NY Times: BUSH GIVES UP on OSAMA

[PalJoey]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 9:58am

I dunno. Maybe he never really wanted to catch him anyway. Worst president ever.

===

C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden

By MARK MAZZETTI
Published: July 4, 2006

WASHINGTON, July 3 — The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday.

The unit, known as Alec Station, was disbanded late last year and its analysts reassigned within the C.I.A. Counterterrorist Center, the officials said.

The decision is a milestone for the agency, which formed the unit before Osama bin Laden became a household name and bolstered its ranks after the Sept. 11 attacks, when President Bush pledged to bring Mr. bin Laden to justice "dead or alive."

The realignment reflects a view that Al Qaeda is no longer as hierarchical as it once was, intelligence officials said, and a growing concern about Qaeda-inspired groups that have begun carrying out attacks independent of Mr. bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Agency officials said that tracking Mr. bin Laden and his deputies remained a high priority, and that the decision to disband the unit was not a sign that the effort had slackened. Instead, the officials said, it reflects a belief that the agency can better deal with high-level threats by focusing on regional trends rather than on specific organizations or individuals.

"The efforts to find Osama bin Laden are as strong as ever," said Jennifer Millerwise Dyck, a C.I.A. spokeswoman. "This is an agile agency, and the decision was made to ensure greater reach and focus."

The decision to close the unit was first reported Monday by National Public Radio.

Michael Scheuer, a former senior C.I.A. official who was the first head of the unit, said the move reflected a view within the agency that Mr. bin Laden was no longer the threat he once was.

Mr. Scheuer said that view was mistaken.

"This will clearly denigrate our operations against Al Qaeda," he said. "These days at the agency, bin Laden and Al Qaeda appear to be treated merely as first among equals."

In recent years, the war in Iraq has stretched the resources of the intelligence agencies and the Pentagon, generating new priorities for American officials. For instance, much of the military's counterterrorism units, like the Army's Delta Force, had been redirected from the hunt for Mr. bin Laden to the search for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed last month in Iraq.

An intelligence official who was granted anonymity to discuss classified information said the closing of the bin Laden unit reflected a greater grasp of the organization. "Our understanding of Al Qaeda has greatly evolved from where it was in the late 1990's," the official said, but added, "There are still people who wake up every day with the job of trying to find bin Laden."

Established in 1996, when Mr. bin Laden's calls for global jihad were a source of increasing concern for officials in Washington, Alec Station operated in a similar fashion to that of other agency stations around the globe.

The two dozen staff members who worked at the station, which was named after Mr. Scheuer's son and was housed in leased offices near agency headquarters in northern Virginia, issued regular cables to the agency about Mr. bin Laden's growing abilities and his desire to strike American targets throughout the world.

In his book "Ghost Wars," which chronicles the agency's efforts to hunt Mr. bin Laden in the years before the Sept. 11 attacks, Steve Coll wrote that some inside the agency likened Alec Station to a cult that became obsessed with Al Qaeda.

"The bin Laden unit's analysts were so intense about their work that they made some of their C.I.A. colleagues uncomfortable," Mr. Coll wrote. Members of Alec Station "called themselves 'the Manson Family' because they had acquired a reputation for crazed alarmism about the rising Al Qaeda threat."

Intelligence officials said Alec Station was disbanded after Robert Grenier, who until February was in charge of the Counterterrorist Center, decided the agency needed to reorganize to better address constant changes in terrorist organizations.
C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden

[iflitifloat]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:15am

They can spin it any way they want to, call it a reorganization or streamlining in the name of efficiency...whatever, but it still amounts to a downscaling of the commitment to find Osama.

We ought to spend less time creating new terrorists in Iraq and redouble our efforts to find the guys who really DID attack us.

Updated On: 7/4/06 at 10:15 AM

[YouWantitWhen????]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:23am

This just made me spitting mad when I read it yesterday.

But then I realized, Bush never wanted to catch Osama. There are too many connections between the Bush family and the Bin Laden family.

Maybe we can go attack another country that had nothing to do with 9/11 to further distract people from the truth. I hear Iceland is available.
Updated On: 7/4/06 at 10:23 AM

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:27am

Amazing. Simply amazing. As it is I've always been suspicious of how it's possible that with all our technology we haven't been able to find him -- now the answer is clear. We've never really been trying. Just wonderful.

Happy Birthday, America.

[spiderdj82]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:33am

It just amazes me that these people do not care what history will say about them.

[soapguy17]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:40am

Wow, Beautiful.

[YouWantitWhen????]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:50am

History is written by the dead.

