Bush Victory Gives Bin Laden "Kosher Stamp" for Nuke Attack

[Crankie Avalon]

Right Hook
Terrorism expert says Bush's reelection gave bin Laden a "kosher stamp from the Islamic world" to use nukes on U.S. -- and a major attack is "inevitable." Plus: A karate champion says CIA must play dirty.

By Mark Follman

Dec. 1, 2004 | Over Thanksgiving weekend, as Americans made their annual retail pilgrimage in the highest numbers since the 9/11 attacks, some of the nation's shopping malls were in the process of beefing up anti-terrorism training for their security guards. Outside of Hartford, Conn., reported the Associated Press, one suburban security force, more accustomed to dispersing loitering teens than sniffing out bombs, was "receiving the type of training that just a few years ago was reserved for the Israeli police and the U.S. military."

One well-known conservative thinks that President Bush's reelection will lead to a horrific al-Qaida attack. According to the Jerusalem Post, Yossef Bodansky, the Israeli-born former director of the U.S. Congressional Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare and author of "Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America," says that an al-Qaida attack on the U.S. with nonconventional weapons is virtually "inevitable," and that the organization is likely "tying up the knots" for such an attack. "All of the warnings we have today indicate that a major strike -- something more horrible than anything we've seen before -- is all but inevitable," he told the Post on Sunday.

After 9/11 and the launch of the U.S. global war on terrorism, a theological debate began within the operational arm of al-Qaida, Bodansky says, over whether the mass killing of innocents using weapons of mass destruction was permissible. Former CIA analyst and bin Laden expert Michael Scheuer asserted in his book "Imperial Hubris" that bin Laden has had the Islamic world's approval to use nuclear weapons against U.S. civilians since May 2003, when a Saudi cleric condoned it in a "lucidly written" treatise citing Islamic law and rebuking U.S. transgressions against Muslims.

Bodansky argues that Bush's reelection has poured fuel on that fire.

"While bin Laden and his associates argued that by virtue of their participation in US democracy, US citizens were enabling their rulers to fight, other Islamic luminaries contended that this does not permit such massive attacks, Bodansky said. The reelection of Bush in November, he said, was viewed by bin Laden and his cohorts as a decisive answer to this deliberation, with Americans now 'choosing' to be the enemies of Islam. In bin Laden's mind-set, he said, the stage was set for a non-conventional attack. While there may still be some vestiges of debate and doubt within Islamic circles, he believes that planning for such an attack is finished. 'They got the kosher stamp from the Islamic world to use nuclear weapons,' he said."

Curiously, this analysis did not get any play in the media before the election.

Continued: http://www.salon.com/opinion/right_hook/2004/12/01/terror_cia/index.html

[bemildred]

1. What a pantload. nt

[GCP]

2. Who or what is the pant load?

Personally I think the guy's got a good point. There are suitcase nukes missing from the former USSR, OBL has the means and the malice.

[bemildred]

5. Mr. Bodansky is speculating.

He has no idea what OBL might choose to do next, and the Muslim
world does not get together every week and take a vote on whether
to authorize OBL to nuke the USA. While it is true that such a
thing is possible, Mr. Bodansky is fearmongering and his blather is
self-serving, since as a "terrorist expert", the more fear of terror,
the more work for the likes of him.

[Crankie Avalon]

6. Yes, let's all just stick our heads in the sand...

...even though even you agree it's possible. Let's not realize the gravity of the situation we are in--especially now that the citizenry of this country can no longer claim innonence in the eyes of the rest of the world since we just (even if it was by a razor thin margin) deliberately voted to keep a group of wanton incompetents like Bush & Co. in power, even after all the pointless destruction, misery, and hatred of America they have caused.

If you don't like the article and can't come up with anything more intelligent to type than "what a pantload," than keep your "blather" to yourself. No one was clamoring for it. I think it safe to say this person is far, far, far more of a terrorist expert than someone like you.

If you want sunshine instead of realistic possibilities, go visit the FOX News website. Kindly leave this thread alone. Besides, you've already killed it, so your "work" here is done.

[Crankie Avalon]

7. Oh, forget it...

...sorry for being a little testy in the first response. I was doing something else this morning, and now it's too late to edit that first reply.

Anyway, we all have our own opinions. If you see this, take care.

[bemildred]

9. No problem.

Edit: FWIW posts in the editorial forum rarely take off. They get
read but usually do not catch fire.

I wasn't trying to kill your thread, I just get annoyed with fearmongers,
even when they are attacking Bush, fear makes you stupid. If he had
couched this in more general terms of the World's reaction to Mr. Bush
and his policies and the likely further damage to American interests,
I probably would have liked it better and said nothing.

[rkc3]

3. Let's hope it's a red state and not the northeast.

[colonel odis]

4. if one were to happen here, i think bush would be finished.

especially if it happened in one of his precious red states.

[AntiCoup2K4]

8. Which it won't

Bush WANTS the terrorist attacks to be in the blue states.

Where are the highest gas prices?

Where's the economy still the worst?

Whether the terrorists work for themselves or for the BCE (there's no question at all who founded Al Qaeda in the first place), it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize it would be much easier for them to pull off something in LA or Seattle or Boston than it would Nebraska or Oklahoma. (gotta be a white skinhead to get away with terrorism there)