Did you see this article? We've got to keep the focus on this story, until the truth comes out. Bush and Co have convinced the media to ignore investigating what really happened at Tora Bora in 2001 for too long. Don't let this slip by.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The CIA is squelching publication of a new book detailing events leading up to Osama bin Laden's escape from his Tora Bora mountain stronghold during the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, says a former CIA officer who led much of the fighting. In a story he says he resigned from the agency to tell, Gary Berntsen recounts the attacks he coordinated at the peak of the fighting in eastern Afghanistan in late 2001, including how U.S. commanders knew bin Laden was in the rugged mountains near the Pakistani border and the al-Qaeda leader's much-discussed getaway....
During the 2004 election, President Bush and other senior administration officials repeatedly said that commanders did not know whether bin Laden was at Tora Bora when U.S. and allied Afghan forces attacked there in 2001.
They rejected allegations by Sen. John Kerry, then the Democratic presidential nominee, that the United States had missed an opportunity to capture or kill bin Laden because they had "outsourced" the fighting to Afghan warlords.
"When I watched the presidential debates, it was clear to me ... the debate and discussions on Tora Bora were -- from both sides -- completely incorrect," said Berntsen, who won't provide details until the agency finishes declassifying his book. "It did not represent the reality of what happened on the ground."
A Republican and avid Bush supporter, Berntsen, 48, retired in June and hasn't spoken publicly before.
UPDATE: You can already pre-order it for October 18th.
It covers his role handling the agency's response to al-Qaeda's 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa. And the book continues through late 2001 when he was assigned to command a CIA team inserted into Afghanistan, code-named "Jawbreaker" — the title of his book, tentatively due out in October.
I guess Gary is outing himself as Eric L.
The publisher is Crown Publishing. This book is important, because Gary Schroen, author of
First In, left Afghanistan before Bin Laden had even fled to Tora Bora from the Al Qaeda stronghold in Jalalabad around November 13, 2001.
If you are interested in this subject, I also personally recommend Al Qaeda's Great Escape by Philip Smucker. He's the Daily Telegraph reporter who was there on the ground and first reported that Bin Laden was at Tora Bora on November 23, 2001.
Interesting info from the co-author's website:
Eric L. and Ralph Pezzullo
Crown | Hardcover | September, 2005 | $24.95 | 0-307-23740-0
For CIA buffs who can’t get enough of books like See No Evil, action junkies who mainlined Rogue Warrior, and those who want to know why Osama Bin Laden slipped from America’s grasp, comes a no-holds-barred look at the CIA’s war in Afghanistan by the deadly, cunning commander who cornered the world’s #1 fugitive.
Looks like it was supposed to ship in September.
Also found this from Reuters:
"A lot of people say we don't know for sure (bin Laden) was there, but our client explains how we did know for sure he was there," Krieger added.
Krieger suggested Berntsen's account of the Tora Bora attack could now be in the sights of CIA censors.
The spy agency has not yet said what changes, if any, it wants in the manuscript.
But in court documents filed with U.S. district court in Washington, Berntsen said he believes the CIA's clandestine division wants to redact 30 pages of the book. The book is scheduled to be published by Random House in October under the title, "Jawbreaker."
A redaction that size could be large enough to kill publication, Krieger said.