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Donald Rumsfeld blamed for failing to kill cornered Osama bin Laden

SE102 said:
Political correctness? Excuse you. You just tried to make a quantum physical argument for liberalism affecting the organizational output of our national security organs.

I'm sure the joint chiefs are a bunch of politically correct liberal bastards too.

More like a lack of political will...
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You might have a point there.


source

.......An extensive review of the nation's antiterrorism efforts shows that for years before Sept. 11, terror experts throughout the government understood the apocalyptic designs of Osama bin Laden. But the top leaders never reacted as if they believed the country was as vulnerable as it proved to be that morning.
Dozens of interviews with current and former officials demonstrate that even as the threat of terrorism mounted through eight years of the Clinton administration and eight months of President Bush, the government did not marshal its full forces against it.

The defensive work of tightening the borders and airport security was studied but never quite completed. And though the White House undertook a covert campaign to kill Mr. bin Laden, the government never mustered the critical mass of political will and on-the-ground intelligence for the kind of offensive against Al Qaeda it unleashed this fall.

The rising threat of the Islamic jihad movement was first detected by United States investigators after the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. The inquiry into that attack revealed a weakness in the immigration system used by one of the terrorists, but that hole was never plugged, and it was exploited by one of the Sept. 11 hijackers.

In 1996, a State Department dossier spelled out Mr. bin Laden's operation and his anti-American intentions. And President Bill Clinton's own pollster told him the public would rally behind a war on terrorism. But none was declared.

By 1997, the threat of an Islamic attack on America was so well recognized that an F.B.I. agent warned of it in a public speech. But that same year, a strategy for tightening airline security, proposed by a vice- presidential panel, was largely ignored.

In 2000, after an Algerian was caught coming into the country with explosives, a secret White House review recommended a crackdown on "potential sleeper cells in the United States." That review warned that "the threat of attack remains high" and laid out a plan for fighting terrorism. But most of that plan remained undone.......
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Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Binary_Digit said:
Actually it translates to the fact that Clinton did not "ignore" opportunities to capture OBL, as the article you quoted dishonestly stated.
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I've got more articles. :mrgreen:

source

Clinton 'missed chance to get rid of bin Laden'

By David Rennie in Washington
Published: 12:01AM BST 02 Sep 2003

Bill Clinton refused to order a strike on Osama bin Laden after the bombing of the American destroyer Cole even though the al-Qa'eda leader's whereabouts were known, according to a book to be published this week.

In early leaks from Losing bin Laden, Richard Miniter, an investigative journalist, claims that Mr Clinton allowed the September 11 attacks to happen by squandering more than a dozen opportunities to capture or kill bin Laden. In two cases the terrorist leader's exact location was known, the book says........
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Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Binary_Digit said:
Actually it translates to the fact that Clinton did not "ignore" opportunities to capture OBL, as the article you quoted dishonestly stated.
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And just in case you you missed it.....

In 1993, the first World Trade Center bombing killed six people.

In 1998, the bombing of two U.S. embassies in Africa killed 224.

Both were the work of al-Qaida and bin Laden, who in 1998 declared holy war on America, making him arguably the most wanted man in the world.

In 1998, President Clinton announced, “We will use all the means at our disposal to bring those responsible to justice, no matter what or how long it takes.”

NBC News has obtained, exclusively, extraordinary secret video, shot by the U.S. government. It illustrates an enormous opportunity the Clinton administration had to kill or capture bin Laden. Critics call it a missed opportunity.

In the fall of 2000, in Afghanistan, unmanned, unarmed spy planes called Predators flew over known al-Qaida training camps. The pictures that were transmitted live to CIA headquarters show al-Qaida terrorists firing at targets, conducting military drills and then scattering on cue through the desert.
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Osama bin Laden: missed opportunities - Nightly News- msnbc.com

Of course this is from the notoriously right wing NBC, so you can discount it on that alone.
[/sarcasm]
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

the corporate media has generally not focused on how bush let osama get away at tora bora.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

scottsoperson said:
the corporate media has generally not focused on how bush let osama get away at tora bora.
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How, exactly, DID Bush let OBL 'get away' at TB?
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Goobieman said:
How, exactly, DID Bush let OBL 'get away' at TB?
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He didn't carpet nuke the area, he only used a fly swatter.... The MOAB.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

scottsoperson said:
that would be terrorism.
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No... that would be war.

