ReThinking 9/11
January 26, 1998
The Honorable William J. Clinton
President of the United States
Washington, DC
Dear Mr. President:
We are writing you because we are convinced that current American
policy toward Iraq is not succeeding, and that we may soon face
a threat in the Middle East more serious than any we have known since the
end of the Cold War. In your upcoming State of the Union Address, you have
an opportunity to chart a clear and determined course for meeting this
threat. We urge you to seize that opportunity, and to enunciate a new strategy
that would secure the interests of the U.S. and our friends and allies
around the world. That strategy should aim, above all, at the removal
of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power. We stand ready to
offer our full support in this difficult but necessary endeavor.
The policy of “containment” of Saddam Hussein has been steadily
eroding over the past several months. As recent events have demonstrated,
we can no longer depend on our partners in the Gulf War coalition to continue
to uphold the sanctions or to punish Saddam when he blocks or evades UN
inspections. Our ability to ensure that Saddam Hussein is not producing
weapons of mass destruction, therefore, has substantially diminished. Even
if full inspections were eventually to resume, which now seems highly unlikely,
experience has shown that it is difficult if not impossible to monitor
Iraq’s chemical and biological weapons production. The lengthy period
during which the inspectors will have been unable to enter many Iraqi facilities
has made it even less likely that they will be able to uncover all of Saddam’s
secrets. As a result, in the not-too-distant future we will be unable to
determine with any reasonable level of confidence whether Iraq does or
does not possess such weapons.
Such uncertainty will, by itself, have a seriously destabilizing effect on the entire Middle East. It hardly needs to be added that if Saddam does acquire the capability to deliver weapons of mass destruction, as he is almost certain to do if we continue along the present course, the safety of American troops in the region, of our friends and allies like Israel and the moderate Arab states, and a significant portion of the world’s supply of oil will all be put at hazard. As you have rightly declared, Mr. President, the security of the world in the first part of the 21st century will be determined largely by how we handle this threat.
Given the magnitude of the threat, the current policy, which depends for its success upon the steadfastness [another way of saying, "Staying the course"] of our coalition partners and upon the cooperation of Saddam Hussein, is dangerously inadequate. The only acceptable strategy is one that eliminates the possibility that Iraq will be able to use or threaten to use weapons of mass destruction [This was 1998 and the same excuse was used to for the ILLEGAL IRAQ war.] In the near term, this means a willingness to undertake military action as diplomacy is clearly failing. In the long term, it means removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power. That now needs to become the aim of American foreign policy.
We urge you to articulate this aim, and to turn your Administration's attention to implementing a strategy for removing Saddam's regime from power. This will require a full complement of diplomatic, political and military efforts. Although we are fully aware of the dangers and difficulties in implementing this policy, we believe the dangers of failing to do so are far greater. We believe the U.S. has the authority under existing UN resolutions to take the necessary steps, including military steps, to protect our vital interests in the Gulf. In any case, American policy cannot continue to be crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity in the UN Security Council.
We urge you to act decisively. If you act now to end the threat of weapons of mass destruction against the U.S. or its allies [1998], you will be acting in the most fundamental national security interests of the country. If we accept a course of weakness and drift, we put our interests and our future at risk.
Sincerely,
Elliott Abrams, Richard L. Armitage, William J. Bennett, Jeffrey Bergner, John Bolton, Paula Dobriansky, Francis Fukuyama, Robert Kagan, Zalmay Khalilzad, William Kristol, Richard Perle, Peter W. Rodman, Donald Rumsfeld, William Schneider, Jr., Vin Weber, Paul Wolfowitz, R. James Woolsey, Robert B. Zoellick"
They're Even Dumber Than We Thought
The Five Morons Revisited
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
August 30, 2006
When the neocons launched the Bush administration's invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and announced plans for invading Syria and Iran, I labeled Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Rice "the five Morons." With the passage of time I see that I over-estimated their mental capabilities.
The "cakewalk" war has now lasted longer than World War II with Nazi Germany, and no end is in sight. It has cost the US taxpayers $310 billion in out-of-pocket costs with many additional hundreds of billions coming due in veterans' medical bills and other expenses yet to be paid.
To carry on the pointless war, which has achieved nothing but death, destruction, and hatred of America, Bush has had to call up inactive reserves who long ago completed their active duty service to their country and have managed to get on with their lives. It is well known that the older one gets the harder it is to find employment or the energy to restart a mothballed business. But Bush is too busy saving us from terrorism to care about people's lives.
Despite the lack of US troops and Bush's inability to prevail in Afghanistan and Iraq, neocons in Bush's government are working around the clock to instigate war with Iran and Syria.
I thought that I had Rumsfeld pegged as the complete dolt, but I was stunned when I read Associated Press reporter Robert Burns account of what Rumsfeld told 200 Navy aviators in a question and answer session at Fallon Naval Air Station on August 28. "The thing that keeps me up at night," said Rumsfeld, is the success of terrorist groups in "manipulating the media."
Rumsfeld told the pilots that terrorists "are actively manipulating the media in this country" by falsely blaming US troops for civilian deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan. All that "collateral damage" we hear about, the tens of thousands of dead and maimed civilians, is just terrorist propaganda. "The enemy lies constantly . . . and with impunity. . . . The enemy is so much better at communicating." Rumsfeld made similar remarks to the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in Reno, Nevada, where he was presented the Dwight D. Eisenhower Distinguished Service Award. Eisenhower must be rolling over in his grave [Note: Donald Rumsfeld called Vietnam Veterans "WHAT WAS LEFT AFTER THE BEST & BRIGHTEST FOUND A WAY TO DODGE MILITARY SERVICE" and as a Vietnam Vetran, I was asked to leave a VFW because THEY felt, "I did not serve in a foreign war," so it is easy to understand why these idiots would give an award to this fool.]
Now I get it. When Fox News' Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilley assured us that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that would be used against us if we didn't strike first, they were being manipulated by Osama bin Laden, who used America to get rid of the secular Saddam Hussein and to create a new training and recruitment ground for al Qaeda and fundamentalist fanatics.
When the New York Times let Judith Miller serve as a propagandist for war with Iraq, the Times was being manipulated by Muslim terrorists, not by neocons.
When CNN, the networks and columnists like Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin reassure us that we will win the war unless we pull out prematurely, they are being manipulated by terrorists. Finally I understand what the Weekly Standard, National Review, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, AEI, and the online site Frontpage are all about.
The terrorists are so clever at manipulation that Americans cannot perceive that we have been sucked deep into a war that is creating the Islamic fundamentalism that we so desperately fear.
Obviously, I misjudged Rumsfeld's intelligence. Anyone who can figure out the Muslim conspiracy is off the charts. What I can't figure is why Rumsfeld is willing for America to continue to be sucked in. Don't tell me that terrorists are manipulating Rumsfeld, too!
I keep waiting for the money appeal from AIPAC. I already know what it is going to say: "Although AIPAC is undisputedly the most powerful lobby in America and can determine with impunity the fate of every elected official, we cannot match the terrorists' ability to manipulate the media. Polls show that terrorists' manipulation of the US media is causing American support for the war to dwindle away. Please send more millions to counter the terrorists' control of the American media. We are winning in the Middle East but losing at home."
One of the lessons one learns in life is that things are not always what they seem to be. Before I watched Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer's National Press Club broadcast on C-Span (August 28), I regarded AIPAC as Israel's friend and promoter. Now I realize that I was wrong. As the two distinguished professors made perfectly clear, anyone who cares about the survival of Israel should scorn the bribes, threats, and blandishments of AIPAC.
AIPAC led the Israeli government onto a path where diplomacy is no longer a tool that Israel can use. Instead, Israel relies on Mao's dictum that "power comes out of the barrel of a gun" or from a bulldozer that knocks down Palestinians' homes, uproots their olive groves, and enrages Muslims at Israel's inhumanity. Backed into a corner with no tool but violence, Israel faces hundreds of millions of increasingly angry Muslims.
If Bush were a true friend of Israel, he would never have let Israel again destroy Lebanon, this time under the pretext of striking at Hezbollah.
AIPAC and Bush have allowed, or caused, Israel to do itself so much damage in the eyes of Muslims and the wider world that a peaceful resolution in the MIddle East is no longer in people's thoughts. With the mighty US military checked in Iraq by a handful of Sunnis, and the mighty Israeli army checked in Lebanon by a handful of Hezbollah, violence is unlikely to settle the matter in a way that neocons in the US and Zionists in Israel would like.
The only hope is that Bush and Olmert miraculously turn into grown men, admit their mistakes, apologize, send reparations and commit to winning acceptance of Israel and America based on Israel's and America's good behavior. It would be nice to see in operation some of the superior morality that the two claim.
Considering the extraordinary hubris and self-righteousness of neocons and Zionists, nothing like this can possibly happen. Israel, the US, and the Muslim world will continue to bleed.
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/076152553X/counterpunchmaga
He can be reached at: paulcraigroberts@yahoo.com
Source: http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts08302006.html
Birds of a Feather
Stop for a moment and look at the names of those who signed the Neocon letter to President Clinton, because these are EVIL NEOCONS who are attempting to propagate a Crusade against PEACE and LIFE; better yet, here is a breakdown:
Elliott Abrams - Pardoned Crook
Elliott Abrams -- Pleaded guilty October 7, 1991, to two misdemeanor charges of withholding information from Congress about secret government efforts to support the Nicaraguan contra rebels during a ban on such aid. U.S. District Chief Judge Aubrey E. Robinson, Jr., sentenced Abrams November 15, 1991, to two years probation and 100 hours community service. Abrams was pardoned December 24, 1992.
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/walsh/summpros.htm
Richard L. Armitage - Plame Leaker
A conspicuous exception was former deputy secretary of State Richard Armitage, whose office would only say, "We're not commenting." He was one of a handful of top officials who had access to the information. He is an old source and friend of Woodward's, and he fits Novak's description of his source as "not a partisan gunslinger." Woodward has indicated that he knows the identity of Novak's source, which further suggests his source and Novak's were one and the same.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10117465/site/newsweek/
William J. Bennett - Congressional Racist
Bill Bennett Tells 1.25 Million Listeners,
Abort Every Black Baby to Stop Crime
109TH CONGRESS - H. RES. 473 - 1ST SESSION
Condemning the racist remarks of William Bennett.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES - SEPTEMBER 29, 2005
Mr. RUSH submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary
RESOLUTION
Condemning the racist remarks of William Bennett.
Whereas William J. Bennett hosts a radio program, "Morning in America"', which airs on approximately 115 radio stations with an estimated weekly audience of 1.25 million listeners;
Whereas on September 28th, 2005, Mr. Bennett said on his radio program, "But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down.''; and
Whereas Mr. Bennett's remarks are outrageous and blatantly racist: Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That the House of Representatives condemns the comments made by William Bennett on his radio program, "Morning in America'', as outrageous racism of the most bigoted and ignorant kind; and condemns all manifestations and expressions of racism and ethnic intolerance.
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=hr109-473
[Ed. Note: Bennett's comment also suggests support for Abortion and since most of these people listed here work for, or have worked for Bush and the Republican Party, is it fair to ask if this is a secret agenda ?]
Jeffrey Bergner
Despite claims to the contrary, Iran is not seeking a peaceful nuclear energy program. Iran has no need of such a program, and its actions to date are not consistent with that end. Iran is seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability, and there is nothing the European trio can offer it to compensate for the perceived security benefits nuclear weapons would bring.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/005/301fkrie.asp
John Bolton - Who Is Larry Franklin?
John Bolton vs. the world
His job is to keep a hawk eye on dovish Colin Powell. And he's helped turn Bush foreign policy into an ideological hammer. By Nicholas Thompson
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/07/16/bolton/
Paula Dobriansky
Then there are the sisters Dobriansky. Larisa Dobriansky, currently the deputy assistant secretary for national energy policy at the Department of Energy—in which capacity she’s charged with managing the department’s Office of Climate Change Policy—was previously a lobbyist with the firm Akin Gump, where she worked on climate change for ExxonMobil. Her sister, Paula Dobriansky, currently serves as undersecretary for global affairs in the State Department. In that role, Paula Dobriansky recently headed the U.S. delegation to a United Nations meeting on the Kyoto Protocol in Buenos Aires, where she charged that “science tells us that we cannot say with any certainty what constitutes a dangerous level of warming, and therefore what level must be avoided.”
Indeed, the rhetoric of scientific uncertainty has been Paula Dobriansky’s stock-in-trade. At a November 2003 panel sponsored by the AEI, she declared, “the extent to which the man-made portion of greenhouse gases is causing temperatures to rise is still unknown, as are the long-term effects of this trend. Predicting what will happen 50 or 100 years in the future is difficult.”
Given Paula Dobriansky’s approach to climate change, it will come as little surprise that memos uncovered by Greenpeace show that in 2001, within months of being confirmed by the Senate, Dobriansky met with ExxonMobil lobbyist Randy Randol and the Global Climate Coalition. For her meeting with the latter group, one of Dobriansky’s prepared talking points was “POTUS [President Bush in Secret Service parlance] rejected Kyoto, in part, based on input from you.” The documents also show that Dobriansky met with ExxonMobil executives to discuss climate policy just days after September 11, 2001. A State Department official confirmed that these meetings took place, but adds that Dobriansky “meets with pro-Kyoto groups as well.”
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2005/05/some_like_it_hot.html
Francis Fukuyama
Thus, in the view of the early Bush administration, the planet would come to be dominated more and more by the "universal homogenous state," a mixture of "liberal democracy in the political sphere combined with easy access to VCRs and stereos in the economic." The arid banality of that definition is matched by Fukuyama's dazzled tribute to "the spectacular abundance of advanced liberal economies and the infintely diverse consumer culture." Fukuyama, it turns out, is a resident of the privileged enclave for imperial functionaries that is northeast Virginia, and so has little understanding of the scope of US domestic poverty and immiseration: "This is not to say that there are not rich people and poor people in the United States, or that the gap between them has not grown in recent years. But the root causes of economic inequality have less to do with the underlying legal and social strcutures of our society, which remain fundamentally egalitarian and moderately redistributionist, as with the cultural and social characteristics of the groups that make it up, which are in turn the historical legacy of premodern conditions. Thus black poverty in the United States, for example, is not the inherent product of liberalism, but is rather the 'legacy of slavery and racism' which persisted long after the formal abolition fo slavery." For Fukuyama, writing at a moment when American class divisions were more pronounced that at any time in human memory, "the egalitarianism of modern America represents the essential achievement of the classless society envisoned by Marx." As a purveyor of official doctrine for the Bush regime, Fukuyama is bound to ignore twenty years of increasing poverty and declining standards of living for all Americans which has caused an even greater retrogression for the black population; there is no way that this can be chalked up to the heritage of slavery.
Robert Kagan
"Obviously the administration intends to publicize all the weapons of mass destruction U.S. forces find -- and there will be plenty."
Think about what the world will look like the day after the bombing ends. Mr. Hussein will still be in power -- if five weeks of heavy bombing in 1991 failed to knock him out, five days of bombing won't either. Can the air attacks insure that he will never be able to use weapons of mass destruction again? The answer, unfortunately, is no. Even our smart bombs cannot reliably hit and destroy every weapons and storage site in Iraq, for the simple reason that we do not know where all the sites are. After the bombing stops, Mr. Hussein will still be able to manufacture weapons of mass destruction. Pentagon officials admit this. [Bombing Iraq Isn't Enough, William Kristol & Robert Kagan, The New York Times, January 30, 1998
http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraq-013098.htm
Zalmay Khalilzad
Washington's Neocon in Baghdad? Zalmay Khalilzad Nominated as U.S. Ambassador
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/07/1343234
William Kristol - Intentionally Left Blank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Kristol
Richard Perle
“This will be the short war I and others predicted… I don’t believe it will be months. I believed all along that it will be a quick war, and I continue to believe that.”
"The President of the United States, on issue after issue, has reflected the thinking of neoconservatives."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Perle
Peter W. Rodman
FBI agents Sunday and Monday questioned senior officials in the Department of Defense as part of an investigation into allegations that a Pentagon analyst passed on classified documents to an Israeli lobbying group, which may have then passed them on to the government of Israel. The documents in question were papers on the US's stance towards Iran.
The Washington Post reports that Douglas Feith, undersecretary for policy for Defense, and Peter Rodman, assistant secretary for international security affairs, are among those whom the FBI interviewed about the contacts between Lawrence Franklin, a lower-level Pentagon analyst, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and an Israeli diplomat. The Post notes that Mr. Franklin, a Catholic, first came to the attention of the FBI more than a year ago when he appeared at a lunch between an AIPAC official and an Israeli diplomat. The FBI's counterintelligence unit was monitoring the meeting as part of another investigation that it has refused to comment on, although one FBI official said it is part of a broader investigation. [Ed. Note: "Part of a broader investigation," hummm... wonder what that is about.]
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0831/dailyUpdate.html
Donald Rumsfeld
William Schneider, Jr.
William Schneider on CNN’s “American Morning” program today highlighted a talk given by former CIA Director James Woolsey’s, about “World War IV” (He counts the Cold War as number III). He says it will be between most of the Middle East and the so-called Western World. Speaking of the undesirable regimes in that area, he said (I paraphrase), “All these countries are going to feel threatened about our formula of democracy creeping in to their area. I say, ‘Good. We want them to feel threatened.’” Schneider then placed Woolsey as being closely allied with Rumsfeld, Perle, Wolfowitz, and others, and made the connection that many others have, that 9-11 was seized as an opportunity to carry out their pre-existing goals. He challenged Bush’s public assertion that this was not a clash of civilizations, pointing to the enormous global opposition to the U.S. and Britain’s Western aggression.
http://pnac.info/index.php/2003/hints-of-pnac-on-cnn-world-war-iv/
Vin Weber
THE WELLSTONE MEMORIAL - Republicans, no longer able to say anything bad about the late Paul Wellstone, were reduced to criticizing his mass memorial service, in which thousands of people cheered Walter Mondale, booed Trent Lott, and were exhorted by one of the speakers to go out there and win the election.
Question 4 (Listen
with Real Audio)
CARL: "What a complete, total, absolute sham."
That's former Republican House member Vin Weber giving the GOP take on a service that turned into a political rally. Republicans are so angry about this televised event that they're asking for equal air time to counter the free publicity that it gave to Democrats. What service?
http://www.npr.org/programs/waitwait/archquiz/2002/021102.html
Paul Wolfowitz
"General Shinseki's estimate is wildly off the mark. I am reasonably certain that [the Iraqi people] will greet us as liberators, and that will help us to keep requirements down."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Wolfowitz
R. James Woolsey
THE IRAQ CONNECTION - Blood Bath - http://radiobergen.org/terrorism/iraq.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._James_Woolsey
Robert B. Zoellick
Trade Hypocrisy: The Problem with Robert Zoellick
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/ffd/2002/1220hypocrisy.htm
The Project for the New American Century
Neocon 101
Some basic questions answered.
What do neoconservatives believe?, What are the roots of neoconservative beliefs?, What is the difference between a neoconservative and a conservative?, How have neoconservatives influenced US foreign policy?, What does a neoconservative dream world look like?
http://www.csmonitor.com/specials/neocon/neocon101.html
ARE YOU WITH US OR EVIL NEOCONS ?
Duck Plucker 101
We're Asking All Media To Refraim From Airing or Publishing Any Mention of the U.S. Constitution, As That May Contain Coded Messages To The Public.
Source [Broken Link]: http://www.middleeast.org/cartoons/U.S.-Bill-of-Right-Wing.jpg
MEDIA WAR WITHOUT END
In early May of 1991, two months after the Gulf War ended, the Washington editors for 15 major American news organizations sent a letter of complaint to then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney. They charged that the Pentagon had exerted "virtually total control" over coverage of the war. The letter represented completion of a ritual for American media coverage of U.S. military actions: News outlets routinely engage in self-censorship and sometimes grouse -- especially after the fact -- that the government has imposed too many restrictions on the press. [Complete article located at:]
http://zmag.org/ZMag/Articles/dec01solomon.htm
"For their part, the leaders of the private sector also have responsibilities to be honest and above board in all dealings, and truthful in reporting profits and losses.""Most people who do business in America are indeed trustworthy and honest. … We must not allow the deeds of a few to tarnish our free enterprise system." - Vice President Dick Cheney, July 2003
"If what Halliburton did was legal in terms of their accounting principles, then why didn't they make full disclosure to the American public? Why did they hide it from the public? Where there is smoke, there's fire." - Larry Klayman, July 2003
WHO IS DICK CHENEY?
Cheney and Bush want privacy for their conversations, but not for anyone else's." --Tony Mauro in USA Today, Feb. 27, 2002
Cheney's 2000 income from Halliburton: $36,086,635
Increase in government contracts while Cheney led Halliburton: 91%
Minimum size of "accounting irregularity" that occurred while Cheney was CEO: $100,000,000 (One hundred MILLION dollars)
Number of the seven official US "State Sponsors of Terror" that Halliburton contracted with: 2 out of 7
Pages of Energy Plan documents Cheney refused to give congressional investigators: 13,500
Amount energy companies gave the Bush/Cheney presidential campaign: $1,800,000
http://www.moveon.org/moveonbulletin/bulletin1.html
August 10, 2000
"George is true-blue for God, but he also has a soft spot for Mammon; and an even softer spot for Dick Cheney, who spent much of the last decade scheming with his fellow oil barons to get a pipeline from the virgin fields of the Caspian Sea -- where $4 trillion in profits are waiting for them -- through Afghanistan and Pakistan to the Indian Ocean. Cheney's business interests in oil and arms, temporarily divested while he helps direct American policy in energy and defense, rival those of the Bushes and bin Ladens. Or as the Chicago Tribune noted last year: 'War is big business, and Dick Cheney is right in the middle of it.'" --Chris Floyd, 10/1/01
Shortly after Desert Storm, the Associated Press reported Cheney's desire to broaden the United States' military role in the region to hedge future threats to gulf oil resources. Cheney is CEO of Dallas-based Halliburton Co., the biggest oil-services company in the world. Because of the instability in the Persian Gulf, Cheney and his fellow oilmen have zeroed in on the world's other major source of oil--the Caspian Sea. Its rich oil and gas resources are estimated at $4 trillion by U.S. News and World Report. [article - August 10, 2000 Cheney's Black Gold: Oil Interests May Drive US Foreign Policy]
http://www.bushwatch.com/oil.htm
Cheney had Iraq in sights two years ago
By Simon English in New York (Filed: 22/07/2003)
Documents released under America's Freedom of Information Act reveal that an energy task force led by vice-president Dick Cheney was examining Iraq's oil assets two years before the latest war began.
The papers were obtained after a long battle with the White House by Judicial Watch, a conservative legal charity that opposes government secrecy and which is suing for the dealings of the task force to be made public.
The emergence of the documents could fuel claims that America's war in Iraq had as much to do with oil as national security. It also indicates that the Bush administration is beginning to lose the battle to keep its internal workings secret.
The 16 pages, dated March 2001, show maps of Iraq oil fields, pipelines, refineries and terminals. A document titled Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield Contracts is also included, listing which countries were keen to do business with Saddam's regime.
Judicial Watch requested the papers two years ago as part of its investigation into links between the Bush administration and senior energy executives including Enron's former chairman Ken Lay. Mr Cheney has fought the release of the documents at every stage. A court ordered two weeks ago that at least some of the task forces working papers should be made public *.
Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton said: "People will draw their own conclusions about the documents, but that is what an open society is about. Given the delay in their release, the Bush administration clearly did not want them to come out."
A spokesman for Mr Cheney did not return calls yesterday. The US Commerce Department said in a statement: "It is the responsibility of the Commerce Department to serve as a commercial liaison for US companies doing business around the world, including those that develop and utilise energy resources. The Energy Task Force evaluated regions of the world that are vital to global energy supply."
Judicial Watch isn't claiming that the documents are proof of any particular intent but says they should be open to public scrutiny. Mr Fitton said: "Opponents of the war will point to the documents as evidence that the Bush administration was after Iraqi oil. Supporters will say the energy task force would have been remiss if it did not take Iraq's oil into account."
Nevertheless, the documents represent a surprising development. Until now it had been assumed that the US government was stonewalling over the energy task force papers because they would show the extent to which major party benefactors, including Enron, effectively wrote national energy policy. Judicial Watch and other watchdogs are now curious what else may be revealed.
A court ordered the government to comply with the Freedom of Information Act and give up these documents more than a year ago. Judicial Watch said it could not explain why the papers were suddenly released. A government spokesman declined to elaborate. Maps of oil fields and pipelines in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and a list of energy development projects in those two countries are also included.
Mr Cheney argues that his consultations with the energy industry should be private so that all parties can speak freely. A US court recently described this invoking of executive privilege "extraordinary" and "drastic".
[Ed. Note - Check links at bottom of UK page links (listed above and below here.]
http://money.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2003/07/22/cncheney22.xml
June 23, 1998
Richard B. Cheney - Defending Liberty in a Global Economy
Selected Paragraphs:
Overall, once we complete the merger, we will have about 100,000 employees. Our sales in 1999 should put us among the top 100 companies in America in terms of revenue. We'll be the largest private employer in Texas and operate in over 130 countries all over the globe. About 70 to 75 percent of our business is energy related, serving customers like Unocal, Exxon, Shell, Chevron, and many other major oil companies around the world. As a result, we oftentimes find ourselves operating in some very difficult places. The good Lord didn't see fit to put oil and gas only where there are democratically elected regimes friendly to the United States. Occasionally we have to operate in places where, all things considered, one would not normally choose to go. But, we go where the business is. So, what happens with respect to U.S. commercial policy, how we conduct ourselves as a nation, the kinds of rules and regulations that American firms are expected to abide by and operate under, and how all of that affects our ability to compete overseas is of considerable interest to those of us at Haliburton and Dresser. Obviously, such matters are not only important to our employees, but to our shareholders, and our customers as well.
