London Times: The al-Qaeda conspiracy

by **Qutb** » Sat Jul 30, 2005 11:51 am

<a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1065-1704834_2,00.html" target="top">This</a> op-ed from The (London) Times offers a mildly dissenting perspective on on the London bombings (for a Murdoch-owned paper, anyway). <blockquote>Quote:<hr>AT TIMES of national emergency, the habit of the news media to drop a story or a lead in mid-air when it seems to be going nowhere unsettles the public. The media betray a sort of sheepish wish to “move on” from an erroneous report, hoping that their audience will not notice. Rather than acknowledge this, they publish a new report, leaving us to compare it with what had previously been said — and draw our own conclusions. Or they start barking up a different tree, the inference being that the last tree may have been the wrong tree. <hr></blockquote> <blockquote>Quote:<hr> Immediately after the first bombing, a report was splashed that two people had been arrested trying to leave Heathrow. The later report that they had been released without charge appeared as little more than a footnote. A few days after that, much was made of the arrest in Egypt of a British Muslim whom the less-scrupulous news reports called a “chemist” (he is a biochemist). There was talk of British agents attending (or joining) his interrogation in Cairo. A statement from the Egyptian authorities denying that they had linked him to the bombing or that he was on their list of al-Qaeda suspects, did receive momentary attention — and then the story seemed to die. I do not know what has happened to it, or him. Then there were some big headlines about an alleged “al-Qaeda operative” who had “slipped” into Britain, and slipped out — just before the bombings. But it transpired that he was low on our counter-terrorist services’ lists of security threats — and that story, too, has disappeared. Then there was an arrest in Pakistan of an alleged “al-Qaeda mastermind”, about which reports have become increasingly confused, dropping from their early position as leading news items. I do not know where we are now on these reports. If I understood them correctly, what helped to trace this mastermind were records of calls made to him by all, or some, of the four July 7 bombers from their mobile phones. If anyone has asked (or answered) a question that surely occurred to millions of us, then I have yet to hear of it: why did the bombers not take the elementary precaution of phoning the mastermind from a telephone box? Just how master was this mind? Is it not a curious way of operating a terrorist network, if the terrorists are to call their mastermind on their mobile phones, then take the phones with them on their bombing spree? <hr></blockquote> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>I would not be so rude or stupid as to suggest that ministers take any sort of satisfaction from terrorist atrocities. (Why, of course not - my comment) But leadership is made easier if there is a visible, tangible threat; and easier still if it can be represented as completely alien. Us v Them is the narrative a politician is most at home with. The BBC’s The Power of Nightmares made an important point: fear silences opposition, and governments walk tallest when an external threat can be identified and they can lead us against it. “Evil” is a more convenient opponent than stupidity, inadequacy and human dysfunction. We hold our leaders’ hands a little more tightly in the dark. <hr></blockquote> <blockquote>Quote:<hr> The police, British Intelligence, and our counter-terrorism apparatus, are all flattered in their work by headlines that suggest that the enemy is formidable, incredibly sophisticated and hard to catch. Any failure on the part of our security services to detect in advance or prevent a terrorist outrage, or to catch the terrorists afterwards, is easily explained if the terrorist movement is widely agreed to be fiendishly clever and well organised. It is not flattering to a counter-terrorism chief to suggest that his quarry is a muppet. The tale of a police mastermind calls for a criminal mastermind, too. <hr></blockquote>

