Bush administration FAILED to capture senior members of al Qaeda in Pakistan

July 8, 2007

U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

By MARK MAZZETTI

WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to capture

senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at the

last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too risky

and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to intelligence and

military officials.

The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence officials

thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and the man

believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense

secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of a

Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes in

Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior intelligence

official involved in the planning.

Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a small

number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred, was

cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and former

officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American military from

operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

The decision to halt the planned "snatch and grab" operation frustrated some

top intelligence officials and members of the military's secret Special

Operations units, who say the United States missed a significant opportunity

to try to capture senior members of Al Qaeda.

Their frustration has only grown over the past two years, they said, as Al

Qaeda has improved its abilities to plan global attacks and build new

training compounds in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have become virtual

havens for the terrorist network.

In recent months, the White House has become increasingly irritated with

Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for his inaction on the growing

threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

About a dozen current and former military and intelligence officials were

interviewed for this article, all of whom requested anonymity because the

planned 2005 mission remained classified.

Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to comment. It

is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned operation.

The officials acknowledge that they are not certain that Mr. Zawahri

attended the 2005 meeting in North Waziristan, a mountainous province just

miles from the Afghan border. But they said that the United States had

communications intercepts that tipped them off to the meeting, and that

intelligence officials had unusually high confidence that Mr. Zawahri was

there.

Months later, in early May 2005, the C.I.A. launched a missile from a

remotely piloted Predator drone, killing Haitham al-Yemeni, a senior Qaeda

figure whom the C.I.A. had tracked since the meeting.

It has long been known that C.I.A. operatives conduct counterterrorism

missions in Pakistan's tribal areas. Details of the aborted 2005 operation

provide a glimpse into the Bush administration's internal negotiations over

whether to take unilateral military action in Pakistan, where General

Musharraf's fragile government is under pressure from dissidents who object

to any cooperation with the United States.

Pentagon officials familiar with covert operations said that planners had to

consider the political and human risks of launching a military campaign in a

sovereign country, even in an area like Pakistan's tribal lands where the

government has only tenuous control. Even with its shortcomings, Pakistan

has been a vital American ally since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the

militaries of the two countries have close ties.

The Pentagon officials noted that tension was inherent in any decision to

approve such a mission: a smaller military footprint allows a better chance

of a mission going undetected, but it also exposes the units to greater risk

of being killed or captured.

Officials said that one reason Mr. Rumsfeld called off the 2005 operation

was the number of troops involved in the mission had grown to several

hundred, including Army Rangers, members of the Navy Seals and C.I.A.

operatives, and he determined that the United States could no longer carry

out the mission without General Musharraf's permission. It is unlikely that

the Pakistani president would have approved an operation of that size,

officials said.

Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had been

hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky government.

"The reluctance to take risk or jeopardize our political relationship with

Musharraf may well account for the fact that five and half years after 9/11

we are still trying to run bin Laden and Zawahri to ground," said Bruce

Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University.

These political considerations have created resentment among some members of

the military's Special Operations forces.

"The Special Operations guys are tearing their hair out at the highest

levels," said a former Bush administration official with close ties to those

troops. While they have not received good intelligence on the whereabouts of

top Qaeda members recently, he said, they say they believe they have

sometimes had useful information on lower-level figures.

"There is a degree of frustration that is off the charts, because they are

looking at targets on a daily basis and can't move against them," he said.

In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military

developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into Pakistan to

carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials said,

various planners bulked up the force's size to provide security for the

Special Operations forces.

"The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan," said the former

senior intelligence official involved in the planning. Still, he said he

thought the mission was worth the risk. "We were frustrated because we

wanted to take a shot," he said.

Several former officials interviewed said the operation was not the only

occasion since the Sept. 11 attacks that plans were developed to use a large

American military force in Pakistan. It is unclear whether any of those

missions have been executed.

Some of the military and intelligence officials familiar with the 2005

events say it showed a rift between operators in the field and a military

bureaucracy that has still not effectively adapted to hunt for global

terrorists, moving too cautiously to use Special Operations troops against

terrorist targets.

That criticism has echoes of the risk aversion that the officials said

pervaded efforts against Al Qaeda during the Clinton administration, when

missions to use American troops to capture or kill Mr. bin Laden in

Afghanistan were never executed because they were considered too perilous,

risked killing civilians or were based on inadequate intelligence. Rather

than sending in ground troops, the Clinton White House instead chose to fire

cruise missiles in what became failed attempts to kill Mr. bin Laden and his

deputies - a tactic Mr. Bush criticized shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Since then, the C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in the

tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success. Intelligence

officials say they believe that in January 2006, an airstrike narrowly

missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who hours earlier had attended a dinner in

Damadola, a Pakistani village.

General Musharraf cast his lot with the Bush administration in the hunt for

Al Qaeda after the 2001 attacks, and he has periodically ordered Pakistan's

military to conduct counterterrorism missions in the tribal areas, provoking

fierce resistance there. But in recent months he has pulled back, prompting

Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to issue stern warnings in private

that he risked losing American aid if he did not step up efforts against Al

Qaeda, senior administration officials have said.

Officials said that mid-2005 was a period when they were gathering good

intelligence about Al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan's tribal areas. By the

next year, however, the White House had become frustrated by the lack of

progress in the hunt for Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri.

In early 2006, President Bush ordered a "surge" of dozens of C.I.A. agents

to Pakistan, hoping that an influx of intelligence operatives would lead to

better information, officials said. But that has brought the United States

no closer to locating Al Qaeda's top two leaders. The latest message from

them came this week, in a new tape in which Mr. Zawahri urged Iraqis and

Muslims around the world to show more support for Islamist insurgents in

Iraq.

In his recently published memoir, George J. Tenet, the former C.I.A.

director, said the intelligence about Mr. bin Laden's whereabouts during the

Clinton years was similarly sparse. The information was usually only at the

"50-60% confidence level," he wrote, not sufficient to justify American

military action.

"As much as we all wanted Bin Ladin dead, the use of force by a superpower

requires information, discipline, and time," Mr. Tenet wrote. "We rarely had

the information in sufficient quantities or the time to evaluate and act on

it."

