In a stunning turn of intelligence panache, President Obama’s leading Counter-terrorism advisor has warned that al-Qaeda is planning an attack in the Yemeni capital Sanaa – most likely on the US embassy.

Amazing.

Not ten days after a lapse in national security allowed a man strapped with explosives to get on a plane bound for the US without a passport, US intelligence has suddenly sprung to life, pulled out the crystal ball they keep locked in the basement at Langley, and conveniently come to the conclusion that attacks are imminent in the very same country where a 23-year-old Kenyan engineering student allegedly got his training – which obviously wasn’t that good being that he didn’t succeed.

But wait, there’s more.

General David Petraeus has already met with Yemeni President Ali Abdallah Saleh to assure him that the United States will support his government’s efforts against ‘al-Qaeda’ in Yemen – not to mention the little problem he’s having with the Houthis, a Shia insurgency, in the north.

As mentioned a few days ago, the United States has poured some $70 million dollars into aiding Yemeni counter-insurgency operations, including training and support. Of course, the line share of that went towards funding the Yemeni offensive against the Houthis in Saada province which has been going on since last summer – which is a very important distinction being that the Houthis are Zaydi Shia, not Sunnis, making the likelihood that they’re in business with al-Qaeda as probable as a snowball vacationing in the Bahamas.

But all you need do is read the bold type – US supports Yemeni fight against terrorism. The fine print’s far too distracting, especially the part where you delve into the authoritarian reality of the Yemeni government, the fact that they seize and hold whomever they want without issue, are guilty of employing torture, and so on. You know, just the sort of government that a nation such as the United States routinely claims they are against – unless, of course, they can be us to their advantage. In that case – game on.

January 3, 2010

Welcome to a new decade. Not surprisingly, al-Qaeda – that formless, shadowy global juggernaut – continues to rule the headlines. It’s been nine years since one of the world’s fastest assumptions of guilt turned the once obscure ‘organization’ into a worldwide threat. Nine years on, al-Qaeda is viewed by many as a well established, well funded, global organization with operatives and training camps in a variety of countries. In short, it is perceived to be a well organized radical militant organization that has the power to seriously threaten the West.

It is here that two very interesting curiosities have to be addressed. The first is an Op-Ed by Robin Cook published in The Guardian four weeks before his death. Cook served as British Foreign Secretary between 1997 and 2001, and later as the Leader of the House of Commons, a position from which he resigned in 2003 in protest over the invasion of Iraq. In the Op-Ed, Cook wrote the following…

“Bin Laden was, though, a product of a monumental miscalculation by western security agencies. Throughout the 80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Al-Qaida, literally “the database”, was originally the computer file of the thousands of mujahideen who were recruited and trained with help from the CIA to defeat the Russians.”

This, of course, contradicts widespread assertions that the group’s origin was organic. It is further bolstered by the fact that during the Bosnian conflict some of the same mujahideen assets employed in Afghanistan were tapped to partake in operations in Bosnia with the same system of covert funding and support provided them.

The second curiosity comes by way of Pierre-Henry Bunel, a former member of French intelligence. In an interview in the 2004 spring edition of World Affairs, Bunel said the following…

“The truth is, there is no Islamic army or terrorist group called Al Qaida. And any informed intelligence officer knows this. But there is a propaganda campaign to make the public believe in the presence of an identified entity representing the ‘devil’ only in order to drive the ‘TV watcher’ to accept a unified international leadership for a war against terrorism. The country behind this propaganda is the US and the lobbyists for the US war on terrorism are only interested in making money.”

In December of 2001, Bunel was convicted by a special French military court for “passing classified documents that identified potential NATO bombing targets in Serbia to a Serbian agent during the Kosovo war in 1998”. His case was transferred from civilian court to ensure that his assertions regarding al-Qaeda would not become public knowledge. In short, with regards to Yugoslavia, Bunel was correct. Those with whom he was accused of passing information to routinely claimed that Bosnian and Albanian guerrillas were being backed by al-Qaeda. In truth, while some of the very same assets used during the Afghan conflict were in play, the Bosnian Defense Fund, which funded the afore mentioned guerrillas, was actually an entity created by way of the Riggs Bank and directed by Richard Pearle and Douglas Feith, the latter of whom would go on to become the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy between 2001 and 2005 during which he supervised the Office Of Special Plans which played an integral role in engineering the perceived, though entirely false, connection between ‘al-Qaeda’ and the regime of Saddam Hussein.

Is all of this merely conspiracy theory? Personally, I’m not a fan of the term. There’s the truth and there’s the perception of it that we’re comfortable with. One thing that remains factual is that on the FBI’s most wanted page, Bin Laden’s crimes do not include those committed on 9/11, though entirely vague language is used to slightly imply the possibility (and please don’t bring up the video tape ‘evidence’, there’s more holes there than could be produced by gofers). The fact remains that even the FBI doesn’t have enough substantial evidence to hold him to account for it…

“USAMA BIN LADEN IS WANTED IN CONNECTION WITH THE AUGUST 7, 1998, BOMBINGS OF THE UNITED STATES EMBASSIES IN DAR ES SALAAM, TANZANIA, AND NAIROBI, KENYA. THESE ATTACKS KILLED OVER 200 PEOPLE. IN ADDITION, BIN LADEN IS A SUSPECT IN OTHER TERRORIST ATTACKS THROUGHOUT THE WORLD.

No direct mention of the attacks of 9/11 despite the fact that he was singled out as the ring leader in the same conspicuously expedient fashion as Lee Oswald was with regards to the Kennedy assassination.

“MURDER OF U.S. NATIONALS OUTSIDE THE UNITED STATES; CONSPIRACY TO MURDER U.S. NATIONALS OUTSIDE THE UNITED STATES; ATTACK ON A FEDERAL FACILITY RESULTING IN DEATH”.

That last bit – “attack on a federal facility resulting in death” – also applies to the afore mentioned attacks outside the United States unless it’s implying that the facility was The Pentagon. Were that the case, one would think the FBI would spell it out a little better. Instead, it remains wholly ambiguous.

If anything, this decade should see the diminishment of the use of the term ‘al-Qaeda’ as a representation of some ominous, global ‘legion of doom’. Three days into it, that doesn’t seem too likely, even though I could leave this house, recruit some troubled soul to carry out an attack, and then claim it the work of ‘al-Qaeda’ and probably have a plethora of different groups throughout the world applaud me for it and help generate an entirely false sense of attachment to them. In the end, the power that we give the name only makes the fear of it greater. That fear, though initially focused on an external threat, has been used to diminish our rights and freedoms more than anything else. And don’t think for a second that the peddling of the name as some representation of a high functioning global network isn’t in the best interest of those that desire, and profit, from the War On Terror – because it’s the ace in the hole. In these troubled economic times the defense sector remains as vital as it always has been. The United States spends more on defense that the rest of the world combined, and it cuts deals abroad to ensure that the defense sector is protected. Case in point, one of the largest “aid” pledges made recently was to Israel. The sum total? $30 billion dollars over the next decade. The catch? That the Israelis promise to spend 75% of it to purchase military hardware manufactured in the United States.

According to The Congressional Research Service, some 17% of the total aid budget of the United States in 2008, some $5 billion dollars, was spent on military aid. Of that $5 billion dollars, $4.7 billion of it came with the caveat that it be spent purchasing US arms.

Of course, that isn’t the whole story, nor is $5 billion dollars the ceiling with regards to ‘aid’. In 2009, the Obama Administration increased the strategic aid to Iraq and Afghanistan to $50 billion dollars. Of that, $15 billion dollars alone went towards Afghan defense. It’s what one refers to as a win-win. On one hand, the American people support the defense sector given the burden created by foreign operations. On the other, the government gives military aid to those nations that it occupies who then turn around and invest it back into the US defense sector. And without al-Qaeda out there, well, business wouldn’t be as good.

January 3, 2010

The attacks of September 11th were horrific. And while seven years has past since they occurred, they have not been forgotten. On that day almost 3,000 people were killed, the majority of them Americans, and the United States changed forever.

In the weeks that followed the attacks the Bush Administration sent mixed messages to the American people. With ample help from a willing media it instilled a fear so immense that it gripped societies far beyond its own borders while at the same time telling Americans to go about their lives as usual as an act of defiance. In short, Mr. Bush told the American people to go shopping.

Over the last seven years I have had countless conversations with hundreds of different people from numerous countries about the true intent of 9/11 and the organization responsible for its planning and execution, and every time that one occurs I am somewhat shocked at people’s perception of the event and its purpose.

One of the most troubling aspects of such conversations is the widespread belief that the sole aim of the attacks was to take life. While that was certainly a crucial part of the operation, the attacks themselves only represented the initial mechanism required to attain much loftier goals, ones which the Bush Administration ignorantly played into. After 9/11 the American landscape changed, and that change was fueled by a fear that allowed the government of the United States to enact unprecedented legislation that diminished the powers of the Constitution, allowed a hard-line element within the administration to enter into what can only be best described as an era of militaristic opportunism, and propel the American people into a war two years later that had everything to do with American hegemony and nothing to do with the terrible events of that fateful day.

In short, 9/11 was one of the most successful psychological operations in modern history and the government of the United States played into it without missing a beat.

