Al-Qaeda leader Bin Laden 'dead'. Again.

[Jan Klimkowski]

Some of the details, the conflicting details, are informative. Xinhua reported a Pakistani helicopter was fired on, one Pakistani helicopter (that one or more sent after that event?) was downed and there was a gun battle at the house. The US claims they had a helicopter that went down due to "unexpectedly hot air" at the property. It seems plausible either the ISI went in to bust up a Blackwater/CIA safehouse, or the US went in to rescue an "asset" held in an undisclosed ISI location. Either possibility could apply to bin Laden, but didn't, because he wasn't there.

Helen - good to see you posting again.

Interesting thoughts. I posted the Xinhau version (post #59), based on alleged Pakistani eye witness accounts, earlier in this thread.

It's a wildcard, but I wouldn't be greatly surprized if this wasn't a botched TF373 or Blackwater/Xe op to extract one of their own.

The location of the safe house clearly identifies it as an ISI location, and it has doubtless hosted numerous VIP guests from across the spectrum.

The WHY NOW question shows "prior knowledge" of impending hostilities on Pakistan's part, whose foreign minister recently (last week or two) cinched a deal with Saudi Arabia for a new military partnership, a special relationship-type deal. Pakistan is moving toward a closer alliance with China away from the US, which isn't new, Pakistan has made the same overtures before, but something new is at work, probably Saudi concerns the US is burning its proxy dictators in the Arab world.

Yes. And Prof Akbar Ahmed's comments, which I posted a couple of pages back, (post #115) also clearly state Pakistani complicity and foreknowledge. Indeed, Akbar Ahmed suggests that the entire charade was instigated and staged by high level ISI elements.

Interpreting the Mickey Leaks can lead to the opposite conclusion: that Mickey released the info on Abbottabad on schedule to order to create a backstory for the US action. Still, there is the problem of the hurried and amateur keystone-kop style cover operation, two fake dead bin Laden photoshops not worthy of 4chan into this. There is also the problem of flags and flowers assembling in NYC and DC before the announcement was made in the wee hours, jumping the gunship at a time when the most diehard patriot could be expected to arrive fashionably late dressed rather informally.

My own judgement on the latest Wikileaks material, and it's distillation through MSM filters, is that the WikiMessage came straight from Langley.

I gave this production two thumbs down while recognizing that some of the players probably have genuine talent. The problem was at the organizational level, and reflects real desperation on the part of the Obama administration.

:angeldevil:

Also, Abbottabad happens to have a poem written about it. Funny thing, since Abbott is an anglicized Aramaic word for father. In the case of the Pakistani gated community of the same name, it just so happens to come from the surname of the man who wrote the poem about the place (he) named after him(self):

(snip the doggerel)

Major James Abbott, Knight Commander of the Order of Bath, ~1853

That's quality.

:gossip: