CNN wrote: -- Al-Jazeera broadcast on Thursday an audiotape on which a voice identified as Osama bin Laden declares "Iraq is the perfect base to set up the jihad to liberate Palestine."

terrorlst leader Osama bin Laden spoke on a video released by al Qaeda in September.

The voice calls on "Muslims in neighboring countries" to "do their best in supporting their mujahedeen brothers in Iraq."

"My speech to you is about the siege of Gaza and the way to liberate it," he said.

"The Gaza siege is a direct result of Annapolis," he adds, apparently referring to the site of November's summit in Annapolis, Maryland, where Israeli and Palestinian leadership agreed to work toward a two-state plan.

He accused Arabs who supported the plan of having become "partners in this horrendous crime."

And he predicted, "Palestine will be restored to us, with God's permission, when we wake up from our slumber and adhere to our faith and sacrifice our souls and belongings for it."

The speaker called for armed revolt in the Middle East.

I’m pretty much of a pacifist and believe that violence should be the last resort. However, when some clown threatens my life, and the life of those I care about, I shift into military mode.

Osama bin Laden isn’t going to be satisfied until we have a full blown war in the middle east. Why in the world is he still out there? What the heck, we should deliver a little US technology to his front door. No troops, just things that fly and go boom. You know, one a day until he rides out on his camel with a white flag waiving.

Michael Moore, in Fahrenheit 9/11 (the film debuted at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival) claimed bin Laden and the Bush family had sufficient ties so as to prevent his capture and punishment during GW’s term. I didn’t buy it then, but it appears Mr. Moore was right about bin Laden escaping capture while GW is on watch.

John McCain, on the other hand, promised that bin Laden would get his immediate attention. Listen up Washington. If technology can find the Titanic under 2 miles of frigid water, you can certainly find a dimwitted terrorlst living in a cave somewhere. What is with the delay?

Realize we are not the only ones who have not found Osama. Mossad, British SIS and others have been trying to track him down too. The consistant "Bush is in bed with ....." is getting totally tiresome as there is no proof at all, simple insinuation. If he is, then show me absolute proof and I will call him out too. Until then these people need to STFU.

What should be interesting to those "we gotsta pull out of Iraq NOWWWWWWWW" people is that the above shows exactly what will happen if Obama or Hillary simply pull the troops, Iraq would become a hot-bed for the Islamic terrorists.

If I were President of the United States, I would up the bounty on Osama Bin Laden's head from $25 million to $1 billion (tax free). No questions asked dead or alive at the front desk of the J. Edgar Hoover Building. I believe $1 billion would bring him in a a lot faster than 25 million.

Moore will focus on the George Herbert Walker Bush's link to the Saudi Royal Family and their links to the Bin Ladens. He will also come up with some conspiracy theory on how it kept Bin Laden from being captured. But what he won't talk about is the numerous times the Clinton Administration had Bin Laden in their sights and refused to pull the trigger, questioning the legality of assassinating a foreign leader (which is really is not a leader of a country.) Heck, the Sudanese Government kicked him out and gave him no quarter. They even offered Bin Laden on a silver platter to the US back in the 1990's and the US refused to take him. Hello???

Then what link did Clinton have since he had intel of exactly where he was at one point after the first WTC attack and did nothing....

Quote »"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him."- G.W. Bush, 9/13/01[/quote]Quote »"I want justice...There's an old poster out West, as I recall, that said, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive,'"- G.W. Bush, 9/17/01, UPI[/quote]Quote »"I don't know where bin Laden is. I have no idea and really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority."- G.W. Bush, 3/13/02[/quote]Quote »"I am truly not that concerned about him."- G.W. Bush, repsonding to a question about bin Laden's whereabouts, (The New American, 4/8/02) [/quote]Seriously, how hard could it be to position a satellite over any area where they suspect he (ObL) might be hiding and watch for evidence of people disappearing into a cave. My point is that they could find him if they really wanted to, the technology is there. The question is why are they not using it. (and, of course, why the change in priority?)

Again, it's not like anyone else is finding him either.

Which begs the question, "Who is covering for this criminal, and why?"

