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How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

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Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#71

Post by pushupentry1219 »

netsharc wrote: post #66

On minute 38 out of 48 (listening on 2x speed), and so far there's nothing worth hearing in here.. the first 18 minutes is one of them explaining what a signal is and how the NSA keeps the world safe and follows the law, then another one of them talks in general about, yeah someone got a signal and it lead to Bin Laden. How? No further details... Edit to add: The last 10 minutes have the guest talking about the day o…

Seems like you've saved me listening to a bunch of garbage. Thank you, kindly!

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#72

Post by pas »

dgfitz wrote: post #37
jmyeet wrote: post #6

From the NSA, this seems like historical revisionism as it contradicts the bin Laden story widely accepted. The short version is: 9/11 happens. The Taliban offer to hand over bin Laden and George W. Bush refuses [1]. Bin Laden escapes into Pakistan. We then start a completely pointless war in Iraq against someone who played no part in 9/11. There was a letter from many conservative leaders prior to 9//1 calling for t…

> From the NSA, this seems like historical revisionism as it contradicts the bin Laden story widely accepted. You just described counterintelligence propaganda.

Sorry can you elaborate on this? What part is propaganda?

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#74

Post by Sad90sNerd »

Bin Laden - what a non-sense. We buried him at sea for religious reasons even though that goes against Muslim beliefs.

If you still believe that Sadam Hussan had weapons of mass destruction and ties to Al Queda then I have a domino theory Ukraine war to sell you.

...Remember kids, jet fuel and office furniture melt steel beams.

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#75

Post by potato3732842 »

jmyeet wrote: post #17
dataflow wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The short version is: 9/11 happens. The Taliban offer to hand over bin Laden and George W. Bush refuses [1] I looked at your link. It seems you missed a huge asterisk on that from your own article: > the third most powerful figure in the ruling Taliban regime told reporters that the Taliban would require evidence that Bin Laden was behind the September 11 terrorist attacks in the US

So how did the alternative course of action work out? EDIT: instead of rejecting the Taliban's offer outright and, say, negotiating and acceptable outcome, we chose to go to war, spend trillions of dollars, kill countless people and ultimately still leave the Taliban in power. The Taliban saying they need proof is a negotiation. There is no court of law. We could've simply bribed them. Imagine how much cheaper and ho…

>The Taliban saying they need proof is a negotiation. There is no court of law. We could've simply bribed them. Imagine how much cheaper and how many lives would've been saved if we'd simply given them $1 billion to hand over bin Laden.

They wouldn't have taken a monetary bribe or other obvious quid pro quo. That would be offensive and bad optics. It's just culturally a non-starter.

A good solution likely would have looked like your typical Bannana republic playbook where the tin pot dictator (taliban) gets the US's help quashing any opposition part of that is people the US doesn't like make it onto that list.

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#76

Post by ahazred8ta »

Barrin92 wrote: post #22
dyauspitr wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why they don’t pay more, it’s not like the government is shy about spending money on defence.

probably an element to it of not attracting the wrong people, they recruit largely fresh out of college and I think the expectation is that people stay, akin to a career in civil service. If you had people cycling through one of the most critical branches of US intelligence at startup pace primarily motivated by money that probably creates some issues. Because they probably care where these people wander off to when…

"The geeks who man the NSA don’t look much like Julian Assange, because they have college degrees, shorter haircuts, better health insurance and far fewer stamps in their passports." -- Bruce Sterling

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#77

Post by ahazred8ta »

wrp wrote: post #68

I heard that the breakthrough in finding Bin Laden came from a Pakistani doctor who just walked in and told them where to look. I haven't seen any further details, so I wonder if it's being played down or was a false rumor to begin with.

Not quite. They identified the city and the house by tracking bin Laden's courier. After that, they tried to get dna samples by sending in a doctor.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ahmed_al-Kuwaiti

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#78

Post by Amezarak »

ahazred8ta wrote: post #77
wrp wrote: post #68

I heard that the breakthrough in finding Bin Laden came from a Pakistani doctor who just walked in and told them where to look. I haven't seen any further details, so I wonder if it's being played down or was a false rumor to begin with.

Not quite. They identified the city and the house by tracking bin Laden's courier. After that, they tried to get dna samples by sending in a doctor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ahmed_al-Kuwaiti

That's the official story. According to reporting by Seymour Hersh and others, what actually happened was:

- Pakistan's ISI was keeping bin Laden as a "guest" at the compound after having captured him.

- A senior ISI official betrayed this fact to the US, in exchange for reward money, American residency, and a cushy CIA job.

- The US brought this up with other ISI officials, who confirmed it and used an ISI emplaced doctor to provide the DNA evidence requested by the US.

- The US negotiated with the ISI on the terms of the raid; the ISI compound guards were ordered to withdraw when the Americans arrived.

https://web.archive.org/web/20240214041103/https://www.lrb.c...

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#79

Post by bitshiftfaced »

netsharc wrote: post #66

On minute 38 out of 48 (listening on 2x speed), and so far there's nothing worth hearing in here.. the first 18 minutes is one of them explaining what a signal is and how the NSA keeps the world safe and follows the law, then another one of them talks in general about, yeah someone got a signal and it lead to Bin Laden. How? No further details... Edit to add: The last 10 minutes have the guest talking about the day o…

> Unsaid is of course that the USA accused, found guilty, and executed someone without trial

Wasn't this a military operation? He was killed in a raid on the compound.

Re: How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

#80

Post by khuey »

jmyeet wrote: post #19
khuey wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Taliban offer to hand over bin Laden and George W. Bush refuses A bit disingenuous to say that and leave out that the most generous version of that offer was to hand Bin Laden over to a third country .

So what's the goal here? To exact vengeance on one individual? To remove his ability to further act in this capacity? Because what we chose instead was to spend $8 trillion on a 20 year war killing millions in Iraq and Afghanistan and still to objectively lose militarily, politically and in terms of the ability for the US to project power in the region. The Taliban control Afghanistan once again. All while doing abso…

None of that has anything to do with what I said.

You can make a damning case that the Bush administration's actions were pointless and self-destructive without the very misleading characterization of what the Taliban was offering, so why be disingenuous?

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