More Confirmation of Seymour Hersh’s Account

[Ronin Truth]

More Confirmation of Seymour Hersh’s Account (https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/more-confirmation-of-seymour-hershs-account/)

Michael S. Rozeff (https://www.lewrockwell.com/author/michael-s-rozeff/?ptype=lrc-blog)


I do not intend to keep writing about Hersh’s account of the killing of Osama bin Laden. There is going to be a large flow of articles about it, including many that criticize Hersh in various ways in order to undermine what he has reported. So far, I’ve run across 4 articles that I think help confirm Hersh’s reporting. Within them are some useful links too. These articles are here (http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/05/12/bin-ladens-assassination-a-volcano-of-lies/), here (http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/05/12/the-manufactured-myth-of-bin-ladens-death/), here (http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2015/05/12/bin-ladens-end-the-truth-comes-out/) and here (http://www.thenation.com/blog/207001/its-conspiracy-how-discredit-seymour-hersh).

An additional hypothesis that I reject needs brief discussion. Several people think that a news report (http://www.foxnews.com/story/2001/12/26/report-bin-laden-already-dead/) of bin Laden’s death and funeral that originated in Pakistan and was presented by FOX in 2001 is enough to make them discredit Hersh. There are others who think that any report by anyone, including Hersh, saying that bin Laden died in 2011 in any manner supports a government lie and coverup of his 2001 death. One can and should be skeptical of government stories, but it still takes discriminating skepticism in order to select a good alternative theory to the government’s. The 2001 death theory relies on a single unconfirmed source and there is no confirmation by physical evidence. The source cited is a Taliban leader. The date is after the U.S. invaded Afghanistan. The Taliban may have wanted to spread this story in order to end or curtail the American military operations. If this story had been true, then after the 2011 report and possibly before that, the Taliban at any time could have had an incentive to verify the death. They could have exhumed the body and provided DNA or other evidence to confirm the earlier death. This theory has a heavy burden to explain the events of 2011 in Abbottabad, no matter how they occurred. Generalized skepticism about government accounts is not enough.

10:46 am on May 13, 2015

Email Michael S. Rozeff (msroz@buffalo.edu)

The Best of Michael S. Rozeff (https://www.lewrockwell.com/author/michael-s-rozeff/?ptype=lrc-blog)



https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/more-confirmation-of-seymour-hershs-account/

[Brian4Liberty]

Interesting commentary from one of the links in the OP:


What’s striking, however, is the embarrassing editorial addendum to this reporting by NBC’s Andrea Mitchell: in an interview with Chris Hayes on MSNBC, a very uneasy-looking Mitchell contented that this doesn’t contradict the Obama administration’s Official Story in any way.

That’s worse than mere nonsense: it’s a pernicious and conscious lie, and it’s to Hayes’ eternal shame that he sat there without calling her on it. The whole administration narrative is based on the concocted story that we found bin Laden by tracing him through his personal courier: that it was due to the heroic efforts of our intelligence agencies, plus a little torture, that we got our man. (The bit about torture was later retracted, although it was featured in “Zero Dark Thirty,” a Pentagon-sponsored film about the operation).

We are learning a lot more from Hersh’s reporting than how and why bin Laden met his end: we’re learning that our media is among the most servile on earth, and that our political leaders lie routinely, and effortlessly, faking outrage better than the best Hollywood actor. We’re learning that you can’t trust anyone in government and the media (or do I repeat myself?) farther than you can throw them.
...
http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2015/05/12/bin-ladens-end-the-truth-comes-out/

[enhanced_deficit]

What’s striking, however, is the embarrassing editorial addendum to this reporting by NBC’s Andrea Mitchell: in an interview with Chris Hayes on MSNBC, a very uneasy-looking Mitchell contented that this doesn’t contradict the Obama administration’s Official Story in any way.


Mrs. Ex Federal Reserve sees the PR puppet as an honest man even if rest of America sees him as dishonest.

[Ronin Truth]

My flag went up when Barry announced "no bin Laden body".