War is a reciprocated, armed conflict between two or more non-congruous entities, aimed at reorganising a subjectively designed, geo-politically desired result.
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[ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War]War - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

Terrorism is the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion.[1] At present, there is no internationally agreed definition of terrorism.[2][3] Common definitions of terrorism refer only to those violent acts which are intended to create fear (terror), are perpetrated for an ideological goal (as opposed to a lone attack), and deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants.
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[ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism]Terrorism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

See the difference?
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Dayton3 said:
That is ridiculous.

Little would've changed regarding Afghanistan, the Taliban, and Al Queda even if Bin Laden had been killed or captured.

It might've even been worse.
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You could say that about the entire "war on terror" if you wanted to.
 
American said:
Since Glinda thanked you we can conclude she has a single brain cell.
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Aw, what's the matter, American? Still smarting that you can't find any evidence whatsoever that I've got an "agenda" against your pal Mike Huckabee?

:rofl
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Goobieman said:
How, exactly, DID Bush let OBL 'get away' at TB?
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Well, he did say he didn't care one bit where OBL was, more than once.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Crunch said:
Link?........
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Okay, once.

"..Terror is bigger than one person..So I don't know where [Bin Laden] is..You know, I just don't spend that much time on him, Kelly, to be honest with you. ...I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."

* March 13, 2002 Press Conference at the The James S. Brady Briefing Room

Press Briefing by Ari Fleischer
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

misterman said:
Okay, once.

"..Terror is bigger than one person..So I don't know where [Bin Laden] is..You know, I just don't spend that much time on him, Kelly, to be honest with you. ...I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."

* March 13, 2002 Press Conference at the The James S. Brady Briefing Room

Press Briefing by Ari Fleischer
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Thanx.... one thing you should know, if you can't back something you want to say with a link or a reference, don't say it, no one will take what you say as any more than your unsupported opinion..... just saying.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Crunch said:
Thanx.... one thing you should know, if you can't back something you want to say with a link or a reference, don't say it, no one will take what you say as any more than your unsupported opinion..... just saying.
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I did back it with a link.

I didn't at first because I thought everyone knew about that quote. I'm surprised you don't. You are less informed than I realized.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

misterman said:
I did back it with a link.

I didn't at first because I thought everyone knew about that quote. I'm surprised you don't. You are less informed than I realized.
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Got me there..... I don't know every word ever spoken by Bush. :roll:
 
I've read that within of week of his "Bin Laden: Dead or Alive" comment that President Bush regretted it and wanted to back off of it as it made the entire war on terror too focused on just one man.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

Crunch said:
Got me there..... I don't know every word ever spoken by Bush. :roll:
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You'd be pretty shocked to hear some of his other material. You should have paid attention more closely. :mrgreen:
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

misterman said:
Okay, once.

"..Terror is bigger than one person..So I don't know where [Bin Laden] is..You know, I just don't spend that much time on him, Kelly, to be honest with you. ...I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."

* March 13, 2002 Press Conference at the The James S. Brady Briefing Room

Press Briefing by Ari Fleischer
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And? You're not making your point. The SecDef should be more worried about his boots on the ground and the overall strategy. You think they didn't know it would be difficult to catch bin Laden? Of course they did, yet it was part of the mission.....but certainly not all of it. For you to think that Rumsfeld should be sitting in his office waiting for blow by blow report only about bin Laden is silly and/or disingenuous.
 
Bush absolutely correct, this Jihad much bigger, much more than Bin Laden.
 
Re: Rumsfeld let Osama get away

American said:
And? You're not making your point. The SecDef should be more worried about his boots on the ground and the overall strategy. You think they didn't know it would be difficult to catch bin Laden? Of course they did, yet it was part of the mission.....but certainly not all of it. For you to think that Rumsfeld should be sitting in his office waiting for blow by blow report only about bin Laden is silly and/or disingenuous.
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I didn't necessarily have a point. You make what you want of it.
 
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