Russia Secretly Offered Afghan Militants Bounties to Kill U.S. Troops, Intelligence Says

By artappraiser on Fri, 06/26/2020 - 9:06pm |

Nothing to see here. Just the Russians actively trying to kill US troops in Afghanistan, and Trump knowing about it for months now, and not lifting a finger to stop it.https://t.co/r88nN3hKxo
— John Aravosis (@aravosis) June 26, 2020

URL:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/us/politics/russia-afghanistan-bounties.html

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Claire MacAskill & Joe Scarborough:

Indeed. What Republican Senator will speak up? Where is the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Comm? @SenatorRisch https://t.co/8x9fuPZzhv
— Claire McCaskill (@clairecmc) June 27, 2020

by artappraiser on Fri, 06/26/2020 - 11:47pm

“Russian involvement in operations targeting Americans, if confirmed, is likely to lead to...questions about why the administration has not responded to it.”

because Trump trying to get out? and admitting Russia may be trying to chase US out makes that politically harder? https://t.co/HMFiTj0bub
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) June 27, 2020

by artappraiser on Sat, 06/27/2020 - 12:47am

Mr. Yglesias is being sarcastic here, but if tell-alls from Woodward to Bolton are correct, it is entirely believable to me that neither of them paid any attention to briefings on this intel:

Look her word is good enough for me https://t.co/JBMGrbE6Sv
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) June 27, 2020

by artappraiser on Sat, 06/27/2020 - 5:18pm

European intel source confirms and also says

MAJOR BREAKING NEWS: The Kremlin Plot to Kill U.S. Soldiers in Afghanistan—a Plot the White House Was Briefed on, Shortly After Which Trump Invited Russia to Form a New G8—Is Now *Confirmed* to Have Led to US/UK Casualties; Trump's Failure to Act Remains Historically Inexplicable https://t.co/Vd6phjGY9L
— Seth Abramson (@SethAbramson) June 28, 2020

by artappraiser on Sat, 06/27/2020 - 10:10pm

The Lincoln Project has an ad out on it:

The ad is brutal. https://t.co/qyejUqVEph
— Claire McCaskill (@clairecmc) June 28, 2020

by artappraiser on Sat, 06/27/2020 - 11:15pm

This may be the issue that pushes Lindsey away from Trump https://t.co/P6Jfs2hqOF
— Tammy Duckworth Stan Account (@AspiringNeolib) June 28, 2020

One thing I think can be safely presumed: his old buddy John McCain would be more than extremely angry.

by artappraiser on Sat, 06/27/2020 - 11:24pm

The NYT and Cnn have a long documented history of printing hoaxes so this 'Story' should remain in that category until verified or debunked.

Putin is a despot but he's not a fool seeking more of Trump's sanctions.

by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 1:34am

Why do you think it is even worth your time to write that here?

Do you think of this group as a bunch of dummies that doesn't know what the name Judith Miller means?

Do you think we also don't know what it means when the DNI says intel wasn't shown to the president and vice-president but doesn't deny its existence?

Come up with something more challenging than "beware the liberal media may not always be true". DOH. It's truer more often than Fox News.

Or are you just trying to convince yourself?

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:03am

Putin Is a dumbfuck who's lucky he found a useful idiot in America, cuz he's done a really shitty job for a guy who's sitting on the resources he Is. 20+ years and what does he have to show but a few billion of extorted money, a semi-quagmire in Syria, a reputation for killing journalists, 3rd worst Covid response in the world, and chaos in America? Get his dick out of your mouth. It's not worth the crappy pay youre getting.

by PeraclesPlease on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 5:34am

Steve Schmidt calls bullshit on tweet by Office of the DNI:

Ok. BS, but I’ll bite. I hope you won’t mind that the question is asked in the language of my native land, New Jersey, and you won’t be offended by the colorful colloquialisms of my people. Why the Fuck not ? Why the Fuck wasn’t POTUS and VPOTUS briefed on this? They were BTW. https://t.co/QM5gDqgyoi
— Steve Schmidt (@SteveSchmidtSES) June 28, 2020

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 1:16am

A non-denial denial wrapped in a larger denial. The "alleged intelligence" has been reported by the NY Times. The intelligence itself is alleged to have come from Intelligence sources. The Director is the perfect job to find out if it is valid information. If the reporting is incorrect it is incorrect about what came from their sources. As the NYT story has it:

The officials familiar with the intelligence did not explain the White House delay in deciding how to respond to the intelligence about Russia.

If the Director could just say the story was all false, that would have been the smart thing to say. This statement screams of Commissars shaking down the party ranks for traitors and infidels.

The denial by Zabihullah Mujahid is special. He is more offended by being seen as a whore than a killer of Americans:

“These kinds of deals with the Russian intelligence agency are baseless — our target killings and assassinations were ongoing in years before, and we did it on our own resources,” he said. “That changed after our deal with the Americans, and their lives are secure and we don’t attack them.”

The Taliban are so touchy these days. Gone are the halcyon days of yore when they took C.I.A. money with no drama.

by moat on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 12:18pm

interesting insight about the Taliban, moat.

