Communist China Knew For Years Bats Caused Disease, Left Wild Animal Markets Open

Rowan Scarbough at the Washington Times offers a piece on how Communist China allowed wild animal markets to remain open and the sale and consumption of bats are suspected of causing COVID-19.

Communist China has allowed wild animal markets to offer live bats, raccoons, civets and other species, and a series of studies shows the animals are teeming with viruses that threaten humans.

Scientific studies concluded that the 2002 SARS epidemic likely started from coronaviruses in bats that made their way to humans in Guangdong province. Chinese tastes favor raw bats, snakes and other animals that are bought live and slaughtered.

Today, bats are suspected as the source for the devastating coronavirus that causes COVID-19. Officially known as SARS-CoV-2, it was first reported in Wuhan, China, in November or December. Wildlife groups have urged Beijing for years to shut down sales and consumption of these animals. 

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/mar/18/china-knew-years-bats-caused-disease-yet-left-wild/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=manual&utm_campaign=evening&utm_

term=evening&utm_content=evening&bt_ee=zSLBWOIE7h3swv9Jn4h7IpfbvfvtDExIBi5SwOv

BuxpdCJSzCzOUpioo6qJ76ifP&bt_ts=1584562367401 

Navy SEAL Who Killed Osama Bin Laden Reveals The Way To Destroy ISIS ‘In A Matter Of Days’

 

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times offers a piece on the views of former Navy SEAL Robert O'Neill.

 

The Navy SEAL who killed Osama bin Laden predicts that President Obama will reverse course and order American ground troops into Iraq to fight the Islamic State terrorist army.

“Apparently these guys have a short memory, and they’re daring us to come back, and when we do, it will be over in a matter of days,” said former Chief Petty Officer Robert O’Neill.

Mr. O’Neill believes the president’s advisers have come to realize the beleaguered Iraqi Security Forces, without U.S. boots on the ground, are not capable of taking back all the territory seized by the Islamic State, including the country’s second-largest city — densely defended Mosul.

“We need to fight them,” Mr. O’Neill told editors and reporters at The Washington Times in an exclusive interview. “We don’t need to create jobs for them. If deterrence doesn’t work, which it’s not, you meet force with force at the point of origin. We need to do that, and we’ll do that. We just need to realize that is what needs to be done.”

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/feb/19/robert-oneill-navy-seal-who-killed-bin-laden-fores/ 

Islamic State Using Leaked Snowden Info To Evade U.S. Intelligence

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times offers a piece on how NSA leaker Edward Snowden has aided terrorists.

A former top official at the National Security Agency says the Islamic State terrorist group has “clearly” capitalized on the voluminous leaks from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and is exploiting the top-secret disclosures to evade U.S. intelligence.

Bottom line: Islamic State killers are harder to find because they know how to avoid detection.

Chris Inglis was the NSA's deputy director during Mr. Snowden’s flood of documents to the news media last year. Mr. Snowden disclosed how the agency eavesdrops, including spying on Internet communications such as emails and on the Web’s ubiquitous social media.

Asked by The Washington Times if the Islamic State has studied Mr. Snowden's documents and taken action, Mr. Inglis answered, “Clearly.”

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/4/islamic-state-using-edward-snowden-leaks-to-evade-/

The (Spy) Game's Afoot In Hunt For NSA Leaker Snowden

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times offers a piece on the irony of how NSA Leaker Edward Snowden is possibely being hunted by the NSA.

One twist in the fugitive hunt for asylum-seeking Edward Snowden is that the man who has revealed the most secrets about the National Security Agency in history now is undoubtedly one of its chief targets.

A subplot in this international thriller is a cat-and-mouse game: Will the NSA penetrate his communications or will the master leaker outwit all the agency's high-tech gadgets — since he, as well as anyone, knows how they work?

“NSA is probably doing what it does best, which is sweeping the ‘electronicshere’ for communications, voice and data, indicating his next chess move,” former CIA officer Bart Bechtel says. “They may also be looking at known and suspected collaborators.”

A second analyst, a former intelligence operative, says that the same methods Mr. Snowden, an ex-NSA contractor, disclosed in documents leaks to the press are now being turned on him.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jul/13/spy-games-afoot-hunt-nsa-leaker-snowden/ 

Al Qaeda Remains A Threat To U.S. Via Its Franchises

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times offers a piece on the continuing threat from al Qaeda.

In the months before President Obama declared al Qaeda was “on a path to defeat,” his aides were telling Congress that the terrorist network was expanding and was capable of inflicting mass casualties in the U.S.

