Posted on May 11, 2015
Seymour Hersh on what actually happened to Bin Laden... do you believe his story?
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Doesn’t Surprise Me One Bit
Hondo | May 11, 2015
As Jonn’s previously noted, it seems that a guy named Seymour Hersh – a longtime investigative reporter well-known for his work regarding the US military and Intelligence Community – has looked into the bin Laden raid. His conclusion?
Well, Hersh says that the POTUS did order the raid. He also says that US Navy SEALs carried it out.
He also says damn near everything else the current gang of fools and tools running the show in DC Administration has said about the raid is . . . well, pretty much bull. From a very long (approx 10,000 word) article Hersh recently published in the London Review of Books: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n10/seymour-m-hersh/the-killing-of-osama-bin-laden
This spring I contacted Durrani and told him in detail what I had learned about the bin Laden assault from American sources: that bin Laden had been a prisoner of the ISI at the Abbottabad compound since 2006; that Kayani and Pasha knew of the raid in advance and had made sure that the two helicopters delivering the Seals to Abbottabad could cross Pakistani airspace without triggering any alarms; that the CIA did not learn of bin Laden’s whereabouts by tracking his couriers, as the White House has claimed since May 2011, but from a former senior Pakistani intelligence officer who betrayed the secret in return for much of the $25 million reward offered by the US, and that, while Obama did order the raid and the Seal team did carry it out, many other aspects of the administration’s account were false.
“Kayani and Pasha” here were Pakistan’s two most senior military leaders at the time of the bin Laden raid.
Yeah, Hersh is a liberal; I don’t much care for his politics either. But he’s also quite good at what he does. He is the guy in the press who first went bigtime public with the My Lai scandal. He beat Jack Anderson to the Glomar Explorer story (Anderson only gets credit for breaking that one because the CIA Director convinced the New York Times – who Hersh worked for at the time – to sit on Hersh’s story about same that was ready considerably earlier than Anderson’s). He’s also gone public with a number of other stories related to various national intel communities and/or governments blatantly lying to the public.
Jonn’s take on Hersh’s latest is quite different than mine. FWIW: best I can tell Hersh has been far closer to right over the years much more often than he’s been wrong when he’s writing about clandestine and/or intel matters. Believe him or not about this one as you like.
I’d not recommend dismissing out-of-hand his main points here, though. Hersh is one reporter who truly knows how to do his “homework” on this kind of subject – then actually does it before he publishes. Plus, he’s been raising questions about the “official” account of the bin Laden raid for approaching 2 years – and calling out the media for not raising more questions about that account.
Again: I don’t agree with Hersh’s politics, but the man knows his business. And when writing about the intel world, he’s got a pretty good track record.
As I said earlier, the article is quite long (about 10,000 words) – but if you have some time, IMO it’s damn well worth a read.
U.S. Officials Upset About Seymour Hersh Report
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/seymour-hersh-bin-laden-raid-officials-criticism-117826.html
Before Raid
After Raid
Yeah, IMO your leg was wet again, courtesy of the current Administration, circa mid-2011. And I’m pretty sure that wasn’t rain.
Hondo | May 11, 2015
As Jonn’s previously noted, it seems that a guy named Seymour Hersh – a longtime investigative reporter well-known for his work regarding the US military and Intelligence Community – has looked into the bin Laden raid. His conclusion?
Well, Hersh says that the POTUS did order the raid. He also says that US Navy SEALs carried it out.
He also says damn near everything else the current gang of fools and tools running the show in DC Administration has said about the raid is . . . well, pretty much bull. From a very long (approx 10,000 word) article Hersh recently published in the London Review of Books: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n10/seymour-m-hersh/the-killing-of-osama-bin-laden
This spring I contacted Durrani and told him in detail what I had learned about the bin Laden assault from American sources: that bin Laden had been a prisoner of the ISI at the Abbottabad compound since 2006; that Kayani and Pasha knew of the raid in advance and had made sure that the two helicopters delivering the Seals to Abbottabad could cross Pakistani airspace without triggering any alarms; that the CIA did not learn of bin Laden’s whereabouts by tracking his couriers, as the White House has claimed since May 2011, but from a former senior Pakistani intelligence officer who betrayed the secret in return for much of the $25 million reward offered by the US, and that, while Obama did order the raid and the Seal team did carry it out, many other aspects of the administration’s account were false.
“Kayani and Pasha” here were Pakistan’s two most senior military leaders at the time of the bin Laden raid.
Yeah, Hersh is a liberal; I don’t much care for his politics either. But he’s also quite good at what he does. He is the guy in the press who first went bigtime public with the My Lai scandal. He beat Jack Anderson to the Glomar Explorer story (Anderson only gets credit for breaking that one because the CIA Director convinced the New York Times – who Hersh worked for at the time – to sit on Hersh’s story about same that was ready considerably earlier than Anderson’s). He’s also gone public with a number of other stories related to various national intel communities and/or governments blatantly lying to the public.
