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Originally posted by AURaptor:

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Originally posted by Storymark:

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Originally posted by AURaptor:


See, this is EXACTLY what I mean. Lefties are cowards and pussies for trying to dodge and squirm out of the issue, and then when you call them on it , they hyper analyze the god damn sentence,

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Wow. That's fuckin rich coming from a guy who

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Sorry dickhead, but I've never dodged one god damn fucking thing.

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Originally posted by rue:
But what about 9/11 and the interests of JUSTICE for the people who were killed and their families ? (And I do mean JUSTICE - not revenge.) Don't you want to see that done to redress the great human tragedy ?

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Originally posted by rue:
But the US had bin Laden trapped and ready to be captured. And then just let him go. It was quite easily done if there had been the will. But there apparently wasn't one, despite the 'dead or alive' rhetoric.

Are you saying it was OK to let him go when he was within reach ?

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BERNTSEN: With Tora Bora, it began, the final portion of that operation began after we seized the capital, Kabul. I sent an eight-man team down into Jalalabad. From Jalalabad, they moved down south right up against the mountains there, where Tora Bora was back up in the mountains. ...

We had locations on him, we had human source reporting which had proved reliable throughout the war. And that is why we won the war so rapidly. We had picked up a radio off of a dead al Qaeda member and we're listening to bin Laden pray with his people, apologize to his people for bringing them in there.

I had CIA's top Arabic linguist with me, who had listened to bin Laden's for four years. We threw a 15,000-pound Blue 82 at them and then we had B52's conduct strikes on the same areas where he knew he was. ... we did know exactly.

... The Afghans were less than reliable and this is why I was calling for ground forces. And I called for, you know, 600-to-800 rangers to be inserted in there, and had 600-to-800 rangers been inserted, we probably would have ended the thing.

...I made the request in the first two or three days of December. We initiated that operation. We inserted our team in late November into Jalalabad there.

Well, I requested the rangers directly from the commander of JSOC, who was on the ground out there. And of course, their decision was not to do that. They were pleased with the fact that we were killing several hundred of them a day. The problem is this: when you are fighting terrorists, success for the terrorists is not defeating us on the battlefield, it's escaping. And I was trying to make sure that we eliminated every single one of them. And in that case, we didn't. We killed quite a large number of bin Laden's force. We killed 75 percent of the people there. He did cross the border. You may recall that 130 of them were captured by the Pakistanis on the back side of Tora Bora, but bin Laden and his element were able to escape.

...General Franks is a great American. I, however, was on the ground running the intelligence collection operation. ... The U.S. military, the soldiers that were with us on the ground there, fought like lions. They did a wonderful job. The problem was, was Tora Bora was a very, very difficult place to access. It was an area that was far away, it was high, it was cold. It would have been very difficult and it would have been risky to put soldiers in. There likely would have been significant casualties. The fact is is no one, whether they're in the CIA or the military gets ahead taking risks. It would have been a risky endeavor. But I put my four men in there. They went up. And actually two of my men were CIA officers and two of them were JSOC officers that had been assigned over to me. This is a fact of the war.

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The problem was, was Tora Bora was a very, very difficult place to access. It was an area that was far away, it was high, it was cold. It would have been very difficult and it would have been risky to put soldiers in. There likely would have been significant casualties

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Originally posted by rue:
Are you saying it was OK to let him go when he was within reach ?

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Originally posted by rue:
In fact, why not turn him over to the ICC in the first place before going to war ?

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Originally posted by rue:
From www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10639901/
... The Afghans were less than reliable and this is why I was calling for ground forces. And I called for, you know, 600-to-800 rangers to be inserted in there, and had 600-to-800 rangers been inserted, we probably would have ended the thing.

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Originally posted by BigDamnNobody:

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Originally posted by rue:
From www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10639901/
... The Afghans were less than reliable and this is why I was calling for ground forces. And I called for, you know, 600-to-800 rangers to be inserted in there, and had 600-to-800 rangers been inserted, we probably would have ended the thing.

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So willing to accept conjecture as dogma when it fits your preconceived notions. Well, since it's an EXPERT conjecture of a MILITARY person who was THERE - yeah, I think I'd take it over yours - .

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Originally posted by rue:
Rap, it doesn't matter if the US was or is treaty to the ICC or not - the ICC still had jurisdiction over Usama bin Laden.