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/08/washington/08intel.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

"Roger" <rogerfx@hotmail.com> wrote in message

news:4690c98a$0$24695$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

> July 8, 2007

> U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

> By MARK MAZZETTI

> WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to capture

> senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at the

> last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too

> risky

> and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to intelligence

> and

> military officials.

> The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence officials

> thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and the

> man

> believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

> But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense

> secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

> director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of a

> Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes

> in

> Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior

> intelligence

> official involved in the planning.

> Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a small

> number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred, was

> cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and former

> officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

> Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American military

> from

> operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

SEALs and CIA travel light, they always have and they always will. They get

in quick, they get some very specific done quick, they MUST get out quick.

They have to get out quick because they travel light and simply can't

sustain a long fight.

The issue is NOT that it was a small number that grew to several hundred.

The issue is what happens if that group gets bogged down? There are only

two possibilities. Do what Kennedy did in Cuba and abandon them - OR - send

in the troops. Neither are acceptable.

> Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to comment. It

> is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned

> operation.

Probably not. It would require Rummy approvng it then selling it to Bush.

If Rummy didn't approve it it most likely never got to Bush.

> Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had been

> hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky government.

Don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.....

"Roger" <rogerfx@hotmail.com> wrote in message

news:4690c98a$0$24695$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

: July 8, 2007

: U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

: By MARK MAZZETTI

:

: WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to capture

: senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at the

: last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too

risky

: and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to intelligence

and

: military officials.

:

: The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence officials

: thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and the

man

: believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

:

: But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense

: secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

: director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of a

: Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes

in

: Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior

intelligence

: official involved in the planning.

:

: Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a small

: number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred, was

: cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and former

: officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

: Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American military

from

: operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

:

: The decision to halt the planned "snatch and grab" operation frustrated

some

: top intelligence officials and members of the military's secret Special

: Operations units, who say the United States missed a significant

opportunity

: to try to capture senior members of Al Qaeda.

:

: Their frustration has only grown over the past two years, they said, as Al

: Qaeda has improved its abilities to plan global attacks and build new

: training compounds in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have become virtual

: havens for the terrorist network.

:

: In recent months, the White House has become increasingly irritated with

: Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for his inaction on the

growing

: threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

:

: About a dozen current and former military and intelligence officials were

: interviewed for this article, all of whom requested anonymity because the

: planned 2005 mission remained classified.

:

: Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to comment. It

: is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned

operation.

:

: The officials acknowledge that they are not certain that Mr. Zawahri

: attended the 2005 meeting in North Waziristan, a mountainous province just

: miles from the Afghan border. But they said that the United States had

: communications intercepts that tipped them off to the meeting, and that

: intelligence officials had unusually high confidence that Mr. Zawahri was

: there.

:

: Months later, in early May 2005, the C.I.A. launched a missile from a

: remotely piloted Predator drone, killing Haitham al-Yemeni, a senior Qaeda

: figure whom the C.I.A. had tracked since the meeting.

:

: It has long been known that C.I.A. operatives conduct counterterrorism

: missions in Pakistan's tribal areas. Details of the aborted 2005 operation

: provide a glimpse into the Bush administration's internal negotiations

over

: whether to take unilateral military action in Pakistan, where General

: Musharraf's fragile government is under pressure from dissidents who

object

: to any cooperation with the United States.

:

: Pentagon officials familiar with covert operations said that planners had

to

: consider the political and human risks of launching a military campaign in

a

: sovereign country, even in an area like Pakistan's tribal lands where the

: government has only tenuous control. Even with its shortcomings, Pakistan

: has been a vital American ally since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and

the

: militaries of the two countries have close ties.

:

: The Pentagon officials noted that tension was inherent in any decision to

: approve such a mission: a smaller military footprint allows a better

chance

: of a mission going undetected, but it also exposes the units to greater

risk

: of being killed or captured.

:

: Officials said that one reason Mr. Rumsfeld called off the 2005 operation

: was the number of troops involved in the mission had grown to several

: hundred, including Army Rangers, members of the Navy Seals and C.I.A.

: operatives, and he determined that the United States could no longer carry

: out the mission without General Musharraf's permission. It is unlikely

that

: the Pakistani president would have approved an operation of that size,

: officials said.

:

: Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had been

: hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky government.

:

: "The reluctance to take risk or jeopardize our political relationship with

: Musharraf may well account for the fact that five and half years after

9/11

: we are still trying to run bin Laden and Zawahri to ground," said Bruce

: Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University.

:

: These political considerations have created resentment among some members

of

: the military's Special Operations forces.

:

: "The Special Operations guys are tearing their hair out at the highest

: levels," said a former Bush administration official with close ties to

those

: troops. While they have not received good intelligence on the whereabouts

of

: top Qaeda members recently, he said, they say they believe they have

: sometimes had useful information on lower-level figures.

:

: "There is a degree of frustration that is off the charts, because they are

: looking at targets on a daily basis and can't move against them," he said.

:

: In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military

: developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into Pakistan to

: carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

:

: But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials

said,

: various planners bulked up the force's size to provide security for the

: Special Operations forces.

:

: "The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan," said the former

: senior intelligence official involved in the planning. Still, he said he

: thought the mission was worth the risk. "We were frustrated because we

: wanted to take a shot," he said.

:

: Several former officials interviewed said the operation was not the only

: occasion since the Sept. 11 attacks that plans were developed to use a

large

: American military force in Pakistan. It is unclear whether any of those

: missions have been executed.

:

: Some of the military and intelligence officials familiar with the 2005

: events say it showed a rift between operators in the field and a military

: bureaucracy that has still not effectively adapted to hunt for global

: terrorists, moving too cautiously to use Special Operations troops against

: terrorist targets.

:

: That criticism has echoes of the risk aversion that the officials said

: pervaded efforts against Al Qaeda during the Clinton administration, when

: missions to use American troops to capture or kill Mr. bin Laden in

: Afghanistan were never executed because they were considered too perilous,

: risked killing civilians or were based on inadequate intelligence. Rather

: than sending in ground troops, the Clinton White House instead chose to

fire

: cruise missiles in what became failed attempts to kill Mr. bin Laden and

his

: deputies - a tactic Mr. Bush criticized shortly after the Sept. 11

attacks.