While perhaps not a direct contradiction of the president’s near-claim of victory last week, their testimony painted the picture of a robust collection of al Qaeda franchises causing death and destruction in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Mali, Somalia and Afghanistan.

Terrorism analysts say that as the U.S. conducted a concentrated air war via armed Predators against al Qaeda’s core leadership in Pakistan’s tribal areas for more than a decade, the group’s Islamic chieftains decided to diversify.

“I totally disagree with the premise that al Qaeda is on the path to defeat,” said retired Army Gen. Jack Keane (seen in the above U.S. Army photo), who has advised U.S. commanders in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. “Quite the contrary, al Qaeda in Pakistan has deliberately decentralized its operations, not because of the relentless attacks we have had on its national leadership in Pakistan, but because its strategic objective is to dominate and control Muslim countries in the region. As such, al Qaeda must extend its geographic reach, which is not only successful but is expanding.”

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/29/al-qaeda-still-threat-despite-obamas-claim/

Manhunt: CIA Women Who Hunted Bin Laden In The Spotlight In HBO's Documentary

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times offers a piece on the new HBO documentary on the CIA officers who hunter Osama bin Laden.

The look at those who hunted Osama bin Laden begins with the sisterhood — a collection of female CIA analysts who became somewhat obsessed with al Qaeda and its leader.

They now are talking on camera for the HBO documentary "Manhunt," which debuted Wednesday night, two years after the terrorist mastermind was killed and weeks after another jihadist attack on America at the Boston Marathon.

The film, which HBO is showing throughout May, is not about the raid that killed bin Laden but the inside story of the CIA's bin Laden hunters — their frustrations, guilt, joy and, for one, a violent death.  

“The night of the raid, I just had this gut feeling that there was a deeper, darker, richer story other than just the story of the raid itself,” said Greg Barker, a journalist and the director of "Manhunt."

“It’s about an intelligence story that spoke to the decisions made in secret inside our government that led us to Abbottabad.”

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/1/cia-women-who-hunted-bin-laden-in-the-spotlight/?page=all#pagebreak

Details Of Bin Laden Raid Leaked First By Obama Administration Aides

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times reports that Obama administration officials already leaked much of the information contained in No Easy Day, an account of the bin Laden raid by a former U.S. Navy SEAL.

The Obama administration has gone to extraordinary lengths to publicize details of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, even as it threatens to file criminal charges against a former Navy SEAL because he provided the same type of mission rundown in his recently published book.

An examination by The Washington Times shows that several details in the book “No Easy Day” already have appeared in print based on interviews with administration officials and likely will be included in an upcoming movie and another book.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/sep/16/details-of-bin-laden-raid-leaked-first-by-aides/?page=all#pagebreak

Delta Force: The U.S. Army's Quiet Professionals

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times wrote an interesting piece about the Army's Delta Force, the special operations unit that captured Saddam Hussein.

As Navy SEALs bask in the limelight for daring missions, some in the Army are wondering whether the other half of the nation's counter-terrorism covert warriors - Delta Force - is being upstaged and left in the shadows.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jun/3/delta-force-armys-quiet-professionals/?page=all#pagebreak

Note: I interviewed retired Lieutenant General William G. Boykin, a founding member of Delta Force who went on to command the unit, for Counterterrorism magazine.

You can read my interview via the below links:  

http://home.comcast.net/~pauldavisoncrime/pwpimages/LTGBoykin1.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~pauldavisoncrime/pwpimages/LTGBoykin2.jpg

http://home.comcast.net/~pauldavisoncrime/pwpimages/LTGBoykin3.jpg 

Key General Believes Obama's Iraq Pullout Plan Is A Disaster

Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times reports that retired Army General John M. Keane called Obama's Iraq pullout plan a disaster.

President Obama's decision to pull all U.S. forces out of Iraq by December 31 is an "absolute disaster" that puts the burgeoning Arab democracy at risk of an Iranian "strangling," said the architect of the 2007 troop surge that turned around a losing war.

Retired Army General John M. Keane was at the forefront of persuading President George W. Bush to scuttle a static counterinsurgency strategy and replace it with 30,000 reinforcements and a more activist, street-by-street counterterrorism tactic.

Today, even with that strategy producing a huge drop in daily attacks, General Keane bluntly told the Washington Times that the United States again is losing.

You can read the rest of the newspaper story via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/oct/23/key-general-calls-iraq-pullout-plan-a-disaster/?page=all#pagebreak

You can also read a previous post about the Iraq pullout plan via the below link:

http://pauldavisoncrime.blogspot.com/2011/10/toasting-victory-in-iran-over-us-troop.html
The above DoD photo of American soldiers in Iraq was taken by Master Sgt. Andy Dunaway.