Terror Today
A couple of blog-worthy bits from the terror front:
A month and a half before attacking the New York subways with a gas used in Nazi death camps, an al Qaida cell pulled the plug on the operation - on the orders of Bin Laden deputy Ayman Zawakiri, according to an excerpt from Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ron Suskind. It was planned for spring 2003.
Time.com had the piece online Sunday morning. Suskind, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, writes that U.S. intelligence agents learned of the plot from a Bahraini militant's laptop recovered in Saudi Arabia in 2003:
It contained plans for a gas-dispersal system dubbed "the mubtakkar" (Arabic for inventive). Fearing that al-Qaeda's engineers had achieved the holy grail of terror R&D — a device to effectively distribute hydrogen-cyanide gas, which is deadly when inhaled — the CIA immediately set about building a prototype based on the captured design, which comprised two separate chambers for sodium cyanide and a stable source of hydrogen, such as hydrochloric acid. A seal between the two could be broken by a remote trigger, producing the gas for dispersal. The prototype confirmed their worst fears: "In the world of terrorist weaponry," writes Suskind, "this was the equivalent of splitting the atom. Obtain a few widely available chemicals, and you could construct it with a trip to Home Depot – and then kill everyone in the store."
U.S. intelligence agents got help from an informant inside al Qaida, Suskind reports. No word why Bin Laden's deputy called off the operation.
And the second item of intel, also resulting from a raid:
University of Michigan professor Juan Cole writes that the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al Qaida in Iraq leader killed in a June 7 U.S. bombing, shared a goal with some in the U.S. administration:
He's responding to reports of documents recovered from inside Zarqawi's hide-out.
Remember all those times Bush, Rice and Rumsfeld came out and said they suspected that Shiite Iran was somehow aiding the Sunni Arab insurgency? You remember how baffled I was at this bizarre allegation? You wonder whether they were being fed disinformation by a Zarqawi agent, and falling for it.
After they fell for the biggest whoppers of the 21st century, as retailed by Ahmad Chalabi, have Bush administration officials been gullibly swallowing an al-Qaeda black psy-ops operation intended to mire US troops in the Dasht-i Kavir? For people who think of themselves as tough as nails hardheaded realists, the Bushies seem awfully easy to fool. American hawks tied to the Israeli Likud Party, such as Michael Ledeen and Michael Rubin, who are also trying to get up an American war on Iran, turn out to have the same goal as Zarqawi!
A Cole commenter writes:
In fairness to the Bush Administration, there are serious analyasts who believe in a connection between Zarqawi and Iran. Time Reporter Michael Ware, one of the most well-respected authorities on the insurgency, believes that Iran is giving support to al-Zarqawi. Frankly, I would be shocked if Iran wasn't supporting all elements of the insurgency, including Zarqawi. If you think back to how the neocons were saying that Tehran's days were numbered after things were settled in Iraq, it makes perfect sense for Iran to use every tool at its disposal to bog the United States down in a quaqmire, even a jihadist who thinks the Shia are takfir.
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Blog Blowback:
Powerline thinks the biggest news in the Time report is that the CIA has a mole in al Qaida.
Blogs of War found this paragraph interesting in Newsweek's account:
According to the source familiar with his book, Suskind also reports that Al Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah, who was seriously wounded during the U.S. operation that led to his capture in March 2002, was carefully nursed back to good health by doctors flown into Pakistan by the CIA. Suskind quotes a CIA official saying: "He received the finest medical attention on the planet…We got him in very good health so we could start to torture him." Current and former U.S. officials familiar with the Abu Zubaydah story said they could not confirm this quote.
Blogger and law prof Ann Althouse comes at the piece from a different side:
Why are Suskind (and Time) revealing that we have a source in al Qaeda? If al Qaeda breaks into chaos at the news, maybe they'll start killing each other -- or just every guy named "Ali" -- but I don't see how it's Suskind's call. Did the government approve of this disclosure? Is it even true? It might be good disinformation. What am I missing?
"The equivalent of splitting the atom"? "The holy grail of terror R&D"? But "you could construct it with a trip to Home Depot"? Is it easy or hard? What's so amazing about a container with two compartments? It can't be the potential for a remote switch. There's no genius involved in thinking of the two chemicals, is there? That's basically how they set up the gas chamber they used to use in California, isn't it?
The CIA tested the design and was impressed by how... mubtakkar it was? Is that a trick to get them to build it and off themselves, Weatherman-style?
I don't believe the story. Such a device is not as devastating as described - it would be nasty in a closed space like a subway car - but after an emergency stop and exit most people would be fine. Nobody would die from such a device. Serious terroists like Al Qaeda would use explosives - from that there is no escape. This is another story alleging something that didn't happen would have happened but for the wonderful work of the US government. In other words the same people making war in the Middle East, opening our borders in the Southwest, and shoving anti-Arab racism down our children's throats - are really just helping us out.
Time magazine takes a look at Ron Suskinds upcoming book: Al-Qaeda terrorists came within 45 days of attacking the New York subway system with a lethal gas similar to that used in Nazi death camps. They were stopped not by any intelligence break...