January 7, 2008 Apparently, Osama bin Laden and former CIA agent Michael Scheuer have a mutual respect for each other's intellect. In one of bin Laden's latest videos, he said, "If you would like to get to know some of the reasons for your losing of your war against us, then read the book of Michael Scheuer in this regard." Here is Scheuer's take on Osama: "For nearly a decade now, bin Laden demonstrated patience, brilliant planning, managerial expertise, sound strategic and tactical sense, admirable character traits, eloquence, and focused, limited war aims. He has never, to my knowledge, behaved or spoken in a way that could be described as irrational in the extreme." Here we have a "former" CIA man, claiming to be an opponent of administration war policies, speaking as a foremost expert on bin Laden, because of his position on the "bin Laden unit." He validates the latest bin Laden videos with his expertise, without ever acknowledging facts about al Qaida and their leader � the nature of the real threat vs. the created perception, the death of bin Laden, al Qaida the database, the builders and instructors of the Pakistani/Afghani insurgent training camps. In his book Imperial Hubris, written under the penname "Anonymous," Scheuer paints a shocking portrait of camps that he claims were built by bin Laden, when, in truth, he knows that these are all CIA built facilities, including the notorious Tora Bora (where bin Laden is allegedly buried), the camps in the Swat Valley in Northwest Pakistan, the scene of ongoing confrontations and under the watchful eyes of a new American super base which is under construction near there. Scheuer's book had to be cleared by the company before he could publish it, meaning that there is nothing in his book that the CIA does not want to become public knowledge. His information on the insurgent training camps comes from an article from the New York Times, entitled "Turning Out Guerrillas and Terrorists to Wage a Holy War," detailing the training that was provided by American instructors to Afghan insurgents (although both attributed the training to al Qaida). "C.J. Chivers and David Rohde explained that 'American tactics and training became integral parts of the [al Qaeda] schools,' that instruction was standardized so 'courses taught in different languages and hundreds of miles apart . . . were identical,' They all have the same basic skills. . . and received funds from Gulf donors to cover costs" (never mentioning that the Gulf donors were matching US funds). Like Scheuer, the Times ignored the fact that al Qaida did not exist before 1999, according to experts like director of Congressional Task Force on Terrorism, Yossef Bodansky. Scheuer quotes from the Times:
"The main function of the camps was and is to produce quality and uniform religious and paramilitary � or insurgent � training to young Muslims...Since the mid- 1980s, the camps have produced large numbers of skilled fighters � who then return home to fight and train others � not swarms of Terrorists. The terrorists trained in the camps are more accurately viewed as al Qaeda's urban warfare arm, or special forces. The camps' dual-production capability has been obvious for nearly thirty years, but this was little noticed in a West fixated on the small number of terrorists these camps produced. That the camps were producing far larger numbers of well-trained insurgents did not receive a serious think-through � and still has not � and, meanwhile, the trainees learned, according to documents captured in Afghanistan, how to use: AK-47s, Stinger missiles, GPS systems, advanced land navigation, RPGs, map reading, demolition techniques, celestial navigation, hand-to-hand combat techniques, trench digging, weapons deployments, escape and evasion techniques, first aid, scientific calculations to plot artillery fire, first aid, secure communications, et cetera, et cetera." The "et cetera," part that Scheuer left out from the New York Times referred to the training that the mujahedeen had received from a United States Army Special Forces manual which showed ''methods for fabricating explosives, detonators, propellants, shaped charges [you know, the ones that only Iran is capable of constructing], small arms, mortars, incendiaries, delays, switches and similar items from indigenous materials.'' The training included detailed knowledge for advanced terrorism, like manufacturing explosives from common household items and the conversion of basic electronic items like watches, toy remote controllers, and other items into sophisticated triggering systems - the knowledge that has spread from Afghanistan to Iraq and beyond, has served as the basis for traps that have killed American troops, even shaped charges. The camps trained paramilitary soldiers and hi-tech "super terrorists." The Times article notes the excellence of the military training for a "ragged band of fanatics, had achieved a level of competence that American military officials say was on par with the world's best guerrilla forces...One senior military instructor noticed a familiar streak of professionalism 'Wherever they got this, it was modeled after somebody's program. It was not made by some guys on some goat farm outside of Kabul.''' Scheuer promotes the vision of the camps that the CIA wants us to believe, that of Islamic camps producing assassins and suicide bombers, while the virtuous American government and CIA did nothing about it. The army of non- Afghan Muslims and hundreds of paramilitary trainers who came out of these camps is blamed on Islamists who were brought together by us, but the CIA, as usual, tries to maintain "plausible deniability" in relation to