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Title: New Detail On How Bush Effed Up Hunt FoForr Bin Laden - Bush Turns Deaf Ear To Commander's Plea For Troops
Source:
Washington Post
URL Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-sr ... sama-hunt/lessons-learned.html
Published: May 6, 2011
Author: Peter Finn, Ian Shapira and Marc Fisher
Post Date: 2011-05-06 09:27:48 by war
Keywords: None
Views: 7829
Comments: 24
Excerpt:
When the bombing around Jalalabad intensified, bin Laden fled into the fortified caves of Tora Bora, about 35 miles south of the regional capital. Bin Laden knew the territory; as a young man, he had driven bulldozers there as Afghan resistance fighters excavated miles of tunnels.
In late November, probably within days after bin Laden had arrived in the area, Berntsen's team tracked him to a mountainous area called Milawa, just below the peaks of Tora Bora. Berntsen's men called in airstrikes - a barrage from B-52s, F-15s and plenty more - that lasted nearly 60 hours.
"Our guys were exhausted; they had been hammering Osama for days," Berntsen said. "Finally, bin Laden fled deeper into the mountains."
Berntsen, who was back in Kabul, summoned several members of his team to tell him what they would need to take down bin Laden now that they thought they knew where he was. The response: "We need 800 Army Rangers between bin Laden and the border."
Berntsen wrote to his superiors, begging for troops. His pleas went unanswered, according to a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report on Tora Bora. Without more manpower, Berntsen couldn't risk a ground assault.
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December of 2001, and they were already planning for the Iraq invasion and couldn;t be beothered with bon Laden. What a POS Bush was...
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December of 2001, and they were already planning for the Iraq invasion and couldn;t be beothered with bon Laden.
Grammar...spelling...relevance.
And of course, who's going to proof read this latest example of Bush Derangement Syndrome from the dwarf, given his penchant for editing and violating copyright laws?
Just sayin....
bin Laden's last Facebook Post: 'Brb! Someone's at the door!'
#2. To: Badeye (#1)
Oh Boofer...so boldly predictable...
So excruciatingly boring...
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#3. To: Badeye (#1)
You took him off your filter?
#4. To: Badeye (#1)
Grammar...spelling...relevance.
see tagline:
"Thats because your basically and idiot."
Badeye posted on 2011-04-29 10:30:22 ET
#5. To: Fred Mertz (#3)
You took him off your filter?
Nope. But that doesn't block articles posted in the sidebar. You always see those, no matter if you have the poster blocked or not. Check it out for yourself.
bin Laden's last Facebook Post: 'Brb! Someone's at the door!'
#6. To: go65 (#4)
You really don't have to reinforce what you've been reduced to GOey.
We know.
bin Laden's last Facebook Post: 'Brb! Someone's at the door!'
#7. To: no gnu taxes (#6)
BUMP
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#8. To: war (#7)
Why was the Pentagon so unwilling to send more troops? Recently, I asked Franks to comment on his decision. He reiterated his preference for a light footprint and his concern about the time it would take to put additional troops on the ground. He also said that he could not be sure that bin Laden was at Tora Bora because of “conflicting intelligence” that alternately placed him in Kashmir, around Kandahar, and near the Afghan-Iranian border.
Lt. General Michael DeLong, Franks’s top deputy, recalled in his 2004 memoir that the Pentagon did not want to put many American soldiers on the ground because of a concern that they would be treated like antibodies by the locals. “The mountains of Tora Bora are situated deep in territory controlled by tribes hostile to the United States and any outsiders,” he wrote. “The reality is if we put our troops in there we would inevitably end up fighting Afghan villagers--creating bad will at a sensitive time--which was the last thing we wanted to do.”
Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’??
#9. To: no gnu taxes (#8)
ROFLMAO...the man who let bin Laden go has no reason to lie?!?
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#10. To: no gnu taxes (#8)
Lt. General Michael DeLong, Franks’s top deputy, recalled in his 2004 memoir that the Pentagon did not want to put many American soldiers on the ground because of a concern that they would be treated like antibodies by the locals.
They were afraid of OFFENDING the Afghani's?
Oh for the love of right wing hypocrtical bullshit...
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#11. To: war (#10)
I think I'd trust General Franks on the issue more than you leftards.
Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’??
#12. To: no gnu taxes (#11)
Right...trust the guy who fucked it all up.
Bravo, Paddy...bravo...
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#13. To: war (#0)
What a POS Bush was...
This statement would have more weight and credibility if you could name even one issue that you believe Obama has gotten wrong.
When you can't, it just looks like blind partisanship.
#14. To: We The People (#13)
I've named several.
A) He should never taken McCain's bait and commented about Iran in 2009. As soon as he did, the democracy movement there was over.
B) The stim was not big enough and all of the targeted tax credits should have been open ended.
C) I was always opposed to his Afghani "surge"; although, his decision to ramp op covert ops in Pakistan as well as the drone activity seems to have paid off in spades.
D) I disagreed with his decision to extend the Boy Blunder tax cuts. They ALL should have been left to expire. They were ill-advised at the time and, as I prediected, compounded the fiscal woes of this nation.
E) He should never have abandoned the public option.
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#15. To: war (#12)
One of the recurring complaints against W and his team is the purported failure to capture bin Laden at Tora Bora by not using US ground troops. I believe this is a flawed understanding of the situation as I will detail here.
