http://www.cooperativeresearch.org The Center for Grassroots Oversight aims to provide the public with a means to collaborate on investigations at the grassroots level. en-us http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a101001amesdestroyed#a101001amesdestroyed http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a101001amesdestroyed#a101001amesdestroyed The FBI allows the original batch of the Ames strain of anthrax to be destroyed, making tracing the type of anthrax used in the recent anthrax attacks more difficult. Suspicions that the anthrax used in the attack letters was the Ames strain are confirmed on October 17. paxvector 2008-08-19T15:14:42-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a04022002DavidFranz#a04022002DavidFranz http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a04022002DavidFranz#a04022002DavidFranz Dr. David Franz, a former commander of USAMRIID, the US Army's top biological laboratory, says of the 2001 anthrax attacks: "I think a lot of good has come from it. From a biological or a medical standpoint, we've now five people who have died, but we've put about $6 billion in our budget into defending against bioterrorism." Plentiful evidence suggests that the anthrax came from USAMRIID, but investigators say they have no suspects at all. They also say they have come up "against some closely held military secrets" which are slowing down the investigation. "Federal investigators tell ABC News that military and intelligence agencies have withheld a full listing of all facilities and all employees dealing with top-secret anthrax programs where important leads could be found." paxvector 2008-08-19T15:13:41-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1023nytcipro#a1023nytcipro http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1023nytcipro#a1023nytcipro The New York Times reports that health officials and experts believe numerous other drugs are as effective as the antibiotic Cipro in combating anthrax. "Several generic antibiotics, including doxycycline, a kind of tetracycline, and various penicillins, are also effective against the disease," and they all are in plentiful supply. A 1997 Pentagon study of anthrax in rhesus monkeys showed the other drugs to be equally effective. But Cipro remains the only drug officially recommended by the FDA . paxvector 2008-08-19T00:36:02-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=alate1996khattabcamps#alate1996khattabcamps http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=alate1996khattabcamps#alate1996khattabcamps Ibn Khattab, the Saudi mujaheddin fighter who recently became a leader in the rebel movement in Chechnya , establishes some militant training camps in Chechnya after the first Chechen war ends in late 1996 . The camps mostly train Chechens and others from nearby regions in the Caucasus Mountains. But a trickle of Arab fighters continues to arrive and join his forces as well. Khattab's main training camp is near the village of Serzhen-Yurt. Arab instructors teach locals how to shoot weapons and lay mines while also teaching the Koran and the fundamentalist Wahhabist theology favored by Khattab. One Chechen will later tell the Washington Post that Islamist militants "went to the market and they paid with dollars. There was no power here; there was disorder everywhere, and their influence was very strong. ... The poor Chechen people were already suffering so much and our young guys simply couldn't think. They were ready to accept any ideas." Paul 2008-08-18T23:59:43-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a030599russianplans#a030599russianplans http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a030599russianplans#a030599russianplans Since Chechnya achieved de facto independence from Russia in late 1996, its stability has been slowly unraveling as an Islamist faction led by Shamil Baseyev and Ibn Khattab is undermining the Chechen government led by President Aslan Maskhadov . On March 5, 1999, General Gennady Shpigun, the Russian Interior Ministry representative in Chechnya, is kidnapped by masked gunmen just as he is about to board a plane to fly to Moscow from Grozny, the capital of Chechnya. The Russian government is outraged, especially since Maskhadov had guaranteed Shpigun's safety. Sergei Stepashin, who is Russian interior minister at the time of the kidnapping, will later say that the Russian government begins planning a military assault on Chechnya shortly after. Stephashin wants Russia to conquer the flat northern half of Chechnya and then launch strikes into the mountainous southern half. However, Vladimir Putin, head of the Federal Security Service (FSB), Russia's intelligence agency, advocates invading all of Chechnya. By July, Stepashin has been promoted to Russian prime minister, and he says that in a Kremlin Security Council meeting that month: "we all came to