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:07pm

David Rothkopf has a few things to say on the matter in a Twitter thread, starting here:

If Trump acts like a Russian asset,does all the things a Russian asset would do, places Russian interests above US interests, defends Russian intelligence above US intelligence, provides classified information to Russians, helps Russia achieve its goals,then he's a Russian asset.
— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) June 28, 2020

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 1:20am

Poor confused moot can't even keep his hoax history straight. The Taliban didn't even exist when the CIA funded AL Qaida hoax first surfaced,

It seems that pinheads like Rothkopf would update their pathetic failed Trump/Russia collusion hoax and start parroting the Bolton Trump/China collusion hoax.

by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 1:28pm

Your twisting of anything and everything pro-Trump as if he is the yugest genius the world has ever seen who is always right is incredibly blatantly obvious. Especially whenever his administration does something that his very own political party wouldn't like, it was on purpose because the GOP is stupid, that Trump always knows better than both the GOP and Democratic politicians.

While someone like member NCD here might see a fan of a "dear leader", through the wise comments of moat, I am beginning to see marketing for a single man as savior and genius at work. The only question is whether you are paid to do that or do that because you are a fanboy.

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 1:59pm

He may not be the yugest genius among world leaders, but he surely has the yugest ass. (ed note: Trump v. Spanx, Spanx lays down and dies, admits defeat.)

Trump

by jollyroger on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:23pm

Cue the Golfer's Overcoat in 5...4...3...

by jollyroger on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:25pm

I think this kind of ridicule personally rattles the Narcissist Trump mightily but has little affect on followers and fans, nearly zero effect actually, as at many of his rallies the attendees don't look that different. And ya know, comes to mind Trump, as to physical appearance, he only judges women that way; with men he's a fan of Rocketman and Pootie. Despite the bare chest photos of the latter, he's lacking both the height and the hair of an Adonis.

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:42pm

Hey Nonny - still playing Putin deepthroat? He doesnt mind paying Afghanis to kill Americans, And you and your hero Trump dont mind Americans dying. Speaking of which, 130,000 Covid dead - where's your hydroxychloroquine And herd immunity? Florida's adding 8000-10,000 infections a day - Nonny and Donny dont care - they're in it for the chaos and "owning the libs", not for any grow up responsibility. Do you golf too, Anon? Whats your handicap? (Aside from the obvious.)

by PeraclesPlease on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:06pm

From Wikipedia for brevity:

After the Soviet Union intervened in Afghanistan in 1979, Islamic mujahideen fighters engaged in war with those Soviet forces. Some of those Islamic fighters would later transform into the Taliban according to Professor Carole Hillenbrand who stated: "The West helped the Taliban to fight the Soviet takeover of Afghanistan".[10]

Although no documentation has officially surfaced that the CIA directly supported the Taliban or Al Qaeda, some basis for military support of the Taliban was provided when, in the early 1980s, the CIA and the ISI (Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency) provided arms to Afghans resisting the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and the ISI assisted the process of gathering radical Muslims from around the world to fight against the Soviets.[11] Osama bin Laden was one of the key players in organizing training camps for the foreign Arab volunteers, although his organization, Maktab al-Khidamat, was exclusively Saudi funded.[12][13]

For more detailed information, look for Operation Cyclone and Pashtun nationalism during the Soviet invasion. The word "Taliban" means students who went madrassahs in Pakistan as refugees during the war.

Same people, different time.

by moat on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 2:59pm

You parrot a wiki history that verifies that no evidence has been found in 30 years that the CIA funded the Taliban or AQ but is also incomplete and inaccurate. You then make another ignorant claim based on misinformation.

The Taliban formed in refugee camps in Pakistan and those students brought it to Afghanistan two years after the Afghan war ended. Some of the Pashtunwali fighters from the war converted to Wahhabi Islam and joined the Taliban

Inferring that because the CIA supported the Mujahideen they funded the Taliban a decade later is absurd even if some of them joined the Taliban.

by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 5:33pm

The source was only meant to frame the events in the context you claimed was not germane.
I have made no reference to what happened after the war with the Soviets.

Same people, different time. For the sake of precision, I should have said something like precursors to Taliban.

by moat on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 5:54pm

Yes, after two exhausting days of investigation on the golf course, @realDonaldTrump has cracked the case of the Russia bounty payments. It's another hoax perpetrated by those devious hoaxsters at NY Times Books! https://t.co/TzJUJnnd2Q
— Michael R. Bromwich (@mrbromwich) June 29, 2020

This will of course mean zero to Nonny because Mr. Bromwich has bonafide "deep state" credentials going way back: former DOJ IG; Asst US Attorney, SDNY; Assoc. Independent Counsel, Iran-Contra; independent monitor; law enforcement consultant; views are my own

by artappraiser on Sun, 06/28/2020 - 11:23pm

Michael Steele:

Stop it. Trump was briefed. He may not have paid attention to it or read the PDB he was given but he was briefed. He did nothing while Putin put a bounty on our American Troops. Note, this White House has not denied the underlying intelligence. #putinspet https://t.co/sr98scobkx
— Michael Steele (@MichaelSteele) June 28, 2020

by artappraiser on Mon, 06/29/2020 - 12:25am

Adam Silverman has a ton of experience in national security. Read him on the Russian bounties. https://t.co/B4Ed8im07V
— Norman Ornstein (@NormOrnstein) June 29, 2020

by artappraiser on Mon, 06/29/2020 - 1:46am

Trump Slaughters Dozens Of American Troops In Hopes Of Cashing In On Russian Bounties https://t.co/mm7RtNLGXR pic.twitter.com/wVxdATyfTj
— The Onion (@TheOnion) July 6, 2020

by artappraiser on Mon, 07/06/2020 - 4:26pm

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