soaring with Osama

wrote:
Here's a quote from Slate Magazine (http://www.slate.com/id/2147499/):

Syria had hundreds of files on al-Qaida, including dossiers on those
who had participated-or wanted to participate-in the 9/11 attacks.
Syrian spies had penetrated al-Qaida cells throughout the Middle East,
and Syrian President Bashar Assad was passing on loads of data to the
CIA and the FBI. Some of these tips apparently foiled al-Qaida plots,
including a plan to fly an explosives-laden glider into the U.S. Navy's
5th Fleet headquarters.


Anyone know anything about this?



Sounds like a great movie plot -- we are about due for another film
with a glider in it. But, it's an old story now and numerous
references available on the Web have been made to Hersh's assertion,
referenced below.

-----------------

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/conten.../030728fa_fact

THE SYRIAN BET
Did the Bush Administration burn a useful source on Al Qaeda?
by SEYMOUR M. HERSH
Issue of 2003-07-28
Posted 2003-07-18

[....]

Syria also provided the United States with intelligence about future
Al Qaeda plans. In one instance, the Syrians learned that Al Qaeda
had penetrated the security services of Bahrain and had arranged for
a glider loaded with explosives to be flown into a building at the
U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet headquarters there. Flynt Leverett, a former
C.I.A. analyst who served until early this year on the National
Security Council and is now a fellow at the Saban Center at the
Brookings Institution, told me that Syria’s help “let us thwart an
operation that, if carried out, would have killed a lot of Americans.”

[....]

----------------

Are you asking if a glider could do the job, or are you hoping to
confirm the plot by finding Flynt Leverett's telephone number here
on USENET? The Saban Center at the Brookings Institution might be a
better place to start.

http://www.brookings.edu/fp/saban/sabancenter_hp.htm

Flynt Leverett , Foreign Policy Studies, 202/797-4389


The Internet can be a wonderful thing, if we learn how to use it.

You will have to make the call yourself.



Jack