CIA chief: Al-Qaeda crippled, leaders hiding

[sabra]

Source: MSNBC/WP

WASHINGTON - Relentless attacks against al-Qaeda in the Pakistan tribal region appear to have driven Osama bin Laden and other top leaders deeper into hiding, leaving the organization rudderless and incapable of planning sophisticated operations, CIA Director Leon Panetta said Wednesday.

So profound is al-Qaeda's disarray that one of its lieutenants, in a recently intercepted message, pleaded to bin Laden to come to the group's rescue and provide some leadership, Panetta told The Washington Post in an interview.

Panetta credited an increasingly aggressive campaign against al-Qaeda and its Taliban allies, including more frequent strikes and better coordination with Pakistan. He called it "the most aggressive operation that CIA has been involved in in our history."

"Those operations are seriously disrupting al-Qaeda," Panetta said. "It's pretty clear from all the intelligence we are getting that they are having a very difficult time putting together any kind of command and control, that they are scrambling. And that we really do have them on the run."

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35916832/ns/world_news-washington_post/

[Robb]

1. I read an interesting piece recently

...I'll look it up again if anyone's interested, about how Pakistan's militants are becoming paranoid under the relentless drone attacks, as well as regular Pakistan army attacks, and are turning on one another under the suspicion the other faction is divulging locations and what-not in exchange for some kind of preferential treatment.

[Arctic Dave]

3. Not really news. That is common in any organization under stress.

[leftynyc]

34. I'd love to read it

if it's not too much trouble.

[Arctic Dave]

2. Yawn. Another day another corner turned.

Seems to me our corner turning is nothing more then going around in circles.

[DCBob]

4. Good news. But of course Cheney and the warmongers will never admit CIC Obama is succeeding..

Hopefully this is enough to get out and let the Pakistan and Afghan military take over.

[applegrove]

26. Exactly.

[Mithreal]

28. Be surprised. Cheney has praised Obama.

[Mithreal]

27. Succeeding at mostly carrying on their wars and policies? Mostly... Exactly.

Cheney gives Obama some credit (sort of) on national security

First, George W. Bush's vice president commended Obama for his handling of the war in Afghanistan – with barely a whiff of criticism.

"I'm a complete supporter of what they're doing in Afghanistan," Cheney told "This Week" host Jonathan Karl. (For a complete transcript, click here.) "I think the president made the right decision to send troops into Afghanistan. I thought it took him a while to get there."

He also praised Obama's choice of putting Gen. Stanley McChrystal in charge of the Afghanistan operation.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2010/0214/Cheney-gives-Obama-some-credit-sort-of-on-national-security

[Mari333]

5. pentagon is working as hard under obama as they did under Bush pushing

out the propaganda...fast and furious....gotta keep those defense contractors happy

[dipsydoodle]

6. I don't think there's ever been anything

to substantiate that Al-Qaeda is / was anymore than just a handful of people.

There's probably more in the Al Jolson fan club. :sarcasm:

[DCBob]

7. A "handful of people"...

took down the WTC towers.

[dipsydoodle]

15. So they say

.

[TheWatcher]

32. Careful. The Official Myth is a very sacred religion, and we are supposed to respect the "Faith"

of others.

You wouldn't like it if he talked down to your fantasies, now would you?

Let's play nice. :)

[TheWatcher]

31. Now if only we knew WHICH handful of people.

[Robb]

9. When not in blackface, or being otherwise inappropriate

...Jolson was a voice to be reckoned with. Not my cup of tea, but in fairness he's usually given less than his due in terms of influence.

[dipsydoodle]

19. I only used that

because of the suffix Al. If you'd been English I'd have used Al Bowlly. :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDYrXcQj4JI He was killed in an air raid in WW2.

[Mithreal]

13. Or was a creation of our own. Pre-emption: Watch BBC Power of Nightmares for yourself.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2798679275960015727#

[dipsydoodle]

16. I don't have too much difficulty doing that

as I'm English in the UK.:) Go here to see bundles of our TV documentaries in one archive : http://www.thedossier.ukonline.co.uk/video.htm

Should keep you pleasantly occupied for a few days or so. :hi:

[Mithreal]

17. .

