“After [would-be Millennium Bomber Ahmed] Ressam’s arrest [on December 14, 1999] [President Bill] Clinton telephoned [Pakistani Chief Executive] General [Pervez] Musharraf in Pakistan. He demanded that Musharraf find a way to disrupt or arrest bin Laden, according to notes of the conversation kept by the American side. Musharraf’s coup offered a potential fresh start in […]
12/14/1999
On December 14, 1999, Algerian Ahmed Ressam tried to enter the U.S. by ferry from Canada. After raising suspicions, “Inspectors examining Ressam’s rental car found the explosives concealed in the spare tire well, but at first they assumed the white powder and viscous liquid were drug-related–until an inspector pried apart and identified one of the […]
12/14/1999
“…on December 14 [1999], a border guard in Port Angeles, Washington, stopped an Algerian man, Ahmed Ressam, whose obvious anxiety aroused her suspicion.” Inside Ressam’s trunk were “four timers, more than a hundred pounds of urea, and fourteen pounds of sulfate–the makings of an Oklahoma City-type bomb. Ressam bolted. …The guards gave chase and caught […]
12/12/1999
On December 12, 1999, “Jordanian security forces discovered explosives hidden in a specially constructed basement cache and hauled in a ring of locally well-known Islamists who were accused of plotting to attack the Radisson Hotel, favored by American tourists, a biblical site at Mount Nebo (whence Moses inspected the Promised Land) and other targets [including […]
12/12/1999
Militant Islamist Abu Musa al-Zarqawi and his Herat group’s “sleeper cells inside Jordan collected an arsenal of weapons and explosives for simultaneous attacks on a large number of targets on the eve of the millennium. …The GID [General Intelligence Department] uncovered the plot and found the cache of arms before it could be used on […]
12/4/1999
According to a New York Times article on December 4, 1999, “During the [2000 presidential] campaign, George W. Bush had said that if Saddam Hussein was developing weapons of mass destruction (WMD), the United States would ‘take him out.’ ” – Stephen F. Hayes, Cheney, Page 318 […]
12/2/1999
From the December 2, 1999, Manchester, New Hampshire, debate involving the GOP Presidential Candidates: MR. HUME: Governor Bush, Saddam Hussein is still there. What would you do about that, if anything, that is different from what President Clinton has done? GOV. BUSH: I wouldn’t ease the sanctions, and I wouldn’t try to negotiate with him. […]
12/2/1999
“…in early December [2] 1999, at a little-noticed debate among Republican contenders just as the primary season was starting in New Hampshire, [presidential hopeful George W.] Bush went public and vowed to take down Saddam. ‘No one envisioned him still standing,’ Bush said. ‘It’s time to finish the task. And if I found that in […]
11/29/1999
” ‘Afghanistan,’ [UN Secretary General] Kofi Annan said in his final report on the subject in November [29] 1999, ‘is becoming a breeding ground for religious extremism and sectarian violence, as well as various types of international terrorism, the scope of which far exceeds Afghan boundaries.’ “ – Roy Gutman, How We Missed the Story, […]
11/24/1999
An Amnesty International Report on November 24, 1999, read: ” ‘Gross human rights violations are taking place systematically in Iraq…while the Iraqi government has used every opportunity to publicise the suffering of the population under the sanctions regime…it has exercised a complete news blackout on the atrocities that its security forces have been committing.’ ” […]