Osama Bin Laden had perpetrated many acts of violence. Blowback does not only affect states; Osama Bin Laden was killed by his former allies, those who used to support and arm him. Celebrations of someone’s death are always distatsteful, but Osama Bin Laden dealt in violent death and died a violent death. Of course, he who lives by the sword is a two-edged observation; it applies to Americans too, and I am afraid there will sadly be further violence in the short term.
There are questions to be asked about why Osama Bin Laden was killed rather than captured, when he would evidently be such a valuable intelligence asset. There are aspects of the official story which do not add up. I have seen the photo of his body on France 24, and plainly he was killed by a head shot; if you have to shoot someone you are trying to capture, you do not go for the head. Secondly we are told that he could not be captured because there was a fierce firefight of resistance at the house; but that no Americans were injured. So not that fierce, then. Aside from Osama Bin Laden, only two men and one woman were killed – so again, hardly a great pitched battle. The building was then torched, destrying the forensic evidence.
If Bin Laden did not kill himself, or get one of his own men to shoot him, it remains open to question why he was taken out with a headshot in a situation where resistance had been so ineffective that no American had been hurt.
It is yet another commentary on the state of Pakistan that Bin Laden was living in a large house in Abbottabad – which is by no means a backwater. It is also a major garrison town and the headquarters for military and intellligence operations in the Afghan frontier areas. (By chance, James Abbott, its founder, is one of the Great Game players I am currently studying). I simply do not believe that Bin Laden could live for years in a million dollar home in Abbottabad without significant parts of the Pakistani military and intelligence community knowing he was there.
Benazir Bhutto did NOT believe Osama bin Laden was dead. It was obvious that she made a slip of the tongue. Very obvious.
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Still, this buried at sea thing is very, very bizarre.
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Oh, and Craig, King of Welsh Noir’s reference to Emmanuel Goldstein was indeed a suggestion that Osama bin Laden was just a made-up enemy in the style of Big Brother’s enemy. It’s certainly NOT an anti-semitic reference.
However, the idea that it is inexplicable for Osama bin Laden to have lived for ten years in Pakistan without being discovered is not so difficult to believe. Radovan Karadjic had been living in downtown Belgrade as a homeopath without being turned in. Ratko Mladic apparently still is. Ayman al-Zawahiri seems to still be on the loose and Truthers don’t seem to have any theories about him.
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They obviously should have tried to capture him alive though and this is just going to make Truthers even more suspicious.
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“Osama Bin Laden was killed by his former allies, those who used to support and arm him.”
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Yes, apparently the ISI did have something to do with Osama bin Laden’s killing. But again, the ISI have in fact had elements that seemed to never have stopped supporting bin Laden as well as those “retired” members who have remained supporters.
Tweet from a guy in Brooklyn:
“MSNBC using ObL death to justify torture at Guantanamo. This is all so disgusting.”
AngrySoba says:
In an Al Jazeera interview with David Frost on 2 November 2007 whilst listing the three men she considered responsible for the upsurge of terrorism in Pakistan at that time she said: …. Omar sheik, the man who murdered Osama bin Laden Have a look at the video its at about 6Min 20Secs.
Also have a look at the Corbett Report of 2 May 2011 where no fewer than nine previous such assertions by senior/credible people have been made – many with links to the corresponding video.
For my money, the possibility that bin Laden was killed by US special forces yesterday is vanishing to non-existent. Absolutely spiffing distraction and gear-shifting event in preparation for — for what? is what I am interested in.
The wedding was a New World Order Imperial Triumph of no special victory except that God saves His punishment until the Day of Judgement if He wills. Satan has respite until that Day, and there was a strong whiff of brimstone about the barmy vicars of the Queen’s own religion proclaiming the goodness of GB over the rest of the world from the centre of London.
Obama pulled out some very phoney and untrue news to beat that. Not to be outdone Sarcazy and Berlesquoney will pull another fascist rabbit out of their Right-wing imaginations soon.
