Osama Bin Laden Dead!

[Goaty]

Well I spoof it in SillyWorld!

[The Legendary Shark]

In taking away Bin Laden, the US has rendered Al Quaeda even more formless. A truly faceless enemy lurking in every shadow, led by unknown generals.

But wait...isn't there another thread in which you post that you believe the US brought down the WTC, not Al Quaeda...? 

Actually, I don't know who brought down the towers or why - that's my problem with it. Certain facts point to certain interpretations of events that have not, to my mind, been adequately explored. In any event, I don't think it's quite as simple as saying that the US did it.

What I meant by my "faceless enemy" comment was that a faceless enemy is easier to sell to the public in order to generate the fear necessary for those in power with a totalitarian bent to get us begging our governments into taking even more of our liberties away. As has been said before, a viewing of the excellent "The Power of Nightmares", subtitled "The Rise of the Politics of Fear" by Adam Curtis will explain my thinking on this.

[Orlok]

The Power of Nightmares is well worth a look.

Regardless of bin Laden's naughtiness (and he was indeed a prick) the brave boys of Seal Team Six, Dicky Marcinko's finest killers, have now shot dead an unarmed 57 year old kidney dialysis patient.
I'm unsure what form of resisting he was engaged in while faced with a team of trained killers armed with the finest American deathware, but it must have been awesome. Maybe he was pretending to be Jean Charles de Menezes when they decided to slot him.

As more details emerge, this gets worse for the US, so they'll need to do some serious PR work. And not a Jessica Lynch style effort, either.

[Old Tankie]

Yeah, 'cos there's no possibility whatsoever of a 57 year old kidney dialysis patient wearing a suicide vest is there?  Website warriors, don't you just luv 'em!!

[locustsofdeath!]

I'm unsure what form of resisting he was engaged in while faced with a team of trained killers armed with the finest American deathware, but it must have been awesome. Maybe he was pretending to be Jean Charles de Menezes when they decided to slot him.

Maybe they should have tickled him instead! ...

[Dandontdare]

a faceless enemy is easier to sell to the public in order to generate the fear necessary for those in power with a totalitarian bent to get us begging our governments into taking even more of our liberties away.

I thought the whole point was that a faceless enemy was DIFFICULT to sell, so they had to cast Bin laden in the role of evil mastermind controlling a global web of terror like some Bond villain - in other words, they put a face (bin laden) and a name (Al Quaeda) to a nebulous collection of interlinked groups sharing a common anti-US agenda. Creating clearly identifiable "bad guys" that you can constantly refer to makes it much easier to sell it to the American public, who wouldn't like the message that large parts of the world hate them.

I have always thought that Bin laden's personal importance was exaggerated, as was Al Quaeda as a homogenous organisation. The Sun today is already talking about the "new Bin Laden" and his terror plans - so the message is - don't stop being scared yet!

I'm unsure what form of resisting he was engaged in while faced with a team of trained killers armed with the finest American deathware, but it must have been awesome. Maybe he was pretending to be Jean Charles de Menezes when they decided to slot him.

Maybe they should have tickled him instead! ...

Or y'know, arested him and put him on trial. Who knows what maight come to light if they did that though!

[locustsofdeath!]

Or y'know, arested him and put him on trial. Who knows what maight come to light if they did that though!

Well, what are you implying? It's tough to respond if I don't know which line of conspiracy theory you're snorting, ha!

But I know, I know. It's America, the big baddies of the world. You Brits just aren't happy that we've replaced you as That Guy  .

[Robin Low]

Or y'know, arested him and put him on trial. Who knows what maight come to light if they did that though!

While I try to maintain respect for human life (if not actual humans), I think his death was probably the least dangerous outcome.

Alive and on the run, he was a symbol to a minority. Dead, he's a martyr to a minority. Alive, imprisoned and facing trial he would probably have become a far larger symbol and something of a martyr, potentially influencing even more people. (Obviously, there is a tradition of dead religious martyrs having an awful lot of influence, but I don't think OBL has anywhere near as good a story as JC.)

I think some innocent people are probably going to die as result of his death, but I wonder if even more innocent people would have died had this gone to a trial? I fear this falls into the category of 'the lesser evil'.


Regards

Robin

[Richmond Clements]

Obviously, there is a tradition of dead religious martyrs having an awful lot of influence, but I don't think OBL has anywhere near as good a story as JC.

Yup- he didn't record I Walk the Line for starters.

[Dandontdare]

Or y'know, arested him and put him on trial. Who knows what maight come to light if they did that though!