[Ronin Truth]

Further Confirmation of Hersh and Why bin Laden Was Murdered (https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/further-confirmation-of-hersh-and-why-bin-laden-was-murdered/)

Michael S. Rozeff (https://www.lewrockwell.com/author/michael-s-rozeff/?ptype=lrc-blog)

(https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/further-confirmation-of-hersh-and-why-bin-laden-was-murdered/)Why did Obama order Osama bin Laden murdered? The Pakistanis bargained for his death to avoid their own embarrassment. However, it suited the U.S. also to silence him or they would not have agreed. This was an easy concession for the U.S. to make to Pakistan. He would not be around to tell the world that the Pakistan ISI had known where he was for 5 years and kept him under house arrest. He would not be around to reveal that the Saudis were paying the bills. He would not have a soapbox at a trial. Obama would score big political points. Bin Laden’s death took the spotlight off Saudi support for al Qaeda. It took attention away from his own connections to Saudi hijackers who crashed into the Trade Towers.

Remember that 28 pages of the Senate report on 9/11 are still redacted and they point directly at Saudis. They probably point to key Saudis living in Florida (http://www.floridabulldog.org/2011/09/fbi-found-direct-ties-between-911-hijackers-and-saudis-living-in-florida-congress-kept-in-dark/) who helped organize the attacks and who fled the country. Hence, although the U.S. had waged a 10-year war on Afghanistan based on the excuse that the Taliban had not turned over bin Laden to the U.S., the government when it could lay its hands on bin Laden decided simply to murder him instead.

On August 7, 2011, R.J. Hillhouse published an account (http://www.thespywhobilledme.com/the_spy_who_billed_me/2011/08/bin-laden-turned-in-by-informant-courier-was-cover-story.html) of bin Laden’s killing that coincides with that of Hersh. She firmly thinks that his sources differ from hers. That would provide independent confirmation of both writers if both her and his leakers tapped into the same accurate source of information. That would provide confirmation of Hillhouse’s story (which is essentially Hersh’s story) if Hersh’s leakers learned the story from her leakers. If both his and her leakers turn out to be the same, which she thinks very unlikely, it means that, although there is a renewed effort being made by these leakers to get the story out, where the two stories agree there is no additional confirmation.

The main reason I suggest that her earlier report provides confirmation of Hersh arises from something she said today (https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/05/11/former-professor-reported-basics-hershs-bin-laden-story-2011-seemingly-different-sources/) in an interview, which was
“my understanding was there was great concern with the security guys … Everything that I’ve written on national intelligence, [that] was the first time I ever had a [former] senior member of the intelligence community signal me to basically go black … I’ve never been waved off like I was signaled to [then].”


She was strongly warned by a high U.S. intelligence official to drop the matter and say no more. She says that because of this she destroyed her notes with her sources.

While some lesser intelligence sources wanted to leak the details and set the record straight, the higher officials did not. There are indeed a number of lower-ranked CIA operatives who think that their outfit, the government and the nation are damaged by false scenarios and wars based on phony intelligence. But those in the top echelon wanted to cover up the true story of how bin Laden was found, what happened during the raid, and how is body was disposed of.

The fact that she was strongly waved off tells us that the government wanted to cover up what really happened, which is what she had reported but which was not widely circulated or accepted. The government wanted to tell its own fabricated story. This obvious inference is what supports Hersh’s allegations of various government lies and what supports the Hillhouse-Hersh version of the truth.

A 2012 account of the episode in a BBC article (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-asia-13257330) says “Pakistan was not tipped off in advance about the raid…” That was the official U.S. story, designed to shield Pakistani and Saudi Arabian intimate knowledge of and connection to bin Laden’s compound at Abbottabad. Most stories focused on the details of the preparation for the raid and the raid itself. There was much confusion (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/may/04/osama-bin-laden-killing-us-story-change) over what occurred. The accounts raised the question of why the unarmed bin Laden was murdered. No satisfactory answer was ever given by the U.S. government.

Even though the White House conceded that bin Laden was unarmed, it still argued that the SEAL killers acted properly because weapons were nearby. The story became this: “The latest account, which could not be verified by the Guardian, claimed that Bin Laden was shot in his house when the commandos saw he was within reach of an assault rifle and pistol.” The White House spokesman said “I think resistance does not require a firearm.”

This story, which persists to this day, is a weak justification for murdering bin Laden. Clearly, the intent and instructions all along must have been to kill him on sight.

Bin Laden was ordered killed to keep him from talking about his captors, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. It was to avoid embarrassment and having to deal with the captive through some kind of judicial proceeding. When the U.S. played up its own role in finding bin Laden and played down the role of a Pakistani informant, one goal was the same: keep the spotlight off of Pakistan. Another goal was to keep Saudi Arabia out of the picture. A third goal was to score points with the American public over a victory that was American.

