Gary North's REALITY CHECK Issue 88 November 1, 2001

HIDE AND GO SEEK

Yesterday, I was sent the following document. It was posted on Yahoo! for a less than one hour. I have the Yahoo! HTML page version, not just the text. You will see why this story disappeared from Yahoo! within 45 minutes.

One of the great advantages of writing a large- circulation newsletter like mine is that I have subscribers who find all sorts of goodies that no individual could locate all by himself. They send the links to me. In this case, I was sent the full page, so that I could see for myself that it was not a hoax, or at least not the document-sender's hoax. The URL link led to a dead end.

I reproduce the full story here for historical information under fair use doctrine. The article's page said "Email this story." I'm doing exactly that.

After you have read it, and you see the irony, send it to a few friends. They may have missed it.

This story was not front-page news. It should have been. Especially on Halloween.

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Wednesday October 31, 12:03 PM

Bin Laden underwent treatment in July at Dubai American Hospital

Osama bin Laden underwent treatment in July at the American Hospital in Dubai where he met a US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) official, French daily Le Figaro and Radio France International reported.

Quoting "a witness, a professional partner of the administrative management of the hospital," they said the man suspected by the United States of being behind the September 11 terrorist attacks had arrived in Dubai on July 4 by air from Quetta, Pakistan.

He was immediately taken to the hospital for kidney treatment. He left the establishment on July 14, Le Figaro said.

During his stay, the daily said, the local CIA representative was seen going into bin Laden's room and "a few days later, the CIA man boasted to some friends of having visited the Saudi-born millionaire."

Quoting "an authoritative source," Le Figaro and the radio station said the CIA representative had been recalled to Washington on July 15.

Bin Laden has been sought by the United States for terrorism since the bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. But his CIA links go back before that to the fight against Soviet forces in Afghanistan.

Le Figaro said bin Laden was accompanied in Dubai by his personal physician and close collaborator, who could be the Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahari, as well as bodyguards and an Algerian nurse.

He was admitted to the urology department of Doctor Terry Callaway, who specializes in kidney stones and male infertility. Telephoned several times, the doctor declined to answer questions.

Several sources had reported that bin Laden had a serious kidney infection. He had a mobile dialysis machine sent to his Kandahar hideout in Afghanistan in the first half of 2000, according to "authoritative sources" quoted by Le Figaro and RFI.

Email this story http://sg.news.yahoo.com/011031/1/1ml07.html

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This story is, as they say, a corker. Here we have America's Most Wanted Criminal walking into an American hospital and getting treatment in the urology center. At least it wasn't the proctology center. The headline in "Le Figaro" would then have read -- in French, of course -- "Bin Laden Moons America on the Fourth of July!"

I wonder if he paid with Visa or MasterCard. If he has a sense of humor, he paid with American Express. "Don't leave your cave without it!"

He got interviewed by a CIA "asset." I wish I had a cassette tape of that discussion. My imagination runs wild. "So, Osama, what do you think of Barry Bonds' chances? Do you think he can hit more than 70 home runs?"

Quoting "an authoritative source," Le Figaro and the radio station said the CIA representative had been recalled to Washington on July 15.

I can well understand.

Lyndon Johnson, in his homey, Texas Hill Country way, used to say that he would deal with some opponent when, quote, "I've got his pecker in my pocket." He didn't mean this literally. But the CIA had bin Laden in the urology department. He got away.

When I was a youth, I used to listen on the radio to a weekly show called "The Scarlet Pimpernel." It was about a late-eighteenth-century English spy. It began each week with these words:

They seek him here. They seek him there. They seek him everywhere. Where is he, that elusive Pimpernel?

Or at least that's what I remember after half a century. Applied to bin Laden, the answer is:

He's in a cave in Afghanistan with a diesel generator, so that he can plug in his dialysis machine.

We have had a $5 million reward on this man since 1998. America's intelligence network, using spy satellites to trace his cell phone calls, has been after him full-time for three years. So, he walks into an American hospital with his associates, gets treated, talks to a CIA operative, pays his bill, takes his dialysis machine, and disappears.

Meanwhile, this same high-tech intelligence network is going to protect us from anthrax attacks.

It's really a shame that Ed Reimers retired. The Office of Homeland Security could use him for a TV promo. "You're in good hands with Big State."

A variant of this story ran in the conservative WASHINGTON TIMES (Oct. 31).

http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/default-20011031112818.htm

What should we conclude from this story? That the CIA is incompetent beyond anyone's wildest imagination? That the story is a fake? That "Le Figaro" got conned? That the typical cave in Afghanistan is wired to allow the use of a dialysis machine? Or that the story is true -- the best example of American intelligence FUBAR in the last 50 years?

The CIA has denied everything:

"Complete and utter nonsense," said Anya Guilsher, a spokeswoman for the Central Intelligence Agency. "It's false, and I told Le Figaro that, too."

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/10/31/163622.shtml

With a highly detailed, fully verifiable response like this from a spokeswoman of an agency that gets paid to deceive people, how could anyone possibly believe the story? Who could believe that something like this could take place? Only conspiracy theorists, right-wing crazies, and non-patriotic types.

-- PHO (owennos@bigfoot.com), November 01, 2001

Answers

I don't believe the C.I.A. would lie to us.

-- Polly Anna (polly-anna@webster.net), November 01, 2001.