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  • 9/11 mastermind confesses at Gitmo

    9/11 mastermind confesses in Guantanamo

    By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press Writer 38 minutes ago

    Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, confessed to that attack and a string of others during a military hearing at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, according to a transcript released Wednesday by the Pentagon.

    Mohammed claimed responsibility for planning, financing, and training others for bombings ranging from the 1993 attack at the World Trade Center to the attempt by would-be shoe bomber Richard Reid to blow up a trans-Atlantic flight with explosives hidden in his shoes.

    In all, Mohammed said he was responsible for planning 29 individual attacks, including many that were never executed. The comments were included in a 26-page transcript released by the Pentagon, which also blacked out some of his remarks.

    The Pentagon also released transcripts of the hearings of Abu Faraj al-Libi and Ramzi Binalshibh.

    Binalshibh is suspected of helping Mohammed with the Sept. 11, 2001, attack plan and is also linked to a foiled plot to crash aircraft into London's Heathrow Airport. Al-Libi is a Libyan who reportedly masterminded two bombings 11 days apart in Pakistan in December 2003 that targeted President Pervez Musharraf for his support of the U.S.-led war on terror.

    The hearings, which began last Friday, are being conducted in secret by the military as it tries to determine whether 14 alleged terrorist leaders should be declared "enemy combatants" who can be held indefinitely and prosecuted by military tribunals.

    Hearings for six of the 14 have already been held. The military is not allowing reporters to attend the sessions and is limiting the information it provides about them, arguing that it wants to prevent sensitive information from being disclosed.

    The 14 were moved in September from a secret CIA prison network to the prison at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, where about 385 men are being held on suspicion of links to al-Qaida or the Taliban.
    Source: 9/11 mastermind confesses in Guantanamo - Yahoo! News
    "Every man has his weakness. Mine was always just cigarettes."

  • #2
    You'll have to excuse a hint of cynicism her, but after 3 years in US custody this guy basically cops to being responsible for everything nasty that has happened in the world since WW2. I suspect that in the same situation I'd probably do the same.

    Does this sound just a bit like one of those 'confessions' obtained by some dodgy Southern sherriff from a black guy in the 1950s?.

    Hell, I'm sure that if you read the full transcript he confesses to popping JFK, Marylin Monroe & Princess Di.

    I don't doubt that he did some of this, and was involved in some more, but it all ties together way too nicely for this world weary soul.
    sigpic

    Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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    • #3
      Hi Guys,

      I am going to have to go with Bigfella's sentiments on this one and approach the issue with some degree of skepticism

      If nothing else, history has demonstrated that governments whom endorse torture and secret hearings/trials are often not the purveyors of accurate and/or truthful information.

      Too, in the case of the Bush Administration, there is a known proclivity towards Procrustean behavoir when it comes to agenda.

      The alledged confession is awfully convenient, comprehensive and the timing of the release of the information may have an important bearing.

      Finally, it might be that Mr. Mohammed is feeding disinformation to his captors.

      He has had three years to figure out exactly what his interrogators want to hear and craft the delivery to take advantage of the fact that from an organizational standpoint, our intelligence gathering apparatus makes it easy to feed false information into the system at the highest levels of command.
      Pharoh was pimp but now he is dead. What are you going to do today?

      Comment


      • #4
        I have to echo the sentiment I just read at Powerline:

        Personally, I would have preferred it if the government had released a video of Khalid being waterboarded.
        Bigfella, you're kinda making me nauseous with that post. So, you're of the opinion that a good analogy is that KSM is a blameless black man, and the US is a bigoted, badged bully-boy, bent on breaking the back of a beaten-down beggar, right? And you believe, apparently, that even YOU would've been coerced by now into confessing to crimes you haven't committed, presumably due to all the torture and inhumane treatment the US would've subjected you to, is that correct?

        Well, the transcript IS available, as it happens, an guess what? No mentions of JFK, Marylin Monroe or even Princess Di. Just some bad sh!t that he's actually responsible for. And PROUD of, too.

        Read through the transcript, thoughtfully provided to the World by the Department of Defense. You'll find a very respectful Tribunal president addressing KSM with civility, and he answers back, not as a beaten-down and fearful wreck, but as one that has been getting three squares a day and eight good hours a night.

