'Mastermind' Tight-Lipped About Bin Laden

IOL ^ | 3-4-2003

[blam]

'Mastermind' tight-lipped about Bin Laden

March 04 2003 at 11:58AM

Islamabad - Al-Qaeda's alleged terror architect Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has given contradictory information on the fate of Osama bin Laden, initially telling investigators he was alive before later saying he was dead, said a senior security official.

"He is changing his statements," said the official, who is familiar with the investigation.

"Initially he said Bin Laden was alive. But later he changed his statement and said Bin Laden was dead because he had had no contact with the man during the past six months.

"He said he used to maintain contacts with Bin Laden through a chain of messengers via email, who would deliver the message to Bin Laden without telling Mohammed his whereabouts."

'It is very difficult to penetrate the psyche of a hardened person like him' The official was speaking shortly before Pakistan's Information Minister Sheikh Rashid confirmed that Mohammed had been whisked out of the country.

Security sources said Bin Laden's right-hand man was now in US custody and had been flown to Afghanistan.

Mohammed was captured in a pre-dawn raid in Rawalpindi on Saturday. He was hiding in a house with another unidentified al-Qaeda suspect and the Pakistani son of an activist of the country's largest Islamic party.

He had been under interrogation by a joint team of Pakistani intelligence agents and US Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency investigators since Saturday in a secret location in Pakistan.

He had so far proved hard to "break down", said the official.

"It is very difficult to penetrate the psyche of a hardened person like him," he said.

Mohammed's arrest is being hailed as the biggest coup in the 18-month old war on terrorism, and has elated the administration of US President George Bush.

He is believed to be one of Bin Laden's closest lieutenants, second only to his Egyptian deputy Ayman al-Zawahri.

Bin Laden's fate and whereabouts since the US began bombarding Afghanistan in late 2001 remain a mystery, but most Western intelligence agents believe he is alive and hiding somewhere along the Pakistan-Afghan border.

Mohammed is alleged to have planned the September 11 terror attacks in the US and has been on the run in Pakistan for at least a year.

He had been sought by the US since his indictment in 1996 over a plot to blow up commerical airliners over the Pacific a year earlier, and is linked to the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and the attack on a US ship in Yemen in 2000. - Sapa-AFP

[BrooklynGOP]

"It is very difficult to penetrate the psyche of a hardened person like him," he said. Time to bring out the blow torch and a pair of pliars.

[Maelstrom]

*bump

[Thebaddog]

It doesn't seem like this kind if info should be coming out of a professional organization so quickly.

[Paleo Conservative]

Once a military tribunal has convicted him and sentenced him to death we should let our friends in the Mossad have a crack at him.

[Uncle George]

Of course this story is for the terrorists to read; I am glad the media don't get one FACT about this murderer so our FBI, CIA can do their job. Our President will keep us informed with ALL the real news we can safely assimilate.

[TADSLOS]

Hard to say much about a dead man.

[js1138]

Of course this story is for the terrorists to read;

I sure hope so. The other day hannity had a radio debate, and some Hollywood type was asking if we believed Bush was telling the truth. I certainly hope Bush is capable of telling a strategic lie in time of war.

[Common Tator]

If they have broken him, the last thing they would do is tell us they had broken him. I would submit there is a reason the CIA and military are not saying "no comment".

It is most likley they captured him well before they announced his capture. Then when Pakistan announced the capture we were disappointed that Pakistan let out the word too quickly. UH HUH!!

If Pakistan picked him up and then announced it, it seems very likely that he was picked him up and announced when we wanted it announced.

I suspect the Pakistani forces picked him up, gave him truth serum. They let us interrogate him while in their custody to learn all he knew. When we had learned all he knew we had teh Pakistani government turn him over to our custody. That let us annunce he was not talking to us and even if he did, he gave contridictory information.

UH HUH!!!

[kylaka]

Yet again, W is doing what Clinton promised to do, which leads any person with half a brain to conclude that Clinton's empty retoric actually ENCOURAGED the terrorists.

[The Other Harry]

THere goes one more finger...

[kinghorse]

If you paid attention to Firesign Theater as a kid, this wouldn't come as a shock.

Everything you know is wrong

[Oldeconomybuyer]

The Office of Strategic Disinformation in Washington is working overtime and I just love it!

[The Brush]

Bin Laden is dead. If he were alive we'd be seeing weekly TV shows from him taunting us on how we haven't gotten him yet and how Allah was protecting him.
CBS would have given him his own show by now and they'd have sponsers lined up around the block.

[princess leah]

First of all, he needs to have his Right-Hand cut off since he is now no longer Binny's "right hand man"...

[Logic n' Reason]

Again, to quote the Commander in Chief: ". . . We will direct every resource at our command - every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence and every necessary weapon of war - to the destruction and to the defeat of the global terror network. "

Nice to rub the liberal's noses in it!

[PBRSTREETGANG]

They're obviously not hooking up the jumper cables to the right parts.

It's time to "get medieval on his ass".

[Logic n' Reason]

bttt

[old school]

If he's in American custody, pliers and blow-torches won't be used. In fact, I'm dismayed, because this may signal that there is no intent ensure that this man is "appropriately" punished for his crimes. Of course, I understand that there is no, one, specific, question that they're seeking an affirmative answer to; so torture at this juncture won't avail them much. But, I sure would have liked to have seen him delivered to an agency who knows the value of cooperation from the accused!

[putupon]

They should try some vice grips and WD-40 to loosen things up.