Posted on 10/25/2001 8:30:14 AM PDT by Travis McGee
I have come up with what I think is going to happen next in the ongoing drama. Forgive this vanity post, but I think the idea demands discussion in advance of the possible event.
I think OBL is heading for Karachi or Islamabad.
He will stay in Pakistan because it has nukes and medium range rockets, is unstable and ready to blow up like Iran in 79, and of course is closest to Afghanistan for covert travel ease. He wants to be seen as the Mahdi, (Moslem messiah, the next Prophet of Allah) and to do that he needs the adoring masses, and proof that he has humiliated and beaten the Great Satan (and the lackey sell-out government of Musharraf). His "miraculous" escape from under the Amriki bombers and his secret journey to Pakistan will "prove" that the Hand of Allah is protecting and guiding him.
To ensure his safety he will at all times be surrounded by millions of fanatics in densely packed slums where we can not bomb him or send in troops. The micro-model for this will be "Blackhawk Down", the Battle of Mogadishu where (in the Moslem view) they won a great victory and drove the USA out of Somalia. Al Q'aida was instrumental in that battle, particularly by introducing modified anti-helicopter time-fused air-bursting RPGs, and the tactics which led to the shootdowns of several US helicopters, which caused the simple half hour Delta/Ranger "snatch" raid to spin out of control into a furious day and night long battle.
Every day that OBL is loose, appearing like a Super Pope on balconies in front of 100s of thousands of adoring jihadists, his power and influence worldwide will soar like a moon rocket. He will have the 24/7 attention of the entire world media for his every pronouncement, and then he can "ascend" into heaven proving he is truly the Mahdi. Even if we drop a smart bomb on his balcony, he "ascends to heaven" and wins.
If we dare to risk a helicopter/ground attack into the teeming slums to capture or kill him, he will get his "super battle of Mogadishu", which will suit his purpose by killing countless thousands of Moslem noncombatants, driving the entire Moslem world instantly into a world war on America.
And of course any smart bomb we dared to use to kill OBL will kill hundreds of adoring moslem children, proving what bloodthirsty butchers the infidels are.
Even if snipers or or precision fired Hellfire rockets "take him out" on his balcony, we may only kill an OBL double, allowing "the Mahdi" to be "resurrected from the dead" for new appearances, driving his power and influence still higher into the stratosphere.
This scenario has been his ultimate goal all along I believe. I wonder if anyone at the NSC, CIA , NSA or DOS has prepared a counter move to this very possible, even likely, scenario?
They worship a black freakin' rock.
Figures.
They know they can hide their fighters, or OBL himself, by going into the middle of throngs of noncombatants.
If he wanted to be a martyr, he could have attained that years ago.
Blame it on India -- they hate Pakistan. Or Russia -- they hate OBL.
Or China -- they hate everyone.
No, and I don't watch a lot of TV, so it's been a while since I've seen it. I wasn't even looking for or noticing black flags at the time.
Maybe some of the palestinian sympathizer sites has a link. Might also be time to post a vanity to FR and see if anyone has a thought as to how to track the pics or video down.
Yeah, but I've heard it's a very special rock from another planet.
This is the one that shows black clad terrorists running a dusty obstacle course, then cuts to a "room clearing" drill where black clad jihadists shoot cardboard silhouette targets with Christian crosses on their chests.
I am sure you have seen it over and over.
The video clip the networks use ends with about a company of black clad terrorists in ranks and files marching towards the camera with dusty mountains in the background, presumably in Afghanistan.
The marchers are being led by a few black clad jihadists holding up large wind whipped BLACK FLAGS with arabic writing on them.
That's the video still we want to isolate.
It seems like a logical fit with OBL trying to assume the mantle of the Mahdi, "the one who will march out of Afghanistan flying the black flags".
Reminds me of the old movie title - "Bad Day at Black Rock". The title may be usable with slight modification when the historical film about this war is made.
Which is exactly why he's probably already dead, unless he's completely under the thumb of some very powerful sponsor
Put yourself in the shoes of the head of any Islamic nation. Is your leadership position secure as long as Bin Laden is alive? The more popular he becomes with the masses, the more the various Islamic heads-of-state will want him safely dead.
The fact that a number of (govt controlled) Islamic news agencies are giving him good PR is an indication that something interesting is going on behind the scenes, something that was planned out and agreed to by many powerful leaders. What the plan is, I don't know
Time will tell.
Black Flags of Islam Try clicking on either of the Black Flags for the link to other thread.
Should work now. Let me know.
This thread answers a question I've had from the outset: why attack now, against a strong U.S. president who would retaliate, rather than against a cowardly scumbag who'd lob some cruise missiles, make some soothing sophomoric speeches and then get back to checking out the babes? It occurs to me that in order to set off the WWIII/Holy War he desires, bin Ladin and his "brain trust" required a situation just like the one we're in. As you say, he knows us far too well.
We did not retaliate against a genuine act of war, the attack on the Cole. We did not retaliate against previous unthinkable outrages. Bin Ladin, and other Islamacists, have probed our weaknesses. He has determined that while we are militarily strong, we do not have the stomach for using our might nor the moral strength to see body bags returning from combat. He has perceived that we are so bureaucratized and morally/ethically weak as a people that we can be herded around by a bunch of pissed-off feminists, politically-correct college professors and know-nothing, hate-America-first "journalists." We are no longer a warrior culture: just a bunch of Caspar Milquetoasts who flinch at ethical shadows and ask, in the modern Western impotence of J. Alfred Prufrock, "dare I eat a peach?" Obviously, I don't include the FR contingent in thse generalizations. But as with his use of box-cutters to topple the WTC, he is using the moral weaknesses of our effete culture to topple us. Either we grasp the essentials of Darwinian survival -- and soon -- or he stands a good chance of winning this.
I believe the real tests will be how we react to his use of civilian "meat shields," the torture and humiliation of POWs and to the taking of innocent hostages. Those acts are next in the al Quaeda playbook.
Rumsfeld is now talking about how the Taliban are taking shelter in residential areas to use the noncomatants as human shields.
It will be interesting to see how we react.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.