Posted on 06/22/2004 7:38:47 AM PDT by lugsoul
It is strange to me that some folks get so sensitive about any information that calls into question one piece of the puzzle. Sure, it would be a strong piece of evidence IF a Fedayeen officer was at the Kuala Lumpur meeting. But only if he was. If he wasn't, why would anyone want to further the impression that he was?
And I'm evaluating the veracity of the source.
Apparently, you just don't like the information.
No, I'm calling into question the rationale behind the article. As another poster mentioned, nowhere in the article does it say the CIA refuted the information - instead, it relies on an unnamed source to say that the CIA refuted it. And, given the politics of the source, this reeks of misinformation by Newsday.
Do you have any information that it is the same guy, or not?
I don't. But I prefer to get a better grade of information before passing judgement.
"The CIA" can't "conclude" something. The CIA is not a computer, it contains people. Perhaps indeed this or that group of people in the CIA "concluded" this. Note: 1. they could have been wrong in that conclusion (well, do we agree that Our intelligence needs fixing, or don't we? it seems to change), 2. since the article doesn't name who "concluded" it, we have little reason to lend their conclusion credence. Or are we supposed to find anonymous "CIA people" more believable than "Commissioner John Lehman, who was Navy secretary under Ronald Reagan, [who] said "new ... documents" indicated that "at least one officer of Saddam's Fedayeen," an elite army unit, "was a very prominent member of al-Qaida."" ???
The administration official said the CIA and U.S. Army obtained the lists of members of the Fedayeen shortly after the invasion of Iraq last year. Some, he said, had names "similar to" Ahmad Hikmat Shakir. But, he said, the CIA had concluded "a long time ago" that...
Really strange paragraph. What "administration official"? We haven't been introduced to any in this article before this paragraph appears!
Also note that the way this is written, it almost sounds like the official's criticizing "the CIA" for having "concluded" something so incorrect. One pictures for example him sitting in a bar with the reporter saying "those idiots at the CIA wrote this connection off without even looking into it". Of course by the time this comes to press "The CIA concluded" becomes the headline.
But he [Lehman] insisted that Cheney "was right when he said he may have things we [the commission] don't have yet."
Note he didn't merely say that Cheney was right, he "insisted". Good job reporter, he knows how to spin all things properly.
An administration official familiar with the CIA intelligence on the matter identified the al-Qaida associate who met with hijackers Khalid al Midhar and Nawar al Hazmi in Kula Lampur, Malaysia, in early 2000 as Ahmad Hikmat Shakir al-Azzawi. Some of the early planning for Sept. 11 allegedly occurred at the meeting.
This seems to go along with my "the CIA are idiots and the administration is standing by the link, and calling the CIA idiots" theory. The reporter still doesn't seem to get it.
The claim that the Iraqi officer and al-Qaida figure are the same first appeared in a Wall Street Journal editorial on May 27. A similar account was then published in the June 7 edition of the Weekly Standard, which reported that the link was discovered by an analyst working for a controversial Pentagon intelligence unit under Douglas Feith, undersecretary of defense for policy.
Ah, the link was discovered by an analyst working for a "controversial" unit. So we can disbelieve it! "Feith"!
Good spinning, reporter. Good spinning.
Hence the need to cast doubt by crafting a nebulous headline above an indeterminant story quoting an anonymous source
I'm not passing judgment based on this information, either. Prior to this, I've seen a number of folks say "we don't know if it is the same guy." This information, though hearsay from an unidentified "White House official," is the first information I've seen that addresses whether it is the same guy or not. I'm not real happy with the level of verification, either, but it is not much different than folks running around saying "a Fedayeen officer was in Al Qaeda" when that information is still under question.
It doesn't even do that. Nowhere does it say the CIA "refuted" it, just that they "concluded" the two guys aren't the same. Their "conclusion" could have been based on nothing but laziness or ideological blindness.
It really sounds like the reporter's source was complaining about the CIA and their bogus "conclusions", and the reporter didn't get it.
"There's no point to this article other than the headline, which is unsupported. The rest is jibberish."
Literally - it jumps around, it's written very unclearly. Very poorly written, so bad as to obscure it's meaning.
Which I suspect is intentional.
Exactly. If it is found that Iraq worked in any material way with AQ to plan for 9/11, the Democrats won't win back the White House in my lifetime.
The naysayers never have a reasonable answer, or even an unreasonable answer :-) for the fact that Saddam knew that 9/11 was coming. They must think that 'ole Saddam and Osama just gossiped over the backyard fence pre 9/11 about the largest attack in our nation's history.
Yours is precisely the post I was about to make, but you are there first.
The left has an uncanny ability to focus intently on the irrelevant details in order to obscure the crucial facts.
"Now if we can make the RNC use it!"
I'm fairly certain they do.
I've seen paraphrases of FReeper posts in "RNC Research" docs.
Hell, they're welcome to it.
I don't.
The information revealed in this article (that an administration official told the reporter "the CIA didn't think they were the same guy") casts no doubt on the connection.
Interesting (re the RNC research).