the Afghan/Soviet war and the "Islamic threat" we created, which grew out of it. The former head of the CIA's "Bin Laden Unit" wants us to believe in the tortured claims of Shaykh al-Libi (that had been proven false by the time he wrote his book) "the camps housed WMD experts who were building weapons and training others to do so or to use them," even after it had become common knowledge within the US intelligence community that the charge was false. Newsweek confirmed that a copy of the DIA report "would have been sent" to the Bush administration's National Security Council. The CIA also produced a document containing similar conclusions about al-Libi in January 2003, Hubris came out in 2004. As the most widely recognized expert on bin Laden, Scheuer validates each new "bin Laden tape." Do you think that the evil bastard appearing in the upper pictures is the same guy in the lower photos, taken from the latest "bin Laden" videos? Here is Scheuer's latest defense of his hero: "Analysis of Osama bin Laden" by Michael Scheuer "The September 7 release of a new video statement by Osama bin Laden puts to rest, at least for now, widespread speculation that he is dead, retired, or has been pushed aside by his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri. With a newly trimmed and dyed beard, comfortable robes rather than a camouflage jacket, and a clear and patient speaking style, bin Laden achieved a major purpose of his speech before he said a word: he clearly showed Muslims and Americans that he was still alive, that he was healthy and not at death's door, that he spoke from secure surroundings unthreatened by the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan, and that he, al-Qaeda and their allies were ready to continue the war. As usual, this message was wrapped in an as-Sahab Productions video displaying high level production values." In the same article, Scheuer attempts to extend his power to validate terrorist videos that comes from his experience with bin Laden, to that of the Israeli/al Qaida spokesman, Adam Pearlman (a.k.a. Adam Gadahn, a.k.a. Azzam al-Amriki) and Ayman al-Zawahiri (alleged to be a CIA/MI6 asset). While Scheuer was attempting to vouch for both bin Laden and Pearlman, his former associates still at the bureau were denouncing the latest tape as a hoax: "American spy chiefs were quick to name Adam Gadahn, the head of al-Qaeda's English language media operations, as the author of large sections of bin Laden's broadcast... A former senior US intelligence official said: "It has Adam Gadahn written all over it." Mike Baker, a former CIA covert operations officer, said the tape left bin Laden with "the title of biggest gas bag in the terrorist world". Despite this, CIA officials claimed that voice analysis of the tape proved it was definitely bin Laden's voice, even though they failed to point out evidence of why this could not be, or the gaps in the video and audio segments, as well as the obvious editing errors which were uncovered. Jumping back to Imperial Hubris, we watch Scheuer dance around the issue of the problems created for us, by the camps that we did not build, and the insurgents that we did not train in advanced terror tactics: "Completing the picture, we have learned since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan that camps also were dedicated to training Tajiks, Uzbeks, Chechens. and Uighurs. In Afghanistan, then, camps training Islamist insurgents numbered many more than those belonging to al Qaeda and the Taleban, and together they built a store of trouble for the United rotes and the West by preparing men to fight in current insurgencies and ones not yet begun. Many observers, however, still have trouble absorbing the fact that there is a huge cadre of camp-trained Islamist insurgents available around the world � a veteran force in being, if you will, ready to deploy whenever and wherever the opportunity arises." (The database of that huge cadre is called "al Qaida." ) George Crile's expose, was released at the same time as Hubris , it confirmed that the camps in question were CIA/ISI (Pakistani secret service). The deadly training that Scheuer described in his book was carried on from American programs, such as the infamous CIA jihadi textbooks, produced at the University of Nebraska, which remained the curriculum there, even after the Taliban were evicted. Textbooks for children that were a combination of indoctrination in radical Islam and weapons training are at the core of America's problems with radical Islam in Pakistan. In their article "From the USA, the ABCs of jihad," in the Washington Post, Joe Stephens and David B. Ottaway describe the Jihadi textbooks made in the American Bible/corn belt: "Published in the dominant Afghan languages of Dari and Pashtu, the textbooks were developed in the early 1980s under an AID [Agency for International Development] grant to the University of Nebraska-Omaha and its Center for Afghanistan Studies. The agency spent $51 million on the university's education programs in Afghanistan from 1984 to 1994...Under this Jihadism project, the images and talk of resistance to occupation were craftily intermingled with regular education: Children were taught to count with illustrations showing tanks, missiles and land mines, agency officials said. They acknowledged that at the time it also suited US interests to stoke hatred of foreign invaders...One page from the texts of that period shows a resistance fighter with a bandolier and a Kalashnikov slung from his shoulder. The soldier's head is missing. Above the soldier is a verse from the Koran. Below is a Pashtu tribute to the mujaheddin [sic], who are described as