the conclusion that there was a huge hole on our border which won't be closed if we don't [advance] to the Terek [a river dividing the flat northern part of Chechnya from the mountainous southern part]. It was a purely military decision." Stepashin is dismissed as prime minister in early August and replaced by Putin . Chechen raids into the neighboring Russian region of Dagestan in August and a series of mysterious bombings in Moscow in September provide the excuses for Russia to attack Chechnya later in September . But Stepashin will later say: "We were planning to reach the Terek River in August or September. So this was going to happen, even if there had been no explosions in Moscow. I was working actively on tightening borders with Chechnya, preparing for an active offensive." Paul 2008-08-18T23:59:32-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1997checheninfighting#a1997checheninfighting http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1997checheninfighting#a1997checheninfighting In 1996, rebel forces in Chechnya outlasted the Russian army and were able to effectively achieve a de facto independence from Russia . Aslan Maskhadov wins presidential elections in early 1997. But in-fighting amongst the victorious Chechen forces begins, and Maskhadov struggles for control against a number of field commanders and local chieftains. In particular, one powerful Chechen warlord named Shamil Basayev quits Maskhadov's government and joins up with Ibn Khattab, a Saudi who only recently moved to Chechnya and built up his own forces . Khattab is an Islamist who leads many foreigners fighting in Chechnya as a jihad cause. Basayev, while Chechen, trained in a militant training camp in Pakistan around 1990 and is sympathetic to Khattab's religious cause. The Washington Post will later comment: "Islamic extremists figured hardly at all in Chechnya's first war for independence from Russia, from 1994 to 1996. That was clearly a nationalist movement. But when that war ended with no clear winner, Chechnya lay in ruins, presenting fertile ground for Islamic militants." Russia tries to bolster the Maskhadov government by sending it arms and funds and even training its troops. Several assassination attempts are made against him and he is saved twice by an armored limousine Russia provides him with. Kidnappings for ransom become the order of the day. Between 1997 and 1999, more than 1,000 people are kidnapped in Chechnya. In June 1998, amid growing lawlessness, Maskhadov imposes a state of emergency. But this does not restore order. Radical Islamists led by Basayev and Khattab are growing more popular. In January 1999, Maskhadov gives in to pressure and declares that Sharia (strict Islamic law) will be phased in over three years. But this is not good enough for the Islamists, who announce the formation of a rival body to govern Chechnya according to Sharia immediately, and call on Maskhadov to relinquish the presidency. Paul 2008-08-18T23:59:10-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1099chechnyabinladen#a1099chechnyabinladen http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a1099chechnyabinladen#a1099chechnyabinladen According to a later US State Department report, in October 1999, representatives of the allied Chechen warlords Shamil Basayev and Ibn Khattab travel to Kandahar, Afghanistan, to meet with Osama bin Laden. Both warlords already have some al-Qaeda ties . Full scale war between Chechen and Russian forces has just resumed . Bin Laden agrees to provide substantial military and financial assistance. He makes arrangements to send several hundred fighters to Chechnya to fight against Russian troops there. Later in 1999, bin Laden sends substantial amounts of money to Basayev and Khattab for training, supplies, and salaries. At the same time, some Chechen fighters attend Afghanistan training camps. Some of them stay and join al-Qaeda's elite 055 Brigade fighting the Northern Alliance. In October 2001, with the US about to attack the Taliban in Afghanistan, Ibn Khattab will send more fighters to Afghanistan. Paul 2008-08-18T23:58:53-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a09080974pardonfirestorm#a09080974pardonfirestorm http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a09080974pardonfirestorm#a09080974pardonfirestorm Just hours after President Ford announces his pardon of Richard Nixon , he sees evidence that the pardon is even more unpopular than he had feared. The White House switchboard is flooded with "angry calls, heavy and constant," as Ford's lawyer Philip Buchen will later recall. The response, says resigning press secretary Jerald terHorst , is roughly 8-1 against. TerHorst's admission to the press that he is resigning over the pardon adds even more fuel to the blaze of criticism. "I resigned," terHorst tells reporters, "because I just couldn't remain part of an