Usama bin Laden was an impressive Muslim who challenged the world’s terrorist powers, UKUSIS. May Allah have mercy on his soul. Inna lillahi wa inna ilaihi rajeoun.
“In an Al Jazeera interview with David Frost on 2 November 2007 whilst listing the three men she considered responsible for the upsurge of terrorism in Pakistan at that time she said: …. Omar sheik, the man who murdered Osama bin Laden…”
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Yes, yes, we’ve gone over this several times. She happened to have been talking about bin Laden and bin Laden’s son earlier in the video. She mentioned Omar Sheikh who was the man convicted of murdering Daniel Pearl. That’s who she meant to talk about. Benazir Bhutto talked about bin Laden on several occasions around the time of the interview both before and after and she mentioned him in books she had written and yet curiously this interview is the only one in which Benazir Bhutto mentioned – in an offhand manner – that bin Laden had been murdered. It’s what’s called a “factoid” as it has nothing to substantiate it outside of this interview.
“Usama bin Laden was an impressive Muslim who challenged the world’s terrorist powers, UKUSIS. May Allah have mercy on his soul. Inna lillahi wa inna ilaihi rajeoun.”
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That’s more like it! Do you not get somewhat offended by all these conspiracy theorists trying to give Israel credit for bin Laden’s glorious deeds? Bin Laden was the prime suspect of the Nairobi and Dar es Salaam bombings of US embassies. They killed hundreds of African civilians.
Craig,
For my part, I do not see the 9/11 issue in the same way that you do. I have entertained serious doubts concerning the collapse of the third tower, as well as the nature of the fall of the other two. Not an engineer or a scientist by training, but a mere lawyer, I am nevertheless taught to ferret out information and follow leads in preparing my cases. This one involves questions that many “non-political patriots in the US” ( if I may term them so – because they are seeking the truth as to why so many of their fellow citizens died that day. ) The credible questions raised go to the questionable aspects about the matrix of events, and that kind of detailed analysis and examination cannot simply be discarded under the general dismissive rubric of “conspiracy theorists”. All intelligent questions and analysis cannot fairly be so termed, for the convenient purpose of disregarding sensibly posed questions.
I note that engineers, university professors in the sciences and others of high intelligence, technical competence, and with no overt political axe to grind, have posed very hard questions about the events surrounding 9/11. Many of these questions are rational, valid, and still seek credible answers.
I have consciously prefaced what I am about to post, because I have noted your take on 9/11 and respectfully I hold my points with rational reservations about the whole tragic incident to this date. So, I found it informative to have read this equally rational short commentary by Professor Paul Craig Roberts on the recent announcement of Bin Laden’s death:-
“Osama bin Laden’s Second Death
by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts
Global Research, May 2, 2011
If today were April 1 and not May 2, we could dismiss as an April fool’s joke this morning’s headline that Osama bin Laden was killed in a firefight in Pakistan and quickly buried at sea. As it is, we must take it as more evidence that the US government has unlimited belief in the gullibility of Americans.
Think about it. What are the chances that a person allegedly suffering from kidney disease and requiring dialysis and, in addition, afflicted with diabetes and low blood pressure, survived in mountain hideaways for a decade? If bin Laden was able to acquire dialysis equipment and medical care that his condition required, would not the shipment of dialysis equipment point to his location? Why did it take ten years to find him?
Consider also the claims, repeated by a triumphalist US media celebrating bin Laden’s death, that “bin Laden used his millions to bankroll terrorist training camps in Sudan, the Philippines, and Afghanistan, sending ‘holy warriors’ to foment revolution and fight with fundamentalist Muslim forces across North Africa, in Chechnya, Tajikistan and Bosnia.” That’s a lot of activity for mere millions to bankroll (perhaps the US should have put him in charge of the Pentagon), but the main question is: how was bin Laden able to move his money about? What banking system was helping him? The US government succeeds in seizing the assets of people and of entire countries, Libya being the most recent. Why not bin Laden’s? Was he carrying around with him $100 million dollars in gold coins and sending emissaries to distribute payments to his far-flung operations?