7:49 pm on May 13, 2015

Email Michael S. Rozeff (msroz@buffalo.edu)

The Best of Michael S. Rozeff (https://www.lewrockwell.com/author/michael-s-rozeff/?ptype=lrc-blog)



https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/further-confirmation-of-hersh-and-why-bin-laden-was-murdered/

[Brian4Liberty]

Why did Obama order Osama bin Laden murdered?

Because it's much better to torture some random peasant from Afghanistan at Guantanamo for 10 years rather than interrogate Bin Laden? If Bin Laden is not worth interrogating, then nobody should be interrogated, let alone tortured and held forever without due process.

[Ronin Truth]

Why Was Osama bin Laden Killed and Not Captured?

By Michael S. Rozeff

May 15, 2015

Why was Osama bin Laden killed and not captured? This has always been a question of central importance surrounding his death at the hands of U.S. bullets. It is a question that has ethical, legal and pragmatic significance. If a suspect of any inhumanity or crime is executed summarily without judicial procedures, does that merit moral approval or condemnation? Is killing a suspect who can be taken prisoner legal or illegal? Was killing the chief suspected terrorist of the time and a potential source of information wise or unwise?

There is a deeper question. How does the execution of bin Laden reflect upon the condition of America’s federal government and its administration of power? Anything less than good and strong reasons for bin Laden’s execution places the American system of power and government in a bad light. Anything less condemns both the decision to kill and the system that allows such a killing and does nothing about it. Anything less condemns Americans who approve and applaud such an execution.

My first blog on bin Laden’s death on May 2, 2011 raised this question at the outset. Others raised the question too, but it quickly was lost in the attention paid to other details of the story. We now have a second chance, because of Seymour Hersh’s new article, to focus again on this question: why was Osama bin Laden killed and not captured?

Several thoughtful articles appeared immediately after bin Laden’s killing that looked at this question. On May 3, Geoffrey Robertson countered Obama’s assertion that “justice was done”, pointing out that the execution violated laws. In addition, he argued on pragmatic grounds that capture was a superior option. He punctured the notion that execution was better than the challenges of going through legal procedures.

Paul Campos on May 6 understood that bin Laden was executed, that Obama ordered him killed and that this was unlawful:

“The official White House line is that the team had orders to accept a ‘surrender’ by bin Laden if they could do so without endangering themselves, but this appears to be a fairly transparent bit of legal hand-waving. (Orders to kill bin Laden even if he surrendered would violate both American and international codes of lawful military conduct.) What can be said with confidence is that SEAL Team 6 seems to have carried out its orders flawlessly—and that at the very least those orders put no premium on capturing bin Laden rather than killing him.”

Campos understood some of the benefits of capture:

“If this operation had really been about fighting terrorism, it’s obvious that bin Laden and al-Kuwaiti would have been much more valuable to the U.S. alive than dead. The subsequent interrogation of the two men could well have revealed a treasure trove of information regarding such issues as the relationship between al Qaeda and other terrorist groups, the Pakistani security services, elements of the Saudi government, various financial backers around the world, and so forth.

“Capturing bin Laden would, it’s safe to say, demoralize al Qaeda’s remaining leadership far more than killing him has.”

However, contra Robertson, he went on to argue that “extrajudicial execution” was necessary and a “political reality”:

“The political reality is that Obama almost had no choice but to order something that, as a practical matter, was going to end up looking like an extrajudicial execution.”

Campos’s argument was based on two factors. One was the prospect of a “political and legal circus.” The counterargument is that human affairs are filled with such dramas. Trials can be held with appropriate gravity. We should not sacrifice valuable social systems of ethics and law merely to avoid the fact that people like to gossip, comment and turn many matters into food for amusement. If Obama actually decided to kill bin Laden to avoid “circus”, that would be an extraordinarily shallow reason. If that has been Obama’s reason, it reflects very badly on his character.

His second consideration, political embarrassment, got closer to the heart of the matter although missing the most important political considerations that dominated the decision to kill bin Laden:

“For another, bin Laden’s eventual trial could prove embarrassing to the government in a number of ways. Although his guilt for all manner of heinous crimes could never be put into any real doubt, bin Laden’s historical relationship with the U.S. government was inconveniently complex, going back to the days when he fought the Soviets in Afghanistan with the aid of American money and weapons.”

President Obama made a decision to murder bin Laden, rather than capture him. This was first and foremost a political decision, a matter of power. It controverted justice. It had nothing to do with bringing about justice. Obtaining information on terrorists through bin Laden’s capture that might have saved lives also was ranked lower as a consideration. Both justice and the war on terror were dominated by other values. The central question is what were these values.