Another good example of how our sanctions policy oftentimes gets in the way of our other interests occurred in the fall of 1997 when Saddam Hussein was resisting U.N. weapons inspections. I happened to be in the Gulf region during that period of time. Administration officials in the area were trying to get Arab members of the coalition that executed operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm in 1991 to allow U.S. military forces to be based on their territory. They wanted that capability in the event it was necessary to take military action against Iraq in order to get them to honor the UN resolutions. Our friends in the region cited a number of reasons for not complying with our request. They were concerned with the fragile nature of the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians, which was stalled. But they also had fundamental concerns about our policy toward Iran. We had been trying to force the governments in the region to adhere to an anti-Iranian policy, and our views raised questions in their mind about the wisdom of U.S. leadership. They cited it as an example of something they thought was unwise, and that they should not do.
So, what effect does this have on our standing in the region? I take note of the fact that all of the Arab countries we approached, with the single exception of Kuwait, rejected our request to base forces on their soil in the event military action was required against Iraq. As if that weren?t enough, most of them boycotted the economic conference that the United States supported in connection with the peace process that was hosted in Qatar during that period of time. Then, having rejected participation in that conference, they all went to Tehran and attended the Islamic summit hosted by the Iranians. The nation that's isolated in terms of our sanctions policy in that part of the globe is not Iran. It is the United States. And the fact that we have tried to pressure governments in the region to adopt a sanctions policy that they clearly are not interested in pursuing has raised doubts in the minds of many of our friends [Neocons?] about the overall wisdom and judgement of U.S. policy in the area.
Complete text: http://www.flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/cheney23june1998.html
The United States of Oil
No administration has ever been more in bed with the energy industry -- but does that mean Big Oil is calling Bush's shots? First of two parts.
By Damien Cave
Nov. 19, 2001
The Bush administration's ties to oil and gas are as deep as an offshore well. President George W. Bush's family has been running oil companies since 1950. Vice President Dick Cheney spent the late '90s as CEO of Halliburton, the world's largest oil services company. National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice sat on the board of Chevron, which graced a tanker with her name. Commerce Secretary Donald Evans was the CEO of Tom Brown Inc. -- a natural gas company with fields in Texas, Colorado and Wyoming -- for more than a decade.
The links don't end with personnel. The bin Laden family and other members of Saudi Arabia's oil-wealthy elite have contributed mightily to several Bush family ventures, even as the American energy industry helped put Bush in office. Of the top 10 lifetime contributors to George W.'s war chests, six either come from the oil business or have ties to it, according the Center for Public Integrity.
"There's no denying that this is an oil administration," says Peter Eisner, managing director of the nonprofit, nonpartisan watchdog group that conducted the study of Bush's campaign finances. "You can't talk about the career of any George Bush -- father or son -- without talking about oil."
But talking is one thing; determining exactly how the ties to the oil industry affect domestic and foreign policy is another. How much influence does the oil industry have? Is the U.S. bombing Afghanistan in part because -- as antiwar critics have claimed -- the industry wants to clear a path for oil and gas pipelines? Will the Bush administration steadfastly avoid confrontation with Saudi Arabia -- home of 15 of the 19 suspected hijackers -- because it doesn't want to upset ExxonMobil and the other oil companies with a deep Saudi stake? Or, even more intriguingly, could the close ties between Bush and the Saudis lead to increased U.S. pressure on Israel to create a peace settlement?
Or is this too simplistic? Since at least World War II, the oil industry has often been forced by the U.S. government to serve foreign policy objectives, rather than the other way around. Presidents have generally accepted oil's economic significance, its role as the grease that makes capitalism go. But even the most conservative administrations have regularly emphasized geopolitical objectives -- Soviet containment, for example -- at the expense of oil industry interests. Aspects of Bush's energy plan suggest that even this administration will not break the give-and-take pattern.
The problem, however, is that this pattern, the so-called "cheap oil strategy" looks more and more like a failure. Foreign oil dependence has risen over the past decade while now -- with anti-American sentiment growing in the Arab world -- foreign oil supplies are looking increasingly insecure. More than ever, some kind of national policy pushing both conservation and the development of renewable energy resources seems eminently prudent, if not necessary.
And that's where the current makeup of the Bush administration becomes crucial -- not because Bush-Cheney and company plan to invade Iraq to make it safe for ExxonMobil, (although that's not totally beyond the bounds of possibility) but because these are the last men and women in the world to expect radical change from on questions related to energy. Their friends, finances, and world views are all oil-drenched.
George W.'s ties to oil don't prove that the industry decides our every foreign policy move. But they do just about guarantee, for all practical purposes, that nothing significant will change in American energy policy. With Bush-Cheney in power, oil addiction is here to stay.
http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/11/19/bush_oil/index.html
Oil: It's a Bush family affair
The fusion of oil and politics is a Bush family tradition. For generations, the Bushes and their friends have been shuttling back and forth between energy industry boardrooms and Washington's hallowed halls.
Bush's grandfather, Prescott Bush, initiated the pattern. Shortly before winning a Connecticut Senate seat in 1952 he helped his son George raise $350,000 to start what would become Zapata Petroleum.
Sen. Bush also regularly looked out for the oil industry and his son's interests while in Washington. His biggest single favor, according to Herbert Parmet's book "George Bush: The Life of a Lone Star Yankee," came a year into his first Senate term, when he opposed legislation that would have federalized offshore resources -- including oil -- to raise money for education. In the name of states' rights and free enterprise, the bill's defeat helped both the oil companies and gave Zapata just what it needed to expand. In fact, soon after the legislation failed, Zapata moved into offshore drilling -- eventually one of Zapata's most lucrative ventures
George Bush made millions during the '50s and '60s Texas oil boom, and he also made many friends, most notably James Baker, who became Bush's company lawyer in 1963 after Zapata merged with Penn to become Pennzoil.
Bush later brought his friends to Washington, first as a representative in the House, then as head of the Republican National Committee and finally as vice president and president. He didn't stock his administration as full of oilmen and women as his son has, but like Prescott Bush, he didn't mind doing the industry's bidding either. His most public act for oil came in 1981. While serving as Ronald Reagan's vice president, he departed from the White House's official stance and visited Saudi Arabia to plead for an end to sliding prices. Bush argued that he was simply trying to protect American security interests by protecting domestic producers, who have higher costs than their Persian Gulf counterparts. But higher prices had another benefit: by protecting domestic oil jobs, they helped shore up support in Texas for what would eventually become his successful 1988 presidential campaign.
Higher prices also directly helped Bush's son, George W. Bush. George W.'s oil career started in 1978 -- 12 years after his father first entered Congress -- when several of his father's friends invested in his firm, Arbusto ("Bush" in Spanish). Unlike his father, George W. spent much of his oil career in the red. As Joe Conason pointed out in Harper's last year before the election, the company's original investors and others bailed out his firm at least three times. But after a final act of corporate CPR -- a merger with Harken Energy in 1986 -- Bush's connections to power really paid off. Two years after the merger, Abdullah Taha Bakhsh, a former director of Saudi Arabia's income tax department, purchased an 11 percent stake in Harken through his company Traco International. That same year, Harken won a contract for oil-drilling in Bahrain.
"Harken had no international experience at the time," says Eisner at the Center for Public Integrity, which published a detailed account of Bush's rise to power titled "The Buying of the President: 2000." "It was their first out of country contract."
Press reports at the time questioned Bahrain's motivations. Even the normally reserved Wall Street Journal reported in 1991 that the contract "raises the question of ... an effort to cozy up to a presidential son."
The Bush family countered that the contract was well deserved. Regardless, the deal in the Persian Gulf gave Bush a direct tie to the Saudi elite and set Bush on a suddenly successful path.
"It's not just the matter of a single contract," Eisner says. "It also has to do with converting Harken into a player that was then converted into a stake in the Texas Rangers and a run for governor. It's not incidental. The Bahrain deal is central to Bush's life."
Some experts suggest that it's not necessarily a bad thing to have a presidential family so steeped in oil knowledge, given the importance of oil to both national security and the domestic economy. But Bush has shown a pervasive willingness to let oil interests define energy and environmental policy. After accepting millions from the industry during his run for governor, he signed into law tax breaks for state energy producers, and in 1997, he gave them a hand in writing their own rules. Upon hearing that Texas' state environmental agency planned to end an exemption that allowed power plants built before 1971 to avoid complying with state pollution laws, Bush tapped two people to come up with an alternative plan: Vic Beghini, an executive with Marathon Oil Inc. and Ansel Condray, an executive with Mobil.
The plan they came up with initiated a voluntary pollution reduction program that didn't punish companies for noncompliance and thus essentially failed. A study by the Environmental Defense Fund published six months after Bush announced the program revealed that only three of the 26 companies had actually cut their emissions. Two years later, under increasing public pressure, Bush signed a bill forcing power plants to cut their emissions in half by 2003 -- but the essential exemption, as the industry wanted, still stands.
http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/11/19/bush_oil/index1.html
The Condoleezza Rice-Chevron-Central Asia connection
The original ship was repainted and this image is a dramatization of what it looked like.
http://www.aztlan.net/oiltanker.htm
The politicos surrounding Bush also have enjoyed warm government/oil-industry connections. While Bush used his elected position to help friends in his former industry, Cheney employed past government connections to improve his own bottom line.
Iraq provides the most dramatic example. Cheney, intentionally or inadvertently, went against his own edicts in order to pad his company's profits. He told Sam Donaldson in August 2000 that, as the head of Halliburton, "I had a firm policy that I wouldn't do anything in Iraq, even arrangements that were supposedly legal." And yet, as the Financial Times eventually proved, Cheney oversaw $23.8 million in sales to Iraq in 1998 and 1999. Cheney, who collected a $36 million salary before becoming vice president, essentially profited from the destruction of Iraq that he oversaw as secretary of defense during the Gulf War. And while the oil-rig and equipment sales were legal -- a 1998 U.N. resolution gave Iraq the right to rebuild its oil industry -- Cheney's firm sold through European subsidiaries "to avoid straining relations with Washington and jeopardizing their ties with President Saddam Hussein's government," according to a November 2000 Financial Times report.
Cheney also helped Halliburton obtain a windfall of U.S. government loans. He secured $1.5 billion in taxpayer-backed financing for Halliburton -- a massive increase over the $100 million loan it received during the five-year period before Cheney took over. And while Cheney has claimed that Halliburton's rise to power had nothing to do with his political stature, State Department documents obtained by the Los Angeles Times suggest that U.S. officials assisted Halliburton both in Asia and Africa. Even the domestic defense-contracting arm of Halliburton -- Brown & Root -- saw its fortune change drastically once Cheney took over. The company booked $1.2 billion in contracts between 1990 and 1995; with Cheney at the helm, contract awards spiked to $2.3 billion between 1995 and 2000.
Other Bush administration officials have also profited from past government experience and influence. Bush's father and his then Secretary of State James Baker -- the lawyer who fought for Bush during the Florida election fiasco -- work for the Carlyle Group, an investment firm that until recently collected investments from the bin Laden family and other members of the Saudi elite. Reagan's Secretary of State George Schultz sat on the board of Chevron before the arrival of Condoleezza Rice.
Rice joined the Chevron board in 1991, after serving for a year on Bush Sr.'s National Security Council. There, she earned a $35,000 annual retainer, $1,500 for every meeting she attended and stock options worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to SEC documents. She was reportedly hired for expertise in the former Soviet states, and long before U.S. planes started dropping bombs in nearby Afghanistan, she spent much of her time at Chevron working on prospective deals in the Caspian region. Chevron (with Mobil) already produces 70 percent of the oil coming out of the Tengiz oil field in Kazakhstan, according to Ahmed Rashid's book, "Taliban," and the company has been working hard to secure a pipeline that would allow more oil to be produced. In 1993, with Rice on the board, the company pulled together a pipeline project to carry oil to a Russian port on the Black Sea. Russian opposition eventually postponed the plan indefinitely but Chevron still holds a 45 percent stake in the project -- and given the present state of improved Russian-American relations, many suspect that project will eventually get off the ground.
The slowly improving relations between the U.S. and Iran could also help Chevron. When negotiations over pipelines from Tengiz broke down a few years ago, Chevron turned its focus toward the Islamic theocracy, asking the Clinton State Department for a "swapping" license. Approval would have allowed oil from Tengiz to be shipped across the Caspian to Iran while, in exchange, Chevron would be able to sell an equal amount of Iranian oil that would be shipped from the Persian Gulf. The proposal was never approved, but given Rice's ties, many have suspected that Chevron will soon play a larger role in American foreign policy, whether in Iran or the Caspian.
Critics of the Bush administration point out that a stabilized Caspian region could benefit Rice's friends at Chevron, and if she returns to the board, Rice herself. They also argue that maintaining dependence on Saudi oil could benefit Cheney's old firm and Bush's father, and ultimately, the president himself when an inheritance comes his way.
But there is no clear evidence, right now, of oil company desires affecting current U.S. foreign policy. If anything, the terrorist attacks have reduced the energy industry's influence. Before Sept. 11 Saudi Arabia was reportedly pushing the U.S. to pressure Israel into Palestine peace concessions and, according to a Newsweek story, Bush was beginning to comply. But after Sept. 11, the chance that the U.S. would accede to Saudi requests evaporated, given the numerous Saudi connections to the attacks.
In that sense, the trajectory of oil influence over foreign policy has continued upon its historical path. A review of the evidence suggests that over time, the oil industry has progressively lost power. But that still doesn't mean that the current administration is likely to do anything radical to alter U.S. dependence on foreign oil -- barring the unlikely event of Bush pulling a Nixon-visit-to-China shock, and using his oil ties to force a real commitment to renewable energy and conservation.
Tuesday: George Bush may not be a puppet, but he's no groundbreaker either.
http://archive.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/11/19/bush_oil/index2.html
Source: http://groups.google.com/group/misc.activism.progressive/
Investigate Cheney's Secret Energy Deals
Cheney Dismisses Critic With Obscenity
Clash With Leahy About Halliburton
By Helen Dewar and Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, June 25, 2004; Page A04
"Go Fuck Yourself"
Dick Cheney
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3699-2004Jun24.html
[Language Police: Do not downgrade this page. Those were Vice pResident's Cheney's words.]
"As I was telling my husb—"
BEN-VENISTE: Isn't it a fact, Dr. Rice, that the August 6 PDB warned against possible attacks in this country? And I ask you whether you recall the title of that PDB?
RICE: I believe the title was,
"Bin Laden Determined to
Attack
Inside the United States."
Condoleezza
Rice's 9/11 Historical Statements
by Balzac
I would move heaven and earth to
protect my
husb..errr.. President
Bush!
Condoleezza Rice
A pressing issue of dinner-party etiquette is vexing Washington, according to a story now making the D.C. rounds: How should you react when your guest, in this case national-security adviser Condoleezza Rice, makes a poignant faux pas? At a recent dinner party hosted by New York Times D.C. bureau chief Philip Taubman and his wife, Times reporter Felicity Barringer, and attended by Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Maureen Dowd, Steven Weisman, and Elisabeth Bumiller, Rice was reportedly overheard saying, “As I was telling my husb—” and then stopping herself abruptly, before saying, “As I was telling President Bush.”
http://nymetro.com/nymetro/news/people/columns/intelligencer/n_10245/
[If one were to consider this was a Freudian Slip, would it indicate that hot burning desire driven by blind devotion could hinder Condoleezza's judgement when it comes to protecting U.S. and our "sitting duck" military in an ILLEGAL IRAQ WAR?
We think NOT, because THEY had intelligence suggesting bin Laden wanted to attack U.S., did NOTHING about it (except use it as an excuse to start an illegal war with Iraq), and why this piece on Rice is short.]
THE LAVON AFFAIR
IS HISTORY REPEATING ITSELF?
In 1954, Israeli agents working in Egypt planted bombs in several buildings, including a United States diplomatic facility, and left evidence behind implicating Arabs as the culprits. The ruse would have worked, had not one of the bombs detonated prematurely, allowing the Egyptians to capture and identify one of the bombers, which in turn led to the round up of an Israeli spy ring.
Some of the spies were from Israel, while others were recruited from the local Jewish population. Israel responded to the scandal with claims in the media that there was no spy ring, that it was all a hoax perpetrated by "anti-Semites". But as the public trial progressed, it was evident that Israel had indeed been behind the bombing. Eventually, Israeli's Defense Minister Pinhas Lavon was brought down by the scandal, although it appears that he was himself the victim of a frame-up by the real authors of the bombing project, code named "Operation Susannah."
It is therefore a fact that Israel has a prior history of setting off bombs with the intent to blame Arabs for them.
This is not the only example of a "False Flag" operation designed to trick the United States into attacking Israel's enemies. According to Victor Ostrovsky, a Mossad defector now living in Canada, Ronald Reagan was tricked into bombing Libya by means of a radio transmitter smuggled into Tripoli by the Mossad, which broadcast messages designed to fool the United States into thinking Libya was about to launch a massive terror attack on the west. On the basis of this fake evidence, the US bombed Libya, killing Khadaffi's daughter.
The Jews of Iraq is a story by a Jewish writer revealing yet another false flag operation where Israelis used bombs and planted the blame on Arabs
More recently, Captain Ward Boston, who served as senior legal counsel for the Navy's Court of Inquiry into the Israeli attack on USS Liberty, has come forward to report that the Court of Inquiry was ORDERED to conclude that the attack was an accident by President Lyndon Johnson. In hindsight, given the use of unmarked aircraft and boats by Israel during the actual attack, it appears that Israel intended to sink the US ship and frame Egypt for the attack, tricking the US into the war against Egypt.
So, with this established history, it is now time to re-examine some facts about the World Trade Towers:
1. There is no proof at all of who was actually on the hijacked airplanes last 9/11. Even the head of the FBI admits that the only hard evidence are the names used by the hijackers on faked IDs. At least 7 of the men whose names were on those IDs have since turned up alive. Another had died back in 1999. None of the names of the alleged hijackers were on the passenger lists of the four aircraft. We do not know who was on those planes, only that we are supposed to think they were Arab Muslims.
2. The night before the attacks on the World Trade Towers, men using those stolen identities visited bars and strip clubs, making sure they would be noticed and remembered by all they met. Students of Islam will confirm that no Muslim devout enough to be willing to commit suicide would spend the night before he was to meet Allah violating so many of Islam's laws regarding alcohol and nude women. This suggests the planting of a false trail ahead of time, doubly so because we know the identities were stolen. Coupled with the deception of the faked Osama "confession" video tape , it is beyond question that deception and fraud exists in the World Trade Towers case.
3. Contrary to early reports (including a statement by George Bush) of large numbers of Israelis being killed in the 9-11 attacks, only two Israelis died, both passengers on the airplanes. No Israelis working in or near the World Trade Towers died. The foreign press has long rumored that Israelis were given an advance warning not to go to work on 9-11, and in the case of Odigo, an Israeli company with offices located near the World Trade Towers, the existence of a warning message sent before the four aircraft had even left the ground is an established fact. That someone in Israel knew of the attacks ahead of time is beyond question.
4. There is an Israeli spy ring. As in the Lavon Affair, Israeli assets have been trying to dismiss the spy ring story (apparently with the FBI's help) while accusing those who refuse to be silent of "anti-Semitism". The lesson from the Lavon case is that Israel's strident denials and smear campaigns are a sure sign that something is indeed being covered up, even as the "art students" continue to be deported. And, as a US Official stated in Carl Cameron's suppressed story on the Israeli Spy/Bugging Ring, evidence does exist that links the arrested Israeli spies with 9-11, but that this evidence has been classified by the United States Government, probably to keep from looking like total idiots at having been so easily fooled for the Nth time.
The United States has been deceived before by Israeli covert operations with the intention of harming American relations with the Arab nations. Israel has never hesitated to kill Americans (USS Liberty) or allow Americans to be killed (The bombing in Beirut that killed 241 American Marines) when it serves a purpose. And, the fact remains that Israel has exploited 9-11 from the instant when Ehud Barak appeared on the BBC moments after the attacks on the World Trade Towers (holding a prepared speech) to the aggression against the Palestinian people which has escalated non-stop ever since 9-11.
Who is responsible for the World Trade Towers attacks? We truly do not know. What we do know beyond all doubt is that someone went to a great deal of effort to provide an easy and at times all-too-obvious a target to blame. Our nation was fooled by that stunt before. The result was that our money and the blood of our children was spent to attack someone else's enemies.
There is an old saying that goes, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on ME!"
There is another saying, "We won't get fooled again!"
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/lavon.html
11 Questions Avoided by Corporate Media On NORAD Tapes
1. *Who was responsible for scheduling multiple war games and terror exercises involving aircraft for Sept. 11th
2. Who moved "Global Guardian" normally scheduled for October to September?
3. Who designed the war games to involve 'hijackings'?
4. Who planned and scheduled the movement of Airforce aircraft north to Canada, Alaska and Greenland?
5. Who planned the terror exercise at the NRO (National Reconnaissance Office) involving an evacuation in response to threat from the air?
6. Who was "hands-on" responsible for coordinating all the war games the morning of September 11th?
7. Who would have been responsible for turning off the war games to enable a timely real world response to the attacks?
8. How were as many as 21 false radar blips or possible targets (per Jane Garvey) inserted into FAA radar screens?
9. Who was responsible for the identification of ghost flight 11 which allegedly continued to fly south past Manhattan and which may have caused NORAD's Langley intercept jets to vector North toward NYC rather than D.C.? * [NOTE: John Farmer of the 9/11 Commission said to me personally that the 9/11 Commission was never able to identify the individual for this information--to resolve this anomaly.]*
10. Why was there no reference to the pattern of 9/11 Commission cover-up including that of Able Danger as revealed by Capt. Scott Philpott?
11. *The bottom line question that corporate media refuse to answer and which the 9/11 Commission ignored is who, specifically, would have been responsible for creating the circumstances that led to the confusion or fog the morning of 9/11 and who should have immediately ceased any and all war gaming activity and deceptive radar data?
To begin to answer these questions journalists intent on getting answers to questions long asked by the families and others should visit:
*Center for Cooperative Research: Essay -- "U.S. Military Exercises up to 9/11"*
Continue Reading at Source: http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0608/S00053.htm
THE TRUTH ABOUT SEPT 11
The following links are collected by an earth citizen, Gerard Holmgren, who wants the truth to come out on september 11 events. He doesn't have a web site and posts his link on forums, to mailing lists. I saved his message in html and give it here.
http://perso.orange.fr/jpdesm/pentagon/investigation77.htm
Section 1: Airforce stand-down
1:1 It has become popular mythology in the media that fighter jets were scrambled to intercept the hijacked planes. This is completely untrue as the following research shows. Guilty For 9-11: Bush, Rumsfeld, Myers, by Illarion Bykov and Jared Israel, 14 Nov 2001
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-1.htm
1:2 Mr. Cheney's Cover Story -- Section 2 of Guilty For 9-11, 20 Nov 2001
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-2.htm
1:3 9-ll: Nothing Urgent, by George Szamuely, Research & documentation by Illarion Bykov and Jared Israel, Jan 2002
http://emperor.vwh.net/indict/urgent.htm
1:4 Planes "did scramble " on 9/11, they just "arrived late"
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/indict/faq.htm
1:5 Scrambled Messages, by George Szamuely, 12 Dec 2001
http://www.nypress.com/14/50/taki/bunker.cfm
1:6 Air National Guard Mission and Vision statements
[NON WORKING LINK] http://nerdcities.com/guardian/SeptemberEleventh/
ang-mission.htm
http://911research.wtc7.net/mirrors/guardian/SeptemberEleventh/
ang-mission.htm
1:7 Russian Air Force chief says official 9/11 story impossible
http://emperors-clothes.com/news/airf.htm
Scrambling of fighter jets to intercept stray aircraft is a routine procedure. Here's an example of how routine it is.
1.13 Jet Sent to probe Fla. Gov. Plane. Netscape news. May 15 2003.
[NON WORKING LINK] http://channels.netscape.com/ns/news/
story.jsp?floc=NW_2-T&oldflok= FF-APO-1110&idq=/ff/story/0001/
20030515/001648315.htm&sc=1110&floc=NW_2-T
http://newsmine.org/archive/9-11/norad-faa-response/
jeb-bush-plane-intercepted.txt
The procedures were already in place before Sept 11 2001. It happened 67 times in the 10 months between September 2000 and June 2001.
1.8 Use of military jets jumps since 9/11. Associated Press Aug 13 2002.
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/completetimeline/2002/ap081302.html
1.9 CBS News. Scrambling to prevent another 9/11 Aug 14 2002
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/08/14/attack/main518632.shtml
1.10 Preventing another 9/11 Military.com
http://www.military.com/NewsContent/1,13319,FL_jet_081502,00.html
1.11 ABC News Jets on high Alert. Aug 13 2002.
[NON WORKING LINK] http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/
DailyNews/homefront020813.html
http://www.public-action.com/911/suit/nrdsrmbl-ap-8-13-02/index.html
1.12 Military now notified immediately of unusual air traffic events. Fox news Aug 12 2002
[NON WORKING LINK] http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,60245,00.html#top
http://newsmine.org/archive/9-11/norad-faa-response/norad-not-notified.txt
So on Sept 11, 2001 - Why were no fighter jets scrambled, and why has a cover up story been concocted?
In the unlikely event that the airforce failed through incompetence, ( not once but 4 times! ) where is the major inquiry?
I have seen bigger inquiries into car crashes at race tracks.
Section 2: Complicit behaviour of G.W.Bush
It has become common mythology in the media that George W. Bush was at Booker Elementary School when he learned of the first WTC crash. This is a lie. Why is Bush lying about where he was, and what he knew?
2:1 Guilty for 9-11 Section 3: Bush in the open by Illarion Bykov and Jared Israel.
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/indict/indict-3.htm
This is not the only lie Bush has told about his movements that morning. See how many times he has changed his story.
2:2 Sept 11 attacks- evidence of US collusion by Steve Grey.
[NON WORKING LINK] http://austin.indymedia.org/front.php3?
article_id=2342&group=webcast
(Read the section called "A tangle of lies")
http://mumbai.indymedia.org/en/2002/01/543.shtml
2.3 Bush gets tangled in his lies Part 1. A strange press conference. By Jared israel and Francisco Gil-White Sept 25 2002.