Jonn’s take on Hersh’s latest is quite different than mine. FWIW: best I can tell Hersh has been far closer to right over the years much more often than he’s been wrong when he’s writing about clandestine and/or intel matters. Believe him or not about this one as you like.
I’d not recommend dismissing out-of-hand his main points here, though. Hersh is one reporter who truly knows how to do his “homework” on this kind of subject – then actually does it before he publishes. Plus, he’s been raising questions about the “official” account of the bin Laden raid for approaching 2 years – and calling out the media for not raising more questions about that account.
Again: I don’t agree with Hersh’s politics, but the man knows his business. And when writing about the intel world, he’s got a pretty good track record.
As I said earlier, the article is quite long (about 10,000 words) – but if you have some time, IMO it’s damn well worth a read.
U.S. Officials Upset About Seymour Hersh Report
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/seymour-hersh-bin-laden-raid-officials-criticism-117826.html
Before Raid
After Raid
Yeah, IMO your leg was wet again, courtesy of the current Administration, circa mid-2011. And I’m pretty sure that wasn’t rain.
Posted 9 y ago
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What took Obama so long to find Osama?
The Pakistanis told Obama that Osama was hiding in a corner in the oval office.
ba-dum, dum!
The Pakistanis told Obama that Osama was hiding in a corner in the oval office.
ba-dum, dum!
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You mean they sold UBL to the useful idiots the same way they sold Bowe Bergdahl? A gremlin with ferrari badges As-Is no warranty.
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SSgt (Join to see)
Jonn’s take on Hersh’s latest is quite different than mine. FWIW: best I can tell Hersh has been far closer to right over the years much more often than he’s been wrong when he’s writing about clandestine and/or intel matters. Believe him or not about this one as you like.
I’d not recommend dismissing out-of-hand his main points here, though. Hersh is one reporter who truly knows how to do his “homework” on this kind of subject – then actually does it before he publishes. Plus, he’s been raising questions about the “official” account of the bin Laden raid for approaching 2 years – and calling out the media for not raising more questions about that account.
Again: I don’t agree with Hersh’s politics, but the man knows his business. And when writing about the intel world, he’s got a pretty good track record.
As I said earlier, the article is quite long (about 10,000 words) – but if you have some time, IMO it’s damn well worth a read.
U.S. Officials Upset About Seymour Hersh Report
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/seymour-hersh-bin-laden-raid-officials-criticism-117826.html
Before Raid
After Raid
I have no idea who is telling the truth but this much I do know. the HCR, Immigration and massive down-sizing gives me pause on anything he says.
I’d not recommend dismissing out-of-hand his main points here, though. Hersh is one reporter who truly knows how to do his “homework” on this kind of subject – then actually does it before he publishes. Plus, he’s been raising questions about the “official” account of the bin Laden raid for approaching 2 years – and calling out the media for not raising more questions about that account.
Again: I don’t agree with Hersh’s politics, but the man knows his business. And when writing about the intel world, he’s got a pretty good track record.
As I said earlier, the article is quite long (about 10,000 words) – but if you have some time, IMO it’s damn well worth a read.
U.S. Officials Upset About Seymour Hersh Report
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/05/seymour-hersh-bin-laden-raid-officials-criticism-117826.html
Before Raid
After Raid
I have no idea who is telling the truth but this much I do know. the HCR, Immigration and massive down-sizing gives me pause on anything he says.
U.S. officials fuming over Hersh account of bin Laden raid
The Obama administration is hotly disputing the investigative reporter’s version of events.
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More About Seymour Hersh
Seymour Hersh is a crackpot
Jonn Lilyea | May 11, 2015
Everyone has been sending me these links to articles about Seymour Hersh charging that Obama lied about the assassination of bin laden. Seriously, people? Seymour Hersh? Hersh is the fellow who charged that Darth Cheney had a secret assassination team that was taking out the Bush Administration’s political enemies. His sources? Well they were anonymous – in other words he was using the voices in his head.
The latest Hersh “scandal”?
The principal claims that Hersh’s article makes, which largely rely on the assertions of a single, unnamed, retired senior U.S. intelligence official [voices in his head], are:
• That the 2011 U.S. Navy SEAL raid on the Abbottabad compound where bin Laden was hiding in northern Pakistan was not a firefight in which SEALs went into a dangerous and unknown situation, but a setup in which Pakistan’s military had been holding bin Laden prisoner in Abbottabad for five years and simply made him available to the SEALs who flew in helicopters to the compound on the night of the raid.