That is where the Hillhouse-Hersh findings come in and matter so much. The information is not anywhere near as complete as we would like in order to assess the decision to kill. We are not privy to the inner workings of our government. Therefore, our capacity unambiguously to evaluate the condition of our government and our system of power is diminished. It’s the importance and necessity of making such an evaluation and judging our government and our system of power that require that we use the available evidence and information as best we can, imperfect though that information may be. We cannot rely on the words of government officials. We need legal procedures that give us access to the paper trail that show us how and why such decisions as killing bin Laden are made. We need to know the content of the orders that are given. Without such procedures and people who use them, the secrecy of government prevails. The incentives for misuse of power rise dramatically. No government can function properly without watchdogs and whistleblowers who have a free hand both inside divided government and outside. This is where the existing system is so weak. This is why an article like Hersh’s is so important. This is why constant questioning of government’s actions is so important.

What we find in the Hillhouse-Hersh articles is the suggestion that bin Laden was killed at the behest of Pakistan’s ISI. We do not yet have a more complete account of why he was killed. That would take more leaks of a more specific nature, or perhaps a Congressional investigation. However, the system of one part of government investigating another part is weak. The Executive branch usually resists strenuously and holds back information on grounds of executive privilege and national security. It argues that open revelations weaken its capacity to govern. This is yet another area where we find that government works badly. Checks and balances are weak.

We have suggestions of the political considerations that may have resulted in Obama’s decision. They revolve around relations among the U.S. and portions of Pakistan’s and Saudi Arabia’s governments. Pakistan has close relations with Saudi Arabia. Pakistan is a nuclear power. The U.S. is always interested in assuring that its nuclear weapons are never used. Saudi Arabia has oil that the U.S. is always interested in securing. A living, captured and talking bin Laden, out to defend himself, could have led into what are called “sensitive” areas and relationships among these three governments.

There is another consideration unmentioned in the Hillhouse-Hersh articles: 9/11. A living bin Laden on trial would surely have led back to 9/11 and who was involved, why and how. The main accusation against bin Laden was 9/11, not the other terrorist incidents he was involved with. If U.S. prosecutors had tried to keep 9/11 out of the case and restricted it to some other event like the U.S.S. Cole, for which al Qaeda claimed responsibility, a furor would have erupted among Americans.

The execution of bin Laden is a case that shows that American government is not exceptional. It can murder. It does murder. It has murdered. Many times. Many people, running into the millions. This is a case where justice and rule of law were trumped by considerations of power politics. In such cases, the government attempts to argue that what it is doing or has done is or was necessary, essential, wise and just. It blames others or enemies or circumstances. It suggests that matters would have been worse had it not used its powers as it did. It makes every effort to hide its exercise of power beyond law, beyond justice and beyond decent humanity.

Clearly, as long as we have government in its current form, that government cannot be allowed unimpeded and unquestioned exercise of power, if the system is not to become more and more dictatorial and less and less under control of the governed. Its powers need to be strictly limited and monitored, if it not to become totalitarian. It cannot be allowed to keep its secrets or else its incentives to misuse power grow without bound. It cannot be allowed to dominate the airwaves. It cannot be accorded trusting respect. Everything it says and does must be greeted with demands for a full accounting and transparency. The rules that it must follow need to be clear. They must be followed. One American president after another has broken the rules and gotten away with it. The murder of Osama bin Laden is one more instance of this.

The Best of Michael S. Rozeff

Michael S. Rozeff [send him mail] is a retired Professor of Finance living in East Amherst, New York. He is the author of the free e-book Essays on American Empire: Liberty vs. Domination and the free e-book The U.S. Constitution and Money: Corruption and Decline.



https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/05/michael-s-rozeff/why-was-osama-offed/

[Brian4Liberty]

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/05/michael-s-rozeff/why-was-osama-offed/

Another great article.

[The Northbreather]

Even in my personal life I strive to not take second hand information as fact. So much he said she said going on that unless I am there I try to reserve judgement.

I have zero faith in a story that is 100% government controlled and distributed with zero evidence to back it up. I can't see why any thinking person would.

[Brian4Liberty]

Even in my personal life I strive to not take second hand information as fact. So much he said she said going on that unless I am there I try to reserve judgement.

I have zero faith in a story that is 100% government controlled and distributed with zero evidence to back it up. I can't see why any thinking person would.