This morning’s headline has the odor of a staged event. The smell reeks from the triumphalist news reports loaded with exaggerations, from celebrants waving flags and chanting “USA USA.” Could something else be going on?
No doubt President Obama is in desperate need of a victory. He committed the fool’s error or restarting the war in Afghanistan, and now after a decade of fighting the US faces stalemate, if not defeat. The wars of the Bush/Obama regimes have bankrupted the US, leaving huge deficits and a declining dollar in their wake. And re-election time is approaching.
The various lies and deceptions, such as “weapons of mass destruction,” of the last several administrations had terrible consequences for the US and the world. But not all deceptions are the same. Remember, the entire reason for invading Afghanistan in the first place was to get bin Laden. Now that President Obama has declared bin Laden to have been shot in the head by US special forces operating in an independent country and buried at sea, there is no reason for continuing the war.
Perhaps the precipitous decline in the US dollar in foreign exchange markets has forced some real budget reductions, which can only come from stopping the open-ended wars. Until the decline of the dollar reached the breaking point, Osama bin Laden, who many experts believe to have been dead for years, was a useful bogyman to use to feed the profits of the US military/security complex.”
P.S. Again Craig – I do not believe that the official version of the whole sequence of events from the 9/11 tragedy to the recent announcement of Bin Laden’s death, are the kind of matters that one simply can at all take at face value based on those official announcements and/or mainstream media analyses. We should think again – and vigilantly question.
Courtenay, if you think those buildings were wired with explosives, then you’re just dumb.
Angrysoba has a credibility problem with me (as I’m sure I do with him).
He seems incapable of addressing serious points with which he disagrees without characterising those who press them with pejoratives such as ‘all these conspiracy theorists’ and ‘truthers’ (twice in last three posts). It is akin to dismissing an argument with similarly meaningless knee-jerk pejoratives like holocaust denier, anti-semite, fascist, racist etc etc. The primary function of all of them being to excuse the accuser from engaging in intelligent debate at about matters they do not wish (for one reason or another) to engage in.
It would be more honest to lump them all together and simply say something like stark raving nut case; but then that would not have such an appearance of sophistication would it?
As for the convoluted Benazir Bhutto arguments – I urge everyone to have a look and see what they think – plus all the others in the Corbet report link I provided – not to mention many others now emerging.
I’d love to hear what his definition of a ‘Truther’ or a ‘Conspiracy Theorist’ really is.
YugoStiglitz, if you think those buildings were wired with explosives, then you’re just dumb.
POWERFUL argument eh?
“Also have a look at the Corbett Report of 2 May 2011 where no fewer than nine previous such assertions by senior/credible people have been made – many with links to the corresponding video.
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For my money, the possibility that bin Laden was killed by US special forces yesterday is vanishing to non-existent.”
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But spot the contradiction here, Wikispooks. You’re claiming that Osama bin Laden can’t have been killed the other night because he’s already a) died of kidney disease b) been killed in Tora Bora by bombs and c) been killed by Omar Sheik. If he’s died between three and nine different ways already then how do you find each of those earlier reports credible? He can’t possibly have been killed each of those ways but in typical Truther fashion you’re presenting a bunch of mutually contradictory pieces of evidence to make up for the weakness of each piece and apparently seem pretty indiscriminate about what you believe.
He can’t possibly have been killed each of those ways
That is a very fair point.
in typical Truther fashion
That is blinkered, meaningless ad-hominem.
I am looking at ALL the evidence and saying quite simply that, in light of ALL of it, the chances of his having survived until yesterday are remote and the incentive for US Smoke and mirrors ops to pull a rabbit out of hat compelling.
And let me be crystal clear about this: your use of the pejorative truther is no different to the use of any other other I pointed out. It is deeply offensive and I will not be taking you seriously until you show some understanding of why that is so.
BTW my last comment should have read to YugoStiglitz should have read if you think those buildings were NOT wired with explosives, then you’re just dumb.
Wikispooks, what kind of explosives were used at the WTC? Where’s the residue? Where’s the sound recordings of explosives going off? How were the explosives placed in occupied commercial space? How did the conspirators know that the planes would actually hit the buildings? Why didn’t the plane crashes immediately set the explosives off? Was each floor wired?
