25%+ of all Pentagon money is unaccounted for
The Pentagon receives the lion's share of the US tax payer's dollars.
36% goes to current military expenses. 18% goes to what's called "past military" which includes veteran's pensions and medical benefits.
The US spends more on its military than the following countries COMBINED: China, Russia, Britain, France, Japan, Germany, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, India, Brazil, Italy, Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, and Indonesia.
Where does the money go?
At least 25% - and some estimates are much higher - goes down a rat hole unaccounted for and never to been seen again. The above news report ran the day before September 11, 2001. The problem since then has become exponentially worse.
You can see the numbers here:
http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Monday, August 11, 2008
The “Mad Scientist” Ivins, and Other 9/11 Legends
by Sander Hicks
As the sun begins to set on the tyrannical Bush/Cheney Administration, a “culprit” for the anthrax attacks has been dropped on us. The government has produced the dead body of “mad scientist” Bruce Ivins, the way a smiling cat produces a mouse carcass.
This new lone assassin story holds together quite well: as long as you look only at it, and not at any of the other grisly details about US government involvement in anthrax.
The biggest hole in the current news story is that we all are expected now to reverse seven years of thinking, and suddenly believe that the anthrax attacks had no connection to 9/11. They were the work of an American insider, a psycho killer inside the US Army’s Fort Detrick, the Maryland headquarters of tax-payer funded chemical warfare.
With all the blame on Ivins, the official story has contradicted itself.
For example, look at this:
Above is the letter that was sent to Senator Tom Daschle. Would a crazy mad scientist NOT tied to the 9/11 attacks send his anthrax letters out right after 9/11, with “09-11-01” on top, and end the cover note with “Allah is Great”? Would he be willing to contribute to the public terror and build up the effect of 9/11, resulting in the advancement of the neo-con agenda? And here’s the stickler: Would he drive seven hours to Princeton, NJ to mail the letters, because he’s obsessed with a Catholic sorority there, but at the SAME time he’s sane enough to use the 9/11 attacks as a cover story? One that keeps him safe for seven years?
Something doesn’t add up.
Remember Jerome Hauer? We New Yorkers remember him well as the guy whose idea it was to spray carcinogenic insecticides, at eye level, from small pick up trucks, in residential city neighborhoods, to combat the almost nonexistent threat of “West Nile Virus” back in the Giuliani days.
He was a NYC Government bio-terrorism expert who happened to be doing a bio-terrorism drill called “Tripod II” inside the World Trade Center on the morning of 9/11.
It turns out Hauer is old friends with Steven Hatfill, the other anthrax suspect. It turns out, they both lectured at the Council on Foreign Relations together not too many years ago on the topic of “Building a ‘BioBomb’: Terrorist Challenge.” Yep, Hatfill, who commissioned a report from the CIA on how to attack people using anthrax in the mail, back when he worked at Ft. Detrick.
According to a San Jose newspaper, Jerome Hauer told the White House to go on Cipro on the evening of 9/11/01. They did. (On the phone with me, he denied telling the White House that, for what it’s worth.)
Shortly thereafter, Hauer’s next job was at the National Institute of Health, where he was tasked with, guess what? Investigating the anthrax attacks. And who did he point the finger to? Not Ivins, not Hatfill, not any of the gang at Ft. Detrick, or S.A.I.C., Hatfill and Hauer’s old employer, the military contractor. No, Hauer blamed Al Qaeda and Bin Laden. Another Democrat reading from the neo-con hymnal.
(In the same way, when Dan Rather looked at the collapse of the towers on 9/11 and on live TV said it looked just like one of those controlled demolitions, Hauer happened to be right there alongside Rather, saying, nope, it’s clear to me right now that it was jet fuel that dropped those structures. He knew more than one page of the hymnal.)
When you hear the media go on and on about Bruce Ivins’ obsession with sorority girls, or his insanity, take it with a grain of salt. A man’s reputation is fragile and it’s the first thing attacked in a situation like this.
For example, take Dr. Graham. He was a 9/11 truth researcher who died two years ago in Louisiana. Dr. Graham was a Louisiana community activist, a Vietnam veteran, an evangelical, an inventor, and a dentist who met two of the 9/11 hijackers in his hometown of Shreveport ten months before 9/11.
He warned the FBI that he found the two young Saudis suspicious. But he was verbally abused and threatened by FBI. When 9/11 happened, these same two young Saudis were called Bin Laden’s right hand men. That’s interesting because the same two were protected by various agencies of the Federal government in multiple instances, in various cities across the USA.
