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Part 2 of a four-part series
September 11: The circumstantial case
By Bill Molson
Online Journal Contributing Writer
The Pipeline
April 19, 2002�In 1997, two things of note happened in
Texas. Representatives of the Taliban, which had recently
consolidated its power over most of Afghanistan, came to
Houston. They were wined and dined by Unocal, one of the
largest energy firms in the United States. Also, the
governor of Texas, George W. Bush, was pushing legislation
which would allow him to store all of his gubernatorial
papers at his father's presidential library, away from the
archivists in Austin, and be protected by the Federal
Freedom of Information Act rather than Texas state law.
Unocal was hoping to construct an ambitious pipeline project
which would transport Central Asian oil to the Arabian Sea.
Central Asia has what is estimated to be 30 percent of the
world's proven oil reserves, second only to the Persian
Gulf. Dick Cheney, who at the time was president of
Halliburton, was quoted in 1998 as saying, �I cannot think
of a time when we have had a region emerge as suddenly to
become as strategically important as the Caspian.�
In 1998 after the U.S. Embassy bombings, talks with the
Taliban were broken off. Then came the attack on the USS
Cole. President Clinton ordered a cruise missile attack on
al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. Despite a connection with
al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden's shadowy terrorist organization,
the FBI's chief anti-terrorism investigator was prevented
from properly investigating the attack on the Cole. John
O'Neill complained publicly that American and Saudi oil
interests prevented him from tracking down or properly
investigating Osama bin Laden and his network. He later
resigned in protest.
Relations with the Taliban got considerably warmer after
George W. Bush came to office. With a cabinet of former oil
executives and consultants, and bankrolled largely by
energy companies, such as Enron, Bush wanted to try to get
negotiations back on track.
Much of what happened in those negotiations has been
revealed by a book published in France, entitled �Bin
Laden: La Verite Interdite� (Bin Laden: The Forbidden
Truth). Its authors are former French intelligence agent
Jean-Charles Brisard and investigative journalist Guillame
Dasquie. They claim that the United States was negotiating
with the Taliban up until August, just before the attacks.
According to the authors, in August, only one month before
the attacks, one of the negotiators warned the Taliban with
the words, �either accept our offer of a carpet of gold, or
we'll bury you in a carpet of bombs.� If their allegations
are true, the words would prove an eerily accurate
prediction of the future.
In May 2001, as reported in the Los Angeles Times, the Bush
administration gave the Taliban government $43 million
dollars, ostensibly to offset farmers' losses for
destroying their opium crops in the War on Drugs. This was
at a time when only three governments in the world
recognized the Taliban.
Pre-planning?
According to several British newspapers, the U.S. was
planning military action against Afghanistan well before
September 11.
In an interview with the BBC, Niaz Naik, a former Pakistani
diplomat and foreign secretary, said that he was told by
senior American officials in mid-July that the U.S. was
already planning an attack against Afghanistan. He received
this information at a UN sponsored conference on
Afghanistan in Berlin. This would seem to corroborate the
�carpet of gold, carpet of bombs� speech claimed by the
French authors. According to the BBC, Mr. Naik claimed that
the U.S. objective was to capture bin Laden and install a
moderate, Western-friendly government in Afghanistan. He
added that the attack would take place from bases in
Tajikistan, where military advisors were already in place,
and that it would occur by mid-October at the latest.
The presence of the military in Central Asia is confirmed by
the British newspaper The Guardian. According to it, a U.S.
department of defense official, Dr. Jeffrey Starr, visited
Tajikistan in January, and U.S. Rangers were training
special troops in Kyrgyzstan. The head of the current
Afghan war, General Tommy Franks, visited Dushanbe on May
16, 2001, calling Tajikistan �a strategically significant
country.�
This does not, by itself, indicate any guilt. It is entirely
possible that the United States had tired of bin Laden's
games, and decided to eliminate the danger once and for
all. It is possible bin Laden got wind of this and decided
to launch a preemptive strike. It would be an amazing
coincidence, however, if the U.S. had planned to attack
Afghanistan last October no matter what, and then terrorists
loyal to bin Laden committed the worst terrorist atrocity
in world history upon New York City only one month prior to
the scheduled assault. A pre-emptive strike? Perhaps. But
the pilots had been training at U.S. flight schools for
more than a year by that time.
One thing is clear, O'Neill isn't talking. He was killed at
the World Trade Center on September 11, where had become
the new chief of security in July 2001.
Secrecy
Bush's attempt to hide his gubernatorial papers in Texas by
making them federal property was noted above. The
arrangement is especially convenient now that Bush has
since made it more difficult to obtain records under the
Freedom of Information Act. What's interesting is that he
started the process in 1997, just as Unocal's negotiations
with the Taliban were gathering steam.
Bush's penchant for secrecy doesn't stop there, however.
