Has Bush finally lost it?
Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2005 5:39 pm
Bullshitologists wanna rate this?EXCLUSIVE: BUSH PLOT TO BOMB HIS ARAB ALLY
Madness of war memo
By Kevin Maguire And Andy Lines
Picture of George Bush laughing
PRESIDENT Bush planned to bomb Arab TV station al-Jazeera in friendly Qatar, a "Top Secret" No 10 memo reveals.
But he was talked out of it at a White House summit by Tony Blair, who said it would provoke a worldwide backlash.
A source said: "There's no doubt what Bush wanted, and no doubt Blair didn't want him to do it." Al-Jazeera is accused by the US of fuelling the Iraqi insurgency.
The attack would have led to a massacre of innocents on the territory of a key ally, enraged the Middle East and almost certainly have sparked bloody retaliation.
A source said last night: "The memo is explosive and hugely damaging to Bush.
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"He made clear he wanted to bomb al-Jazeera in Qatar and elsewhere. Blair replied that would cause a big problem.
"There's no doubt what Bush wanted to do - and no doubt Blair didn't want him to do it."
A Government official suggested that the Bush threat had been "humorous, not serious".
But another source declared: "Bush was deadly serious, as was Blair. That much is absolutely clear from the language used by both men."
Yesterday former Labour Defence Minister Peter Kilfoyle challenged Downing Street to publish the five-page transcript of the two leaders' conversation. He said: "It's frightening to think that such a powerful man as Bush can propose such cavalier actions.
"I hope the Prime Minister insists this memo be published. It gives an insight into the mindset of those who were the architects of war."
Bush disclosed his plan to target al-Jazeera, a civilian station with a huge Mid-East following, at a White House face-to-face with Mr Blair on April 16 last year.
At the time, the US was launching an all-out assault on insurgents in the Iraqi town of Fallujah.
Al-Jazeera infuriated Washington and London by reporting from behind rebel lines and broadcasting pictures of dead soldiers, private contractors and Iraqi victims.
The station, watched by millions, has also been used by bin Laden and al-Qaeda to broadcast atrocities and to threaten the West.
Al-Jazeera's HQ is in the business district of Qatar's capital, Doha.
Its single-storey buildings would have made an easy target for bombers. As it is sited away from residential areas, and more than 10 miles from the US's desert base in Qatar, there would have been no danger of "collateral damage".
Dozens of al-Jazeera staff at the HQ are not, as many believe, Islamic fanatics. Instead, most are respected and highly trained technicians and journalists.
To have wiped them out would have been equivalent to bombing the BBC in London and the most spectacular foreign policy disaster since the Iraq War itself.
The No 10 memo now raises fresh doubts over US claims that previous attacks against al-Jazeera staff were military errors.
In 2001 the station's Kabul office was knocked out by two "smart" bombs. In 2003, al-Jazeera reporter Tareq Ayyoub was killed in a US missile strike on the station's Baghdad centre.
The memo, which also included details of troop deployments, turned up in May last year at the Northampton constituency office of then Labour MP Tony Clarke.
Cabinet Office civil servant David Keogh, 49, is accused under the Official Secrets Act of passing it to Leo O'Connor, 42, who used to work for Mr Clarke. Both are bailed to appear at Bow Street court next week.
Mr Clarke, who lost at the election, returned the memo to No 10.
He said Mr O'Connor had behaved "perfectly correctly".
Neither Mr O'Connor or Mr Keogh were available. No 10 did not comment.
AL-JAZEERA'S INSIDE STORY
My first random thought.....I dont buy this. Bullshit(and the fact that The Sun who has mastered the art of bullshit, has published this). It has to be bullshit. It cant be anything else(Though not suprising if it was true). But if its true, then I dont know what to say. The fact that he would consider this.
No matter how much I like to speculate. We have to wait for the document to be released, and then one has to make up ones mind and consider if it might be Bush's way of joking as it has been suggested by one civil servant.
But as for the proposition, outlandish as it seems to bomb a building in an allied country....I'll tell ya a thing or two that will make it more plausible(even if the notion is inherently insane) in this particular case.
