Posted on 07/01/2007 8:58:07 AM PDT by TrebleRebel
WASHINGTON — In the fall of 1992, Kanatjan Alibekov defected from Russia to the United States, bringing detailed, and chilling, descriptions of his role in making biological weapons for the former Soviet Union.
----------- Officials still value his seminal depictions of the Soviet program. But recent events have propelled questions about Alibek's reliability:
No biological weapon of mass destruction has been found in Iraq. His most sensational research findings, with U.S. colleagues, have not withstood peer review by scientific specialists. His promotion of nonprescription pills — sold in his name over the Internet and claiming to bolster the immune system — was ridiculed by some scientists. He resigned as executive director of a Virginia university's biodefense center 10 months ago while facing internal strife over his stewardship.
And, as Alibek raised fear of bioterrorism in the United States, he also has sought to profit from that fear.
By his count, Alibek has won about $28 million in federal grants or contracts for himself or entities that hired him.
The Los Angeles Times explored Alibek's public pronouncements, research and business activities as part of a series that will examine companies and government officials central to the U.S. war on terrorism -----------------------
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
“Van der Waals forces exist not only between individual atoms and molecules but also between particles”.
I know these are big words, try here, it might help you understand the sentence:
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary.htm
There's no doubt in my mind whatsoever that the reason the government/media complex has suddenly started pushing for this now is entirely because of Steven Hatfill's lawsuit, and the ruling from Judge Walton which hopefully will be coming sooner or later.
I believe they've been talking about such a law for years. A Bill to create such a law was introduced in the House in February of 2005. Source: HERE.
In 2006, Senator Arlen Spector described it as a "solution in search of a problem."
It's a very complex issue. The media is lobbying hard for it. I wouldn't expect any solution soon. It certainly won't come before Dr. Hatfill's lawsuit is resolved one way or another.
I'd bet that you'll never see any such law -- at least no law which truly protects reporters from being forced to name sources. Such a law would give the media a free hand to cover up all sorts of crimes and to protect all sorts of criminals.
You're right that the media have been pushing for it for years, and that it'll probably fail yet again. I'm adamantly opposed to making the media a de facto extralegal institution that could do or say essentially anything without any possibility of accountability. What's scary to me is that a lot of members of Congress apparently don't have a problem with the idea, which speaks volumes.
It sure would be nice to know though what the holdup is now with Judge Walton and the lawsuit.
Yeah, I'd like to "know," too.
I can only speculate based upon the facts. The facts seem to be:
1. The mediation session was supposed to conclude on July 20, and there has been no word on that.
2. Judge Walton postponed the "status meeting" he had ordered for July 27. He only said the meeting will be "rescheduled."
3. If he had postponed it simply because he or someone else had a case of the sniffles, he would have been immediately rescheduled.
4. The "status meeting" was a key meeting to see if they were ready for trial. Everything IS ready for trial except for the issue of what came from the mediation session.
5. Judge Walton will not delay forever his ruling on the issue of compelling reporters to name their confidential sources.
My conclusion from looking at these facts is that the mediation session is still going on, that there is some indication of a settlement coming soon, and Judge Walton is holding off on his ruling to see what happens.
On Hatfill, it seems that NK should have contacted Dr. Hatfill for his input.
The media outlet should always have the incentive to get the best information on such an issue. In other words, contact the person of interest to get their side or else don’t speak to the issue. The NYT counsel might have suggested that Mr. Z was not a good idea given that “Pilot B” had already been shot down in a major case.
As background to LeMonde’s mid-2007 contribution, let me first share this entry from five years ago which addresses the leaks. I’ve translated it but I learned my Spanish from “Scooby Doo — Donde Esta?” and I don’t know any French.
L’enquête du FBI sur l’anthrax vise des chercheurs américains
Le Monde Édition du jeudi 04 juillet 2002.
http://www.ledevoir.com/2002/07/04/4695.html
The investigation of the FBI into the anthrax aims at American researchers
Le Monde
Edition of Thursday July 4, 2002
“A name was quoted in the medium of the biologists associated with these programs but the investigators remained extremely discrete. Suddenly, the FBI decided to let know that it had searched, on June 25, with its agreement, the apartment of Steven Hatfill, located at Frederick, the community on which Fort Detrick depends. For which reason it did make public this searching? One of the possible explanations is that the federal police force, shown inaction, wanted to calm its detractors. Another is that it seeks to divert the attention while appearing to be interested in Mr. Hatfill whereas its suspicions relate to someone else.”