To think that such an outcome was not the goal of those that planned the attacks is extremely short sighted. Since 2001 the United States has found itself not only militarily stretched to the limit and embroiled in two different conflicts abroad, but has increased its military spending every year since. The Defense budget for the fiscal year 2009 is an estimated $713 billion dollars, more than the financial bailout package. Of course, unlike the bailout, which the government has promised to repay to the people, even though that’s unlikely, the Defense budget is something that American taxpayers support no matter their views. And within that budget is money allocated for the Black Budget, used to run off the books operations such as Extraordinary Rendition, the use of Black Sites in foreign counties, illegal covert operations, covert military assistance and training, and the continued existence of the detention facilities at Guantanamo.

That said, I personally do not believe that those that planned 9/11 ever thought, even in their wildest dreams, that the attacks would produce the sort of Constitutional degradation that has been prevalent over the last seven years, not to mention much of the public’s willingness to unquestioningly accept it. But that is precisely what has occurred. In seven years the American landscape has been transformed into one in which questionable actions taken by law enforcement, and other agencies, have become acceptable to many, even if they usurp those freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution.

Ground Zero isn’t just in New York. In truth, it’s in every city, town, and neighbourhood in the United States.

One of the most troubling aspects of the post-9/11 world has been the promotion of al-Qaeda as a world-wide organization that operates as if a global military entity. This perception has been promoted to such an extent that many believe it to be a well oiled terror machine that possesses boundless resources and a large global network of loyal soldiers that act on the orders of a single command structure.

This perception has led to the rise of a very dangerous phenomenon. First, the actions of unaffiliated groups inspired by al-Qaeda that claim affiliation with the group despite being completely unaffiliated with them. The second is the use of the group’s name by militants, such as those that appeared in Iraq following the occupation, that are most likely not even in contact with any of al-Qaeda’s actual figureheads.

In short, following 9/11, what was simply a terror cell was transformed into an international terrorist phenomenon and promoted as a global entity that has, in turn, only caused those aligned with perhaps only some of its principles to adopt the moniker because of the fear attached to its name alone. The promotion of al-Qaeda as the globe’s foremost terrorist threat has also immensely benefited the policy aspirations of the United States, who have used a false image of the organization to justify its actions, especially in Iraq, where ‘al-Qaeda’ did not even exist prior to the occupation. Only an estimated 5-7% of the insurgency was comprised of foreign fighters that claimed affiliation with al-Qaeda, and even they were considered the enemies of some Sunni guerrilla groups, not to mention all of Iraq’s Shia militias.

So what am I driving at?

It’s rather simple, actually. Given everything that has transpired since 9/11, all that need be done at this point is for a threat to be issued for panic to take hold. In turn, that panic plays directly into the hands of those that helped make the monster appear one thousand times its size and strength and used that image to justify their actions. And so al-Qaeda, or whomever is using the name this week, wins another victory without firing a shot or detonating a single bomb. Meanwhile, their enemy is spending its way into financial extinction.

According to The Age, an Australian daily, Osama bin Laden has warned of a new attack…

“Osama bin Laden is planning an attack against the United States that will “outdo by far” September 11, an Arab newspaper in London has reported.

- bin Laden ‘planning US attack’
- Goal to ‘outdo’ September 11
- al-Qaeda reinforces training camps

And according to a former senior Yemeni al-Qaeda operative, the terrorist organisation has entered a “positive phase”, reinforcing specific training camps around the world that will lead the next “wave of action” against the West.”

According to the article the attack will “change the face of world politics and economics”. From the perspective of a psychological operation, especially given the current state of global financial fears, such rhetoric is to be expected.

The article also contains the quote – “this will be shown by the fact that we now control a major part of the south of Somalia”.

Now this is interesting because the United States backed the Ethiopian invasion of Somalia, as well as initially assisting it by proving air and naval support and the use of US Special Forces in various locations. Since the invasion, the conflict has produced one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world, despite the fact that it rarely gets mentioned. Prior to the invasion the ICU were the first governing body to actually bring peace to most of the country for the first time in decades, but because of their hard-line Islamic ideology, and perceived connections with terrorist organizations elsewhere, the Ethiopians were used as a proxy to remove them from power. Thus, the above statement could been seen as a lure, simply another attempt to see the United States directly involve itself in another conflict. More money, more loss, further exhaustion.

Could the United States be attacked again? Certainly. Given everything that’s transpired over the last seven years that can’t be discounted. But the real question is – does an attack need to be carried out to get results? In a world gripped by fear the issuing of a statement becomes just as powerful as an attack in many ways. And those that release such statements know that. Thanks to the unprecedented PR that they’ve been gifted, it’s certainly a much less costly vehicle with which to cause havoc.