:

: Since then, the C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in the

: tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success. Intelligence

: officials say they believe that in January 2006, an airstrike narrowly

: missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who hours earlier had attended a dinner in

: Damadola, a Pakistani village.

:

: General Musharraf cast his lot with the Bush administration in the hunt

for

: Al Qaeda after the 2001 attacks, and he has periodically ordered

Pakistan's

: military to conduct counterterrorism missions in the tribal areas,

provoking

: fierce resistance there. But in recent months he has pulled back,

prompting

: Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to issue stern warnings in private

: that he risked losing American aid if he did not step up efforts against

Al

: Qaeda, senior administration officials have said.

:

: Officials said that mid-2005 was a period when they were gathering good

: intelligence about Al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan's tribal areas. By the

: next year, however, the White House had become frustrated by the lack of

: progress in the hunt for Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri.

:

: In early 2006, President Bush ordered a "surge" of dozens of C.I.A. agents

: to Pakistan, hoping that an influx of intelligence operatives would lead

to

: better information, officials said. But that has brought the United States

: no closer to locating Al Qaeda's top two leaders. The latest message from

: them came this week, in a new tape in which Mr. Zawahri urged Iraqis and

: Muslims around the world to show more support for Islamist insurgents in

: Iraq.

:

: In his recently published memoir, George J. Tenet, the former C.I.A.

: director, said the intelligence about Mr. bin Laden's whereabouts during

the

: Clinton years was similarly sparse. The information was usually only at

the

: "50-60% confidence level," he wrote, not sufficient to justify American

: military action.

:

: "As much as we all wanted Bin Ladin dead, the use of force by a superpower

: requires information, discipline, and time," Mr. Tenet wrote. "We rarely

had

: the information in sufficient quantities or the time to evaluate and act

on

: it."

:

:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/08/washington/08intel.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

:

:

On Jul 8, 12:18 pm, "Billy" <neverm...@cox.net> wrote:

> "Roger" <roge...@hotmail.com> wrote in message

>

> news:4690c98a$0$24695$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

> : July 8, 2007

> : U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

> : By MARK MAZZETTI

> :

> : WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to capture

> : senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at the

> : last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too

> risky

> : and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to intelligence

> and

> : military officials.

> :

> : The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence officials

> : thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and the

> man

> : believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

> :

> : But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense

> : secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

> : director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of a

> : Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes

> in

> : Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior

> intelligence

> : official involved in the planning.

> :

> : Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a small

> : number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred, was

> : cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and former

> : officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

> : Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American military

> from

> : operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

> :

> : The decision to halt the planned "snatch and grab" operation frustrated

> some

> : top intelligence officials and members of the military's secret Special

> : Operations units, who say the United States missed a significant

> opportunity

> : to try to capture senior members of Al Qaeda.

> :

> : Their frustration has only grown over the past two years, they said, as Al

> : Qaeda has improved its abilities to plan global attacks and build new

> : training compounds in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have become virtual

> : havens for the terrorist network.

> :

> : In recent months, the White House has become increasingly irritated with

> : Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for his inaction on the

> growing

> : threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

> :

> : About a dozen current and former military and intelligence officials were

> : interviewed for this article, all of whom requested anonymity because the

> : planned 2005 mission remained classified.

> :

> : Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to comment. It

> : is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned

> operation.

> :

> : The officials acknowledge that they are not certain that Mr. Zawahri

> : attended the 2005 meeting in North Waziristan, a mountainous province just

> : miles from the Afghan border. But they said that the United States had

> : communications intercepts that tipped them off to the meeting, and that

> : intelligence officials had unusually high confidence that Mr. Zawahri was

> : there.

> :

> : Months later, in early May 2005, the C.I.A. launched a missile from a

> : remotely piloted Predator drone, killing Haitham al-Yemeni, a senior Qaeda

> : figure whom the C.I.A. had tracked since the meeting.

> :

> : It has long been known that C.I.A. operatives conduct counterterrorism

> : missions in Pakistan's tribal areas. Details of the aborted 2005 operation

> : provide a glimpse into the Bush administration's internal negotiations

> over

> : whether to take unilateral military action in Pakistan, where General

> : Musharraf's fragile government is under pressure from dissidents who

> object

> : to any cooperation with the United States.

> :

> : Pentagon officials familiar with covert operations said that planners had

> to

> : consider the political and human risks of launching a military campaign in

> a

> : sovereign country, even in an area like Pakistan's tribal lands where the

> : government has only tenuous control. Even with its shortcomings, Pakistan

> : has been a vital American ally since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and

> the

> : militaries of the two countries have close ties.

> :

> : The Pentagon officials noted that tension was inherent in any decision to

> : approve such a mission: a smaller military footprint allows a better

> chance

> : of a mission going undetected, but it also exposes the units to greater

> risk

> : of being killed or captured.

> :

> : Officials said that one reason Mr. Rumsfeld called off the 2005 operation

> : was the number of troops involved in the mission had grown to several

> : hundred, including Army Rangers, members of the Navy Seals and C.I.A.

> : operatives, and he determined that the United States could no longer carry

> : out the mission without General Musharraf's permission. It is unlikely

> that

> : the Pakistani president would have approved an operation of that size,

> : officials said.

> :

> : Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had been

> : hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky government.

> :

> : "The reluctance to take risk or jeopardize our political relationship with

> : Musharraf may well account for the fact that five and half years after

> 9/11

> : we are still trying to run bin Laden and Zawahri to ground," said Bruce

> : Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University.

> :

> : These political considerations have created resentment among some members

> of

> : the military's Special Operations forces.

> :

> : "The Special Operations guys are tearing their hair out at the highest

> : levels," said a former Bush administration official with close ties to

> those

> : troops. While they have not received good intelligence on the whereabouts

> of

> : top Qaeda members recently, he said, they say they believe they have

> : sometimes had useful information on lower-level figures.