In 2004, on the verge of publishing a book about his experiences with the FBI and the 9/11 terrorists, Dr. Graham was poisoned.
Here’s where the Graham story becomes a lot like the Ivins story. Graham was taken to the hospital and the FBI showed up in the ER at the same time. The FBI intimidated doctors, told them he was crazy. The cardiac surgeon abandoned Graham after that. The FBI implied Graham was suicidal to the Shreveport media. Graham died a slow death a year and a half later from the poisoning. The local media there have been reticent to cover this story, and effectively consented to let the FBI write it for them. But it’s the FBI who should be indicted for murder.
Recently, anthrax suspect Steven Hatfill was paid $6 million of your taxpayer dollars. He didn’t like being called a “person of interest” in the anthrax investigation and he sued the Department of Justice. Wow, $6 million.
I guess it pays to be friends with people like Jerome Hauer and the Council on Foreign Relations. And yet I’m still waiting for answers regarding so much about Hatfill. I wish I had all the time in the world to fully research his alleged ties to far-right fascist groups in South Africa (who used anthrax). And why did the Washington Post Magazine report that a glove box for handling toxic chemicals was found concealed at the bottom of a pond on Hatfill’s property? The $6 million doesn’t exonerate him in my eyes. It sounds like someone pulling favors.
The same Department of Justice that paid him hasn’t responded to my formal request that the Inspector General at Justice look into FBI involvement in the death of Dr. Graham. This might seem unreasonable but they themselves promised a response. They are now five months late.
I had called them from Shreveport after I had confronted the local FBI. I felt the walls closing in. The FBI didn’t deny that they had told the local media the Graham was crazy. They stuck to their story and tried to get me to believe it. But they couldn’t provide evidence. There is none.
Graham was a good man and his suspicions were right on. The FBI agent I talked to had murder and cover-up just pouring out of his body-language, his nervous twitches, and the way he expelled me and another reporter from their offices.
In the same way, we are being handed an official story about Bruce Ivins. But details are left out. Like why did the FBI have to offer Ivin’s son $2.5 million and the “sportscar of your choice” to say certain things about his dad? If Ivins was guilty, then why the need to fabricate evidence? An offer of $2.5 million sounds heavy handed, like you’re desperate to find a fall guy, dead or alive. Preferably dead, patsies are so much more agreeable that way.
Let’s go back to Jerry Hauer.
This was a guy who came up a lot at the Citizens Grand Jury convened by citizen activists in the well-organized 9/11 truth community. When I was researching my story on the Spitzer-Silverstein connection for New York Megaphone, I tracked down Hauer’s home phone number and called him on Labor Day, last fall.
My timing was good, because I think he was a little drunk. He said things slightly slurred, and was at times a bit too honest. It was all a joke to him. On the audio file you can hear people laughing in the background.
We discussed the San Diego Citizens Grand Jury Indictment, which he dismissed with insults, but couldn’t say why.
He confirmed that he worked with Hatfill at SAIC. Then, I asked if Hatfill was innocent of involvement in the anthrax attacks. He was less than direct:
HICKS: A lot of people are wondering you know, where these anthrax attacks came from.
HAUER: I have uh…NO idea.
HICKS: Do you think that Hatfill is innocent?
HAUER: I…I…think that the FBI…should not have s…said anything about Hatfield until they knew more. I do not think Steve Hatfield is a murderer. I think Steve Hatfield is very passionate but I don’t think he’s a murderer. I don’t believe he did it.
HICKS: Uhhhh. That seems to be not the most clear, specific response in the world. I’m wondering if you’re saying that Hatfill…Can you say conclusively that Hatfill was not involved in the anthrax attacks? Is that what you’re saying?
HAUER: I’m not going to get into those details.
HICKS: So you’re leaving some room for ambiguity?
HAUER: No, I’m not. I’m not going to get into those details.
HICKS: Why not?
HAUER: I just don’t want to comment on it.
I just listened to the whole mp3 again for the first time in a while. I remember the night I made the interview. And then, using 1/8 inch audio cables, I turned my phone recording tape player into something that could talk to a Mac. Using some mp3-studio shareware I downloaded, I made this mp3.
I was excited because I sort of knew that someday, the US Government and the FBI would throw up a sloppy non-answer for the anthrax attacks. And on that day, I knew that this interview would be especially relevant. I felt at the time I had contributed something to advancing the real story on anthrax.
In this audio file, notice how Jerry Hauer sort of acknowledges that the FBI is mishandling the case, and yet he still refers to them as the place to go for answers. That’s called misprision of a felony, when you know that someone is committing a crime, like covering up the five anthrax murders. But you don’t do anything about it.
