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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| New book claims 9/11 hijackers spoke Balochi |
| 2005-04-19 |
| Not sure what to make of this, maybe the hijackers picked up some Baluchi when they were in South Western Afghanistan and used it as a code language. At the end is an excerpt from the book with a strange claim by former CIA operative Bob Baer. Hat tip Bharat Rakshak Some of the 9/11 hijackers are said to have spoken in Balochi in the run-up to that tragedy that grabbed world headlines in 2001. According to Parick Keefe, the author of a new book on how the United States intercepts electronic communications worldwide, terrorists whose conversations are picked up by the National Security Agency, the most secret of American spying establishments, often use slang, obscure references and sometimes speak languages such as Balochi, a language shared by the 9/11 hijackers. Keefe, according to the Daily Times, believes that no one at the National Security Agency speaks Balochi. The world's chatter, as such intercepts are known in the spying trade, has grown so dramatically as to overwhelm the capabilities of the eavesdroppers. Keefe says it is not humanly possible for the millions of intercepts the US makes to be deciphered and interpreted. Bob Baer told me, "You've got to have the linguists. Look at the guys who brought down the World Trade Center. They were all Baluch. Christ, I don't know anyone who speaks Baluch. " (Baluchi is an Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family, spoken by the Baluch people, of whom there are only an estimated 100,000 in the world, mostly in Pakistan.). "The fact is that [Mohammad] Atta and his cousin were both Baluch and who knows who else they had in a support network working out of Karachi." Baer continued. "And NSA barely had any Dari speakers."(Dari is the Afghan dialect of Farsi.) ."I think they just had one when the war started in October. So I can't imagine they trained any Baluch speakers." |
| Posted by:Paul Moloney |
| #10 Of course they do, it's like a second language - Shutting up sir. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2005-04-19 11:10:54 AM |
| #9 But do they speak Bocce? |
| Posted by: BH 2005-04-19 10:24:57 AM |
| #8 The significance is the key role Baluchistan plays in the area. It's wild, the locals are fighting both Iran and the Afghan government and Iran's proposed natural gas pipeline through the area to India is being held up by them (good for us). If Atta et al have strong ties there, it underscores the roots al Qaeda has put down in places like this. |
| Posted by: too true 2005-04-19 8:48:30 AM |
| #7 Or illegals on a jobsite. |
| Posted by: raptor 2005-04-19 7:56:54 AM |
| #6 No real mystery. Its common for people to switch to a language that they believe any listeners don't understand. Ever been around parents who speak a language their kids don't understand? |
| Posted by: phil_b 2005-04-19 3:44:20 AM |
| #5 That would be interesting, it makes sense that Arab terrorists would be taught languages that they know intelligence agencies have no experience with. |
| Posted by: Paul Moloney 2005-04-19 2:22:16 AM |
| #4 I meant that KSM (and his nephews?) could have taught them Baluchi, though I don't think that interpretation is in the spirit of Baer's remarks. |
| Posted by: Dan Darling 2005-04-19 2:18:09 AM |
| #3 That connection is the only reason I posted this Dan, but I had thought that the Arab ethnicity of Mohammad Atta and the rest of the Hamburg Cell had been well established, so I'm not sure how being Baluchi could tie in with that. Unless some of the Saudi muscle used in the hijackings were of Baluchi descent, but again I think their Arab Tribal links are well known. Still I thought it was worth posting. |
| Posted by: Paul Moloney 2005-04-19 1:47:39 AM |
| #2 Balochi Jooos. Wow, who'da thunk it? |
| Posted by: .com 2005-04-19 1:40:55 AM |
| #1 Don't some accounts of KSM's shifting ethnicities say he's a Baluch? |
| Posted by: Dan Darling 2005-04-19 1:40:21 AM |