> :

> : "There is a degree of frustration that is off the charts, because they are

> : looking at targets on a daily basis and can't move against them," he said.

> :

> : In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military

> : developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into Pakistan to

> : carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

> :

> : But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials

> said,

> : various planners bulked up the force's size to provide security for the

> : Special Operations forces.

> :

> : "The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan," said the former

> : senior intelligence official involved in the planning. Still, he said he

> : thought the mission was worth the risk. "We were frustrated because we

> : wanted to take a shot," he said.

> :

> : Several former officials interviewed said the operation was not the only

> : occasion since the Sept. 11 attacks that plans were developed to use a

> large

> : American military force in Pakistan. It is unclear whether any of those

> : missions have been executed.

> :

> : Some of the military and intelligence officials familiar with the 2005

> : events say it showed a rift between operators in the field and a military

> : bureaucracy that has still not effectively adapted to hunt for global

> : terrorists, moving too cautiously to use Special Operations troops against

> : terrorist targets.

> :

> : That criticism has echoes of the risk aversion that the officials said

> : pervaded efforts against Al Qaeda during the Clinton administration, when

> : missions to use American troops to capture or kill Mr. bin Laden in

> : Afghanistan were never executed because they were considered too perilous,

> : risked killing civilians or were based on inadequate intelligence. Rather

> : than sending in ground troops, the Clinton White House instead chose to

> fire

> : cruise missiles in what became failed attempts to kill Mr. bin Laden and

> his

> : deputies - a tactic Mr. Bush criticized shortly after the Sept. 11

> attacks.

> :

> : Since then, the C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in the

> : tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success. Intelligence

> : officials say they believe that in January 2006, an airstrike narrowly

> : missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who hours earlier had attended a dinner in

> : Damadola, a Pakistani village.

> :

> : General Musharraf cast his lot with the Bush administration in the hunt

> for

> : Al Qaeda after the 2001 attacks, and he has periodically ordered

> Pakistan's

> : military to conduct counterterrorism missions in the tribal areas,

> provoking

> : fierce resistance there. But in recent months he has pulled back,

> prompting

> : Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to issue stern warnings in private

> : that he risked losing American aid if he did not step up efforts against

> Al

> : Qaeda, senior administration officials have said.

> :

> : Officials said that mid-2005 was a period when they were gathering good

> : intelligence about Al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan's tribal areas. By the

> : next year, however, the White House had become frustrated by the lack of

> : progress in the hunt for Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri.

> :

> : In early 2006, President Bush ordered a "surge" of dozens of C.I.A. agents

> : to Pakistan, hoping that an influx of intelligence operatives would lead

> to

> : better information, officials said. But that has brought the United States

> : no closer to locating Al Qaeda's top two leaders. The latest message from

> : them came this week, in a new tape in which Mr. Zawahri urged Iraqis and

> : Muslims around the world to show more support for Islamist insurgents in

> : Iraq.

> :

> : In his recently published memoir, George J. Tenet, the former C.I.A.

> : director, said the intelligence about Mr. bin Laden's whereabouts during

> the

> : Clinton years was similarly sparse. The information was usually only at

> the

> : "50-60% confidence level," he wrote, not sufficient to justify American

> : military action.

> :

> : "As much as we all wanted Bin Ladin dead, the use of force by a superpower

> : requires information, discipline, and time," Mr. Tenet wrote. "We rarely

> had

> : the information in sufficient quantities or the time to evaluate and act

> on

> : it."

> :

> : ...

>

> read more

"Callisto" <rxp3@psu.edu> wrote in message

news:1183913258.076352.71110@w3g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...

On Jul 8, 12:18 pm, "Billy" <neverm...@cox.net> wrote:

> "Roger" <roge...@hotmail.com> wrote in message

>

> news:4690c98a$0$24695$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

> : July 8, 2007

> : U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

> : By MARK MAZZETTI

> :

> : WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to

> capture

> : senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at the

> : last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too

> risky

> : and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to intelligence

> and

> : military officials.

> :

> : The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence

> officials

> : thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and the

> man

> : believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

> :

> : But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the

> defense

> : secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

> : director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of

> a

> : Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes

> in

> : Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior

> intelligence

> : official involved in the planning.

> :

> : Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a

> small

> : number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred,

> was

> : cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and

> former

> : officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

> : Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American military

> from

> : operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

> :

> : The decision to halt the planned "snatch and grab" operation frustrated

> some

> : top intelligence officials and members of the military's secret Special

> : Operations units, who say the United States missed a significant

> opportunity

> : to try to capture senior members of Al Qaeda.

> :

> : Their frustration has only grown over the past two years, they said, as

> Al

> : Qaeda has improved its abilities to plan global attacks and build new

> : training compounds in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have become virtual

> : havens for the terrorist network.

> :

> : In recent months, the White House has become increasingly irritated with

> : Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for his inaction on the

> growing

> : threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

> :

> : About a dozen current and former military and intelligence officials

> were

> : interviewed for this article, all of whom requested anonymity because

> the

> : planned 2005 mission remained classified.

> :

> : Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to comment.

> It

> : is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned

> operation.

> :

> : The officials acknowledge that they are not certain that Mr. Zawahri

> : attended the 2005 meeting in North Waziristan, a mountainous province

> just

> : miles from the Afghan border. But they said that the United States had

> : communications intercepts that tipped them off to the meeting, and that

> : intelligence officials had unusually high confidence that Mr. Zawahri

> was

> : there.

> :

> : Months later, in early May 2005, the C.I.A. launched a missile from a

> : remotely piloted Predator drone, killing Haitham al-Yemeni, a senior

> Qaeda

> : figure whom the C.I.A. had tracked since the meeting.

> :

> : It has long been known that C.I.A. operatives conduct counterterrorism

> : missions in Pakistan's tribal areas. Details of the aborted 2005

> operation

> : provide a glimpse into the Bush administration's internal negotiations

> over

> : whether to take unilateral military action in Pakistan, where General

> : Musharraf's fragile government is under pressure from dissidents who

> object

> : to any cooperation with the United States.