The reality is that there were two Amerithrax squads, each vigorously pursuing the alternative hypotheses in good faith. A super-patriot bioevangelist or financial motivation was plausible, and needed to be vigorously pursued. Such a theory was viable only where a candidate had access to pretty current, detailed USG-insider threat assessment information.
As the documentary evidence and testimony and physical evidence accumulated, by late 2003, it was clear that US-based operatives supporting the goals of the militant islamists were responsible.
My own pet theory as to the leaks is that TrebleRebel was poised to break the case wide open (through Newsweek) when law enforcement chose to throw Newsweek a bone with the bloodhound story — to throw it off the scent.
Given the stovepiping and strict compartmentalization that was enforced after the early leaks, the squad pursuing a Hatfill theory was not even told of the evidence supporting an Al Qaeda hypothesis.
Not very many volumes. There are members of Congress who support just about any screwball idea you can imagine. The purpose of the House of Representatives is to sort out the loonie ideas from the supposedly rational ideas which are then presented to the Senate for further sorting.
Jamestown Foundation in February 2007 offered this piece on “Three Explanations for al-Qaeda’s Lack of a CBRN Attack”
By Chris Quillen
http://www.jamestown.org/terrorism/news/article.php?articleid=2370251
Three explanations are disruption, deterrence, and patience.
I can probably add another "fact" leading to that same conclusion:
6. It would seem highly unlikely that Judge Walton would delay his ruling unless ALL parties in the lawsuit asked him to do so. And ALL parties in the lawsuit would not ask him to do so UNLESS they ALL believed that a settlement could be reached fairly soon.
I don't know what "fairly soon" would mean in this situation. It seemed to take them MONTHS to iron out details of the settlement of the Hatfill v Vanity Fair/Reader's Digest lawsuit and that was a LOT less complicated.
For an insider’s take on the Hatfill matter and the Amerithrax investigation, see the treatise on the subject by Ayman’s spymaster.
Mohammad Khalil al-Hukaymah alias Abu Jihad al-Masri was the author of the description of the Amerithrax investigation in 2002. He discussed the Hatfill matter. He was the guy who recently reminded the world of Islambouli’s central role.
Abu Jihad al-Masri joined the Egyptian Islamic Group in 1979. He was arrested in 1981 after Sadat’s assassination. He once was arrested alongside the blind sheik Abdel-Rahman and is reportedly connected to the blind sheikh’s successor Taha. He dedicated the treatise “[t]o the pious and the hidden who are not known when they come and who are not missed when they disappear — To those whom their God will answer when they pray to Him. To all the eyes that are vigilant late at night to bring victory to this religion.”
The introduction of the 152-page book starts:
“The Manhattan raid led to a radical change in the perception of American Security. After the northern half of the continent had been isolated from the rest of the world and its threats by two oceans, it now came from inside. The surprise hit the symbols of American power in its economic and security dimensions.”
Published at al-Maqreze Center for Historical Studies website (www.almaqreze.com), the section on the anthrax investigation appears to have been written in 2002.
“The Anthrax Scandal:
Over many months, there was an excited search for the person responsible for the worst biological terror attack on American soil. Six letters sent by mail to Leahy, Daschle, Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather, The New York Post and the offices of the National Enquirer in Florida, led to the sickening of 18 people and five deaths. The crime was especially scary because anthrax, which is a complex powder that scatters in the atmosphere, had spilled from the envelopes and spread through parts of the mail system and contaminated a Senate building. One year later, the main post office in Washington had not yet opened.
The FBI is under great pressure to close this case, and the anthrax criminal is supposed to be alive and free. Two members of the Senate have asked to receive regular reports about this investigation from the FBI, and they have become increasingly impatient.”
After a lengthy discussion of the focus on Hatfill, the author explains,
“Until the investigators find material evidence that connects a person to the crime, they are forced to speculate about the motives and methods of the criminal. They are still casting a wide net. Law enforcement sources say they have issued hundreds of subpoenas and they are analyzing thousands of documents in search of new evidence.
