Al Quaeda has a nuke bought in '98! Guess who the right will blame.

[Merlin]

(I originally thought the report indicated a recent purchase, in which case the onus would be on Bush. But the Arabic source of this report says they bought it in 1998.)

So the Clinton program of buying down the nuclear stockpile of the old Soviet Union didn't work?

Link (courtesy LBN):
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/392006.html

On further edit:

The Al-Hayat site is in Arabic only and seems not to have an English language version, so the subtleties of this story can't really be checked unless one can read Arabic.

I don't know much about the cred of Haaretz. Anybody else?

(Note: there IS a Dar al Hayat in English, but that is published out of Lebanon and is probably an entirely different news source, since it has no reference in today's edition to this story.)

[Media_Lies_Daily]

1. Do you really believe Al Qaeda has nukes? Not sure that I do at all.

[Merlin]

2. To the right wing, truth is incidental.

What counts is propaganda.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

16. Understood.

[Norquist Nemesis]

3. Isreal's been feeding information for a long time

and I suspect that's where alot of the 'intel' came from for Iraq. There's a book written by a former Isreali intelligence official (I'll have to check on the name of it, sorry) that talks about starting a rumor with enriched uranium from Africa. Sound familiar? It was written in the mid to late 1990's.

[theorist]

4. Possible entry points?

They'd be lucky to get it into the US. They'd need several suit case size nukes and ship them in on containers hoping a cell could intercept it without getting caught. Then they'd be lucky to get it out of said port city. (I'm thinking somewhere in the South, i.e. Florida, Georgia, or South Carolina.) :nuke:

Note to Ashcroft: I am a graduate student in Bloomington, IN and am not a terrorist. If you would like me to apply for a postition as an analyst in your office (and I know your people could find me), give me a call, I'd be happy to have a little chat. :P

[countmyvote4real]

6. I'll be looking out for your posts, Theo.

Note to Ashcroft: This is my first contact with him. I am just expressing my concern for his free speech, right to an attorny and his care when you take him away.

Please, do the same for me.

[DemBones DemBones]

15. What makes you think that ports in

the South are less closely watched than ones in the North, or on the Pacific coast?

I agree that port security is a major problem and is not getting enough attention, but I'd never heard it was worse in Savannah or Mobile than in San Francisco or Boston.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

17. They wouldn't have to get it any closer than the anchorage/dock...

...of a major port city in the U. S. Why carry it inland when so many major targets are along the coast?

[Granite]

19. Go IU!

Another IU alum here (2 degrees).

I, too, doubt that AQ has a Nuke - plus, as you said, the mechanics of delivering/detonating such a device doesn't cause me to lose sleep at night.

Asymetrical attacks, unforseen possibilities, and irrationality (i.e. suicide bombers) are what tend to make me nervous.

Good to see a fellow Hoosier poster - do you follow IU basketball?

[Cat Atomic]

5. Who is making this claim?

Sounds like just the sort of election year fearmongering bullshit we've all been expecting from Bush's crew.

[Oilwellian]

7. Have a link?

Let's not pay any attention to Bush's reaction to the Pakistani nuclear scientist selling information to NKorea & Iran. He just got a tongue lashing, was forgiven and sent on his merry way with his fortune in tact. Where's this administration's outrage over this fact?

Let's also not forget the tremendous damage this administration did by outing Valerie Plame and her entire operation that monitored wmds. Imagine how many are now on the black market, and without her vital efforts, we haven't a clue where they are and who has them.

[Merlin]

8. It's Al-Hayat (London) via Haaretz.

Got it from over on LBN:

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/392006.html

[Norquist Nemesis]

9. They've held on to this for SIX YEARS?

Not likely.

[Merlin]

10. Yeah, and Osama didn't use it when he was being obliterated in Afghan.

Remember when he was holed up in the Tora Bora mountains. We rained an unbelievable tonnage of explosives on that range for about 3 weeks. He was probably wounded during the barrage, but still escaped because Tommy Franks was too gutless to cover the eastern escape routes near the Paki border.

This story sounds more and more like a new product of Rove's right wing fear machine.

[La_Serpiente]

11. they have an English version

However, I do not think the story has been translated yet.

Juan Cole hasn't touched on it.

here is his webblog

http://www.juancole.com/

Here is Al-Hayat

http://english.daralhayat.com/

[Merlin]

12. Thanks for the link, snake.

By the way, is that incredible picture real?

[La_Serpiente]

13. Yes

it is from the Hubble Telescope

great yeah?

I got it here

http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/pictures.html

By the way, it takes awhile for them to translate stories.

[ComerPerro]

14. Now suppose we get nuked just in time to save Bush's ass

This way, they get to blame Clinton AND instill martial law!

Hoo Boy!

[DemBones DemBones]

18. Anyone heard more about this story? n/t

[Merlin]

20. Al Hayat still has no English version of this story. I'd say it's bogus.

If there were anything at all to this, it would be world news by now, and they would surely have put up a translation.

Sorry for sounding the alarm. Sounded plausible at first. Glad it's not true.

One thing it points out is how right Howard Dean is when he lambasts Bush for shutting down the buy-down program Clinton had implemented to acquire the remaining nuke arsenal of the Soviet Union. We are nuts if we don't follow thru on that.

[Eurobabe]

21. this is about as unbelievable

as the "memo" they found in a Baghdad al-Qaeda safe house. You know the one that links Iraq and al-Qaeda?

I don't trust anything anyone tells me about this situation anymore.