> :

> : Pentagon officials familiar with covert operations said that planners

> had

> to

> : consider the political and human risks of launching a military campaign

> in

> a

> : sovereign country, even in an area like Pakistan's tribal lands where

> the

> : government has only tenuous control. Even with its shortcomings,

> Pakistan

> : has been a vital American ally since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and

> the

> : militaries of the two countries have close ties.

> :

> : The Pentagon officials noted that tension was inherent in any decision

> to

> : approve such a mission: a smaller military footprint allows a better

> chance

> : of a mission going undetected, but it also exposes the units to greater

> risk

> : of being killed or captured.

> :

> : Officials said that one reason Mr. Rumsfeld called off the 2005

> operation

> : was the number of troops involved in the mission had grown to several

> : hundred, including Army Rangers, members of the Navy Seals and C.I.A.

> : operatives, and he determined that the United States could no longer

> carry

> : out the mission without General Musharraf's permission. It is unlikely

> that

> : the Pakistani president would have approved an operation of that size,

> : officials said.

> :

> : Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had been

> : hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky

> government.

> :

> : "The reluctance to take risk or jeopardize our political relationship

> with

> : Musharraf may well account for the fact that five and half years after

> 9/11

> : we are still trying to run bin Laden and Zawahri to ground," said Bruce

> : Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University.

> :

> : These political considerations have created resentment among some

> members

> of

> : the military's Special Operations forces.

> :

> : "The Special Operations guys are tearing their hair out at the highest

> : levels," said a former Bush administration official with close ties to

> those

> : troops. While they have not received good intelligence on the

> whereabouts

> of

> : top Qaeda members recently, he said, they say they believe they have

> : sometimes had useful information on lower-level figures.

> :

> : "There is a degree of frustration that is off the charts, because they

> are

> : looking at targets on a daily basis and can't move against them," he

> said.

> :

> : In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military

> : developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into Pakistan

> to

> : carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

> :

> : But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials

> said,

> : various planners bulked up the force's size to provide security for the

> : Special Operations forces.

> :

> : "The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan," said the former

> : senior intelligence official involved in the planning. Still, he said he

> : thought the mission was worth the risk. "We were frustrated because we

> : wanted to take a shot," he said.

> :

> : Several former officials interviewed said the operation was not the only

> : occasion since the Sept. 11 attacks that plans were developed to use a

> large

> : American military force in Pakistan. It is unclear whether any of those

> : missions have been executed.

> :

> : Some of the military and intelligence officials familiar with the 2005

> : events say it showed a rift between operators in the field and a

> military

> : bureaucracy that has still not effectively adapted to hunt for global

> : terrorists, moving too cautiously to use Special Operations troops

> against

> : terrorist targets.

> :

> : That criticism has echoes of the risk aversion that the officials said

> : pervaded efforts against Al Qaeda during the Clinton administration,

> when

> : missions to use American troops to capture or kill Mr. bin Laden in

> : Afghanistan were never executed because they were considered too

> perilous,

> : risked killing civilians or were based on inadequate intelligence.

> Rather

> : than sending in ground troops, the Clinton White House instead chose to

> fire

> : cruise missiles in what became failed attempts to kill Mr. bin Laden and

> his

> : deputies - a tactic Mr. Bush criticized shortly after the Sept. 11

> attacks.

> :

> : Since then, the C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in

> the

> : tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success.

> Intelligence

> : officials say they believe that in January 2006, an airstrike narrowly

> : missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who hours earlier had attended a dinner in

> : Damadola, a Pakistani village.

> :

> : General Musharraf cast his lot with the Bush administration in the hunt

> for

> : Al Qaeda after the 2001 attacks, and he has periodically ordered

> Pakistan's

> : military to conduct counterterrorism missions in the tribal areas,

> provoking

> : fierce resistance there. But in recent months he has pulled back,

> prompting

> : Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to issue stern warnings in

> private

> : that he risked losing American aid if he did not step up efforts against

> Al

> : Qaeda, senior administration officials have said.

> :

> : Officials said that mid-2005 was a period when they were gathering good

> : intelligence about Al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan's tribal areas. By the

> : next year, however, the White House had become frustrated by the lack of

> : progress in the hunt for Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri.

> :

> : In early 2006, President Bush ordered a "surge" of dozens of C.I.A.

> agents

> : to Pakistan, hoping that an influx of intelligence operatives would lead

> to

> : better information, officials said. But that has brought the United

> States

> : no closer to locating Al Qaeda's top two leaders. The latest message

> from

> : them came this week, in a new tape in which Mr. Zawahri urged Iraqis and

> : Muslims around the world to show more support for Islamist insurgents in

> : Iraq.

> :

> : In his recently published memoir, George J. Tenet, the former C.I.A.

> : director, said the intelligence about Mr. bin Laden's whereabouts during

> the

> : Clinton years was similarly sparse. The information was usually only at

> the

> : "50-60% confidence level," he wrote, not sufficient to justify American

> : military action.

> :

> : "As much as we all wanted Bin Ladin dead, the use of force by a

> superpower

> : requires information, discipline, and time," Mr. Tenet wrote. "We rarely

> had

> : the information in sufficient quantities or the time to evaluate and act

> on

> : it."

> :

> : ...

>

> read more

On Jul 8, 6:06 pm, "Billy" <neverm...@cox.net> wrote:

> "Callisto" <r...@psu.edu> wrote in message

>

> news:1183913258.076352.71110@w3g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...

> On Jul 8, 12:18 pm, "Billy" <neverm...@cox.net> wrote:

>

> > "Roger" <roge...@hotmail.com> wrote in message

>

> >news:4690c98a$0$24695$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

> > : July 8, 2007

> > : U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

> > : By MARK MAZZETTI

> > :

> > : WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to

> > capture

> > : senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at the

> > : last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too

> > risky

> > : and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to intelligence

> > and

> > : military officials.

> > :

> > : The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence

> > officials

> > : thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and the

> > man

> > : believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

> > :

> > : But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the

> > defense

> > : secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

> > : director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members of

> > a

> > : Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo planes

> > in

> > : Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior

> > intelligence

> > : official involved in the planning.