And why is it that every single “expert” that you rely on turns out to be a nutjob? I.e. Steven Jones. Do you also believe that Jesus Christ came to America and hung out with the Mayans (as he believes) and that the U.S. caused the earthquake in Haiti (as he believes)?
Angrysoba, you’ve deeply offended him! Booohoooo!
Too bad truthers tend to identify themselves as truthers. He must be offended by everyone!
“Angrysoba has a credibility problem with me (as I’m sure I do with him).
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He seems incapable of addressing serious points with which he disagrees without characterising those who press them with pejoratives such as ‘all these conspiracy theorists’ and ‘truthers’ (twice in last three posts).”
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In fact, I addressed the problems I had with the Benazir Bhutto video and not for the first time. You seem to have ignored the substantive points I made with diversionary tactics such as complaining about how I characterize your views.
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“It is akin to dismissing an argument with similarly meaningless knee-jerk pejoratives like holocaust denier, anti-semite, fascist, racist etc etc. The primary function of all of them being to excuse the accuser from engaging in intelligent debate at about matters they do not wish (for one reason or another) to engage in.”
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I’m more than happy to engage with you on some of these topics. I only fear that regular posters will be tearing their hair out and gnashing their teeth if we go back down the “9/11 Was an Inside job” discussion, though. I think most posters are sick to death of me talking about it (or rather my arguments against). That said, I don’t have a problem with using terms like Holocaust denier, anti-semite, fascist, racist etc… and sometimes they are more worthwhile employing than engaging the person indulging in it simply because they might have views that aren’t worthy of respect.
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“It would be more honest to lump them all together and simply say something like stark raving nut case; but then that would not have such an appearance of sophistication would it?”
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I’ll call you a stark-raving nutcase if you prefer but it is precision rather than sophistication it lacks.
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“I’d love to hear what his definition of a ‘Truther’ or a ‘Conspiracy Theorist’ really is.”
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It’s pretty simple. Truthers are people who think there was an “inside job” aspect to 9/11 either because the US government knew an attack was on its way and let it happen or took a partial or complete role in orchestrating it. Conspiracy theorist is a blanket term for people who prefer exotic and perhaps counter-intuitive explanations for events which have far more prosaic and ostensibly explicable causes. Their approach to evidence tends to be eccentric and unscientific: That which bolsters their view is unquestioningly accepted and that which contradicts their view is dismissed or becomes evidence for a larger conspiracy. See: birthers. Do you believe Barack Obama was born in Kenya? If so you will no doubt think the birth certificate he released a few days ago is a fake and evidence of a wider conspiracy.
YugoStiglitz misses my point spectacularly – da dahhhh !!!
And goes on to make a string more ad hominems.
I said NOTHING about how the buildings were brought down. I just thought he should experience being called ‘Dumb’ in a similarly gratuitously offensive manner, that’s all.
I have no intention of debating the intricacies of the buildings collapse here either – if only because Craig has issued rather stern warnings about it in the past. Suffice to say that my own opinion – pace an NYC architect by the name of Jeffrey Orling – is that the towers collapse were substantially progressive gravitational ones; but that they were initiated AFTER the impact of the planes by something other than impact damage and burning, oxygen-starved kerose fires which could not alone have precipitated them.
I can point you at reams of reading material which I am confident YugoStiglitz is entirely oblivious of, but will not do so unless invited.
AngrySoba
Your last post is eminently reasonable but suffers from EXACTLY the same blinkered view of evidence with which you accuse ‘Truthers’ and ‘conspiracy theorists’. And BTW the in your use of the term ‘US Government’ in your definition of ‘Truthers’ is more than a little simplistic – ‘Inside Job’ less so, but both require considerable nuancing to approach accuracy when applied to people who have spent vast amounts of time in equally disinterested (as your own anyway) research into these matters.