McCain recently promised that he would not rest until ObL is behind bars. I really question US intelligence's ability to function in the middle east. You'de think that the $25million bounty would have caught the attention of someone somewhere.

Maybe if the military had not been gutted the prior 8 years to Bush we would have people potentially in a place to give us information where he is? Maybe we should pull out satellites off of watching for terrorlst groups to look for this one person?

Who knows? It's all speculation and people will believe what they want.

I always ask people about the other option - maybe NOT "finding him" is a better option. Maybe it'd be better if no one ever heard from him again.

If we capture him, then what? The entire universe of radical Islam will rally behind him and ratchet up their violence in righteous protest. And if we announce that we've killed him, we make him a martyr, with the same results.

But what if no one ever finds him? - what if the world just never hears from him again?

For a moment there, I thought someone else was posting as Bob... Better make it a habit of loggin out of your computer, my friend!

I'm all in favor of a specialized team of mercenaries, US-trained of course, going in with one mission and one mission only: Take out OBL and anyone who harbors him.

Can't be THAT hard. Seriously.

And when we start making policies based on fear of "martyrdom", that's when I'm packing up and moving. Screw the radicals, let them get pissed.

My money is on the well-fed Midwestern lads with the Apaches and the Sidewinders.

As I don't keep up on all matters of current events and foreign policies, I may very well have this all wrong. That said, it's my belief that we (the U.S.) could have had this guy a loooooong time ago if the sheer amount of resources that have been devoted to Iraq would have been put into finding him. There have been a number of articles claiming testimony of units operating in the region of Afghanistan closing in on bin Laden, only to lose him due to holes in their perimeter, due to lack of troops.

With regard to the Iraq pull out thing, I don't think we should have as many people over there as we do. As I said earlier, those forces would be of much better use elsewhere. Though possibly overly simplistic and not realistic, I would think the goal would be to ramp up training efforts of the Iraqi police and military, and let them police their own. As their ranks increase, we may decrease our own, until all we have left are trainers and advisers, not an occupying force. Again, I'm sure it's not that simple, as (I would hope) it would have been brought up/attempted before.

I agree that we should have had him. I believe in numerous encounters we thought he was dead. At one point we were tracking him by cell phones used by those that directly support him. Of course, that ended when the Media blew the whistle on "illegal cellphone" tapping in the US.

I don't understand why some people seem to think we need to tell everyone what we are doing and how we do it.

audtatious wrote:I don't understand why some people seem to think we need to tell everyone what we are doing and how we do it.

Agreed. Who needs covert intel when you have CNN?

Pretty much. My uncle was Special Ops at one point and he has a pretty bad view of CNN. Seems he and his group were preparing to go in somewhere (don't remember the details unfortunately) and CNN broke the "buildup" right about the time they were leaving on their op. Would have sucked if they were not able to cancel.

96Qowner wrote:I always ask people about the other option - maybe NOT "finding him" is a better option. Maybe it'd be better if no one ever heard from him again.

If we capture him, then what? The entire universe of radical Islam will rally behind him and ratchet up their violence in righteous protest. And if we announce that we've killed him, we make him a martyr, with the same results.

But what if no one ever finds him? - what if the world just never hears from him again?

Vaporization would work really well. Then a little high tech video work with an ObL look alike telling the world how wrong he was and how...

I like the way you think

Sometimes

Wait until you hear my plans for North Korea!

Heck, maybe just quietly gas a couple mountains ranges where he and his posse hang out.

audtatious wrote:

Pretty much. My uncle was Special Ops at one point and he has a pretty bad view of CNN. Seems he and his group were preparing to go in somewhere (don't remember the details unfortunately) and CNN broke the "buildup" right about the time they were leaving on their op. Would have sucked if they were not able to cancel.

When I was in the AF, we used to call CNN "classified news network"... I couldn't help but smile when their building was damaged in a recent downtown tornado

Sorry man, but if you have a "military mode" you're not a pacifist.

It's a relative term.

(mess with my family, or those I care about, and poppa tiger is gonna bite ya in the butt)

Ewww. Yukky.

I'd prefer a Weatherby at a thousand yards, but that's just me.