How Snarly Bombed in Bagram

The story I want to discuss here today is almost a week old. However, even now it is still not really clear just what it was that happened.

As we know, a suicide truck bomb exploded inside the outer gates of the Bagram military base in Afghanistan, Tuesday, February 27.

If there is anyplace that is ours in the ongoing turf war in Afghanistan, it is the Bagram base, therefore this attack had to be considered a coup on the part of the Taliban.

Next, we heard that Vice President, Mr "Big" Dick Snarly had been on the base at the time of the explosion. Unnamed spokespeople for the Taliban took responsibility for the bomb and claimed that it had been intended for the Mr Snarly.

The gov't replied Mr Snarly had been in no danger -- he was a mile or so away from the blast which killed about twenty people, mostly Afghanis, and a couple of American soldiers as well as another foreign soldier (I forget which nationality). However, they did not deny that Talibanis were responsible, nor did they refute their claim that the bomb was intended to snuff the Vice president (although they maintained that at no time was his safety in any way compromised).

Juan Cole posted an excellent, deep and extrememly well informed commentary written by one of his readers. This commentary, actually an article in its own right, draws together a number of threads in the tapestry of deceit known as the War on Terror. I pick out here a few points that interest me but you should read the whole article. The bold face but not the caps is my edit.

When Mr Snarly came to Pakistan, a high-ranking person (supposedly #3) in the Taliban was taken into custody:

"...the very day Cheney read the riot act to Musharraf, the Pakistanis found the #3 of the Taliban and arrested him. Or is it more likely that Cheney delivered, personally, intelligence that showed Musharraf exactly WHERE this man was. And that Cheney told him: either you get him or we will. Today. And then Cheney leaves, and goes to Baghram Airport. Where, oddly enough, he is forced to stay overnight, due to weather."

The next day finds Mr Snarly at Afghanistan at the Bagram base when the bombing took place. Did the Taliban know he was there, was it a guess, a lucky shot, or did someone in the Pakistani ISI leak the information to them?

The commenter on Cole's page asks:

"Was all of this a ruse to smoke out, for Musharraf, a very high placed spy for the Taliban and al-Qaeda? Or was the bombing at Bagram, more a signal to Cheney: WE got YOUR message! YOU told Musharraf where our #3 guy was, and YOU were sending US a message. Now, here is OUR message to YOU, Mr. Cheney! WE knew you were there. We KNEW your movements. Think about THAT! Maybe next time you come around our part of the world, we'll get YOU!"

Jeeze, this sounds almost like the kind of "messages" Mafiosi send one another. Things to remember here is that the Codpiece administration has gotten closer to India since its test of an atomic bomb and that the Taliban itself is a Frankenstein child of the Pakistani ISI:

"...since the U.S.- India nuclear deal, elements of the Pakistani Army and ISI have once again begun to assist the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Cheney and Bush are blowing all kinds of intelligence to let the Pakistanis know that we know what they're up to. But will it really do Musharraf much good? Will he suddenly be able to swoop down on rogues in his Army and ISI, and quell yet another possible coup? How long can he last, when he sucks up more and more to the Americans?"

Again, I recommend you read the whole thing. Also, Lurch at Main and Central also had an early on commentary worth a read.
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By the way, the pix up at the top is not from Bagram -- it from one of our misslies in Kabul.

All the bombs are in the hands of terrorists