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| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Are you joking? Independent verification from "anyone who knows Photoshop"? I think if anyone can doctor a photo to the highest possible quality, it's the US government. And according to the official story, Bin Laden was almost certainly shot in the head twice. So you think a photograph of a mangled head released by the US government and verified by armchair experts on the Internet is reliable proof? You're not even a very good conspiracy theorist. If you're going to doubt official evidence, you're taking the first step into CT circular reasoning where no proof will ever be good enough.
I highly doubt there is anything significantly inaccurate about this story, for two main reasons:
1. It would be very easy for Al Qaeda to disprove the story, and why wouldn't they?
2. If the US know Bin Laden has been dead for some time, as you suggest, why didn't they announce it at the time, and why announce it now? If Obama has been saving up this story for an appropriate time, even the Republicans in this thread are pointing out that 18 months before an election isn't the ideal time for it to come out.
It's only one small step to the "Al Qaeda was invented by the US government" reasoning from here. |
No, it won't lead to circular logic. As I said, a photo will suffice for me. As I understand it, no matter how well doctored a photo is, an expert can tell. I wasn't suggesting the US government knows he's been dead for some time, either. I guessed on the possibility they just now found out he's been dead for some time, or more recently via causes outside their control. Crucial difference. I can understand that to most of you, my skepticism seems no different to that displayed by loony conspiracy theorists. Several points though:
1. I'm not ignoring a torrent of plausible, multi-source verified civilian evidence. I'm ignoring a single piece; one which is provided by the government and proven in their lab.
2. I'm expecting to be convinced soon enough, and wanting to be.
3. I'm not drawing any definite conclusions about what actually happened, i.e. "George Bush hired six men and then they flew the planes because America wanted to go to war and get some oil!" I'm doubting the official version somewhat, and offering some ideas about how it might be incorrect.
4. Unlike 9/11, the moon landing or anything else, a cover-up (or at least slight distortion of the real events) is actually plausible in this case. The event happened in a nation far away from Western eyes, in the countryside, without media present, and no witnesses besides agents under the direct control of the US government. How hard would it be to say to the 6-8 soldiers present, "Tell everyone you killed Osama rather than found him dead from kidney failure. The morale of the American people depends on it." They'd be extremely willing to do so, and there'd be no way for anyone to dispute this. It's a highly controlled situation.
I don't doubt that the helicopter was actually shot down in battle, either. It would be ridiculous to suggest they'd crash their own aircraft. However, as I said, it's plausible that when the soldiers got inside, he was already dead, or wasn't even on site and they've used this small (real) battle as a fake, stand-in event.
I don't hold my doubts idly, either. When they didn't apprehend him in the first 5 years after S/11, I thought it possible he'd died in an indiscriminate airstrike, from suicide, disease, or something else. They caught every one of his lieutenants (I think), monitored radio traffic comprehensively, foiled a number of other terrorist plots and still weren't able to catch him. Why? It wasn't for lack of knowledge about the workings and activities of Al-Qaeda.
As Egos said, the organisation is extremely de-centralised. I learnt a lot about it reading this excellent book (link). If bin Laden had been suddenly killed in a cave somewhere, perhaps hardly anyone knew about it.
As for the people who think that if he was killed five years ago, Al-Qaeda would have announced it, look at the effect news of his death has had in America. To date, it's the only "real" sign of "progress" in this bullshit "war", and it's taken ten years. It's a huge morale booster for the West, and a massive blow for Al-Qaeda and its sympathisers. Had Al-Qaeda known he was dead, it would have been greatly to their benefit to pretend otherwise.
Again, all possibilities and speculation, none of which can be proven.
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Last edited by Domesticated on May-03-2011 at 12:55
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At least we know now who did it 
