Rumsfeld denies he let bin Laden escape

[sabra]

Source: PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW

WASHINGTON — Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld defended his controversial tenure under President George W. Bush, pushing back against criticism that he used too few troops to invade Iraq, and that he let Osama bin Laden escape into Pakistan.

Rumsfeld, 78, said in an interview with the Tribune-Review that he never received a request to send troops to a mountain complex where bin Laden was believed to be hiding early in the war. A Senate report saying otherwise is "factually not correct," he said.

In December 2001, Afghan fighters and special forces operatives approached the complex of caves at Tora Bora, a mountainous area on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border where bin Laden was thought to have fled. As U.S. bombers pounded the cave complex, a weary bin Laden wrote his last will and testament, expecting to die in the high-altitude caves, according to a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report released in November 2009.

"It never got to me," said Rumsfeld, whose memoir "Known and Unknown" was released Tuesday. CIA Director "George Tenet never asked us for additional assistance. (Central Command commander Gen.) Tommy Franks never indicated that he wanted to do anything additional beyond what they were trying to do."

....

"He may or may not have been there. Let's assume that he was," Rumsfeld said. "Our people in the Pentagon are not really organized for manhunts, if you think about that. They deal with armies, navies, air forces. The FBI and the CIA on the other hand are arranged to do some of that."

Read more: http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_722651.html

[aquart]

1. Uh huh.

[Mojorabbit]

4. I know, right?

Amazing attempt to rewrite history on his part but I don't think it is working.

[Adsos Letter]

2. How is it we can't seem to find bin Laden?

:eyes: :sarcasm:

[rpannier]

3. Sometimes you have to go after Bin Laden with the resources you have, not what you wish you had

I realize it's not an exact quote, but the spirit of Rumsfeld's, "Sometimes you go to war..." comment

[roseBudd]

18. Brg. Gen. Mattis had his marines in place at Tora Bora & was refused permission

to go up after Bin Laden

http://www.tnr.com/article/the-battle-tora-bora?page=0,2

There were around 2,000 U.S. troops in or near the Afghan theater at the time. At the U.S. airbase known as K2 in Uzbekistan were stationed some 1,000 soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division, whose specialty is fighting in harsh terrain. Hundreds of those soldiers had already deployed to Bagram Air Force Base, 40 miles north of Kabul. In addition, 1,200 Marines were stationed at Forward Operating Base Rhino, near Kandahar, from the last week of November onward. Brigadier General James Mattis, the commander of the Marines in the Afghan theater, reportedly asked to send his men into Tora Bora, but his request was turned down. In the end, there were more journalists--about 100, according to Nic Robertson of CNN and Susan Glasser of The Washington Post, who both covered the battle--in and around Tora Bora than there were Western soldiers.

[rpannier]

19. I don't dispute that. I'm simply providing a Rumsfeldian-style answer to this quote

"Our people in the Pentagon are not really organized for manhunts, if you think about that. They deal with armies, navies, air forces. The FBI and the CIA on the other hand are arranged to do some of that."

Even if they weren't prepared for something like that, they should have done it anyway.
Kind of like his why personnel carriers had improper protection

[pokerfan]

5. Short version

[ScottLand]

14. Saw this one too. Luckovich is always spot on.

[MrModerate]

6. Rumsfeld, like most of his colleagues in the Bush Maladministration . . .

Never learned how to spell the word "responsibility."

And haven't since. Rumsfeld is and always will be a symbol of total failure. His name will feature prominently in future anthologies of military clusterfucks. That's his legacy and no amount of mealy-mouthed apologism is going to change it.

[lib2DaBone]

7. Someday.. somehow.... the truth will be told...

911 was an inside job

[reggie the dog]

13. i cannot wait until i can teach 911 as an inside job

in history classes without being described as delusional by many parents who believe the 911 commission report. inside job all the way to rigging the towers with explosives and shipping the ruins to china for recycling

[TreasonousBastard]

8. Well, SOMEBODY let him get away, and it wasn't me.

[xchrom]

27. +1

[grahamhgreen]

9. But not the Bin Ladens that they FLEW OUT IN AIRPLANES AFTER THE ATTACK!!

We need a real 9-11 investigation.

[reggie the dog]

23. +1

i still want to know why the ruins of the twin towers were sold to a foreign, chinese, recycling company, and still belive the many many physics professors from around the usa and the world who say the official explination to their falling is bullshit

[LawnKorn]

10. Rumsfeld never really looked for bin Laden

The elusive, mystical figure that was wreaking havoc on the United States was just another reason for increasing defense expenditures. The defense contractors were paying him big bucks to keep the gravy train rolling.

[lunatica]

11. Rummy boy you ain't fooling anyone but yourself

You go ahead and stand your lying ground. No one expects any different from you.

[rasputin1952]

12. A lot of people screamed about Clinton wagging the dog when he

went after bin-Laden, impeaching him was far more important...:eyes:

After the bush circus moved into the WH, they ignored warnings about an imminent attack, bad start there.

