Since
December 22, 2001, U.S.-backed Hamid Karzai became the head of
Afghanistan (first as the “interim” leader and later as the President),
Osama bin Laden’s videos and audiotapes have mysteriously surfaced from
time to time, sending the world reeling in fear and confusion. Headline
news stories have continuously hyped the CIA’s claims that these
recorded bin Laden appearances and voices were indeed from the
most-wanted-man in the world, despite the odds against their
authenticity.
Death of Osama bin Laden in 2001
Although the
corpse of bin Laden would never be found, various sources alluded to the
circumstances that led to his death in the Middle East.
According to
United Press International (Oct. 31, 2001), bin Laden underwent
clandestine kidney treatment by Dr. Terry Calloway (Canadian urologist)
for 11 days in July at the American Hospital in Dubai. During his
hospital stay, bin Laden met with a U.S. CIA agent, according to French
daily Le Figaro and Radio France International. The day before the
infamous September 11 terrorist attacks, bin Laden entered a military
hospital for further kidney dialysis treatment in Raqalpindi, Pakistan,
reported by CBS (Jan. 28, 2002).
In an interview
with CNN (Jan. 19, 2002), Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf hinted,
“He (bin Laden) is dead for the reason he is a ...kidney patient.”
Musharraf also mentioned that bin Laden took two dialysis machines with
him into Afghanistan.
A few days later,
Dr. Sanjay Gupta on CNN (Jan. 21, 2002) gave his professional assessment
of bin Laden’s medical condition based on the videotape broadcasted by
al Jazeera on December 27, 2001. He explained that bin Laden’s ghastly
appearance — “grayness of beard, paleness of skin, very gaunt sort of
features” — is often associated with chronic kidney failure or renal
failure. He also noted that bin Laden couldn’t move his left arm
probably due to a stroke because people suffering from kidney failures
have a higher risk for stroke. Dr. Gupta pointed out that dialysis
machines require electricity, clean water and a sterile environment to
function properly. Without an operational machine, a patient could only
survive for less than a week.
During December
2001, the U.S. Air Force, after cornering the Taliban combatants in the
mountainous Tora Bora, relentlessly blasted the area for days,
unleashing an estimated 1.8 million kg of explosives, including the
deadly bunker-busting bombs to implode caves. According to the Pentagon,
radio transmissions of bin Laden's voice were detected regularly until
December 14, 2001.
An Egyptian paper
posted on December 26, 2001, ran an obituary on Osama bin Laden whose
death resulted from lack of proper medical care for “serious lung
complications.” A Taliban official told the Pakistan Observer that he
saw bin Laden’s face before the burial in Tora Bora where some members
of bin Laden’s family, friends and al Qaeda fighters gathered for his
funeral. Asked whether he could pinpoint the spot where bin Laden was
buried, he answered, "I am sure that like other places in Tora Bora that
particular place too must have vanished," implying that it was
obliterated by U.S. aerial bombing.
According to
Washington Post (Oct. 28.2002), the Arabic-language al-Majallah obtained
bin Laden’s will from a “very reliable” source in Afghanistan. The will
— typed, signed by bin Laden and dated December 14, 2001— includes
verses of Koran and the words of a man “who appeared desperate and on
the verge of death.”
Tapes — Authentic vs. Fake
It is certain that
all videos of bin Laden released in 2001 were authentic, except the one
found by anti-Taliban forces, which was an obvious fake. It was
difficult to determine the exact time the real videos were made but they
were all filmed outdoors. More importantly, the sequential release of
videos was showing bin Laden’s health deteriorating before our eyes.
Bruce Lawrence, a Duke professor, who authored Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama Bin Laden (Verso,
2005) based on 20 complete speeches and interviews of bin Laden,
pointed out that authentic tapes contain several key elements:
-
verses quoted from the Koran because bin Laden was a devout Muslim;
-
references to past Western atrocities against Muslims;
-
lengthy taped messages (shortest one was 18 minutes).
The fake one,
released by Pentagon on December 13, 2001, was conveniently left in a
deserted house in Jalalabad. The poor-quality video not only showed a
well-fed man posing as bin Laden, resembling nothing like the al Qaeda
chief, but also writing with his right hand (bin Laden was left-handed).
At a small gathering, the imposter was laughing and joking about how he
had carried out the September 11 atrocities, except he got the names
wrong on two hijackers.
Another fraudulent
video of bin Laden aired by al Jazeera on October 29, 2004, occurred
just four days before the U.S. presidential election. Besides missing
key elements, this particular tape (shot indoors) depicted a blurry
image of supposedly bin Laden (contrast to his previous sharp images),
standing behind a podium against a brown canvas backdrop. In a new
twist, the speaker (fully recovered from poor health) claimed direct
responsibility for the 2001 attacks against the United States. (Although
bin Laden praised the September 11 hijackers, he never took credit for
their attacks in any of his 2001 videos.) Even Walter Cronkite, the
well-known retired news reporter, suggested that the whole scenario was a
concoction by Karl Rove to secure the re-election for George W. Bush.
As for audiotapes,
they started to appear in 2002 almost on a regular and
politically-timed basis, some of which claimed to be voices of al Qaeda
members, while others were attributed to al Zawahiri or bin Laden.
Strangely, the fact that al Qaeda adopted new tactics for relaying
messages has never raised any public suspicion. More troubling, al Qaeda
has a history of secrecy and deception — never giving warnings or
claiming responsibility for any attacks; yet, the emergence of numerous
taped messages suggests that al Qaeda has broken away from its usual
practice of silence by claiming responsibility for various global
terrorist attacks.
One audiotape
purported to be from bin Laden (released on November 12, 2002) was
confirmed by U.S. intelligence to be genuine after completing a
technical and linguistic analysis. However, IDIAP, the world’s foremost
voice identification experts in Switzerland, reached a contrary
conclusion — the voice on the tape didn’t belong to bin Laden but to
someone whose voice patterns resembled bin Laden. Swiss researchers
declared their scientific voice analysis to be 95 per cent accurate,
with risk of error just five per cent. This audiotape was the only one
analyzed by an independent group of experts.
Behind Fake Tapes
Obviously, to
release a “terrorist” video or an audiotape would have an explosive
impact on society. There is no rational explanation for al Qaeda to
release fake tapes. Some argue that it has been done to keep the myth
that bin Laden is still alive. If so, there would be no need to have
taped messages of other al Qaeda members speak for bin Laden if he
really were alive. Furthermore, there would be no reason for al Qaeda to
make a fake tape when they could make a real one to draw attention to
its future and past terrorist acts or even call forth a coordinated
attack.
The fact that the
fake tapes do exist implies only one possibility — the party responsible
for releasing such tapes wanted to incite public fear and confusion,
instill blame on the targeted enemies, and justify the fight against
terrorism anywhere in the world. As clearly demonstrated in the recent
appearance of bin Laden audiotape (Jan. 19, 2006), President Bush told
reporters: “When he says he’s going to hurt the American people again,
or try to, he means it.” Homeland Security spokeswoman Michelle
Petrovich pitched in: “we recognize that al-Qaida remains committed to
striking the homeland.” Vice President Cheney stated: “I think you have
to destroy them (terrorists). It’s the only way to deal with them.”
The next time a bin Laden tape surfaces, it must be from the ghost of Osama bin Laden.
(First published on UniOrb.com, February 1, 2006)