Sunday, January 25, 2004

More on the Iranian connection

In a couple earlier posts I was questioning how the 9/11 puzzle fits together.

Recent articles on that surprise witness in the German trial of an accused terrorist are implicating Iran in the 9/11 terrorist attack. They are claiming the implication, if true, could have "immediate and profound repercussions" for U.S.-Iranian relations. Of course, Iran is now "robustly" denying the connection.

I'm surprised a bit here that this is coming across as a wholly new idea, due to something I read in the 2002 Baer book (See No Evil) that I've been quoting for the last couple of days:

After Iran released the last of the American hostages in 1991, the White House kept its fingers crossed that Iran was finally out of the terrorism business. By December, however, it was becoming apparent that Iran had simply switched battlefields. The CIA picked up information that several leaders of the Saudi Hizballah had traveled to Tehran. Obviously somehting was brewing. After the meeting, the Iranian Pasdaran opened a training base in the Biqa' for Saudi Hizballah terrorist cadres. It issued the terrorists false passports and provided all the funding they needed, and in July 1995, the Iranian-trained networks started to watch American facilities in Saudi Arabia, including the consulate in Jeddah.

...Just as ominously, the CIA was learning about the first tentative contacts between Osama bin Laden and Iran. In December 1995 one of bin Laden's Egyptian associates visited Tehran and met with several officers from the Ministry of Intelligence and Security. The U.S. wasn't sure bin Laden had reached an agreement with the Iranians on a strategic relationship, but we in the intelligence community suspected he had. Bin Laden desperately needed the terrorist expertise Iran possessed. Our fears were confirmed, as I've mentioned, when bin Laden met an Iranian intelligence officer in Afghanistan in July 1996 to hammer out a strategic relationship. The possibility of a grand terrorist alliance aimed against the U.S. was staggering.

pp. 250-251

Although we never found out what happened at the meeting, we knew bin Laden intended to propose to Iran a coordinated terrorism campaign against the U.S. Perhaps if I'd been replaced with a case officer who could talk to the ..........................., we might have found out if bin Laden's proposal was ever acted on.
p.166

(That "blacked out" portion is something that comes up here and there in the book, as the CIA had the final say of what could be published in the book and what couldn't.)

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.

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