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Posted on 06/11/2002 7:06:16 AM PDT by MississippiMan
'Dirty Bomb' Suspect Not Cooperating, Wolfowitz Says
Tue Jun 11, 8:39 AM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A suspected American al Qaeda operative accused of plotting a radioactive "dirty bomb" attack on the United States has not yet given authorities information on his associates, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said on Tuesday.
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"He came into this country with the intention, by various means, not just the dirty bomb idea, of killing hundreds and maybe thousands of Americans," he said on CBS' "The Early Show."
Detained by the FBI ( news - web sites) in Chicago on May 8, al Muhajir was declared an "enemy combatant" by President Bush ( news - web sites) over the weekend and transferred to a naval brig in South Carolina.
But Wolfowitz said the former gang member had not provided information to investigators.
"To the best of my knowledge he hasn't cooperated at all so far," Wolfowitz said on NBC's "Today Show."
"He clearly had associates and one of the things we want to ask him about is who those associates were and how we can track them down," he added on CBS.
Wolfowitz said it was clear to investigators, however, that al Muhajir had had "a great deal of contact" with the al Qaeda network of Saudi exile Osama bin Laden ( news - web sites), and that "he was clearly taking a great deal of instruction."
Authorities said on Monday al Muhajir had trained with al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan ( news - web sites) and was in the planning stages of launching a so-called dirty bomb attack, which combines a conventional bomb with radioactive material, somewhere in the United States.
Washington blames bin Laden's network for the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people.
Wolfowitz said al Muhajir apparently planned to get radioactive material for the bomb from somewhere within the United States.
"This man actually thought he could get them from places like university labs," he said. "I have no idea how difficult that would be but there is nuclear material around in a lot places."
The New York-born Jose Padilla, 31. who changed his name to Abdullah al Muhajir, was being held by the Defense Department as an "enemy combatant," which under the rules of war allows him to be held until the end of the conflict and questioned without an attorney present.
Civil rights groups like the American Civil Liberties Union ( news - web sites) have criticized the detention and said he should be tried in U.S. court.
"What we're about here is preventing," Wolfowitz said. "Preventing him from doing further acts, preventing those about whom he may have knowledge from doing further acts."
If authorities decide to prosecute al Muhajir he will be transferred back to civil courts, Wolfowitz said.
Yaser Esam Hamdi, an American-born Saudi national detained in Afghanistan, is a second U.S. citizen known to be held by the Defense Department.
John Walker Lindh, another American captured while fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan, is facing trail in a federal court in Virginia. He is in the custody of the Justice Department ( news - web sites).
Wolfowitz spoke from a spot outside the Pentagon ( news - web sites) where one of the hijacked airliners crashed Sept. 11, to note that workers had almost completed reconstruction efforts.
Poised to lay the final piece of limestone, he said officials planned to also place a time capsule to honor those killed in the attack.
"It's also a way of honoring the incredible determination and resolve of the workers who put this building back together so quickly," he said on CBS.
"I think its symbolic of the resolve of the American people to prevail over people like Abdullah al Muhajir."
The War on Terrorism will never be completed.
My source?
Senator Trent Lott, who said,
"As long as there's one man who thinks that he can use violence
to change things he doesn't agree with, the War on Terror will be needed.
Progress.
Now the government doesn't even pretend to follow procedure.
Very true.
I remember in Shirley Maclane's book,"Don't Fall Off the Mountain",
she talked about taking a foreign friend out of his country
by tying a scarf from her arm to his arm.
The guards were afraid to touch him because she was an American Citizen,
and they were afraid of repercussions if they hurt her.
That respect for our citizens abroad is no more,
and even our government holds citizenship in contempt.
You're dreaming.
"These people" are not cowards.
Generally, people who routinely initiate the use of force are cowards at their core, choosing violence in response to fear. That's why Bush's claim that, "This morning, Freedom itself was attacked by faceless cowards." was not just posturing. I think that tendency is enough to get them singing when they're without council, alone, and being screwed with by interrogators.
But his arrest was supposedly predicated on those he associated with. Now they are saying he won't tell them who his associates were. Kinda self-refuting don't you think.
If you're familiar with the Rowley letter (Waco,Oklahoma, China et.al), you'll understand how the Bureau will obsfuscate to cover their own ass. This is a perfect opportunity to take the heat off themselves. I hate to say it, but I really don't trust anything we're told by our government.
It's not that I have any personal information on this case, but based on the Fed's history (as well as congress, senate and the executive office) and their propensity to protect their own, I remain extremely pessimistic regarding their veracity.
You don't see a difference between me knowing who you have associated with and you not telling me who you associated with ? Its like me having witnesses that you robbed a bank and you saying "What bank ? "
Arab activists at a very high level (Arab media, Arab academia, Arab cultural institutions) have routinely indoctrinated Arab children in nearly every Arab country to believe that "the West" is raping the Arab world and Arab culture.
The Arab terrorists we are seeing are not mindless losers quivering in random fears and striking out spasmodically in any direction they can.
In fact, the Arab terrorists we are seeing are the opposite of the Arab world's version of sheeple -- the terrorists we see are the people who have the balls to try and do something about what they've been told is the destruction of their culture.
There are two points that everyone should see.
It's difficult to figure out how much of what's reported we should all take at face value, and how much tin foil we should automatically strap on. But if we believe the accepted version of the whole war on terrorism, then we need to face the fact that these are NOT losers and fringe psychopaths that we're up against.
(Could anyone here like to imagine what the result would have been if, say, the CIA had been tasked with creating something like al-Qaida? Could the US government have created a global network of "fighters" powerful enough to threaten any place on the globe even after a year of struggle with a vastly larger force with vastly greater resources?)
--KotS
Not when the government comes out and plainly states that they do not. If I can paraphrase accurately Wolfowitz says: "Clearly he has associates, but he won't tell us who they are."
If they had any credible information whatsoever, they wouldn't need his cooperation to build a case. Furthermore the constitution protects his right to refrain from cooperating. It is absurd to suggest that one accused of a crime (and in this case he isn't even charged with a crime) must cooperate with the authorities or be assumed guilty. That turns our alleged justice system on its ear.
What if you backed out at the last minute. Would I still be able to arrest you even though you had "gotten religion" at the last moment and decided against carrying out the crime? This is the slippery slope that exists when attempting to prosecute thought crimes. It is just this sort of thing that the founders were attempting to prevent.
If this guy really intended to commit a crime then I want him put away. But I do not think that what we've been told is enough to make such a decision.
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