Maybe because you were involved.
Audio - Hicks and Hauer:
http://www.voxpopnet.net/podcasts/hauer.mp3
As the sun begins to set on the tyrannical Bush/Cheney Administration, a “culprit” for the anthrax attacks has been dropped on us. The government has produced the dead body of “mad scientist” Bruce Ivins, the way a smiling cat produces a mouse carcass.
This new lone assassin story holds together quite well: as long as you look only at it, and not at any of the other grisly details about US government involvement in anthrax.
The biggest hole in the current news story is that we all are expected now to reverse seven years of thinking, and suddenly believe that the anthrax attacks had no connection to 9/11. They were the work of an American insider, a psycho killer inside the US Army’s Fort Detrick, the Maryland headquarters of tax-payer funded chemical warfare.
With all the blame on Ivins, the official story has contradicted itself.
For example, look at this:
Above is the letter that was sent to Senator Tom Daschle. Would a crazy mad scientist NOT tied to the 9/11 attacks send his anthrax letters out right after 9/11, with “09-11-01” on top, and end the cover note with “Allah is Great”? Would he be willing to contribute to the public terror and build up the effect of 9/11, resulting in the advancement of the neo-con agenda? And here’s the stickler: Would he drive seven hours to Princeton, NJ to mail the letters, because he’s obsessed with a Catholic sorority there, but at the SAME time he’s sane enough to use the 9/11 attacks as a cover story? One that keeps him safe for seven years?
Something doesn’t add up.
Remember Jerome Hauer? We New Yorkers remember him well as the guy whose idea it was to spray carcinogenic insecticides, at eye level, from small pick up trucks, in residential city neighborhoods, to combat the almost nonexistent threat of “West Nile Virus” back in the Giuliani days.
He was a NYC Government bio-terrorism expert who happened to be doing a bio-terrorism drill called “Tripod II” inside the World Trade Center on the morning of 9/11.
It turns out Hauer is old friends with Steven Hatfill, the other anthrax suspect. It turns out, they both lectured at the Council on Foreign Relations together not too many years ago on the topic of “Building a ‘BioBomb’: Terrorist Challenge.” Yep, Hatfill, who commissioned a report from the CIA on how to attack people using anthrax in the mail, back when he worked at Ft. Detrick.
According to a San Jose newspaper, Jerome Hauer told the White House to go on Cipro on the evening of 9/11/01. They did. (On the phone with me, he denied telling the White House that, for what it’s worth.)
Shortly thereafter, Hauer’s next job was at the National Institute of Health, where he was tasked with, guess what? Investigating the anthrax attacks. And who did he point the finger to? Not Ivins, not Hatfill, not any of the gang at Ft. Detrick, or S.A.I.C., Hatfill and Hauer’s old employer, the military contractor. No, Hauer blamed Al Qaeda and Bin Laden. Another Democrat reading from the neo-con hymnal.
(In the same way, when Dan Rather looked at the collapse of the towers on 9/11 and on live TV said it looked just like one of those controlled demolitions, Hauer happened to be right there alongside Rather, saying, nope, it’s clear to me right now that it was jet fuel that dropped those structures. He knew more than one page of the hymnal.)
When you hear the media go on and on about Bruce Ivins’ obsession with sorority girls, or his insanity, take it with a grain of salt. A man’s reputation is fragile and it’s the first thing attacked in a situation like this.
For example, take Dr. Graham. He was a 9/11 truth researcher who died two years ago in Louisiana. Dr. Graham was a Louisiana community activist, a Vietnam veteran, an evangelical, an inventor, and a dentist who met two of the 9/11 hijackers in his hometown of Shreveport ten months before 9/11.
He warned the FBI that he found the two young Saudis suspicious. But he was verbally abused and threatened by FBI. When 9/11 happened, these same two young Saudis were called Bin Laden’s right hand men. That’s interesting because the same two were protected by various agencies of the Federal government in multiple instances, in various cities across the USA.
In 2004, on the verge of publishing a book about his experiences with the FBI and the 9/11 terrorists, Dr. Graham was poisoned.
Here’s where the Graham story becomes a lot like the Ivins story. Graham was taken to the hospital and the FBI showed up in the ER at the same time. The FBI intimidated doctors, told them he was crazy. The cardiac surgeon abandoned Graham after that. The FBI implied Graham was suicidal to the Shreveport media. Graham died a slow death a year and a half later from the poisoning. The local media there have been reticent to cover this story, and effectively consented to let the FBI write it for them. But it’s the FBI who should be indicted for murder.
