Mother Of All Battles

(Conspiracy Nation, 07/14/05) -- During the 1990-1991 First Gulf War, Saddam Hussein warned it would be "the mother of all battles." Then, when "Stormin' Norman" Schwarzkopf quickly rolled over Iraqi troops, the phrase "mother of all battles" became a sick joke.

But in retrospect, one can see that deadly terror events in the U.S. began subsequent to 1991.

In the Middle East, time is viewed differently than in the West. To Arabs, the medieval Crusades never ended. To westerners, they are ancient history. To westerners, "mother of all battles" is perceived in the time frame of 1990-1991 and the First Gulf War. However to Middle Easterners it is not so strictured.

On February 26, 1993, "a large bomb planted by terrorists exploded in the underground garage of Two World Trade Center, damaging the base of the building (subsequently repaired), killing 6 people, and injuring some 1,000." ("World Trade Center," Encyclopedia Britannica electronic reference)

In Cover Up, author Peter Lance (http://www.peterlance.com) shows how much of what happened has been generally obscured. The 1993 WTC bomb had been built by Ramzi Yousef, nephew of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. Yousef had hoped the North Tower would crash like a domino into the South Tower. But his calculations were off. It was promised "that the next time it will be very precise and the Trade Center will be one of our targets." (Lance, op. cit.)

But Lance and others emphasise that the WTC 93 terrorists are not directly connected to Iraq per se. He cites Vince Cannistraro, formerly in charge of the CIA's Counterterrorism Center, who notes "an obsession with Iraq and trying to link Saddam to global terrorism." (Lance, op. cit.)

Yet a "mother of all battles" (what is now called the "War On Terror") was manifesting beginning soon after the First Gulf War. Saddam Hussein may have been foreseeing a virulent Islamic reaction against western "infidels."

The FBI had used an informant, Emad Salem, to penetrate a network run by Dr. Omar Abdel Rahman. Apparently the FBI allowed things to proceed, hoping for a dramatic last-minute intervention just-in-time to stop WTC 93. There are even credible allegations that the FBI contributed to Ramzi Yousef's bomb, planning to later substitute harmless ingredients. Emad Salem is quoted as saying, "...we was start already building the bomb which is went off in the World Trade Center. It was built by supervising supervision from the Bureau and the DA [District Attorney] and we was all informed about it and we know that the bomb start to be built. By who? By your confidential informant. What a wonderful great case!" ("Who Bombed The World Trade Center?"  http://pdr.autono.net/WhoBombedWTC.html)

Later, on April 19, 1995, the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City was bombed. The original indictment accused Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols, and others unknown of responsibility for the outrage. A sketch of "John Doe #2," a Middle Eastern-looking man, was distributed. But soon, the others unknown aspect of the case was sidelined and the focus was upon McVeigh and Nichols. In his book, Others Unknown, Stephen Jones, McVeigh's attorney, describes how he struggled against the federal government's attempts to conceal the whole truth about the case.

In "Labyrinth Seen in WTC Attacks" (http://www.shout.net/~bigred/Labyrinth.html) Conspiracy Nation reported how Chicago attorney David Schippers alleged there are as many as 5000 members of the Iraqi Republican Guard living near Oklahoma City. In "The Secrets of Timothy McVeigh," independent investigator Sherman H. Skolnick (http://www.skolnicksreport.com/tmsecrets.html) had also, before Schippers, reported upon more than 4000 Iraqi military intelligence personnel imported into the U.S. subsequent to the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

For some reason -- perhaps not to alarm the public; perhaps to hide U.S. intelligence screw-ups -- the official versions of what happened were exceedingly narrow.

On July 17, 1996, TWA Flight 800 exploded off Long Island, New York. Six days later, on July 23, 1996, J. Orlin Grabbe  (http://www.orlingrabbe.com) reportedly wrote "that Syrian-backed terrorists shot down the plane." (The 70 Greatest Conspiracies Of All Time, by Jonathan Vankin and John Whalen) According to Peter Lance (op. cit.), by August 22, 1996, New York Times reporter Don Van Natta, Jr., was about to file a story saying that "investigators have finally found scientific evidence that an explosive device was detonated inside the passenger cabin of Trans World Airlines Flight 800." Lance also reports that "a confidential FBI source said that [James] Kallstrom himself was ready to announce that the TWA 800 crash had formally become a criminal investigation."

Yet once again, a decision was made to limit investigation. Officially, TWA 800 was brought down by a sort of "spontaneous combustion." Case closed.

The above details are "old news" for many. However many people who believe themselves to be well-informed could benefit by turning off the television and studying some or all of the sources cited above. They might then be less-inclined to hurriedly dismiss so-called "conspiracy theories."

A pattern of again circumscribing investigation can be discerned in the London events of July 7, 2005. Yesterday, it was revealed that French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy had claimed some of the London bomb suspects had been arrested last year. A French spokesperson backed away from the claim, stating that Sarkozy "had not been referring to any of the four suspected bombers but to other members of a network to which they belonged." ("Row over French bomb arrest claim," BBC News, 7/13/05) As in the Emad Salem/WTC 93 situation, it looks as if the British had been using informants to penetrate a network. It may even be that the four "suicide bombers" were helping British investigators! Yet that angle of perception has been quickly brushed aside. British officials "are adamant the men were not arrested and then released in order to break a wider network." (BBC News, op. cit.)

It is also questioned whether the London "suicide bombers" were the cause of the July 7th events at all. Early reports persistently claimed that "timers, not suicide bombers, set off the blasts." ("Timers, not bombers, set off London blasts," Reuters, 7/8/05) The "package bombs" were "left by attackers who fled and detonated them by timers..." (Ibid.) According to U.S. authorities, "London police had recovered key parts of the timing devices" and "fragments of timing devices." (Ibid.) Suddenly, in Orwellian fashion, the story has been re-written: the "timing devices" are erased and the "suicide bombers" are penciled in. Commenting on this inconsistency, J. Orlin Grabbe yesterday pointed out, "On July 12, The Times of London revealed that the explosives used in the London Transport bombings were military-grade explosives and investigators emphasized they believed the bombers were British and worked in small cells. Furthermore, although the British police are putting out information that suicide bombers were involved in the London bombings, Vince Cannistraro, the former CIA counter-terrorism chief, told The Guardian that 'two unexploded bombs' were recovered along with 'mechnical timing devices.' It goes without saying that suicide bombers would not have been using timing devices." (http://www.orlingrabbe.com/oldpage.htm)

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