The evidence may be small and unseen - sweat or an odor on an envelope - but that is all that they need in order to attract the dogs.”
Al-Hukaymah pointed to the Aldrich Ames incident and the FBI’s inability to find the perpetrator of the anthrax mailings as evidence that U.S intelligence can be defeated. Aldrich Ames, head of counterintelligence relating to the Russians, had a different rolex for different days of the week. He drove a new jaguar to work. Aldrich told the CIA that his money came from his wife’s foreign inheritance, and the CIA never required meaningful corroboration. So we should not be that surprised when someone known, to borrow Dr. Alibek’s description to me, as an “Islamic hardliner,” is given access to Center for Biodefense and ATCC facilities, to include a program funded by DARPA’s $13 million during the relevant period. Perhaps the focus should not be on more money, for biodefense but on doing a better job at maintaining security. Perhaps focus should be on avoiding proliferation of know-how.
Al-Hukaymah reportedly was Ayman’s connection to Mamdouh Ismail, an Egyptian defense attorney and a former member of “the Jihad group” who since the 1980’s has represented various Egyptians accused of terrorism offences in Egypt. He represented al-Nashar, the biochemist who was an expert on polymerization and had a key to the 7/7 bomber’s flat. Ismail was one of several hundred rounded up following the assassination of Anwar al-Sadat in 1981. He served three years. Ismail was arrested on March 29, 2007. Mamdouh Ismail now is accused of complicity in an “Egyptian project” of al-Qaeda, taking his orders from Ayman al-Zawahiri via al-Qaeda propaganda chief al-Hukaymah and the UK-based EIJ publicist Hani al-Sibai. Both al-Hukaymah and Al-Sibai deny the charge. Attorney Ismael has publicly objected to a reconciliation between Cairo and Egyptian Islamic Jihad. In 1999, Ismail was refused permission to establish an Islamist political party (called Hizb ash-Shari’a) with the help of fellow lawyer attorney al-Zayyat. The two had worked with EIJ shura member al-Sibai before he took refuge in the UK. The IANA writers Kamal Habib and Gamal Sultan (associated with Al-Timimi’s charity) had wanted to forge ahead notwithstanding the blind sheik’s view, Montasser seemed to immediately relent — pointing out that they would all go to hell in a legislature if the majority then approved a practice that was not in conformance with shariah law.
Now that the UK officials are up to speed on the important role of Islambouli’s ghost, the UK private sector has rushed out and developed some anthrax-defeating ectoplasm such as was the key technology in Ghostbusters.
Now The Anti-Anthrax Gel To Thwart Terror, Wednesday, 1st August 2007
What would Guiliani’s anthrax expert deduce from Ahmed Al-Haznawi’s leg lesion? (see VF’s unkind feature today)
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/09/giuliani200709
One of the hijackers, Ahmed Al-Haznawi, went to the ER on June 25, 2001 with what now appears to have been cutaneous anthrax, according to Dr. Tsonas, the doctor who treated him, and other experts. “No one is dismissing this,” said CIA Director Tenet. Alhaznawi had just arrived in the country on June 8. His exposure perhaps related to a camp he had been in Afghanistan. He said he got the blackened gash-like lesion when he bumped his leg on a suitcase two months earlier. Two months earlier he had been in camp near Kandahar (according to a videotape he later made serving as his last Will and Testament). His last will and testament is mixed in with the footage by the al-Qaeda’s Sahab Institute for Media Production that includes Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and Sulaiman Abu Ghaith. There are some spiders that on rare occasions bite and cause such a blackened eschar (notably the Brown Recluse Spider found in some parts of the United States)
Dr. Tara O’Toole of the Biodefense Center at John Hopkins concluded it was anthrax. The former head of that group, Dr. Henderson, now director of the office of public health preparedness at the Department of Health and Human Services, explained: “The probability of someone this age having such an ulcer, if he’s not an addict and doesn’t have diabetes or something like that, is very low. It certainly makes one awfully suspicious.” The FBI says no anthrax was found where the hijackers were. (The FBI tested the crash sites where the planes came down and found no traces of anthrax). Although no doubt there are some other diseases that lead to similar sores, it is reasonable to credit that it was cutaneous anthrax considering all the circumstances, to include the finding by the 9/11 Commission that “ In 2001, Sufaat would spend several months attempting to cultivate anthrax for al Qaeda in a was located, it makes it more likely that the John Hopkins people are correct that the lesion was cutaneous anthrax. He briefed Ayman and Hambali, according to Tenet, over the course of a week and wrapped up his work in the Summer of 2001.
