Trapped Al-Qa'eda Leader Is Uzbek Mullah

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 3-21-2004

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Looks like this Uzbek group is about to die out:

The group was once believed to have 1,000 to 1,500 members,
but experts and diplomats in the region say they now number only a few hundred at most.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

No one said definitely that it was AZ. Certainly not the US.

A lot of people thought it was high probability because of the fierce firefight, and they thought they had an electronic intercept that could be interpreted that he was there.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

See post #21 for a link that gives the history of this Uzbek group. This deal just about wipes them out which is why they are fighting so hard.

[endthematrix]

Experts and diplomats?

"But as some analysts and intelligence experts are concerned that the IMU is regrouping in neighboring Tajikistan, many others have turned their attention to the Hizb ut-Tahrir as the next potential threat. With an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 members in Central Asia, it has become by far the largest radical Islamic organization in the region."

It's a wider war that you think. The links go farther up the chain....The Aim of Hizb ut-Tahrir
"It also aims to bring back the Islamic guidance for mankind and to lead the Ummah into a struggle with Kufr, its systems and its thoughts so that Islam encapsulates the world."

[Rams82]

From debka..."Pakistan admits bin Laden’s No. 2 Zuwahiri was not in area of battles in Waziristan as first claimed. DEBKAfile's sources reported Friday that chief of Pushtun Ahmadi tribal federation is leading the rebel side. Harm to him would spark wholesale tribal war offensive against Pakistan."

Supposedly TS will HTF in Pakistan if they kill this guy...but then again its debka

[blam]

"Supposedly TS will HTF in Pakistan if they kill this guy...but then again its debka "

A lot of people there need killing. Let'er rip!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Well now we have a different report:

DNA tests on corpse will reveal if it is Bin Laden's deputy

A senior American official involved in the hunt for Bin Laden said that al-Zawahiri may already be dead. According to his version of events, the Egyptian was in the escaping car and was shot by Taskforce 121, the shadowy rapid reaction force comprising special forces and CIA agents that had helped to capture Saddam Hussein last December.

The body, he said, had been retrieved from the wreckage and was undergoing DNA tests to confirm whether it was that of al-Zawahiri. In deference to the US forces’ hosts, any announcement was being delayed to make it look as if it were a Pakistani-run operation, as well as to have time to use any information garnered to capture other fighters.

[Rams82]

"A lot of people there need killing. Let'er rip!"

I sure hope those 60+ nuclear weapons are secure if that happens...

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

The group was once believed to have 1,000 to 1,500 members, but experts and diplomats in the region say they now number only a few hundred at most.

In engineering parlance: "the Limit of a force of 1,500 -- as the stupidity of its leadership becomes infinite -- is an army of zero."

Zero, a concept the Arabs in particular can identify with on a number of levels.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

ping

[RIGHT IN LAS VEGAS]

A goat short stay!

[Uncle George]

ONLY ONE DAISY CUTTER WOULD HAVE ENDED IT IN FIVE MINUTES.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

ping!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

These guys are going to zero alright!

[Mad_Tom_Rackham]

ONLY ONE DAISY CUTTER WOULD HAVE ENDED IT IN FIVE MINUTES.

Of course, this would deprive the free world of the priceless video of OBL and Zawahiri undergoing their full rectal cavity searches, preferably administered by a loosely-trained 800 lb young male gorilla with the appropriate pheromonal incentives provided free of charge by the citizenry of the Untited States of America.

[endthematrix]

Tohir Yuldash knew of Sept 11! http://www.angelfire.com/space/pearly/htmls/bush-ignored.html (bbc and independent articles)

"Mr Muttawakil learnt of the coming attacks on America not from other members of the Taliban leadership, but from the leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Tahir Yildash (Tohir Yuldash). The organisation was one of the fundamentalist groups that had found refuge on Afghan soil, lending fighters for the Taliban's war on the Northern Alliance and benefiting from good relations with al-Qa'ida in its fight against the Uzbek government.

According to the emissary, Mr Muttawakil emerged from a one-to-one meeting with Mr Yildash looking shocked and troubled. Until then, the Foreign Minister, who had disapproved of the destruction of the Buddhist statues in Bamian earlier in the year, had no inkling from others in the Taliban leadership of what Mr bin Laden was planning.

"At first Muttawakil wouldn't say why he was so upset," said the aide. "Then it all came out. Yildash had revealed that Osama bin Laden was going to launch an attack on the United States. It would take place on American soil and it was imminent. Yildash said Osama hoped to kill thousands of Americans."

[endthematrix]

"Just across the border in Afghanistan, 10,000 US troops have massed for Operation Mountain Storm"

This appears not to be a coincidence! September 7, 2002 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=331115

"Another US official was also present ­ possibly from the intelligence services. Mr Katz, who now works at the American embassy in Eritrea , declined to talk about the meeting. But other US sources said the warning was not passed on.

A diplomatic source said : "We were hearing a lot of that kind of stuff. When people keep saying the sky's going to fall in and it doesn't, a kind of warning fatigue sets in. I actually thought it was all an attempt to rattle us in an attempt to please their funders in the Gulf, to try to get more donations for the cause."

The Afghan aide did not reveal that the warning was from Mr Muttawakil, a factor that might have led the Americans to down-grade it. "As I recall, I thought he was speaking from his own personal perspective," one source said. "It was interesting that he was from the Foreign Affairs Ministry, but he gave no indication this was a message he was carrying."

Interviewed by The Independent in Kabul, the Afghan emissary said: "I told Mr Katz they should launch a new Desert Storm ­ like the campaign to drive Iraq out of Kuwait ­ but this time they should call it Mountain Storm and they should drive the foreigners out of Afghanistan. They also had to stop the Pakistanis supporting the Taliban."

The Taliban emissary said Mr Katz replied that neither action was possible. Nor did Mr Katz pass the warning on to the State Department, according to senior US diplomatic sources.

When Mr Muttawakil's emissary returned to Kabul, the Foreign Minister told him to see UN officials. He took the warning to the Kabul offices of UNSMA, the political wing of the UN. These officials heard him out, but again did not report the secret Taliban warning to UN headquarters. A UN official familiar with the warnings said : "He appeared to be speaking in total desperation, asking for a Mountain Storm, he wanted a sort of deus ex machina to solve his country's problems. But before 9/11, there was just not much hope that Washington would become that engaged in Afghanistan."

Officials in the State Department and in UN headquarters in New York said they knew nothing about a Taliban warning. But they said they would now be looking into the matter."

[iopscusa]

Corection: 1st biggest liar award goes to Illegal-Immigration Lawyers, then Liberals/Leftists then the rest of the scum!

[Dave Elias]

"Of course, this would deprive the free world of the priceless video of OBL and Zawahiri undergoing their full rectal cavity searches, preferably administered by a loosely-trained 800 lb young male gorilla with the appropriate pheromonal incentives provided free of charge by the citizenry of the Untited States of America."

Hate to burst your fantasy, but gorillas never get anywhere near 800lb in mass. Their maximum size is about 400lbs, which is reached only by older males not yonger gorillas as you propose.