Al-Jazeera.As you probably all know(quite public in the media then) their office was hit by smart bombs in Kabul in 2001 and a missile attack killed one of their journalists in Baghdad.
In both events, they had phoned in and mailed their exact coordinates and postion to the Pentagon even before the attacks started to try and insure that there would be no mistakes. Al-Jazeera do not consider these attacks to be accidebtal in the least, and there are detailed info of several other situations where they had faced direct pressure.
The Americans were alledgedly very much incensed when al-Jazeera reported live from the Fallujah air-bombings on the same day as the US army had agreed to a seize fire. Many such examples to go with their showing the beheadings tape and terrible civilian casualties in many spots.
I know it's The Mirror, I know the White House has rubbished the comment, but they did the same with previous leaked documents.
But still, this doesnt mean this is true. And this must be quite exaggerated.
that they would specifically target a TV station in another country? I could accept(sic) that they "accidentally" "misread" some coordinates but to go out of their way in order to do a hit... How would they cover that up? Even brown-nosed Western journalists would get fired up by such a hit, as journalists tend to be rather sympathetic to other journalists on these matters...
One thing that is easy for me to believe though is Isee why one side would want to eliminate media that reports the other sides view of the war. I do not have any problems believing that Bush could have uttered this as an intention. I don't have any problems believing that a military agency would draft a 'scenario' for hitting al-Jazeera even if it's in Dubai. After all - there's been lots of examples of less imaginable actions being 'considered' at scenario level. Its' funny that people actually try to put some sort of sense of ethics in war. This would make sense in the context of war(as in art of war.And steps that would be plausible in waging war), and that is why I would have an easy time believing this if it was true.
But....What I do have major problems believing is that the diplomats and bureaucrats in Washington/Pentagon would not shoot such an idea down before it could ever be carried out(and which is why such a thing as this could only be 'scenario's in some drawingboard).
Another reason(and the main reason) I dont this is true is because, how could they cover this up? The previous "accidental" bombings of Al-Jazeera offices in other countries could be a disguised as mistake because its in the middle of war(even though the civil buildings they are bombing are no were near any hostiles). Its just like Clever Generals of ancient times, killing a rival in your side in the midst of the battle,no one would suspect you.
But in this case? No. Heck no. The difference is that there'd be no way of calling this a mistake if they did a hit on al-Jazeera in Dubai.
"Ups - one of our plains dropped a bomb while flying over friendly territory, and it just happened to hit al-Jazeera, who we've already bombed twice in other countries. Third mistake, sorry. Our bad".
Doesn't work. It would be seriously damaging in the region and I promise you that journalists from even normally friendly sources would be straining against their leashes. And it wouldn't be in any books about the Art of war, but rather, in the bloopers section of military books (Which mostly consists of the military failures of Austria and France
).And oh, not to mention that this is 'just' very very very bad publicity for Bush, who could be stood up as raging moron (again
) if the memo get's published in full.And also...What is indicative of the memo's veracity is the almost unprecedented action on behalf of Downing Street (at least in recent history) to issue a threat to prosecute the printing of the memo itself, as it would constitute a breach of the laws on publishing classified documents. This is novel, considering that even very damaging/delicate papers have previously been allowed to go into print.
Futhermore it substantiates that you can find wordings like The Mirrors article printed yesterday in the actual memo, because nr. 10 issuing such a threat to editors is VERY bad press to begin with because of the freedom to speculate it offers/the thought it provokes that 'they have something to hide', and there'd be no reason to break with tradition if the alternative of the memo getting public wasn't considered worse.
Lastly,I must say that I hope it turns out to be one big farce, like the 2000 election
P.S. Weeee! My first thread(Not that anyone has read this far ).Which I bothered to post(instead of just read it,and discuss it on another site) just because Femto said everyone should post more threads
P.S II Add a poll for the question please
(Which can be a very general one if needed to be;))edit: use the quote function, it does a better job than bolding. also, it is always appropriate to cite the source with a URL if possible. thanks -- psi29a
I think it was a sound test or something. Man, pretty embarrassing.