Just the reason why I do read Debka. When you think of it, it is about as reliable as the Wall Street mavens on what's going to happen next to the markets.
Debka makes for some interesting reading and some interesting scenarios. arthur -----Original Message----- From: Jan Matthieu [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, August 13, 2002 8:17 PM To: Cordell, Arthur: ECOM; Keith Hudson; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Sometime soon? (was RE: Next 11 September ----- Original Message ----- From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, August 13, 2002 7:54 PM Subject: RE: Sometime soon? (was RE: Next 11 September > See also > > http://www.debka.com/ > > Prince Saud's Tit for Tat - A Spurious Exercise > DEBKAfile Special Analysis > 12 August: > Debka is one of the sites I have been following for more than a year now. Sometimes they seem have info you don't find elsewhere. Of course they are very pro-Zionist and anti-Arafat, but then, when you know, you take that into account. It is certainly wise to consider all sources, not just left-wing. But debka is using a number of tricks that are very unprofessional. For example they make all sorts of claims without ever revealing a source, and when the claims don't come out they just remain silent about it (I'm thinking of the thousands of Chinese soldiers who would have been fighting on the side of the taliban at one time; it never materialized and they never mentioned it again, strange? It happens all the time.) I could do the same, claim I have secret sources and predict some major suicide attack is going to happen in israel. Not difficult, given the fact these are happening almost weekly. Debka is interesting but unreliable, but it sure as hell is many times worth the time reading I would waste on reading the stuff on whateveritwasthatreallyhappenedaccordingtocertainpeople dot com. with the Israeli did it, Osama had nothing to do with it and everyone had just been waiting to attack afghanistan because they wanted to build that pipeline nonsense, it's just tiring and it leaves one nothing wiser. If I want to learn this kind of stuff I can go to the local pub, where they all have their personal idea of who's responsible for those attacks. > -----Original Message----- > From: Keith Hudson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > Sent: Tuesday, August 13, 2002 6:17 AM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: Sometime soon? (was RE: Next 11 September > > > Hi Lawry, > > At 18:55 12/08/02 -0700, you wrote: > <<<< > Hi, Keith, > The "RAND Report" isn't a RAND report. Rather the presentation that you are > referring to is by a short-term French 'analyst' who is working out of RAND. > I don't have a great opinion of RAND's political analysis generally, finding > it sadly superficial and commercial, but in all fairness to RAND, I don't > think we can blame the organization for this one-person show. I see the > presentation (made to Perle's advisory group) as being part of the concerted > effort to demonize Saudi Arabia. > >>>> > > I suppose the fact that the report used language such as "evil" betrays a > single author. I didn't know that. I assumed it was a typical Rand > think-tank report. Nevertheless, I can't imagine that the report was > without some foundation or else it wouldn't have proceeded further. You would be surprised how some unfounded or distorted stories can proceed! <cut> > The reaction in most instances has taken the form of falling back to an > intensely puritanical form of Islam as the only way of retaining their > dignity and self-respect. We've seen this fairly recently in the case of > the rapid rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan -- which, I suggest, is far > from being defeated (I notice, most women are still wearing burkas!) > I think this last bit is silly, I'm sorry. The Taliban, as everyone who is even a bit informed of recent and older history, knows, were essentially a Pakistan directed invasion force, led by pakistani military officers with the aim to create a Pakistan friendly Pashtun-controlled Afghanistan which would not claim back the Pashtun part of Pakistan, due to be returned to Afghanistan in 1994, according to the 1893 peace treaty with the British after the second Afghan war, in much the same way Hong Kong had been leased from China for a century (and WAS in fact returned to its rightful 'owners'). The Taliban had very little real popular support, except maybe in the southernmost provinces, and even there... They are defeated all right, but Al Qaeda isn't. But what the fact that most women are 'still' wearing burkas has to do with the Taliban I don't know. Women have been wearing burkas in Afghanistan since time immemorial, or at least for the last millennium; I was five times in the country on longer visits and I can assure you that, except for the large cities and even there certain educated and westernized women, they all have been