> > :

> > : Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a

> > small

> > : number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred,

> > was

> > : cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and

> > former

> > : officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

> > : Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American military

> > from

> > : operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

> > :

> > : The decision to halt the planned "snatch and grab" operation frustrated

> > some

> > : top intelligence officials and members of the military's secret Special

> > : Operations units, who say the United States missed a significant

> > opportunity

> > : to try to capture senior members of Al Qaeda.

> > :

> > : Their frustration has only grown over the past two years, they said, as

> > Al

> > : Qaeda has improved its abilities to plan global attacks and build new

> > : training compounds in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have become virtual

> > : havens for the terrorist network.

> > :

> > : In recent months, the White House has become increasingly irritated with

> > : Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for his inaction on the

> > growing

> > : threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

> > :

> > : About a dozen current and former military and intelligence officials

> > were

> > : interviewed for this article, all of whom requested anonymity because

> > the

> > : planned 2005 mission remained classified.

> > :

> > : Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to comment.

> > It

> > : is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned

> > operation.

> > :

> > : The officials acknowledge that they are not certain that Mr. Zawahri

> > : attended the 2005 meeting in North Waziristan, a mountainous province

> > just

> > : miles from the Afghan border. But they said that the United States had

> > : communications intercepts that tipped them off to the meeting, and that

> > : intelligence officials had unusually high confidence that Mr. Zawahri

> > was

> > : there.

> > :

> > : Months later, in early May 2005, the C.I.A. launched a missile from a

> > : remotely piloted Predator drone, killing Haitham al-Yemeni, a senior

> > Qaeda

> > : figure whom the C.I.A. had tracked since the meeting.

> > :

> > : It has long been known that C.I.A. operatives conduct counterterrorism

> > : missions in Pakistan's tribal areas. Details of the aborted 2005

> > operation

> > : provide a glimpse into the Bush administration's internal negotiations

> > over

> > : whether to take unilateral military action in Pakistan, where General

> > : Musharraf's fragile government is under pressure from dissidents who

> > object

> > : to any cooperation with the United States.

> > :

> > : Pentagon officials familiar with covert operations said that planners

> > had

> > to

> > : consider the political and human risks of launching a military campaign

> > in

> > a

> > : sovereign country, even in an area like Pakistan's tribal lands where

> > the

> > : government has only tenuous control. Even with its shortcomings,

> > Pakistan

> > : has been a vital American ally since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and

> > the

> > : militaries of the two countries have close ties.

> > :

> > : The Pentagon officials noted that tension was inherent in any decision

> > to

> > : approve such a mission: a smaller military footprint allows a better

> > chance

> > : of a mission going undetected, but it also exposes the units to greater

> > risk

> > : of being killed or captured.

> > :

> > : Officials said that one reason Mr. Rumsfeld called off the 2005

> > operation

> > : was the number of troops involved in the mission had grown to several

> > : hundred, including Army Rangers, members of the Navy Seals and C.I.A.

> > : operatives, and he determined that the United States could no longer

> > carry

> > : out the mission without General Musharraf's permission. It is unlikely

> > that

> > : the Pakistani president would have approved an operation of that size,

> > : officials said.

> > :

> > : Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had been

> > : hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky

> > government.

> > :

> > : "The reluctance to take risk or jeopardize our political relationship

> > with

> > : Musharraf may well account for the fact that five and half years after

> > 9/11

> > : we are still trying to run bin Laden and Zawahri to ground," said Bruce

> > : Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University.

> > :

> > : These political considerations have created resentment among some

> > members

> > of

> > : the military's Special Operations forces.

> > :

> > : "The Special Operations guys are tearing their hair out at the highest

> > : levels," said a former Bush administration official with close ties to

> > those

> > : troops. While they have not received good intelligence on the

> > whereabouts

> > of

> > : top Qaeda members recently, he said, they say they believe they have

> > : sometimes had useful information on lower-level figures.

> > :

> > : "There is a degree of frustration that is off the charts, because they

> > are

> > : looking at targets on a daily basis and can't move against them," he

> > said.

> > :

> > : In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military

> > : developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into Pakistan

> > to

> > : carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

> > :

> > : But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials

> > said,

> > : various planners bulked up the force's size to provide security for the

> > : Special Operations forces.

> > :

> > : "The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan," said the former

> > : senior intelligence official involved in the planning. Still, he said he

> > : thought the mission was worth the risk. "We were frustrated because we

> > : wanted to take a shot," he said.

> > :

> > : Several former officials interviewed said the operation was not the only

> > : occasion since the Sept. 11 attacks that plans were developed to use a

> > large

> > : American military force in Pakistan. It is unclear whether any of those

> > : missions have been executed.

> > :

> > : Some of the military and intelligence officials familiar with the 2005

> > : events say it showed a rift between operators in the field and a

> > military

> > : bureaucracy that has still not effectively adapted to hunt for global

> > : terrorists, moving too cautiously to use Special Operations troops

> > against

> > : terrorist targets.

> > :

> > : That criticism has echoes of the risk aversion that the officials said

> > : pervaded efforts against Al Qaeda during the Clinton administration,

> > when

> > : missions to use American troops to capture or kill Mr. bin Laden in

> > : Afghanistan were never executed because they were considered too

> > perilous,

> > : risked killing civilians or were based on inadequate intelligence.

> > Rather

> > : than sending in ground troops, the Clinton White House instead chose to

> > fire

> > : cruise missiles in what became failed attempts to kill Mr. bin Laden and

> > his

> > : deputies - a tactic Mr. Bush criticized shortly after the Sept. 11

> > attacks.

> > :

> > : Since then, the C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in

> > the

> > : tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success.

> > Intelligence

> > : officials say they believe that in January 2006, an airstrike narrowly

> > : missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who hours earlier had attended a dinner in

> > : Damadola, a Pakistani village.

> > :

> > : General Musharraf cast his lot with the Bush administration in the hunt

> > for

> > : Al Qaeda after the 2001 attacks, and he has periodically ordered

> > Pakistan's

> > : military to conduct counterterrorism missions in the tribal areas,

> > provoking

> > : fierce resistance there. But in recent months he has pulled back,

> > prompting

> > : Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to issue stern warnings in

> > private

> > : that he risked losing American aid if he did not step up efforts against

> > Al

> > : Qaeda, senior administration officials have said.