Then again, madmen aren’t exactly in short supply – on either side of the fence.

November 10, 2008 42 Comments

I have no idea if anyone has been following coverage of the emerging Anthrax scandal, but a piece run in Saturday’s edition of the New York Daily News provides a bit of a shocking primer…

“In the immediate aftermath of the 2001 anthrax attacks, White House officials repeatedly pressed FBI Director Robert Mueller to prove it was a second-wave assault by Al Qaeda, but investigators ruled that out, the Daily News has learned.

After the Oct. 5, 2001, death from anthrax exposure of Sun photo editor Robert Stevens, Mueller was “beaten up” during President Bush’s morning intelligence briefings for not producing proof the killer spores were the handiwork of terrorist mastermind Osama Bin Laden, according to a former aide.

“They really wanted to blame somebody in the Middle East,” the retired senior FBI official told The News.

On October 15, 2001, President Bush said, “There may be some possible link” to Bin Laden, adding, “I wouldn’t put it past him.” Vice President Cheney also said Bin Laden’s henchmen were trained “how to deploy and use these kinds of substances, so you start to piece it all together.”

But by then the FBI already knew anthrax spilling out of letters addressed to media outlets and to a U.S. senator was a military strain of the bioweapon. “Very quickly [Fort Detrick, Md., experts] told us this was not something some guy in a cave could come up with,” the ex-FBI official said. “They couldn’t go from box cutters one week to weapons-grade anthrax the next.”

As it turns out, 62 year old Army Scientist Dr. Bruce Ivins had been the prime suspect in a year long FBI investigation into the 2001 Anthrax attacks prior to committing suicide last week before he was to discuss a plea deal with authorities. Colleagues that worked with Ivins at Fort Detrick, Maryland, who have also been placed under immense scrutiny by the FBI, have since claimed that Ivins was innocent and that the pressure brought to bear by the agency led Ivins to kill himself. But the FBI claims that it possesses DNA evidence that links Ivins with the attacks.

While Ivins suicide has garnered some media attention, the fact that the strain of Anthrax used in the attacks was a lethal US military grade bio-weapons strain of the toxin has not been significantly highlighted – meaning that your average American still believes that the Anthrax attacks that came in the wake of 9/11 were part of a greater and ongoing terrorist plot.

That said; two vital questions have to be asked.

1) Was Ivins actually responsible or is there something more to all of this that could be far more damaging to the country?

2) Why hasn’t the fact that the Anthrax that was used in the attacks been widely reported as a US military bio-weapons strain, thus negating the possibility that the letters and packages sent containing the lethal spores were part of a greater al-Qaeda operation?

Like it or not, this is a very serious issue with regards to the falsehoods propagated by the Bush Administration in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. Unfortunately, given the sensitive and classified nature of the military’s bio-weapons programs, the probability that an untainted investigation into the matter is unlikely.

More…

This article in yesterday’s Washington Post is also of interest.

August 4, 2008 18 Comments

As a follow up to an entry posted a few days ago, an article of note from the New York Times entitled – C.I.A. Outlines Pakistan Links With Militants…

“The C.I.A. emissary presented evidence showing that members of the spy service had deepened their ties with some militant groups that were responsible for a surge of violence in Afghanistan, possibly including the suicide bombing this month of the Indian Embassy in Kabul, the officials said.

The decision to confront Pakistan with what the officials described as a new C.I.A. assessment of the spy service’s activities seemed to be the bluntest American warning to Pakistan since shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks about the ties between the spy service and Islamic militants.

The C.I.A. assessment specifically points to links between members of the spy service, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, and the militant network led by Maulavi Jalaluddin Haqqani, which American officials believe maintains close ties to senior figures of Al Qaeda in Pakistan’s tribal areas.

The C.I.A. has depended heavily on the ISI for information about militants in Pakistan, despite longstanding concerns about divided loyalties within the Pakistani spy service, which had close relations with the Taliban in Afghanistan before the Sept. 11 attacks.

That ISI officers have maintained important ties to anti-American militants has been the subject of previous reports in The New York Times. But the C.I.A. and the Bush administration have generally sought to avoid criticism of Pakistan, which they regard as a crucial ally in the fight against terrorism.”

This should come as absolutely no surprise whatsoever, least of all to the Central Intelligence Agency who used the ISI as their primary conduit with regards to supporting the Mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 80’s. The CIA is, by no means, in the dark when it comes to the reality of the ghost government that the ISI represents. To present information that they are, in any way, shocked that elements within the ISI (or as a whole) have continued to support those that they have, for years, considered invaluably quintessential with regards to the injection of Pakistani influence in the region is a stretch to say the least.

July 30, 2008 5 Comments