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/calif1.htm
2:4 Bush Gets Tangled in his 9-11 Lies, Part 2: White House Cover-up Creates More Problems than it Solves by Jared Israel and Francisco Gil-White [7 October 2002]
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/calif2.htm
2:5 The President as Incompetent Liar: Bush's Claim that he Saw TV Footage of 1st Plane Hitting WTC. Comments by Jared Israel [Posted 12 September 2002]
http://emperors-clothes.com/indict/liar.htm
Clinton was impeached for lying about an affair.Bush is lying about where he was, what he was doing and what he knew, during the crucial period between 8.45 and 9 AM on Sept 11.
----
Why did the President - after being told "America is under attack" continue to listen to school children reading for another 25 minutes ? Why was he cheering, smiling and joking even as it was known that at least one more hijacked plane was on the loose ? View the TV footage which proves treason at the top level.
2:6 http://www.emperors-clothes.com/indict/vid.htm
----
Section 3: The Fictitious Hijackers
If 19 Arabs hijacked the planes, why are there no Arabic names on any of the passenger lists? If they used non-Arabic aliases, which of the "innocents " on the lists are alleged to be the hijackers?
3:1 Passenger and crew list for AA 11 (first WTC crash.)
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/trade.center/victims/AA11.victims.html
3:2 AA 77 (Pentagon crash)
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/trade.center/victims/AA77.victims.html
3:3 UAL 175 (2nd WTC crash)
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/trade.center/victims/ua175.victims.html
3:4 UAL 93 (Pennsylvania crash)
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/trade.center/victims/ua93.victims.html
If they are alleged to have been using non-Arabic aliases (19 obviously Arabic men got on board using non-Arabic ID, with 100% success rate ?), why did the FBI claim that they were traced through the use of credit cards to buy tickets in their own names?
If 9 of the alleged hijackers were searched before boarding, as claimed in this article
3:5 http://www.policetalk.com/9_hijackers.html
why is there no airport security footage of them? How did they (allegedly) get on board with knives, guns, AND electronic guidance systems, while being searched, but avoiding security cameras and not being on the passenger lists?
What aliases were they alleged to be using when they were searched,and if they were not using aliases, why are they not on the passenger lists?
What of reports that some of the alleged hijackers are still alive, and had nothing to do with the attacks ?
3:6 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/1559151.stm
3:7 http://www.rense.com/general20/alives.htm
3:8 http://www.muslimedia.com/archives/world01/afgwar-die.htm
3:9 [NON WORKING LINK] http://www.americanfreepress.net/10_12_01/
STILL_ALIVE__FBI_Mixed_Up_on_T/still_alive__fbi_mixed_up_on_t.html
http://www.apfn.net/messageboard/10-21-01/discussion.cgi.57.html
3:10 [NON WORKING LINK] http://www.corpust.com/CorpusTArchiveFBI70f19Alive.cfm
http://www.caller2.com/2001/september/13/today/national/11307.html
3.12 http://www.welfarestate.com/911/
3.13 http://truedemocracy.net/td4/24s-c-6men.html
3.14 http://www.abqtrib.com/archives/news01/092001_news_trail.shtml
3.15 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/
2001/09/23/widen23.xml
3.16 [NON WORKING LINK] http://www.worldmessenger.20m.com/alive.html
http://911research.wtc7.net/cache/planes/evidence/worldmessenger_alive.html
3.17 [NON WORKING LINK] http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/NEWSTF/stfch11.htm
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/hijackers.html
3.18 http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/
chi-0109190363sep19.story?coll=chi-news-hed
According to this article
3:11 [NON WORKING LINK] http://216.239.33.100/search?
q=cache:uEUylyDIXdYC:www.dallasnews.com/ sharedcontent/dallas/
nation/9-11/stories/121202dnint911gas.928b2377.html+FBI+Agent
+Sept.+11+Hijackers+Probably+Used+Gas&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
http://newsmine.org/archive/9-11/911-gas-theory.txt
The FBI now claims that the hijackers used gas to subdue the passengers and crew. If they used gas they would have been affected themselves - unless they had masks. The story gets better all the time. They somehow got on board with masks, gas, guns, knives and electronic guidance systems, in spite of being searched, didn't show up on the airport security cameras, and were not on the passenger lists. They left flight manuals in Arabic in rented cars outside the airport (last minute brushing up on the way there, about how to fly the things!) and then crashed the planes in breath taking displays of skilled piloting. Just to make sure we knew who they were, their passports were conveniently found in spite of fiery crashes which incinerated the planes and occupants. So they got on board with false IDs but used their real passports ?
If the mythical Arab hijackers really were on the planes and airport security systems failed due to incompetence (not once but 19 times!), where is the major inquiry? I have seen bigger inquiries into racehorse doping scandals.
Section 4: More oddities
Why the official story concerning the hijacking of AA11 (first WTC crash) cannot possibly be true.
4:1 9/11 Redux: (The Observer1s Cut) American Airlines Flight 11, Re-examined By David L. Graham
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/redux.html
Was an urban rescue team sent to New York the night before the attacks?
4:2 http://www.halturnershow.com/FEMA.htm
4:3 http://www.tpromo.com/gk/jun02/062602.htm
4.4 Former top German Cabinet Minister rejects official story of 9 11 attacks. Interview with Andreas von Buelow. Tagesspiegel Jan 13 2002.
http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/VonBuelow.html
National Security Advisor Rice and White House spokesman Fleischer lied in saying that nobody had ever conceived of planes being used in this manner, their statements in this article,
Bush Was Warned of Hijackings Before 9/11; Lawmakers Want Public Inquiry ABC News May 16 2002
4:5 http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/warningmemo020516.html
when the 1994 extract from Time magazine, quoted in article 2:1 demonstrates that the potential problem had been recognized for decades. And there are other examples of this possibility having been widely recognized prior to Sept 11.
4:6 "Omens of terror." by David Wise Oct 7 2001
http://www.hermes-press.com/omens.htm
In article 4:5 Rice also lied in saying that any threat had been overwhelmingly perceived as being overseas. The statement she made is in this press briefing. 4:7 Press Briefing by National Security Advisor Dr. Condoleezza Rice. The James S. Brady Briefing Room May 16 2002 . 4.10PM EDT
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/05/20020516-13.html
But this is the truth about the memo to which she refers. 4:8 August memo focused on attacks in the U.S. by Bob Wooward and Dan Eggen. Washington Post staff writers. May 18 2002. page A01.
What did happen to Flight 93? by Richard Wallace. The Daily Mirror Sept 13, 2002
4:9 http://www.unansweredquestions.net/timeline/2002/mirror091302.html
4:10 http://www.thepowerhour.com/postings-three/flight-93-shot-down.htm
4.11 http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/page.cfm
?objectid=12192317&method= full&siteid=50143
Are cell phone calls from planes, of the type allegedly made by passengers on Sept 11 possible?
4:12 http://feralnews.com/issues/911/dewdney/
project_achilles_report_1_030123.html
4.13 http://feralnews.com/issues/911/dewdney/
project_achilles_report_2_030225.html
Section 5: Where is the evidence against Bin laden?
Why is it that the US government doesn't feel confident enough of it's case against Bin laden to lay any formal charges, but keeps " finding" convenient video " confession" tapes ? Probably because new video technology makes it impossible to distinguish between a real video confession and a fake. When seeing and hearing isn't believing. by William M. Arkin. Washington Post Feb 1 1999
5:1 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/dotmil/arkin020199.htm
Last word in High Tech trickery. by David Higgins Sydney Morning Herald. may 16 2002
5:2 http://smh.com.au/articles/2002/05/16/1021415016681.html
For more detailed evidence of a preplanned agenda to fabricate evidence against Bin Laden, Sept 11 attacks- evidence of US collusion by Steve Grey.
2:2 http://austin.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=2342&group=webcast
(Read the section called "Evidence please !")
It has become a common myth that Bin Laden has admitted to the attacks. This simply isn't true.Bin laden denies terror attacks and points finger at Jews. Annanova news.
5:3 http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_410936.html?
menu=news.latestheadlines
Bin laden denies attacks as Taliban talks holy war. ABC news online Sept 17 2001.
5:4 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2001/09/item20010917010639_1.htm
Bin Laden denies being behind attacks. JS ONline Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Sept 16 2001
5:5 http://www.jsonline.com/news/nat/sep01/binladen-denial.asp
Osama Bin Laden claims terrorist attacks in USA were committed by some American terrorist group. Pravda Sept 12 2001
5:6 http://english.pravda.ru/accidents/2001/09/12/14910.html
Bin laden Denies US attack says paper. Middle East News
5:7 http://www.metimes.com/2K1/issue2001-37/reg/bin_laden_denies.htm
Bin laden says he wasn't behind attacks CNN Sept 17 2001
5:8 http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/09/16/inv.binladen.denial/index.html
Bin Laden denies role in attacks. newsday.com Sept 17 2001
5:9 http://www.newsday.com/ny-wobin172369727sep17,0,7370581.story
Taliban says Bin Laden denied role in attacks. Yahoo news Sept 13 2001.
5:10 http://www.welfarestate.com/binladen/denies-reuters-taliban.htm
Section 6: Insider trading reveals high level foreknowledge
In the first few hours after the attacks, it was reported that investigators were already looking into huge volumes of insider trading on airline stocks in the weeks leading up to the attacks. Why has this story since completely disappeared? Do authorities seriously expect us to believe that more than a year later, they still do not know who was responsible? Should not alarm bells have been ringing BEFORE the attacks with these record volumes of trading? If the executive director of the CIA had previously managed the firm which handled much of the trade, are we seriously expected to believe that he doesn't know who was responsible?
Suppressed Details of Criminal Insider Trading Lead Directly Into The CIA's Highest Ranks -- CIA Executive Director `Buzzy' Krongard Managed Firm That Handled `Put' Options on UAL, by Michael C. Ruppert, 9 Oct 2001
6:1 http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/10_09_01_krongard.html
Mystery of terror `insider dealers', by Chris Blackhurst, 14 Oct 2001
6:2 http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=99402
Profits of Death -- Insider Trading and 9-11, by Tom Flocco - Edited by Michael C. Ruppert, 6 Dec 2001
6:3 http://globalresearch.ca/articles/FLO112B.html
Where is the major inquiry? I have seen bigger inquiries into local government contract scandals.
Section 7: The pentagon frame up and the WTC plane switch
It is alleged that American Airlines 77 (a hijacked Boeing 757) crashed into the Pentagon. A Boeing 757 is a very large aircraft with a wingspan of 125 ft and a length of 155 ft. So how did it make an initial hole 12 ft wide, collapsing only about a 35 ft depth of the outer ring of the building - and not leave any wreckage outside ?
This photo of the damage to the Pentagon wall
7:1 http://66.129.143.7/june2aa.htm
proves that whatever crashed into the pentagon was NOT AA 77, which demonstrates the Pentagon attack to have been a self-inflicted frame up.
For a quick overview of the impossibility of the official story
7:2 http://www.asile.org/citoyens/numero13/pentagone/erreurs_en.htm
For a full physical analysis of the crash scene Physical and mathematical analysis of Pentagon crash. by Gerard Holmgren Oct 2002
7:3 http://alberta.indymedia.org/news/2002/10/4578.php
Why was there a concerted effort to fabricate eyewitness evidence for the official story regarding AA 77? Did AA 77 hit the Pentagon? Eyewitness accounts examined. by Gerard Holmgren June 2002
7:4 http://hamilton.indymedia.org:8081/front.php3?article_id=1786&group
=webcast
7:5 The Pentagon crash hoax
http://nerdcities.com/guardian/SeptemberEleventh/WhatHitThePentagon/
What hit WTC towers? Were they the planes we've been told ? ( AA 11 and UAL 175)
Section 8: If the Attack on Afghanistan was a retaliation for Sept 11, why had it already been planned months before ?
BBC News report by George Arney.
8:1 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/
newsid_1550000/1550366.stm
U.S. Planned for attack on Al -Qaida. White house given strategy two days before Sept 11. NBC news. May 16 2002
US planned to hit bin Laden ahead of September 11. By David Rennie in Washington
8:3 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/08/05/
walq05.xml
US Tells of covert Afghan plans before 9/11 By Bob Drogin LA Times May 18 2002
8.5 http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-051802strike.story
Why were we originally told that the attack on Afghanistan was not planned prior to Sept 11, and was purely a retaliation to a " surprise" attack, and the story then changed after proof of the preplanned attack came to light ?
Section 9: U.S. and Bin Laden co-operate behind the scenes.
The new story is that they allegedly feared Bin Laden so much that they wanted to get him first. So why didn't they arrest him when they had the chance in July 2001? The CIA met Bin Laden while undergoing treatment at an American Hospital last July in Dubai, by Alexandra Richard, Translated courtesy of Tiphaine Dickson, Le Figaro, 11 Oct 2001
9:1 http://globalresearch.ca/articles/RIC111B.html
9:2 http://guardian.co.uk/waronterror/story/0,1361,584444,00.html
9:3 http://emperors-clothes.com/misc/lefigaro.htm
Bin Laden met with the CIA in July and walked away by Michael C. Ruppert
9:4 http://www.rense.com/general16/bin.htm
And why was the Bush family still in business with the Bin Laden Family, even AFTER Sept 11?
Osama bin Laden's Bush family Business Connections, Alliance With Pakistan Will Stimulate Drug Trade, Bring Revenues Under U.S. Control --Colombian Opium Production Will Soar; The Taliban's Biggest Economic Attack on the U.S. Came in February With The Destruction of Its Opium Crop by Michael C. Ruppert, 18 Sept 2001
9:5 http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/09_18_01_bushbin.html
Carlyle profit from Afghan war, by David Lazarus, 2 Dec 2001
9:6 http://globalresearch.ca/articles/LAZ112A.html
Elder Bush in Big G.O.P. Cast Toiling for Top Equity Firm, by Leslie Wayne, 5 Mar 2001
9:7 http://www.truthout.com/0662.Bush.Saudi.htm
The George W. Bush Money Tree
9:8 http://www.bushnews.com/bushmoney.htm
Bush Family's dirty little secret: President's oil companies funded by Bin Laden family and wealthy Saudis who financed Osama bin Laden, by Rick Wiles, Sept 2001
9:9 http://www.americanfreedomnews.com/afn_articles/bushsecrets.htm
Arms Build-up Enriches Carlyle Group, Bush Sr. is Consultant, by Mark Fineman, 10 Jan 2002
9:10 http://www.truthout.com/01.11F.Arms.Carlyle.htm
Gaping holes in the CIA V Bin Laden Story by Jared Israel
9:11 http://emperors-clothes.com/news/probestop-i.htm
BushLaden by Jared Israel
9:12 http://emperors-clothes.com/news/bushladen.htm
Addition to the above article
9:13 http://emperors-clothes.com/news/bushladen2-i.htm
Judicial Watch: Bush/Bin Laden connection "has now turned into a scandal" Statement from Judicial watch with comments by Jared Israel
9:14 http://emperors-clothes.com/news/jw.htm
9:15 Bin laden. Terrorist monster: Take two ! by Jared Israel. Oct 9 2001
http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/jared/taketwo-a.htm
9:16 New Chairman of 9/11 Commission had business ties with Osama's Brother in Law by Michel Chossudovsky 27 December 2002
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO212A.html
And why did the US turn down an offer to extradite Bin Laden in 1996, AFTER naming him as wanted for the 1993 WTC bombing?
Section 10: The suspicious collapse of the World trade centre Towers.
How did the WTC collapse? Why no serious inquiry? Why was the debris rushed away for recycling before any examination could be held?
10:1 Muslims suspend laws of physics by J. McMichael Nov 25 2001
http://www.public-action.com/911/jmcm/physics_1.html
10:2 Muslims suspend laws of Physics. part 2 by J.McMichael
http://serendipity.li/wot/mslp_ii.htm
"Burning Questions...Need Answers": Fire Engineering's Bill Manning Calls for Comprehensive Investigation of WTC Collapse, 4 Jan 2002
10:3 http://zgrams.zundelsite.org/pipermail/zgrams/2002-January/000200.html
10:4 http://www.fivedoves.com/letters/jan2002/markr19-12.htm
10:5 http://www.nyenvirolaw.org/PDF/
FireEngineering-1-4-02-BurningQuestionsNeedAnswers.pdf
10:6 A firefighter says "we think there were bombs set in the building"
http://people.aol.com/people/special/0,11859,174592-3,00.html
10:7 In Curious Battle: An expert recants on Why the WTC collapsed by John Flaherty and Jared Israel
http://emperors-clothes.com/news/albu.htm
10:8 Documentary footage from the scene of the WTC attacks, and eyewitness accounts from firefighters at the scene reveal serious flaws in the official accounts.
http://www.thepowerhour.com/postings/911-oddities-revealed.htm
For a series of engineering articles and informative videos on the WTC collapse, see
10:9 http://home.attbi.com/~jmking/Collapse_update.htm
10:10 Evidence of explosives in South WTC Tower collapse
http://la.indymedia.org/news/2002/12/23816.php
10:11 The World Trade Centre demolition
http://www.nerdcities.com/guardian/WTC/wtc-demolition.htm
10:12 Chapter 1 of the FEMA WTC collapse report (with comment)
http://www.nerdcities.com/guardian/WTC/WTC_ch1.htm
10:13 Chapter 2 (with comment)
http://www.nerdcities.com/guardian/WTC/WTC_ch2.htm
10.14 The jet fuel. How hot did it heat the World trade Center?
http://www.uscrusade.com/forum/config.pl/read/1064
10.15 Proof of controlled demolition at the WTC by Jerry Russell, Ph.D.
http://www.attackonamerica.net/proofofcontrolleddemolitionatwtc.htm
10.16 Where's the inferno?
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/wtc_fire.htm
Steel melts at 1539 degrees. Jet fuel (kerosene) burns at 800 degrees. Are we seriously expected to believe that burning kerosene towards the top of the building (heat travels upwards) somehow caused both towers to neatly implode in a manner identical to that of a controlled demolition ? Where is the inquiry? I have seen bigger inquiries into suburban housefires. Why is discussion of the possibility of a controlled implosion completely taboo? Why do authorities keep inventing ridiculous stories about burning jet fuel melting steel?
Section 11: Hands off Bin Laden !
Why were the FBI told to not investigate the Bin Laden family links in the US?
Has someone been sitting on the FBI? Transcript of a BBC Newsnight Report on "the questionable links of the bin Laden Family," 6 Nov 2001
11:1 http://globalresearch.ca/articles/BBC111A.html
11:2 http://emperors-clothes.com/news/probetrans.htm
(added comments by Jared Israel)
Bush thwarted FBI probe against bin Ladens, Hindustan Times, 7 Nov 2001
11:3 http://globalresearch.ca/articles/HIN111A.html
US efforts to make peace summed up by `oil', by Lara Marlowe, 19 Nov 2001
11:4 http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/MAR111A.html
11:5 http://www.fisiusa.org/fisi_News_items/news369.htm
Called Off the Trail? FBI Agents Probing Terror Links Say They Were Told, "Let Sleeping Dogs Lie" By Brian Ross and Vic Walker. ABC News Dec 19 2002
11:6 http://abcnews.go.com/sections/primetime/DailyNews/
FBI_whistleblowers021219.html
After capturing one of the six most wanted Taliban leaders, the US then let him go. "By mistake " of course, because of "flawed intelligence."
11:7 Taliban general 'freed by mistake' Sunday Times Dec 19 2002
http://www.sundaytimes.news.com.au/common/story_page/
0,7034,5704967%255E15574,00.html
11:8 US accidentally set wanted Taliban Leader free. Clari news dec 18 2002.
http://quickstart.clari.net/qs_se/webnews/wed/bn/
Qus-attacks-taliban.RVGa_CDI.html
11:9 FBI agent Robert Wright says FBI assigned to intelligence operations continue to protect terrorists from criminal investigations and prosecutions. Judicial Watch Sept 11, 2002.
http://www.judicialwatch.org/2469.shtml
Section 12: Its really not so surprising.
In 1962, the joint chiefs of staff approved a CIA plan to commit terrorist acts against the US and frame Cuba.
Friendly Fire -- Book: U.S. Military Drafted Plans to Terrorize U.S. Cities to Provoke War With Cuba, by David Ruppe, 1 May 2001
12:1 http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/jointchiefs_010501.html
Pentagon Proposed Pretexts for Cuba Invasion in 1962, The National Security Archive, 30 Apr 2001
12:2 http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/20010430/
Northwoods - a plan for terror to justify war.Comments by Jared Israel.
12:3 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-int.htm
Scanned images of the actual document.
12.4 Page i http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-i.htm
12.5 Page ii http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-ii.htm
12:6 Page iii http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-iii.htm
12.7 Page 1 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-1.htm
12.8 Page 2 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-2.htm
12.9 Page 3 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-3.htm
12.10 Page 4 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-4.htm
12.11 Page 5 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-5.htm
12.12 Page 6 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-6.htm
12.13 Page 7 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-7.htm
12.14 Page 8 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-8.htm
12.15 Page 9 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-9.htm
12:16 Page 10 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-10.htm
12.17 Page 11 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-11.htm
12.18 Page 12 http://emperors-clothes.com/images/north-12.htm
US military schemes- ominously like 9/11.
12:19 http://emperors-clothes.com/misc/bamford.htm
If such tactics were considered normal and acceptable practice by the Government in 1962, what evidence is there that things have changed?
Henry Kissinger advocated a similar strategy in 1992
12:20 http://www.spotlight.org/Newsbureau/Prisoner/Media/media.html
as Did Zbigniew Brzezinski in 1997. A War in the Planning for Four Years. HOW STUPID DO THEY THINK WE ARE? Zbigniew Brzezinski and the CFR Put War Plans In a 1997 Book - It Is "A Blueprint for World Dictatorship," Says a Former German Defense and NATO Official Who Warned of Global Domination in 1984, in an Exclusive Interview With FTW by Michael C. Ruppert
12:21 http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/zbig.html
Section 13: Who created and funded the Al Qaeda Network?
A Vital Piece of the Puzzle: Dollars for Terror -- The United States and Islam, by Carol Brouillet.
13:1 http://www.communitycurrency.org/vital.html
Bin Laden in the Balkans - Collection of mainstream media articles. Compiled by Jared Israel
13:2 http://emperors-clothes.com/news/binl.htm
The Creation called Osama by Shamsul Islam
13:3 http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/creat.htm
"Articles documenting US creation of Taliban and Bin Laden's terrorist network" Series of links to different articles
13:4 http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/doc.htm
"Osama Bin Laden: Made in USA" by Jared Israel
13:5 http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/jared/madein.htm
"Bush and the media cover up the Jihad schoolbook scandal" by Jared Israel
13:6 http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/jared/jihad.htm
U.S. Protects Al-Qaeda Terrorists in Kosovo, by Umberto Pascali, 2 Nov 2001
13:7 http://globalresearch.ca/articles/PAS111A.html
Which Terrorists are worse? Al Quaeda? Or the KLA? by Jared Israel
13:8 http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/kla-aq.htm
Section14 : Who created the civil war in Afghanistan?
Interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Jimmy Carter's National Security Adviser [Posted 6 October 2001] Ex- National Security Chief Brzezinski admits: Afghan war and Islamism were made in Washington
14:1 http://emperors-clothes.com/interviews/brz.htm
Section 15: Why have the President and Vice President resisted moves for an inquiry into Sept 11?
Bush asks Daschle to limit Sept. 11 probes -- CNN Jan 29 2002.
15:1 http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/01/29/inv.terror.probe
Bush, GOP blast calls for 9/11 inquiry. CNN May 17 2002
15:2 http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/05/16/president.gop.senators
Daschle: Bush, Cheney Urged No Sept. 11 Inquiry Reuters newswire UK May 26 2002
15:3 http://www.newsfrombabylon.com/article.php?sid=1680
Bush and Cheney Block 9-11 Investigation By Mike Hersh Oct 24, 2002, 2:22pm
15:4 http://www.mikehersh.com/Bush_and_Cheney_Block_911_Investigation
_.shtml
Bush Was Warned of Hijackings Before 9/11; Lawmakers Want Public Inquiry ABC News May 16 2002
4:5 http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/warningmemo020516.html
15.5 Bush opposes 9/11 query panel. CBS News. May 23 2002.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/05/15/attack/main509096.shtml
15:6 9/11 Panel asks what briefers told Bush. White House retreats on independent probe.
Dana Priest and Dana Milbank. Washington Post Sept 21 2002. Page A01
15.7 White House refuses to release Sept 11 info.by Frank Davies Miami Herald May 5 2003
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/5792329.htm?template=
contentModules/printstory.jsp
Why It Is Important To Understand 9/11
When contemplating war, beware of babies in incubators
The babies in the incubator story is a classic example of how easy it is for the public and legislators to be mislead during moments of high tension. It's also a vivid example of how the media can be manipulated if we do not keep our guards up.
Why did CNN and other CORPORATE MEDIA attempt to LIE to the United States people after the Oklahoma bombing.
Despite the facts:
"...within hours of the explosion, dozens of Muslim organizations around the country issued statements condemning the bombing in the strongest terms possible. " 2
The Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, a nation-wide Muslim group, held a blood drive, and donated $7,500 to disaster relief organizations.
Fifty Holy Land Foundation volunteers flew to Oklahoma City to assist local charities.
Muslims met with the governor and presented him with checks totaling $21,000 for the Victims Relief Fund.
there was minimal coverage in the media of these positive acts.
Shortly after the bombing, TV and radio newscasters speculated that the terrorist act had the markings of a Middle Eastern perpetrator:
Washington-based journalist Steven Emerson allegedly said on a national news program that the bombing "...was done with the intent of inflicting as many casualties as possible. That is a Middle Eastern trait. "
One day after the bombing, Bob Grant of the Bob Grant Show responded to a caller who suggested that there was no evidence that the terrorists were Muslim. Grant allegedly commented "...in the Oklahoma case...the indications are that those people who did it were some Muslim terrorists. But a skunk like you. ...What I'd like to do is put you up against the wall with the rest of them, and mow you down along with them. Execute you with them. Because you obviously have a great hatred for America, otherwise you wouldn't talk the way you talk, you imbecile. "
In their coverage of the bombing, the New York Times commented: "Some Middle Eastern groups have held meetings there (Oklahoma), and the city is home to at least three mosques." Mere presence of a conference or mosque in the city was deemed to be suggestive of an involvement in a mass murder.
