9/11: Stop beating around the Bush
By Robert Scheer
Love the truth; it ultimately bows to no master. Even for the President of the United States, the
commander-in-chief of the world’s most powerful propaganda machine, deceptions inevitably
unravel.
In the past week we’ve moved from the 16 deceitful words in President George Bush’s State of
the Union speech to the 28 White House-censored pages in the Congressional report that dealt
with Saudi Arabia’s role in the September 11 terrorist attack on the United States. Yet even in its
sanitised version, the bipartisan report, long delayed by an embarrassed White House, makes
clear that the United States should have focused on Saudi Arabia, and not Iraq, in the aftermath
of September 11.
As we know, but our government tends to ignore, 15 of the 19 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia;
none came from Iraq. Leaks from the censored portions of the report indicate that at least some of
those Saudi terrorists were in close contact with — and financed by — members of the Saudi
elite, extending into the ranks of the royal family. The report finds no such connections between
Iraq and Al Qaeda terrorists.
It is now quite clear that the President — unwilling to deal with the ties between Saudi Arabia and
Osama bin Laden — pursued Saddam Hussein as a politically convenient scapegoat. By drawing
attention away from the Muslim fanatic networks centered in Saudi Arabia, Bush diverted the war
against terrorism. That seems to be the implication of the 28 pages, which the White House
demanded be kept from the American people when the full report was released. Even many in
Bush’s own party are irritated that the President doesn’t think we can be trusted with the truth.
‘‘I went back and read every one of those pages thoroughly,’’ Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala.,
former vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said. ‘‘My judgment is 95 per cent of
that information could be declassified, become uncensored so the American people would
know.’’ Asked why he thought the pages were excised, Shelby, a leading pro-administration
conservative, said, ‘‘I think it might be embarrassing to international relations.’’
Quite an embarrassment if the censored pages reveal that the Bush administration covered up the
Saudi connection to the terrorist attacks. Obviously alluding to Saudi Arabia, Sen. Bob Graham,
D-Fla., the former Senate Intelligence Committee chairman, said, ‘‘High officials in this
government, who I assume were not just rogue officials acting on their own, made substantial
contributions to the support and well-being of two of these terrorists and facilitated their ability
to plan, practice and then execute the tragedy of September 11.’’ On Monday, Graham,
responding to reports that Saudi Arabia would welcome making public some of the pages, called
on Bush to fully declassify ‘‘the currently censored pages’’.
Newsweek, relying on anonymous government sources, reported that the ‘‘connections between
high-level Saudi princes and associates of the hijackers’’ included helping Al Qaeda operatives
enter the United States and financing their residence in San Diego, where they plotted their
infamous attacks. Remember, too, that it was well known that Saudi charities with ties to the royal
House of Saud were bankrolling the Al Qaeda operation in Afghanistan — even as former
President Bush visited the kingdom shortly after his son was elected, eager to secure contracts
for his then-employer, the Carlyle Group.
The fact is, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, unlike Baghdad, Iraq, has long been a key hotbed of extremist
Muslim organising. By shielding and nurturing our relationship with the Saudi sheiks, Bush &
Son have provided cover for those who support terrorism. After all, is it really likely that
career-conscious FBI and CIA officers would be willing to criticise possible links between Al
Qaeda and the House of Saud when the President’s father is out hustling business ties with the
same family?
Even after September 11, 2001, the Bush administration immediately protected Saudis in the
United States, including allowing members of the large Bin Laden family who were in this country
to be spirited home on their government’s aircraft before they could be questioned. This at a time
when many immigrants from all over the world were being detained arbitrarily.
Bush has used September 11 as an excuse to turn this country upside down, making a hash of
civil liberties and bankrupting our federal government with unprecedented deficit spending on
war and its materiel. Before we do anymore irrevocable damage in the name of an open-ended
‘‘war against evil,’’ we have a right and a responsibility to confront the uncensored truth of what
happened that black day — no matter what powerful people are brought to account. (LAT-WP).
meadev.nic.in
Bush will not declassify part of
9/11 report
By Bill Sammon
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
President Bush yesterday rejected calls by
Saudi Arabia and some members of Congress to
declassify part of a congressional report on
September 11, saying such a move "would help
the enemy" and jeopardize national security.
"There's an ongoing investigation into the
9/11 attacks, and we don't want to compromise
that investigation," Mr. Bush told reporters in the
Rose Garden. "If people are being investigated,
it doesn't make sense for us to let them know
who they are."