At the time, CBS reported that “U.S. troops are said to have found another biological weapons research lab near Kandahar, one that that was eyeing anthax.” But CBS and FBI spokesman further noted that “Those searches found extensive evidence that al-Qaida wanted to develop biological weapons, but came up with no evidence the terrorist group actually had anthrax or other deadly germs, they said.” Only years later did we learn that there was in fact extremely virulent anthrax at Kandahar. (Though some senior officials at the CIA and FBI knew this in Autumn 2003) Thus, a factual predicate important to assessment of the John Hopkins report on the leg lesion needed to be reevaluated. That is, we now know extremely virulent anthrax was located precisely at the spot from where the hijacker with the lesion had arrived.
Here is a repost from July 29th by a supporter of Dr. Ali Al-Timimi of a summary of the case and Dr. Al-Timimi’s eloquent statement upon indictment. There is a great musical background.
http://thesunnah.wordpress.com/2007/07/29/sheikh-ali-al-timimi/
The poignant and compelling rendition illustrates the importance of presentation. Ali is relying on his words with just a little help — but very effective help — of some enjoyable music.
An analysis reported today suggests Ayman uses digital manipulation of his backdrops — such as adding a cannon or adding some books.
http://news.com.com/8301-10784_3-9753090-7.html
The jihadist videos are most compelling, I think, when they use the music.
Yesterday ABC reported that a new video advises “Wait for the Big Surprise.” “Soon... God Willing,” is repeated.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8QOI1A01&show_article=1
That sounds like language used by Gadahn in an earlier videotape. Gadahn was the former hard rocker who used to listen to songs with lyrics like “`Murder is the only way to kill time.”
The impressionable Gadahn had fallen under the influence of Egyptian Islamic Group member Hisham Diab in California. The blind sheik would stay with Diab and his neighbor Khalil Deek. His wife, who he married for a green card, woke up one day and thought to herself “Uh-oh, this guy, the blind sheik, was involved in WTC 1993. I’ve got a terrorist sleeping on my couch. She says she called the local FBI field office but they didn’t know, she says, who the blind sheik was and weren’t interested. She also claims that even after Abdel-Rahman was arrested in mid-1993, he would regularly call Diab from prison each Sunday and deliver fiery sermons that were recorded and distributed to some of his other followers.
Gadahn was someone who Diab and his neighbor, AQ operative, Khalil Deek, could control. Diab’s step-son says Diab beat him almost daily when for doing poorly in his Arabic lessons.
Diab left the country suddenly in June 2001.
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/Story?id=352268&page=2
KSM asked Gadahn to participate in an operation as a martyr in Maryland but Gadahn refused — citing he had just gotten married.
Khalil Deek lived in Peshawar, where Islambouli headed the blind sheik’s Midkhat Services. For a time, he lived in Bosnia.
So even when you have some idiot heavy metal cult-member-waiting-to-happen issuing repeated threats, the blind sheik’s detention is central to the threats (whether in letters containing pathogenic bacteria or not).
Ed Lake summarizes the science that points to GMU on his webpage. He writes:
“On July 30, 2006, it was realized that the silicon and oxygen detected by AFIP in the Daschle anthrax powder could be trace amounts remaining from coating the wet spores with a surfactant prior to drying. The purpose and significance of a surfactant is explained in an October 29, 2001, article in New Scientist Magazine.
...
Although the New Scientist article talks only about bioweapons manufacturing, the use of surfactants is definitely not something restricted only to bioweapons facilities.”
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/20060273187.html
Now reducing his analysis to key words for googling, one comes up with “silicon dioxide surfactant spores hydrophobic.”
That leads you first and foremost to the GMU patent coinvented by the former USAMRIID head and the Russian biological expert who had Ali Al-Timimi’s number.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=silicon+dioxide+surfactant+spores+hydrophobic&btnG=Search
Ed is citing this article.