Even after McVeigh was arrested and the government identified two white males as perpetrators, CNN correspondent Wolf Blitzer insisted that "there is still a possibility that there could have been some sort of connection to Middle East terrorism. One law enforcement source tells me that there's a possibility that they (the Caucasian suspects) may have been contracted out as freelancers to go out and rent this truck that was used in the bombing."
A lot of people seemed to agree with this media speculation. Within two days after the Oklahoma City bombing, there were hundreds of recorded instances of harassment and hate crimes against Muslims, Arabs, Iraqis, people who appeared to be Muslims, and Muslim organizations and buildings. Two days after the explosion, Timothy McVeigh was arrested. But the anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, and anti- Iraqi attacks continued for weeks. 2 One Muslim woman miscarried after an attack.
Local Muslims later asked to participate in a mass memorial service led by the Governor. They were refused. However, Muslim delegations from other areas of the country were allowed to attend. The service was entirely Judeo-Christian in format. [Continue reading at]:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/reac_ter1.htm
Why It Is Important To Understand 9/11
In the beginning Osama denied any responsibility for the 9/11 Attack, which seems odd. We think he would have admitted it openly.
September 2001 Headlines THEY Would Like You To Forget
[Note: These links have not been verified since 2001]
bin Laden denies attacks as Taliban talks holy war
"The US is pointing the finger at me but I categorically state that I have not done this," bin Laden said.
Bin Laden denies being behind attacks
"I stress that I have not carried out this act, which appears to have been carried out by individuals with their own motivation," said the statement, broadcast by Qatar's Al-Jazeera satellite channel.
OSAMA BIN LADEN CLAIMS TERRORIST ACTS IN USA WERE COMMITTED BY SOME AMERICAN TERRORIST GROUP
Notorious international terrorist Osama Bin Laden denies his involvement in the US terrorist acts. The Pakistani Khabrein daily with reference to some Taliban sources quotes him as saying that the terrorist act was committed by some American terrorist group and that he had nothing to do with it.
Bin Laden Denies U.S. Attack, says paper
"The terrorist act is the action of some American group. I have nothing to do with it," the newspaper Khabrain quoted Bin Laden as saying through "sources close to the Taliban."
Bin Laden says he wasn't behind attacks
"I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons," bin Laden's statement said.
Bin Laden Denies Role in Attacks
"I stress that I have not carried out this act, which appears to have been carried out by individuals with their own motivation," said the statement, broadcast by Qatar's Al-Jazeera satellite channel.
Taliban Says Bin Laden Denies Role in Attacks
Afghanistan's ruling Taliban movement said on Thursday that Saudi-born dissident Osama bin Laden had told them he had no role in Tuesday's terror attacks in the United States.
Bin Laden denies terror attacks and points finger at Jews
The paper quoted bin Laden as saying: "Neither I nor my organisation Al-Qaida is involved in the attacks and the US has traced the attackers within America. Ummat quotes bin Laden as saying: "We are against the American system but not the American people. Islam does not allow killing of innocent people, men, women and children even in the event of war."
Continue Reading at: http://www.flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/DahArc/daharc20.html
YOU ARE LOOKING AT A US GOVERNMENT LIE
On Friday 14 December 2001 a videotape of Osama bin Laden "confessing" to the 9/11 attacks was released. The tape was supposedly found in a house in Qandahar, Afghanistan. The recording was of very poor audio and visual quality and the authenticity of the tape was questioned.
This annoyed President Bush who said "[It is] preposterous to think this tape was doctored."
Okay, let's have a look.
Here's 5 Osama's - which is the odd one
out?
Presbyterian Church publishes 9/11 conspiracy theory
Presbyterian Church publishes 9/11 conspiracy
theory
Malaysia Sun
Tuesday 8th August, 2006
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s publishing arm has released a book that says President Bush organized New York's Sept. 11 attacks.
The decision by the 160-year-old Westminster John Knox Press, the trade and academic publishing imprint of the Presbyterian Publishing Corp., to attribute the attacks on the World Trade Center brings into the U.S. religious mainstream a conspiracy theory long held by the world's jihadists.
In 'Christian Faith and the Truth behind 9/11: A Call to Reflection and Action,' author David Ray Griffin calls the United States the world's 'chief embodiment of demonic power, says he initially scoffed at 9/11 conspiracy theories.
But after investigating he concluded that the Twin Towers were brought down by controlled demolition, military personnel were given stand-down orders not to intercept hijacked flights and the 9/11 Commission, ostensibly created to uncover the truth behind the events of 9/11, 'simply ignored evidence' that the administration was involved in the attacks.
Griffin further asserts that such events such as that of 9/11 are part of a long history of 'false-flag attacks,' attacks orchestrated by governments against their own people to garner popular support for military action.
Griffin is a professor at California's Claremont School of Theology and Claremont Graduate University, and a codirector of the Center for Process Studies.
http://story.malaysiasun.com/p.x/ct/9/cid/b8de8e630faf3631/id/7cca827f00576d2a/
Controlling the News
In-House Memos on Television News Presentations
http://www.flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/newscontrol.html
Bringing Up the Past or Proof What Comes
Around, Goes Around
by Dahbud Mensch
Bush's Impending Watergate
By Harvey Wasserman
May 23, 1991
George Bush should be impeached. Whether he will be impeached depends on the intestinal fortitude of Congress. But the evidence is clearly sufficient to begin proceedings.
The grounds for impeachment rest in the now-familiar circumstances around the 1980 Iranian hostage crisis. The story has circulated since the mid 1980s, but in recent weeks has gained startling new confirmation.
The circumstances are worth repeating: On November 4, 1979, radical Iranian students seized some 55 American citizens and began a crisis that lasted until the moment Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as president 444 days later.
Future historians may well blame President Jimmy Carter for the inception of the crisis. He ignored warnings that it could happen and stumbled badly once it began. Some may also wonder if he exploited the situation to deflect a challenge to his renomination from Sen. Edward Kennedy.
But by October of 1980, one thing was clear: If the hostages were released prior to the election, Carter would be re-elected. If not, Ronald Reagan would win. All major polls -- including one by the primary Republican pollster, Richard Wirthlin -- showed a 10 percent swing on just that issue.
In early October, word spread through the world media that Carter had negotiated a deal for the hostages' release. It was widely believed that he had agreed to unfreeze some $4 billion in assets claimed by the deposed Shah, and to supply spare parts to the American-made arms inherited by the Ayatollah Khomeini's revolutionary regime. The hostages were due home by mid-October, in ample time to assure Carter's re-election.
Then, mysteriously, the deal was off. The hostages weren't coming home after all. What happened?
The Iranians were known to detest Jimmy Carter. Despite his advocacy of human rights, Carter had befriended the brutal, repressive Shah. Conceivably, the Muslim fundamentalists tantalized Carter with the hostages' possible release and then, just for the hell of it, left him hanging.
There were other theories. Columnist George Will suggested that Iran responded to Reagan because he had threatened to use nuclear weapons if the hostages weren't released, something the pacifistic Carter would not have done.
But two years later, Barbara Honegger, a member of the Reagan campaign team, angrily left the White House staff, leveling charges of sexual discrimination. She then asserted that during the 1980 campaign a special "October Surprise" Committee had operated with a mandate that appeared focused on sabotaging Carter's arrangements and guaranteeing that the hostages remain in Teheran until after the 1980 election.
Honegger claimed no direct proof, but she recalled being told that the hostages would not be coming home because October Surprise Committee member Richard Allen (later chief of Reagan's National Security Council) had "cut a deal" to keep them in Teheran. Future CIA director William Casey may have masterminded the sabotage, Honegger said.
Honegger was dismissed by Reagan-Bush staffers as a "low-level munchkin." But her allegations were given powerful confirmation in 1985 by Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, president of Iran at the time of the crisis. According to Bani-Sadr, George Bush, then candidate for vice president, may personally have flown to Paris on a crucial weekend to convince the son of the Ayatollah "that the hostages should not be released during the Carter administration." Instead, Bani-Sadr said, "they should be released when Reagan became president. So, in return, Reagan would give them arms."
Indeed, Iran was desperately needed weapons to carry on its holy war with Iraq's Saddam Hussein. Hostilities had begun in September, and they were short on guns and cash. There was little doubt they would trade whatever "assets" they had for the arms they needed -- including the American hostages.
The story became common knowledge among top Middle Eastern operatives, including Bassam Abu Sharif, number two man in the Palestine Liberation Organization (assassinated during the recent Gulf War) and Mansour Rafizadeh, a former CIA operative and head of the Shah's dreaded SAVAK secret police.
"The deal was made to release the hostages exactly the moment Ronald Reagan was president," Rafizadeh told the Other America's Radio Network. "It was promised for the arms," said Rafizadeh. "The moment Ronald Reagan was president, they signaled the plane [with the hostages aboard], they took off. After, the shipment of the arms started from Tel Aviv."
Despite repeated denials from the Reagan-Bush team, the story gained some media prominence during the 1988 election, including a story in the Advocate, a major feature co-authored by activist Abbie Hoffman (now dead by an alleged suicide) in Playboy, and an op-ed in the now-defunct Los Angeles Herald-Examiner.
Just prior to the election, a self-proclaimed former CIA operative named Richard Brenneke claimed to have personally flown Bush to Paris to negotiate the deal. Producers from CBS' 60 Minutes were preparing a feature on Brenneke, who was in jail in Colorado, when questions about his credibility were raised and the feature was canceled. The Miami Herald, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe and other major publications carried stories concluding there was insufficient evidence to confirm or deny the deal occurred.
Recently, Brenneke was cleared of perjury charges stemming from his claimed connection to the Paris trip. And the assertions have resurfaced with new power. Former Carter security adviser Gary Sick, after a two-year investigation, has released a book arguing the likelihood that an "arms for no hostages" deal was, in fact, made. Bani-Sadr has issued a new book asserting the same thing. Bill Moyers' Frontline devoted an entire program to it. Bush's denials -- issued just before his recent heart problems -- that he ever flew to Paris during the 1980s campaign made front-page news across the nation.
But does the story really turn on that? White House spokesperson Marlin Fitzwater says all of Bush's time can be accounted for. Bush has vehemently denied ever going to Paris during the 1980 campaign. Yet the official log of Bush's whereabouts on the crucial weekend -- when he is alleged to have made the deal -- has a hole big enough for him to have flown to Paris, negotiated the deal and then flown back.
The idea that the vice presidential candidate would have flown abroad to negotiate a deal that amounts to treason might seem absurd. Bush, after all, was formerly head of the Central Intelligence Agency, and a master of plausible deniability. It was clearly out of character to expose himself in such a direct manner to what could ultimately be a scandal of truly epic proportions.
On the other hand, the Iranians could well have demanded Bush's personal presence. It was well-known that the Ayatollah's cabal put little faith in the American electoral system. Like many Iranians, they believed that the true power in U.S. politics rested not with elected officials, but with the secret police, i.e. the CIA. As the CIA's former head, they believed Bush to be the true power in the Reagan-Bush campaign, and may well have demanded his personal approval for any trade of their hostage "assets."
Even so, the question of Bush going to Paris may be a red herring. The circumstances pointing to the likelihood of a deal being made are overwhelming. That Carter had all but secured their release is well-known. That there was a Reagan-Bush October Surprise Committee run by Allen and Casey is undeniable, as is the fact that the hostages were released precisely at the moment that Ronald Reagan was sworn in as President. It is also well-known that large quantities of American-sponsored arms began flowing through Israel in March 1981.
As for the question of Iranian motive, although Khomeini profoundly hated Jimmy Carter, he had no reason to like Reagan more, and would hardly have bothered to spite one representative of the "Great Satan" over another. In Iran's jihad with Saddam Hussein, however, the hostages were an asset to be traded, a bargaining chip to go to the highest bidder. Carter was deeply disinclined to send Iran large quantities of arms; once in office, Reagan did just that.
Thus, the evidence suggesting that George Bush actually flew to Paris to negotiate the deal is ultimately irrelevant. As the number two man on the ticket and the former head of the CIA, no such deal would have been cut without Bush's approval, whether he flew to Paris or not.
And that means high treason and public crimes of the highest order. The ideal that the nominees of a major party could have knowingly prolonged the agony of American citizens in exchange for weapons is about as low as one could imagine any politician sinking.
In fact, the sabotage may even have preceded the October negotiations. Earlier in 1980, Carter set out to free the hostages with "Operation Eagle Claw," built around a surprise helicopter landing and secret assault on the building where they were held in Teheran.
The mission proved disastrous. At least two American helicopters crashed into each other in the desert long before they made it anywhere near Teheran. Eight Marines were killed. Carter looked ineffectual and frustration with the hostage crisis escalated.
Unfortunately, the operatives in charge of Desert Claw may not have been loyal to Carter -- or to the U.S. Carter held deeply alienated a broad range of CIA operatives by trying to clean up the Agency when he first came to power. Admiral Stansfield Turner, the tough but honest Navy man Carter put in charge at the CIA fired some 600 "spooks" soon after taking command. Many were deeply loyal to former Director George Bush and to the "Old Boy" network that serves as the Agency's true infrastructure.
That loyalty may have carried over to sabotage of Operation Eagle Claw. For the man who served as chief mission planner was none other than Richard Secord, who later surfaced as a major kingpin in the shady arms dealings between the Reagan White House and the contras of Nicaragua. A top staffer at a key base in Eagle Claw's catastrophic helicopter support operation was none other than the legendary Colonel Oliver North. Working closely with him as a logistical planner was Albert Hakkim, who later sat by Secord's side at the Congressional Iran-contra hearings and wept of his love for Oliver North.
As historian Donald Fried has put it "Precisely the people in the intelligence community commissioned to develop some kind of rescue for the hostages were those elements of covert action close to William Casey and hostile to Carter."
Casey, of course, later became Reagan's CIA chief. But higher up in the chain at the time of the failed rescue mission was Donald Gregg, a member of Carter's National Security Council who later surfaced as s high-level Bush operative. Gregg's close personal ties to Bush became a serious issue in light of his extensive dealings with key contra figures tied both to the Iran-contra scandal and illegal drug shipments coming from Central America. Gregg is now Bush's ambassador to South Korea.
In a recent interview Carter specifically implied that Gregg might have betrayed key security items to Bush during the 1980 campaign. Students of the affair, including author Gary Sick, also wonder if Gregg might have fed the Reagan-Bush team key items in the dealings between Carter and the Iranians.
At this point with Bush's popularity so high on the heels of a much-desired military victory millions of Americans would not want to believe such a story could be true. The U.S. triumph over Saddam Hussein clearly filled a psychological void plaguing Americans since Vietnam. It allowed for a military triumph where the most recent memory had been of defeat. And it gave Americans the opportunity to do penance for the mistreatment of Vietnam veterans by showering those who fought the brief Gulf War with a heroes' welcome outstripping anything since World War II and way out of proportion for the size and duration of the Iraqi massacre.
Nonetheless, there is nothing in the character of the Reagan-Bush regimes that indicates a moral incapability of cutting such a deal. More than 200 members of the administration were indicted during their eight-year tenure, including Attorney General Edwin Meese and close Reagan counselors Michael Deaver and Lyn Nofziger. By all accounts, the Reagan-Bush administration were the most corrupt since the short term of Ulysses S. Grant.
The idea that Ronald Reagan and George Bush could have conspired to prolong the torment of U.S. hostages dwarfs the miasma that was Watergate on both a moral and political scale. Ultimately its impact will depend on the willingness of Congress to investigate the facts and act on what it finds. It is time for Congress to once again assume its role in the balance of powers. Impeachment means bringing to trial. The evidence is clearly sufficient to begin the process.
At presstime, Congress had launched a preliminary staff investigation into the Reagan-Bush 1980 campaign and whether there had been negotiations with Iran to delay the release of the American Hostages.
At the end of the cartoon/article above there is a line that says, "Intelligence Agencies Are NOT the Problem Sealed IRAN/CONTRA Documents ARE !".
The link (associated with that line) would normally take one to all public files on IRAN/CONTRA, which I can no longer find [They have been moved.].
Here is some background information to go with the above article:
October Surprise X-Files
By Robert Parry
The Russian Report
On Jan. 11, 1993, Russia's Supreme Soviet sent a secret cable to the U.S. Congress. The cable claimed that Russian national security files held evidence that two U.S. Presidents and two CIA directors had committed an act of treachery with Iran's radical Islamic government in 1980.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile1.html
The Ladies' Room Secrets
Stored away in a converted Ladies' Room on Capitol Hill, dusty boxes contained startling evidence of Republican dirty tricks in the 1980 presidential campaign -- and of a bipartisan cover-up that continues to this day.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile2.html
Bill Casey's Iranian
Iranian banker Cyrus Hashemi was a mystery man of the 1980s, a nexus point for scandal, from accessing vaults of the corrupt BCCI to opening doors to the Iran-Contra Affair. But for years, the FBI withheld key wiretaps of Hashemi's secret conversations.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile3.html
Follow the Money
An intimidating array of individuals and forces wanted President Carter ousted from the White House in 1980. Some were driven by ambition; others by money; and still others by revenge. Together, they were over-powering.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile4.html
Saddam's 'Green Light'
In 1980, Iraq's Saddam Hussein was suddenly a bigtime international 'player,' invited to the gaudy palaces of the Saudi Arabian monarchy. But there was an ulterior motive behind the flattering invitation: Saddam's army was the new protector of the petro-rich against the Iranian hordes.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile5.html
Where's Bill Casey
In 1991-92, the October Surprise investigation was like a worldwide Where's Waldo game, trying to locate Bill Casey on crucial days in 1980. Two national magazines and a House task force claimed success, thus disproving that Casey sabotaged the Iran hostage talks. The game was over; Casey and the Republicans were innocent.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile6.html
Bush & a CIA Power Play
The CIA Old Boys were reeling. In the 1970s, exposure of their dirty games and dirty tricks made the Cold Warriors look sinister -- and silly. Then, President Carter ordered a housecleaning that left scores of CIA men out in the cold.
In 1980, the CIA men wanted back in and their champion was former CIA director George Bush. With Bush and Ronald Reagan in power, the old spies could resume their work with a vengeance. The temptation was to do to Jimmy Carter what the CIA had done to countless other world leaders -- overthrow him.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile7.html
Lies Spun into History
Better than Democrats, Bob Dole and other Republicans grasped the value of defending heroes, even imperfect ones. So the GOP battled the charges that Bill Casey and other Republicans played a nearly treasonous dirty trick to win in 1980.
The defense required enforcing absurd alibis, bullying investigators and massaging the facts. But it worked. The Democrats acquiesced and the Republicans proved that they respected history enough to falsify it.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile8.html
October Surprise: Time for Truth? Part 2
The diciest part of the October Surprise saga remains the allegations of secret Paris meetings between Republicans and Iranians in fall 1980. According to some of those alleging that the GOP sabotaged President Carter's pre-election hostage negotiations, the Paris meetings followed earlier contacts between William Casey and Iranians in Madrid; in effect, the Paris talks cemented the deal.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/archive/xfile10.html
Complete articles located at links.
In conclusion I am also reminded of the following:
"The Bush administration deliberately, not inadvertently, helped to arm Iraq by allowing U.S. technology to be shipped to Iraqi military and to Iraqi defense factories," Gonzalez said. "Throughout the course of the Bush administration, U.S. and foreign firms were granted export licenses to ship U.S. technology directly to Iraqi weapons facilities despite ample evidence showing that these factories were producing weapons." - Henry Gonzalez, July 27, 1992
http://www.fas.org/spp/starwars/congress/1992/h920727g.htm
"The president misled Congress and the public about the role U.S. firms played in arming Iraq." - Speech on the floor of the House of Representatives, House Banking Committee chair Henry Gonzalez
Intelligence Agencies Are NOT the Problem
Sealed IRAN/CONTRA Documents
ARE !
Who is John O'Neill and Why Did He Die?
See Full Image at:: http://www.propagandamatrix.com/W199I.gif
This transcript is produced from the teletext subtitles that are generated live for Newsnight. It has been checked against the programme as broadcast, however Newsnight can accept no responsibility for any factual inaccuracies. We will be happy to correct serious errors
Has someone been sitting on the FBI?
6/11/01
GREG PALAST:
The CIA and Saudi Arabia, the Bushes and the Bin Ladens. Did their connections
cause America to turn a blind eye to terrorism?
UNNAMED MAN:
There is a hidden agenda at the very highest levels of our government.
JOE TRENTO, (AUTHOR, "SECRET HISTORY OF THE CIA"):
The sad thing is that thousands of Americans had to die needlessly.
PETER ELSNER:
How can it be that the former President of the US and the current President
of the US have business dealings with characters that need to be investigated?
PALAST:
In the eight weeks since the attacks, over 1,000 suspects and potential
witnesses have been detained. Yet, just days after the hijackers took
off from Boston aiming for the Twin Towers, a special charter flight
out of the same airport whisked 11 members of Osama Bin Laden's family
off to Saudi Arabia. That did not concern the White House.
Their official line is that the Bin Ladens are above suspicion - apart from Osama, the black sheep, who they say hijacked the family name. That's fortunate for the Bush family and the Saudi royal household, whose links with the Bin Ladens could otherwise prove embarrassing. But Newsnight has obtained evidence that the FBI was on the trail of other members of the] Bin Laden family for links to terrorist organisations before and after September 11th.
This document is marked "Secret". Case ID - 199-Eye WF 213 589. 199 is FBI code for case type. 9 would be murder. 65 would be espionage. 199 means national security. WF indicates Washington field office special agents were investigating ABL - because of it's relationship with the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, WAMY - a suspected terrorist organisation. ABL is Abdullah Bin Laden, president and treasurer of WAMY.
This is the sleepy Washington suburb of Falls Church, Virginia where almost every home displays the Stars and Stripes. On this unremarkable street, at 3411 Silver Maple Place, we located the former home of Abdullah and another brother, Omar, also an FBI suspect. It's conveniently close to WAMY. The World Assembly of Muslim Youth is in this building, in a little room in the basement at 5613 Leesburg Pike. And here, just a couple blocks down the road at 5913 Leesburg, is where four of the hijackers that attacked New York and Washington are listed as having lived.
The US Treasury has not frozen WAMY's assets, and when we talked to them, they insisted they are a charity. Yet, just weeks ago, Pakistan expelled WAMY operatives. And India claimed that WAMY was funding an organisation linked to bombings in Kashmir. And the Philippines military has accused WAMY of funding Muslim insurgency. The FBI did look into WAMY, but, for some reason, agents were pulled off the trail.
TRENTO:
The FBI wanted to investigate these guys. This is not something that they
didn't want to do - they wanted to, they weren't permitted to.
PALAST:
The secret file fell into the hands of national security expert, Joe Trento.
The Washington spook-tracker has been looking into the FBI's allegations
about WAMY.
TRENTO:
They've had connections to Osama Bin Laden's people. They've had connections
to Muslim cultural and financial aid groups that have terrorist connections.
They fit the pattern of groups that the Saudi royal family and Saudi
community of princes - the 20,000 princes - have funded who've engaged
in terrorist activity.
Now, do I know that WAMY has done anything that's illegal? No, I don't know that. Do I know that as far back as 1996 the FBI was very concerned about this organisation? I do.
PALAST:
Newsnight has uncovered a long history of shadowy connections between the
State Department, the CIA and the Saudis. The former head of the American
visa bureau in Jeddah is Michael Springman.
MICHAEL SPRINGMAN:
In Saudi Arabia I was repeatedly ordered by high level State Dept officials
to issue visas to unqualified applicants. These were, essentially, people
who had no ties either to Saudi Arabia or to their own country. I complained
bitterly at the time there. I returned to the US, I complained to the
State Dept here, to the General Accounting Office, to the Bureau of Diplomatic
Security and to the Inspector General's office. I was met with silence.
PALAST:
By now, Bush Sr, once CIA director, was in the White House. Springman was
shocked to find this wasn't visa fraud. Rather, State and CIA were playing "the
Great Game".
SPRINGMAN:
What I was protesting was, in reality, an effort to bring recruits, rounded
up by Osama Bin Laden, to the US for terrorist training by the CIA. They
would then be returned to Afghanistan to fight against the then-Soviets.
The attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 did not shake the State Department's faith in the Saudis, nor did the attack on American barracks at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia three years later, in which 19 Americans died. FBI agents began to feel their investigation was being obstructed. Would you be surprised to find out that FBI agents are a bit frustrated that they can't be looking into some Saudi connections?
MICHAEL WILDES, ( LAWYER)
I would never be surprised with that. They're cut off at the hip sometimes
by supervisors or given shots that are being called from Washington at
the highest levels.
PALAST:
I showed lawyer Michael Wildes our FBI documents. One of the Khobar Towers
bombers was represented by Wildes, who thought he had useful intelligence
for the US. He also represents a Saudi diplomat who defected to the USA
with 14,000 documents which Wildes claims implicates Saudi citizens in
financing terrorism and more. Wildes met with FBI men who told him they
were not permitted to read all the documents. Nevertheless, he tried
to give them to the agents.
WILDES:
"Take these with you. We're not going to charge for the copies. Keep them. Do
something with them. Get some bad guys with them." They refused.
PALAST:
In the hall of mirrors that is the US intelligence community, Wildes, a
former US federal attorney, said the FBI field agents wanted the documents,
but they were told to "see no evil."
WILDES:
You see a difference between the rank-and-file counter-intelligence agents,
who are regarded by some as the motor pool of the FBI, who drive following
diplomats, and the people who are getting the shots called at the highest
level of our government, who have a different agenda - it's unconscionable.
PALAST:
State wanted to keep the pro-American Saudi royal family in control of
the world's biggest oil spigot, even at the price of turning a blind
eye to any terrorist connection so long as America was safe. In recent
years, CIA operatives had other reasons for not exposing Saudi-backed
suspects.