We have Special Forces in each of the branches of service, they exist for, among other things, insertion into situations precisely like this one. Recon would have shown where he was, after all, satellites and ground intelligence had bin-Laden pinpointed for the attempt to get him by cruise missle. They missed him by somne half an hour. Like Hitler in Munich, he missed death because of shear luck.

I can't believe bin-Laden wasn't being tracked well after the attempt to get him failed. He's been a target for decade, with today's technology, finding him should be pretty easy...but bush made his point as to how his crappy administration would deal with him when he told the world he didn't care about bin-Laden anymore...that little blurb meant that the sacrifices our men and women made in life and limb were for nothing.

Rumsfeld is an idiot. The deaths that were racked up during this fiasco, both military and civilian are his and the bush's burden. He's trying to justify a failure on his part, and his "explanation" doesn't cut it.

[reggie the dog]

26. the actions of rummie, w, and their whole kabal

dishonered the armed forces, insulted all of its members, and let to pain, suffering, mental anguish, ptsd, and other traumas of many servicemen and servicewomen who were luckier than their brothers and sisters who died! now think of all the families ruined by death of mom or dad, or having mom or dad back with crippling PTSD! how many suicides (r.i.p. high school brother matt aka "opey", a ptsd suicide representing a broken family! his kids are 3 and 6 and are fucked!!!!) and this son of a bitch tries to weasel his way out now!! fuck him, and fuck W. i had argued for years that these assholes were doing war for money and that it would fuck up the lives of millions of people, and last summer it fucked the lives of one of my high school brothers (no we were not that close since going different ways since high school but that is part of life)

[Hubert Flottz]

15. He's right...

And everybody else is wrong. He was too busy turning the Pentagon into GESTAPO Headquarters.

[forty6]

16. I never believe a word out of that man's mouth anyway, so he can claim

anything he wants! When his lips are moving, he's lying.

[Solly Mack]

17. Snort

[demotech]

20. They let Cheney escape aswell.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

21. They scoured Iraq pretty well for Saddam.

:shrug:

[reggie the dog]

22. no bullshit here

i guy i went to the university with who was intent on becoming an officer in the navy and who was sent out working "communications" or something of that order came back disgusted after one tour on a boat near the middle east. disgusted because he said everyone knew that bin laden was let go, they had him near tora bora and let him go, because his family was too important for the us economy was the reason my college buddy had heard, he wanted out once his contract was over because he said it was all just a big bullshit game and he personally thought that 911 was an inside job, smoke and mirrors, and an excuse to go get heroin and oil. now this guy had his roots in myanmar and his family fled clandentinly to the usa to flee real fascism, but he told me the us goverment was just as corrupt as the govt in his birthcountry and was more dangerous because stronger and that once he could he was out and done with the navy, in college he wanted to make a career out of the navy..... one tour with some access to communications and he wanted out....

[yellowcanine]

24. "Our people in the Pentagon are not really organized for manhunts, ... The FBI and the CIA on the

other hand..."


Is it just me or does Rummy never miss a chance to shift the blame for his own failures?

[yellowcanine]

25. "Well, goodness sakes, the location of Bin Laden is a known unknown."

"Did we capture Bin Laden? No. Would we if we could have? Of Course!"

[whosinpower]

32. What was the reason for the war then?

I thought it was to "git" Osama Bin Laden - dead or alive.

Yeah - I am being sarcastic.

[yellowcanine]

33. Hard to tell because they probably couldn't decide if he was "for us or against us"

Being as 9-11 likely made it possible for chimpy to win in 2004, though he still almost blew it by invading Iraq.

[Javaman]

28. aka Not my fault, it's someone elses problem. I'm not in jail, so screw off. nt

[lebkuchen]

29. Did anyone notice Negroponte, Wolfowitz and Woolsey on CNNI

the day Egypt overthrew its dictator? They all tried to rewrite history with blatant lies, on the same debase level as Rummy. They were all happy Mubarak was overthrown even though their entire careers have been spent propping up dictators. Woolsey even said that the overthrow was a result of Bush invading Iraq. No CNNI reporter engaged him, and he was cut off. Nevertheless, why does CNNI put these idiots on TV to begin with. I wrote them twice to complain, saying that peaceful revolution was hardly these men's area of expertise. In fact, they are all signers of the PNAC document with the exception of Negroponte.

It's a crime that they all aren't being tried right now.

[icnorth]

31. "Why does CNNI put these idiots on TV

to begin with?" Did you mean the four horsemen of the Apocalypse or the CNN reporters. It's often hard to differentiate.

[denem]

30. There was the KNOWN location Bin Laden, the UNKNOWN location Bin Laden

and the UNKNOWN, NO LOCATION Bin Laden.

I had no responsibility to take responsibility for the excommunicated, unreported, no idea, never heard or said a word matters regarding any known, unknown, located nor unlocated, specific or generally filed 'Bin Laden' objectives which could not and did not happen, plausibly or otherwise.



Don.