        So get your weak crap outta here, and try, if you're able, to remember who the Good Guys are, and who the Bad Guys are.

        Folks, try to get this: we are in a war to the knife with guys like this. It is almost certainly KSM's hands that can be seen in the video cutting Danny Pearl's head off while he's still alive, and that image tortures me to this day. He is a savage, and whatever has happened to him since his capture hasn't been anything close to what he deserves. And Bigfella, as for OUR side, you and that fool William (who no doubt posted something silly just now) seem eager to believe the very worst, and to show as little support for a victory over these creatures as you can.

        You're 'world-weary', are you, precious? Well, you're being very tiresome yourself, and so is every other snarky, snide, sneering critic the US has had to put up with while we're doing the heavy lifting, and getting this kind of smack for our trouble.

        I am growing to loathe the people that think this way more every day, and I find them insufferably smug and invincibly ignorant on the absolutely crucial question of the age: do we have the guts, brains, balls, spine and self-confidence, and far more importantly, the RIGHT to fight and win this thing?

        By the evidence provided in these fora, some of us do NOT.

        Comment


        • #5
          I just hope KSM shed some light on the involvement of Pakistan's ISI in the Daniel Pearl beheading. Musharraff did make a comment at the time that he ( Daniel) was sticking his nose where it does not belong - or something of that nature. Bluesman - what are your thoughts on this? ISI has been and still is buddies with Taliban for a long time.

          KSM was captured in a defense housing area - darn near neighbors with some really high ranking Pakistani Officers.

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by texasjohn View Post
            I just hope KSM shed some light on the involvement of Pakistan's ISI in the Daniel Pearl beheading. Musharraff did make a comment at the time that he ( Daniel) was sticking his nose where it does not belong - or something of that nature. Bluesman - what are your thoughts on this? ISI has been and still is buddies with Taliban for a long time.

            KSM was captured in a defense housing area - darn near neighbors with some really high ranking Pakistani Officers.
            ISI is as schizophrenic as Pakistan itself. Half are loyal state servants; half are mad as hatters and every bit as fundamentalist as Osama himself. The agency itself is unreformable, and invulnerable to bureaucratic attack. Which must make it interesting when Musharraf sits down at a meeting with its head: each man is sitting there thinking, 'I know you'd kill me if you could, and I know that you know that I'd kill you if I could, too.' Then they say 'Good morning' to each other and get down to business.

            Pearl's murder was probably exactly as it appears: a mundane if brutal murder by a bunch of whacko Jew-hate-crazed millenarian lunatics that saw a way to trap him and took advantage of it. I don't know if there was any ISI involvement in it or not.

            I tell you this, though: just before Cheney's visit to Pakistan, a new chief of the anti-Taleban strike force was appointed, and he hit the ground runnin', baby. He's been cleaning up those guys like crazy, with four BIG captures since taking over three weeks ago.

            His heart is definitely in the fight (more than many posters on this very Board ). I'm not sure if his ISI colleagues will allow him to keep his head or not, but he seems to have picked his own men, as there have been no operations-killing leaks like we've seen in the past. (Surreptitious phone call from ISI to Taleban big-shot: 'Hey, Mullah Bluesman, you better get under the bed; our boys are rollin' out of the barracks in a hour to come arrest you.' And sure enough, the target would be fifty miles away when the raid got to his front door.)

            But the success rate - right here before the usual, expected, annual 'spring offensive' - has been the best it's been since Tora Bora. We've been snappin' 'em up on our side, and the Pakistanis have been going all-out, too.

            But ISI remains a dichotomy. It always will be one, until some new dictator wants to take his own life into his hands and start purging it.

            Comment


            • #7
              Bluesman,

              It is clear from your post that you neither read properly nor attempted to understand my post.

              It looks very much like you are continuing an argument you've been having for some time. That argument isn't with me, so I don't feel the need to join in.

              If you actually want to have an intelligent discussion about something, try turning off 'rant' mode & toning down the insults.