Yeah, you have to have to constantly utilize a mental filter to separate fact from speculation, rumor, fiction and lies. And then assign probability on top of that.

One thing that is undisputed by most in this case is that bin Laden probably could have easily been taken alive, but instead he was executed on the spot. Pretty high probability of that being fact. "Dead men tell no tales" is definitely fact.

[Ronin Truth]

Further Confirmation of Hersh and Why bin Laden Was Murdered

Michael S. Rozeff

Why did Obama order Osama bin Laden murdered? The Pakistanis bargained for his death to avoid their own embarrassment. However, it suited the U.S. also to silence him or they would not have agreed. This was an easy concession for the U.S. to make to Pakistan. He would not be around to tell the world that the Pakistan ISI had known where he was for 5 years and kept him under house arrest. He would not be around to reveal that the Saudis were paying the bills. He would not have a soapbox at a trial. Obama would score big political points. Bin Laden’s death took the spotlight off Saudi support for al Qaeda. It took attention away from his own connections to Saudi hijackers who crashed into the Trade Towers. Remember that 28 pages of the Senate report on 9/11 are still redacted and they point directly at Saudis.

They probably point to key Saudis living in Florida who helped organize the attacks and who fled the country. Hence, although the U.S. had waged a 10-year war on Afghanistan based on the excuse that the Taliban had not turned over bin Laden to the U.S., the government when it could lay its hands on bin Laden decided simply to murder him instead.

On August 7, 2011, R.J. Hillhouse published an account of bin Laden’s killing that coincides with that of Hersh. She firmly thinks that his sources differ from hers. That would provide independent confirmation of both writers if both her and his leakers tapped into the same accurate source of information. That would provide confirmation of Hillhouse’s story (which is essentially Hersh’s story) if Hersh’s leakers learned the story from her leakers. If both his and her leakers turn out to be the same, which she thinks very unlikely, it means that, although there is a renewed effort being made by these leakers to get the story out, where the two stories agree there is no additional confirmation.

The main reason I suggest that her earlier report provides confirmation of Hersh arises from something she said today in an interview, which was “my understanding was there was great concern with the security guys … Everything that I’ve written on national intelligence, [that] was the first time I ever had a [former] senior member of the intelligence community signal me to basically go black … I’ve never been waved off like I was signaled to [then].”

She was strongly warned by a high U.S. intelligence official to drop the matter and say no more. She says that because of this she destroyed her notes with her sources.

While some lesser intelligence sources wanted to leak the details and set the record straight, the higher officials did not. There are indeed a number of lower-ranked CIA operatives who think that their outfit, the government and the nation are damaged by false scenarios and wars based on phony intelligence. But those in the top echelon wanted to cover up the true story of how bin Laden was found, what happened during the raid, and how is body was disposed of.

The fact that she was strongly waved off tells us that the government wanted to cover up what really happened, which is what she had reported but which was not widely circulated or accepted. The government wanted to tell its own fabricated story. This obvious inference is what supports Hersh’s allegations of various government lies and what supports the Hillhouse-Hersh version of the truth.

A 2012 account of the episode in a BBC article says “Pakistan was not tipped off in advance about the raid…” That was the official U.S. story, designed to shield Pakistani and Saudi Arabian intimate knowledge of and connection to bin Laden’s compound at Abbottabad. Most stories focused on the details of the preparation for the raid and the raid itself. There was much confusion over what occurred. The accounts raised the question of why the unarmed bin Laden was murdered. No satisfactory answer was ever given by the U.S. government.

Even though the White House conceded that bin Laden was unarmed, it still argued that the SEAL killers acted properly because weapons were nearby. The story became this: “The latest account, which could not be verified by the Guardian, claimed that Bin Laden was shot in his house when the commandos saw he was within reach of an assault rifle and pistol.” The White House spokesman said “I think resistance does not require a firearm.”

This story, which persists to this day, is a weak justification for murdering bin Laden. Clearly, the intent and instructions all along must have been to kill him on sight.

Bin Laden was ordered killed to keep him from talking about his captors, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. It was to avoid embarrassment and having to deal with the captive through some kind of judicial proceeding. When the U.S. played up its own role in finding bin Laden and played down the role of a Pakistani informant, one goal was the same: keep the spotlight off of Pakistan. Another goal was to keep Saudi Arabia out of the picture. A third goal was to score points with the American public over a victory that was American.

7:49 pm on May 13, 2015 Email Michael S. Rozeff

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https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/further-confirmation-of-hersh-and-why-bin-laden-was-murdered/