Tom Kovach
The smoking guns of Islam
By Tom Kovach
Having studied foreign languages and cultures, I'm often ashamed of the "ugly American" attitude. I saw it a lot when I was stationed in Korea for a year. But, even though I try to be culturally aware, it still amazes me how much information is right before our faces, but we don't see it because of our myopic American view of the world.
Such is the case with certain dates on the Islamic calendar. Those dates are the "smoking guns" of Islam.
During my investigation of the Flight 800 disaster (Wed, 17 Jul 1996 — an airliner exploded in midair of the coast of Long Island), I became aware of just how seriously the Islamist terrorists consider their calendar when planning their attacks. And, from their viewpoint, that makes perfect sense. Their calendar is based upon their religion. And, their attacks are part of a jihad — a never-ending religious war to convert the entire world to Islam. Therefore, they view their attacks upon America as religious events, and plan them accordingly.
We ignore that point at our peril.
Several years ago, I wrote a column (that, alas, did not get published) in which I correctly predicted the date of a terrorist attack three months in advance. The only thing I used to do that was the Islamic calendar. And, in retrospect, we might have been able to predict (and prevent?) the "9-11" attacks if our government would have used this same lens to examine terrorist trends. (But, of course, using the Islamists religion against them would be "politically incorrect.")
Consider this.
On the 9th of January, 1991, US Secretary of State James Baker met with Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz. The talks broke down. Baker returned to the United States with his report. Three days later, on 12 Jan 1991, a joint session of the United States Congress approved a "resolution on the use of force" — the closest we have come to a Constitutionally-required "declaration of war" since December of 1941. Three days after the resolution passed, the sun set on the last day of Operation Desert Shield. When the sun rose the next morning, Baghdad had experienced the first "thunder and lightning" of Operation Desert Storm.
But, from an Islamic point of view, the war began on the day that the talks broke down. From the point that Baker and Aziz failed to negotiate a peaceful resolution, the Islamic mindset is that the two countries were at war. The resolution from Congress was, in the Islamist mind, a mere rubber-stamp formality. On the Islamic calendar, the talks broke down on the date 22 Jumada t-Tania 1411. Now, fast forward to the date 22 Jumada t-Tania 1422.
Or, on the Gregorian calendar, 11 September 2001.
But, as I began to write in my never-published book on the "9-11" attacks, (the title was Business as Usual, from the post-attack speech by President George W. Bush), that date was also the 60th anniversary (on the Gregorian calendar) of the groundbreaking ceremony for a building that was one of the engineering marvels of its day: The Pentagon. And, keep in mind that Osama bin-Laden is a civil engineer by training and by trade. (He comes from a family of civil engineers; one of the wealthiest families in Saudi Arabia.) One of the key sentences from that book was, "Osama bin-Laden is not a stupid man; he is an evil man." The terrorist mastermind took into account — albeit, from an Islamist viewpoint — a date that should've been a resounding insult to Americans.
Apparently, bin-Laden underestimated our lamentable American penchant for historical nonchalance.
So, let's see if we can spark some interest. Put on your thinking caps. Follow the dominos. Lets see if we can learn to avert disaster. We must learn the lessons of history, or be doomed to repeat them.
Recent news from WorldNetDaily reports that terrorists have apparently accuired the capability to build a thermobaric bomb. So, you might ask, "What is a thermobaric bomb, and why should I care about it?" To understand the future of terrorism, you need to look to the past. And, to understand what happened last month on the ground in Pakistan, you need to understand what happened last decade in the air off Long Island.
The type of thermobaric bomb described in the above-linked WND report was, by American munitions standards, fairly crude (but effective). The bomb in Pakistan apparently used an aluminum powder to create a cloud of flammable dust immediately ahead of the blast wave from the bomb. When the bomb's fireball caught up with the blast wave, it ignited the dust, and created an even larger explosion. This is the same concept behind the fuel-air MOAB — nicknamed "the Mother of All Bombs," in mocking reference to Saddam Hussein's threat to give the United States "the mother of all battles" if we invaded Iraq. (Historical note: after his capture by American commandos, Hussein received "the mother of all trials" in an Iraqi court, which then sentenced him to "the mother of all hangings.")
The official myth of the Flight 800 disaster is that a "random spark" in the center fuel tank caused the airliner to be cleanly cut into two major sections by a jet-fuel explosion. The fact that jet fuel is not explosive (except under very specific condidtions) seems to have escaped FBI investigators, who were busy looking for a way to save President Bill Clinton's political skin in an election year. The fact is that Flight 800 was brought down by a missile strike. (Actually, the 747 was hit by three missiles, according to a detailed engineering report that I have in my possession.) One of the missiles that intercepted Flight 800 contained a type of fuel-air explosive in its warhead. The presence of oxidizer-pellet shrapnel in the bodies of crash victims proves this point.
So what?
The recent bombing in Pakistan was apparently the work of al-Qaida. Why would they attack their Muslim brothers? Because, from the Islamist viewpoint, Pakistan was a traitor. In the current (never-ending?) war against terrorism, Pakistan has cooperated — albeit reluctantly at times — with the United States. The hotel that was bombed in Islamabad was owned by an American company. (And, not just any company. The hotel chain's founder, J. Willard Marriott, was personal friends with President Ronald Reagan. Terrorists had a lasting fear of "President Ray-Gun," who ordered the Navy F-14 jets that bombed Muammar Qaddafi's tent.) The terrorists wanted to send a message to their betrayers.
The message was in the date.