TRENTO:
If you recruited somebody who is a member of a terrorist organisation,
who happens to make his way here to the US, and even though you're not
in touch with that person anymore but you have used him in the past,
it would be unseemly if he were arrested by the FBI and word got back
that he'd once been on the payroll of the CIA. What we're talking about
is blow-back. What we're talking about is embarrassing, career-destroying
blow-back for intelligence officials.
PALAST:
Does the Bush family also have to worry about political blow-back? The
younger Bush made his first million 20 years ago with an oil company
partly funded by Salem Bin Laden's chief US representative. Young George
also received fees as director of a subsidiary of Carlyle Corporation,
a little known private company which has, in just a few years of its
founding, become one of Americas biggest defence contractors. His father,
Bush Senior, is also a paid advisor. And what became embarrassing was
the revelation that the Bin Ladens held a stake in Carlyle, sold just
after September 11.
ELSNER:
You have a key relationship between the Saudis and the former President
of the US who happens to be the father of the current President of the
US. And you have all sorts of questions about where does policy begin
and where does good business and good profits for the company, Carlyle,
end?
PALAST:
I received a phone call from a high-placed member of a US intelligence
agency. He tells me that while there's always been constraints on investigating
Saudis, under George Bush it's gotten much worse. After the elections,
the agencies were told to "back off" investigating the Bin Ladens and
Saudi royals, and that angered agents. I'm told that since September
11th the policy has been reversed. FBI headquarters told us they could
not comment on our findings. A spokesman said: "There are lots of things
that only the intelligence community knows and that no-one else ought
to know.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/events/newsnight/1645527.stm
F.B.I. Is Investigating a Senior Counterterrorism Agent
by DAVID JOHNSTON and JAMES RISEN
8/19/01
WASHINGTON, Aug. 18 — The F.B.I. has begun an internal investigation into one of its most senior counterterrorism officials, who misplaced a briefcase containing highly classified information last year. The briefcase contained a number of sensitive documents, including a report outlining virtually every national security operation in New York, government officials said.
The official, John O'Neill, 49, is the special agent in charge of national security in the Federal Bureau of Investigation's New York office. The job is among the most powerful in the F.B.I., and, although Mr. O'Neill is not widely known, he has overseen cases like the terrorist bombing of the Navy destroyer Cole in Yemen last year and the bombings of American embassies in East Africa in 1998.
The briefcase incident was seen as potentially so serious that the Justice Department conducted a criminal investigation. The inquiry ended in recent weeks with a decision by the department's internal security section not to prosecute, law enforcement officials said.
Mr. O'Neill left his briefcase in a hotel conference room while he attended an F.B.I. meeting in Tampa, Fla., last summer. The briefcase was stolen, but the local authorities recovered it and returned it to him within hours with the contents.
Jill Stillman, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department, said that department officials would not comment on the matter. Requests to discuss the matter with Mr. O'Neill were made to bureau officials in New York and Washington. In both cases, they said that he declined to comment on the case.
After the criminal inquiry, the bureau's internal affairs unit began its own investigation to determine whether Mr. O'Neill had violated F.B.I. rules against mishandling classified information.
Officials identified one document in the briefcase as a draft of what is known in the bureau as the Annual Field Office Report for national security operations in New York. The closely guarded report contained a description of every counterespionage and counterterrorism program in New York and detailed the budget and manpower for each operation. The document, submitted to bureau headquarters, is used as a central planning tool each year.
F.B.I. agents are prohibited from removing classified documents from their offices without authorization. Violations are punishable by censure, suspension or even dismissal, depending on the seriousness.
But the outcome of the internal inquiry is uncertain. Even if the inquiry finds that Mr. O'Neill violated regulations, he is unlikely to be sanctioned. He has been planning to retire and told associates in recent days that he would step down next week. He is expected to take a job as a private security consultant.
Several officials said that Mr. O'Neill became the subject of especially intense scrutiny partly because law enforcement officials did not want to treat the matter lightly after the cases of John M. Deutch, the former director of Central Intelligence, and Wen Ho Lee, the Los Alamos nuclear weapons scientist.
Mr. Deutch lost his security clearances and was the subject of a Justice Department investigation for mishandling classified material after he placed classified documents on unclassified computers in his home. Mr. Deutch was pardoned by President Clinton in January.
Dr. Lee pleaded guilty in September 2000 to one count of mishandling classified material just as the rest of the government's case against him collapsed.
In Mr. O'Neill's case, F.B.I. officials were alarmed, in part, because of the sensitivity of the documents involved, including details about the bureau's counterterrorism and counterintelligence operations. One document contained highly sensitive information about an F.B.I. source.
Mr. O'Neill immediately reported the incident to his superiors. But after the Tampa authorities recovered the briefcase, it was taken from him and the documents inside it were fingerprinted to determine whether anyone had touched the briefcase and whether the documents might have been handled by a foreign intelligence service.
The investigation concluded that the documents in the briefcase had not been touched and that it had probably been stolen by thieves who were thought to be responsible for several hotel robberies in the Tampa area at the time.
Mr. O'Neill started as an entry- level clerk at the bureau and has been an agent for more than 25 years. Throughout his career, associates said, Mr. O'Neill has been regarded as a dedicated, relentless and hard-charging investigator who was one of the F.B.I.'s brightest stars. But associates said that he sometimes chafed at the restrictive rules of conduct at the bureau and that his single-mindedness had sometimes irritated colleagues in the bureau, at the C.I.A. and at the State Department. Mr. O'Neill's aggressiveness has led to serious frictions in the Cole bombing case, for example.
This year, the United States ambassador to Yemen, Barbara Bodine, blocked Mr. O'Neill from returning to Yemen to oversee the F.B.I. investigation of the bombing of the destroyer Cole. Mr. O'Neill had led the initial team of agents in Yemen after the bombing last fall, but ran afoul of Ambassador Bodine over what she considered his heavy-handed style, State Department officials said. She considered the F.B.I. contingent too large and objected to the agents' insistence on carrying heavy weapons, they said.
But Mr. O'Neill has many admirers. Barry W. Mawn, assistant director of the F.B.I. in charge of the New York office, said that Mr. O'Neill was a tireless worker and had his "complete confidence" since Mr. Mawn took over the office last year.
"John is recognized worldwide as probably one of the best in conducting both counterterrorism and counterintelligence operations," Mr. Mawn said.
James K. Kallstrom, the head of the New York office in the mid- 1990's, said that Mr. O'Neill "has been a major force for the public safety of the United States and the security of the United States for over two decades."
Like a number of Mr. O'Neill's friends and supporters, Mr. Kallstrom made clear that he thought Mr. O'Neill had been the victim of a smear campaign by people seeking to damage his reputation, perhaps because he was being mentioned for a national security job at the White House, a job he apparently never sought.
"The notion that individuals in public service or anywhere else are absolutely perfect human beings who never have a fault or lapse of memory or never make a mistake is a standard that no one should be held to," Mr. Kallstrom said.
Mary Jo White, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, praised Mr. O'Neill in a statement Friday as "one of the unsung heroes in our nation's efforts to combat terrorism in the United States and around the world."
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/19/national/19FBI.html
Another widely overlooked conspiracy theory about the events of September 11th is the reasoning for George W. Bush, shortly after becoming president, according to a widely available BBC News video, to issue Executive Order W199I-WF-213589, demanding that Federal investigators "back off" of the bin Ladens and the group ABL, because of it's relationship with WAMY,(World Assembly of Muslim Youth). According to a report prepared for the UN, Saudi Arabia has transferred $500 million to Al Qaeda over the past decade, yet like the bin Ladens themselves who were flown out of the US by the CIA after the attacks, they are above suspicion because of business dealings they have with the Bush Administration(s). Senator Bob Graham publicly admitted, based on information he has received, that at least one foreign country assisted the 9-11 terrorists, and we won't find out who that is for the next 20 or 30 years.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/analysis_inganamort_010703_conspiracy.html
PROTECTING THE TERRORISTS /
ALLOWING THEM TO ATTACK
Order W199I-WF-213589 - FBI hindered in Al-Qaeda investigation
- US agents told to "back off" Bin Ladens (ANANOVA)
- Bush Thwarted FBI probe against Bin Ladens (AFP)
- FBI told to "back off" investigating Bin Laden family before
the attacks on Sept. 11th: BBC Newsnight Video
- Has someone been sitting on the FBI? BBC Newsnight transcript
- Bush took FBI Agents of bin Laden family trail (TIMES OF INDIA)
- FBI claims Bin Laden inquiry was frustrated (LONDON GUARDIAN)
- FBI 'was told to back off bin Laden family' (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD)
- Another FBI Agent Blows the Whistle on 9-11
- FBI agent: I was stymied in terror probe
- Whistleblower Complains of FBI Obstruction
- Judicial Watch press conference featuring special FBI agent Robert Wright
- impeded from terrorist investigations
- Scandal Inside the FBI: Did G-Men Miss the Boat on 9-11?
- SECTION OF W199I DOCUMENT FROM GREG PALAST'S BOOK 'THE BEST DEMOCRACY
MONEY CAN BUY'
- MINNESOTA FBI AGENTS WERE OBSTRUCTED IN PRE-SEPT. 11 TERRORIST INVESTIGATION
BY 'HIGHER-UPS'
- FBI Lawyer Tells of Terror 'Roadblock'
- Minneapolis agent says FBI headquarters rewrote requests for search warrants
for Moussaoui
- Agent Claims FBI Supervisor Thwarted Probe
- Agent blasts FBI over 11 September 'cover-up'
- Angry FBI agents joked about al Qaeda mole at HQ
- Another FBI Agent Blows the Whistle - New evidence that the Bureau quashed
another terror probe before 9/11
- FBI Agent: Bureau Prevented Terror Probe
- The ignored warning: FBI officer prevented from prosecuting future 9/11
hijacker
- FBI AGENT ROBERT WRIGHT SAYS FBI AGENTS ASSIGNED TO INTELLIGENCE OPERATIONS
CONTINUE TO PROTECT TERRORISTS FROM CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS
[Ed. Note: All of the above are links located at]:
http://www.infowars.com/sept11_archive.htm
THE COUNTER-TERRORIST
John O'Neill was an F.B.I. agent with an obsession:
the growing threat of Al Qaeda.
by LAWRENCE WRIGHT
Issue of 2002-01-14
Posted 2002-01-14
The legend of John P. O'Neill, who lost his life at the World Trade Center on September 11th, begins with a story by Richard A. Clarke, the national coördinator for counter-terrorism in the White House from the first Bush Administration until last year. On a Sunday morning in February, 1995, Clarke went to his office to review intelligence cables that had come in over the weekend. One of the cables reported that Ramzi Yousef, the suspected mastermind behind the first World Trade Center bombing, two years earlier, had been spotted in Pakistan. Clarke immediately called the F.B.I. A man whose voice was unfamiliar to him answered the phone. "O'Neill," he growled.
"Who are you?" Clarke said.
"I'm John O'Neill," the man replied. "Who the hell are you?"
O'Neill had just been appointed chief of the F.B.I.'s counter-terrorism section, in Washington. He was forty-two years old, and had been transferred from the bureau's Chicago office. After driving all night, he had gone directly to headquarters that Sunday morning without dropping off his bags. When he heard Clarke's report about Yousef, O'Neill entered the F.B.I.'s Strategic Information Operations Center (SIOC) and telephoned Thomas Pickard, the head of the bureau's National Security Division in New York. Pickard then called Mary Jo White, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who had indicted Yousef in the bombing case.
One of O'Neill's new responsibilities was to put together a team to bring the suspect home. It was composed of agents who were working on the case, a State Department representative, a medical doctor, a hostage-rescue team, and a fingerprint expert whose job was to make sure that the suspect was, in fact, Ramzi Yousef. Under ordinary circumstances, the host country would be asked to detain the suspect until extradition paperwork had been signed and the F.B.I. could place the man in custody. There was no time for that. Yousef was reportedly preparing to board a bus for Peshawar. Unless he was apprehended, he would soon cross the Khyber Pass into Afghanistan, where he would be out of reach. There was only one F.B.I. agent in Pakistan at the time, along with several agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration and the State Department's diplomatic-security bureau. "Our Ambassador had to get in his car and go ripping across town to get the head of the local military intelligence," Clarke recalled. "The chief gave him his own personal aides, and this ragtag bunch of American law-enforcement officials and a couple of Pakistani soldiers set off to catch Yousef before he got on the bus." O'Neill, working around the clock for the next three days, coördinated the entire effort. At 10 A.M. Pakistan time, on Tuesday, February 7th, SIOC was informed that the World Trade Center bomber was in custody.
During the next six years, O'Neill became the bureau's most committed tracker of Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network of terrorists as they struck against American interests around the world. Brash, ambitious, often full of himself, O'Neill had a confrontational personality that brought him powerful enemies. Even so, he was too valuable to ignore. He was the point man in the investigation of the terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia, East Africa, and Yemen. At a time when the Clinton Administration was struggling to decide how to respond to the terrorist threat, O'Neill, along with others in the F.B.I. and the C.I.A., realized that Al Qaeda was relentless and resourceful and that its ultimate target was America itself. In the last days of his life, after he had taken a new job as the chief of security for the World Trade Center, he was warning friends, "We're due."
"I am the F.B.I.," John O'Neill liked to boast. He had wanted to work for the bureau since boyhood, when he watched Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., as the buttoned-down Inspector Lewis Erskine in the TV series "The F.B.I." O'Neill was born in 1952 and brought up in Atlantic City, where his mother drove a cab for a small taxi business that she and his father owned. After graduating from Holy Spirit High School, he got a job as a fingerprint clerk with the F.B.I. During his first semester in college, he married his high-school sweetheart, Christine, and when he was twenty their son, John P. O'Neill, Jr., was born. O'Neill put himself through a master's program in forensics at George Washington University by serving as a tour guide at the F.B.I. headquarters. In 1976, he became a full-time agent in the bureau's office in Baltimore; ten years later, he returned to headquarters and served as an inspector. In 1991, he was named assistant special agent in charge in the Chicago office. In 1994, he received the additional assignment of supervising VAPCON, a national investigation into violence against abortion providers. The following year, he transferred to headquarters to become the counter-terrorism chief.
John Lipka, an agent who met O'Neill during the VAPCON probe, marvelled at his ability to move so easily from investigating organized crime and official corruption to the thornier field of counter-terrorism. "He was a very quick study," Lipka told me. "I'd been working terrorism since '86, but he'd walk out of the Hoover building, flag a cab, and I'd brief him on the way to the White House. Then he'd give a presentation, and I'd be shocked that he grasped everything I had been working on for weeks."
O'Neill entered the bureau in the J. Edgar Hoover era, and throughout his career he had something of the old-time G-man about him. He talked tough, in a New Jersey accent that many loved to imitate. He was darkly handsome, with black eyes and slicked-back hair. In a culture that favors discreet anonymity, he cut a memorable figure. He favored fine cigars and Chivas Regal and water with a twist, and carried a nine-millimetre automatic strapped to his ankle. His manner was bluff and dominating, but he was always immaculately, even fussily, dressed. One of his colleagues in Washington took note of O'Neill's "night-club wardrobe"—black double-breasted suits, semitransparent black socks, and ballet-slipper shoes. "He had very delicate feet and hands, and, with his polished fingernails, he made quite an impression."
In Washington, O'Neill became part of a close-knit group of counter-terrorism experts which formed around Richard Clarke. In the web of federal agencies concerned with terrorism, Clarke was the spider. Everything that touched the web eventually came to his attention. The members of this inner circle, which was known as the Counter-terrorism Security Group (C.S.G.), were drawn mainly from the C.I.A., the National Security Council, and the upper tiers of the Defense Department, the Justice Department, and the State Department. They met every week in the White House Situation Room. "John could lead a discussion at that level," R. P. Eddy, who was an N.S.C. director at the time, told me. "He was not just the guy you turned to for a situation report. He was the guy who would say the thing that everybody in the room wishes he had said."
In July of 1996, when T.W.A. Flight 800 crashed off the coast of Long Island, there was widespread speculation in the C.S.G. that it had been shot down by a shoulder-fired missile from the shore. Dozens of witnesses reported having seen an ascending flare that culminated in an explosion. According to Clarke, O'Neill, working with the Defense Department, determined the height of the aircraft and its distance from shore at the time of the explosion, and demonstrated that it was out of the range of a Stinger missile. He proposed that the flare could have been caused by the ignition of leaking fuel from the aircraft, and he persuaded the C.I.A. to do a video simulation of this scenario, which proved to be strikingly similar to the witnesses' accounts. It is now generally agreed that mechanical failure, not terrorism, caused the explosion of T.W.A. Flight 800.
Clarke immediately spotted in O'Neill an obsessiveness about the dangers of terrorism which mirrored his own. "John had the same problems with the bureaucracy that I had," Clarke told me. "Prior to September 11th, a lot of people who were working full time on terrorism thought it was no more than a nuisance. They didn't understand that Al Qaeda was enormously powerful and insidious and that it was not going to stop until it really hurt us. John and some other senior officials knew that. The impatience really grew in us as we dealt with the dolts who didn't understand."
Osama bin Laden had been linked to terrorism since the first World Trade Center bombing, in 1993. His name had turned up on a list of donors to an Islamic charity that helped finance the bombing, and defendants in the case referred to a "Sheikh Osama" in a recorded conversation. "We started looking at who was involved in these events, and it seemed like an odd group of people getting together," Clarke recalled. "They clearly had money. We'd see C.I.A. reports that referred to 'financier Osama bin Laden,' and we'd ask ourselves, 'Who the hell is he?' The more we drilled down, the more we realized that he was not just a financier—he was the leader. John said, 'We've got to get this guy. He's building a network. Everything leads back to him.' Gradually, the C.I.A. came along with us."
O'Neill worked with Clarke to establish clear lines of responsibility among the intelligence agencies, and in 1995 their efforts resulted in a Presidential directive giving the F.B.I. the lead authority both in investigating and in preventing acts of terrorism wherever Americans or American interests were threatened. After the April, 1995, bombing in Oklahoma City, O'Neill formed a separate section for domestic terrorism, but he concentrated on redesigning and expanding the foreign-terrorism branch. He organized a swap of deputies between his office and the C.I.A.'s counter-terrorism center, despite resistance from both agencies.
"John told me that if you put the resources and talents of the C.I.A.'s counter-terrorism center and the F.B.I.'s counter-terrorism section together on any issue, we can solve it—but we need both," Lipka recalled. In January, 1996, O'Neill helped create a C.I.A. station, code-named Alex, with a single-minded purpose. "Its mission was not just tracking down bin Laden but focussing on his infrastructure, his capabilities, where he got his funding, where were his bases of operation and his training centers," Lipka said. "Many of the same things we are doing now, that station was already doing then."
The coöperation that O'Neill achieved between the bureau and the C.I.A. was all the more remarkable because opinions about him were sharply polarized. O'Neill could be brutal, not only with underlings but also with superiors when they failed to meet his expectations. An agent in the Chicago office who felt his disapproval told me, "He was smarter than everybody else, and he would use that fine mind to absolutely humiliate people."
In Washington, there was one terrorist-related crisis after another. "We worked a bomb a month," Lipka recalled. Often, O'Neill would break for dinner and be back in the office at ten. "Most people couldn't keep up with his passion and intensity," Lipka said. "He was able to identify those people who shared his work ethic, and then he tasked the living shit out of them, with E-mails and status briefings and phones and pagers going off all the time, to the point that I asked him, 'When do you sleep?' " O'Neill began acquiring nicknames that testified to his relentlessness, among them the Count, the Prince of Darkness, and Satan.
But many in the bureau who disliked O'Neill eventually became devoted followers. He went to extraordinary lengths to help when they faced health problems or financial difficulty. "He was our Elvis—you knew when he was in the house," Kevin Giblin, the F.B.I.'s head of terrorist warning, recalled.
O'Neill's tenure in the F.B.I. coincided with the internationalization of crime and law enforcement. Prior to his appointment as the bureau's counter-terrorism chief, the F.B.I. had limited its involvement to operations in which Americans had been killed. "O'Neill came in with a much more global approach," Lipka told me. One of his innovations was to catalogue all the explosives used by terrorists worldwide. "He thought, When a bomb goes off in the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad, even though no Americans were killed, why don't we offer our assistance, so that we can put that information on a global forensic database," Lipka said. Since 1984, the F.B.I. had had the authority to investigate crimes against Americans abroad, but that mandate had been handicapped by a lack of coöperation with foreign police agencies. O'Neill made a habit of entertaining every foreign cop or intelligence agent who entered his orbit. He called it his "night job."
"John's approach to law enforcement was that of the old Irish ward boss to governance: you collect friendships and debts and obligations, because you never know when you're going to need them," Clarke told me. He was constantly on the phone, doing favors, massaging contacts. By the time he died, he had become one of the best-known policemen in the world. "You'd be in Moscow at some bilateral exchange," Giblin recalled, "and you'd see three or four men approach and say, in broken English, 'Do you know John O'Neill?' "
The need to improve relationships with foreign police agencies became apparent in November, 1995, when five Americans and two Indians died in the bombing of an American-run military-training center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The F.B.I. sent over a small squad to investigate, but the agents had scarcely arrived when the Saudis arrested four suspects and beheaded them, foreclosing any opportunity to learn who was behind the operation.
In the spring of 1996, Jamal Ahmed al-Fadl, who had supported a plot by Al Qaeda against American soldiers in Somalia four years earlier, arrived at the American Embassy in Asmara, Eritrea. The C.I.A. debriefed him for six months, then turned him over to the F.B.I., which put him in the witness-protection program. Fadl provided the first extensive road map of the bin Laden terrorist empire. "Fadl was a gold mine," an intelligence source who was present during some of the interviews told me. "He described the network, bin Laden's companies, his farms, his operations in the ports." Fadl also talked about bin Laden's desire to attack Americans, including his ambition to obtain uranium. The news was widely circulated among members of the intelligence community, including O'Neill, and yet the State Department refused to list Al Qaeda as a terrorist organization.
On June 25, 1996, O'Neill arranged a retreat for F.B.I. and C.I.A. agents at the bureau's training center in Quantico, Virginia. "We had hot dogs and hamburgers, and John let the C.I.A. guys on the firing range, because they never get to shoot," Giblin recalled. "Then everyone's beeper went off." Another explosion in Saudi Arabia, at the Khobar Towers, a military-housing complex in Dhahran, had killed nineteen American soldiers and injured more than five hundred other people, including Saudis. O'Neill assembled a team of nearly a hundred agents, support personnel, and members of various police agencies. The next day, they were on an Air Force transport plane to Saudi Arabia. A few weeks later, they were joined by O'Neill and the F.B.I. director, Louis Freeh.
It was evening when the two men arrived in Dhahran. The disaster site was a vast crater illuminated by lights on high stanchions; nearby lay charred automobiles and upended Humvees. Looming above the debris were the ruins of the housing complex. This was the largest bomb that the F.B.I. had ever investigated, even more powerful than the explosives that had killed a hundred and sixty-eight people in Oklahoma City in 1995. O'Neill walked through the rubble, greeting exhausted agents who were sifting the sand for evidence. Under a tarp nearby, investigators were gradually reconstructing fragments of the truck that had carried the bomb.
In the Khobar Towers case, neither the Saudis nor the State Department seemed eager to pursue a trail of evidence that pointed to Iranian terrorists as the likeliest perpetrators. The Clinton Administration did not relish the prospect of military retaliation against a country that seemed to be moderating its anti-Western policies, and, according to Clarke, the Saudis impeded the F.B.I. investigation because they were worried about the American response. "They were afraid that we would have to bomb Iran," I was told by a Clinton Administration official, who added that that would have been a likely course of action.
Freeh was initially optimistic that the Saudis would coöperate, but O'Neill became increasingly frustrated, and eventually a rift seems to have developed between the two men. "John started telling Louis things Louis didn't want to hear," Clarke said. "John told me that, after one of the many trips he and Freeh took to the Mideast to get better coöperation from the Saudis, they boarded the Gulfstream to come home and Freeh says, 'Wasn't that a great trip? I think they're really going to help us.' And John says, 'You've got to be kidding. They didn't give us anything. They were just shining sunshine up your ass.' For the next twelve hours, Freeh didn't say another word to him."
Freeh denies that this conversation took place. "Of course, John and I discussed the results of every trip at that time," he wrote to me in an E-mail. "However, John never made that statement to me. . . . John and I had an excellent relationship based on trust and friendship."
O'Neill longed to get out of Washington so that he could "go operational," as he told John Lipka, and supervise cases again. In January, 1997, he became special agent in charge of the National Security Division in New York, the bureau's largest and most prestigious field office. When he arrived, he dumped four boxes of Rolodex cards on the desk of his new secretary, Lorraine di Taranto. Then he handed her a list of everyone he wanted to meet—"the mayor, the police commissioner, the deputy police commissioners, the heads of the federal agencies, religious and ethnic leaders," di Taranto recalled. Within six months, O'Neill had met everyone on the list.
"Everybody knew John," R. P. Eddy, who left Washington in 1999 for a job at the United Nations, told me. "You would walk into Elaine's or Bruno's with him, and everyone from the owner to the waiters to the guy who cleaned the floor would look up. And the amazing thing is they would all have a private discussion with him at some point. The waitress wanted tickets to a Michael Jackson concert. One of the wait staff was applying for a job with the bureau, and John would be helping him with that. After a night of this, I remember saying, 'John, you've got this town wired.' And he said, 'What's the point of being sheriff if you can't act like one?' "
O'Neill was soon on intimate terms with movie stars, politicians, and journalists—what some of his detractors called "the Elaine's crowd." In the spring of 1998, one of O'Neill's New York friends, a producer at ABC News named Christopher Isham, arranged an interview for a network reporter, John Miller, with Osama bin Laden. Miller's narration contained information to the effect that one of bin Laden's aides was coöperating with the F.B.I. The leak of that detail created, in Isham's words, "a firestorm in the bureau." O'Neill, because of his friendship with Isham and Miller, was suspected of providing the information, and an internal investigation was launched. The matter died down after the newsmen denied that O'Neill was their informant and volunteered to take polygraphs.
