28 pages? How about the UBL docs.. or the Iraq docs

While Bush haters, 9/11 truthers, and transparency lovers push for the release of the 28 pages from a 2003 Senate report that many believe will implicate the Saudis in 9/11, there's another trove of yet-to-be-analyzed docs that may shed some light on the GWoT: the bin Laden docs captured at Abbotabad.

Some of them trickled out a few years ago and a few more came out recently in the NYC trial of yet another African Embassy bomber suspect.  Here's the Long War Journal:

“Our groups inside Afghanistan are the same for every season for many years now,” Rahman wrote. “We have groups in Bactria, Bactica, Khost, Zabul, Ghazni and [Wardak] in addition to the battalion in Nuristan and Kunz,” the US government’s translation reads. Bactria and Bactica are probably poor translations of Paktia and Paktika, two provinces where al Qaeda’s allies are known to have a strong presence. Also, Kunz is likely Kunar.

Therefore, Rahman indicated that al Qaeda had a presence in at least eight Afghan provinces. The size of these “groups” was not disclosed. But earlier in the letter, Rahman mentioned that al Qaeda has “a full battalion in Nuristan and Kunar.” A translator or analyst from the US government estimated that this battalion consisted of “around 70 individuals.”

In other words, the notion that "Core AQ" has been run out of Afghanistan into the Pakistan-drone kill box only to be 'decimated' might not be exactly true. Other docs mention ties to Iran, if only from an enemy of my enemy fashion. Here's Stephen Hayes:

Hayes said the initial "scrub" of the bin Laden documents by the CIA was very successful, producing 400 intelligence reports and leading to U.S. actions around the world against al Qaeda. "Then it all stopped. The CIA basically sat on the documents. ...

I think it's because the Obama administration didn't want to know what was in them," said Hayes, adding that the documents would have had "tremendous implications" for U.S. foreign policy overall. "Once you've exposed these documents in al Qaeda's own hand, it requires the administration to act on them. And the president's argument all along has been that the war on terror is ending," said Hayes.

Emphasis added.  It's appropriate that Hayes is weighing in here--he was at the forefront to get the captured Iraqi regime documents released. Eventually they were, via a DoD web portal, only to be shut down later after the New York Times used them to reprint some sensitive nuclear information. Who knows what else those docs might show.  But by all means, we need those 28 pages!

Of course Hayes and his friend Joscelyn, along with Fox and other conservatives, were among the only outlets to report the suggested bin Laden connection with Iran...


Maybe that's because the mainstreamers want nothing to do with upending Obama's legacy project of normalizing relations with both commie Cuba and radical Iran (with neither of them reforming first).  Today we learn the new rulers of Yemen have approved direct flights from Iran.  So it appears our government has picked a devil in dealing with the other devils.  Maybe there are some documents supporting that premise somewhere.