wearing them burkas and I see no reason why they all of a sudden would stop the practice because the law permits now not to wear them. In the seventhies there was no law enforcing burkas, and the large majority of women, or rather every women in the countryside wore them, especially in the southern parts. As a matter of fact, practically the only female faces I remember having seen in Afghanistan in those good old days before 1973 when the commies fucked up the regional balance arranging a coup against the king, were those of girls and of hostesses for airlines and government burocracy secretaries. > In other words, remembering that 15 of the 19 terrorists of September 11 > were Saudis, there is the distinct danger that another Al Qaeda attack will > almost certainly occur given the fanaticism of many young men who've been > indoctrinated from an early age. How can Bush do otherwise than get enough > troops into the Middle East to be on hand if Saudi Arabia goes even more > extremist than now? The American public would never forgive him. He only > just got away with it since 11 September, considering that a great deal was > known, or suspected, about Al Qaeda long before then. (A new attack by Al > Qaeda, even if Osama bin Laden is dead, is even more likely today than ever > before, considering that the Israeli situation is worsening.) Bush can't > come out with his real reason for sending troops because that itself would > probably spark off a revolution in SA -- and, just as seriously, intensify > the Al Qaeda network in Iran (where, according to the last Sunday Telegraph > they have recently established training camps). Yup, I agree with that possibility. I actually told my minister last year, a couple of weeks after 11/9, that the real problem was Saudi Arabia for mostly those reasons. But I'm not so sure the fundamentalists are as strong over there as is generally suggested. There is also quite some Saudi who are not that stupid and actually want their children to get a real education. > > As I've suggested before, unless anything dramatic happens before then, I > think that Bush will announce troop movements to Kuwait on September 11 > coming -- to great public acclaim -- and will keep on building those up > (and the Qatar airbase) until King Fahd dies and a succession is brought > about -- either peacefully or not. If the succession is peaceful and Saudi > Arablia seems to be stable (and more friendly to the US) then Bush *might* > start to move against Iraq. But that itself might spark off a revolution in > SA. That sounds a bit too much like debka-talk. > > Almost whatever scenario is envisaged, something near to catastrophic loss > of life will almost certainly occur in the Middle East in the fairly > nearish future. Given the present administration, America can do no other > in order to protect its oil supplies. It would require a President of > extraordinary stature and persuasiveness to chart a different peaceful > course. Even so, such a President would still have to accept that the nasty > regimes of Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, etc -- particularly nasty as to > half their populations (their womenfolk) -- would have to continue for at > least two or three generations longer before their culture changes to > anything approaching a fair and decent society. > There is a lot of truth there too; I wonder, I would love to see muslim society achieve enlightenment, or at least modernity. The sufi are their best hope. Only if that timing is right, I'll be like 111 by the time they do... > <<<< > Your description of the British who are in jail caught me by surprise; I > hadn't realized that they had been there so long or under the conditions you > describe. There is an incongruence here; it has notbeen a Saudi pattern to > treat foreigners the way you describe, and so I am wondering whether there > might not be more to the story than we know? > >>>> > >From all I heard, most Saudi have been treating foreign workers with a lot of contempt and generally badly. Only this time it is British who are the victims, and that is another kind of foreigner. To me it only shows they are now more consistent in their misuse of their foreign workers. Before they only mistreated mostly Filipino and Sri Lankan workers; of course females are habitually mistreated as they do with every female (I allow for the occasional exception), but they abuse men too, after all, they are miscreants. It's the same kind of racism white man has practiced during the colonial time and even today in many places. Jan Matthieu > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- > ------------ > > Keith Hudson, General Editor, Handlo Music, http://www.handlo.com > 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath BA1 5HX, England > Tel: +44 1225 312622; Fax: +44 1225 447727; mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > ________________________________________________________________________ >
