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Archive for the 'Osama bin Laden' Category

Sep 16th, 2010

Summary: In a 44-minute audio recording that appears to mark the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the U.S., al-Qaida’s No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahiri, released an audio recording accusing the Pakistani government of responding too slowly to severe flooding in the country and calling on Pakistanis to revolt. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on September 16, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that former president Jimmy Carter told NBC’s Brian Williams in an interview that he believed race was at the core of much of the opposition to President Obama.


Jan 30th, 2010

Summary: In a new audiotape, al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden calls for the world to boycott American goods and the U.S. dollar, blaming the United States and other industrialized countries for global warming. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on January 30, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that Iraq denied North Carolina-based Blackwater Worldwide (Xe), which guards American diplomats in Iraq, an operating license because of a deadly shooting spree in Baghdad. Iraqi officials said the lingering outrage over a September 2007 shooting in Baghdad’s Nisoor Square that left 17 Iraqi civilians dead led to its decision. The shooting strained relations between Washington and Baghdad and fueled the anti-American insurgency in Iraq, where many Iraqis saw the bloodshed as a demonstration of American brutality and arrogance.


Jan 17th, 2010

Summary: Despite Pakistani protest, the Obama administration is ramping up its missile campaign against insurgent targets in North Waziristan along Pakistan’s northwest frontier with Afghanistan, where al-Qaida’s top leadership, possibly including Osama bin Laden himself, have taken refuge. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on January 17, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that by actually putting into practice the Neo-Conservative theories of pre-emptive war and unilateralism, George W. Bush demonstrated their failure more persuasively than could the most articulate critic.


Jan 16th, 2010

Summary: Spanish lawmaker Gaspar Llamazares was horrified to learn that the FBI used an online photograph of him to create an age-enhanced image showing what Osama bin Laden might look like today. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on January 16, 2009, Aubrey Immelman reported that Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), talking about the recount in the Coleman-Franken U.S. Senate race in an interview on Fox News Channel’s “FOX & Friends,” besmirched the integrity of Minnesota’s election system by alleging that “a lot of irregularities occurred during the voting process.”


Dec 10th, 2009

Summary: Finding Bin Laden: Here’s what we know about Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts, based on information from U.S. intelligence sources; analysis by NBC News senior investigative producer Robert Windrem. … Personality profiles of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri by Aubrey Immelman, Unit for the Study of Personality in Politics. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on December 10, 2008, Aubrey Immelman reported that Thomas Fingar, Bush administration deputy director of national intelligence for analysis, had suggested the Iraq war was as much the failure of policymakers as the product of the flawed intelligence on which they relied. Fingar’s assessment reveals that decision-making on Iraq was marred by a strong sense of time pressure, a tendency among decision makers to seek concurrence on Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction, and a directive leadership style in the White House — all of which are well-established causes of groupthink. Furthermore, according to the Gayle Report, the Department of Defense knew before the start of the Iraq war in 2003 of the threats of mines and roadside bombs in Iraq but did nothing to acquire Mine Resistant Ambush-Protected (MRAP) vehicles ahead of the invasion — a level of overconfidence symptomatic of groupthink.


Dec 6th, 2009

Summary: Defense Secretary Robert Gates tells ABC News chief Washington correspondent George Stephanopoulos on ABC News “This Week” that the U.S. has not had any good intelligence on the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden in “years.” … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on December 6, 2008, Aubrey Immelman reported that President George W. Bush, on a valedictory tour prior to leaving office, had admitted to a few previously unacknowledged errors, telling one interviewer that he was “unprepared for war” when he entered office and that his “biggest regret” was the failure of intelligence leading up to the Iraq invasion.


Nov 29th, 2009

Summary: Osama bin Laden was unquestionably within reach of U.S. troops in the mountains of Tora Bora when American military leaders made the crucial and costly decision in December 2001 not to pursue the terrorist leader with massive force, according to a Senate Foreign Relations Committee report that affixes a measure of blame for the state of the Afghanistan war today on military leaders under former president George W. Bush, specifically Donald H. Rumsfeld as defense secretary and his top military commander, Gen. Tommy Franks. … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on November 29, 2008, Aubrey Immelman reported that a rocket attack on a U.N. compound in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone killed two foreigners and wounded 15, while a suicide bomber struck Shiite worshippers at a mosque run by followers of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, killing at least 12 people, a day after Iraqi lawmakers approved a status-of-forces agreement with the Bush administration setting a timeline for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq.


Sep 14th, 2009

Summary: Osama bin Laden has released a new tape in which he cites U.S. support for Israel as the reason for the attack of 9/11, saying, “the cause of our disagreement with you is your support to your Israeli allies who occupy our land of Palestine.” … One-year retrospective: One year ago today, on the fifth day after losing his 2008 primary challenge against U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District, Aubrey Immelman, in line with his focus on national security, reported on the assassination of a provincial governor in Afghanistan, U.S. casualties in Afghanistan, an assessment by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the Bush administration that the U.S. is “not winning the war” in Afghanistan and “running out of time,” and ongoing violence in Iraq.


Jun 4th, 2009

Summary: Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden has released two messages to convince Muslims they should hate President Barack Obama, in a PR offensive that analysts said shows the terrorist organization worries the new president will succeed in improving America’s image in the Muslim world and undermine the group’s jihad, or holy war. … “The Personality Profile of Al-Qaida Leader Osama Bin Laden” by Aubrey Immelman, Unit for the Study of Personality in Politics.