Malaysian recruited for 2002 L.A. terror plot, officials say
http://www.bakersfield.com/state_wire/story/5899091p-5913597c.html
EILEEN NG, Associated Press Writer
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) - A Malaysian recruited by al-Qaida to become a pilot for a second wave of Sept. 11-style attacks on the United States pulled out of the plan after he witnessed the carnage of the first assaults, Southeast Asian officials said Friday.
President Bush in a speech Thursday outlined some of the details of an alleged plot to hijack an airliner and fly it into a skyscraper in Los Angeles, and said cooperation between Washington and several Asian countries helped expose it.
The plan never appeared close to the stage where it could be put into execution. And scores of arrests in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks severely curtailed the ability of al-Qaida and its Southeast Asian affiliate, Jemmah Islamiyah, to operate.
Adding details to Bush's outline, security officials and terrorism experts in Southeast Asia on Friday said Malaysian engineer Zaini Zakaria was among three men al-Qaida was preparing to take part in an attack on the West Coast.
Zaini traveled to al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan in 1999, where he met senior figures in the terrorist group including Indonesian Riduan Isamuddin, or Hambali, a Malaysian security official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
When he returned to Malaysia the same year, Zaini obtained a license to fly a small plane, and began making inquiries in Australia about getting a license to fly a jet, the official said.
But Zaini was never told what his mission for al-Qaida would be. When he saw media coverage of the Sept. 11 attacks, he severed his ties with the militants.
Zaini, who has been detained without trial in Malaysia since December 2002, told Malaysian interrogators that he "didn't want that kind of Jihad," another Malaysian official told AP.
It's simply amazing the intellectual gymnastics liberals go through in order to prove how much they hate the US.
This ****wad Villaraigosa wasn't even Mayor when it all went down. He's just trying for name recognition for a Senatorial run I'll bet.
Let's see. AP says that there really was no plot after all, because the guy claims he backed out.
And Villaraigosa blames Bush for not warning him about the plot and the forthcoming speech, even though Bush did warn his administration.
Well, which is it? Typically, the AP article suggests that Bush is to blame both ways. If anything went wrong, Bush did it.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa
Another Ray Nagin?
And that poor, poor terrorist's wife, can't even visit the terrorist after his terrorist operating money was frozen. So sad . . .
Apparently he didn't read that report:
According to the transcript, Mohammed said Zacarias Moussaoui, the French-Moroccan facing trial in the United States as the "20th hijacker, had been sent to a flight school in Minnesota to train for a West Coast attack.
But after 9/11, "we never got time to catch our breath, we were immediately on the run,' Mohammed was quoted as saying. Al-Qaeda’s communications network was severely disrupted. Operatives could no longer use satellite phones and had to rely on couriers, although they continued to use Internet chat rooms. "Before Sept. 11, we could dispatch operatives with the expectation of follow-up contact, but after Oct. 7 (when U.S. bombing started in Afghanistan), that changed 180 degrees. There was no longer a war room ... and operatives had more autonomy.
I posted the info here
"The timing is suspicious"...
Notice how this news appears the day after Bush makes his comments. Why didn't this story appear before if it is that easy to know?
Security officials and terrorism experts in Southeast Asia on Friday said...
This is why. There is definitely an element that uses their position for political purposes. This is more leaking in service of the Democrats.
And the story decides to be a kitchen sink of bash Bush -- it's not just about the plot that was not really thwarted, according to this spin -- but also makes up some nonsense about how it strained the relations of Bush and the Mayor of Los Angeles, who wasn't even mayor at the time.
Hmmm...do I believe GW or a captured terrorist?