Recently, anthrax suspect Steven Hatfill was paid $6 million of your taxpayer dollars. He didn’t like being called a “person of interest” in the anthrax investigation and he sued the Department of Justice. Wow, $6 million.
I guess it pays to be friends with people like Jerome Hauer and the Council on Foreign Relations. And yet I’m still waiting for answers regarding so much about Hatfill. I wish I had all the time in the world to fully research his alleged ties to far-right fascist groups in South Africa (who used anthrax). And why did the Washington Post Magazine report that a glove box for handling toxic chemicals was found concealed at the bottom of a pond on Hatfill’s property? The $6 million doesn’t exonerate him in my eyes. It sounds like someone pulling favors.
The same Department of Justice that paid him hasn’t responded to my formal request that the Inspector General at Justice look into FBI involvement in the death of Dr. Graham. This might seem unreasonable but they themselves promised a response. They are now five months late.
I had called them from Shreveport after I had confronted the local FBI. I felt the walls closing in. The FBI didn’t deny that they had told the local media the Graham was crazy. They stuck to their story and tried to get me to believe it. But they couldn’t provide evidence. There is none.
Graham was a good man and his suspicions were right on. The FBI agent I talked to had murder and cover-up just pouring out of his body-language, his nervous twitches, and the way he expelled me and another reporter from their offices.
In the same way, we are being handed an official story about Bruce Ivins. But details are left out. Like why did the FBI have to offer Ivin’s son $2.5 million and the “sportscar of your choice” to say certain things about his dad? If Ivins was guilty, then why the need to fabricate evidence? An offer of $2.5 million sounds heavy handed, like you’re desperate to find a fall guy, dead or alive. Preferably dead, patsies are so much more agreeable that way.
Let’s go back to Jerry Hauer.
This was a guy who came up a lot at the Citizens Grand Jury convened by citizen activists in the well-organized 9/11 truth community. When I was researching my story on the Spitzer-Silverstein connection for New York Megaphone, I tracked down Hauer’s home phone number and called him on Labor Day, last fall.
My timing was good, because I think he was a little drunk. He said things slightly slurred, and was at times a bit too honest. It was all a joke to him. On the audio file you can hear people laughing in the background.
We discussed the San Diego Citizens Grand Jury Indictment, which he dismissed with insults, but couldn’t say why.
He confirmed that he worked with Hatfill at SAIC. Then, I asked if Hatfill was innocent of involvement in the anthrax attacks. He was less than direct:
HICKS: A lot of people are wondering you know, where these anthrax attacks came from.
HAUER: I have uh…NO idea.
HICKS: Do you think that Hatfill is innocent?
HAUER: I…I…think that the FBI…should not have s…said anything about Hatfield until they knew more. I do not think Steve Hatfield is a murderer. I think Steve Hatfield is very passionate but I don’t think he’s a murderer. I don’t believe he did it.
HICKS: Uhhhh. That seems to be not the most clear, specific response in the world. I’m wondering if you’re saying that Hatfill…Can you say conclusively that Hatfill was not involved in the anthrax attacks? Is that what you’re saying?
HAUER: I’m not going to get into those details.
HICKS: So you’re leaving some room for ambiguity?
HAUER: No, I’m not. I’m not going to get into those details.
HICKS: Why not?
HAUER: I just don’t want to comment on it.
I just listened to the whole mp3 again for the first time in a while. I remember the night I made the interview. And then, using 1/8 inch audio cables, I turned my phone recording tape player into something that could talk to a Mac. Using some mp3-studio shareware I downloaded, I made this mp3.
I was excited because I sort of knew that someday, the US Government and the FBI would throw up a sloppy non-answer for the anthrax attacks. And on that day, I knew that this interview would be especially relevant. I felt at the time I had contributed something to advancing the real story on anthrax.
In this audio file, notice how Jerry Hauer sort of acknowledges that the FBI is mishandling the case, and yet he still refers to them as the place to go for answers. That’s called misprision of a felony, when you know that someone is committing a crime, like covering up the five anthrax murders. But you don’t do anything about it.
Maybe because you were involved.
Audio - Hicks and Hauer:
http://www.voxpopnet.net/podcasts/hauer.mp3
Thursday, August 7, 2008
CACI International Taps Former CIA Official
Washington Business Journal August 7, 2008 - 12:34 PM EDT
by Jeff Clabaugh, Staff Reporter
CACI International Inc. has added James Pavitt, former deputy director of operations for the Central Intelligence Angecy, to its board of directors.
