reply to post by Pha3drus
This thread annoys me.
In my experience on ATS Al’Qa’ida and violent Islamic extremism are the most misunderstood topics that we discuss. I blame allot of this on the
media and your reluctance to go find anything that doesn’t fall under the category of “conspiracy/revisionist” media.
I took a quick look at the link, I have not watched the first video but I have seen the second BBC documentary with Jason Burke who is the middle east
correspondent for the Guardian and regarded as somewhat of a expert on the history of Al’Qa’ida. I would advise you to go and read his book on
the subject rather than this documentary as it gives the impression that he is saying Al’Qa’ida is not real, however in his book he explains that
it is the media representation of Al’Qa’ida that is inaccurate and the real Al’Qa’ida and the threat posed by it is still dangerous. His book
provides a fantastic and complex history of the group however his views do not fit in with conspiracy literature.
Now onto what Cook said.
I find it strange how the conspiracy comunity will believe Robin Cook, but will not believe all the other government ministers who would disagree and
in spite of the fact most of you clearly have no understanding of the history of Al’Qa’ida. You have basically heard one quote and taken it as
proof that Al’Qa’ida is a CIA stooge (even though that is not what this article is saying).
It’s the biggest problem on the terrorism forum on ATS, people have no understanding of Al’Qa’ida and seek to look for a alternative history of
the group that will back up their 9/11 conspiracies. This just fuels ignorance, its infuriating. It just goes to show how narrow your understanding of
this group is that you are talking the world of a estranged MP who is not a expert in the history of Al’Qa’ida.
Look at what he has said, at no point does he indicate that Al’Qa’ida is a CIA stooge only that they are the result of a miscalculation of
American foreign policy in the 1980’s. He is just wrong to say that the CIA directly funded Al’Qa’ida and armed them at this time. Under
operation Cyclone almost all funding went through the ISI and at the time Bin Laden was so wealthy through his family connections he would have no
need for the extra funding. Any funding that he did receive would have come from the ISI, possibly with the CIA’s figure prints on it, but he was
not directly funded by the CIA. Just about all training went through the ISI as well; however there are some interesting accounts of British SAS
training the Mujahedeen in the use of American stinger missile systems. Some estimates claim that up to 100,000 militants were trained under operation
cyclone however most of them received their training form the Pakistanis and not the west. During the 1980’s, Bin Laden was for the most part a
financer, setting up a series of stop over homes for travailing Mujahedeen and keeping a record of those going to fight the soviets, latterly he is
said to have set up a training camp. He was not a “war lord”, he was more of a logistics man, and he was a very small fish in the grand scale of
the mighty Afghan war lords. Even if he did get some direct training through operation cyclone he would have been one of literally 100’s of
thousands and thus it means nothing. They would never have known what he was to become.
There is nothing in any of the mainstream literature that suggest the CIA set up Al’Qa’ida directly in the 1980’s as part of a future weapon to
be used against the American people as a justification for future wars and as a fall guy in a false flag. However it could be accurate to argue that
as Cook may have been arguing for, that as a result of a “monumental miscalculation” by the CIA during the 1980’s they inadvertently planted the
seeds for the 9/11 attacks by facilitating a victory for the Mujahedeen in the 1980’s against the Soviets and then abandoning the Afghanistan during
operation cyclone.
In any case, the “Al’Qa’ida” you are thinking about never existed until between 1996-2001 Cook is talking about the Al’Qa’ida of the
1980’s which is totally different form the group you are thinking about.
If you read Burkes book, he will probably back up most of what I have just said.