I would be quite happy to take this further, but, pace Craig’s previous strictures, this is not the place to do so. I am the techie/admin man on the Deep Politics forum for what that’s worth, though hardly contribute these days what with the WikiSpooks project and all. That said there are maybe a hundred thousand posts there on these topics and I might be persuaded to re-engage.
As for YugoStiglitz; his last post is illustrative of the quality of his intellect and he can piss of so far as I’m concerned.
Hungryshampoo
You still here?
The destruction of of the twin towers was planned by Bin Laden and executed by the Zionist powers that be in the US to justify a decade of terror against Muslims.
The decade of terror has exposed the West as unchangeable colonialists, who are right now engaged in illegal terror and colonialism in Libya. It has exposed the West as addicted liars, as in the proclamation of Usama bin Laden’s latest demise.
It has also exposed the West as a 100% failed force, even to the extent that when one Goldsmith grandchild marries another Goldsmith grandchild in Westminster Abbey, Craig is happy because adultery has poisoned the Royal succession and there’s something for the masses as well.
This country is bankrupt many times over, mortgaged to those whose names must not pass the lips here. Why would anyone feel bitter and used by being expelled from a mafia (the Foreign Office) that serves a collection of gangsters ( the Zionist Bankers) who hate and want to control freedom of speech and thought in all its forms?
I would be happy to have found my way out of such company and be queueing to join Usama’s cause.
Once again I have to say – don’t undermine Benazir Bhutto PBUH – listen carefully – she *knew* her life was in danger and felt it necessary to tell us of Bin Laden’s demise in a meaningful and prepense way (notice the deliberate pause before ‘Osama’).
Without sounding pretentious, I predicted the words ‘truthers’ and ‘conspiracy’ would infiltrate this discussion on Bin Laden’s apparent second death, essentially I believe to undermine rational thinking. Such ‘modus operandi’ worked well after the millennium to undermine those who were taking a cynical stance toward politics, mistrusting authority, endorsing democratic practices, feeling generally suspicious toward others and displaying an inquisitive. From more recent studies(Christopher French/Patrick Leman) the social dynamic has changed – the conflation of a criminal conspiracy with a conspiracy theory have sometimes merged on viable evidence from intense research on some of the more important aspects of recent history helped by the ‘sea’ of information and data the Internet provides. During the cold war, conspiracy theories arguably played a part in sowing mistrust between east and west. For canny politicians or campaigners, conspiracy theories can be a good way of exploiting people’s fears by promulgating rumours that are difficult, if not impossible, to disprove. ‘Courtenay’s’ ‘We should think again – and vigilantly question’- just happens to be sound advice.
Previously, I had not looked into what was behind the claim that Bhutto claimed that bin Laden was dead. I figured that perhaps she was misguided and speaking out of turn.
But, no, it turns out that she concurrently indicated that she believed that bin Laden was still alive, and in the David Frost interview, she simply FUCKING MISSPOKE!
This is evidence to the truthers! They simply wait for the “gotcha” moment (“pull it” as said by Larry Silverstein) and they base their religious beliefs on a few misspoken words!
Damn you people are hilarious!
yugo****yourself
Benazir Bhutto was a trained and dedicated politician who lived in Oxford for many years. Politicians do not misspeak without correcting themselves. They may lie, all the time, and when they get to Blair’s level of lies, they do talk impulsive nonsense in order to avoid speaking anything at all.
Right, Wikispooks, you don’t intend to spread trutherism but then you do exactly that – you can’t help but cite your particular ministry of the 911 truth cult. You’re a dumb silly truther, plain and simple.
Two questions:
1) What does it feel like to be a British leftie who’s been manipulated by American right-wing nutjobs?
2) What is your response to Craig Murray referring to your kind as “nutters”?
(I believe that’s the word he used – in any event, he clearly believes that your brain is not right for believing in the truther conspiracy.)
“Benazir Bhutto was a trained and dedicated politician who lived in Oxford for many years.”
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This is known as special pleading.
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“Politicians do not misspeak without correcting themselves.”
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So is that. Politicians make mistakes all the time.
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Seriously, this is one of the lamest and most laughable pieces of evidence I’ve ever seen. It’s actually quite amusing.