Anthrax preparation indicates home-grown origin
16:04 29 October 2001
From New Scientist Print Edition. Subscribe and get 4 free issues.
Debora MacKenzie
As anthrax continues to turn up in US postal facilities, and postal workers, evidence is emerging that it is an American product. Not only are the bacteria genetically close to the strain the US used in its own anthrax weapons in the 1960s, but New Scientist can reveal that the spores also seem to have been prepared according to the secret US “weaponisation” recipe.
This is troubling, say bioterrorism specialists. While the terrorists behind the anthrax-laced mail US might have got hold of the strain of anthrax in several laboratories around the world, the method the US developed for turning a wet bacterial culture into a dangerous, dry powder is a closely-guarded secret....
For its weapon, say informed sources, the US added various molecules, including surfactants, to the wet spores so that when they were dried, they broke up into fine particles within a very narrow size range of a few microns.
GMU microbiology grad Shaikh Ali Timimi shared his views on the Taliban in March 2001.
http://www.themodernreligion.com/jihad/afghan/tamimi.html
Ali said:
“Over the past two to three years, I have been increasingly asked by Muslims both locally (i.e., here in the US) and abroad regarding the Taliban and our responsbilities toward that regime. I will never forget one incident in Singapore two summers ago when I was asked to convey a letter to Shaikh Ibn Uthaymeen -— may Allah’s mercy be on his soul -— asking for an unambigious ruling on the Taliban government and a Muslim’s responsbility to that goverment. Shaikh Ibn Uqla’s recent fatwa I think is a positive step in the right direction but there still is a need for more voices to be heard on the topic so a consensus or majority opinion may be formed.
In general my response when asked is that while I do not have all the facts to say unequivocally that the Taliban represent THE Islamic state of our time and their emir THE emir of the Muslims -— for to do so has its implications on bay’a, hijra, nusra, etc. -— we can say the following we are obliged to support all that they do which is in agreement with Islam. This is the same principle which is used time and time again regarding those contemporary states (few as they are) which still remain in the pale of Islam and the various Islamic groups movements when they are do something that is within the bounds of the Sunna. In other words, our wala’ does not have to be 100% or nothing -— rather the principle of Ahl as-Sunna is that wala’ is shown to the degree someone is in agreement with Islam and the Sunna. Likewise bara’a is also not 100% or nothing rather again it is to be shown to the degree someone is at variance with Islam and the Sunna.”
He spoke out against those who criticized the Taliban for destroying the Buddha statues:
“Even if someone was to argue that given the geopolitical situation of the umma as a whole the timing is questionable, it is, however, highly questionable to publicly decry the Taliban for an action which is without doubt Islamic even if for the sake of argument poorly timed. Indeed to add one’s voice to the chorus of the shouts of the unbelievers is an action which resembles that of the hypocrites who command evil and forbid good.”
He concluded:
“I ask Allah with all His beautiful names and exalted attributes to protect, guide and strengthen the Taliban and to break the backs and put to shame the forces of unbelief and hypocrisy.”
A Taliban minister or two have been known to share Ali’s desire to break the backs the forces of unbelief.
For example, in January 2007, a Taliban spokesman who was captured had packets of anthrax for use for mailing against government officials. An Afghanistan governor says his residence contained anthrax powder packets. According to a report by the Aghan Islamic Press Agency, as monitored by the BBC. the powdered anthrax was intended for mailing to government officials. The former Taliban spokesman quietly told a camera that he was “on a mission” when he was arrested.
BBC Worldwide Monitoring provided a translation of a news report from Pashto:
Text of report by Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press news agency Jalalabad, 17 January: The governor of eastern Nangarhar Province has given details on the arrest of the Taleban spokesman.
***
Sherzai said: “Three people, including Dr Hanif, were arrested after a clash with the government forces. A fourth person who was wounded in the clash managed to escape.”
...
He said: “A biological substance, anthrax, was also seized from those arrested. They planned to send the substance in envelopes addressed to government officials....”