Well, what are you implying? It's tough to respond if I don't know which line of conspiracy theory you're snorting, ha!

Nothing in particular, I'm not a conspiracy fan, just that I'm sure they preferred a quick death to a drawn out trial which could mean the subpoening of all kinds of sensitive information and who knows what. Wikiliaks showed us there's vast amounts of information held by the governemnt that they don't want released.

personally, I've got no problem with assassination or summary execution of an evil git like him, but why can't they be honest about it? They're still claiming he wa shot in self-defense because assassination is officially illegal. Just come clean and say we went in and shot him, end of story.

[Peter Wolf]

I was 100percent certain that it was all lies right from the outset but now i am 200percent certain that its all lies.

Lies and propaganda and political posturing and opportunism.

Look at how many times the official version of events has changed in the past 3 days.First OBL was armed and firing an automatic firearm at the alleged Seal team so OBL took 2 rounds to the head then OBL offered no resistance and was still shot in the head and then the White House was going to release pictures and now they are not and then there was the staged White house war room pictures of Clinton,Obama,Gates* etc watching the live feed and then it turns out that the live feed was lost for 25 minutes during which OBL was shot and this is after it was claimed that Obama,Clinton,Gates watched the entire thing.

Referring back to the pictures it was first claimed that Obama watched OBL take 1 round to the left eye and then after that the White House claimed that the picture of the dead OBL showed what what sounded like exit wounds to the head [eyes and forehead blasted outwards] of of the dead OBL.

And so on...............................................

A lot of what has now been retracted or altered by the White House was first propagated by John Brennan - White House Anti-Terrorism advisor so they are deliberately lying and spinning thingsso this does not inspire confidence in them or the official version of events in the slightest.

*When i first saw the picture it was obviously staged and i thought it was photoshopped and it turns out the picture was released as a reaction to the sceptics of it all so they are desperate to be believed and that seeing a picture of them tensely watching a screen is supposed to convince you that its all genuine.  

Now allegedly the Seal team seized the contents of Bin Ladens hard drive plus numerous discs full of information and that this hard drive was the epicentre of alleged Al Quaeda terrorist activity which will provide numerous leads so really this is an opportunity for the US govt to do what they like to stop Al Quaeda which means if they want to send the US miltary into Pakistan they can just claim info on the hard drive points to Al Quaeda activity in Pakistan and likewise if they want to go into the Yemen and likewise if they want to go into Syria and so on.....

There was also the laughable claim that Al Quaeda has hidden 160 nuclear warheads at various undisclosed locations in the US plus another warhead that was allegedly hidden in Europe somewhere which would be detonated if OBL is assassinated or captured according to info courtesy of Weakileaks as it was info that was learnt during interrogations at Guantanemo bay.No reports of any warheads going off in Europe yet...........

So anyway THE most important and valueable intelligence asset against the Al Quaeda War On Terror that has resulted in everything that has gone on in the last 10 years including the creation of a police State was needlessly shot in the head  

But in the meantime the Police State continues and increases in reaction to the alleged death of OBL.If i dint have much patience i would be seriously losing patience with anyone who is incapable of seeing all this for what it really is.

I wish they would stop this silliness as its become ridiculous now.

[COMMANDO FORCES]

Well, I heard that the SEAL team was under orders to take him alive but problems arose when they saw he was wearing a British Army uniform. Before they could check who he was, they had shot him dead 

[Orlok]

Mr Burdis, you made me spit tea out of my nose. Stop it this instant, do you hear?

Oh, and Tankie...

Yeah, 'cos there's no possibility whatsoever of a 57 year old kidney dialysis patient wearing a suicide vest is there?  Website warriors, don't you just luv 'em!!

I took unarmed to mean exactly that. Unless he was wearing an Allah belt all the time (imagine the horror of late night toilet visits ), he'd have to be quick to put it on in a surprise raid, wouldn't he?
And I'm ex-Navy and served in Gulf War I. You know, the one before the crappy sequel?

[vzzbux]

Crappy sequel? A bit harsh there Orlok.

I did my stint on GW1 and my humour is quite black but I wouldn't go that far. I know a few recent ex squaddies who have endured the current one and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. It is creating some fucked up puppies out there.





V

[The Legendary Shark]

The US isn't noted for its accuracy in describing terrorist threats. Remember when Donald Rumsfeld told us all to be very, very afraid because of things like this:



Would look great in an episode of MACH 1, Thunderbirds or James Bond, but in this case it's just pure dark fantasy for the purposes of scaring the general population into terrified submission.