In New York, O'Neill created a special Al Qaeda desk, and when the bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania occurred, in August, 1998, he was sure that bin Laden was behind them. "He was pissed, he was beside himself," Robert M. Blitzer, who was head of the F.B.I.'s domestic-terrorism section at the time, remembered. "He was calling me every day. He wanted control of that investigation." O'Neill persuaded Freeh to let the New York office handle the case, and he eventually dispatched nearly five hundred investigators to Africa. Mary Jo White, whose prosecuting team subsequently convicted five defendants in the case, told me, "John O'Neill, in the investigation of the bombings of our embassies in East Africa, created the template for successful investigations of international terrorism around the world."
The counter-terrorist community was stunned by the level of coördination required to pull off the simultaneous bombings. Even more troubling was the escalation of violence against civilians. According to Steven Simon, then a terrorist expert at the N.S.C., as many as five American embassies had been targeted—luck and better intelligence had saved the others. It was discouraging to learn that, nearly a year before, a member of Al Qaeda had walked into the American Embassy in Nairobi and told the C.I.A. of the bombing plot. The agency had dismissed this intelligence as unreliable. "The guy was a bullshit artist, completely off the map," an intelligence source said. But his warnings about the impending attacks proved accurate.
Moreover, key members of the Al Qaeda cell that planned the operation had been living in one of the most difficult places in the Western world to gain intelligence: the United States. The F.B.I. is constrained from spying on American citizens and visitors without probable cause. Lacking evidence that potential conspirators were actively committing a crime, the bureau could do little to gather information on the domestic front. O'Neill felt that his hands were tied. "John was never satisfied," one of his friends in the bureau recalled. "He said we were fighting a war, but we were not able to fight back. He thought we never had the tools in place to do the job."
O'Neill never presumed that killing bin Laden alone would be sufficient. In speeches, he identified five tools to combat terrorism: diplomacy, military action, covert operations, economic sanctions, and law enforcement. So far, the tool that had worked most effectively against Al Qaeda was the last one—the slow, difficult work of gathering evidence, getting indictments, hunting down the perpetrators, and gaining convictions.
O'Neill was worried that terrorists had established a beachhead in America. In a June, 1997, speech in Chicago, he warned, "Almost all of the groups today, if they chose to, have the ability to strike us here in the United States." He was particularly concerned that, as the millennium approached, Al Qaeda would seize the moment to dramatize its war with America. The intelligence to support that hypothesis was frustratingly absent, however.
On December 14, 1999, a border guard in Port Angeles, Washington, stopped an Algerian man, Ahmed Ressam, who then bolted from his car. He was captured as he tried to hijack another automobile. In the trunk of his car were four timers, more than a hundred pounds of urea, and fourteen pounds of sulfate—the makings of an Oklahoma City-type bomb. It turned out that Ressam's target was Los Angeles International Airport. The following day, Jordanian authorities arrested thirteen suspected terrorists who were believed to be planning to blow up a Radisson Hotel in Amman and a number of tourist sites frequented by Westerners. The Jordanians also discovered an Al Qaeda training manual on CD-ROM.
What followed was, according to Clarke, the most comprehensive investigation ever conducted before September 11th. O'Neill's job was to supervise the operation in New York. Authorities had found several phone numbers on Ressam when he was arrested. There was also a name, Ghani, which belonged to Abdel Ghani Meskini, an Algerian, who lived in Brooklyn and who had travelled to Seattle to meet with Ressam. O'Neill oversaw the stakeout of Meskini's residence and spent much of his time in the Brooklyn command post. "I doubt he slept the whole month," David N. Kelley, an assistant United States Attorney and chief of organized crime and terrorism for the Southern District, recalled. A wiretap picked up a call that Meskini had made to Algeria in which he spoke about Ressam and a suspected terrorist in Montreal. On December 30th, O'Neill arrested Meskini on conspiracy charges and a number of other suspected terrorists on immigration violations. (Meskini and Ressam eventually became coöperating witnesses and are both assisting the F.B.I.'s investigation of the September 11th attacks.)
O'Neill was proud of the efforts of the F.B.I. and the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force to avert catastrophe. On New Year's Eve, he and his friend Joseph Dunne, then the Chief of Department for the New York City Police, went to Times Square, which they believed was a highly likely target. At midnight, O'Neill called friends at SIOC and boasted that he was standing directly under the giant crystal ball.
After the millennium roundup, O'Neill suspected that Al Qaeda had sleeper cells buried in America. "He started pulling the strings in Jordan and in Canada, and in the end they all led back to the United States," Clarke said. "There was a general disbelief in the F.B.I. that Al Qaeda had much of a presence here. It just hadn't sunk through to the organization, beyond O'Neill and Dale Watson"—the assistant director of the counter-terrorism division. Clarke's discussions with O'Neill and Watson over the next few months led to a strategic plan called the Millennium After-Action Review, which specified a number of policy changes designed to root out Al Qaeda cells in the United States. They included increasing the number of Joint Terrorism Task Forces around the country; assigning more agents from the Internal Revenue Service and the Immigration and Naturalization Service to monitor the flow of money and personnel; and creating a streamlined process for analyzing information obtained from wiretaps.
Many in the F.B.I. point to the millennium investigation as one of the bureau's great recent successes. A year earlier, O'Neill had been passed over when the position of assistant director in charge of national security became available. When the post of chief of the New York office opened up, in early 2000, O'Neill lobbied fiercely for it. The job went to Barry Mawn, a former special agent in charge of the Boston office. As it happened, the two men met at a seminar just after the decision was announced. "I got a knock on the door, and there was John holding two beers," Mawn recalled. O'Neill promised complete loyalty in return for Mawn's support of his work on counter-terrorism. "It turns out that supporting him was a full-time job," Mawn said.
O'Neill had many detractors and very few defenders left in Washington. Despite occasional disagreements, Louis Freeh had always supported O'Neill, but Freeh had announced that he would retire in June, 2001. A friend of O'Neill's, Jerry Hauer, of the New York-based security firm Kroll, told me that Thomas Pickard, who had become the bureau's deputy director in 1999, was "an institutional roadblock." Hauer added, "It was very clear to John that Pickard was never going to let him get promoted." Others felt that O'Neill was his own worst enemy. "He was always trying to leverage himself to the next job," Dale Watson said. John Lipka, who considers himself a close friend of O'Neill, attributes some of O'Neill's problems to his flamboyant image. "The bureau doesn't like high-profile people," he said. "It's a very conservative culture."
The World Trade Center had become a symbol of America's success in fighting terrorism, and in September, 2000, the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force celebrated its twentieth anniversary in the Windows on the World restaurant. The event was attended by representatives of seventeen law-enforcement agencies, including agents from the F.B.I. and the C.I.A., New York City and Port Authority policemen, United States marshals, and members of the Secret Service. Mary Jo White praised the task force for a "close to absolutely perfect record of successful investigations and convictions." White had served eight years as the United States Attorney for the Southern District, and she had convicted twenty-five Islamic terrorists, including Yousef, six other World Trade Center bombers, the blind cleric Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, and nine of Rahman's followers, who had planned to blow up the Lincoln and Holland Tunnels, the United Nations headquarters, and the F.B.I. offices.
O'Neill seemed at ease that night. Few of his colleagues knew of a troubling incident that had occurred two months earlier at an F.B.I. pre-retirement conference in Orlando. During a meeting, O'Neill had been paged. He left the room to return the call, and when he came back, a few minutes later, the other agents had broken for lunch. His briefcase, which contained classified material, was missing. O'Neill immediately called the local police, and they found the briefcase a couple of hours later, in another hotel. A Montblanc pen had been stolen, along with a silver cigar cutter and a lighter. The papers were intact; fingerprint analysis soon established that they had not been touched.
"He phoned me and said, 'I gotta tell you something,' " Barry Mawn recalled. O'Neill told Mawn that the briefcase contained some classified E-mails and one highly sensitive document, the Annual Field Office Report, which is an overview of every counter-terrorist and counter-espionage case in New York. Mawn reported the incident to Neil Gallagher, the bureau's assistant director in charge of national security. "John understood the seriousness of what he had done, and if he were alive today he'd tell you he made a stupid mistake," Gallagher told me. Even though none of the information had been compromised, the Justice Department ordered a criminal inquiry.
Mawn said that, as O'Neill's supervisor, he would have recommended an oral reprimand or, at worst, a letter of censure. Despite their competition for the top job in New York, Mawn had become one of O'Neill's staunchest defenders. "He demanded perfection, which was a large part of why the New York office is so terrific," Mawn said. "But underneath his manner, deep down, he was very insecure."
On October 12, 2000, a small boat filled with C4 explosives motored alongside a U.S. destroyer, the Cole, which was fuelling up off the coast of Yemen. Two men aboard the small craft waved at the larger vessel, then blew themselves to pieces. Seventeen American sailors died, and thirty-nine others were seriously wounded.
O'Neill knew that Yemen was going to be an extremely difficult place in which to conduct an investigation. In 1992, bin Laden's network had bombed a hotel in Aden, hoping to kill a number of American soldiers. The country was filled with spies and with jihadis and was reeling from a 1994 civil war. "Yemen is a country of eighteen million citizens and 50 million machine guns," O'Neill reported. On the day the investigators arrived in Yemen, O'Neill warned them, "This may be the most hostile environment the F.B.I. has ever operated in."
The American Ambassador to Yemen, Barbara Bodine, saw things differently. In her eyes, Yemen was the poor and guileless cousin of the swaggering petro-monarchies of the Persian Gulf. Unlike other countries in the region, it was a constitutional democracy—however fragile—in which women were allowed to vote. Bodine had had extensive experience in Arab countries. During the Iraqi invasion and occupation of Kuwait, she had been the deputy chief of mission in Kuwait City, and she had stayed through the hundred-and-thirty-seven-day siege of the American Embassy by Iraqi troops until all the Americans were evacuated.
Bodine, who is on assignment from the State Department as diplomat-in-residence at the University of California at Santa Barbara, contends that she and O'Neill had agreed that he would bring in a team of no more than fifty. She was furious when three hundred investigators, support staff, and marines arrived, many carrying automatic weapons. "Try to imagine if a military plane from another country landed in Des Moines, and three hundred heavily armed people took over," she told me recently. Bodine recalled that she pleaded with O'Neill to consider the delicate diplomatic environment he was entering. She quoted him as responding, "We don't care about the environment. We're just here to investigate a crime."
"There was the F.B.I. way, and that was it," she said to me. "O'Neill wasn't unique. He was simply extreme." According to Michael Sheehan, who was the State Department's coördinator for counter-terrorism at the time, such conflicts between ambassadors and the bureau are not unusual, given their differing perspectives; however, Bodine had been given clear instructions from the outset of the investigation. "I drafted a cable under [then Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright's signature saying that there were three guiding principles," Sheehan said. "The highest priorities were the immediate safety of American personnel and the investigation of the attack. No. 3 was maintaining a relationship with the government of Yemen— but only to support those objectives."
O'Neill's investigators were billeted three or four to a room in an Aden hotel. "Forty-five F.B.I. personnel slept on mats on the ballroom floor," he later reported. He set up a command post on the eighth floor, which was surrounded by sandbags and protected by a company of fifty marines.
O'Neill spent much of his time coaxing the Yemeni authorities to coöperate. To build a case that would hold up in American courts, he wanted his agents present during interrogations by local authorities, in part to insure that none of the suspects were tortured. He also wanted to gather eyewitness testimony from residents who had seen the explosion. Both the Yemeni authorities and Bodine resisted these requests. "You want a bunch of six-foot-two Irish-Americans to go door-to-door?" Bodine remembers saying to O'Neill. "And, excuse me, but how many of your guys speak Arabic?"
There were only half a dozen Arabic speakers in the F.B.I. contingent, and even O'Neill acknowledged that their competence was sometimes in question. On one occasion, he complained to a Yemeni intelligence officer, "Getting information out of you is like pulling teeth." When his comment was translated, the Yemeni's eyes widened. The translator had told him, "If you don't give me the information I want, I'm going to pull out your teeth."
When O'Neill expressed his frustration to Washington, President Clinton sent a note to President Ali Abdullah Saleh. It had little effect. According to agents on the scene, O'Neill's people were never given the authority they needed for a proper investigation. Much of their time was spent on board the Cole, interviewing sailors, or lounging around the sweltering hotel. Some of O'Neill's requests for evidence mystified the Yemenis. They couldn't understand, for instance, why he was demanding a hat worn by one of the conspirators, which O'Neill wanted to examine for DNA evidence. Even the harbor sludge, which contained residue from the bomb, was off limits until the bureau paid the Yemeni government a million dollars to dredge it.
There were so many perceived threats that the agents often slept in their clothes and with their guns at their sides. Bodine thought that much of this fear was overblown. "They were deeply suspicious of everyone, including the hotel staff," she told me. She assured O'Neill that gunfire outside the hotel was probably not directed at the investigators but was simply the noise of wedding celebrations. Still, she added that, for the investigators' own safety, she wanted to lower the bureau's profile by reducing the number of agents and stripping them of heavy weapons. Upon receiving a bomb threat, the investigators evacuated the hotel and moved to an American vessel, the U.S.S. Duluth. After that, they had to request permission just to come ashore.
Relations between Bodine and O'Neill deteriorated to the point that Barry Mawn flew to Yemen to assess the situation. "She represented that John was insulting, and not getting along well with the Yemenis," he recalled. Mawn talked to members of the F.B.I. team and American military officers, and he observed O'Neill's interactions with Yemeni authorities. He told O'Neill that he was doing "an outstanding job." On Mawn's return, he reported favorably on O'Neill to Freeh, adding that Bodine was his "only detractor."
An ambassador, however, has authority over which Americans are allowed to stay in a foreign country. A month after the investigation began, Assistant Director Dale Watson told the Washington Post, "Sustained cooperation" with the Yemenis "has enabled the F.B.I. to further reduce its in-country presence. . . . The F.B.I. will soon be able to bring home the F.B.I.'s senior on-scene commander, John O'Neill." It appeared to be a very public surrender. The same day, the Yemeni Prime Minister told the Post that no link had been discovered between the Cole bombers and Al Qaeda.
The statement was premature, to say the least. In fact, it is possible that some of the planning for the Cole bombing and the September 11th attacks took place simultaneously. It is now believed that at least two of the suspected conspirators in the Cole bombing had attended a meeting of alleged bin Laden associates in Malaysia, in January, 2000. Under C.I.A. pressure, Malaysian authorities had conducted a surveillance of the gathering, turning up a number of faces but, in the absence of wiretaps, nothing of what was said. "It didn't seem like much at the time," a Clinton Administration official told me. "None of the faces showed up in our own files." Early last year, the F.B.I. targeted the men who were present at the Malaysia meeting as potential terrorists. Two of them were subsequently identified as hijackers in the September 11th attacks.
After two months in Yemen, O'Neill came home feeling that he was fighting the counter-terrorism battle without support from his own government. He had made some progress in gaining access to evidence, but so far the investigation had been a failure. Concerned about continuing threats against the remaining F.B.I. investigators, he tried to return in January of 2001. Bodine denied his application to reënter the country. She refuses to discuss that decision. "Too much is being made of John O'Neill's being in Yemen or not," she told me. "John O'Neill did not discover Al Qaeda. He did not discover Osama bin Laden. So the idea that John or his people or the F.B.I. were somehow barred from doing their job is insulting to the U.S. government, which was working on Al Qaeda before John ever showed up. This is all my embassy did for ten months. The fact that not every single thing John O'Neill asked for was appropriate or possible does not mean that we did not support the investigation."
After O'Neill's departure, the remaining agents, feeling increasingly vulnerable, retreated to the American Embassy in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen. In June, the Yemeni authorities arrested eight men who they said were part of a plot to blow up the Embassy. New threats against the F.B.I. followed, and Freeh, acting upon O'Neill's recommendation, withdrew the team entirely. Its members were, he told me, "the highest target during this period." Bodine calls the pullout "unconscionable." In her opinion, there was never a specific, credible threat against the bureau. The American Embassy, Bodine points out, stayed open. But within days American military forces in the Middle East were put on top alert.
Few people in the bureau knew that O'Neill had a wife and two children (John, Jr., and his younger sister, Carol) in New Jersey, who did not join him when he moved to Chicago, in 1991. In his New York office, the most prominent pictures were not family photographs but French Impressionist prints. On his coffee table was a book about tulips, and his office was always filled with flowers. He was a terrific dancer, and he boasted that he had been on "American Bandstand" when he was a teen-ager. Some women found him irresistibly sexy. Others thought him a cad.
Shortly after he arrived in Chicago, O'Neill met Valerie James, a fashion sales director, who was divorced and was raising two children. Four years later, when he transferred to headquarters, in Washington, he also began seeing Anna DiBattista, who worked for a travel agency. Then, when he moved to New York, Valerie James joined him. In 1999, DiBattista moved to New York to take a new job, complicating his life considerably. His friends in Chicago and New York knew Valerie, and his friends in Washington knew Anna. If his friends happened to see him in the company of the "wrong" woman, he pledged them to secrecy.
On holidays, O'Neill went home to New Jersey to visit his parents and to see his children. Only John P. O'Neill, Jr., who is a computer expert for the credit-card company M.B.N.A., in Wilmington, Delaware, agreed to speak to me about his father. His remarks were guarded. He described a close relationship—"We talked a few times a week"—but there are parts of his father's past that he refuses to discuss. "My father liked to keep his private life private," he said.
Both James and DiBattista remember how O'Neill would beg for forgiveness and then promise better times. James told me, "He'd say, 'I just want to be loved, just love me,' but you couldn't really trust him, so he never got the love he asked for."
The stress of O'Neill's tangled personal life began to affect his professional behavior. One night, he left his Palm Pilot in Yankee Stadium; it was filled with his police contacts all around the world. On another occasion, he left his cell phone in a cab. In the summer of 1999, he and James were driving to the Jersey shore when his Buick broke down near the Meadowlands. As it happened, his bureau car was parked nearby, at a secret office location, and O'Neill switched cars. One of the most frequently violated rules in the bureau is the use of an official vehicle for personal reasons, and O'Neill's infraction might have been overlooked had he not let James enter the building to use the bathroom. "I had no idea what it was," she told me. Still, when the F.B.I. learned about the violation, apparently from an agent who had been caught using the site as an auto-repair shop, O'Neill was reprimanded and docked fifteen days' pay. He regarded the bureau's action as part of a pattern. "The last two years of his life, he got very paranoid," James told me. "He was convinced there were people out to get him."
In March, 2001, Richard Clarke asked the national-security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, for a job change; he wanted to concentrate on computer security. "I was told, 'You've got to recommend somebody similar to be your replacement,' " Clarke recalled. "I said, 'Well, there's only one person who would fit that bill.' " For months, Clarke tried to persuade O'Neill to become a candidate as his successor.
O'Neill had always harbored two aspirations—to become a deputy director of the bureau in Washington or to take over the New York office. Freeh was retiring in June, so there were likely to be some vacancies at the top, but the investigation into the briefcase incident would likely block any promotion in the bureau. O'Neill viewed Clarke's job as, in many ways, a perfect fit for him. But he was financially pressed, and Clarke's job paid no more than he was making at the F.B.I. Throughout the summer, O'Neill refused to commit himself to Clarke's offer. He talked about it with a number of friends but became alarmed when he thought that headquarters might hear of it. "He called me in a worked-up state," Clarke recalled. "He said that people in the C.I.A. and elsewhere know you are considering recommending me for your job. You have to tell them it's not true." Clarke dutifully called a friend in the agency, even though O'Neill still wanted to be a candidate for the position.
In July, O'Neill heard of a job opening in the private sector which would pay more than twice his government salary—that of chief of security for the World Trade Center. Although the Justice Department dropped its inquiry into the briefcase incident, the bureau was conducting an internal investigation of its own. O'Neill was aware that the Times was preparing a story about the affair, and he learned that the reporters also knew about the incident in New Jersey involving James and had classified information that probably came from the bureau's investigative files.The leak seemed to be timed to destroy O'Neill's chance of being confirmed for the N.S.C. job. He decided to retire.
O'Neill suspected that the source of the information was either Tom Pickard or Dale Watson. The antagonism between him and Pickard was well known. "I've got a pretty good Irish temper and so did John," Pickard, who retired last November, told me. But he insisted that their differences were professional, not personal. The leak was "somebody being pretty vicious to John," but Pickard maintained that he did not do it. "I'd take a polygraph to it," he said. Watson told me, "If you're asking me who leaks F.B.I. information, I have no idea. I know I don't, and I know that Tom Pickard doesn't, and I know that the director doesn't." For all the talk about polygraphs, the bureau ruled out an investigation into the source of the leak, despite an official request by Barry Mawn, in New York.
Meanwhile, intelligence had been streaming in concerning a likely Al Qaeda attack. "It all came together in the third week in June," Clarke said. "The C.I.A.'s view was that a major terrorist attack was coming in the next several weeks." On July 5th, Clarke summoned all the domestic security agencies—the Federal Aviation Administration, the Coast Guard, Customs, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the F.B.I.—and told them to increase their security in light of an impending attack.
On August 19th, the Times ran an article about the briefcase incident and O'Neill's forthcoming retirement, which was to take place three days later. There was a little gathering for coffee as he packed up his office.
When O'Neill told ABC's Isham of his decision to work at the Trade Center, Isham had said jokingly, "At least they're not going to bomb it again." O'Neill had replied, "They'll probably try to finish the job." On the day he started at the Trade Center—August 23rd—the C.I.A. sent a cable to the F.B.I. saying that two suspected Al Qaeda terrorists were already in the country. The bureau tried to track them down, but the addresses they had given when they entered the country proved to be false, and the men were never located.
When he was growing up in Atlantic City, O'Neill was an altar boy at St. Nicholas of Tolentine Church. On September 28th, a week after his body was found in the rubble of the World Trade Center, a thousand mourners gathered at St. Nicholas to say farewell. Many of them were agents and policemen and members of foreign intelligence services who had followed O'Neill into the war against terrorism long before it became a rallying cry for the nation. The hierarchy of the F.B.I. attended, including the now retired director Louis Freeh. Richard Clarke, who says that he had not shed a tear since September 11th, suddenly broke down when the bagpipes played and the casket passed by.
O'Neill's last weeks had been happy ones. The moment he left the F.B.I., his spirits had lifted. He talked about getting a new Mercedes to replace his old Buick. He told Anna that they could now afford to get married. On the last Saturday night of his life, he attended a wedding with Valerie, and they danced nearly every number. He told a friend within Valerie's hearing, "I'm gonna get her a ring."
On September 10th, O'Neill called Robert Tucker, a friend and security-company executive, and arranged to get together that evening to talk about security issues at the Trade Center. Tucker met O'Neill in the lobby of the north tower, and the two men rode the elevator up to O'Neill's new office, on the thirty-fourth floor. "He was incredibly proud of what he was doing," Tucker told me. Then they went to a bar at the top of the tower for a drink. Afterward, they headed uptown to Elaine's, where they were joined by their friend Jerry Hauer. Around midnight, the three men dropped in on the China Club, a night spot in midtown. "John made the statement that he thought something big was going to happen," Hauer recalled.
Valerie James waited up for O'Neill. He didn't come in until 2:30 A.M. "The next morning, I was frosty," she recalled. "He came into my bathroom and put his arms around me. He said, 'Please forgive me.' " He offered to drive her to work, and dropped her off at eight-thirteen in the flower district, where she had an appointment, and headed to the Trade Center.
At 8:46 A.M., when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the north tower, John P. O'Neill, Jr., was on a train to New York, to install some computer equipment and visit his father's new office. From the window of the train he saw smoke coming from the Trade Center. He called his father on his cell phone. "He said he was O.K. He was on his way out to assess the damage," John, Jr., recalled.
Valerie James was arranging flowers in her office when "the phones started ringing off the hook." A second airliner had just hit the south tower. "At nine-seventeen, John calls," James remembered. He said, "Honey, I want you to know I'm O.K. My God, Val, it's terrible. There are body parts everywhere. Are you crying?" he asked. She was. Then he said, "Val, I think my employers are dead. I can't lose this job."
"They're going to need you more than ever," she told him.
At nine-twenty-five, Anna DiBattista, who was driving to Philadelphia on business, received a call from O'Neill. "The connection was good at the beginning," she recalled. "He was safe and outside. He said he was O.K. I said, 'Are you sure you're out of the building?' He told me he loved me. I knew he was going to go back in."
Wesley Wong, an F.B.I. agent who had known O'Neill for more than twenty years, raced over to the north tower to help set up a command center. "John arrived on the scene," Wong recalled. "He asked me if there was any information I could divulge. I knew he was now basically an outsider. One of the questions he asked was 'Is it true the Pentagon has been hit?' I said, 'Gee, John, I don't know. Let me try to find out.' At one point, he was on his cell phone and he was having trouble with the reception and started walking away. I said, 'I'll catch up with you later.' "
Wong last saw O'Neill walking toward the tunnel leading to the second tower.
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?020114fa_FACT1
O'Neill Versus Osama
By Robert Kolker
December 17, 2001
Most of the victims of the September 11 attack seemed tragically random -- they were just going to work. Not John O'Neill. Until last August, he'd been the FBI's top expert on Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, a lead investigator of the USS Cole and African embassy bombings. Leaving the Bureau in frustration, he'd taken a job he thought of as retirement: World Trade Center security chief. But when he died it became clear: His own life contained as many mysteries as his enemy's. [Continue reading at]:
http://www.newyorkmetro.com/nymetro/news/sept11/features/5513/
FBI terrorist fighter's body found at WTC
NEW YORK (CNN) --The body of John P. O'Neill, a former assistant director of the FBI and an expert on terrorism, was recovered Friday from the rubble of the World Trade Center.
O'Neill had recently retired from the FBI and had just taken over security for the World Trade Center, said New York City Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik.
