Sunday, April 23, 2006

Next Degree of Separation

Four years ago, the primary goal of USA anti-terrorist operations was to capture and kill Osama Bin Laden. Since that was not achievable, we consoled ourselves by 'taking care' of an astounding number of No.2’s of al-Qaida. Obviously, that work is nearing completion (although the most famous No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri, is still at large). The publicity about the killings of the people who are related to the No. 2’s has now started. How about the bombings and killings of women and children in the process? Do not worry. They are all connected some way to Osama. Haven’t you heard of the ‘six degrees of separation’?

Thursday, April 13, 2006

Proxy Bin Laden Trial

I find the replay of the horrors of 9/11 in the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui (the purported 20th hijacker) quite disturbing and unnecessary. Moussaoui is accused of not warning the FBI that the 9/11 attack was imminent. To me, this is a flimsy excuse for the incompetence of the FBI. When they arrested Moussaoui, they knew that he could be a terrorist who may be getting trained to hijack a plane and crash it (as he was not interested in learning how to take off and land a plane). But FBI wanted to him to actually confirm it before taking any action. He did not do that. So, 9/11 is his fault! This is like a student who flunked the exam, blaming his parents for not waking him up early on the day of the exam. The fact Moussaoui is a mentally unstable person, who quite possibly was already dropped from the team of 9/11 terrorists, is conveniently ignored. The testimonies of witnesses, playing of the cockpit tapes etc. are required if Osama Bin Laden is on trial. Since they cannot get Osama, why not use this trial as an opportunity to rekindle the fear and anger of the people? It may help to justify the war in Iraq!