Pavitt led the CIA’s response to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks as head of the agency’s America’s Clandestine Service. Pavitt also spent three years as senior intelligence adviser on the National Security Council for President George H.W. Bush.
He left the CIA in 2004, and is now a principal at District-based security and counterterrorism consulting firm The Scowcroft Group.
“We will especially rely on [Pavitt’s] expertise as we continue to evolve the unique CACI tools and resources we provide to help the government analyze data and ascertain and counter terrorist threats,” CACI Chairman Jack London said in a statement.
CACI International (NYSE: CAI) reports fiscal fourth quarter earnings later this month. The company’s third quarter profits rose 21 percent to $22.3 million, with record quarterly sales of $634 million, up 34 percent from a year ago.
http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2008/08/04/daily70.html
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Mystery of Siddiqui Disappearance
Portrait of an al Qaeda "Islamo-Fascist?": " ... Some reports say Aafia Siddiqui was part of an al-Qaeda sleeper cell ... Aafia Siddiqui is the youngest of three children of a British-trained doctor. Her brother is an architect based in Houston, while Fauzia is a neurologist who used to work at Mount Sinai hospital in New York. Aafia Siddiqui went to school in Karachi and graduated with a biology degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US. ... She continued with her studies, enrolling in Brandeis University near Boston for a PhD in neuro-cognitive science. Her degree has often been misreported as being in microbiology or genetics. ... "By Syed Shoaib Hasan
BBC News, Islamabad
Aafia Siddiqui, whom the US accuses of al-Qaeda links, vanished in Karachi with her three children on 30 March 2003.
The next day it was reported in local newspapers that a woman had been taken into custody on terrorism charges. Initially, confirmation came from a Pakistan interior ministry spokesman. But a couple of days later, both the Pakistan government and the FBI publicly denied having anything to do with her disappearance.
Two days after Aafia Siddiqui went missing, "a man wearing a motor-bike helmet" arrived at the Siddiqui home in Karachi, her mother told the BBC. "He did not take off the helmet, but told me that if I ever wanted to see my daughter and grandchildren again, I should keep quiet," Ms Siddiqui's mother told me over the phone in 2003. The mother, who has since died, also related the affair to other newspapers.
But the government continued to deny having anything to do with her daughter's disappearance. This is despite the fact that Mrs Siddiqui's other daughter, Fauzia, says she was told by then Interior Minister Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat in 2004 that her sister had been released and would return home shortly.
Research at the time refused to turn up anything on the status of Aafia Siddiqui - she was not listed as wanted by any federal or Pakistani agency. At that point, it seemed she had vanished off the face of the earth.
Islamic activities
Aafia Siddiqui is the youngest of three children of a British-trained doctor. Her brother is an architect based in Houston, while Fauzia is a neurologist who used to work at Mount Sinai hospital in New York. Aafia Siddiqui went to school in Karachi and graduated with a biology degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US.
Demonstrations have been held in Karachi calling for Ms Siddiqui's release It was during this time that she got actively involved in on-campus Islamic activities.
A fellow Pakistani student recalls her as being one of the "hello, brother" types.
"They were the ones with scarves who used to get after us to come to the association meetings," the student, Hamza, told the BBC. "I remember Aafia as being sweet, mildly irritating but harmless. You would run into her now and then distributing pamphlets."
After graduation, Aafia Siddiqui married Muhammad Amjad Khan, a young Pakistani doctor in Boston. She continued with her studies, enrolling in Brandeis University near Boston for a PhD in neuro-cognitive science. Her degree has often been misreported as being in microbiology or genetics.
US discrimination
At that time, her main problems arose from married life. She and her husband argued over where to bring up their children.
"Aafia wanted them to be brought up in the US and receive a Western education, but Amjad was against it," her mother said in 2003.
The 11 September 2001 attacks in the US changed everything. Her husband was detained by the FBI for questioning.
Aafia Siddiqui reappeared five years later in US custody in Afghanistan
The reason was his purchase of night vision goggles, body armour and military manuals. He is said to have told the FBI it was for big-game hunting.
Aafia Siddiqui was also questioned briefly, but later released, as was her husband. Soon, they decided to return to Pakistan, citing the increasing discrimination against Muslims in the US following the 9/11 attacks.
In Pakistan, the already estranged couple soon separated, and they divorced in 2002, while she was pregnant with their third child. Following the birth, Aafia Siddiqui worked briefly in Baltimore, US, before returning to Pakistan in December 2002, where she disappeared months later.