> > :

> > : Officials said that mid-2005 was a period when they were gathering good

> > : intelligence about Al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan's tribal areas. By the

> > : next year, however, the White House had become frustrated by the lack of

> > : progress in the hunt for Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri.

> > :

> > : In early 2006, President Bush ordered a "surge" of dozens of C.I.A.

> > agents

> > : to Pakistan, hoping that an influx of intelligence operatives would lead

> > to

> > : better information, officials said. But that has brought the United

> > States

> > : no closer to locating Al Qaeda's top two leaders. The latest message

> > from

> > : them came this week, in a new tape in which Mr. Zawahri urged Iraqis and

> > : Muslims around the world to show more support for Islamist insurgents in

> > : Iraq.

> > :

> > : In his recently published memoir, George J. Tenet, the former C.I.A.

> > : director, said the intelligence about Mr. bin Laden's whereabouts during

> > the

> > : Clinton years was similarly sparse. The information was usually only at

> > the

> > : "50-60% confidence level," he wrote, not sufficient to justify American

> > : military action.

> > :

> > : "As much as we all wanted Bin Ladin dead, the use of force by a

> > superpower

> > : requires information, discipline, and time," Mr. Tenet wrote. "We rarely

> > had

> > : the information in sufficient quantities or the time to evaluate and act

> > on

> > : it."

> > :

> > : ...

>

> > read more

Do you know why the Bush 1 and Clinton administrations never pursued

'al quaeda'?

And why Bush 2 didn't either - until after 911?

I do.

"Callisto" <rxp3@psu.edu> wrote in message

news:1183936368.024626.291040@n60g2000hse.googlegroups.com...

On Jul 8, 6:06 pm, "Billy" <neverm...@cox.net> wrote:

> "Callisto" <r...@psu.edu> wrote in message

>

> news:1183913258.076352.71110@w3g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...

> On Jul 8, 12:18 pm, "Billy" <neverm...@cox.net> wrote:

>

> > "Roger" <roge...@hotmail.com> wrote in message

>

> >news:4690c98a$0$24695$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

> > : July 8, 2007

> > : U.S. Aborted Raid on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in '05

> > : By MARK MAZZETTI

> > :

> > : WASHINGTON, July 7 - A secret military operation in early 2005 to

> > capture

> > : senior members of Al Qaeda in Pakistan's tribal areas was aborted at

> > the

> > : last minute after top Bush administration officials decided it was too

> > risky

> > : and could jeopardize relations with Pakistan, according to

> > intelligence

> > and

> > : military officials.

> > :

> > : The target was a meeting of Al Qaeda's leaders that intelligence

> > officials

> > : thought included Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top deputy and

> > the

> > man

> > : believed to run the terrorist group's operations.

> > :

> > : But the mission was called off after Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the

> > defense

> > : secretary, rejected the 11th-hour appeal of Porter J. Goss, then the

> > : director of the Central Intelligence Agency, officials said. Members

> > of

> > a

> > : Navy Seals unit in parachute gear had already boarded C-130 cargo

> > planes

> > in

> > : Afghanistan when the mission was canceled, said a former senior

> > intelligence

> > : official involved in the planning.

> > :

> > : Mr. Rumsfeld decided that the operation, which had ballooned from a

> > small

> > : number of military personnel and C.I.A. operatives to several hundred,

> > was

> > : cumbersome and put too many American lives at risk, the current and

> > former

> > : officials said. He was also concerned that it could cause a rift with

> > : Pakistan, an often reluctant ally that has barred the American

> > military

> > from

> > : operating in its tribal areas, the officials said.

> > :

> > : The decision to halt the planned "snatch and grab" operation

> > frustrated

> > some

> > : top intelligence officials and members of the military's secret

> > Special

> > : Operations units, who say the United States missed a significant

> > opportunity

> > : to try to capture senior members of Al Qaeda.

> > :

> > : Their frustration has only grown over the past two years, they said,

> > as

> > Al

> > : Qaeda has improved its abilities to plan global attacks and build new

> > : training compounds in Pakistan's tribal areas, which have become

> > virtual

> > : havens for the terrorist network.

> > :

> > : In recent months, the White House has become increasingly irritated

> > with

> > : Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for his inaction on the

> > growing

> > : threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

> > :

> > : About a dozen current and former military and intelligence officials

> > were

> > : interviewed for this article, all of whom requested anonymity because

> > the

> > : planned 2005 mission remained classified.

> > :

> > : Spokesmen for the Pentagon, C.I.A. and White House declined to

> > comment.

> > It

> > : is unclear whether President Bush was informed about the planned

> > operation.

> > :

> > : The officials acknowledge that they are not certain that Mr. Zawahri

> > : attended the 2005 meeting in North Waziristan, a mountainous province

> > just

> > : miles from the Afghan border. But they said that the United States had

> > : communications intercepts that tipped them off to the meeting, and

> > that

> > : intelligence officials had unusually high confidence that Mr. Zawahri

> > was

> > : there.

> > :

> > : Months later, in early May 2005, the C.I.A. launched a missile from a

> > : remotely piloted Predator drone, killing Haitham al-Yemeni, a senior

> > Qaeda

> > : figure whom the C.I.A. had tracked since the meeting.

> > :

> > : It has long been known that C.I.A. operatives conduct counterterrorism

> > : missions in Pakistan's tribal areas. Details of the aborted 2005

> > operation

> > : provide a glimpse into the Bush administration's internal negotiations

> > over

> > : whether to take unilateral military action in Pakistan, where General

> > : Musharraf's fragile government is under pressure from dissidents who

> > object

> > : to any cooperation with the United States.

> > :

> > : Pentagon officials familiar with covert operations said that planners

> > had

> > to

> > : consider the political and human risks of launching a military

> > campaign

> > in

> > a

> > : sovereign country, even in an area like Pakistan's tribal lands where

> > the

> > : government has only tenuous control. Even with its shortcomings,

> > Pakistan

> > : has been a vital American ally since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001,

> > and

> > the

> > : militaries of the two countries have close ties.

