Did a Pakistani official sell info to CIA to settle in the West?

The info about how the CIA received their information in August 2010 now has another source.  Once again it is pointed out that the CIA had this house under surveillance for months.  We find it interesting that the reporter goes into detail about the person who sold the information.  Not surprised at all as this would go along with some of what has been rumored that someone in the Pakistani government tipped them off.

Now fully convinced that Obama did dither for months not days and with the raid being stopped on Saturday night 'due to weather' which wasn't a factor, we believe that the CIA Director ordered the raid to commence while Obama was on the golf course since Obama was brought back from playing golf as witnessed by his golf gear.  CIA Director Panetta and others were making sure that Obama couldn't stop this raid.  We would be willing to bet that the CIA was part of the raid -- just makes sense.

We also believe the part if the raid failed, Jarrett demanded that Panetta take the blame but as we know the raid was a success so the dithering Obama claimed full credit for the operation when he was an unwilling participant.  Did the people in the White House actually believe with all their change of stories that the real truth was not going to start to come out.  It just took a freelance member of the foreign press to put together the details because most of the DC media is too busy propping up Obama to be bothered.

Obama and his people couldn't even keep their mouths shut 24 hours before going against what they promised Gates to keep the details of the raid SECRET.  They seem to care less they have outed the SEAL Team and how they operate as they want Obama to receive the full credit.  It is not working and this is one more story showing Obama dithering to add to the rest.

Did a Pakistani official sell info to CIA to settle in the West?

Wajid Ali Syed

Saturday, May 14, 2011 

WASHINGTON: Did a Pakistani intelligence official sell the information about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden to the US last year to get millions of dollars and relocate to a western country with a new non-Pakistani passport? All those seeking to know the full facts of the Osama episode are looking for an answer to this question. 

President Barack Obama would not have agreed to go forward with the mission to kill Osama bin Laden had it not been for intense pressure from CIA Director Leon Panetta, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defence Robert Gates, administration sources have revealed.
The advocates of the mission had “reached a boiling point”, because President Obama, hesitated for months and kept delaying the final approval. This delay was because of a close aide who suggested that this could damage him politically.
According to these sources, Administration officials were frustrated with the president’s indecisiveness and his orders not to carry out the mission in February. President Obama was “dragged kicking and screaming” to give the green light for the operation in the last week of April. By then, the US military and other high-level officials were so determined to launch the operation that they did not want to give the president the opportunity to delay or to call it off. 

President Obama reluctantly approved to go forward with the operation only if the CIA head agreed to take all the blame in case the mission failed. The planning for the operation underscores the deep divisions in the Obama administration, with President Obama and a close aide, Valerie Jarrett, procrastinating on making a decision and high-ranking officials and members of the cabinet pressing him to go ahead on the other. The chief architect of the plan to “take bin Laden out” was CIA Director Leon Panetta. 

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Secretary of Defence Robert Gates, US Commander in Afghanistan General David Petraeus and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper were part of the group that supported Panetta. 

When asked to comment, the White House referred the question to the National Security Council. The NSC said the Department of Defence was fielding such inquiries. The Defence Department’s press office contact Lieutenant Colonel Elizabeth Robbins responded with this comment: “The Department of Defense is not giving out any further operational details of the mission.” 

However, according to an informed official, the story that a courier helped track bin Laden is just a cover. The CIA actually learned of bin Laden’s whereabouts in August of 2010, when an informant associated with Pakistani intelligence walked into a US Embassy and claimed that bin Laden was living in a house in Abbottabad. The official, however, would not disclose whether the Embassy was located in Pakistan or Afghanistan. 

After confirming that the information was somewhat accurate, the CIA set up a safe house in Abbottabad in September last year to monitor bin Laden’s compound. 

As the intelligence collection proceeded, the CIA demanded that Pakistan come clean with what they knew about bin Laden, claims the official. In December of 2010, the CIA station chief’s identity was made public in the Pakistani press. The intelligence official says that the station chief’s cover was blown to retaliate against the CIA for pressing Pakistani intelligence for information about bin Laden. At the time, the speculation was that the move was in response to a civil suit accusing ISI officials of being involved in the 2008 Mumbai attacks. Once it was clear that the information from the walk-in source was accurate, Panetta set up a reporting chain from the CIA’s Pakistan station direct to him, a highly unusual move that involved bypassing the normal official channels. 

Again the US president was not informed of this progress. Meanwhile, the intelligence operatives learned that key people from an Islamic country friendly to Pakistan were sending Pakistan money to keep Osama out of sight and under virtual house arrest, claims the official. 

By January of 2011 there was a high degree of certainty that bin Laden was in the house. In early February, Panetta suggested that the US should move on bin Laden. But Gates and Petraeus were determined to avoid the “boots on the ground” strategy at all costs. CIA chief Panetta was in favour of an invasion. But President Obama balked on the advice of Valerie Jarrett, a close aide. 

The source maintains that Jarrett’s objection to the proposal was based on the worry that the mission could fail, further eroding Obama’s approval ratings and the strong likelihood that it would be interpreted as yet another act of aggression against the Muslims. The source explained that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton played a crucial role to pressure President Obama to take action. In the last week of April, she met with White House Chief of Staff William Daley to request a meeting with the president to secure approval for the mission. Within hours, Daley called to say that Valerie Jarrett refused to allow the president to give that approval. 

However, Clinton made sure that the vice president was made aware of the situation. The president was later approached by Hillary Clinton, Robert Gates and Leon Panetta and pressurised to order the mission. 

Panetta was directing the operation with both his CIA operatives and the military. The plan was not to capture but to kill bin Laden on sight. Contrary to the news reports, it was Panetta and not President Obama who took the lead on coordinating the details of the mission. 

According to the source, the White House staff has compromised the identity of the unit that carried out the mission. The source said the claim that the raid yielded a “treasure trove” of information about al-Qaeda is also exaggerated. Obama meanwhile is “milking” the mission as a tactic to better his chances of re-election in 2012. The concern in intelligence circles is that in his zeal to boost his approval ratings, the president is harming relations with Pakistan. 

The writer is currently a freelance journalist based in Washington who has worked for foreign and Pakistani newspapers and TV channels. 

Source:  The News.com

We thought with the short time on the ground that the "treasure trove" of information about Al Qaeda was overblown by this White House.  They have spun so much they probably don't know how to separate fiction from fact by now as they use everything for Obama's reelection campaign.  Truth has taken a real hit with all the spin from the White House staff.  For sometime a lot of us have not thought that Bin Laden was  more of the figurehead for Al Qaeda with the day to day leadership in someone else's hands and probably why there is no vacuum in leadership of Al Qaeda with Bin Laden dead.  As a non-betting person, would be willing to bet that Bin Laden was not in full control of Al Qaeda when President Bush made the statement after years in office that it didn't make much difference if we got him or not.  Unlike Obama, President Bush listened to his CIA Director.