In an interview in December 1999, Taliban official Maulvi Hafeezullah said: ” ‘We will never hand over bin Laden. The U.S. has made a monster out of one man. We can unleash a *heroin bomb* to match your nuclear bomb.’ This was a nod to the fact that Afghanistan, under the Taliban, had been recently […]
Category: quotes
12/15/1999
In December 1999, journalist Peter Bergen interviewed bureau chief of The News Rahimullah Yusufzai, in Peshawar, Pakistan. “Rahimullah confirmed my sense that the Taliban were not necessarily the ardent fans of bin Laden that their public statements had suggested, ‘I have privately heard some criticism,’ he said. ‘They say sarcastically, *Even after the war [against […]
12/15/1999
“In a December 1999 debate among GOP presidential contenders, [candidate George W.] Bush backtracked when he said he’d ‘take ’em out’ if Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Asked by the moderator whether he had said ‘take him out,’ Bush replied, ‘Take out the weapons of mass destruction.’ ” [The 15th of the month used […]
12/15/1999
“In December 1999, NSA [National Security Agency] intercepted another series of telephone calls coming into [al Qaeda operative Ahmed Mohammed Ali] al-Hada’s home in Sana’a [Yemen], which revealed that an ‘operational cadre’ of al Qaeda operatives intended to travel to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in early January 2000. The transcript of the intercepted call identified only […]
12/15/1999
“In December 1999, the UN Security Council authorised the setting up of United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) to monitor Iraq’s weapons programmes and to identify any remaining disarmament tasks. Hans Blix, a veteran Swedish diplomat and former director general of the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency], was put in charge of UNMOVIC.“ […]
12/15/1999
“In December 1999, the UN Security Council gave Iraq permission to sell unlimited amounts of oil under the OFF [Oil For Food] programme.” [The 15th of the month used for date sorting purposes only.] – Ali A. Allawi, The Occupation of Iraq, Page 70 […]
12/15/1999
“After earlier reports of sharp tension between Taliban leaders and bin Laden, U.S. intelligence discovered that the Taliban’s Council of Ministers had unanimously endorsed its alliance with al Qaeda at the end of 1999. [Taliban leader] Mullah Omar had even reportedly executed Taliban dissenters over the issue.” [The 15th of the month used for date […]
12/14/1999
On December 14, 1999, “When Ahmed Ressam, the would-be bomber of Los Angeles International Airport [LAX], stepped off the ferry from Canada at Port Angeles, Washington…and was nabbed by alert Customs agents, U.S. investigators had little inkling that the arrest would prove a turning point in their understanding of al-Qaeda’s scope–of the networks that stretched […]
12/14/1999
“The December [14] 1999 arrest of Ahmed Ressam, a low-level Algerian terrorist operative, had not only helped break up the millennium terrorist plot but also had tipped the CIA to the existence of an Algerian al Qaeda network of black Africans. The result: a doubling of the known number of al Qaeda in the world, […]
12/14/1999
On December 14, 1999, “Michael Sheehan, the State Department counterterrorist chief, phoned Taliban foreign minister [Wakil Ahmed] Muttawakil with an emotional message from [President Bill] Clinton. ‘If you have an arsonist in your basement, and every night he goes out and burns down a neighbor’s house, and you know this is going on, then you […]