Posted on 11/29/2009 5:40:23 PM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
Washington, DC (AHN) - A new Senate report blasts the Bush administration's December 2001 effort to capture or kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in the Afghanistan mountains of Tora Bora.
The report, written by the Senate Foreign Relations, says bin Laden was within reach on Dec. 16, but he and his "entourage of bodyguards walked unmolested out of Tora Bora and disappeared into Pakistan's unregulated tribal area." The report says most analysts believe he is still there.
The report, requested by the committee's chairman, Massachusetts Democrat John Kerry, blames the failure to catch or kill bin Laden on then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's decision to use a force of untrained, mostly Afghani fighters to seal his escape routes.
The report says more than 100 American commandos were on the scene during the battle, but their calls for reinforcements were denied. Bin Laden, according to the report was so shaken by U.S. air strikes that he prepared a will that indicated he thought he was moments from death.
The report also slams then-Afghanistan-theater commander Gen. Tommy Franks for refusing to deviate from a plan to use mostly indigenous forces on the ground to ease the risk of an anti-U.S. backlash in the country.
The report's release comes two days before the Obama administration is expected to announce the deployment of more troops to Afghanistan.
Democrat leaders always live in the past. Our AG is a disgusting p.o.c.
I love BlackFive! :)
7. A talking point for the ignorant left, their enablers and military geniuses like F John Kerry is born.
Lighten up on Jehn Kerry, after all he is the pride of Massachusetts.
They keep sending this coward back to the Hill so they must take pride in him.
Not much to take pride in, in my Opinion, but then they also sent back Kennedy tiem and time again and they love Bawney Fwank.
I have seen here on FR since Dec 2001, questions regarding whether Bin Laden was dead or alive. Quite frankly, I do not know one way or another.
So its Bush;s fault for not killing Osama, but if he did, then he could be tried in the World Court for War Crimes. Obama is going to ride the report to the Rose Garden and announce he's sending 3 thousand combat troops, and 27 thousand lawyers, 6 cooks and 3 bakers.
Six months from now, his plan to sell Afghanistan back to the Taliban will have been completed and we can hi-tail it to the nearest 'copter and make our escape. I see it all too clearly now...
Exactly HOW DO YOU BLAME BUSH for a guy who has been DEAD for years?????? Like they still believe this douche is alive??????
Hell... weren't these the same people who started to rail against U.S. policy about doing anything? How many times did Bush have to present his case before going into Iraq?
You're right Diana.... lying bastards.
President Bush's Afghanistan speech
GEORGE W. BUSH
Statement given after the start of the US and British military strikes on targets in Afghanistan on Sunday, 7th October 2001.
On my orders, the United States military has begun strikes against al-Qaeda terrorist training camps and military installations of the Taleban regime in Afghanistan.
We are joined in this operation by our staunch friend, Great Britain. Other close friends, including Canada, Australia, Germany and France, have pledged forces as the operation unfolds.
Scumbag democrats.
Yamamoto was shot down over New Guinea by two US P-38 Lightnings. Maybe you mean Yamashita, who I believe, was executed as a war criminal.
Never got Yamamoto? Am I missing something?
According to the report:
Bin Laden expected to die. His last will and testament, written on December 14, reflected his fatalism. ‘‘Allah commended to us that when death approaches any of us that we make a bequest to parents and next of kin and to Muslims as a whole,’’ he wrote, according to a copy of the will that surfaced later and is regarded as authentic. ‘‘Allah bears witness that the love of jihad and death in the cause of Allah has dominated my life and the verses of the sword permeated every cell in my heart, ‘and fight the pagans all together as they fight you all together.’ How many times did I wake up to find myself reciting this holy verse!’’ He instructed his wives not to remarry and apologized to his children for devoting himself to jihad.
I assume they captured it after the fight.
DeLong amplified the reasons for not sending American troops after bin Laden. ‘‘The real reason we didn’t go in with U.S. troops was that we hadn’t had the election yet,’’ he said in the staff interview, a reference to the installation of Hamid Karzai as the interim leader of Afghanistan. ‘‘We didn’t want to have U.S. forces fighting before Karzai was in power. We wanted to create a stable country and that was more important than going after bin Laden at the time.’’ ‘
Sounds like the turmoil after Ike refused to let the US Troops advance to Berlin and left it to the Russians, or the decision to not cross the Rhine earlier than they did. Some decisions are made that in retrospect are bad.
Was the decision correct? Militarily,probably not. Politically, perhaps, but, in the long run, with Obama signaling to the Taliban that we are leaving without victory, all the taliban has to do is wait; and wait they will do.
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