:hi:

[Mithreal]

8. Whatever.

[TheWatcher]

33. Like it or not, until we end Rule By Organized Crime in this country, this is the kind of drivel we

can expect to hear reported as Reality for the rest of our lives.

The rest of the world DOES think we're insane, and we are, from the Top to the Bottom.

Criminal Rule by a cabal of Psychotic Oligarchs in charge of Babysitting a population whose majority consists of apathetic, dumbed down, uninformed, incurious inmates in an Open Air Asylum of fake comfort, fake reality, and fake Political Theater.

These days the rest of the world smiles nervously and hurries past us, hoping we don't do something REALLY stupid.

And if the Bird Cage Liner gets changed back to one of the Sopranos in the next fake election, the rest of the world will probably need to seek therapy for anxiety, for fear that during our next Breakdown, we're going to take the rest of the World with us.

It will never change until We The People say "Enough".

[lib2DaBone]

10. OK... War is over.. everyone go home...

...now we can spend $15 Billion a month on Jobs and Health Care.

Very simple solution.. stop war mongering. Duh..?

[activa8tr]

21. YES!!! I think we can do this soon.

Of course, all the money we have been spending there is money we don't have.

[Yeahyeah]

11. They hide very well.Or CIA not look so well.

Goldstein,where are you?Come out come out wherever you are.

[DCBob]

12. Meanwhile another AQ leader taken out...

WASHINGTON – An al-Qaida leader believed to have played a key role in the bombing of a CIA post in Afghanistan last December was apparently killed by an American missile strike last week, a senior U.S. official said Wednesday. The counterterrorism official said Hussein al-Yemeni was believed killed in a strike in Miram Shah, the main town in North Waziristan....

Al-Yemeni is considered an important al-Qaida planner and explosives expert who had established contact with groups ranging from al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula to Afghan and Pakistani Taliban militant groups. He is also known as Ghazwan al-Yemeni. The counterterrorism official said al-Yemeni was in his late 20s or early 30s and was a conduit in Pakistan for funds, messages, and recruiting but that he specialized in suicide operations.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100317/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_al_qaida_leader_killed

[bemildred]

14. Emmanuel Goldstein is on the run ...

Panetta and his minions once again pat themselves on the back for doing one heckuva job. We can still give these third world peasants a taste of the lash, we can.
:puke:

[MannyGoldstein]

24. Am Not nt

[bemildred]

25. Well, ummmm, were you sighted? nt

[global1]

18. I Just Have The Feeling That This Administration Is Closing In On Osama Bin Laden......

and that before long we will learn that they took him out.

I know that there are those on DU that believe that he's dead already. I'm not one of those that believe that.

[Mithreal]

20. Not a bad feeling. We already caught the mastermind, didn't ya know?

I agree with Michael Moore, others will look back on us and think we had gone insane and for good reason they'll think that. Most of this country's woes were self inflicted.

[TheWatcher]

30. The Foolish Followers of the Last Dictatorship thought that too.

It seems that our side can be every bit as embarrassing and deluded.

Another day in the Fake War On Terror(tm)

[ConcernedCanuk]

22. WHO the hell they thing they are fooling? - oh I know, johnny 6-pac the voter

.
.
.

but no-one else with more than a dozen brain=cells clicking.

EVEN IF it was true that the USA and it's gang(sadly, that includes us now) killed EVERY al-Qaeda leader and member,

the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians has created enemies that will come back on us decades from now.

EVEN IF the USA stopped all aggressive action today;

their actions in the ME has created hatred for the West that will survive decades into the future.

USA has created endless war;

for when the children of THESE aggressions take revenge on the USA/WEST

then the USA will go slaughter some more . . .

well done Bush/Obama

fools all

[Iggo]

23. Are they in their death throes again?

Sweet!

[Rosa Luxemburg]

29. It never was an international organization

just a few bandits hired by cheney