File the Bin Laden Phone Leak Under 'Urban Myths'

President Bush asserted this week that the news media published a U.S. government leak in 1998 about Osama bin Laden's use of a satellite phone, alerting the al Qaeda leader to government monitoring and prompting him to abandon the device. The story of the vicious leak that destroyed a valuable intelligence operation was first reported by a best-selling book, validated by the Sept. 11 commission and then repeated by the president. A leak alerted Osama bin Laden to telephone surveillance, according to President Bush and others. A leak alerted Osama bin Laden to telephone surveillance, according to President Bush and others. (AP) Who's Blogging? Read what bloggers are saying about this article. * wandering hillbilly * Donlan???s Diversions * True Blue Liberal Full List of Blogs (10 links) » Most Blogged About Articles On washingtonpost.com | On the web But it appears to be an urban myth. The al Qaeda leader's communication to aides via satellite phone had already been reported in 1996 -- and the source of the information was another government, the Taliban, which ruled Afghanistan at the time.

March 10, 2003
The New York Times
By SIMON ROMERO
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/10/technology/10GEAR.html
(just a snip from this article, pertaining to Iridium Satellite phone company)

Perhaps the most striking example of the military's adaptation of a civilian communications technology is the Iridium global phone network, a satellite-based wireless communications system. Motorola and other investors spent more than $5 billion during the 1990's to build Iridium into a commercial global satellite telephone system, only to have the company file for bankruptcy protection in 1999 after it failed to sign up many customers.

The Defense Department salvaged Iridium in 2000 by negotiating a two-year, $72 million agreement with the company's new owners, Iridium Satellite of Leesburg, Va., to have unlimited access to its network, which allows users to place calls or send and receive text messages almost anywhere in the world. The Pentagon hired General Dynamics to develop special encryption services and built a $200 million ground station in Hawaii to use as a gateway for connecting Iridium calls.

The Defense Department renewed its $36 million annual airtime contract with Iridium last December, allowing about 20,000 government workers to continue using the system. Warren Brown, an Iridium spokesman, said the Defense Department remained the company's largest customer, but large contracts with civilian customers were an increasingly important part of Iridium's revamped business.
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The bankruptcy resulted in a bargain-basement sale, and the company has been owned largely by Saudis.....I dount that they aquired the DoD gateway in Hawaii, though. The following is a thumbnail of the sale....I recall contemporaneously reading that the bin laden family was in on this deal.......Motorola (the tech/financial force behind Iridium) and the DoD slept together every night along the way of the Iridium story.....but the original stockholders are the only ones that got screwed........lots of people wondered what might have been quietly piggybacked into the Iridium system for intelligence reasons,.....In the end, arabs got it at a price they couldn't refuse, and the DoD had/has the DoD gateway.....now the press is full of bin'laden stories about him chucking his satphones
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Iridium Taken Over by Brazilian, Australian and Arabian Investors
Brazil/April 9, 2001/Satnews/ -- The company which took over Iridium is shared by Brazilian, Australian and South Arabian investors with 61% stake. Iridium is a telephone services company which holds a satellite communications network and provided cell phone services worldwide. The former Iridium was controlled by Motorola Inc. and other investors including Inepar. The owners of the new Iridium Holding LLC also own an affiliated named Iridium Carrier Holdings.

The Brazilian partner is Inepar, through the Panama-based subsidiary Milport Associates which holds a 8,9% stake in Iridum Carrier. In Brazil, Inepar operates in communications and electric power sectors. The Australian hold 26,9% of the company and the Arabian other 24,3%. The new owners paid US$25mil for Iridium which launching costed almost US$6bil to Motorola and other investors.

The filing seeks the transfer of mobile-phone handset and other U.S. licenses used by a bankrupt predecessor company to the fleet's new owners, Iridium Satellite LLC.

The foreign investors own a combined total of 61 percent of Iridium Holdings LLC, the parent of the new Iridium Satellite. They own a similar percentage of an affiliated company which is seeking the handset license transfer.

The new owners argued that ownership by citizens of Brazil and Australia should not be an issue for the FCC because both countries are members of the World Trade Organization.

The remaining foreign owner, Baralonco N.V., is a Netherlands Antilles corporation ultimately owned and controlled by Prince Khalid bin Abdullah bin Abdulrahman, a Saudi citizen, the application said. A cousin of King Fahd, he controls the Saudi holding group Mawarid, which owned 8 percent of the old Iridium.