Mounting charges
Various theories about her disappearance started to appear in international and local publications. The first of these was on 23 June 2003 - three months after her disappearance - in Newsweek. An investigative report, calling her a micro-biologist, said she and her husband were part of an al-Qaeda sleeper cell.
In Baltimore, she is alleged to have opened a mailbox for a suspected al-Qaeda operative now in Guantanamo Bay. Majid Khan has been accused of planning to blow up petrol stations across the US.
The charges started to mount.
In 2004 then-FBI director Robert Mueller announced at a press conference that Aafia Siddiqui was wanted for questioning. She was later named as part of an alleged al-Qaeda diamond smuggling operation in Liberia.
Publications such as Newsweek quoted the FBI as saying this was to finance al-Qaeda's biological and chemical weapons programme.
After that, her name remained on the list of disappeared - until she surfaced last month in Afghanistan in US military custody.
Sister speaks out
Aafia Siddiqui is now to appear in court in the US on charges of assaulting and attempting to kill US personnel while in detention in Afghanistan. The FBI has been unable to make any of the other charges stick.
"It is always believed one is innocent until proven guilty, not the other way round," her sister, Fauzia, told reporters in Karachi on Tuesday. She added that every time she had met US officials, they had said they had never formally accused Aafia Siddiqui of being a terrorist.
Ex-security officials also point out that if Ms Siddiqui was detained for being a terror suspect, her ex-husband, who is free, should have been too.
Why, then, would Aafia Siddiqui have been arrested and kept in secret confinement for so long?
The answer may lie in her relationship with the family of alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Aafia Siddiqui is said to have married Ali Abd'al Aziz Ali, one of his nephews following her divorce.
Although her family denies this, the BBC has been able to confirm it from security sources and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's family. It is an open secret in Karachi, that any member of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's family deemed to be "a 1% threat to US security" is in American custody.
That may be the only "crime" that Aafia Siddiqui has committed.
In the eyes of US and Pakistani security officials, it was apparently too big to ignore.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7544008.stm
•••••••
A Confederacy of Kangaroos: This AP release has to be read in its entirety to appreciate the contradictions in the government's case. The article opens with damning statements from the prosecution that flip in midcourse - some completely reverse themselves, like otters splashing around at Sea World - so you have to read it all to know how the case deconstructs. Note that Aafia Siddiqui is bleeding profusely in the courtroom, her bullet wound "oozing" - but the judge berates her for not standing, and presses on with the trial, undeterred by open bullet wounds. - AC
•••
NY charges for woman in Afghan military shooting
AUG 5, 2008
BY TOM HAYS, AP
Filed under: NEW YORK, TOM HAYS, Al Qaida Suspect Shooting
NEW YORK (Map, News) - An MIT-educated Pakistani woman linked to al-Qaida appeared in federal court Tuesday to face charges she tried to kill U.S. employees in a gunfight in Afghanistan after police said they discovered suspicious documents about explosives and landmarks in her handbag.
Aafia Siddiqui, wearing a burgundy head scarf and recovering from a gunshot wound, was ordered held without bail on one count each of attempted murder and assault stemming from the July incident. She had been arrested Monday in Afghanistan and flown to New York to be formally charged.
"Your honor, she's been shot," a defense attorney told a federal magistrate when asked to explain why her client preferred not to stand during the hearing. "She has a wound, and it's oozing."
Magistrate Ronald Ellis set a Monday hearing to determine whether Siddiqui should be released on bail. He also said he would ask prison officials to make sure she was receiving proper care.
Prosecutors allege Siddiqui, 36, was stopped by police on July 17 outside a government building in central Afghanistan's Ghazni province. Police searched her handbag and discovered documents containing recipes for explosives and chemical weapons and describing "various landmarks in the United States, including New York City," according to a criminal complaint, which did not identify the landmarks.
Siddiqui also was carrying "chemical substances in gel and liquid form that were sealed in bottles and glass jars," the complaint said without elaborating.
The next day, as a team of FBI agents and U.S. military officers prepared to question Siddiqui, she snatched a soldier's rifle and pointed it at an Army captain, prosecutors said. An interpreter pushed the rifle aside as she fired two shots, which missed, they said. One of two shots fired by a soldier in response hit her in one of her hips.
Even after being hit, Siddiqui struggled and shouted in English that she wanted "to kill Americans" before the officers subdued her, the complaint said.
Asked by the judge if she understood the charges, she replied in a soft voice, "I understand them."
At the time of the incident, Afghan officials gave conflicting accounts of what transpired between Siddiqui and the U.S. interrogators.
