-others/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The Osama bin Laden Myth
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2012/11 ... en-myth-2/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
In recent months, a certain number of Arab newspapers, favorable to the Al-Assad administration, discussed the infiltration into Syria of 600 to 1,500 fighters from the Islamic Fighting Group in Libya (IFGL), rebranded Al Qaeda in Libya since November 2007. In late November 2011, the Libyan press reported the attempt by the Zintan militia to detain Abdel Hakim Belhaj, companion of Osama Bin Laden [2] and historic leader of Al Qaeda in Libya, who became military governor of Tripoli by the grace of NATO [3]. The scene took place at Tripoli airport, as he was leaving for Turkey. Finally, Turkish newspapers mentioned Mr. Belhaj’s presence at the Turkish-Syrian.
http://www.voltairenet.org/Free-Syrian- ... mmanded-by" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Mr Belhadj - known in the jihadi world as Abu Abdullah al-Sadiq - commanded the now defunct Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG).
The group was formed in 1990 by Islamist Libyans who had fought in Afghanistan against Soviet forces in the 1980s.
The LIFG waged a three-year low-level insurgency mainly based in eastern Libya, and staged three attempts to assassinate Col Gaddafi in 1995 and 1996, according to Middle East analyst Omar Ashour of Exeter University.
By 1998, the group was crushed. Most of its leaders fled to Afghanistan and joined forces with the Taliban. There, Mr Belhadj is alleged to have developed "close relationships" with al-Qaeda leaders and Taliban chief Mullah Omar, according to an arrest warrant issued by the Libyan government in 2002.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-14786753" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Belhaj is a founding member and former leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which is listed by both the U.S. State Department and the British Home Office as an international terrorist organization. Several past or present LIFG members have held prominent positions in al Qaeda, including operations chief Atiyah Abd al-Rahman, who was recently killed in a CIA drone attack. The LIFG is hardly Libya’s only militant Islamist force, but it’s easily the biggest and very possibly the most dangerous.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... eader.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Major news out of Libya as Abdelhakim Belhadj, the former head of the al Qaeda-linked Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, and a major player in the U.S.-backed overthrow of Moammar Gadhafi, has reportedly joined the Islamic State and is leading its forces there. This according to The Blaze National Security journalist Sara Carter on Twitter, and Fox News’ Catherine Herridge in a Fox News report.
Belhadj’s ties to al Qaeda were controversial during the run up to U.S. airstrikes in support of the Libyan rebels, but this did not prevent him from maintaining a high profile at the time, including being made head of the Tripoli Military Council, a position he held until resigning to run for office in May 2012. Belhadj has a reputation for involvement in the international jihad has well, playing a role in the 2004 Madrid training bombings, and accused by investigators of being involved in the murder of two Tunisian politicians at behest of the Muslim Brotherhood.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... ly-leads-/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
A Libyan politician who was abducted in a joint MI6-CIA operation has welcomed an appeal court ruling that allows him to sue the UK government for his rendition, a decision that establishes a significant precedent for other claims.
Abdel Hakim Belhaj and his Moroccan wife, Fatima Bouchar, were secretly flown in 2004 to Tripoli, where Muammar Gaddafi’s security forces tortured him, and, it is alleged, British intelligence officers took part in his interrogation.
The court of appeal ruled on Thursday that the case should go ahead despite government attempts to resist it on grounds of the “act of state doctrine”, arguing that the courts could not inquire into what happened because it involved a foreign state.
Speaking to the Guardian from Libya, Belhaj, 48, said: “I always had faith in the British justice system. The right decision has been made. I feel I am getting closer to realising justice in my case.”
The British government maintained that the UK’s relations with the US would be seriously damaged if Belhaj was allowed to sue and make his case in a British court. The Foreign Office is considering whether to appeal.
The judgment said that while the trial relating to the couple’s rendition was likely to require a British court to assess the wrongfulness of acts by the CIA and Libyan agents, that was no reason to bar the claim.