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Originally posted by rue:
"Like the United Nations or the World Trade Organization, the ICC is trans-national not supra-national. This means it is a voluntary association of countries -- no nation is forced to participate.

The ICC, however, can prosecute individuals regardless of their nationality. Even if Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia failed to ratify the ICC treaty, someone like Osama bin Laden could still be prosecuted by the ICC if no other legal authority (including the American courts) stepped forward to take care of it."

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Originally posted by rue:
Any questions?
The terrorist actions of 9/11 were under ICC jurisdiction, and the ICC was ready and able to accept custody of terrorists, just like it had taken custody of Milošević a few months earlier.

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The Bush administration had the opportunity to agree to have Usama bin Laden turned over to the ICC by the Taliban, but refused - opting to invade instead.

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The Bush administration was focused neither on bin Laden nor justice. Instead, bin Laden and the Taliban were excuses to go into Afghanistan, excuses maintained only as long as dictated by circumstance.

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Originally posted by rue:
Rap, it doesn't matter if the US was or is treaty to the ICC or not - the ICC still had jurisdiction over Usama bin Laden.

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But look what happened afterward - Bush dropped the bin Laden issue like a hot potato as soon as it became inconvenient. Do you think Bush was REALLY after bin Laden ?

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Originally posted by rue:
LeadB [...]

I think you're missing the logic.

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rue wrote: In September 2001 Bush was saying "dead or alive". By March 2002 Bush was saying "I don't know. I don't really think about him very much. I'm not that concerned."

That's a mere 6 months later.

Bush was simply not that interested in bin Laden or justice for 9/11

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Originally posted by AURaptor:
OBL is wanted dead or alive. Period, end of discussion. When Bush later says " I'm not that concerned" , he's only attempting to put out the view that OBL's continued freedom is of some great bane to Bush's very existence. Granted, it's a tricky situation, and one Bush could have delt better with, but he's not going to give those supporting OBL the pleasure of having Bush publically squirm at the notion that OBL is still out and about.

It's a pointless Catch 22 until OBL is dead or captured.

Rue - you're making far too big deal about this.

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Originally posted by SignyM:
Yanno Rue. come to think of it, I DO remember the Taliban offering to turn ObL over to the IC because they were afraid that ObL would be mistreated or something in USA hands.

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Originally posted by rue:
LeadB

I have time for just a short reply and won't be back for a few days - so -

Drag your eyes away from Tora Bora for a second.

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In September 2001 Bush was saying "dead or alive". By March 2002 Bush was saying "I don't know. I don't really think about him very much. I'm not that concerned."

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That's a mere 6 months later.

Bush was simply not that interested in bin Laden or justice for 9/11.

"Now is it possible that in Bush's heart of hearts, he pulled the entire Afghan invasion to get an oil pipe line deal?" No. it was an opportunistic tidbit, nothing more. Bush went to Afghanistan b/c the logic of the situation forced him there. He was REALLY interested in Hussein and so spent as short a time as possible in Afghanistan, leaving without finishing the job.

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"I do not believe the Taliban would have turned OBL over to anyone; I believe they were stalling for time and hoping to make Bush look bad." If the Taliban had stalled egregiously no force in the world could have kept the US allies away (and there were many). The only ones who would have looked bad would have been the Taliban and bin Laden and they would have invited the rage of a united world.

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Originally posted by SignyM:
Yanno Rue. come to think of it, I DO remember the Taliban offering to turn ObL over to the IC because they were afraid that ObL would be mistreated or something in USA hands.

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Originally posted by rue:
LeadB

Sorry for the non-continuous postings - my schedule is not always mine to make.

[...]

Anyway, I have to get going, again. I don't expect you to credit my POV, but I am convinced in a few years when the Bush administration is subject to scrutiny and the facts come out, it will look pretty much like this.

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Originally posted by rue:
Rap -

I wasn't ignoring your posts. I used that quote "... I don't really think about him very much ...") to illustrate the change of Bush's approach. Let me ask you this (warning - extended logic ahead - should not be attempted by people unfamiliar with its use !) :

While it's possible for both statements to be false ("dead or alive !" and "I don't really think about him very much") it's impossible for both statements to be true. So, which one, in your opinion, fits into the 'pandering political statement' category, or do they both fit that category ?

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I really think you're taking things way out of context here.

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