Gen. Khan Mohammad Mujahid, police chief in central Ghazni province, initially said police argued with the Americans over giving up custody of Siddiqui. But he later said there was no argument and that the woman lunged at one of the U.S. soldiers, drawing the gunshot.
U.S. military officials declined comment at the time.
On Tuesday, an Afghan official in Ghazni said the woman took the weapon while U.S. officials were arguing with Afghan security official over the custody rights. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the issue.
Siddiqui's defense attorney, Elizabeth Fink, argued that alleging a "90-pound woman" could incite the violence claimed in the complaint was "patently absurd."
"We don't know what happened," Fink said. "All I know is that I have a person who's shot here."
In court, prosecutors said that Siddiqui was given good medical care and that a physician had accompanied her on the flight to the United States. They did not discuss the case any further.
At a 2004 news conference, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller III identified Siddiqui as one of seven people the FBI wanted to question about their suspected ties to al-Qaida - an allegation her family has vehemently denied.
U.S. authorities said at the time that Siddiqui had received a biology degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and had written a doctoral thesis on neurological sciences at Brandeis University, outside Boston. They said they believed she returned to Pakistan shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks and later vanished for several years.
Though they never alleged Siddiqui was a full-fledged member of al-Qaida, they said they believed she could be a "fixer," someone with knowledge of the United States who supported other operatives trying to slip into the country and plot attacks.
If convicted, Siddiqui faces up to 20 years in prison on each charge.
http://www.examiner.com/a-1522847~NY_charges_for_woman_in_Afghan_military_shooting.html
Book claims White House ordered faked letter to tie Saddam and 9/11
Also see: "Did White House fake link between Saddam and Al Qaeda?" Los Angeles Times. Excerpt:
Book claims White House ordered faked letter to tie Saddam and 9/11
WASHINGTON (AFP) — A new book by author Ron Suskind alleges that the White House ordered the CIA to fabricate a letter purportedly showing links between deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and the September 11, 2001 attacks.
The book, "The Way of the World," was immediately attacked by the White House, the CIA and former CIA director George Tenet who is alleged to have passed the White House order to senior CIA operators.
"There was no such order from the White House to me nor, to the best of my knowledge, was anyone from CIA ever involved in any such effort," Tenet said in a statement.
In an interview with National Public Radio, Suskind said his account came from the former head of the Near East Division, Rob Richard, and others "right in the thick of this operation."
"Tenet turns to Richard, as he remembers it, and says, 'Listen, Marine' -- Richard is a former marine -- 'you're not going to like this, but here goes."
According to Suskind, the White House gave Tenet a letter to be rewritten in the hand of Tarir Jallil Habbush, a former Iraqi intelligence chief in CIA protective custody after the 2003 US invasion.
The letter, dated July 2001, had Habbush saying Iraq had hosted Mohammed Atta, the lead September 11 hijacker, who "displayed extraordinary effort and showed a firm commitment to lead the team which will be responsible for attacking the targets that we have agreed to destroy," according to the book.
"The idea was to take the letter to Habbush and have him transcribe it in his own neat handwriting on a piece of Iraqi government stationery to make it look legitimate," Suskind wrote.
"CIA would then take the finished product to Baghdad and have someone release it to the media," he wrote.
The July 2001 dated letter surfaced in Britain in December 2003.
Suskind does not say who ordered it to be fabricated but claims it came from the "highest reaches" of the White House.
Mark Mansfield, a CIA spokesman, denied that the agency was involved in forging the letter, and dismissed the book in scathing terms as belonging in the "fiction section."
Tenet said: "It is well established that, at my direction, CIA resisted efforts on the part of some in the administration to paint a picture of Iraqi-Al Qaeda connections that went beyond the evidence.
"The notion that I would suddenly reverse our stance and have created and planted false evidence that was contrary to our own beliefs is ridiculous," he said.
The book also says a British intelligence official secretly met with Habbush before the war in Amman, and that Habbush told him that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction.
Suskind says President George W. Bush knew of the intelligence before the invasion.
Habbush was later resettled and paid five million dollars.
First, former CIA Director George Tenet told the president it was a "slam dunk" that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Then came efforts by the Bush White House to discredit critics, like ambassador Joe Wilson, who questioned the wisdom of going to war in Iraq.
Now comes a new book by author Ron Suskind claiming that the White House ordered the CIA to forge and backdate a handwritten letter from the head of Iraqi intelligence to Saddam Hussein to link the Iraq regime to Al Qaeda. The White House calls the assertion nonsense.