The fellow who reportedly had “anthrax powder packets” had been living in Peshawar. (Where KSM’s cell member Islambouli had lived for years while heading the blind sheik’s Midkhat Services organization). Muhammad Hanif’s real name is Abdulhaq Haji Gulroz. Is this young guy mentioned above Qari Mullah Din Muhammad Hanif, the former madrassa-trained Minister of Education who wouldn’t let the medical school use cadavers? (That was a good thing, given that it didn’t have electricity) Is he a “Dr.” If so, what kind? The former education minister had not received a secular education and oversaw the medical school. A veterinary student in September 2001 said they had nothing in the way of facilities or equipment. It was the Agriculture Minister who had taken a keen interest in supervising the Red Cross/FAO-funded anthrax vaccine laboratory.
Anthrax lab director Yazid Sufaat did his anthrax work, he told his wife, as part of a Taliban medical brigade. A building associated with the charity WAFA housed a lab, and WAFA was a militant supporter of the Taliban. So while we await lab tests and further clarification or confirmation, this sketchy report about anthrax powder packets is certainly intriguing.
At the time of the mailings, a Taliban spokesman said: “We don’t even know what anthrax is.” The Taliban had long denied having any interest in biological or chemical weapons research. The next month, however, reporters were tipped off by a senior official of the Northern Alliance to check out the Institute of Veterinary Vaccine Production in Kabul run by the Minister of Agriculture.
The lab was repeatedly targeted by bombers but the closest of 13 B-52 bombs landed 50 feet away, causing craters. There was a walk-in incubator to develop bacteria. The equipment used to make vaccines was taken away the day before the bombardment began. The cement walls of the building were cracked. Doors were blasted off their hinges. Shards of glass were strewn on the floor. At the end of one corridor on the second floor a reporter and photographer from The Mirror (UK) were led into a small office. The word “anthrax” was scribbled on an unbroken test tube. A sign read “to be safe than sorry” — the word “better” had fallen off. When AP journalist Kathy Gannon and a photographer stood in front of a glass bottle labeled in English “anthrax spore concentrate” in the two-story building, the photographer’s reflection shone back. The scientists explained that their work at the lab was intended only to develop animal vaccines. Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that “the one place where the only vial that had English on it said ‘anthrax’ kind of gives you pause.” Testing showed that it was avirulent strain used in developing animal vaccines. The scientists complained that much of the anthrax vaccine on hand had expired and that they were having trouble getting the supplies they needed to produce more. Before 9/11, private companies in India and Iran had been their main suppliers. Shipments were halted after Sept. 11, and the laboratories have had to rely on their stocks.
Mullahs oversaw the anthrax vaccine laboratory much to the consternation of the scientist in charge of the lab. The mullahs had ordered that the lab be moved to Kabul so that they could oversee it. According to one British press report, much of the laboratory staff had disappeared some months before 9/11 and their whereabouts were unknown. The Institute once had a staff of 45 and one of Afghanistan’s most modern buildings. The scientists gathered before an AP journalist and photographer pointed to a large clear container that held concentrated anthrax spores. The scientists explained that the Taliban had taken a keen interest in their work. Although he was famed for his ability to recite the koran and not scientifically inclined, the Minister of Agriculture would come and inspect what they were doing. The head of the lab explained, “He and his Taliban superiors were interested in the technical detail of what happened here, although they had no background in science.” The International Committee of the Red Cross and the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization provided the scientists technical help. The head of the lab acknowledging that the Taliban could have obtained the knowledge to handle and develop anthrax. Dr Raoufi said: “Sadly, some use what is meant to be good for their own destructive ends.”
Minister of Agriculture Mullah Qari Abdullah hated the West. Seven months before 9/11 half of the lab’s staff disappeared. “We’d rather have been running the labs on our own,” the lead scientist explained. “But the mullahs were in charge of everything and we couldn’t stop them learning about our activities. There was always a danger information could get into the wrong hands.” The lab was first built in a northern province in 1993 with equipment from India. Scientists infected three sheep to study the results in developing new vaccines. They told a reporter from the Mirror that they buried the carcasses 30 feet down away from any water supplies. “This was very dangerous work, though we knew what we were doing. We developed the technology of how to keep anthrax bacteria and how to develop it for use in vaccines.” I would be suspicious of the anthrax research and any research during the Taliban (period) because they were under the control of Osama and al-Qaida,” the deputy head of Northern Alliance military intelligence, told The Associated Press. “We have strong evidence of their involvement in chemical weapons,” he added. “We believe that they were using government facilities, like the Ministry of Agriculture, to do their research in terrorism.” A source who worked at the factory told the Mirror (UK): “There’s no doubt the Taliban were planning chemical or biological warfare against the West.” I believe anthrax might have been first on their list.”