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Obama says it all:
“After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.”
Note the phrase is ‘after a firefight’ not ‘during’ or ‘in’
From the transcript of his speech from ther Whitehouse
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead
Ah – angry reverts to his job description – witchfinder general – and he has yugo from St Louis cavorting atop his organ as usual (take that any way you like). I expect the hope is that if they rant on with personal abuse we’ll get tired. We won’t. The US government brought down WTC1,2 and 3. Nobody else could have. Go on, call me a moron, truther, conspiracy theorist, whatever – since it’s your only form of debate it would be shame to deny it to you.
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Remember that my offer (as CEO of ACME Demolitions, Inc.) to demolish high buildings armed only with a zippo lighter still stands. It’s a same-day service, no expensive materials or lengthy preparations, no fancy-dan experts needed – just a little lighter fuel. And if you pay for two towers I’ll bring down another for free – the introductory offer is also still available.
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If you wanted three tall buildings brought down and I offered you this deal would you accept it? You know it’s going to be a tiny fraction of the next lowest quotation. Why would you not accept it? Perhaps because you understand that such a proposition is utterly preposterous?
Vronsky, how did the U.S. government bring down the Towers?
Was there a plane at the Pentagon?
Did another plane crash in Pennsylvania?
“The US government brought down WTC1,2 and 3.”
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Wikispooks tells me this is unnuanced. And I’ve never heard of any Truther (with the possible exception of Judy Wood) until now claim that WTC3 was brought down by the US government.
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I’m not worried about trying to tire people out or make people forget their pet theories I am just interested in hearing a coherent one. Also, I’m still waiting for some kind of plan of action from the Truthers. Much of it seems to be confined to endless fundraising, selling DVDs, round-the-world speaking tours such as by Richard Gage etc…
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“Remember that my offer (as CEO of ACME Demolitions, Inc.) to demolish high buildings armed only with a zippo lighter still stands. It’s a same-day service, no expensive materials or lengthy preparations, no fancy-dan experts needed – just a little lighter fuel. And if you pay for two towers I’ll bring down another for free – the introductory offer is also still available.”
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Have you ever cooked a steak with just a zippo lighter? It seems that comparing the destruction of the World Trade Center to a Zippo lighter fire is very silly indeed as it completely neglects the impacts of the planes and the massive fireballs that lit several damaged stories. You shouldn’t expect to be treated seriously if you think the Zippo lighter example is an apt comparison so it is rich of you to complain on the one hand about being called howwible names and then on the other to make such a pisspoor attempt at ridiculing “the official story”.
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On the other hand you could put forward a likely hypothesis of what you think brought down the twin towers. TNT? Or aircraft impacts? Could you explain how two massive planes loaded with jet fuel weren’t able to trigger the explosives that were rather pointlessly added to the buildings? Pointless because flying planes into buildings usually has the effect of causing huge loss of life and structural damage. Could you explain why on Earth the US government would want to do such a crazy thing and how on Earth they engineered such a feat to have the buildings collapse at the impact points and mask whatever the real agent for the collapse was?
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“And I’ve never heard of any Truther (with the possible exception of Judy Wood) until now claim that WTC3 was brought down by the US government.”
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In fact, I suppose there is a completely uncontroversial way in which this is true as WTC3 (or the remains) was indeed brought down by controlled demolition. Okay, I’ll give you that one then.
Here are two interesting videos which summarise my own judgements of the OBL news.
The first is al-Jazeera. Billed as an eye witness to the killing of OBL (ie the inteviewer’s core assumption is that the official narrative is kosher) but turning out to be confirmation that, so far as the locals are concerned it isn’t
The second from RT – an interview with James Corbett which cover things pretty comprehensively
The crux of the matter is that OBL is now officially dead – a page has been turned in the over-arching GWOT official narrative; and whether he died yesterday or 10 years ago is more or less irrelevant to anyone who is paying attention to the big picture.
My own view remains that the evidence is massively in favour of him having been dead for a long time – but the precise timing is really a side issue.