Gareth Porter: NONE OF THE OFFICIAL LINE ON BIN LADEN IS TRUE

[kpete]

Gareth Porter: None of the official line on bin Laden is true

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A few days after US Navy Seals killed Osama bin Laden in a raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a "senior intelligence official" briefing reporters on the materials seized from bin Laden's compound said the materials revealed that bin Laden had, "continued to direct even tactical details of the group's management." Bin Laden was, "not just a strategic thinker for the group," said the official. "He was active in operational planning and in driving tactical decisions." The official called the bin Laden compound, "an active command and control center."

The senior intelligence official triumphantly called the discovery of bin Laden's hideout, "the greatest intelligence success perhaps of a generation," and administration officials could not resist leaking to reporters that a key element in that success was that the CIA interrogators had gotten the name of bin Laden's trusted courier from al-Qaeda detainees at Guantanamo. CIA Director Leon Panetta was quite willing to leave the implication that some of the information had been obtained from detainees by "enhanced interrogation techniques."

Such was the official line at the time. But none of it was true. It is now clear that CIA officials were blatantly misrepresenting both bin Laden's role in al-Qaeda when he was killed and how the agency came to focus on his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

In fact, during his six years in Abbottabad, bin Laden was not the functioning head of al-Qaeda at all, but an isolated figurehead who had become irrelevant to the actual operations of the organization. The real story, told here for the first time, is that bin Laden was in the compound in Abbottabad because he had been forced into exile by the al-Qaeda leadership.

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http://truth-out.org/news/item/8866-finding-bin-laden-the-truth-behind-the-official-story

[tabatha]

1. Well, the stuff will be online for readers to decide for themselves.

"CIA Director Leon Panetta was quite willing to leave the implication that some of the information had been obtained from detainees by "enhanced interrogation techniques."

I think that statement is mere interpretation, and not valid.

[bemildred]

2. Dang, you mean the spooks wouid lie to us to make themselves look good?

[sad sally]

3. blowback...

Osama’s Ghost: “Yes, Mr. President. Al-Qaeda is not much in Afghanistan, having decided to migrate its activities to Pakistan and encourage our brothers in Yemen, Somalia and North Africa. They are moving into Syria from al-Qaeda in Iraq where it first surfaced thanks to your invasion. The word used by the CIA is ‘blowback.’ But no one is furthering our basic mission of weakening the U.S. more than the rulers of the country are themselves. Look at your rich-poor economy; Wall Street’s destructive greed; crumbling schools, roads, transit, clinics, drinking water facilities; and starved public budgets for the most basic necessities of your people – food for the hungry, healing for the sick, shelter for the homeless.”

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/05/02-7

[AnotherMcIntosh]

4. After the great many governmental lies, more people should realize that government lying is just SOP

[bvar22]

5. And Jessica Lynch...

...held off an entire Iraqi Platoon single handedly with just her M-16 and a broken arm before her rescue,

....And Pat Tillman died as a hero giving up his life to save his fellow soldiers,

...And the USA drops Humanitarian bombs that only kill terrorists & insurgents,

...And

[saras]

10. if we had those bombs, we could just bomb the bejeezus out of DC and New York, couldn't we?

Couldn't possibly harm anything of value.

In fact, they should blow one up inside CIA headquarters at 8:05AM each day.

[leveymg]

6. UBL "forced into exile by al-Qaeda leadership" - Saudi and Pak. intelligence.

I think the documents that Mr. Porter describes are just another layer of onionskin in another cover story that's been created to obscure the central truth about what al-Qaeda really is. What it is not is run by a shura of Mujahaddin couriers and remnants of the Taliban.

AQ started out as the paramilitary arm of Saudi General Intelligence Division (GID), and to this day continues to carry out terrorist operations globally, including in Syria, with impunity. This longevity is because it continues to be part of GID/ISI.

Back in 1976, CIA Director GHW Bush met with Saudi Prince Turki and they created the Saudi clandestine services organization which became al-Qaeda. This was part of the "Safari Club" deal between Bush, Saudi Arabia, and rightist elements of the French and several other western intelligence services. The Safari Club used BCCI as a funding vehicle for the Pakistani (Saudi) nuclear program, and spawned a global criminal commercial/intelligence complex that has mucked up our politics and society, and ripped us off blind ever since.

All this, and 9/11 too, because DCI Bush couldn't live with the restrictions imposed on the Agency's clandestine service by a Democratic Congress and President after the Church Committee uncovered some of CIA's history of wrongdoing, including assassinations, destabilization of elected governments and elections (of traditional allies and third-world countries, alike), and various illegal domestic operations.

So, bottom-line, DCI GHW Bush outsourced many of these functions to GID, which in turn acted as Osama bin Laden's control until May 2011. Yes, Virginia, al-Qaeda still has a leadership.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. What amazes me is that nowdays, the CIA is openly reported to be using drones

and other military actions in different countries.
Back in the 70's and 80's, the gov adamantly denied the CIA was ever involved in anything, especially
military actions. The CIA was still a quasi hush hush group.
Today?
Matter of fact comments in news reportage of CIA miitary action.

[leveymg]

9. CIA has always had two units: intel analysis and clandestine operations

Two different cultures within the same agency. Until recently, the clandestine services was referred to as the Directorate of Operations (DO), and before than as the Directorate of Plans. It's now called the National Clandestine Service (NCS). Within that directorate is a paramilitary unit, Special Activities Division (SAD). Special Activities maintains a symbiotic relationship with the Joint Special Operations Command, and is run largely by former members of JSOC.

SAD/SOG is a special operation force, parallel with the military's four special mission units.

You're right - some of the paramilitary activities carried out by SAD/SOG became much more overt (and more conventional, such as operating UAVs) in the so-called Global War on Terror. But, around the world, the CIA's covert paramilitary operations have been well known for more than six decades.

[AnotherDreamWeaver]

8. I believe some of the readers comments more than the article itself.