Or, as Bush Duh put it "History, we don’t know. We’ll all be dead.’

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:55am

YWIW, I've heard that before, and I still cannot believe he said that. Though, nothing should shock me anymore with this one, I suppose.

Let alone worst president ever, possibly dumbest person ever. The lists of quotes like that are mind-numbing.

Anyway. My mom has constantly been saying that Bush never wanted to find Bin Laden; she would tell me "if they really wanted to find him, they'd have found him by now," but rather, by "pursuing the search," Bush could look more diligent and committed.

What a dumbass. I think I hate him. Not only does he give up, but he announces it; does he think people across the world have no access to U.S. news?

And in light of last night's discussion, this, people, is clearly why we should all be f*cking patriotic. Hooray for America, the land of the inept.

Updated On: 7/4/06 at 10:55 AM

[YouWantitWhen????]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 10:58am

For Em:

How does the president think history will judge him for going to war in Iraq?

“After the second interview with him on Dec. 11, we got up and walked over to one of the doors. There are all of these doors in the Oval Office that lead outside. And he had his hands in his pocket, and I just asked, ‘Well, how is history likely to judge your Iraq war,’” says Woodward.

“And he said, ‘History,’ and then he took his hands out of his pocket and kind of shrugged and extended his hands as if this is a way off. And then he said, ‘History, we don’t know. We’ll all be dead.’”
Woodward Shares War Secrets

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 11:01am

Wait, I'm a little confused; they're disbanding the unit that had been designated for finding him, but at the same time insisting that the effort won't be diminished? How is that possible? Are they giving up or not? Does this mean they're actually stopping and lying about it, or really just scaling down?

Updated On: 7/4/06 at 11:01 AM

[YouWantitWhen????]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 11:07am

Like I said, he is hiding in Iceland.

Forget Pakistan or Afghanistan - focus now on Iceland.

If you look away, you are against us and now support terrorism.

Forget Osama, Focus on Iceland, Forget Osmaa Focus on Iceland.


Note: I believe it is a "reallocation of resources". Whenever that happens in the real world, it means some business unit is closing and efforts are going elsewhere. But, I don't think they will give up entirely on looking for him. Which means now that they are not even trying, perhaps they will finally catch him.

[opiv]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 11:10am

And the fact that bin Laden and his family were able to leave the country a couple days after 9/11...

I just don't get Bush at all.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 11:11am

So... the effort is lessened and if they find him, they find him? Like, if he just happens to stroll by?

It just says too much that they're even lessening the efforts. After what he's responsible for, that should never happen, even if only as a symbol. Bush is making himself look like an insensitive asshole. What, five years have gone by so now it's not important to try to find him anymore?

[Auggie27]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 2:15pm

Why look for Osama when you can go after Bill Keller of the NY Times? Whom at least one conservative pundits feels deserves to be "executed for treason." Happy 4th.

[DG]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 2:19pm

"And the fact that bin Laden and his family were able to leave the country a couple days after 9/11... "

Just to be clear, while there were relatives of his here who were flown out, Osama was not.

[opiv]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 2:25pm

Oh, for some reason I though he was too. Still, stupid thing to do.

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 2:36pm

Mini-scene

Setting: Streets of Afghanistan.
Bush is on a tour of the country, some years after his presidency.

Bush (To secret service man, pointing across street) - Hey, isn't that. . .

Secret Service Man: Couldn't be...

Bush: Hey, Osama! Osama!

Osama (sees Bush, waves): Hey! Ooooh, looks like you finally caught me!

Bush: Hey hey, looks like it. Hey look, Secret Service Guy, I caught Osama!

Secret Service Guy: Always the last place you look.

(All laugh)
End scene.

[Cruel_Sandwich]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 3:29pm

well that's nice...

[papalovesmambo]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 3:55pm

gee, it couldn't possibly be a psy-op, could it? i mean it would be completely and totally out of character for this administration to use the leaks that plague it (and the paper that thrives upon them) to let obl think he's not a priority. i mean that could never happen. why, i bet if he thought he was not a priority he might do something stupid like think he's safe and use a method of communication or travel that he'd previously not used because he was worried about getting caught.

nah, couldn't be anything like that.

[jrb_actor]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 4:35pm

papa, you must get dizzy from all that spinning

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 4:41pm

DAME - I don't speak French :)

[DAME]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 5:06pm

Well it was Spanish. But somehow they were mis informed and thought it was dirty because I got deleated.

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/4/06 at 5:12pm

I know it was Spanish - it was a lame, failed attempt at humor. Hence the little smiley dude.