In The Way of the World, to be published today, Suskind writes:
The White House had concocted a fake letter from Habbush to Saddam, backdated to July 1, 2001. It said that 9/11 ringleader Mohammad Atta had actually trained for his mission in Iraq –- thus showing, finally, that there was an operational link between Saddam and al Qaeda, something the vice president’s office had been pressing CIA to prove since 9/11 as a justification to invade Iraq. There is no link.
Suskind says the order to forge such a letter was written on “creamy White House stationery” but gives no details about how it was created or how it was delivered to Iraq ...
Book claims White House ordered faked letter to tie Saddam and 9/11
WASHINGTON (AFP) — A new book by author Ron Suskind alleges that the White House ordered the CIA to fabricate a letter purportedly showing links between deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and the September 11, 2001 attacks.The book, "The Way of the World," was immediately attacked by the White House, the CIA and former CIA director George Tenet who is alleged to have passed the White House order to senior CIA operators.
"There was no such order from the White House to me nor, to the best of my knowledge, was anyone from CIA ever involved in any such effort," Tenet said in a statement.
In an interview with National Public Radio, Suskind said his account came from the former head of the Near East Division, Rob Richard, and others "right in the thick of this operation."
"Tenet turns to Richard, as he remembers it, and says, 'Listen, Marine' -- Richard is a former marine -- 'you're not going to like this, but here goes."
According to Suskind, the White House gave Tenet a letter to be rewritten in the hand of Tarir Jallil Habbush, a former Iraqi intelligence chief in CIA protective custody after the 2003 US invasion.
The letter, dated July 2001, had Habbush saying Iraq had hosted Mohammed Atta, the lead September 11 hijacker, who "displayed extraordinary effort and showed a firm commitment to lead the team which will be responsible for attacking the targets that we have agreed to destroy," according to the book.
"The idea was to take the letter to Habbush and have him transcribe it in his own neat handwriting on a piece of Iraqi government stationery to make it look legitimate," Suskind wrote.
"CIA would then take the finished product to Baghdad and have someone release it to the media," he wrote.
The July 2001 dated letter surfaced in Britain in December 2003.
Suskind does not say who ordered it to be fabricated but claims it came from the "highest reaches" of the White House.
Mark Mansfield, a CIA spokesman, denied that the agency was involved in forging the letter, and dismissed the book in scathing terms as belonging in the "fiction section."
Tenet said: "It is well established that, at my direction, CIA resisted efforts on the part of some in the administration to paint a picture of Iraqi-Al Qaeda connections that went beyond the evidence.
"The notion that I would suddenly reverse our stance and have created and planted false evidence that was contrary to our own beliefs is ridiculous," he said.
The book also says a British intelligence official secretly met with Habbush before the war in Amman, and that Habbush told him that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction.
Suskind says President George W. Bush knew of the intelligence before the invasion.
Habbush was later resettled and paid five million dollars.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
CBW Cover Stories: Dr. Bruce Ivins & the FBI’s “Court Document”/Analysis of the Original Psyop Blaming Iraq for the 2001 Anthrax Attacks
" ... Someone clearly invented false stories about the anthrax investigation and fed them to Brian Ross, knowing he would run all over ABC News programs heaping blame on Saddam for those attacks. In fact, Ross said that there were at least four highly-placed, separate sources who told him that. ... "Story posted at AC's Anti-Fascist Research Bin
Friday, August 1, 2008
PROJECT ANTHRAX & THE COVER-UP (PART ONE): SAIC, PROTECTED CO-CONSPIRATOR STEPHEN HATFILL & BIO-ECONOMIC STATE TERRORISM
By Alex Constantine
At least one of the anthrax mailings came from overseas, so neither of the key suspects could have possibly acted alone. Manipulation of the limited hang-out allows the FBI and controlled media to "clear" Hatfill - with fear of a libel suit ensuring that the press lays off him - but there is still a mountain of suppressed evidence that damns the beleaguered but now affluent virologist. The convenient "suicide" of Bruce E. Ivins, a patsy, takes the heat off of Hatfill completely, but he remains an obvious perpetrator, and the others will never be exposed ... according the the cover-up script ...
For the rest of the story, click moi
At least one of the anthrax mailings came from overseas, so neither of the key suspects could have possibly acted alone. Manipulation of the limited hang-out allows the FBI and controlled media to "clear" Hatfill - with fear of a libel suit ensuring that the press lays off him - but there is still a mountain of suppressed evidence that damns the beleaguered but now affluent virologist. The convenient "suicide" of Bruce E. Ivins, a patsy, takes the heat off of Hatfill completely, but he remains an obvious perpetrator, and the others will never be exposed ... according the the cover-up script ...
For the rest of the story, click moi
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