Shortly after coming to power, he used an obscure executive
order to block the release of papers from the Reagan and
Bush I administration. He later issued an executive order
that would block the release of presidential records if
either the current or former occupant of the White House
wished them to not be released, potentially forever,
effectively undermining the Presidential Records Act passed
in the wake of the Watergate scandal.
Why was this action taken? Furthermore, why was the
groundwork for it being laid prior to September 11? The
claim of national security makes no sense, as the papers
that are scheduled for release are 12 years old.
Furthermore, why is it necessary to have the ability to
block papers even if the former president wants them
released? Many consider this an attempt to protect
officials involved in the Iran-Contra scandal, which
include many members of the current administration as well
as the current president's own father.
When an open-meeting law prevented Bush's Social Security
commission from meeting privately, the group split into two
so the law would not apply. And then, of course, there are
the documents relating to the vice president's energy
commission, which the Congress is suing to get a look at in
the wake of Enron's collapse. Dick Cheney is keeping the
records secret, and is threatening to fight all the way to
the Supreme Court. Why is he taking such a politically
damaging position? According to him, he fears future
presidents would no longer get sound advice if the details
of such meetings can't be kept secret. But with so many
demonstrated connections between Bush, the energy industry,
and Afghanistan, is there something more?
Cheney Asks Daschle to Back Off
Last January 22, Cheney made a rare private phone call to
Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle, asking him to back off
the investigation into the September attacks. Daschle
refused. The following Tuesday in a private meeting, George
W. Bush made the same request. According to Daschle's
memory of the call, Cheney claimed �a review of what
happened on September 11 would take resources and personnel
away from the effort in the war on terrorism.� Concerning
Bush and Cheney's requests, CNN reported, �Although the
president and vice president told Daschle they were worried
a wide-reaching inquiry could distract from the
government's war on terrorism, privately Democrats
questioned why the White House feared a broader
investigation to determine possible culpability.�
Why was Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle asked personally
by the executive branch to back off from the investigation
surrounding September 11? What possible motive could there
be to not explore, from every possible angle, this vicious
attack on American soil? The vice president's suggestion
that �it would take resources away from the war on
terrorism� is absurd. There can be nothing more important
than finding out how this happened to make sure it never
happens again. Yet, both the president and vice president
asked that the investigation be limited. Why?
Other Relevant Facts
George W. Bush made his first million with an oil company
called Arbusto Oil. One of the investors was the head of
the bin Ladin family business and Osama's brother, Salem
bin Laden. The bin Ladin Group was also an investor in the
American banking and defense firm, the Carlyle Group, which
employs the father of the current president, George H.W.
Bush, as well as former President Reagan's Defense
Secretary Frank Carlucci and Reagan's Secretary of State
James A. Baker III.
Before the attacks, the Taliban hired Laila Helms, niece of
former CIA director Richard Helms, to be its public
relations liaison with the U.S. government.
MSNBC reported that just two weeks before the attack, a
radio station in the Cayman Islands received an unsigned
letter warning of a major terrorist attack against the U.S.
via an airline or airlines. The letter was forwarded to the
government where it sat until after the attacks. Although
it was reported that government officials went to the
island to investigate, nothing has been heard since. While
no evidence exists that the terrorist hijackers went to the
Cayman Islands, it is known as an international banking
haven.
The FBI is still withholding the transcripts and information
from the black box and flight recorder of United Flight 93
that crashed in Pennsylvania.
Next:
In Part 3, we look at the pattern of behavior by the Bush
administration, both before and after the attacks.
Sources:
�Taliban in Texas for talks on gas pipeline� BBC News
Online,
December 4, 1997.
http://news6.thdo.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/west_asia/newsid_37000/37
021.stm
Robert Scheer, �Bush's Faustian Deal with the Taliban,� Los
Angeles
Times, May 22, 2001.
George Arney, �US 'planned attack on Taliban,'� BBC News
Online,
September 18, 2001.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/low/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1550000/1550
366.stm
David Leigh, �Attack and counter-attack,� The Guardian,
September 26,
2001.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4264545,00.html
Lucius Lomax, �W,'s Paper Chase,� Austin Chronicle,
September 28,
2001.
George Monbiot, �America's pipe dream,� The Guardian,
October 23,
2001.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4283019,00.html
Thomas Walkom, �Did bin Laden have help from U.S. friends?,�
Toronto
Star, November 27, 2001.
American Morning With Paula Zahn, transcript. CNN.com,
January 8,
2002.
Chris Hansen, �Warning Signs,� MSNBC, September 23, 2001.
http://www.msnbc.com/news/633017.asp?cp1=1
Editorial, �Flight 93's secrets / It's time to treat the
American
people as adults,� Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, February 28,
2002.
�US Agents told: Back off bin Ladens,� Sydney Morning
Herald,
Wednesday, November 7, 2001.
�Bush asks Daschle to limit September 11 probes,� CNN.com,
January
29, 2001.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/01/29/inv.terror.probe/
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