Saddam Behind Anthrax Attacks?

A terrorist who knew the routing single-piece FCM might take from entry at
Boca Raton to DC could have been aiming to disable several important postal facilities.

Well that lets most of Postal Management off the hook.

Good, clear, logical thinking. A two-fer, so to speak, ace a prominent politician and blow out key nodes of the postal network at the same time. Interesting for its sophistication, for it would mean that they viewed the postal network the same way a script kiddie views the internet network, when they spread their own form of virus.

--Boot Hill

Or, they not only view it the same way; "they" is "they", "themselves"!

At the moment there is a rash of "letter bombs" which bear a postmark "somewhere in Italy".

Someone who understands modern postal systems knows very well that it's pretty difficult for a fused charge of any kind to make it through the multiple stages of any facing/cancelling operation, or even through the various kinds of sortation equipment it will meet.

So, how do you get a letter bomb delivered if it's going to be triggered in transit?

First of all, you get it cancelled BEFORE you put the bomb into it. I can think of several ways to do that.

Then you load the envelope with the explosive device and hand carry it to the delivery location.

The FBI, among other police organizations, would go crazy investigating the post office of origin where the bomb was loaded into an already cancelled envelope.

It's really not all that difficult to find folks willing to cancel an envelope or two ~ in fact, the USPS will do it for you for a modest fee (as an ordinary feature in the philatelic servicing business). You can find out what post offices are busy with some sort of commemorative cancellation right in the Postal Bulletin (or it's foreign postal system equivalent.)

BTW, I've seen envelopes disintegrate in an 010 operation, stuff flying everywhere. Was it a bomb? Was it bad paper? Was it just that envelope's turn to self-destruct? Best advice when you see that happen is to reverse course, go somewhere else, and call the Inspectors because, after all, it could have been a bomb and where there's one there's two, or maybe three, or more!

My suspicion is there's someone inside AlQaeda who understands the equipment and workings of modern postal systems. They are not smarter than the USPS folks, or even the foreign postal administration people, but, since the advent of the student loan system, they have become much smarter than the FBI in this regard.

Both the present letter bomb problem and the Anthrax Attack of 2001 could be solved in a matter of days by putting postal system experts to work and pulling back the accountants and lawyers at the FBI.

Hey, that's not fair ~ it's not "MOST", it's more nearly "ALL"~~!

Still, you'll have to admit a good number of them are well-spoken, have the most tasteful in currently fashionable ties, and fit their suits.

Now what more could you want in a "management team"?

"My suspicion is there's someone inside AlQaeda who understands the equipment and workings of modern postal systems."

That's one way to view it, and of course, to get any measure of success, you would have to have someone with an intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the postal system, but another way to view this is that the al Qa'ida person that fleshed out the goal for the anthrax attack had a degree in communications theory. Communications theory would tell you what could be done as well as why, while knowledge of the inner workings of the postal system would tell you how to accomplish it. The former being strategy, the latter, tactics.

So we may be seeing two tiers of al Qa'ida ops planning at work behind the anthrax attack.

Interesting line of thought you offer. The key to understanding it being that the prominent targets of the anthrax attack, Daschle and Leahy, while making a wonderful distraction to confuse investigators, were not the primary targets. The primary target was the postal system, itself.

When viewed this way, the attack on Daschle and Leahy make perfect sense for al Qa'ida.

--Boot

Exactly! ~ Now, think backwords on this. If the attack was designed to shut down critical postal facilities (as "critical" might be imagined in the AlQaida mind, if not our own), you get whatever facilities Congress uses (Senate mail room for example), you get the facility used by US Government headquarters agencies, and you knock out the AMF at Dulles, and/or the AMF at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, JFK and Laguardia in New York, and maybe a couple of airlines as well. (AMF = Air Mail Facility).

In most countries that would be a definitive attack. In the US it's not, but most foreigners simply fail to comprehend how big the American empire really is!