act that I felt was ethically wrong." Reporters almost uniformly side with terHorst against Ford; as author Barry Werth will later write, "the press concluded intrinsically that terHorst's act of conscience trumped the president's." TerHorst's resignation is inevitably compared to Nixon's infamous "Saturday Night Massacre" , and engenders a similar avalanche of press criticism and public outrage. The day after, protesters greet Ford in Pittsburgh with chants of "Jail Ford!" Conservative columnist George Will writes, "The lethal fact is that Mr. Ford has now demonstrated that ... he doesn't mean what he says." The New York Times calls the pardon a "profoundly unwise, divisive, and unjust act. ... This blundering intervention is a body blow to the president's own credibility and to the public's reviving confidence in the integrity of its government." Ford's popularity plunges almost overnight from 70 percent to 48 percent; fewer than one in five Americans identify themselves as Republicans. Ford's biographer John Robert Greene will write that journalists begin "treating Ford as just another Nixon clone in the White House--deceitful, controlled by the leftover Nixonites, and in general no different than any of his immediate predecessors." Werth will conclude that Ford's "self-sacrific[e]" is the political equivalent of him "smothering a grenade." Nixon's refusal to atone in any fashion for his crimes placed the burden of handling Watergate squarely on Ford's shoulders, and that burden will weigh on his presidency throughout his term, as well as damage his chances for election in 1976. Ford will later write: "I thought people would consider his resignation from the presidency as sufficient punishment and shame. I thought there would be greater forgiveness." Years later, Ford's chief of staff, Dick Cheney, will reflect that the pardon should have "been delayed until after the 1974 elections because I think it did cost us seats [in Congress]. If you say that that is a political judgment, it's true, but then, the presidency is a political office." blackmax 2008-08-18T23:58:35-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a101200colewarning#a101200colewarning http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a101200colewarning#a101200colewarning The NSA issues a top-secret intelligence report warning that terrorists are planning an attack in the Middle East, but the warning is not distributed until several hours after the USS ''Cole'' is bombed in Yemen . The warning says that terrorists are involved in the "operational planning" for an attack on US or Israeli targets in the Middle East. It says that members of a group have been tracked to planning activities in Dubai and Beirut, but the names of the operatives and the group remain classified. According to one official, the warning specifies an attack in Yemen, but other officials say it covers the Middle East in general. Typically, the NSA requires one to two days to gather and distribute such highly classified reports. The warning is not reported on the US intelligence community's worldwide computer network called Intellink. NSA reports often are sent out to a smaller network due to their high classification. Paul 2008-08-18T23:57:40-07:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a080590cheneysaudi#a080590cheneysaudi http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/context.jsp?item=a080590cheneysaudi#a080590cheneysaudi Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, accompanied by senior aide Paul Wolfowitz and US CENTCOM commander-in-chief General Norman Schwarzkopf, visits Saudi Arabia just four days after Iraq invades Kuwait . Cheney secures permission from King Fahd for US forces to use Saudi territory as a staging ground for an attack on Iraq. Cheney is polite, but forceful; the US will not accept any limits on the number of troops stationed in Saudi Arabia, and will not accept a fixed date of withdrawal (though they will withdraw if Fahd so requests). Cheney uses classified satellite intelligence to convince Fahd of Hussein's belligerent intentions against not just Kuwait, but against Saudi Arabia as well. Fahd is convinced, saying that if there is a war between the US and Iraq, Saddam Hussein will "not get up again." Fahd's acceptance of Cheney's proposal goes against the advice of Crown Prince Abdullah. With Prince Bandar bin Sultan translating, Cheney tells Abdullah, "After the danger is over, our forces will go home." Abdullah says under his breath, "I would hope so." Bandar does not translate this. On the same trip, Cheney also visits Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, who rejects Cheney's request for US use of Egyptian military facilities. Mubarak tells Cheney that he opposes any foreign intervention against Iraq. US forces will remain in Saudi Arabia for thirteen years . blackmax 2008-08-18T16:17:57-07:00