The case has been brought by the Libyan couple against the former foreign secretary, Jack Straw, MI6’s former director of counter-terrorism, Sir Mark Allen, the Foreign Office, the Home Office and MI5.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/o ... ia-torture" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Abdelhakim Belhadj’s links to key neocons (as the tweet above reveals) and Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi’s connection to the CIA-run and Saudi financed war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan provides further evidence al-Qaeda and its spawn, the Islamic State, formerly ISIS, are intelligence fabrications designed to perpetuate the war on terror and further the geostrategic agenda of the global elite. Belhadj’s CIA rendition (with the help of British intelligence) and al-Hasidi’s capture by the U.S. reveal both to be intelligence assets. The presence of the Islamic State in Iraq, Syria and now Libya is a key element in the next phase in the war on terror. In late February the Islamic State released a video calling for jihadists from Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Egypt to immigrate to Libya. Mohammed al-Dairi, the Libyan foreign minister, is calling for direct military intervention against the Islamic State. “I ask world powers to stand by Libya and launch military strikes against these groups,” he said in February. “This threat will move to European countries, especially Italy.”
http://www.globalresearch.ca/cia-asset- ... 80/5434923" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The revelations that US ally Abdelhakim Belhadj is now leading ISIS in Libya should come as no surprise to those who have followed US policy in that country, and throughout the region. It illustrates for the umpteenth time that Washington has provided aid and comfort to precisely those forces it claims to be fighting around the world.
According to recent reports, Abdelhakim Belhadj has now firmly ensconced himself as the organizational commander of the ISIS presence inside Libya. The information comes from an unnamed US intelligence official who has confirmed that Belhadj is supporting and coordinating the efforts of the ISIS training centers in eastern Libya around the city of Derna, an area long known as a hotbed of jihadi militancy.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/washington ... ya/5435574" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
...here the new "organizational" commander of ISIS is getting an award from Senator John McCain....
Mr. Aznar’s outing goes hand in hand with the intervention made by his friends from the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, the think tank headed by former Israeli ambassador to the UN Dore Gold [13]. They publicly voice their doubts about the validity of the current CIA strategy to place Islamists in power throughout North Africa. Their criticism is aimed against the secret society of the Muslim Brotherhood, but also against two Libyan figures: Abel Hakim Belhadj and his friend Sheikh Ali Al-Salibi. The latter is regarded as the new leader of Libya [14]. The two men are deemed to be the pawns of Qatar in the new Libya [15]. It was also Sheikh Salabi who distributed $ 2 billion of Qatari funds to help Al-Qaeda in Libya [16].
Thus the contradiction that was desperately kept hidden for the past decade returns to the surface: the mercenaries, formerly paid by Osama Bin Laden, have never stopped working in the service of US strategic interests since the first war in Afghanistan, including the period of the September 11 attacks. Yet they are portrayed by Western leaders as implacable enemies.
It is likely that the objections of Mr. Aznar and the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs will be overridden by NATO, as were those raised by AFRICOM commander General Carter Ham. At the beginning of the war Libya, he was incensed at having to protect jihadists who had gone to slaughter GIs in Iraq.
Detached from reality, the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee (aka "Committee pursuant to resolution 1267") and the US Department of State still have on their black list the organization of Abdel Hakim Belhaj and Sheik Salabi under its former label of Islamic Fighting Group in Libya. It would appear that is it the duty of every State to arrest these individuals if they enter their territory.
http://www.voltairenet.org/Free-Syrian- ... mmanded-by" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
...quite the web ehh?
Four years after the triumphant announcement of Osama Bin Laden’s death by the US government, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence recently released a list of books allegedly found in his compound. This list of English-language books can almost be dubbe ‘conspiracy for beginners’ with titles such as Fritz Springmeier’s “Bloodlines of the Illuminati”, John Coleman’s “The Committee of 300”, the 1977 MKULTRA hearings and Manly P. Hall’s “Secret Teachings of All Ages”. Bin Laden apparently also enjoyed reading about US Foreign policy and 9/11 conspiracy theories. Here’s the full list of of books as reported by BBC.
http://vigilantcitizen.com/latestnews/u ... d-mkultra/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Over 120 CIA documents concerning 9/11, Osama bin Laden and counterterrorism were published today for the first time, having been newly declassified and released to the National Security Archive. The documents were released after the NSA pored through the footnotes of the 9/11 Commission and sent Freedom of Information Act requests.
The material contains much new information about the hunt before and after 9/11 for bin Laden, the development of the drone campaign in AfPak, and al-Qaida’s relationship with America’s ally, Pakistan. Perhaps most damning are the documents showing that the CIA had bin Laden in its cross hairs a full year before 9/11 — but didn’t get the funding from the Bush administration White House to take him out or even continue monitoring him. The CIA materials directly contradict the many claims of Bush officials that it was aggressively pursuing al-Qaida prior to 9/11, and that nobody could have predicted the attacks. “I don’t think the Bush administration would want to see these released, because they paint a picture of the CIA knowing something would happen before 9/11, but they didn’t get the institutional support they needed,” says Barbara Elias-Sanborn, the NSA fellow who edited the materials.
http://911blogger.com/news/2012-06-20/n ... xpert-says" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Bin Laden died December 13, 2001.