To get this scenario to work (at the destination), AlQaida would have to arrange for mailing to take place in an area where the First Class Mail carrying aircraft would land at IAD or DCA. West Palm Beach area would be perfect for this, and Boca Raton is a logical spot to begin. In fact, the first element of the Anthrax Attack appeared in this area.

Note here that it was AlQaida's intent (under this hypothesis) to send the anthrax in a manner that it would leak out along the route, or possibly almost explode upon the opening of the envelope.

What AlQaida's planners did not plan on was the absolutely abominable way single piece First Class Mail not bearing a barcode is handled in the US Postal Service mail processing systems.

AlQaida's agents dropped their envelopes in a street collection box on September 7 or September 8, 2001 in Boca Raton. They were picked up sometime Saturday. These letters were the only contents of that box and therefore of the mail tray sitting in the bottom of the box.

Through dint of normal processing USPS managed to enclose all but one of the letters in empty MTE (Mail Transport Equipment) which is normally sent from South Florida locations to the Philadelphia BMC and then on to various MPCs and AOs needing empty equipment.

The letters were not only delayed a number of days beyond the attack date of 9/11, they ended up being transported by "truck", not "plane", from New Jersey to Washington DC and New York! Consequently the letters were not handled at critical AMFs (which could have resulted as well in the closure of all terminal operations at DCA, DIA, JFK, LGA, etc.) They were still handled at two mail processing facilities, one of which was just reopened.

Leahy, etc., were not the targets ~ just the USPS, the serving airlines, and the terminal complexes at several major American airports with world reknown.

Althugh "Mitchell" disputes my contentions regarding a certain Website that could be the source of the addresses used for the Anthrax Attack letters, that particular Website contains enough other static information to provide even the most cursory analyst with the identities of the most likely targets to intercept with an Anthrax Attack Vehicle.

"but most foreigners simply fail to comprehend how big the American empire really is!"

Nor how screwed up and inefficient it can get! LOL, we were saved from the worst consequences by good old-fashioned American bureaucratic bungling! That'll teach 'em to mess with us! Whoo-Hoo! We're number one! We're number one!

But al Qa'ida is probably still laughing about how long it took us to figure out what the intended primary target really was. Or at least for the public to figure it out.

--Boot

It wasn't really "bungling". Rather, it's a situation kind of "designed into the system".

Now that we know that it "works" to protect us, that just solidifies the belief that single-piece FCM needs no improvement!

Still, these guys could have put the major airports serving the world's first and second most important cities out of business for years!

Miniter said that Kay told him that, "the Iraqis had developed new techniques for drying and milling anthrax—techniques that were superior to anything the United States or the old Soviet Union had. That would make the former regime of Saddam Hussein the most sophisticated manufacturer of anthrax in the world." Miniter said there are "intriguing similarities" between the nature of the anthrax that could be produced by Saddam and what hit America after 9/11. The key similarity is that the anthrax is produced in such a way that "hangs in the air much longer than anthrax normally would" and is therefore more lethal.

So, what does David Kay say these days?

#29 for you too...

Thanks!

I really don't understand it -- there is so much evidence against Saddam, and yet they ignore it.

At this point, I really don't understand why aren't they coming out with the information.

"So, what does David Kay say these days?"

Whatever it might be, the New York Times and Reuters, et al, forgot to ask him...

In reply no. 4, above:

Miniter said that Kay told him that, "the Iraqis had developed new techniques for drying and milling anthrax --- techniques that were superior to anything the United States or the old Soviet Union had. That would make the former regime of Saddam Hussein the most sophisticated manufacturer of anthrax in the world." Miniter said there are "intriguing similarities" between the nature of the anthrax that could be produced by Saddam and what hit America after 9/11. The key similarity is that the anthrax is produced in such a way that "hangs in the air much longer than anthrax normally would" and is therefore more lethal.

I had missed this article. Thank you so much for the ping.

I would just LOVE to see the anthrax attacks tied directly to Iraq and then see the Democrat's faces when they hear the news.

I mean, I would pay serious money to see this.

What do you bet that these "special coatings" are similar to those used on the fibers in glass cloth.