Saudi Arabia is not a member of the WTO. Baralonco would hold a 24.3 percent stake in Iridium Carrier Holdings, which is seeking the handset license. Iridium Carrier is controlled by the same six parties who control affiliated Iridium Holdings, Iridium Satellite LLC's parent.

"The shareholders in the new Iridium organization are familiar faces," said Greg Lucas, managing partner of McLean, Va., commercial space consultancy FCCFilings.com. He said they were getting a second bite at access to the system for a "steal" through direct equity stakes in the new parent company.

http://www.satnews.com/stories/3apr2001-6.html

here's a little more on the subject linking bin laden family to Iridium.......

DAY OF INFAMY 2001
Do bin Ladens benefit financially from attack?
Iridium phones suddenly in high demand for rescue efforts

By Joseph Farah
© 2001 WorldNetDaily.com

With normal communications methods crippled since the attack on the World Trade Center, a previously under-achieving satellite-based phone system linked with Osama bin Laden's family is, ironically, experiencing a boom in business.

Iridium telephones are suddenly in high demand, particularly in rescue efforts in New York and Washington.

While Iridium is a $5 billion business, the satellite phone system is a technological achievement that has, until now, been regarded as something of a joke in the telecommunications industry due to lack of consumer interest.

Little known, however, is the fact that bin Laden's brother, at least once, served as a director of the U.S. telecommunications company backed by Motorola.

As late as three years ago, Hasan bin Laden served as a director of the Iridium Middle East Corp. subsidiary, reported the New York Daily News. The Saudi bin Laden Group, the family's investment arm, has also reportedly invested in the global phone link firm.

A spokesman for the company denied, at that time, that the bin Laden Group and Hasan bin Laden had any financial or professional connection with Osama bin Laden, who even then was wanted on terrorism charges. The bin Laden family has claimed to have severed all ties with Osama after his role in masterminding the U.S. Embassy bombings in East Africa in 1998.

"Our traffic went up significantly (after last Tuesday) and probably will continue that way until the networks are restored," D. D'Ambrosio, executive vice president for business development at Iridium Satellite LLC in Leesburg, Va., told the Arizona Republic.

The company, which was formed last year to buy the Arizona-developed system out of bankruptcy, maintains one of its three global gateways in Tempe, and it relies on Motorola Inc.'s Scottsdale-based Integrated Information Systems Group to service its government users.

Iridium's ability to bypass cell-phone towers and land-based telephone lines came in handy after terrorists rammed planes into New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Cellular phone service in lower Manhattan failed when the towers that transmit signals came crashing down along with the World Trade Center buildings. Land lines proved useless after authorities shut off utilities to the area. In Washington, cell-phone circuits were simply overloaded with panicked residents' calls.

Iridium works through a system of 66 satellites circling 485 miles above the Earth.

The bin Laden family fortune has been estimated at $5 billion from its vast contracting and construction enterprises. Osama bin Laden's personal fortune is valued at $300 million.

If the bin Laden family is, indeed, still involved in Iridium, a company that was recently reorganized after its unsuccessful debut on the telecommunications scene, it would not be the first time the bin Laden family has materially benefited directly from "black sheep" Osama bin Laden's acts of terrorism.

The bin Laden family also helped rebuild a U.S. Air Force base in Saudi Arabia after the Khobar Towers were destroyed in 1996. Osama bin Laden is the chief suspect in that bombing.

Iridium Satellite LLC, a privately held company, is the successor to the bankrupt, delisted Iridium LLC. Iridium Satellite won a two-year contract in December to continue Defense Department service and launched commercial service in April. The company has distributed about 20,000 units so far, according to officials of the company.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=24519

The Washington Post is using bloggers to verify their positions now?

The accumulation of intelligent input by pajama-clad "fact checkers" here at FR are better than anywhere in the country, imo .......... not that that this is a blog. ;-)

FR rules.

If you want the indepth truth as quickly as possible ................ this is the place.

*******

From a while back:

P> "It was amazing Thursday to watch the documents story go from FreeRepublic.com, a bastion of right-wing lunacy, to Drudge to the mainstream media in less than 12 hours," said Jim Jordan, a strategist for independent Democratic groups opposed to Bush, and Kerry's former campaign manager.

"That's not to say the documents didn't deserve examination."But apparently the entire thing was cooked up by a couple of amateurs on Free Republic. The speed with which it moved was breathtaking.”

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