Questions About al Qaeda’s Involvment in Bhutto Murder
The Raw Story is reporting that there is internal dissent in the CIA over who was responsible for Benazir Bhutto’s death last month:
In a 45-minute interview given exclusively to the Washington Post Friday, CIA Director Hayden blamed members of al Qaeda and Baitullah Mehsud, a Pakistani tribal leader.
However, when asked about the allegations that Mehsud, and thus al Qaeda, is behind the assassination, one former high-ranking CIA case officer replied, “That is total bullshit.”
“Mehsud is an ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence] asset. It is ridiculous to think he acted unilaterally. What [the Pakistanis] have [as evidence] is an intercepted conversation, but it is not conclusive that Mehsud is speaking or that he is admitting a role in the assassination. There is some sort of congratulations, but that call could have been made at any time about any topic.”
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The use of snipers and gunmen as assassins, say intelligence sources, does not support the theory that al Qaeda was behind the attacks. These sources added that if Mehsud was involved, it could have only been on contract through the ISI.
One US official concluded that if “Mehsud is in fact behind this, then it would be more of an indictment against the ISI than against al Qaeda.”
The ISI, the Taliban, and al Qaeda all have strong ties to one another. It is this complex relationship that confuses the players and the issues and prevents what many professional intelligence officers believe to be a much needed public understanding of what is terrorism and what is not.
In the case of the Bhutto assassination, these sources view the shooting as an act of murder, not an act of terrorism. As previously reported by Raw Story, they believe that the bombing that followed the shooting was aimed at eliminating the shooter and removing evidence of the assassination.
According to a former high ranking US intelligence official, who wishes to remain anonymous due to the delicate nature of the information, the US intelligence community understands the gunman to have been killed in the blast following Mrs. Bhutto’s assassination.
“He was killed, probably not knowing that the suicide bomber was there,” said this source. “We don’t know for sure if the two men arrived together. We do know that the assassin died in the explosion, and was probably meant to.”
Several other US intelligence officials concur that the bomber was likely “inserted” to “clean up” evidence of the shooting, including eliminating the gunman.
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