              Until then I'll just leave you in your corner.
              sigpic

              Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by Bigfella View Post
                Bluesman,

                It is clear from your post that you neither read properly nor attempted to understand my post.

                It looks very much like you are continuing an argument you've been having for some time. That argument isn't with me, so I don't feel the need to join in.

                If you actually want to have an intelligent discussion about something, try turning off 'rant' mode & toning down the insults.

                Until then I'll just leave you in your corner.
                I must say I did not quite get what exactly you were getting at either. Are you simply saying that KSM was "forced" into a confession but in reality is as clean as a whistle?? That's what I got out of your post.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Bluesman View Post
                  ...try, if you're able, to remember who the Good Guys are, and who the Bad Guys are.
                  Kind’a says it all in a nutshell doesn’t it?
                  Who are the Good Guys and who are the Bad Guys?
                  Well IMO the Bad Guy is the one who would literally carve the head off of a living human being and then later brag about it, whereas the good guy is the one who would bring such a monster to book.
                  But like I said this is my own opinion, others may differ.
                  As for those who say that it is his internment in Gitmo, and that pressure may have been applied to entice him to make the statement he has made, should remember that long before his capture he was suspected of being one of the leaders of AQ, and of being the planner and controller of 9/11.
                  As for his other admissions, with the exception of his personal slaughter of Daniel Pearl, some may be true and others false, but it is curious how he singled this one deed out from among all the others. As if he was singularly proud of his actions.
                  For that one deeed of inhuman barbarity alone; and if for nothing else, he has forfeited any and all claim for fair treatment.
                  When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a literary dogma, we become automatons. We cease to grow. - Anais Nin

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by Amled View Post
                    Kind’a says it all in a nutshell doesn’t it?
                    Who are the Good Guys and who are the Bad Guys?
                    Well IMO the Bad Guy is the one who would literally carve the head off of a living human being and then later brag about it, whereas the good guy is the one who would bring such a monster to book.
                    But like I said this is my own opinion, others may differ.
                    As for those who say that it is his internment in Gitmo, and that pressure may have been applied to entice him to make the statement he has made, should remember that long before his capture he was suspected of being one of the leaders of AQ, and of being the planner and controller of 9/11.
                    As for his other admissions, with the exception of his personal slaughter of Daniel Pearl, some may be true and others false, but it is curious how he singled this one deed out from among all the others. As if he was singularly proud of his actions.
                    For that one deeed of inhuman barbarity alone; and if for nothing else, he has forfeited any and all claim for fair treatment.
                    THANK you VERY much, sir. Absolutely correct.

                    What I'm on about, and Bigfella won't cop to it, is his default position of 'The US must've been bustin' poor KSM's balls the whole time, and gosh, even someone like ME, innocent ingenue that I am, would've been confessing to being bleedin' Guy Fawkes by the time those American thugs at Gitmo were through beating the the hell outta me, you know, like they're prone to do, being all savage like they are, an' all. Oh, and of COURSE the timing's just PERFECT for the Bush regime, and it ties together way too nicely for this world-weary (oh, and let's not forget cynical, too) soul.'

                    So, is that what you think? That it's the US that's up to something? That the US is untrustworthy, and we've made KSM falsely confess to things he has not done? We're the dodgySouthern sheriff; KSM is the black guy from the '50's. You wrote it, I read it and I understood it, I called you on it, so screw you, Jack.

                    You're like William: absolutely useless to those of us trying to fight back against creatures like this. WORSE than useless; a net negative in the ledger.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      I believe his confessions are all true. The intelligence guys have ways to verify these things. Double check his stories with other sources can easily confirm if his confessions are real or he's just saying stuff to satisfy his captors. False confessions are actually more trouble than they're worth.

                      The southern sherrif hanging a confessed black man in the 50s is really not a good comparison.

                      The alleged sherrif was probably a racist and out to get some blacks. He doesn't care about solving the crime or prevent future crimes from happening.

                      Our intelligence guys may or may not be racist. Their primary job is not to kill muslims but to catch terrorists and to prevent future terrorism from happening. Beating a false confession from this scum bag actually hinders their job.
                      "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by gunnut View Post
                        ...False confessions are actually more trouble than they're worth.
                        You're right, and the dirtbag deserves nothing less than a long drop on a short rope.