"That Tuesday was his first or second day on the job," Kerik said Friday in an interview with CNN's Larry King Live. . "He was going to go into One World Trade, the tower one, and when the strike came he went into the second tower in an attempt to help people get out of the building and he died there. We found his body today."
O'Neill, 50, was the chief of international terrorism operations for the FBI. He supervised on-site investigations of the bombing by terrorists of the USS Cole in Yemen last year, and the 1998 attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
A 1996 article published in the Van Impe Intelligence Briefing quoted O'Neill as saying, "No longer is it just the fear of being attacked by international terrorist organizations -- attacks against Americans and American interests overseas. A lot of these groups now have the capability and the support infrastructure in the United States to attack us here if they choose to do so."
In a 1997 speech to a meeting of the National Strategy Forum in Chicago, he called Afghanistan's conflict with Russia "a major watershed event" in terrorism.
Aided by the United States, Afghanistan "beat one of the largest standing armies in the world at that time, which gave them a buoyed sense of success and that they could take on other countries like the U.S. and be likewise successful," he said.
"John was a very good friend ... a great guy, a patriotic American," said New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. "Our hearts and sympathy and condolences go out to his family."
http://edition.cnn.com/2001/US/09/21/vic.body.terror.expert/
John O'Neill, Assassinated
http://judicial-inc.biz/Oneill.htm
John P. O'Neill Wall of Heroes
Rove and "All the _resident's men" might view this list as a carbon copy of their cabal's growing "enemies list." The individuals and groups cited here have acted or spoken heroically in defense of the US Constitution (in particular, the sanctity of the vote and the freedom of the press) as well as the UN Charter, the NATO alliance, the national security of the US, the economic security of the US, the environmental security of the US and/or other vital principles and institutions.
(NOTE: There are many others not yet listed here. This list is meant to be representative, not all-inclusive. Click on Explosive Books and "Vital Links" for authors (e.g., Mark Crispin Miller), columnists (e.g., Paul Krugman) and Information Rebellion Web sites (e.g., Buzzflash) that have fueled the resistance! All of them also, by right, deserve to have their names scrawled on the wall of heroes.)
US and British government officials or employees who resigned in protest and/or have spoken out:
John O'Neill, FBI counterterrorism investigator who resigned in frustration with the _resident's administration, went to work as security chief of the World Trade Center and died on 9/11 attempting to rescue others. The remarkable story of John O'Neil is told in the French best-seller Forbidden Truth, in a lengthy New Yorker magazine feature, and in an hour-long PBS Frontline documentary.
Richard Clarke, US Counterterrorism Czar, National
Security Council official, who exposed the _resident's incompetence both
pre-9/11 and post-9/11 in his book, Against All Enemies, and under oath
at the 9/11 commission hearings.
Rand Beers, National Security Council official, resigned in protest
over the _resident's handling of the "war on terrorism," spoke out publicly
and went to work for Sen. John Kerry (D-Mekong Delta).
Joseph Wilson, former Poppy Bush ambassador to Iraq, spoke out publicly denouncing the _resident for using the "Niger uranium" lie in the 2003 SOTU as a justification for the war in Iraq.
Greg Thielmann, former State Dept. intelligence official, who spoke out publicly on the _resident's trumped up excuses for his unilateral, "pre-emptive" war in Iraq.
Eric Schaeffer, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official, who resigned in protest and spoke out publicly to denounce the _resident's pro-polluter actions within the EPA.
Colleen Rawley, FBI investigator who blew the whistle and spoke publicly about how her attempts to get action on pre-9/11 intelligence on Al-Qaeda pilot training in the US were blocked by officials at the _resident's Just Us Dept. in D.C.
Sibel Edmonds, former FBI translator who is blowing the whistle on the White House's 9/11 cover-up.
Paul O'Neill, the _resident's former Treasury Secretary, who reported on the Bush administration obsession with Iraq and talk early on of removing Saddam Hussein.
Roger Cressey, terrorism expert in both Democratic and Republican administrations, quoted on NBC: Is Cressey saying that some senior members of the Bush administration viewed Saddam Hussein as a greater threat to the United States than Osama bin Laden? "Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. It was inconceivable to them that al-Qaida could be this talented, this capable without Iraq, in this case, providing them real support."
Robin Cook, Glenda Jackson and Clair Short, members of the British cabinet, Labor Party MPs, who resigned in protest of various misdeeds by the-shell-of-a-man-formerly-known-as-Tony Blair.
Michael Meacher, who resigned as UK Environment Minister, who wrote in the Guardian that "the war on terrorism is a smokescreen and that the US knew in advance about the September 11 attack on New York but, for strategic reasons, chose not to act on the warnings"
Dr. David Kelly, UK's leading bio-war expert, found dead in an alleged suicide (under investigation by a special inquiry in the UK) after being "outed" as the source for a BBC story on false allegations about WMD made by the-shell-of-a-man-formerly-known-as-Tony Blair in the ramp up the war in Iraq.
Katharine Gun, who worked as a translator at Britain's super-secret Government Communications Headquarters and now faces up to two years in prison
Andrew Wilkie, Australian intelligence officer, who gave testimony on the lies which the US, UK and Australian governments fed to their peoples.
Judge Guido Calabresi, 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals
Nicole Rank, a FEMA worker in West Virginia, and her husband Jeff, who were handcuffed and arrested at a 4th of July event for wearing anti-Bush tee-shirts
former U.S. Park Police Chief Teresa Chambers, fired for speaking the truth about the Bush Abomination
Michael F. Scheuer (aka "Anonymous") US CIA
James Hansen NASA
U.S. elected officials and U.S. former elected officials:
Congressional Black Caucus
Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-WV), who has made several speeches, denouncing the _resident's rush to war and articulating the danger to the Republic poised by the _resident's arrogance and misguided policies. These powerful orations, delivered while too many other Senators simply went along with the war cry, will go down in history as among the most important ever made from the floor of the U.S. Senate.
Former Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fraudida), who has spoke out on the 9/11 cover-up since the most painful days of mid-September 2001, who has courageously and relentlessly demanded full disclosure on what didn't happen pre-9/11, and who has even calmly discussed "impeachment."
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI), the only Senator to vote against the so-called PATRIOT ACT.
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), who has courageously and relentlessly demanded full disclosure in numerous scandals involving "all the _resident's men," incuding his demand that then NBC chairman Jack Welch release an election night newsroom video tape which allegedly records his instructions for NBC news to call the election for Bush in spite of the chaos that had broken out in Fraudida, as well as his demand for the release of VICE _resident's Cheney's "Energy Task Force" documents.
Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), quoted in Associated Press: Rep. Jim McDermott, who drew headlines across the globe last year for criticizing President Bush while in Baghdad, is enmeshed in a new controversy over remarks he made about the capture of Saddam Hussein...Asked again if he meant to imply the Bush administration timed the capture for political reasons, McDermott said: "I don't know that it was definitely planned on this weekend, but I know they've been in contact with people all along who knew basically where he was. It was just a matter of time till they'd find him. "It's funny," McDermott added, "when they're having all this trouble, suddenly they have to roll out something."
Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA.) who spoke out on the record in the US Congress, demanding answers to numerous disturbing questions about what didn't happen before 9/11 and what did happen on and immediately after 9/11. McKinney lost her seat when she was defeated in a "Democratic" primary after being redistricted, in the months following her then explosive and now not so outrageous speech. She has since been voted back into the U.S. House of Representatives.
Former Senator Max Cleland (D-Georgia)Now outspoken member of the independent 9/11 commission investigation, robbed of his Senate seat duew to a) the shameless attack orchestrated by the Bush cabal's political hitmen and a) some "touch screen voting" technology
Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-MN) and Gov. Mel Carnahan (D-Misery), both of whom died in mysterious small plane crashes during hotly contested US Senate campaigns.
Rep. Doug Bereuter (R-NE)
Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE)
former Rep. Bob Barr (R-GA)
Howard Dean (D-Jeffords)
President-Elect Al Gore
Former Senators Gary Hart (D-CO) and Warren Rudman (R-NH), for highlighting the need for real Homeland Security as opposed to the crayola crayon folly of the _resident's Dept. of Homeland Insecurity
Former US President Jimmy Carter
Former Lt. Gov. of Texas Ben Barnes
Former Minnestoa Governor Elmer Anderson (R), who wrote in the Star-Tribune: "I am more fearful for the state of this nation than I have ever been -- because this country is in the hands of an evil man: Dick Cheney. It is eminently clear that it is he who is running the country, not George W. Bush."
U.S. Military and Intelligence (active and retired):
Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, US Army
General William Odom, former NSA Director
Admiral Stansfield Turner, former CIA Director
Captain Ian Fishback, US Army
Brigadier General Janet Karpinski
Col. Lew Tyree, US Army Reserve, quoted in Charleston (WV) Gazette: "I
feel we were not told the truth. I do not think we should be there. America
is in more danger now because we are using up a tremendous amount of human
resources, the soldiers. We tend to ignore that there are well over 1,000
dead and well over 7,000 injured. We use many of the soldiers time and
time again. Where are the replacements going to come from? We're getting
re-enlistments, but not recruits. Where is the strength for defending this
country in another arena?"
Staff Sgt. Charles Pollard, quoted in Washington Post
Spc. Clinton Deitz , "If Donald Rumsfeld was here," he said, "I'd ask him
for his resignation," quoted on ABC News
Air Force Lt Col Karen Kwiatkowski), in Knight Ridder, "If one is seeking
the answers to why peculiar bits of 'intelligence' found sanctity in a
presidential speech, or why the post-Saddam [Hussein] occupation [of Iraq]
has been distinguished by confusion and false steps, one need look no further
than the process inside the Office of the Secretary of Defense [OSD]."
Pfc. Isaac Kindblade), in The Oregonian, "The president says, 'Bring 'em
on.' The generals say we don't need more troops. Well, they're not over
here."
Tim Predmore, 101st Airborne, quoted in the Independent: "I once believed
that I served for a cause: 'To uphold and defend the Constitution of the
United States'. Now I no longer believe that," Tim Predmore, a member of
the 101st Airborne Division serving near Mosul, wrote n a blistering opinion
piece this week for his home newspaper, the Peoria Journal Star in Illinois. "I
can no longer justify my service for what I believe to be half-truths and
bold lies."
Army Chief of Staff Eric Shinseki, who challenged the fantasy spun by Don
Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz and correctly insisted that several hundred
thousand troops would be needed to pacify Iraq.
Ray McGovern, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
Wesley Clark, former NATO Supreme Commander
Anthony Zinni, retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, former head of Central
Command for U.S. forces in the Middle East, who said of "all the _resident's
men" -- "I'm not sure which planet they live on..."
Colonel David Hackworth, US Army (Retired), quoted in Salon calling Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld an "asshole" who "misunderstood the whole war" and
he predicted that American troops could be stuck in Iraq for "at least" another
30 years.
Larry C. Johnson is a member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity. He served with the CIA from 1985 through 1989 and worked in the
State Department's office of Counter Terrorism from 1989 through 1993.
He also is a registered Republican who contributed financially to the Bush
Campaign in 2000.
And many, many others named and unnamed...
US News & Media:
Bill Moyers, PBS NOW
Walter Cronkite, retired CBS anchor man
Helen Thomas, UPI correspondent
Charles MacArthur, Harper's Publisher who accused the "US mainstream news
media" of proffering up Bush administration war propaganda
Bernie Ward KGO Radio
Ray TalieferoKGO Radio
Amy Goodman Democracy Now, Pacifica
Christiana AmanpourCNN
Howard Stern
Dom Imus
Rick Mercier of the Free Lance-Star (Fredricksburg, VA), who, ala Richard
Clarke, apologized in an op-ed piece for the news media's failure to honestly
cover the Iraq war.
9/11 Families and Families of US GIs in Iraq
[There are many names to list here, but these are at least worthy examples.]
Cindy Sheehan
Mindy Kleinberg, Patty Casazza, Lori van Auken, Kristen Breitweiser, four
New Jersey women widowed on 9/11 are demanding real answers to real questions
Ellen Mariani, widow of 9/11 victim, who is suing the _resident, the
VICE _resident and others under the RICO Act
Cherie Block, whose husband is in Iraq, quoted in the Chicago Tribune: "Either
he doesn't really understand what's going on, or he's not telling it the
way it really is," said Block, whose husband Wallace is a sergeant with
the 129th Company.
Jane Bright, whose son died in Iraq, quoted in the Guardian: "I don't
care what the administration says about flag-waving and children throwing
flowers. It is just not true. The stories coming back are horrific. All
he told me was that he had seen and done some horrible things, that they
had all done and seen some terrible things."
Jill Kiehl, widow of Army Specialist James Kiehl, quoted in Reuters: "The
evidence that's starting to come out now feels like he (Bush) was misleading
us," Kiehl said, holding the couple's 10-month-old son Nathaniel, born
seven weeks after his father died.
Nadia McCaffrey "...a California resident, defied the Bush administration
by inviting news cameras to photograph the arrival of her son's casket
from Iraq. The White House has banned photography of flag-draped coffins
arriving at air force bases, but because Patrick McCaffrey's remains were
flown into the Sacramento International airport, his mother was able to
invite the photographers inside. "I don't care what [President Bush] wants," Ms
McCaffrey declared, telling her local newspaper: "Enough war." (Guardian)
Lila Lipscomb: "Freed from the military censors who prevent soldiers from
speaking their minds when alive, Lila Lipscomb has also shared her son's
doubts about his work in Iraq. In Fahrenheit 9/11, she reads from a letter
Michael mailed home. "What in the world is wrong with George, trying to
be like his dad, Bush. He got us out here for nothing whatsoever. I'm so
furious right now, Mama." (Guardian)
And many, many others...
Business and Economics:
George Soros, who has taken out full page ads in major
city newspapers in the US to document the numerous untruths in the _resident's
argument unliteral, "pre-emptive" for war in Iraq.
Ted Turner, former CNN owner, who has denounced the -resident on the environment,
the UN, the war in Iraq and other vital issues
George A. Akerlof, 2001 Nobel prize laureate who
teaches economics at the University of California in Berkeley, quoted in
Der Speigel: "I think this is the worst government the US has ever had
in its more than 200 years of history. It has engaged in extradordinarily
irresponsible policies not only in foreign policy and economics but also
in social and environmental policy. This is not normal government policy.
Now is the time for (American) people to engage in civil disobedience.
I think it's time to protest - as much as possible."
Literature:
Gore Vidal
Arundhati Roy
Carlos Fuentes
Entertainment and Media:
Michael Moore
Dixie Chicks
Bruce Springsteen
Sean P. Diddy Combs
Eminem
Ron Reagan, for speaking the truth about the Bush Abomination during the
media coverage of his father's passing
Margaret Cho
Linda Ronstadt
Bonnie Raitt
Madonna, for endorsing Wesley Clark (D-NATO)
Laurie David, Larry David & Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Cher, for calling C-SPAN about her visit the maimed US GIs from Iraq
Merle Haggard
Sean Penn
Barbara Streisand
Robert Redford
Susan Sarandon & Tim Robbins
Martin Sheen
George Clooney
Kanye West
Harry Belafonte
Danny Glover
International Leaders and Officials:
Nelson Mandela, South Africa
Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General
Jacque Chirac, France
Helmut Schroeder, Germany
Pope John Paul
Jacque Cretien, Canada
Hans Blix, former UN Weapons Inspector
Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba , Hiroshima, quoted in Agence France Press: "The
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the central international agreement guiding
the elimination of nuclear weapons, is on the verge of collapse. The chief
cause is US nuclear policy that, by openly declaring the possibility of
a pre-emptive nuclear first strike and calling for resumed research into
mini-nukes and other so-called 'useable nuclear weapons,' appears to worship
nuclear weapons as God"
http://www.mindspace.org/liberation-news-service/heroes.html
Tribute To John P. O'Neill - An FBI Agent Who Stood Tall
By Martin Dillon
Globe-Intel
5-27-2
http://www.rense.com/general25/tall.htm
Aug. 29, 2001
Someday someone will die and the public will not understand why we were not more effective and throwing every resource we had at certain problems.
FBI agent's e-mail response to headquarters
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/knew/could
EXPOSED: Bush Planned on Invading Iraq Before 9/11-Part 1
EXPOSED: Bush Planned on Invading Iraq Before 9/11-Part 2
Above videos contain John O'Neill - digg
DEVIL WORSHIPERS IN D.C.
"God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East." - George W. Bush - HAARETZ.COM
Satan's demons take on the image of God, similar to that done in Eden, (How else do they take control of earth?): II Corinthians, 11:14
The Antichrist is variously understood as being a consummately evil system of government or leader.
The Antichrist will be a leader who deceives many people.
The Antichrist will divide the world and create war without end.
The Antichrist will declare that things which are evil to be good.
The Antichrist will refer to war as peace, death as a solution for justice, and serving the wealthy as a means of helping the poor.
Many nations will recognize that he is evil, but his own people will be inclined to believe his deceptions.
A Reminder From Herb
Christians are to no longer execute sinners, so they should not wage carnal war, but spiritual warfare John 18:36; 2 Corinthians 10:1-6; Ephesians 6:10-18; 1 Timothy 1:18-20; 6:11-14; 2 Timothy 2:3-5; 4:6-8
Christians must be peacemakers forgiving those who do them harm treating their enemies with love and not seeking revenge Matthew 5:9, Romans 14:19, Ephesians 4:29-32; Colossians 3:12-14; Matthew 6:9-15; Mark 11:25-26, Luke 6:27-36 Romans 12:17-21; 1 Peter 3:8-12
Hatred which is the same as murder is unforgiving, vengeful and hostile towards one's enemies 1 John 3:15
Democrats and Republicans Who Support Murder of Innocent Civilians Also Approve of the MURDER of United States Military and PEACE Activists !
Remember
the U.S.S. Liberty
http://www.ussliberty.org/g/libmemorial.gif
34 U.S. Military Dead, 171 Wounded
http://www.ussliberty.org/
HOW CAN EHUD BARAK APPEAR IN THE BBC STUDIO JUST MINUTES AFTER THE FINAL [9/11] ATTACK WITH A PRE-PREPARED SPEECH ???
As if by magic, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak appeared from BBCs main office in London with a pre written/ pre prepared speech. He Spent 30 minutes speaking about how dangerous some "Islamic" countries and terrorists are. At the end of the interview, the news reporter stated that Mr. Barak joined him an hour before it was broadcasted, meaning Barak was there even an hour earlier. In real time of events this means he was there within minutes of the blast, with a pre-written interview. He knew beforehand that the attacks would take place. It was not difficult to see that Barak came with a pre written speech as he is quick to point out all of Israel's enemies which he calls "rogue states". The answers to the interview were carefully prepared to use public sentiments created by the blast, against enemies of Israel. These could not have been developed between the time of attacks and Barak appearing on BBC. Barak's presence in UK could also not have been co-incidental at that crucial time. 11 September 2001
http://www.11september.2itb.com/bbc_letter.htm
"After what happened in New York and Washington, the whole world must now embark upon a world war against the enemies of Israel." Ehud Barak - Le Monde diplomatique [Ed. Note: Barak says "enemies of Israel" NOT 'enemies of the world, United States, OR Terrorists.] 13 September 2001
"Every time we do something you tell me America will do this and will do that . . . I want to tell you something very clear: Don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it." - Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, 3 October 2001.
http://www.mediamonitors.net/khodr49.html
http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/01/10/Sharon3.html
WHAT COMES AROUND, GOES AROUND
Is Ariel Sharon: The Jewish Hitler ?
"The description of Ariel Sharon as “The Jewish Hitler” is used because it is so perfectly fitting. Ariel Sharon is an evil, sadistic war criminal, an inhuman monster, as the events of today demonstrate and the following historical report makes clear. Reference is made to the fact that he is Jewish to illustrate the demented hypocrisy of racist Israeli and Jewish-American Zionists, who damn the Nazis while being virtual Nazis themselves."
In the Jerusalem Post, under the headline: US, Israel agree on disengagement terms it says, "The US administration has agreed to publish a declaration hinting at denying Palestinians the right-of-return and agreeing that the security fence surrounds some major settlement blocs in the West Bank."
Reuters, under the headline: Beset by scandal, Sharon is urged to delay U.S. trip it says, " Sharon's intention to annex large West Bank settlement blocs in the bargain has angered the Palestinians and concerned the United States for it would strip them of significant amounts of occupied territory which they seek for a viable state."
In the article, Who Won World War II it says, "Under the Bushites – whose ancestors had no scruples doing business with Hitler – Israel has become the spearhead in reviving the ideology defeated in World War II. Within a few years, Israel turned from an arrière garde fighting outdated wars for outdated causes into the avant garde of barbarism, followed closely by the USA. The whole arsenal of barbarism of Israel's occupation – the physical, tactic, strategic, linguistic, and ideological arsenal – is doing its way from Gaza to Baghdad, from Megido Prison to Guantanamo Bay, from the Jerusalem Post to the Washington Post."
In the article, Heir to the Holocaust it says, "But while President Bush publicly embraced the community of holocaust survivors in Washington last spring, he and his family have been keeping a secret from them for over 50 years about Prescott Bush, the president's grandfather. According to classified documents from Dutch intelligence and US government archives, President George W. Bush's grandfather, Prescott Bush made considerable profits off Auschwitz slave labor. In fact, President Bush himself is an heir to these profits from the holocaust which were placed in a blind trust in 1980 by his father, former president George Herbert Walker Bush."
In the article, The KKKristian KKKoalition & Pat Robertson it quotes Pat Robertson, "Just like what Nazi Germany did to the Jews, so liberal America is now doing to the evangelical Christians. It's no different. It is the same thing. It is happening all over again. It is the Democratic Congress, the liberal-based media and the homosexuals who want to destroy the Christians. Wholesale abuse and discrimination and the worst bigotry directed toward any group in America today. More terrible than anything suffered by any minority in history." Pat Robertson in a 1993 interview with Molly Ivins
[Ed. Note: The original link is gone; however, the file is located in the following pdf]:
http://www.www.freidenker.at/archiv/911.pd
How Bush's grandfather helped Hitler's rise to power
Rumours of a link between the US first family and the Nazi war machine have circulated for decades. Now the Guardian can reveal how repercussions of events that culminated in action under the Trading with the Enemy Act are still being felt by today's president
Ben Aris in Berlin and Duncan Campbell in Washington
Saturday September 25, 2004
The Guardian
George Bush's grandfather, the late US senator Prescott Bush, was a director and shareholder of companies that profited from their involvement with the financial backers of Nazi Germany.
The Guardian has obtained confirmation from newly discovered files in the US National Archives that a firm of which Prescott Bush was a director was involved with the financial architects of Nazism.
His business dealings, which continued until his company's assets were seized in 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act, has led more than 60 years later to a civil action for damages being brought in Germany against the Bush family by two former slave labourers at Auschwitz and to a hum of pre-election controversy.
The evidence has also prompted one former US Nazi war crimes prosecutor to argue that the late senator's action should have been grounds for prosecution for giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
The debate over Prescott Bush's behaviour has been bubbling under the surface for some time. There has been a steady internet chatter about the "Bush/Nazi" connection, much of it inaccurate and unfair. But the new documents, many of which were only declassified last year, show that even after America had entered the war and when there was already significant information about the Nazis' plans and policies, he worked for and profited from companies closely involved with the very German businesses that financed Hitler's rise to power. It has also been suggested that the money he made from these dealings helped to establish the Bush family fortune and set up its political dynasty.
Remarkably, little of Bush's dealings with Germany has received public scrutiny, partly because of the secret status of the documentation involving him. But now the multibillion dollar legal action for damages by two Holocaust survivors against the Bush family, and the imminent publication of three books on the subject are threatening to make Prescott Bush's business history an uncomfortable issue for his grandson, George W, as he seeks re-election.
While there is no suggestion that Prescott Bush was sympathetic to the Nazi cause, the documents reveal that the firm he worked for, Brown Brothers Harriman (BBH), acted as a US base for the German industrialist, Fritz Thyssen, who helped finance Hitler in the 1930s before falling out with him at the end of the decade. The Guardian has seen evidence that shows Bush was the director of the New York-based Union Banking Corporation (UBC) that represented Thyssen's US interests and he continued to work for the bank after America entered the war.
Tantalising
Bush was also on the board of at least one of the companies that formed part of a multinational network of front companies to allow Thyssen to move assets around the world.
Thyssen owned the largest steel and coal company in Germany and grew rich from Hitler's efforts to re-arm between the two world wars. One of the pillars in Thyssen's international corporate web, UBC, worked exclusively for, and was owned by, a Thyssen-controlled bank in the Netherlands. More tantalising are Bush's links to the Consolidated Silesian Steel Company (CSSC), based in mineral rich Silesia on the German-Polish border. During the war, the company made use of Nazi slave labour from the concentration camps, including Auschwitz. The ownership of CSSC changed hands several times in the 1930s, but documents from the US National Archive declassified last year link Bush to CSSC, although it is not clear if he and UBC were still involved in the company when Thyssen's American assets were seized in 1942.
Three sets of archives spell out Prescott Bush's involvement. All three are readily available, thanks to the efficient US archive system and a helpful and dedicated staff at both the Library of Congress in Washington and the National Archives at the University of Maryland.
The first set of files, the Harriman papers in the Library of Congress, show that Prescott Bush was a director and shareholder of a number of companies involved with Thyssen.
The second set of papers, which are in the National Archives, are contained in vesting order number 248 which records the seizure of the company assets. What these files show is that on October 20 1942 the alien property custodian seized the assets of the UBC, of which Prescott Bush was a director. Having gone through the books of the bank, further seizures were made against two affiliates, the Holland-American Trading Corporation and the Seamless Steel Equipment Corporation. By November, the Silesian-American Company, another of Prescott Bush's ventures, had also been seized.
The third set of documents, also at the National Archives, are contained in the files on IG Farben, who was prosecuted for war crimes.
A report issued by the Office of Alien Property Custodian in 1942 stated of the companies that "since 1939, these (steel and mining) properties have been in possession of and have been operated by the German government and have undoubtedly been of considerable assistance to that country's war effort".
