"
After Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden, the White House released a photo of President Barack Obama and his Cabinet inside the Situation Room, watching the daring raid unfold. Hidden from view, standing just outside the frame of that now-famous photograph was a career CIA analyst" -
The man who hunted Osama bin Laden
posted by vidur
on Jul 5, 2011 -
58 comments
Michael Scheuer, the former chief of the CIA's "bin Laden Station", and the initially anonymous author of
Imperial Hubris, pulls an
O'Reilly on
yesterday's Glenn Beck broadcast:
"The only chance we have as a country have right now is for Osama bin Laden to deploy and detonate a major weapon in the United States [...] only Osama can execute an attack which will force Americans to demand that their government protect them [...] with as much violence as necessary."
[more inside]
posted by WCityMike
on Jul 1, 2009 -
96 comments
What is the logical consequence of noting the fact that the terrorist groups that make a difference on planet Earth—such as Hamas and Hezbollah, the PLO, Colombia's FARC—are extensions of, respectively, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and Venezuela? It is the negation of the U.S. government's favorite axiom. It means that when George W. Bush spoke, and when Barack Obama speaks, of America being "at war" against "extremism" or "extremists" they are either being stupid or acting stupid to avoid dealing with the nasty fact that many governments wage indirect warfare.
International relations professor Angelo M. Codevilla argues that
Osama bin Laden is not quite influential, not quite relevant, and probably dead.
(multipage version)
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane
on Mar 27, 2009 -
33 comments
On Wednesday Sept. 5
th, German police stopped a
major
terrorist
attack.
The planned bomb consisted of 730 kilogramms of hydrogen peroxide to be mixed with other chemicals.
The explosive power would have been equivalent to 550 kilogramms of TNT.
The
IHT reports the possible targets were the Ramstein US Air Force Air Base and Frankfurt International Airport.
The suspects had been under observation for 10 months, the chemicals had been
clandestinely rendered harmless
by German authorities.
What caused the final arrest?
Two things: 1) they had just recieved a call from north Pakistan urgently ordering them to follow through within 14 days.
2) a local village policeman
blew the surveillance cover by literally telling them at a routine road stop that they were on a watch-list. German intelligence immediately knew the policeman had blown their cover. How? They had bugged the car
[
Spiegel,
rough translation].
[more inside]
posted by umop-apisdn
on Sep 8, 2007 -
45 comments
It Isn’t Easy Being the Sexy Bin Laden : “the face is alluring (big dark eyes, long lashes, plump lips, caramel skin)”. Satin sheets, a feather boa and not much else.
And who could resist alluring bin Laden quotes like this?
“At the end of the day, I believe that the American people understand things and they have compassion and they see what’s fair,” [bin Laden] says. "They’re very fair, and that’s why I love America, and that’s why my mom loves America.”
Or
this quote:
“Come on, where’s the American spirit? Accept me. I want to be embraced, because my values are like yours. And I’m here. I’m not hiding.”
posted by Davenhill
on Dec 24, 2005 -
58 comments
Osama bin Laden,
littérateur and new-media star. A thought-provoking analysis of bin Laden's adept use of Koranic language and the Internet by Bruce B. Lawrence, an Islamic scholar at Duke who edited a new anthology of bin Laden's public statements called
Messages to the World. The Western media -- says the millionaire mass-murderer
formerly trained as a useful ally by the CIA via
Pakistan's ISI -- "implants fear and helplessness in the psyche of the people of Europe and the United States. It means that what the enemies of the United States cannot do, its media are doing!" Know thy enemy.
[via Arts and Letters Daily.]
posted by digaman
on Nov 3, 2005 -
57 comments
'The Search For Osama'. A long, well-researched article in the 'New Yorker' about the ongoing global manhunt for the leader of al Qaeda and the architect of the September 11 attacks.
posted by eyebeam
on Jul 30, 2003 -
5 comments
Where-o-where can bin Laden be? The general belief among U.S. officials appears to be that al Qaeda's leader, Osama bin Laden, probably is still somewhere in Afghanistan... But, conceded a defense official, the United States has very little solid information on the whereabouts of bin Laden. "If we had a real clue, we would have already got him," he said.
posted by Rastafari
on Dec 11, 2001 -
9 comments
From a piece in the NYTimes today,
Home Front Is Minefield for President:
"The lesson we're learning," one administration official said today, "is that you can bomb the wrong place in Afghanistan and not take much heat for it. But don't mess up at the post office."Leave it to the White House to come away with exactly the wrong interpretation. But the facts are there, too -- most Americans are more concerned about the (relatively slight) risk of getting Anthrax than the rather significant risk that, if we screw up in Afghanistan, we might lose the current coalition against terrorism, Bin Laden, and any hope for "homeland security" for a long time to come....
posted by mattpfeff
on Oct 25, 2001 -
12 comments
"To me, every fundamentalist Muslim, no matter how peaceable in his own behavior, is part of a murderous movement and is thus, in some fashion, a foot soldier in the war that bin Laden has launched against civilization."
a comment by
Daniel Pipes
If Muslim fundamentalists are this bad I wonder what his views are of the
other religious fundamentalists
posted by Qambient
on Oct 22, 2001 -
49 comments
Little Osama Check out the Brady Family photo of young Osama Bin Laden and his 22 brothers and sisters, published in The Sun...
Full story
here.
posted by crunchybird
on Sep 24, 2001 -
30 comments
Text of Osama's Fatwah: "The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies--civilian and military--is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque from their grip, and in order for their armies to move out of all the lands of Islam..."
posted by semmi
on Sep 21, 2001 -
0 comments
How To Launder Money If the "terrorism can't be overpowered, it can only be undermined" train of thought holds true, then the money funding terrorist activities needs to be cutoff, especially considering they may directly profit from it (and theoretically at least, it's easier to choke off funds than grass roots ideology). From what I've read Osama bin Laden's money comes from wealthy fundamentalist sympathizers, "rogue" governments and the heroin racket. Governments create, maintain and oversee the money apparatus, but if money laundering can't be stopped I don’t see how terrorism can either, um short of eradicating poverty, "the petri-dish for the culture of suicide bombing."
posted by kliuless
on Sep 19, 2001 -
11 comments