> > :

> > : The Pentagon officials noted that tension was inherent in any decision

> > to

> > : approve such a mission: a smaller military footprint allows a better

> > chance

> > : of a mission going undetected, but it also exposes the units to

> > greater

> > risk

> > : of being killed or captured.

> > :

> > : Officials said that one reason Mr. Rumsfeld called off the 2005

> > operation

> > : was the number of troops involved in the mission had grown to several

> > : hundred, including Army Rangers, members of the Navy Seals and C.I.A.

> > : operatives, and he determined that the United States could no longer

> > carry

> > : out the mission without General Musharraf's permission. It is unlikely

> > that

> > : the Pakistani president would have approved an operation of that size,

> > : officials said.

> > :

> > : Some outside experts said American counterterrorism operations had

> > been

> > : hamstrung because of concerns about General Musharraf's shaky

> > government.

> > :

> > : "The reluctance to take risk or jeopardize our political relationship

> > with

> > : Musharraf may well account for the fact that five and half years after

> > 9/11

> > : we are still trying to run bin Laden and Zawahri to ground," said

> > Bruce

> > : Hoffman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University.

> > :

> > : These political considerations have created resentment among some

> > members

> > of

> > : the military's Special Operations forces.

> > :

> > : "The Special Operations guys are tearing their hair out at the highest

> > : levels," said a former Bush administration official with close ties to

> > those

> > : troops. While they have not received good intelligence on the

> > whereabouts

> > of

> > : top Qaeda members recently, he said, they say they believe they have

> > : sometimes had useful information on lower-level figures.

> > :

> > : "There is a degree of frustration that is off the charts, because they

> > are

> > : looking at targets on a daily basis and can't move against them," he

> > said.

> > :

> > : In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military

> > : developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into

> > Pakistan

> > to

> > : carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

> > :

> > : But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials

> > said,

> > : various planners bulked up the force's size to provide security for

> > the

> > : Special Operations forces.

> > :

> > : "The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan," said the

> > former

> > : senior intelligence official involved in the planning. Still, he said

> > he

> > : thought the mission was worth the risk. "We were frustrated because we

> > : wanted to take a shot," he said.

> > :

> > : Several former officials interviewed said the operation was not the

> > only

> > : occasion since the Sept. 11 attacks that plans were developed to use a

> > large

> > : American military force in Pakistan. It is unclear whether any of

> > those

> > : missions have been executed.

> > :

> > : Some of the military and intelligence officials familiar with the 2005

> > : events say it showed a rift between operators in the field and a

> > military

> > : bureaucracy that has still not effectively adapted to hunt for global

> > : terrorists, moving too cautiously to use Special Operations troops

> > against

> > : terrorist targets.

> > :

> > : That criticism has echoes of the risk aversion that the officials said

> > : pervaded efforts against Al Qaeda during the Clinton administration,

> > when

> > : missions to use American troops to capture or kill Mr. bin Laden in

> > : Afghanistan were never executed because they were considered too

> > perilous,

> > : risked killing civilians or were based on inadequate intelligence.

> > Rather

> > : than sending in ground troops, the Clinton White House instead chose

> > to

> > fire

> > : cruise missiles in what became failed attempts to kill Mr. bin Laden

> > and

> > his

> > : deputies - a tactic Mr. Bush criticized shortly after the Sept. 11

> > attacks.

> > :

> > : Since then, the C.I.A. has launched missiles from Predator aircraft in

> > the

> > : tribal areas several times, with varying degrees of success.

> > Intelligence

> > : officials say they believe that in January 2006, an airstrike narrowly

> > : missed killing Mr. Zawahri, who hours earlier had attended a dinner in

> > : Damadola, a Pakistani village.

> > :

> > : General Musharraf cast his lot with the Bush administration in the

> > hunt

> > for

> > : Al Qaeda after the 2001 attacks, and he has periodically ordered

> > Pakistan's

> > : military to conduct counterterrorism missions in the tribal areas,

> > provoking

> > : fierce resistance there. But in recent months he has pulled back,

> > prompting

> > : Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney to issue stern warnings in

> > private

> > : that he risked losing American aid if he did not step up efforts

> > against

> > Al

> > : Qaeda, senior administration officials have said.

> > :

> > : Officials said that mid-2005 was a period when they were gathering

> > good

> > : intelligence about Al Qaeda's leaders in Pakistan's tribal areas. By

> > the

> > : next year, however, the White House had become frustrated by the lack

> > of

> > : progress in the hunt for Mr. bin Laden and Mr. Zawahri.

> > :

> > : In early 2006, President Bush ordered a "surge" of dozens of C.I.A.

> > agents

> > : to Pakistan, hoping that an influx of intelligence operatives would

> > lead

> > to

> > : better information, officials said. But that has brought the United

> > States

> > : no closer to locating Al Qaeda's top two leaders. The latest message

> > from

> > : them came this week, in a new tape in which Mr. Zawahri urged Iraqis

> > and

> > : Muslims around the world to show more support for Islamist insurgents

> > in

> > : Iraq.

> > :

> > : In his recently published memoir, George J. Tenet, the former C.I.A.

> > : director, said the intelligence about Mr. bin Laden's whereabouts

> > during

> > the

> > : Clinton years was similarly sparse. The information was usually only

> > at

> > the

> > : "50-60% confidence level," he wrote, not sufficient to justify

> > American

> > : military action.

> > :

> > : "As much as we all wanted Bin Ladin dead, the use of force by a

> > superpower

> > : requires information, discipline, and time," Mr. Tenet wrote. "We

> > rarely

> > had

> > : the information in sufficient quantities or the time to evaluate and

> > act

> > on

> > : it."

> > :

> > : ...

>

> > read more

But they did get them to send cash for library fund and Hillary's campaign

funding and to keep spooks from getting too close to Osama.

Don't you wonder just how many times the Clinton's will get to sell out

America?

Hopefully, they will eventually get the same treatment as the Ceausescu

family in Romania.