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| Bill Quick: More on anthrax... |
| 2002-07-18 |
| Bill Quick points to David Tell's column at The Weekly Standard. Tell asks "Who is Syed Athar Abbas?" Tell's premise is that the FBI investigators' ideological PC blinders are causing them to look in the wrong places for the perpetrators of the anthrax attacks last October. Tell convincingly points a finger, not an American researcher, but at Syed Athar Abbas. Abbas is a Pakistani, which would be the first place I would be looking if I were an FBI agent. That doesn't mean I'd discard any clues that didn't point there, but a Pakistani would ring a lot more alarm bells than some guy in Frederick, Maryland, or a Sri Lankan, or even a bio-Wen Ho Lee. Digging into the machinery of terrorism doesn't lead to Frederick; it leads to Pakland. That's where al-Qaeda is. Al-Qaeda is the group that declared war on the U.S. and attacked us in September — lest we forget. In April, Abbas signed a plea agreement acknowledging guilt in a check-kiting scheme that netted him $100,000. Abbas was one of the guys the FBI tried to look up in the days immediately following 9/11. Abbas wasn't there, having skipped a month before. His lawyer says he'd gone home to Pakland to care for Dear Old Dad, who was dying. Before leaving, Abbas had bought a $100,000 "fine-food particulate mixer" that could be used to mix chemicals — really finely ground chemicals, as small as a single micron in diameter. Abbas didn't go into business creating cake mixes. In fact, he didn't take delivery of the machine, but had it transported... elsewhere. We don't know where "elsewhere" is. Despite his plea agreement, Abbas has refused to cooperate with the investigators who'd like to have a look at the mixer, and the folks who ran it. I was surprised when the investigation of the anthrax attacks veered toward domestic sources. We can only guess what evidence led it there. The evidence that's available to us, the Great Unwashed, points toward an Islamist: the timing, the fact that the first anthrax letter sent overseas went to Daily Jang, another to the U.S. consulate in Lahore, and then, as though to fog those two, to the consulate in Ekaterinburg in Russia, to a joint venture company in Vietnam, and to a doctor in Chile — I'd guess each of these last three was a red herring. If Abbas is a part of the terror machine, he's not the one who mixed up the anthrax, but he could well be a part of the logistics machine that supported the guys that did. It would be a really good idea to pump this guy full of happy juice and listen really closely as he babbles... |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |
| #3 American Moslem reaction to the hits that the United States took from Moslems last September, is unambiguous. First, to civil counter-terror operations: OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. Second, to international counter-terror operations: TREASON. |
| Posted by: RG Fulton 2002-07-18 12:20:11 |
| #2 At the same time, the FBI has made enough mistakes in the past to be cautious this time. They've pointed the finger at someone who turned out to be innocent (Richard Jewell), botched another investigation to the point that it couldn't be resolved (Wen-Ho Lee), and covered up wrong-doing in another (Ruby Ridge). I don't blame the director for shaking his guys and saying, "get it right this time before we open our mouths and look more stoopid." Regards, |
| Posted by: Steve White 2002-07-18 09:28:26 |
| #1 IMHO,the US government has gone to extraordinary lengths to avoid pointing fingers at people from the Mideast. The July 4th attack is a good example of this. I believe that this is due to the fact that a big part of this war involves attacking Islamic terrorists without giving the impression that we are attacking Islam itself. Also, the government doesn't want to fuel a domestic backlash against Mideasterners. On a certain level, this is both charitable and good strategy. But it also underestimates American goodwill and, to a certain extent, makes the government look stupid. I think that most Americans instinctively understand this and begrudgingly tolerate it, but it is still irksome to think that the FBI is wasting valuable resources casing down a ghost for PR purposes. The problem is that Islamic terrorism is a product of Islamic fundamentalism and to combat it we will have to attack a principle part of Islam. At this point, I don't believe that the rest of the Islamic world is capable of disassociating itself from the fundamentalists and then we will be at war with Islam itself. The problem with this strategy is that we have unilaterally denied ourselves sound tactics such as "racial profiling". We know that the terrorists are Mideasterners or Muslim converts. This has thrown a monkey wrench into domestic investigations and has left us vulnerable. So far this has not been a very big problem but I fear that when Saddam's back is against the wall at the end of Desert Storm II, he will use this vunerability to do us grave harm. |
| Posted by: Ray 2002-07-18 09:01:39 |