obedient to Allah. Such men will sacrifice their wealth and life itself to impose Islamic law on the government, the text says. The United States' Jihadism successfully transformed Afghan children into true freedom fighters..." Then we have secretive American government figures, like Congressman Charlie Wilson and Zbigniew Brzezinski (the self-proclaimed father of the anti-Soviet jihad idea) traveling to the secret camps in Pakistan to cheer the Afghans on, telling them "God is on your side," as seen in the following: Another important piece of investigative journalism, Triple Cross, by Peter Lance, reveals some of the little-known CIA al Qaida connections, in particular, that of Ali Mohamed: " In the years leading to the 9/11 attacks, no single agent of al Qaeda was more successful in compromising the U.S. intelligence community than a former Egyptian army captain turned CIA operative, Special Forces advisor, and FBI informant named Ali Mohamed [a.k.a. Ali Amiriki, or "Ali the American"]. Spying first for the Central Intelligence Agency and later the FBI, Mohamed even succeeded in penetrating the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center at Fort Bragg � while simultaneously training the cell that blew up the World Trade Center in 1993 [taught Ramsey Yousef, cousin of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged planner of 9/11]. He lived the quiet life of a Silicon Valley computer executive while slipping off to Afghanistan and the Sudan to train some of al Qaeda's most lethal terrorists in bomb-making and assassination tradecraft � much of that time maintaining his status as an FBI informant who worked his Bureau control agent like a mole...A deep-penetration al Qaeda sleeper, he succeeded as a triple agent, gaining access to the most sensitive intelligence in the U.S. counter-terrorism arsenal." - Peter Lance There you have it, Ali, a CIA double-agent, was key to bringing the camps run by bin Laden up to American standards for paramilitary training. He also gave bin Laden's agents access to top secret intelligence which he had access to in the Army, while in the employ of the FBI, he was also working for the CIA to improve the lethality of al Qaida. The hidden hand of the CIA is becoming visible in every step that America has taken over the years to create a believable new enemy for us, in the form of international Islamist extremism, to replace the Soviet bogeyman that the damned mujahedeen we trained so well took from us. Thanks to the CIA's hard efforts to create a potential enemy out of a peaceful religion, and especially to the efforts of loyal "retired" spooks, like Michael Scheuer, we are about to witness what the fascist neoconservatives like Michael Ledeen meant when they urged "total war" on us, as the path to victory in the war on terror. In this, Scheuer and the neocons are in complete agreement. Instead of acknowledging what has taken place in the past and trying to correct the mistakes, Scheuer joins those extremists calling for us to wage total war upon Islam, as a necessary evil, to preserve our gluttonous American way of life: "America is in a war for survival. Not survival in terms of protecting territory, but in terms of keeping the ability to live as we want, not as we must." The hellish scenario described in the following passage should give sane people nightmares: "We will have to use military force in the way Americans used it... from skies over Tokyo and Dresden. Progress will be measured by pace of killing and, yes, by body counts. Not the fatuous body counts of Vietnam, but precise counts that will run to extremely large ambers. The piles of dead will include as many or more civilians as combatants because our enemies wear no uniforms. Killing in large numbers is not enough to defeat our Muslim foes. With killing must come a Sherman-like razing of infrastructure. Roads and irrigation systems; bridges, power plants, and crops in the field; fertilizer plants and grain mills � all these and more will need to be destroyed to deny the enemy its support base. Land mines, moreover will be massively reintroduced to seal borders and mountain passes too long, high, or numerous to close with U.S. soldiers. As noted, such actions will yield large civilian casualties, displaced populations, and refugee flows. Again, this sort of bloody-mindedness is neither admirable nor desirable, but it will remain America's only option so long as she stands by her failed policies toward the Muslim world." We are seeing the first steps in that desired war escalation in the recent announcement that large numbers of Special Forces were moving into Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province, to train paramilitary forces and more Islamic militias to fight the other Islamists that we had previously trained. The CIA plot to create a credible enemy that would fight against US Army and Marine troops has started to bear fruit. Their plan is working, Americans are being killed by American-trained Islamists all over the place. If Congress allows it to go forward (both Democrats and Republicans will support the plan enthusiastically), this may prove to be the elusive path to world war III that Cheney and the neocons have been frantically searching for. At least that's what New Delhi news analyst Aijaz Ahmad foresees as Pakistan's fate, if it fails to "disengage from the US war on terrorism." Ahmad spells-out the obvious conclusion about reviving the original CIA program to train and radicalize Islamists and to wage war in Pakistan � "There is no military solution in Pakistan, just as there was no military solution in Iraq, Afghanistan, or on the nuclear issue with Iran." |