The campaign in Afghanistan is one of the most incredible examples of the capabilities of Special Operations Forces as combat multipliers. Using only several hundred Americans and thousands of native Afghan troops we routed the Taliban and Al Qaeda from their sanctuary and destroyed them as a military force. Beginning in Oct. 2001 the Northern Alliance and it’s Spec Ops advisers were pushing the Taliban South and East using local knowledge and muscle and US airpower. By the end of November the Taliban were simply trying to escape to Pakistan or slip away and blend back into the populace. The first uses of conventional forces was supporting the fall of Kandahar but there were not large numbers of conventional forces on the ground at the end of November. Also the heavy lift helicopters capable of delivering troops high in the mountains and resupplying them were in even shorter supply.
The last stop on the path to Pakistan going east is in Tora Bora, which is often described as a fortress. It is actually the last bolthole where someone can hide in very inhospitable terrain still in Afghanistan, yet still be only several dozen miles to safety in Pakistan. Better yet the entire area is riddled with hundreds of smuggler’s trails offering a myriad of options for escape. In early December the CIA believed that bin Laden and close to one thousand Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters had made their way to Tora Bora and were sitting tight. The use of local militia had been amazingly successful thus far and given our limited airlift and combat troop levels was really the only option for operations against Tora Bora. The same methods used with the Northern Alliance were employed to recruit several local warlords to provide the troops needed to attack Tora Bora and to secure the escape routes.
It is one thing to question this decision if there was an actual alternative that would have allowed us to use US troops to do the job, but for the reasons I have mentioned and others that was not a realistic option.
http://www.blackfive.net/main/2006/09/tora_bora_did_w.html
Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’??
#16. To: no gnu taxes (#15)
Berntsen, who was back in Kabul, summoned several members of his team to tell him what they would need to take down bin Laden now that they thought they knew where he was. The response: "We need 800 Army Rangers between bin Laden and the border."Berntsen wrote to his superiors, begging for troops. His pleas went unanswered, according to a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report on Tora Bora. Without more manpower, Berntsen couldn't risk a ground assault.
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#17. To: war (#16)
And Franks and others with more experience say Bernstein was wrong
Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’??
#18. To: war (#14)
I've named several.A) He should never taken McCain's bait and commented about Iran in 2009. As soon as he did, the democracy movement there was over.
B) The stim was not big enough and all of the targeted tax credits should have been open ended.
C) I was always opposed to his Afghani "surge"; although, his decision to ramp op covert ops in Pakistan as well as the drone activity seems to have paid off in spades.
D) I disagreed with his decision to extend the Boy Blunder tax cuts. They ALL should have been left to expire. They were ill-advised at the time and, as I prediected, compounded the fiscal woes of this nation.
E) He should never have abandoned the public option.
Interesting.
When I asked you this a week or so ago the only thing you came back with was that he lets himself be bullied.
Would you consider yourself to be to the left of Obama?
#19. To: no gnu taxes (#17)
Sorry...Paddy...the CIA concluded that he WAS at Tora Bora and I challenge your point that the one time candidate for the GOP nomination to the US Senate [NY] has LESS military experience in Afghanistan than Tommy Franks. Bernsten's job in Afghanistan, btw, PRE-DATED the Bush adminstration let alone 9/11 and he was the CIA's front man IN EaStern Afghanistan. This was while Franks was naning a weather station in Alaska.
So...more bullshit from you...
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#20. To: We The People (#18)
No way. I'm a pragmatic who hasn't voted major party for POTUS since Bush in 1988.
Had we not moronicaly cut taxes back in 2002 and 2003, I would have been screaming for them 2-3 years ago.
I do hate republicans. I've yet to meet a smart one yet. And I hate stupidity.
Since 1958 (the year I was born), only twice have I believed the GOP candidate to be smarter than the democrat. That was 1964 and 1984. Barry Goldwatyer was a brilliant man who should have controlled his campaign better and Walter Mondale is a dumbfuck x2.
You can make the case that 1968 was a draw but I still believe Humphrey was pretty smart. 20pts down in the polls and he almost pulled it off.
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
#21. To: war (#19)
You don't know and can't know whether it was possible to catch Osama under Bernsten's conditions at that time. This is nothing more than a vehicle to trash Bush -- the man whose policies accounted for killing Osama.
Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’??
#22. To: no gnu taxes (#21)
This is nothing more than a vehicle to trash Bush
Bush is a leftist, globalist, traitor to this country.
You need to face reality.
#23. To: We The People (#22)
Bush is a leftist, globalist, traitor to this country.You need to face reality.
Yawn
Who would say isn't?
Now, I know I’m not going to change the minds of any of the True Believers…those who read all of Reverend Al’s sermons, and say things like, “You know, global warming can mean warmer OR colder, wetter OR drier, cloudier OR sunnier, windier OR calmer, …”. Can I get an ‘amen’??
#24. To: no gnu taxes (#21)
You don't know and can't know whether it was possible to catch Osama under Bernsten's conditions at that time.
What's worse Padlock.,.,.is that we don't know because he didn't try.
Bernsten said that OBL was there and the US could have got him.
Was he lying?
America...My Kind Of Place...
"I truly am not that concerned about [bin Laden]..."
--GW Bush
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