Posted on 11/13/2008 7:52:48 PM PST by 82ndABNOfficer
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- U.S. intelligence agencies believe Osama bin Laden is isolated from al Qaeda and spending much of his energy merely surviving, the head of the CIA said on Thursday.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
And he works at the 7-11 down the street.
Because that is a media started / web continued myth - The notion of UBL needing dialysis was debunked by several Gov'ts OGAs (including ours) back in the late 90s.
When one understands the region of the world where he is located along with the logistic complexities regarding both Intel and DA Ops, one understands how he has remained alive.
When one understands that Gulbuddin Hekmatyar & Jalaluddin Haqqani both remain alive and very much wanted dead, one understands how UBL has remained so as well. Ditto this for Zawahiri.
That these men remain alive (but hunted and running) is not a sign of failure on our part (possibly to a slight degree in terms of risk-adverse HQs) but speaks more simply to the region of the world in which they are located in.
Of the four (alone) HVTs I've mentioned above I'd be willing to bet we eventually put 3 in the ground ourselves with one of them dying of the elements of old age and on the run (that likely being Jalaluddin Haqqani).
Eyes in the sky are great and all, but in this region of the world they are only as great as the HUMINT we have to go along with them.
that sounds about right. osama the martyr and obama the 12th imam/hero can start wearing a cape.
As for why Iraq, because it is the heart of the ME and is essential to the WOT. After 9-11 we were (smartly) not at war with only AQ or the Taliban. But understood this was a larger war than that.
+1 - The shooters have long yearned for more balls out of HQ elements in Stan/Pak border regions - (and that is Mil-side-HQs, not CinC.
I believe that Iran must be naturalized, before we pull out.
I've had nothing but good to say about the folks at the agency. With thousands vetted,coming in and out of that building yearly, it astounds me how folks tear Christians In Action a new one. There's always Murphy's Law, always a need for more intelligence but generally going into an Op we already knew that. Take care 82nd Officer.
Thank you for your support.
God bless our brave men and woman!
Saddam hated the Taliban and the Afghanis. He saw them as religious nutcases who were living in the Stone Age. As brutal as Saddam was, he was also a committed secularist who was interested in modernizing Iraq and making himself sole power source. He worked quite hard to disempower the mullahs, balance the religious sects against each other, and making Iraq a modern petrostate.
That was why Saddam was our friend back before he invaded Kuwait. He was seen as a secular force to moderate the Iranians, who had signed on to a theocracy.
If Saddam wanted to help the Afghanis, why didn’t he just get involved in Oct 2001 when started Operation Enduring Freedom? He stayed well away from that involvement.
Do not expect a rational response from liberals when it comes to the war and every other issue. The facts and history will vindicate us. Anyway we have won the war in Iraq.
There are numerous ways to conclude (even verify to a set date) that someone is/was alive, without being able to pinpoint their location in any actionable sense.
They don’t even have to actually “get” Osama bin Laden to claim they did.
I’m not at all convinced he’s even still around to get anyway. They could just claim credit for what happened years ago. Who’s going to refute it, bin Laden? If he pops his head out of a cave to say, “Did not!”, great.
Do you seriously believe the CIA disbanded units looking for AQ HVTs? A TF name change alone would allow for the silly/irrelevant stories about Alec Station.
Think it through.
Suppose the CIA or any US agency claimed that OLB was well and truly dead.
How many seconds would it be before the left and all its leaders declare the WOT over and call for an immediate withdrawal of US forces from everywhere?
Maybe they can find a birth certificate by the end of this month.
A lot of good Americans sacrificed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Sadly Saudi A, UAE, China and others just bought our election.
This is not a conventional war 82. The only way to win the WOT is to fight the war that came to us. A Holy War.
My theory is that our presence in Iraq is primarily to prevent a Caliphate. Islamic scripture says it’s capitol MUST be in Iraq and our goal is to use military might and intelligence capabilities, combined with a fundamental understanding of Jihad and it’s goals, to prevent it.
Our being in Iraq wasn’t random and wasn’t based as much on Saddam or WMD as it did the knowledge that the success, or failure, of the war on Jihad lies in Mesopotamia.
This knowledge is what separates the Bush administration from the Obama administration and is the primary reason we have stayed for as long as we have in the country. The containment of Iran, the country that wants to establish said Caliphate, is an added bonus.
We planted a US flag on the capitol of their Biblical base. If it holds it will likely be one of the most stunning accomplishments in world history.
Thanks for all the links.
ROFL!
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