Re: Taliban Bountygate, we have moved from the crime to the coverup

[grantcart]

NYT is reporting that intelligence sources were tipped off by transfers to known Afghan crime figures who were known to do business with the Taliban.

They raided the homes and not only caught the perpetrators but recovered the money. The perpetrators were arrested and immediately copped to what was done. Some of those who were being pursued fled to Russia.

Now the administration is trying to say that the lead was not followed up because 1) there was no actionable intelligence and 2) that the quality of the information was not promising

These, clearly, are outright lies and prove an attempt to cover up because:

1) The intelligence was acted on and obtained 100% proof that the original question raised by the transfers was valid.

2) The information led to arrests and recovery of the money, and it was only then that the reason for the transfers was known. So the intelligence wasn't a guess on what was happening it was an explanation for facts already in evidence.

It would be as if after the Watergate burglars were caught that the Nixon administration said that we shouldn't hear what they have to say because there is no actionable options for burglars in handcuffs and the quality of the intelligence from the police department isn't good.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/30/us/politics/russian-bounties-afghanistan-intelligence.html

In a raid in Kunduz City in the north about six months ago, 13 people were arrested in a joint operation by American forces and the Afghan intelligence agency, the National Directorate of Security, according to Safiullah Amiry, the deputy provincial council chief there. Two of the main targets of the raid had already fled — one to Tajikistan and one to Russia, Mr. Amiry said — but it was in the Kabul home of one of them where security forces found a half-million dollars. He said the Afghan intelligence agency had told him the raids were related to Russian money being dispersed to militants.