Investigative Report: What They Knew; When They Knew It

Insight Magazine ^ | May 27, 2002 | Kenneth R. Timmerman

[rwfromkansas]

Could you link to Stepho saying that....I find thta interesting if true.

[rwfromkansas]

Where did you hear about that?

[aristeides]

It was in one of the Brit papers in November. Here's a reference to it in Reed Irvine's Accuracy in Media, naming as source the Sunday Times (of London): OKLAHOMA BOMBING LINKED TO BIN LADEN .

I had slightly misremembered the spelling, by the way: it's "Explosivija za Oklahomu".

[BlackVeil]

"Next, you're saying that Tim McVeigh converted to Islam in Saudi Arabia ... " Wingn' was suggesting that he might have converted. After all, thousands of others did during "Desert Storm". Most of them were just on the religious trail, but this might have been something more dangerous, a discontented fanatic who had finally found a cause. Also, it is conceivable that he converted to some sort of Islamic/cult group. There are a number of such groups operating in the Western world, (i.e. Order of the Solar Temple) and their landmarks are secrecy, high finance, ability to evade the law, willing to murder and commit suicide. I do not have the space here to elaborate about Solar Temple, but take it from me, they are incredibly evil. I sometimes wonder if what we know as Al-Quaida is not a Muslim version of this - a secret cult, rather than an ordinary religious, political or even terrorist group. If such a group was doing the bidding of the Iraqi government, they would be a major problem.

That is speculation on my part. But I agree with okie, we have been at war for just over a decade, and many incidents need to be examined with that in mind.

[BlackVeil]

To start with, I did not know about McVeigh's Iraq essay. Thanks for posting it. Talk about alarm bells ringing! As you say, the current attacks on Bush are politically motivated and often quite silly, "But this line of attack is unwittingly opening up things that go back farther ..." I agree with you there, and one of the problems is that it would take us through several regimes. I often wonder if it does not go right back - to 1983-85 - and the intelligence circles involved in Iran Contra. There are various threads in this, but I would point to:
The scandal-ridden bank BCCI, who facilitated Iran/Contra finances, was run by a Saudi, Bin Mafhouz. He married his sister to Usama Bin Laden. Marriages in that part of the world aren't love matches, and one marries ones kinsfolk as well as an individual.

It is possible that US security services were infiltrated by Iraqi agents, who were trying to stuff up this deal - an it did get stuffed up. Did they stop at that, or have they developed their skills, and remain as sleepers somewhere in the system?

[BlackVeil]

Thanks for the links. As you say: "one big question McVeigh did not even attempt to answer was how he learned to build such a massive, destructive bomb without out a college education or any real experience with explosives." I should say. And if one could get those types of results with fertilizer products, I wonder why anyone bothers with military high-grade explosives. I do remember, at the time of the trial, that they could bring no forensic evidence of where they explosives were up until the day of the bombing. They would have left traces. That's where the "unknown others" come in.

[wingnuts'nbolts]

I actually heard him on the broadcast at the time. I can't remember what program it was. He also mentioned TWA FL800 as being a "bomb". I have seen this mentioned here on FR, but cannot supply you with a link. I wish I could.

[Mitchell]

Thanks for the information. I didn't know about the connection between BCCI and bin Laden.

[Mitchell]

"Next, you're saying that Tim McVeigh converted to Islam in Saudi Arabia ... " Wingn' was suggesting that he might have converted. After all, thousands of others did during "Desert Storm".

Do you know of anybody who has converted to Islam but kept the conversion secret? That doesn't seem to be the style.

[BlackVeil]

The story of the links between BCCI and Bin Laden has yet to be written. One reason, I believe, why no one is tackling it is because it does not easily fall into either a left or right wing agenda - it is a story of Third World corruption and the real agenda of many Islamic "anti-imperialists", which is not to the taste of most progressive writers. But also, senior figures in both Democrat and Republican politics come out badly, along, of course with the CIA et. al. So conservatives are not motivated to get onto it.

One person writing about this is left-wing journalist Marsden. Apologies to post such an anti-Bush source, I am not promoting his analysis, just making reference to the facts he collected. Much of the stuff of BCCI was written in the 1990s, and reads even more alarmingly now. The strange tangle of oil money, the CIA, Islamic fundamentalists, drug dealers and bankers indicated an established network of covert operations, which could easily get out of control.

Wayne Marsden, "Questionable Ties" BCCI defrauded depositors of $10 billion in the ’80s in what has been called the “largest bank fraud in world financial history” by former Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau. During the ’80s, BCCI also acted as a main conduit for laundering money intended for clandestine CIA activities, ranging from financial support to the Afghan mujahedin to paying intermediaries in the Iran-Contra affair... (Bin Mahfouz’s sister is also a wife of Osama bin Laden, a fact that former CIA Director James Woolsey revealed in 1998 Senate testimony.) http://www.inthesetimes.com/issue/25/25/feature3.shtml

[BlackVeil]

"converted to Islam but kept the conversion secret? That doesn't seem to be the style."

It is not the usual style, because most converts are simply acting for religious motives, and openly live their faith. However, the Islamic religion specifically allows for a strategy of hiding ones beliefs, if necessary. This is "taqiyya" (dissimulation). As they say: "It is permissible to speak words of unbelief when al-Taqiyya is mandatory." Taqiyya is especially assciated with the Shia, and they get criticised by the Sunnis for it (it is like the Catholic/Protestant thing "you can't believe what a Shia tells you! They practice taqiyya!) In fact, this custom is found in many Islamic sources, the Shia were more into it because they were a minority and often persecuted. As a stragegy, taqiyya is simply part of the accomodating nature of many Islamic beliefs - it is meant to be an easy religion - and does ask people to stick their neck out un-necessarily.

But you can see how the taqiyya rule could be changed into the means of preserving some cultish, secretive, Islamic organisation which might recruit a man like McVeigh. If he converted, he did not join the line up in an ordinary mosque.

[BlackVeil]

Sorry, the line in the above post on Islamic converts should read "does NOT ask them to stick their necks out ... "

[philman_36]

Fred25 should be his replacement.
See above. "Yep, you got me pegged Fred." GMTA!