NBC: Clinton Ordered Bin Laden Spared

Newsmax ^ | 3/16/04 | Limbacher

[Tumbleweed_Connection]

A secret CIA videotape shows that the Clinton administration had pinpointed the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden a year before the 9/11 attacks, but declined to kill him because of White House orders that he should be taken alive.

The video, obtained and broadcast by NBC News, "illustrates an enormous opportunity the Clinton administration had to kill or capture bin Laden," the network reported Tuesday.

Images filmed in Afghanistan by CIA Predator Drones show a man clad in white robes who towers over his entourage. [Bin Laden is 6' 5" tall.]

The film was shot over Tarnak Farm, the walled compound where bin Laden was believed to live at the time. The layout of the buildings in the Predator video perfectly matches previous photos and diagrams of Tarnak Farm prepared by U.S. intelligence.

The clip left CIA analysts convinced they had located the man who in 1998 had bombed U.S. embassies in East Africa and whose agents, four years earlier, had detonated a bomb in the parking garage of the World Trade Center.

"It’s dynamite. It’s putting together all of the pieces, and that doesn’t happen every day," said William Arkin, a former intelligence officer and now military analyst for NBC.

Though President Clinton has boasted repeatedly that he issued orders to kill bin Laden, no action was taken when the White House finally got its chance.

Why not?

Gary Schroen, a former CIA station chief in Pakistan, told NBC that the White House had in fact ordered the CIA to do just the opposite - take bin Laden alive or not at all.

The order "reduced the odds from, say, a 50 percent chance down to, say, 25 percent chance that we were going to be able to get him,” Schroen told the network.

The directive effectively killed the plan and, along with it, the U.S.'s best chance to prevent the 9/11 attacks.

[jmstein7]

BUMP!!!

[ladyinred]

Check out reply #39. Possible?

[Defender2]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1099223/posts

Nine of the Creeps who plotted against the U.S.S. Cole have been captured!!!! The link above.

[TheSpottedOwl]

The Clintons will skate in this life, but they'll be judged by God for this.

Never Forget!

[Political Junkie Too]

Though President Clinton has boasted repeatedly that he issued orders to kill bin Laden, no action was taken when the White House finally got its chance. Why not?

Because he lied about his boasts.

-PJ

[Samwise]

waiting to see how this ultimately turns out to be Bush's fault.

[M. Thatcher]

Yikes. I can't even imagine the implications politically if this turns out to be true.

The implications politically are precisely zero.

Paula Jones nailed it when she said about Clinton, "He gets away with everything."

[Tumbleweed_Connection]

Clintons Help Kerry Try to Raise $1 Million a Day

[Tangerine Time Machine]

Interesting that this surfaces now.

Is this Bush taking an issue off the table for Kerry, or an internal Dem battle?

[cwb]

Exactly! Hell, it was in the middle of the Monica scandal...during her first week before the grand jury, that he launched the attacks on Afghanistan and Sudan. Fact is, a CLinton response would've been par for the course and more consistent with what he'd been doing for months. And even at this point, his term was winding down. Sorry, Lisa, this excuse doesn't work any longer.

[kjam22]

I disagree. The implications are the end of the Clinton dynasty. This will be the first of these type stories. McCauliffe....out. Hillary etal...out. This is a win for everybody. Dems and Repubs alike are better off with the Clintons out of power. Better off for different reasons... but better off none the less.

[eeriegeno]

This surprises everone????

What else can you expect from a 'good ol boy' from Arkansas except that he will occasionally get his tool cleaned by an enterprising dimwit?

The picture of Bill Clinton superimposed over the burning WTC buildings playing a saxaphone should be the image embedded in every American's mind.

And John Kerry is no better. Actually, a little worse at lying while acting believable......

[Lijahsbubbe]

A big yawn from half the country?

You are correct.

[Skywarner]

"It was clear from the video that it was a high level AQ meeting with the leader (OBL) obviously present at the time. Although NBC did ask the question, "did Clinton let OBL slip away," they still had to throw in if Clinton, being hampered by scandal, prevented him from acting. It never seemed to hamper him in the past. It's about time they released this information that many have known about for some time."

Of course, if Clinton hadn't involved himself in a scandal - of his own making - perhaps he would have had more time for actually dealing with his duty to defend the nation.

[M. Thatcher]

I disagree. The implications are the end of the Clinton dynasty.

HA.

What are you smoking?

[kjam22]

Is this Bush taking an issue off the table for Kerry, or an internal Dem battle?

Difficult to imagine that Bush has persuaded NBC to run something negative about the clintons. This came from Kerry.

[new cruelty]

LOL. C'mon now. It would be nice if this spelled the end of the clinton die-nasty. Even if it doesn't, let's all say it will and maybe others will catch on. Eventually it may become true.

[Law is not justice but process]

Did you mean entertained or intern-tained?

[MamaLucci]

..if Clinton, being hampered by scandal, prevented him from acting."

Ask the people who died in the missle strikes he ordered during the impeachment.

That is a very cogent point.....perhaps you should pass it on to NBC.

[Defender2]

#56. only if ketchup boy kerry, demoCommiecRAT supremosh*t, is trying to ward off clintoon's endorsement, a.k.a., kiss of you know what I mean... starts with a D. ;-)