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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Thomas A Watson who wrote (253571)	5/8/2002 11:07:54 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

The two positions are not mutually exclusive: nowtoronto.com ...The book also reveals that a former top FBI counterterrorism official who was killed in the World Trade Center attack had complained bitterly about how U.S. oil politics had shut down FBI investigations. The former official, John O'Neill, resigned in protest as head of the FBI's national security division in August and was hired as chief of security at the twin towers. "All the answers, everything needed to dismantle Osama bin Laden's organization, can be found in Saudi Arabia," O'Neill is quoted as saying in the book. Agents trying to probe last year's bombing of the USS Cole constantly knocked heads with the U.S. State Department, which ended up barring O'Neill, the head of the investigation, from entering Yemen. Brisard says O'Neill told him about the problems last June and July. "He was profoundly frustrated with the situation." The book's thesis was also advanced independently in a report on BBC-TV's investigative show Newsnight in early November. "(The U.S. Department of) State wanted to keep the pro-American Saudi royal family in control of the world's biggest oil spigot, even at the price of turning a blind eye to any terrorist connection,'' it reported. The show asked whether September 11 could have been prevented if the FBI had been allowed to do its job. As it happened, 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis, mostly from wealthy families. "(FBI investigators) were pursuing these matters, but were told to back off," said David Armstrong, an intelligence expert at the Washington, D.C.-based Public Education Center, a nonprofit investigative organization that helped the BBC research its report. Boston University international relations professor Adim Najamat, who has studied Saudi politics, says the notion of an FBI retreat from investigations does seem plausible given the regime's precariousness. "Bin Laden seems to have a big following in Saudi Arabia. It is quite clear that the Saudi government is playing a game for its life. The irony is, bin Laden might get what he wants due to U.S. actions in Afghanistan," he says. ...The real killer came whenever O’Neill decided to open up to the French intelligence experts, Guillaume Dasquié and Jean-Charles Brisard in July of last year. rense.com - an article on Brisard and Dasquié’s book - Bin Laden, la verite interdite (Bin Laden, the forbidden truth) which claims: << Under the influence of United States oil companies, the government of President George W Bush initially blocked intelligence agencies' investigations on terrorism while it bargained with the Taliban on the delivery of Osama bin Laden in exchange for political recognition and economic aid>> << The authors claim that O'Neill told them that "the main obstacles to investigate Islamic terrorism were US oil corporate interests and the role played by Saudi Arabia in it". The two claim that the US government's main objective in Afghanistan was to consolidate the position of the Taliban regime to obtain access to the oil and gas reserves in Central Asia.>> ...Shortly after leaving the FBI, John O’Neill was offered a job offering three times the salary he had previously received – approximately $300, 000 The job was head of security for the World Trade Center. His first day was the 11th Sept. He apparently went back into the building to help with the rescue operation and was killed when the building collapsed on top of him

To: Thomas A Watson who wrote (253571)	5/8/2002 11:15:30 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Followup: the Bushes and the Bin Ladens. news.bbc.co.uk ...Their official line is that the Bin Ladens are above suspicion - apart from Osama, the black sheep, who they say hijacked the family name. That's fortunate for the Bush family and the Saudi royal household, whose links with the Bin Ladens could otherwise prove embarrassing. But Newsnight has obtained evidence that the FBI was on the trail of other members of the] Bin Laden family for links to terrorist organisations before and after September 11th. This document is marked "Secret". Case ID - 199-Eye WF 213 589. 199 is FBI code for case type. 9 would be murder. 65 would be espionage. 199 means national security. WF indicates Washington field office special agents were investigating ABL - because of it's relationship with the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, WAMY - a suspected terrorist organisation. ABL is Abdullah Bin Laden, president and treasurer of WAMY. ... The FBI wanted to investigate these guys. This is not something that they didn't want to do - they wanted to, they weren't permitted to.