"Some of these documents indicate that (there was) at least one officer of Saddam's Fedayeen, a lieutenant colonel, who was a very prominent member of al Qaeda," Lehman said.
I'll bet Lehman has notice there were more than one!
And, as nboted succinctly by True Capitalist above, it really makes no difference if therre was ANOTHER Iraqi with the same name as the one who met with the 9-11 conspirators in Kuala Lumpur.
Enough is known about the one in KL to come to some very disturbing conclusions, and ask a couple very interesting questions, like where is this guy now? I suspect he outlived his usefulness and underwent a 35 calibre memory wipe.
Has anyone, at any time, said "we've looked into what we saw in the documents and we do think it is the same guy?"
Your post bears repeating:
FACT: Even if they aren't the same Shakir, we know that the "al-Qaida" Shakir was provided a job by the Iraqi Embassy to greet arriving passengers at Kula Lumpar Airport. The CIA has pictures of the "al Qaida" Shakir meeting 911 hijacker Kahlid al Midhar at the airport and then leaving with him to attend a meeting with al Hazmi (another hijacker) along with other top 911 planners. Shakir quit his "job" as a greeter two days after the meeting
FACT: "al-Qaida" Shakir was arrested in Qatar, released to Jordan where he was arrested again and then released to Iraq at the request of top Iraqi officials.
Iraq has their fingerprints all over this with their questionable association with "al-Qaida" Shakir and whether he was also the Shakir in the Fedayeen is interesting, but beside the point.
Ex-CIA Director George Tenet in New Business Venture with Ahmed Chalabi
Jun 20 2004 by Jim Bauman
A DeadBrain field reporter spent one excruciating day with former CIA Director George Tenet and discredited Iraqi fortune hunter Ahmed Chalabi. Here's what we learned...
Tenet and Chalabi recently founded a detective agency. Ninety percent of their cases involve marital infidelity. We sat in while they talked about their work.
"Honestly, I thought I'd be sittin' on multiple security company corporate boards, but I was blackballed. I've got a son headed to college in a year. That's obscenely expensive! So, I started this business. I felt sorry for Chalabi, and hired him as a partner," said Tenet.
"Partner, bah! He treats me like an Abu Ghraib prisoner! I could've been an important person in the new Iraqi government, I'll have you know," said Chalabi.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, you were a double agent who wanted to be the Shah of Iraq. Hey, listen, I'd treat you better if you didn't screw up so often. Just two weeks ago, we were staking out a CEO's wife who was suspected of cheating on her hubby, and Chal takes long-range photos of the woman near the window kneeling in front of a pair of pants.
"Chal runs back to the car, and yells to me that he's got proof, definite proof, that she's cheatin'. Well, we develop the pictures, and yeah, the woman was kneeling in front of a pair of pants, but they were hanging from a mannequin. Her hobby was sewing men's clothes!"
"Leave me alone, you incompetent Spy Meister - Ex-Director of Faulty Intelligence!" said Chalabi.
"Hey, Chal, should I tell them about the time you fell into a client's swimming pool? You were screamin' your head off, 'I can't swim! Save me, oh great Saddam!' After I rescued you, you told me your cousin, Saddam, saved your life once. Only problem is…you don't have a cousin named Saddam," said Tenet.
"Shut up! You purveyor of stinking lies and bureaucratic bungling!" said Chalabi.
And so it went. In summing up, we're not experts on private eyes, but Tenet and Chalabi sure acted like two
I'm not trying to pick a fight, Peach. You frequently refer to Saddam's foreknowledge based upon the newspaper article. But foreknowledge of the attack in the Middle East was not unique. Some Saudis knew, some Pakis knew, some Egyptians knew. Your comment seems to indicate that the foreknowledge is evidence of something, and I am curious whether that foreknowledge would constitute similar evidence, in your mind, with regard to the others who knew ahead the attacks.
...and they will not be dissuaded by new facts that have arisen.
That has got to be satire! Forgive me if it's going over my head...
Who cares if it is the same guy?
Clearly the guy in Malaysia was the more important of the two if they really were two.
A job as a VIP "greeter" at the KL Airport had been arranged for him by the Iraqi Embassy. Anybody suspicious yet?
He meets two of the 9-11 conspirators as they arrive. Why would he? It was set up, obviously. By who? The KL Airport manager? Somehow I doubt that. The same people that set him up with the job? Who knows? Suspicious yet?
He not only meets these two al Qaida guys, but he LEAVES his worksite and accompanies the conspirators to their meetings and participates in them. Suspicious yet?
After the meetings he leaves Malaysia and heads back to Iraq.
He is arrested twice on his way back, the last time in Jordan where he is interviewed by CIA. The CIA and Jordanian intelligence try to "turn" him, and allow him to travel on to Iraq. No eyebrows raised yet?
He vanishes from the face of the earth. Well, well, well.
I guess we know what happens to folks who outlive their usefulness to Saddam Hussein. Is that the fate of this unfortunate?
I certainly don't know, but I do know this; this whole story stinks and anyone who writes this off as sheer coincidence must be an idiot.
If this guy was or was not the Fedayeen officer of the same name is a matter of supreme indifference. It is obvious that he was Iraqi and connected.
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