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.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/2001/12/26 ... eady-dead/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Rumours have been growing that Bin Laden may already be dead, but the statement suggested that he may have been alive as little as two weeks ago.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/d ... erburkeman" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistan's president says he thinks Osama bin Laden is most likely dead because the suspected terrorist has been unable to get treatment for his kidney disease.
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiap ... .binladen/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Osama bin Laden is "probably" dead, but former Taliban leader Mullah Omar is alive, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has said.
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiap ... .binladen/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
An MSNBC hit piece that attempts to debunk Dr. Steve R. Pieczenik’s assertion that Osama Bin Laden died from Marfan syndrome in 2001 unwittingly provides corroboration from a top Cornell doctor who first made similar statements in an interview with Salon magazine two months after 9/11.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/osama-died ... tion/24753" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
All the evidence suggests Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama bin Laden. But tell that to the CIA and all the other misconceptualizers of the War on Terror.
http://spectator.org/articles/42097/osama-bin-elvis" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Which is closer to dying: Osama bin Laden or the CIA's effort to catch him? Nothing has characterized the fruitlessness of the hunt for the al-Qaeda leader so much as the recurrent — and mostly inaccurate — reports that he is seriously ailing, or even at death's door. In 2002, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf said bin Laden had kidney disease, and that he had required a dialysis machine when he lived in Afghanistan. That same year, the FBI's top counterterrorism official, Dale Watson, said, "I personally think he is probably not with us anymore." Since then, of course, bin Laden has appeared on multiple videos looking healthier than ever.
http://content.time.com/time/nation/art ... 80,00.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Former FBI Translator: Bin Laden Worked for U.S. Right Up Until 9/11
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2009/07/ ... l-911.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
FBI angers politician whose image was used to show older Bin Laden
http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/01/17/osama.photo.fbi/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
It was later revealed that Bush made an investment of $50,000 while representing Salem bin Laden of the Saudi Binladin Group. This fact became controversial after the September 11, 2001 attacks due to Salem bin Laden being an older, half-brother of Osama bin Laden, who is alleged to have planned and financed the attacks. Upon Salem bin Laden's death in a 1988 airplane crash, in Texas, his interest in Arbusto (along with other Binladin Group assets), passed to Khalid bin Mahfouz.
In 1982, Arbusto became known as Bush Exploration, a year after George H. W. Bush became Vice President. A friend of the Bush family, Philip Uzielli, invested $1 million in 1982 in exchange for a 10% stake in the company, at a time when the whole company was valued at less than $400,000. As it neared financial collapse again in September 1984, Bush Exploration merged with Spectrum 7 Energy Corp., a company owned by William DeWitt and Mercer Reynolds. G. W. Bush became Chairman and CEO of Spectrum 7.
In 1985 Spectrum 7 reported a net loss of $1.5 million and was bought in 1986 for $2.2 million by Harken Energy, with Bush joining the Harken board of directors and finance audit committee.
In 1987 the Saudi investor Abdullah Taha Bakhsh bought most of Union Bank of Switzerland's shares in Harken becoming its third largest investor owning 17% of the company. He was represented on the board by Talat M. Othman. Another investor was Ghaith R. Pharaon, a partner of Bakhsh's, who would later be involved in the Bank of Credit and Commerce International scandal, and is currently the target of an international dragnet.
In January 1990 with the company in the same state as its previous incarnations, it was awarded a contract to drill for crude oil off the coast of Bahrain, a move that shocked industry insiders as Harken had no previous experience outside of the US or of drilling offshore.
In June 1990 Bush sold more than half of his shares in Harken to a Los Angeles broker named Ralph D. Smith. One week after the sale Harken announced an overall loss of $23.2 million triggering an investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission into the sale.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbusto_Energy" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
It is hard to imagine an address closer to the heart of American power. The offices of the Carlyle Group are on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC, midway between the White House and the Capitol building, and within a stone's throw of the headquarters of the FBI and numerous government departments. The address reflects Carlyle's position at the very centre of the Washington establishment, but amid the frenetic politicking that has occupied the higher reaches of that world in recent weeks, few have paid it much attention. Elsewhere, few have even heard of it.