                        However, I have a feeling he is exagerrating his importance in some areas, like the Bali bombings. Not because he was tortured into confessing, but to make himself seem more important than he really was, and to attempt to relieve the pressure on others who are still out there.

                        KSM knows he is done for, and is now confessing to anything and everything. "Taking one for the team" as it were...
                        "We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008

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                        • #13
                          Originally posted by highsea View Post
                          You're right, and the dirtbag deserves nothing less than a long drop on a short rope.
                          Under normal circumstances I would tend to agree with you on this point, but here I think that you are proposing a too lenient punishment.
                          A while ago here on the board we were discussing Zacarias Moussaoui, and his sentence, and I for one favoured, as you do here a long drop at the end of a short rope.
                          That is until someone described the conditions under which he would sit out the remainder of his life in a Super-Max penitentiary.
                          Total isolation for the rest of his life, half an hour exercise alone a day, no contact with the rest of the world, no newspapers or books; except the Quran, no talking to his guards unless they address him first, these were just some of the conditions facing an inmate on solitary in Super-Max.
                          Cruel and inhumane some might say.
                          Well let them tell that to the family and friends, and to those who saw him standing with the head of Pearl in his hand.
                          Too lenient I say, but in lack of better…
                          When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a literary dogma, we become automatons. We cease to grow. - Anais Nin

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Just to start off I am a total opposed to the death penalty (as I am to torture). Firstly I just think its wrong and secondly (as stated by Amled) I would think punishment wise, a lifetime in a super-max type prision would be worse. I've always personally wondered why people constantly appeal their sentence to try and get life.

                            The problem with this guy's confession is that it covers most of the successful terrorist operations in the last few years. If his is indeed that involved then fantastic as he would thus be a true 'terrorist mastermind'.

                            But is this confession a way to let a bunch of other guys off the hook?
                            Will it allow other guys down the line to argue that they were just minor players?
                            Will the hunt for the Bali terrorists be eased now that the head guy is out of the picture. Bust him on 9/11 and find other people who are responsible for the other crimes.
                            "Just go home rednecks!" Me, 28/03/2007

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by texasjohn View Post
                              I must say I did not quite get what exactly you were getting at either. Are you simply saying that KSM was "forced" into a confession but in reality is as clean as a whistle?? That's what I got out of your post.
                              Sorry Texasjohn, I'll repost & explain

                              "You'll have to excuse a hint of cynicism her, but after 3 years in US custody this guy basically cops to being responsible for everything nasty that has happened in the world since WW2. I suspect that in the same situation I'd probably do the same.

                              Does this sound just a bit like one of those 'confessions' obtained by some dodgy Southern sherriff from a black guy in the 1950s?.

                              Hell, I'm sure that if you read the full transcript he confesses to popping JFK, Marylin Monroe & Princess Di.

                              I don't doubt that he did some of this, and was involved in some more, but it all ties together way too nicely for this world weary soul." Bigfella


                              You'll note that in the final line I make it clear that I do think he is guilty of a good deal. From what I have heard he was involved in a lot of nasty stuff. Doesn't mean all of this is correct.

                              What makes me suspicious is the scope of his claims & especially all the 'plots' that didn't come to fruition. That was what my 'sherriff Buford' reference was to. You know, the guy confesses to a string of unsolved cases after a few days in lockup?

                              Then there are the claims of responsibility fot the '93 WTC bombing & Bali. Those have been pretty comprehensively investigated & KSM's active role was minimal to nonexistant.

                              Was he tortured into confessing? I don't know, and neither does anyone else here. Besides, the process is nowhere near as simple as that. I am prepared to bet that he has been physically mistreated & repeatedly questioned.

                              The guy spent 3 years in the CIA shadow prison system. Between the tender mercies of his interrogators & his own attempts to bignote AQ I would want some independent corroboration before taking any of this as gospel.

                              Even Daniel Pearl's family don't consider this reliable enough to feel certain that they know the full truth about his death.

                              Once you start down the torture road confessions lose all value.
                              sigpic

                              Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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