YOU KNEW THIS WAS COMING:

'Terror boss' moves up ladder as U.S. sees fit (DEBRA PICKETT, March 4, 2003, SUN-TIMES)

A month after the Sept. 11 attacks, President Bush released a list of the world's most-wanted terrorists. There were 22 names on it. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was No. 22.

And the list wasn't alphabetical.

But, sometime between then and early Saturday morning, when Mohammed was captured in Pakistan, the U.S. government identified Mohammed as the mastermind behind the al-Qaida plot.

Osama bin Laden, we're now told, is pretty much a figurehead: It's Mohammed who made things happen. Over the past 2-1/2 years, he's climbed from last place to a photo finish for No. 1 on the most-wanted list.

The cynical view on this is that Mohammed is still the relatively small fish we were first told he was, but the news of his arrest is being hyped because the Bush administration needs a victory in the war on terrorism before going to war in Iraq.

Is there more to the capture of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed than meets the eye? (Paul Thompson, March 4, 2003, Cooperative Research)

Why are some writers so harsh in their assessments? A large reason, as one of the unnamed experts mentioned above points out, is a very curious shoot-out in Karachi, Pakistan, on September 11, 2002. Ramzi bin al-Shibh, the man who wanted to join the 19 hijackers but was unable to get a US visa, was captured at the end of a four-hour battle involving thousands of police. Nine other suspected terrorists were captured, and two were killed. [Telegraph, 9/16/02] The capture of bin al-Shibh was hailed as a major victory, but it was accidental: "Pakistani intelligence and police officials now admit that the man they were actually looking for that day was Khalid Shaikh Mohammed...," reported one account. [Christian Science Monitor, 10/29/02, Guardian, 9/23/02]

"Afterward, and still, Karachi was thick with rumor. Mohammed was dead, was captured, was there and got away, was there and was allowed to get away." [Los Angeles Times, 12/22/02] And tge Asia Times claimed Mohammed was killed. They reported that the FBI together with Inter-Services Intelligence, or the ISI, Pakistan's notorious intelligence agency, conducted a raid aimed at capturing Mohammed alive. "However, despite instructions to the contrary, a few Pakistan Rangers entered the flat, where they found Shaikh Mohammed and another man, allegedly with their hands up. The Rangers nevertheless opened fire on the pair. ... Later, the Pakistani press carried pictures of a message scrawled in blood on the wall of the flat, proclaiming the Muslim refrain of Kalma, in Arabic: 'There is no God except Allah, Mohammed is his messenger'). An official who was present in the flat at the time of the shooting has told Asia Times Online that the message was written by Shaikh Mohammed with his own blood as his life drained from him." His wife and two children, captured in the raid, confirmed his identity. [Asia Times, 10/30/02] An Australian newspaper repeated that the view that he was killed, and added, "Some reports went so far as to suggest his wife and son had identified his body and buried him under the watchful eye of the FBI." [Daily Telegraph, 3/4/03]

Hopefully he has been in custody for some time and we've gotten all we need from him.

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 6, 2003 9:40 AM