October 23, 2002

11:41 AM

Iraqis linked to Oklahoma atrocity This rumor has been arond for some time now, and the Bush group certainly might like to see a connection to Iraq, though the official version seems to deny such a connection. Is this a political move to make legitimate a war against Iraq or an attempt to re-open what might have been a botched detective job originally, or just plain utter nonsense?
posted by Postroad (16 comments total)

Why don't we just ask Timothy McVeigh?
posted by ColdChef at 11:50 AM on October 23, 2002

Instead, there are serious concerns that a group of Arab men with links to Iraqi intelligence, Palestinian extremists and possibly al Qaeda, used McVeigh and Nichols as front men to blow up the Alfred P Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

Wow, Postroad! 'Tis the stuff dreams are made of!

Hmmm: our sworn enemies have never hesitated to take credit for their handiwork in the past, so why the layers of supposed obfuscation this time?

What triggered Davis's investigation was a report immediately after the Oklahoma explosion of Middle-Eastern looking men fleeing in a brown Chevrolet truck only minutes earlier.

You don't say!
posted by donkeyschlong at 11:54 AM on October 23, 2002

Did we have a discussion a while back on the, John Doe 2? I remember a facial sketch or was that within a thread?
posted by thomcatspike at 12:00 PM on October 23, 2002

This is reaching for straws. On the basis of one vague description we can conclude that Iraq is behind the attacks? I'm sorry but no.

This is almost as bad as the "Mossad agents taking pictures of WTC site therefore Israel was behind it all" story.
posted by PenDevil at 12:04 PM on October 23, 2002

Yeah, we had the John Doe 2 thread

Also, Postroad, ask Laurie Mylroie to marry you and go look for Iraqis hidden under American beds late at night
posted by matteo at 12:30 PM on October 23, 2002

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posted by RylandDotNet at 12:42 PM on October 23, 2002

Not sure if this link is going to work, but check it out and also infowars.com to see earlier connections between Oklahoma City and Al-Qaeda not taken note of by most news sources.
http://www.newsmax.com/showinsidecover.shtml?a=2002/5/27/132357
posted by anyasar at 12:45 PM on October 23, 2002

A Conservative(Closet Libertarian) coworker of mine sent me the InfoWars article a few weeks ago.

If you take everything at face value I wonder how a local news reporter seems to have scooped all of our intelligence agencies?

If the information was credible why hasn't the Bush admin snapped it up and started using it as the proof that So-Damn-Insane-Hussien is directly involved in Anti-American/Anti-Western terrorism?

This reporter has had this information for how many years now. Why has it taken her this long to get noticed. 7 years is a long time to be ignored. I would have thought that a determined reporter would have been able to get the attention of the government before now.

The notes she took are not publicly available (that I am aware of) so there is no way for us to check her sources or verify her claims in any real way.

She's apparently been on O'Reilly a couple of times. The lawyer that led the impeachment trial against Clinton is representing her.
posted by Wong Fei-hung at 1:15 PM on October 23, 2002

not taken note of by most news sources

Do you know why they didn't?
posted by matteo at 1:15 PM on October 23, 2002

As I noted in the previous thread, this isn't conclusive -- but it is unsettling. The FBI has the videotape from the convenience store where the clerk said she saw John Doe No. 2, the only image we may have of him, and for whatever reason they're saying nothing. Supposedly a House committee subpoena'ed some of this evidence over the summer, but I lost track of what was happening with that.

The person to ask is Nichols, who traveled to the Philippines and may have met Ramzi Yousef.

This article adds more detail, but most of it has already been reported.
posted by dhartung at 1:31 PM on October 23, 2002

Just the fact that this might even be within the realm of possibility, and something that the FBI would want to probe, proves - yet again - that execution is foolish way to deal with a criminal.
posted by pejamo at 1:44 PM on October 23, 2002

{snide comment}

Is it somehow possible to wipe one's ass with digital news media? Damn, I miss the old days...

{/snide comment}
posted by zekinskia at 2:15 PM on October 23, 2002

Matteo, I know the Alex Jones version of why most news sources didn't pick up on this & other similar stories. (He has good information but often seems like a lunatic on camera; he's his own worst enemy.) His story is that most "mainstream" media is controlled by people who have economic, political, and personal reasons for reporting stories in a way that coincides with the government's "official story" on any given topic. If they go too far afield of this, they are penalized by not being granted access, interviews, inside scoops, etc. I'm not in media so I don't know the details of how this works, but it sounds plausible that it is in the interest of mainstream news to keep pleasing those in charge, and to discredit alternative news sources. If the government -- specifically the ATF bureau, which had an office in the Murrah building and whose personnel was specifically told not to come into work the day of the attack -- has something to hide, they would not want discrepancies being published by "reputable" news sources. Also, i do think it's valuable to shake up people's assumptions about the govt and media, just to encourage everyone to examine facts rather than skip to the bottom of the story for someone else's interpretation. IMHO, of course. And Alex Jones's, raving madman, God bless 'im.
posted by anyasar at 3:28 PM on October 23, 2002

This is not new information

It has legs now because it's suddenly *good* for the administration if the Iraqis to have killed 165 Americans. Imagine the blame they could lay on Bill Clinton and Janet Reno for this cover-up.
posted by astrogirl at 7:22 PM on October 23, 2002

"Good evening, I'm Kent Brockman and here's our wild speculations at the top of the hour!"

Possible? Well, practically anything's possible. But this article is such a collection of assumptions, guesses, unfounded conclusions, and bald assertions, that I think the "evidence" will only convince those who want to be convinced.

The FBI is under pressure from the highest political levels in Washington to investigate suspected links between Iraq and the Oklahoma bombing.

I'm sure they are. I'm sure they are.
posted by octobersurprise at 7:29 PM on October 23, 2002

But wait! The Unabomber didn't act alone!!

How deep does all this go? I remember reading about John Wilkes Booth traveling to Afghanistan......
posted by TheManWhoKnowsMostThings at 7:59 PM on October 23, 2002