The president made his remarks just hours
before meeting in the White House with Saudi
Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, who had
hoped to convince Mr. Bush to disclose the
information so that Saudi Arabia could defend
itself against charges of complicity with al
Qaeda.
"We are disappointed," Prince Saud told
reporters after the two-hour meeting with Mr.
Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. "But we
understand the reasons."
One of those reasons, according to Mr. Bush,
was that national security might be compromised
by declassification of the information, which
takes up about 28 pages of a nearly 900-page
report by a joint congressional committee.
"We have an ongoing war against al Qaeda
and terrorists, and the declassification of that
part of a 900-page document would reveal
sources and methods that will make it harder for
us to win the war on terror," he said.
Mr. Bush said he might be able to declassify
the information "at some point in time down the
road, after the investigations are fully complete
and if it doesn't jeopardize our national security."
"But it makes no sense to declassify when
we've got an ongoing investigation that could
jeopardize that investigation," he added. "And it
made no sense to declassify ... during the war
on terror, because it would help the enemy if
they knew our sources and methods."
Eleanor Hill, staff director of the joint
committee inquiry, said she expects some of the
28-page section to be released in the future.
"I'm not even sure every page should be
released," Mrs. Hill said. "What I felt is that we
should have been able to release portions of it.
There are pieces of this report that do need to
be classified."
Another congressional aide said the two
intelligence oversight committees could release
some of the missing pages of the report through
its declassification procedures. Under
congressional rules, classified information can be
released by Congress through a majority vote.
Sen. Bob Graham, Florida Democrat, criticized
the president for yesterday's decision to withhold
the information. He and other Democratic presidential hopefuls have
accused Mr. Bush of trying to shield Saudi Arabia from evidence that it
supported the September 11 hijackers.
"The motivations here are more political than they are national security,"
Mr. Graham told reporters yesterday.
Sen. Richard C. Shelby, chairman of the banking committee, said the
information was withheld because it "might be embarrassing to some
international relations."
"I think they've classified for the wrong reasons," the Alabama
Republican told NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday. "My judgment is 95
percent of that information could be declassified, become uncovered so the
American people would know."
Yesterday, Rep. Jerold Nadler, New York Democrat, called the withholding
of the information a "cover-up" during an appearance on Fox News.
Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar bin Sultan, who also attended
yesterday's White House meeting, issued a statement when the
congressional report was released on Thursday that "28 blanked-out pages
are being used by some to malign our country and our people."
"Saudi Arabia has nothing to hide," he said. "We can deal with questions
in public, but we cannot respond to blank pages."
Those sentiments were echoed by Prince Saud yesterday.
"We have nothing to hide and we do not seek nor do we need to be
shielded," he said. "In that report, Saudi Arabia is indicted by insinuation.
"It is an outrage to any sense of fairness that 28 blank pages are now
considered substantial evidence to proclaim the guilt of a country that has
been a true friend and partner to the United States for over 60 years," he
added.
The prince accused the joint committee of "wrongly and morbidly"
smearing Saudi Arabia in connection with September 11. He said
declassification would allow the Saudi royal family to rebut the charges in a
"clear and credible manner, and remove any doubts about the kingdom's
true role in the war against terrorism and its commitment to fight it."
For years prior to September 11, the Saudi government was less than
forthcoming with U.S. authorities who were investigating Osama bin Laden,
the mastermind of many attacks against American interests. The Saudis
became more cooperative after September 11 and their cooperation
accelerated after their capital of Riyadh was bombed by Islamic militants in
mid-May.
Following those attacks, the Saudis cracked down on terrorists, staging
raids almost every week. The latest raid took place on Monday, when six
militants and two Saudi soldiers were killed.
Yesterday, Saudi Arabia's interior minister confirmed that the militants
had been trained in al Qaeda camps.
Prince Saud yesterday also gave U.S. authorities permission to question
Omar Bayoumi, an employee of the Saudi aviation authority who befriended
two of the Saudi hijackers on their arrival in California. He did so in a
meeting with National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
Prince Saud said FBI and CIA agents in Saudi Arabia could freely
question Mr. Bayoumi, who was questioned already by American, British and
Saudi investigators. They found "no proof" of a connection to the terror
attacks, Prince Saud told the Associated Press at the Saudi Embassy.
washtimes.com
The Washington Times hardly qualifies as a left wing rag. |