Question: Did GMU microbiology grad student Ali Al-Timimi, who wanted to break the back of the unbelievers who were criticizing the Taliban, have any contact with Taliban leaders? If so, who?
GMU microbiology grad student Ali Al-Timimi seems to indicate that he visited Singapore in the Summer of 1999.
The 9/11 planning meeting was at anthrax lab tech’s condo in Kuala Lumpur in January 2000. Nawaf, who later would live in Falls Church and attend Ali’s mosque, was also at the meeting.
[Although irrelevant, Hatfill at some point was visiting KL to see his girlfriend’s family.]
It was not until the Summer 2000, in June, that Zawahiri and Atef arrived to visit their regional anthrax operative. They met in Indonesia. Zawahiri also met there in Indonesia with Kuwaiti Omar al-Faruq, now detained at Guantanamo Bay, and Indonesian Agus Dwikarna, now detained in Jakarta. Al-Faruq was a senior Al Qaeda representative in southeast Asia. Dwikarna acted as a guide for Zawahiri’s and Atef’s trip to Indonesia. Even in far away places like Singapore, the USG likely has lots of witnesses available to them of who Ali Al-Timimi saw while in Singapore.
I was in Singapore, I think, about the same time, along with Kuala Lumpur and Indonesia and the other countries in the region. In KL, I arrived at the time of a crowded muslim holiday. Stayed in Chinatown. Got a weird vibe at the KFC. It was in KL that some young men were eager to get their picture with the loose woman tourist with me who dared wear shorts. Then at some point spent a long time on the muslim island of Lombok, next to Bali, and went to the wonderful Nyale worm festival on the southern tip of the island. In the idyllic Ayutullah, Thailand, halfway between Chiang Mai and Bangkok, I stayed very near where Hambali was later captured. He lived a quiet life — working while his Chinese wife learned Arabic. In the middle of Vietnam, where no one changed US currency, and the town was used to catering only to Russians at a naval base that had been there, I had to leave my girlfriend while I travelled a day to get cash. Although everyone in Vietnam and throughout the region was extremely friendly, they kept the woman with me as collateral. Hambali for a while was hiding out in Cambodia, as I recall.
Question: what confirmation is there of the date Al-Timimi visited Singapore — to include where precisely he went and his reason for going there. Usually, he would go to places to speak at conferences during breaks in the school year.
I lived in Arlington, VA for 15 or so years where I would do a lot of research at GMU — and so keep barely missing Ayman and his minions.
Now we could leave it to the CIA and FBI to take care of business, except that they had full advance information Nawaf had entered the country after attending the meeting at KL — and I believe he was even listed in the phone book — and they didn’t pick him up.
Today, I got into a discussion with someone (NOT "ZacandPook") who asked,
"How come Chertoff has ruled out terrorism in the MN bridge collapse?" And he went on to say, "Al Qaeda has targeted U.S. bridges in the past for terrorist attacks, so what evidence is DHS secretary Chertoff relying on to say that the MN bridge collapse wasn’t a terrorist attack of some kind? I think a good bit of investigation work has to be done to determine if the bridge fell from a structure failure, human error, or sabotage."
He even posted a LINK to an article where some al Qaeda member was checking out NYC bridges to see if any could be brought down.
While he didn't say that article as "proof" that al Qaeda did it, he couldn't see how a terrorist attack could be "ruled out".
It wasn't "ruled out". Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said there was no indication terrorism had been involved in the disaster. That's not ruling it out. I explained that there was no sign of any explosion, and I explained how a terrorist attack on such a bridge would almost certainly require that massive amounts of explosives be used.
Then we discussed whether Chertoff had an open mind. Evidently, "having an open mind" means: Believing al Qaeda did it until solid evidence is found proving otherwise. And "being closed minded" means: Believing it was a structural failure until solid evidence is found proving otherwise.
I heard on TV that Chertoff has since stated that "Nothing is being ruled out." If so, then someone with an "open mind" can tell all his friends and neighbors that "Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has stated that it is possible the bridge was brought down by al Qaeda terrorists."
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