Prescott Bush, a 6ft 4in charmer with a rich singing voice, was the founder of the Bush political dynasty and was once considered a potential presidential candidate himself. Like his son, George, and grandson, George W, he went to Yale where he was, again like his descendants, a member of the secretive and influential Skull and Bones student society. He was an artillery captain in the first world war and married Dorothy Walker, the daughter of George Herbert Walker, in 1921.
In 1924, his father-in-law, a well-known St Louis investment banker, helped set him up in business in New York with Averill Harriman, the wealthy son of railroad magnate E H Harriman in New York, who had gone into banking.
One of the first jobs Walker gave Bush was to manage UBC. Bush was a founding member of the bank and the incorporation documents, which list him as one of seven directors, show he owned one share in UBC worth $125.
The bank was set up by Harriman and Bush's father-in-law to provide a US bank for the Thyssens, Germany's most powerful industrial family.
August Thyssen, the founder of the dynasty had been a major contributor to Germany's first world war effort and in the 1920s, he and his sons Fritz and Heinrich established a network of overseas banks and companies so their assets and money could be whisked offshore if threatened again.
By the time Fritz Thyssen inherited the business empire in 1926, Germany's economic recovery was faltering. After hearing Adolf Hitler speak, Thyssen became mesmerised by the young firebrand. He joined the Nazi party in December 1931 and admits backing Hitler in his autobiography, I Paid Hitler, when the National Socialists were still a radical fringe party. He stepped in several times to bail out the struggling party: in 1928 Thyssen had bought the Barlow Palace on Briennerstrasse, in Munich, which Hitler converted into the Brown House, the headquarters of the Nazi party. The money came from another Thyssen overseas institution, the Bank voor Handel en Scheepvarrt in Rotterdam.
By the late 1930s, Brown Brothers Harriman, which claimed to be the world's largest private investment bank, and UBC had bought and shipped millions of dollars of gold, fuel, steel, coal and US treasury bonds to Germany, both feeding and financing Hitler's build-up to war.
Between 1931 and 1933 UBC bought more than $8m worth of gold, of which $3m was shipped abroad. According to documents seen by the Guardian, after UBC was set up it transferred $2m to BBH accounts and between 1924 and 1940 the assets of UBC hovered around $3m, dropping to $1m only on a few occasions.
In 1941, Thyssen fled Germany after falling out with Hitler but he was captured in France and detained for the remainder of the war.
There was nothing illegal in doing business with the Thyssens throughout the 1930s and many of America's best-known business names invested heavily in the German economic recovery. However, everything changed after Germany invaded Poland in 1939. Even then it could be argued that BBH was within its rights continuing business relations with the Thyssens until the end of 1941 as the US was still technically neutral until the attack on Pearl Harbor. The trouble started on July 30 1942 when the New York Herald-Tribune ran an article entitled "Hitler's Angel Has $3m in US Bank". UBC's huge gold purchases had raised suspicions that the bank was in fact a "secret nest egg" hidden in New York for Thyssen and other Nazi bigwigs. The Alien Property Commission (APC) launched an investigation.
There is no dispute over the fact that the US government seized a string of assets controlled by BBH - including UBC and SAC - in the autumn of 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy act. What is in dispute is if Harriman, Walker and Bush did more than own these companies on paper.
Erwin May, a treasury attache and officer for the department of investigation in the APC, was assigned to look into UBC's business. The first fact to emerge was that Roland Harriman, Prescott Bush and the other directors didn't actually own their shares in UBC but merely held them on behalf of Bank voor Handel. Strangely, no one seemed to know who owned the Rotterdam-based bank, including UBC's president.
May wrote in his report of August 16 1941: "Union Banking Corporation, incorporated August 4 1924, is wholly owned by the Bank voor Handel en Scheepvaart N.V of Rotterdam, the Netherlands. My investigation has produced no evidence as to the ownership of the Dutch bank. Mr Cornelis [sic] Lievense, president of UBC, claims no knowledge as to the ownership of the Bank voor Handel but believes it possible that Baron Heinrich Thyssen, brother of Fritz Thyssen, may own a substantial interest."
May cleared the bank of holding a golden nest egg for the Nazi leaders but went on to describe a network of companies spreading out from UBC across Europe, America and Canada, and how money from voor Handel travelled to these companies through UBC.
By September May had traced the origins of the non-American board members and found that Dutchman HJ Kouwenhoven - who met with Harriman in 1924 to set up UBC - had several other jobs: in addition to being the managing director of voor Handel he was also the director of the August Thyssen bank in Berlin and a director of Fritz Thyssen's Union Steel Works, the holding company that controlled Thyssen's steel and coal mine empire in Germany.
Within a few weeks, Homer Jones, the chief of the APC investigation and research division sent a memo to the executive committee of APC recommending the US government vest UBC and its assets. Jones named the directors of the bank in the memo, including Prescott Bush's name, and wrote: "Said stock is held by the above named individuals, however, solely as nominees for the Bank voor Handel, Rotterdam, Holland, which is owned by one or more of the Thyssen family, nationals of Germany and Hungary. The 4,000 shares hereinbefore set out are therefore beneficially owned and help for the interests of enemy nationals, and are vestible by the APC," according to the memo from the National Archives seen by the Guardian.
Red-handed
Jones recommended that the assets be liquidated for the benefit of the government, but instead UBC was maintained intact and eventually returned to the American shareholders after the war. Some claim that Bush sold his share in UBC after the war for $1.5m - a huge amount of money at the time - but there is no documentary evidence to support this claim. No further action was ever taken nor was the investigation continued, despite the fact UBC was caught red-handed operating a American shell company for the Thyssen family eight months after America had entered the war and that this was the bank that had partly financed Hitler's rise to power.
The most tantalising part of the story remains shrouded in mystery: the connection, if any, between Prescott Bush, Thyssen, Consolidated Silesian Steel Company (CSSC) and Auschwitz.
Thyssen's partner in United Steel Works, which had coal mines and steel plants across the region, was Friedrich Flick, another steel magnate who also owned part of IG Farben, the powerful German chemical company.
Flick's plants in Poland made heavy use of slave labour from the concentration camps in Poland. According to a New York Times article published in March 18 1934 Flick owned two-thirds of CSSC while "American interests" held the rest.
The US National Archive documents show that BBH's involvement with CSSC was more than simply holding the shares in the mid-1930s. Bush's friend and fellow "bonesman" Knight Woolley, another partner at BBH, wrote to Averill Harriman in January 1933 warning of problems with CSSC after the Poles started their drive to nationalise the plant. "The Consolidated Silesian Steel Company situation has become increasingly complicated, and I have accordingly brought in Sullivan and Cromwell, in order to be sure that our interests are protected," wrote Knight. "After studying the situation Foster Dulles is insisting that their man in Berlin get into the picture and obtain the information which the directors here should have. You will recall that Foster is a director and he is particularly anxious to be certain that there is no liability attaching to the American directors."
But the ownership of the CSSC between 1939 when the Germans invaded Poland and 1942 when the US government vested UBC and SAC is not clear.
"SAC held coal mines and definitely owned CSSC between 1934 and 1935, but when SAC was vested there was no trace of CSSC. All concrete evidence of its ownership disappears after 1935 and there are only a few traces in 1938 and 1939," says Eva Schweitzer, the journalist and author whose book, America and the Holocaust, is published next month.
Silesia was quickly made part of the German Reich after the invasion, but while Polish factories were seized by the Nazis, those belonging to the still neutral Americans (and some other nationals) were treated more carefully as Hitler was still hoping to persuade the US to at least sit out the war as a neutral country. Schweitzer says American interests were dealt with on a case-by-case basis. The Nazis bought some out, but not others.
The two Holocaust survivors suing the US government and the Bush family for a total of $40bn in compensation claim both materially benefited from Auschwitz slave labour during the second world war.
Kurt Julius Goldstein, 87, and Peter Gingold, 85, began a class action in America in 2001, but the case was thrown out by Judge Rosemary Collier on the grounds that the government cannot be held liable under the principle of "state sovereignty".
Jan Lissmann, one of the lawyers for the survivors, said: "President Bush withdrew President Bill Clinton's signature from the treaty [that founded the court] not only to protect Americans, but also to protect himself and his family."
Lissmann argues that genocide-related cases are covered by international law, which does hold governments accountable for their actions. He claims the ruling was invalid as no hearing took place.
In their claims, Mr Goldstein and Mr Gingold, honorary chairman of the League of Anti-fascists, suggest the Americans were aware of what was happening at Auschwitz and should have bombed the camp.
The lawyers also filed a motion in The Hague asking for an opinion on whether state sovereignty is a valid reason for refusing to hear their case. A ruling is expected within a month.
The petition to The Hague states: "From April 1944 on, the American Air Force could have destroyed the camp with air raids, as well as the railway bridges and railway lines from Hungary to Auschwitz. The murder of about 400,000 Hungarian Holocaust victims could have been prevented."
The case is built around a January 22 1944 executive order signed by President Franklin Roosevelt calling on the government to take all measures to rescue the European Jews. The lawyers claim the order was ignored because of pressure brought by a group of big American companies, including BBH, where Prescott Bush was a director.
Lissmann said: "If we have a positive ruling from the court it will cause [president] Bush huge problems and make him personally liable to pay compensation."
The US government and the Bush family deny all the claims against them.
In addition to Eva Schweitzer's book, two other books are about to be published that raise the subject of Prescott Bush's business history. The author of the second book, to be published next year, John Loftus, is a former US attorney who prosecuted Nazi war criminals in the 70s. Now living in St Petersburg, Florida and earning his living as a security commentator for Fox News and ABC radio, Loftus is working on a novel which uses some of the material he has uncovered on Bush. Loftus stressed that what Prescott Bush was involved in was just what many other American and British businessmen were doing at the time.
"You can't blame Bush for what his grandfather did any more than you can blame Jack Kennedy for what his father did - bought Nazi stocks - but what is important is the cover-up, how it could have gone on so successfully for half a century, and does that have implications for us today?" he said.
"This was the mechanism by which Hitler was funded to come to power, this was the mechanism by which the Third Reich's defence industry was re-armed, this was the mechanism by which Nazi profits were repatriated back to the American owners, this was the mechanism by which investigations into the financial laundering of the Third Reich were blunted," said Loftus, who is vice-chairman of the Holocaust Museum in St Petersburg.
"The Union Banking Corporation was a holding company for the Nazis, for Fritz Thyssen," said Loftus. "At various times, the Bush family has tried to spin it, saying they were owned by a Dutch bank and it wasn't until the Nazis took over Holland that they realised that now the Nazis controlled the apparent company and that is why the Bush supporters claim when the war was over they got their money back. Both the American treasury investigations and the intelligence investigations in Europe completely bely that, it's absolute horseshit. They always knew who the ultimate beneficiaries were."
"There is no one left alive who could be prosecuted but they did get away with it," said Loftus. "As a former federal prosecutor, I would make a case for Prescott Bush, his father-in-law (George Walker) and Averill Harriman [to be prosecuted] for giving aid and comfort to the enemy. They remained on the boards of these companies knowing that they were of financial benefit to the nation of Germany."
Loftus said Prescott Bush must have been aware of what was happening in Germany at the time. "My take on him was that he was a not terribly successful in-law who did what Herbert Walker told him to. Walker and Harriman were the two evil geniuses, they didn't care about the Nazis any more than they cared about their investments with the Bolsheviks."
What is also at issue is how much money Bush made from his involvement. His supporters suggest that he had one token share. Loftus disputes this, citing sources in "the banking and intelligence communities" and suggesting that the Bush family, through George Herbert Walker and Prescott, got $1.5m out of the involvement. There is, however, no paper trail to this sum.
The third person going into print on the subject is John Buchanan, 54, a Miami-based magazine journalist who started examining the files while working on a screenplay. Last year, Buchanan published his findings in the venerable but small-circulation New Hampshire Gazette under the headline "Documents in National Archives Prove George Bush's Grandfather Traded With the Nazis - Even After Pearl Harbor". He expands on this in his book to be published next month - Fixing America: Breaking the Stranglehold of Corporate Rule, Big Media and the Religious Right.
In the article, Buchanan, who has worked mainly in the trade and music press with a spell as a muckraking reporter in Miami, claimed that "the essential facts have appeared on the internet and in relatively obscure books but were dismissed by the media and Bush family as undocumented diatribes".
Buchanan suffers from hypermania, a form of manic depression, and when he found himself rebuffed in his initial efforts to interest the media, he responded with a series of threats against the journalists and media outlets that had spurned him. The threats, contained in e-mails, suggested that he would expose the journalists as "traitors to the truth".
Unsurprisingly, he soon had difficulty getting his calls returned. Most seriously, he faced aggravated stalking charges in Miami, in connection with a man with whom he had fallen out over the best way to publicise his findings. The charges were dropped last month.
Biography
Buchanan said he regretted his behaviour had damaged his credibility but his main aim was to secure publicity for the story. Both Loftus and Schweitzer say Buchanan has come up with previously undisclosed documentation.
The Bush family have largely responded with no comment to any reference to Prescott Bush. Brown Brothers Harriman also declined to comment.
The Bush family recently approved a flattering biography of Prescott Bush entitled Duty, Honour, Country by Mickey Herskowitz. The publishers, Rutledge Hill Press, promised the book would "deal honestly with Prescott Bush's alleged business relationships with Nazi industrialists and other accusations".
In fact, the allegations are dealt with in less than two pages. The book refers to the Herald-Tribune story by saying that "a person of less established ethics would have panicked ... Bush and his partners at Brown Brothers Harriman informed the government regulators that the account, opened in the late 1930s, was 'an unpaid courtesy for a client' ... Prescott Bush acted quickly and openly on behalf of the firm, served well by a reputation that had never been compromised. He made available all records and all documents. Viewed six decades later in the era of serial corporate scandals and shattered careers, he received what can be viewed as the ultimate clean bill."
The Prescott Bush story has been condemned by both conservatives and some liberals as having nothing to do with the current president. It has also been suggested that Prescott Bush had little to do with Averill Harriman and that the two men opposed each other politically.
However, documents from the Harriman papers include a flattering wartime profile of Harriman in the New York Journal American and next to it in the files is a letter to the financial editor of that paper from Prescott Bush congratulating the paper for running the profile. He added that Harriman's "performance and his whole attitude has been a source of inspiration and pride to his partners and his friends".
The Anti-Defamation League in the US is supportive of Prescott Bush and the Bush family. In a statement last year they said that "rumours about the alleged Nazi 'ties' of the late Prescott Bush ... have circulated widely through the internet in recent years. These charges are untenable and politically motivated ... Prescott Bush was neither a Nazi nor a Nazi sympathiser."
However, one of the country's oldest Jewish publications, the Jewish Advocate, has aired the controversy in detail.
More than 60 years after Prescott Bush came briefly under scrutiny at the time of a faraway war, his grandson is facing a different kind of scrutiny but one underpinned by the same perception that, for some people, war can be a profitable business.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1312540,00.html
"The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth becomes the greatest enemy of the State." Dr. Joseph M. Goebbels
"Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the countryto danger. It works the same in any country." Hermann Goering, President of the Reichstag, Nazi Party, Luftwaffe Commander in Chief
"By means of shrewd lies, unremittingly repeated, it is possible to make people believe that heaven is hell -- and hell heaven. The greater the lie, the more readily it will be believed." Mein Kampf
Speaking of Fascism...
Science Faction
~@~'s example of science faction would reference "From the Earth to the Moon". by Jules Verne, point out how people at that time could not believe a trip to the moon was possible, and then point to NASA Apollo 11.
One night, 30 plus years ago, a tape, wrapped in a torn, small, brown paper bag, was shoved through his mail slot with no identification or label.
Although somewhat outdated, the similarities suggested in the below audio, leading up to 1984 and 'the present' use of Bush's (sic) Hitlerisms are amusing. Make sure to listen in a 'relaxed state' and listening could be considered fun.
[Click Above Graphic to Listen =
MP3]
18,371,504 bytes - Science Faction
THE END...for now !
Addendum Follows:
Does More War Require a Draft?
By Brent Budowsky
Editor's Note: In this guest essay, political analyst Brent Budowsky says policymakers and pundits favoring a wider war in the Middle East must be asked about ominous signs that the Bush administration's proclivity for war means some form of military draft is in America's future:
The involuntary recall of 3,500 Marines to active duty, required by personnel shortages for the war in Iraq, on top of previous extensions of deployment schedules for active-duty troops and reserves, demands an answer to this question: Is America headed for a return to the draft, either by that traditional name or in some other form?
The problem is simple: the United States went to war in Iraq without sufficient numbers of troops leading to inevitable problems. My view has always been that it would have been better for the President to have finished the job of killing bin Laden in Afghanistan, rather than cutting and running on that job, and helping bin Laden escape, to charge into an unwise war in Iraq.
Once the decision to wage war in Iraq was made, the manner with which it was conducted created inevitable and catastrophic results that have caused major, long-term damage to American force structures, recruitment and restocking of equipment that will cost many billions of dollars to replace.
Many thoughtful Republicans, such as Sen. Chuck Hagel, have raised these issues from the beginning. Even Sen. John McCain, one of the strongest supporters of the war, has always understood the implications of troop strength and force structure, and now criticizes the President for not leveling with the American people on the consequences and cost of the war.
From the beginning, there have been unfair burdens imposed on our troops; there have been unfair deployment practices that have imposed major hardship on Reserves and their families; there have been inadequate supplies for our forces including insufficient armor, bandages and even helmets; there has been major erosion of equipment in the desert sands that will impose shocking new costs to replace; and there has been a major and dangerous disruption of American military force structures around the world, and major damage done to recruitment at home.
My view -- expressed here, elsewhere and privately to officials, once this war was unwisely begun -- has long been to seek a cease-fire with internal Iraqi insurgents, laying down their arms in return for a seat at the table of the governing of Iraq. This cease-fire would NOT include external terrorists, who are in much smaller numbers and would have been isolated and defeated with American casualties being dramatically decreased years ago.
Similarly, I have urged for several years, and urge again here, that America regain its traditional role of Middle East diplomacy deploying internationally known figures in both parties -- former President Clinton and former Sens. Sam Nunn and George Mitchell, working with former Secretaries of State Jim Baker, Colin Powell or others. The last six years represent the first time since 1948 that there has been no American diplomatic leadership at least attempting to address the fundamental issues that divide the Middle East. This re-engagement should have been initiated six years ago; it must be initiated now.
The President has been trapped in a narrow, provincial, war-obsessed mentality that has only increased instability, radically strained American force structures, given tactical advantages to our terrorist enemies and to Iran. This, too, must change immediately before the damage and dangers become even worse at a time of escalating chaos in the region, deteriorating conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and further destabilized American military force structures.
Warning Sign
The forced recall of 3,500 Marines is a clarion call warning to all Americans, and along with other distortions of deployment practices, is now, in effect, a form of reviving the draft.
Listening to the President, Vice President Cheney, the various neoconservative policy pushers, their vision appears to be a vision of endless and permanent world war, with expanding and ever more dangerous fields of combat, when we do not even have the troops strength to meet our commitments today.
Having been involved in intelligence and military matters for more than two decades, this much is clear: we cannot sustain our commitments today; with any additional wars to fight, we will be left with only two choices: either inadequate forces creating more Iraqs, or adequate forces that can only be maintained through a revival of the draft, no matter what it is called. That is the fact.
When these neoconservative voices rush to the airwaves to proclaim the wars they would like (others) to fight, Democrats, Republicans and all in the media should ask:
If you want war with Iran, where will you get the troops, and will you bring back the draft?
If you want war with Syria, where will you get the troops, and will you bring back the draft?
If you want war with North Korea, where will you get the troops, and will you bring back the draft?
It is high time and long overdue that the United States resumes its role of world diplomatic and political leadership and brings in people of world-wide credibility and stature to at least test the waters for game-changing diplomacy.
For those who prefer the course of war, we must all ask, on every occasion: for the wars you would like to fight, where will you get the troops, and are you prepared to bring back the draft?
Brent Budowsky was an aide to U.S. Senator Lloyd Bentsen on intelligence issues, and served as Legislative Director to Rep. Bill Alexander when he was Chief Deputy Whip of the House Democratic Leadership. Budowsky can be reached at brentbbi@webtv.net
Source: http://www.consortiumnews.com/2006/082306a.html
A FLASH VIDEO ON: The Draft - http://www.flyingsnail.com/draft.html
President justifies war to parents of dead:
http://www.flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/2deadday.html
NOBODY for president
You Can Lead A Horse To Water,
But You Can Not Make Him Drink
by Dahbud Mensch
Nobody cares Republicans spent 55 million of your tax dollars to discover if Monica swallowed and 3 million on the 9/11 Commission.
Nobody cares about Florida, Katherine Harris, the Supreme Court and the 2000 Presidential Election.
Nobody cares about President Bush's military record.
Nobody cares about Bush Family dealings and past association with the Nazi Party.
Nobody cares about IRAN/CONTRA.
Nobody cares about the Bush Administration's inability to find a traitor in the White House, who revealed Wilson's wife, but were able to supply photos of 9/11 hijackers within hours of the mass murder.
Nobody cares about who ordered the Air Force to stand down on 9/11.
Nobody cares about where the Weapons of Mass Destruction are and that Saddam was not involved in 9/11.
Nobody cares about their children dying in an illegal war and an upcoming draft.
Nobody cares about six corporations owning most media and that General Electric, who owns NBC, is one of the largest exporters of WMD on the planet.
Nobody cares about Bush making the planet unsafe and creating a never ending world of terror.
Nobody cares about Israeli and Christian extremists who hate their lives because they believe they are with sin and want to murder the rest of the world in God's name.
Nobody cares about who belongs to Skull & Bones.
Nobody cares about Chemtrails.
Nobody cares about children left behind by a budget that supports war and destroys education.
Nobody cares "The War/Rape/Torture President" disgraced Flag and Country.
Nobody knows who did the Anthrax Attacks.
Nobody knows the truth about a lying Republican Bush Neocon Administration and dimwitted Democrats who took us into an illegal war, murdered tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians, and caused gas prices to 'skyrocket'; when Nobody knows the truth about sleazy Texas oilmen.
Nobody wants to subpoena God to find out whose side she is REALLY on.
He Said It
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Closing Argument
Drop Dead ~ Telecom Crimes ~ Patriot Act ~ Denialist ~ Are you better off?
Alan Shore: When the weapons of mass destruction thing turned out to be not true, I expected the American people to rise up. Ha! They didn't.
Then, when the Abu Ghraib torture thing surfaced and it was revealed that our government participated in rendition, a practice where we kidnap people and turn them over to regimes who specialize in torture, I was sure then the American people would be heard from. We stood mute.
Then came the news that we jailed thousands of so-called terrorists suspects, locked them up without the right to a trial or even the right to confront their accusers. Certainly, we would never stand for that. We did.
And now, it's been discovered the executive branch has been conducting massive, illegal, domestic surveillance on its own citizens. You and me. And I at least consoled myself that finally, finally the American people will have had enough. Evidentially, we haven't.
In fact, if the people of this country have spoken, the message is we're okay with it all. Torture, warrantless search and seizure, illegal wiretapping's, prison without a fair trial - or any trial, war on false pretenses. We, as a citizenry, are apparently not offended.
There are no demonstrations on college campuses. In fact, there's no clear indication that young people seem to notice.
Well, Melissa Hughes noticed. Now, you might think, instead of withholding her taxes, she could have protested the old fashioned way. Made a placard and demonstrated at a Presidential or Vice-Presidential appearance, but we've lost the right to that as well. The Secret Service can now declare free speech zones to contain, control and, in effect, criminalize protest.
Stop for a second and try to fathom that.
At a presidential rally, parade or appearance, if you have on a supportive t-shirt, you can be there. If you are wearing or carrying something in protest, you can be removed.
This, in the United States of America. This in the United States of America. Is Melissa Hughes the only one embarrassed?
*Alan sits down abruptly in the witness chair next to the judge*
Judge Robert Sanders: Mr. Shore. That's a chair for witnesses only.
Alan: Really long speeches make me so tired sometimes.
Judge Robert Sanders: Please get out of the chair.
Alan: Actually, I'm sick and tired.
Judge Robert Sanders: Get out of the chair!
Alan: And what I'm most sick and tired of is how every time somebody disagrees with how the government is running things, he or she is labeled un American.
U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shapiro: Evidentially, it's speech time.
Alan: And speech in this country is free, you hack! Free for me, free for you. Free for Melissa Hughes to stand up to her government and say "Stick it"!
U.S. Attorney Jonathan Shapiro: Objection!
Alan: I object to government abusing its power to squash the constitutional freedoms of its citizenry. And, God forbid, anybody challenge it. They're smeared as being a heretic. Melissa Hughes is an American. Melissa Hughes is an American. Melissa Hughes is an American!
Judge Robert Sanders: Mr. Shore. Unless you have anything new and fresh to say, please sit down. You've breached the decorum of my courtroom with all this hooting.
Alan: Last night, I went to bed with a book. Not as much fun as a 29 year old, but the book contained a speech by Adlai Stevenson. The year was 1952. He said, "The tragedy of our day is the climate of fear in which we live and fear breeds repression. Too often, sinister threats to the Bill of Rights, to freedom of the mind are concealed under the patriotic cloak of anti-Communism."
Today, it's the cloak of anti-terrorism. Stevenson also remarked, "It's far easier to fight for principles than to live up to them."
I know we are all afraid, but the Bill of Rights - we have to live up to that. We simply must. That's all Melissa Hughes was trying to say. She was speaking for you. I would ask you now to go back to that room and speak for her. ~ Boston Legal ~ Stick It ~ Season 2 ~ Episode 19 ~ [Video at link] ~ Written by David E. Kelley & Janet Leahy ~ Directed by Adam Arkin.
One Can Lead A Horse To Water, But ....
Until there is a solution for this, where one solution has been provided, Nobody will bring Peace to Our Times, feed the hungry, care for the sick, and bake apple pie better than Mom. (otoh) If None of the Above was on voter ballots, it would be a huge step towards recovering U.S. political control, and Nobody gets it.
American Dream ~ George Carlin/L.I.L.T ~ http://vimeo.com/72719973
