Too convenient
Aside from the illegality and the immorality of the killing, my other thought about the government’s May Day and Media frenzied announcement of the latest killing of Al Qaeda icon Osama bin Laden was its insidious convenience.
Editing, lead comment by Carolyn Bennett
KPFA’s “Guns and Butter” this week recalled the long-dead, resurrected, and re-deceased Osama bin Laden. Program host Bonnie Faulkner played an archived 2009 interview with Dr. David Ray Griffin, author of Osama bin Laden: Dead or Alive? On the evidence, he concludes that bin Laden died in December 2001 and in a Global Research article, Griffin writes, “If my little book — by showing that bin Laden has probably long been dead — can help shorten this war [in Afghanistan], it will have served its main purpose.”
Another critical finding in his book, Griffin says, is that several years of “fake bin Laden tapes appear to be part of an extensive propaganda operation, in which the U.S. military intelligence has used tax dollars, illegally, to propagandize the American public — with the aim of furthering the militarization of America and its foreign policy.” This is some of the evidence summarized in Griffin’s article.
“Objective Evidence that Bin Laden died 10 years ago —
1. [U]p until mid-December 13, 2001, the CIA had regularly been intercepting messages between bin Laden and his people. At that time [December 13, 2001], however, the messages suddenly stopped, and the CIA has never again intercepted a message.
2. [O]n December 26, 2001, a leading Pakistani newspaper published a story reporting that bin Laden had died in mid-December, adding:
‘A prominent official in the Afghan Taleban movement . . . stated . . . that he had himself attended the funeral of bin Laden and saw his face prior to burial.’
3. Bin Laden had kidney disease. He had been treated for it in the American Hospital in Dubai in July 2001, at which time he reportedly ordered two dialysis machines to take home.
If you have ever wondered what bin Laden was doing the night before the 9/11 attacks, CBS News reported that he was being given kidney dialysis treatment in a hospital in Pakistan.
[I]n January of 2001, Dr. Sanjay Gupta said – based on a video of bin Laden that had been made in either late November or early December of 2001 – that he appeared to be in the last stages of kidney failure.
4. In July of 2002, CNN reported that bin Laden’s bodyguards had been captured in February of that year, adding: ‘Sources believe that if the bodyguards were captured away from bin Laden, it is likely the most-wanted man in the world is dead.’
5. [T]he United States has since 2001 offered a $25 million reward for any information leading to the capture or killing of bin Laden.
However, this reward offer has produced no such information, even though Pakistan has many desperately poor people, only about half of whom have been supportive of bin Laden.
“Testimonial Evidence that Bin Laden died 10 years ago —
Considerable testimony in 2002 from people in position to know [said] bin Laden was, or probably was, dead. “These people included:
- Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf
- Head of the FBI’s counterterrorism unit Dale Watson
- [Reagan administration NSC aide, U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel] Oliver North, who said: I’m certain that Osama is dead. . . And so are all the other guys I stay in touch with’
- Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai
- Israeli intelligence sources who said that any new messages from bin Laden were ‘probably fabrications’
- Pakistani intelligence sources who ‘confirmed the death of . . . Osama Bin Laden’ and ‘attributed the reasons behind Washington's hiding news on the death of Osama Bin Laden to the desire of the hawks of the American administration to use the issue of al-Qaida and international terrorism to invade Iraq.’
For this reason, perhaps, the stories about the demise of bin Laden largely came to an end in the latter part of 2002, when the United States was gearing up for its attack on Iraq. From then until now, there have been few such stories.
· In October 2008, former CIA case officer Robert Baer during an interview on National Public Radio suggested, in passing, that bin Laden was no longer among the living. When asked about this, Baer said, ‘Of course he’s dead.’
· In March of 2009, former Foreign Service officer Angelo Codevilla published an essay in the American Spectator entitled ‘Osama bin Elvis.’
Explaining his title, Codevilla wrote, ‘Seven years after Osama bin Laden’s last verifiable appearance among the living, there is more evidence for Elvis’s presence among us than for his.’
Post-December 2001 audio tape and video tape
‘Messages from Osama bin Laden’
“The most obviously faked video is one that [appeared] in 2007 [and] was identical to the ‘October Surprise’ video of 2004 — except that the bin Laden figure now had a completely black beard. … Although pundits tried, with straight faces, to explain why bin Laden might have dyed his beard, or put on a fake one, this video was best treated with the respect it deserved by a YouTube video featuring an actor wearing a very long, very black, beard, and saying: ‘Hello, long time no see. It is me, Osama bin Laden; and, no, this is not to be confused with just-for-men hair color commercial. . . . I make this video to prove to world that me still alive and kicking.’