But since the start of the "war on terrorism", the firm - unofficially valued at $3.5bn - has taken on an added significance. Carlyle has become the thread which indirectly links American military policy in Afghanistan to the personal financial fortunes of its celebrity employees, not least the current president's father. And, until earlier this month, Carlyle provided another curious link to the Afghan crisis: among the firm's multi-million-dollar investors were members of the family of Osama bin Laden.
Carlyle partners, who include Baker and the firm's chairman, Frank Carlucci - Ronald Reagan's defence secretary and a former deputy director of the CIA - own stakes that would be worth $180m each if each partner owned an equal slice. As in many areas of its work, though, Carlyle is not obliged to reveal the details, and chooses not to.
Among the defence firms which benefit from Carlyle's success is United Defense, a Virginia-based contractor which makes vertical missile launch systems currently on board US Navy ships in the Arabian sea, as well as a range of other weapons delivery systems and combat vehicles. Carlyle's other holdings span an improbable range, taking in the French newspaper Le Figaro and the company which bottles Dr Pepper.
"They are big, and they are quiet," says David Mulholland, business editor of Jane's Defence Weekly. "But they're not easy to get information out of, [but] United Defense are going to do well [in the current conflict]." United also owns Bofors, a Swedish munitions manufacturer.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/o ... ber11.usa4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
New York - Now that the U.S. Congress is investigating the truth of President George W. Bush's statements about the Iraq war, they might look into one of his most startling assertions: that there was a link between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.
Critics dismissed that as an invention. They were wrong. There was a link, but not the one Bush was selling. The link between Hussein and Bin Laden was their banker, BCCI. But the link went beyond the dictator and the jihadist - it passed through Saudi Arabia and stretched all the way to George W. Bush and his father.
BCCI was the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, a dirty offshore bank that then-president Ronald Reagan's Central Intelligence Agency used to run guns to Hussein, finance Osama bin Laden, move money in the illegal Iran-Contra operation and carry out other "agency" black ops. The Bushes also benefited privately; one of the bank's largest Saudi investors helped bail out George W. Bush's troubled oil investments.
BCCI was founded in 1972 by a Pakistani banker, Agha Hasan Abedi, with the support of Sheik Zayed bin Sultan al Nahyan, ruler of Abu Dhabi and head of the United Arab Emirates. Its corporate strategy was money laundering. It became the banker for drug and arms traffickers, corrupt officials, financial fraudsters, dictators and terrorists.
The CIA used BCCI Islamabad and other branches in Pakistan to funnel some of the two billion dollars that Washington sent to Osama bin Laden's Mujahadeen to help fight the Soviets in Afghanistan. It moved the cash the Pakistani military and government officials skimmed from U.S. aid to the Mujahadeen. It also moved money as required by the Saudi intelligence services.
The BCCI operation gave Osama bin Laden an education in offshore black finance that he would put to use when he organised the jihad against the United States. He would move money through the Al-Taqwa Bank, operating in offshore Nassau and Switzerland with two Osama siblings as shareholders.
At the same time, BCCI helped Saddam Hussein, funneling millions of dollars to the Atlanta branch of the Italian government-owned Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL), Baghdad's U.S. banker, so that from 1985 to 1989 it could make four billion dollars in secret loans to Iraq to help it buy arms.
http://truth-out.org/archive/component/ ... -bin-laden" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
James R. Bath, friend and neighbor of George W. Bush, was used as a cash funnel from Osama bin Laden's rich father, Sheikh bin Laden, to set George W. Bush up in business, according to reputable sources from the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. The connection between GW Bush, the bin Laden family, and the Bank Commerce Credit International (BCCI) is well documented. The excerpts from the books and news articles are supplemented by the links at the bottom of the page to the cash flow charts of the bin Laden-backed BCCI money which was funneled into the Bush family in return for favors.
"...BCCI would make payments to key officials, sometimes in suitcases filled with cash. As BCCI officer Abdur Askhia stated in interviews tithe Subcommittee staff: Abedi's philosophy was to appeal to every sector. President Carter's main thing was charity, so he gave Carter charity. Pakistani President Zia's brother in law needed a job, he got a job. Bangladeshi president Ashraf's mistress needed a job, she got a job. Admission of your son to a top college, he would arrange it somehow. There was a world wide list of people who were in the payoff of BCCI...". from United States Senate Subcommittee Report on Bank Credit Commerce International, 1992--the Kerry Committee.
Osama bin Laden, whose funds were inherited from his father, Sheikh bin Laden's BCCI investments, has been operating out of Afghanistan since he was established as a conduit for CIA funds in the 1980's. "Afghanistan was by far the biggest; it was, in fact, the biggest CIA operationof all time, both in terms of dollars spent ($5-$6 billion) and personnel involved..."from the book The CIA's Greatest Hits.