by **seemslikeadream** » Sat Jul 30, 2005 11:59 am

Are things starting to spin out of control, not going quite according to the plan? <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/29/AR2005072902038.html">www.washingtonpost.com/wp...02038.html</a> U.S. Evicted From Air Base In Uzbekistan By Robin Wright and Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post Staff Writers Saturday, July 30, 2005; Page A01 Uzbekistan formally evicted the United States yesterday from a military base that has served as a hub for combat and humanitarian missions to Afghanistan since shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Pentagon and State Department officials said yesterday. In a highly unusual move, the notice of eviction from Karshi-Khanabad air base, known as K2, was delivered by a courier from the Uzbek Foreign Ministry to the U.S. Embassy in Tashkent, said a senior U.S. administration official involved in Central Asia policy. The message did not give a reason. Uzbekistan will give the United States 180 days to move aircraft, personnel and equipment, U.S. officials said. If Uzbekistan follows through, as Washington expects, the United States will face several logistical problems for its operations in Afghanistan. Scores of flights have used K2 monthly. It has been a landing base to transfer humanitarian goods that then are taken by road into northern Afghanistan, particularly to Mazar-e Sharif -- with no alternative for a region difficult to reach in the winter. K2 is also a refueling base with a runway long enough for large military aircraft. The alternative is much costlier midair refueling. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld returned this week from Central Asia, where he won assurances from Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan that the United States can use their bases for operations in Afghanistan. U.S. forces use Tajikistan for emergency landings and occasional refueling, but it lacks good roads into Afghanistan. Kyrgyzstan does not border Afghanistan. "We always think ahead. We'll be fine," Rumsfeld said Sunday when asked how the United States would cope with losing the base in Uzbekistan. In May, however, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman called access to the airfield "undeniably critical in supporting our combat operations" and humanitarian deliveries. The United States has paid $15 million to Uzbek authorities for use of the airfield since 2001, he said. Yesterday, Pentagon spokesman Lawrence T. Di Rita said that the U.S. military does not depend on one base in any part of the world. "We'll be able to conduct our operations as we need to, regardless of how this turns out. It's a diplomatic issue at the moment," Di Rita said. The eviction notice came four days before a senior State Department official was to arrive in Tashkent for talks with the government of President Islam Karimov. The relationship has been increasingly tense since bloody protests in the province of Andijan in May, the worst unrest since Uzbekistan gained independence from the Soviet Union. Undersecretary of State R. Nicholas Burns was going to pressure Tashkent to allow an international investigation into the Andijan protests, which human rights groups and three U.S. senators who met with eyewitnesses said killed about 500 people. Burns was also going to warn the government, one of the most authoritarian in the Islamic world, to open up politically -- or risk the kind of upheavals witnessed recently in Ukraine, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan, U.S. officials said. Karimov has balked at an international probe. As U.S. pressure mounted, he cut off U.S. night flights and some cargo flights, forcing Washington to move search-and-rescue operations and some cargo flights to Bagram air base in Afghanistan and Manas air base in Kyrgyzstan. As relations soured, the Bush administration was preparing for a further cutoff, U.S. officials said. The United States was given the notice just hours after 439 Uzbek political refugees were flown out of neighboring Kyrgyzstan -- over Uzbek objections -- by the United Nations. The refugees fled after the May unrest, which Uzbek officials charged was the work of terrorists. The Bush administration had been pressuring Kyrgyzstan not to force the refugees to return to Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan has been widely viewed as an important test for the Bush administration -- and whether the anti-terrorism efforts or promotion of democracy takes priority. "We all knew basically that if we really wanted to keep access to the base, the way to do it was to shut up about democracy and turn a blind eye to the refugees," said the senior official, on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive diplomacy. "We could have saved the base if we had wanted." After the latest setback in relations, the Bush administration is going to "wait for a cooling-off period," the administration official said. "We are assuming they mean it and want us out. We are now not sending someone to Uzbekistan." The next test will be whether to withhold as much as $22 million in aid to Uzbekistan if it does not comply with provisions on political and economic reforms it committed to undertake in a 2002 strategic partnership agreement with Washington. Last year, the administration withheld almost $11 million. U.S. officials expect the Uzbek government will again be ineligible for funds

by **Qutb** » Sat Jul 30, 2005 12:52 pm

John Loftus claims London bombing "mastermind" works for the MI6 - on Fox: <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/">www.foxnews.com/</a> Click "video" under "Answering Question" and then click on "Nabbed - finally". This is the Haroon Rashid Aswat who the Justice Deprtment prosecutors in Seattle wanted to indict in 1999 for setting up a terrorist training camp in Bly, Oregon, only to see their efforts blocked by the highest levels of the Justice dept. - according to Loftus, because he was a British agent! Loftus says "he is a double agent" and "the MI6 has been trying to hide him". The Fox guy seems pretty shocked. The story about Aswat disappeared as soon as it appeared, says the Times op-ed above. He fled to Pakistan on July 6, was arrested, only to be released within 24 hours, then fled to Zimbzbwe and Zambia. And now? Zambia is a member of the British Commonwealth, if I'm not mistaken. I think we'll se Haroon Aswat disappear down the memory hole. As for Uzbekistan - the Central Asian republics are aligning themselves with Russia and China in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. They have had enough. America and Britain are losing the Great Game.

London Times: The al-Qaeda conspiracy

London Times: The al-Qaeda conspiracy

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