“This video is very funny. But there is, of course, nothing funny about the fact that obviously fake bin Laden videos have been used, and are still being used, to justify the AfPak war, which continues to kill dozens if not hundreds of innocent people each week, including women and children attending weddings and funerals.…
“… [T]he technology for making fake audio and video tapes is now so advanced that even experts can be fooled. So although the press regularly tells us that intelligence agencies have authenticated the latest bin Laden tape — it is virtually impossible to prove a tape to be authentic.
“It is sometimes possible, however, to prove a tape to be a fake. For example:
· If the person hired to play bin Laden writes with his right hand
· If he is much heavier and darker than bin Laden was in a tape made about the same time
· If he has fatter hands and shorter fingers
· If his nose has a different shape
· If, in discussing the Twin Towers, he says that the fire melted the steel, whereas the real bin Laden would have known that a building fire cannot melt steel. Here referenced “the video allegedly found by U.S. troops in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, in November 2001, which is widely known as the ‘bin Laden confession video’
“‘October Surprise’— Obviously fabricated was the ‘October Surprise’ video, which appeared on October 29, 2004 — just in time to help George W. Bush get reelected.
“One clue that it was a fake, aside from its timing, is provided by its language: Bin Laden’s own messages were saturated with references to Allah and the Prophet Mohammed but in this October Surprise video, Allah was mentioned rarely and the only ‘Mohammad’ mentioned was Mohamed Atta.
“… [U]undoubtedly authentic bin Laden messages portrayed worldly events as cause or at least permitted by Allah, the speaker on this October Surprise video gave a purely secular account of events, even telling the American people: ‘Your security is in your own hands.’”
Sources and notes
Guns and Butter - May 11, 2011: ‘Osama bin Laden: Dead or Alive?’ Bonnie Faulkner speaking with Dr. David Ray Griffin on his new book Osama bin Laden Dead or Alive? Examines all the evidence, the important bin Laden videos and audio recordings, the significance in the timing of their release, and statements by significant political and intelligence figures, http://www.kpfa.org/archive/show/34
From archives: July 22, 2009, direct link to mp3 file: 20090722_bonniefaulkner_davidraygriffin.mp3
KPFA (source):http://www.kpfa.org; David Ray Griffin: http://www.davidraygriffin.com
http://davidraygriffin.com/obama-says-justice-has-been-done-bin-laden-scholar-says-no/
“Osama bin Laden: Already Dead... Evidence that Bin Laden has been dead for Several Years
(Professor David Ray Griffin) May 2, 2011, http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=listByAuthor&authorFirst=David%20Ray%20&authorName=Griffin, Global Research, October 9, 2009 David Ray Griffin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by David Ray Griffin, http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=15601
U.S. professor (ret.) of philosophy of religion and theology David Ray Griffin is co-founder and director of the Center for Process Studies, a research center of Claremont School of Theology, “which seeks to promote the common good by means of the relational approach found in process thought.” Griffin has authored several books on “the subject of the September 11 attacks suggesting that there was a conspiracy involving some elements of the United States government.” Wikipedia biographical notes
A long line of abuse of power
Oliver North, Ronald Reagan, and Iran -Contra
In early November 1985, at the suggestion of the head of the National Security Council (NSC), William (“Bud”) McFarlane, Reagan authorized a secret initiative to sell antitank and antiaircraft missiles to Iran in exchange for that country’s help in securing the release of Americans held hostage by terrorist groups in Lebanon.
The initiative directly contradicted the administration’s publicly stated policy of refusing to negotiate with terrorists or to aid countries—such as Iran—that supported international terrorism. News of the arms-for-hostages deal, first made public in November 1986 (only one month after Reagan ordered raids on Libya in retaliation for its alleged involvement in the Berlin bombing), proved intensely embarrassing to the president.
Even more damaging, however, was the announcement later that month by Attorney General Edwin Meese that a portion of the $48 million earned from the sales had been diverted to a secret fund to purchase weapons and supplies for the Contras in Nicaragua. The diversion was undertaken by an obscure NSC aide, U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, with the approval of McFarlane’s successor at the NSC, Rear Admiral John Poindexter. (North, as it was later revealed, had also engaged in private fund-raising for the Contras.)
These activities constituted a violation of a law passed by Congress in 1984 (the second Boland Amendment) that forbade direct or indirect American military aid to the Contra insurgency.
In response to the crisis, by this time known as the Iran-Contra Affair, [President Ronald] Reagan fired both North and Poindexter and appointed a special commission, headed by former senator John Tower of Texas (the Tower Commission), to investigate the matter. An independent counsel, Judge Lawrence Walsh, was also appointed, and the House and Senate began joint hearings to examine both the arms sales and the military assistance to the Contras. As a result of Walsh’s investigations, North and Poindexter were convicted on charges of obstructing justice and related offenses, but their convictions were overturned on appeal, on the ground that testimony given at their trials had been influenced by information they had supplied to Congress under a limited grant of immunity. [Historical notes, Britannica]
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