The story of the Bush involvement in the BCCI scandal involved "trails that branched, crossed one another, or came to unexpected dead ends...". It was like a "three dimensional chess game." from The Outlaw Bank, page 227.
The BCCI bribery connection went straight to the George Bush oval office. The White House political director, a man whom the Senate noted sat in on presidential meetings, named Ed Rogers, was hired away from the Chief of Staff's Office to represent the BCCI's American representative, Sheik Adham.
"Q-Mr. President, considering your concern about propriety in government, what was your reaction when a senior member of your White House staff, Ed Rogers, left the White House employ and signed a contract with a Saudi sheikh accused of being a key figure in the BCCI scandal?
The President-Well, he is a free citizen to do anything he wants once he leaves the White House. My concern is about the White House itself, that it be beyond any perception of impropriety.
Q-Well, what do you think he was selling to the Saudis except for accessing---
The President--Ask him. I don't know anything what he's selling. I don't know anything about this man, excpet I've read bad stuff about him. And I don't like what I read about him. But I would suggest that the matter is best dealt with by asking this man what kind of representation he is doing for this sheikh. But it has nothing to do, in my view, with the White House." from the Official Papers of the Presidents, Press Conference, October 25, 1991. George Herbert Walker Bush.
http://www.theforbiddenknowledge.com/ha ... _laden.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
1988: Bin Ladens Bail Out George W. Bush?
Prior to this year, President George W. Bush is a failed oilman. Three times, friends and investors have bailed him out to keep his business from going bankrupt. However, in 1988, the same year his father becomes president, some Saudis buy a portion of his small company, Harken, which has never performed work outside of Texas. Later in the year, Harken wins a contract in the Persian Gulf and starts doing well financially. These transactions seem so suspicious that the Wall Street Journal in 1991 states it “raises the question of… an effort to cozy up to a presidential son.” Two major investors in Bush’s company during this time are Salem bin Laden and Khalid bin Mahfouz. Salem bin Laden dies in a plane crash in Texas in 1988. [Intelligence Newsletter, 3/2/2000; Salon, 11/19/2001] Salem bin Laden is Osama’s oldest brother; Khalid bin Mahfouz is a Saudi banker with a 20 percent stake in BCCI. The bank will be shut down a few years later and bin Mahfouz will have to pay a $225 million fine (while admitting no wrongdoing) (see October 10, 2001)). [Forbes, 3/18/2002]
July 1991: Bin Laden Loses Money in BCCI; Begins Profiting from Drug Trade
In early 2001, anonymous US officials will say that when the notorious Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) is shut down in July 1991 (see July 5, 1991), Osama bin Laden suffers a heavy blow because he has put much of his money in the bank and he loses everything he invested there. As a result, he begins to launder money from the drug trade to make up for the lost revenue. He cooperates with Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who is already diverting profits from the Afghan drug trade to help finance Islamic terrorist movements. Others claim bin Laden begins his involvement with the drug trade several years later. [United Press International, 3/1/2001] It also seems that bin Laden’s financial network eventually grows to at least partly replace the role of BCCI for Islamist militant financing (see After July 1991).
http://www.historycommons.org/context.j ... 8failedman" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
There exist to this day an Arab-Texas connection. Khalid bin Mahfouz, financier of both George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden, still maintains a palatial estate in Houston, TX. Former President George Bush also lives in Houston. James Bath, Texas political confidant of George W. Bush, managed to obtain a $1.4 million loan from Mahfouz in 1990. Bath and Mahfouz, along with former Secretary of Treasury John Connally, were also co-investors in Houstonís Main Bank. Bath was also president of Skyway Aircraft Leasing Ltd, a Texas air charter company registered in the Cayman Islands. According to published reports in the early 1990s, the real owner was bin Mahfouz. When Salem bin Laden, Osamaí brother, died in 1988, his interest in the Houston Gulf Airport was transferred to bin Mahfouz.
Since Osama bin Ladenís bloody attack on America on September 11, the federal government has moved quickly to freeze bank accounts connected to Osama bin Laden, Khalid bin Mahfouz, and a host of Islamic charities.
Perhaps federal agents should freeze the financial assets of the Bush family too. It would not be the first time Bush-family assets were seized by the US government for trading with the enemy.
http://www.public-action.com/911/psyopn ... ecrets.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Plenty more here -
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and here -
viewtopic.php?f=36&t=22473&p=281882" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;