• An officer from Pakistan’s powerful military intelligence agency ISI accompanied the SEALs on the raid and showed them around the Abbottabad compound, and the only shots fired that night were the ones that the SEALs fired to kill bin Laden.
• A “walk in” to the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad tipped off the CIA that bin Laden was living in the Abbottabad compound, and it was not true — despite the statements of multiple U.S. officials after the raid — that the CIA had traced back one of bin Laden’s couriers to the Abbottabad compound and built a circumstantial case that bin Laden was living there.
• Saudi Arabia was financing bin Laden’s upkeep in his Abbottabad compound.
• A Pakistani army doctor obtained DNA from bin Laden that proved he was in Abbottabad, proof that was provided to the States so that all the supposed uncertainty — cited by Obama administration officials after the raid — about whether bin Laden was actually living in the compound was a lie.
• The “most blatant lie,” according to Hersh, was that “Pakistan’s two most senior military leaders — General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, chief of the army staff, and General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, director general of the ISI — were never informed” in advance of the U.S. raid on the bin Laden compound.
Yeah, well, if you thought that Hersh was the king of the black helicopter theorists during the Bush Administration, what would make you think that he has been rehabilitated? Yes, I want to believe all of the crazy shit in regards to Obama, but I’m not ready to climb aboard the Hersh Crazy-Train to Blackhelicoptertown. He wrote one decent expose` forty years ago and he thinks that it gives him the credibility to write whatever he wants these days.
Seymour Hersh is a crackpot
Jonn Lilyea | May 11, 2015
Everyone has been sending me these links to articles about Seymour Hersh charging that Obama lied about the assassination of bin laden. Seriously, people? Seymour Hersh? Hersh is the fellow who charged that Darth Cheney had a secret assassination team that was taking out the Bush Administration’s political enemies. His sources? Well they were anonymous – in other words he was using the voices in his head.
The latest Hersh “scandal”?
The principal claims that Hersh’s article makes, which largely rely on the assertions of a single, unnamed, retired senior U.S. intelligence official [voices in his head], are:
• That the 2011 U.S. Navy SEAL raid on the Abbottabad compound where bin Laden was hiding in northern Pakistan was not a firefight in which SEALs went into a dangerous and unknown situation, but a setup in which Pakistan’s military had been holding bin Laden prisoner in Abbottabad for five years and simply made him available to the SEALs who flew in helicopters to the compound on the night of the raid.
• An officer from Pakistan’s powerful military intelligence agency ISI accompanied the SEALs on the raid and showed them around the Abbottabad compound, and the only shots fired that night were the ones that the SEALs fired to kill bin Laden.
• A “walk in” to the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad tipped off the CIA that bin Laden was living in the Abbottabad compound, and it was not true — despite the statements of multiple U.S. officials after the raid — that the CIA had traced back one of bin Laden’s couriers to the Abbottabad compound and built a circumstantial case that bin Laden was living there.
• Saudi Arabia was financing bin Laden’s upkeep in his Abbottabad compound.
• A Pakistani army doctor obtained DNA from bin Laden that proved he was in Abbottabad, proof that was provided to the States so that all the supposed uncertainty — cited by Obama administration officials after the raid — about whether bin Laden was actually living in the compound was a lie.
• The “most blatant lie,” according to Hersh, was that “Pakistan’s two most senior military leaders — General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, chief of the army staff, and General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, director general of the ISI — were never informed” in advance of the U.S. raid on the bin Laden compound.
Yeah, well, if you thought that Hersh was the king of the black helicopter theorists during the Bush Administration, what would make you think that he has been rehabilitated? Yes, I want to believe all of the crazy shit in regards to Obama, but I’m not ready to climb aboard the Hersh Crazy-Train to Blackhelicoptertown. He wrote one decent expose` forty years ago and he thinks that it gives him the credibility to write whatever he wants these days.
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SGT Scott Bailey
SGT Bodine, you are right on the money. But whenever FOX news or some other entity throws these stories out there, they rely on the fact that people won't do their homework to verify. Because they have so many people hating our President, they know they won't do the research. And it doesn't matter. Facts just get in their way. Good Job SGT Bodine. Everyone should investigate accusations before they make themselves look like idiots. I do not like people disrespecting our military capabilities. We have the best military in the world. The rest of the world knows that, but this reporter thinks he's smarter than the rest of the world. A lot of these 911 reporters gave a lot of false information, or unconfirmed, because the public was in such despair, they believed all they heard. Well, except positive things about President Obama.
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I think there will always be conspiracy theories! I think in the end it doesn't matter in the long-run as much if he is gone or not, someone else will take his spot and be just as dangerous
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SGT (Join to see)
LTC David S. Chang, ChFC®, CLU® , I agree with you 100% it's always been that way.
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