The bombing took place on the 21st of September (Pakistan time), and the hotel was apparently a known meeting place for American intelligence agents. Back in Washington, it was still the 20th of September when the bomb exploded. And, on the Islamic calendar, the 20 September 2008 came on 19 Ramadan 1429. The 19th of Ramadan is a sad day on the Islamic religious calendar. It marks the anniversary of an attack upon the first Imam, the prince Ali Abu-Hasan. He was stabbed while praying in a mosque, and he died two days later. (Interestingly, he was born on Friday the 13th.) The attacker was considered a man that had access to the mosque; thus, a traitor to Islam. That was the message: Pakistan is a traitor to Islam.
As has been pointed out by intrepid investigative author Jack Cashill, the downing of Flight 800 coincided with National Liberation Day in Iraq. On the Islamic calendar, Flight 800 was downed on 01 Rabi al-Awwal 1417. Perhaps not merely coincidentally, 01 Rabi al-Awwal is also the annual National Day of the Islamic government of The Maldives. If I were to research the official calendars of the "57 states" belonging to the Organization of Islamic States, I would probably find national holidays on all of them. The date 01 Rabi al-Awwal is the start of the Islamic calendar. It marks the Hijra — the migration of Muhammed from Mecca to Medina. To the devout Muslim, the Hijra would be an approximate equivalent of the Epiphany (the baptism of Jesus) to the devout Christian.
And, there is a definite message there.
The downing of TWA Flight 800 was, in the minds of Islamist terrorists, a "migration" of sorts. The title of Cashill's book on the topic, First Strike, asserts that the missile strike was the actual beginning of a holy war against America. All other attacks — such as the 1993 vehicle bomb in the basement of the World Trade Center or the bombing of Philippene Airlines Flight 434 (which also affected the center fuel tank of a 747), both carried out by Ramzi Yousef (the understudy of Khalid Sheikh Muhammad) — were merely "probe" attacks in preparation for the jihad. And, given the dramatic increase in the severity of subsequent attacks, history has proven Cashill correct.
There is more — much more — to this connect-the-dots view of Islamist war against America. For example, just prior to the downing of Flight 800 was the attack on the Khobar Towers barracks complex in Saudi Arabia (25 June 1996; 08 Safar 1417). The Saudis were viewed by the Islamist radicals as double-minded for hosting the Americans that had attacked Iraq. So, just like their counterparts 1380 years earlier, on the same date (08 Safar, at the Battle of Siffin), the Islamists attacked those that they considered to be "impure" Muslims. And, if I can come up with this information while typing a blog (for free, I might add) in my home-office, imagine what I might discover if the government actually hired me to use my military experience to do this type of analysis full-time to prevent such attacks.
Then again, it might not work out if they "can't handle the truth"*. For example, the government claims there is absolutely nothing suspicious about the sudden crash of an Alabama Air National Guard F-16 fighter on 11 Sep 2002. The cause of the crash was a jet engine turbine blade that suddenly came loose during flight. The crash and fire were made worse because the pilot could not jettison his external fuel tanks — due to a faulty control switch that can only be accessed by removing the control panel inside the cockpit. The switch had been routinely checked not long before the crash. There is no evidence of sabotage — because the unit commander never called in the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI) or the FBI to augment the crash investigation. (The official crash report says so, and I have a copy.) The jet belonged to the same unit as a young lieutenant named George W. Bush three decades prior. That same unit, on the same day as the crash, did a flyover of the Alabama State Capitol to comemorate the "9-11" attacks. Of course, the date and the unit are all "mere coincidence," and any talk of sabotage is merely "right-wing conspiracy mongering." Right? Of course, right — just like it was "not an act of terrorism" when a Muslim college student suddenly drove his car onto a sidewalk and ran over more than a dozen fellow students ... while shouting anti-Israel slogans. A mere coincidence — just like when Flight 800 blew up all by itself ... on one of the highest dates on the Islamic calendar.
Mere coincidence, or are all these calendar anniversries the smoking guns of Islam?
* Of course, one way to avoid being suddenly fired for telling the truth about Islamist terrorism is for me to get elected to Congress. Hmmmmmm.
© Tom Kovach
Having studied foreign languages and cultures, I'm often ashamed of the "ugly American" attitude. I saw it a lot when I was stationed in Korea for a year. But, even though I try to be culturally aware, it still amazes me how much information is right before our faces, but we don't see it because of our myopic American view of the world.
Such is the case with certain dates on the Islamic calendar. Those dates are the "smoking guns" of Islam.
During my investigation of the Flight 800 disaster (Wed, 17 Jul 1996 — an airliner exploded in midair of the coast of Long Island), I became aware of just how seriously the Islamist terrorists consider their calendar when planning their attacks. And, from their viewpoint, that makes perfect sense. Their calendar is based upon their religion. And, their attacks are part of a jihad — a never-ending religious war to convert the entire world to Islam. Therefore, they view their attacks upon America as religious events, and plan them accordingly.
We ignore that point at our peril.
Several years ago, I wrote a column (that, alas, did not get published) in which I correctly predicted the date of a terrorist attack three months in advance. The only thing I used to do that was the Islamic calendar. And, in retrospect, we might have been able to predict (and prevent?) the "9-11" attacks if our government would have used this same lens to examine terrorist trends. (But, of course, using the Islamists religion against them would be "politically incorrect.")
Consider this.
On the 9th of January, 1991, US Secretary of State James Baker met with Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz. The talks broke down. Baker returned to the United States with his report. Three days later, on 12 Jan 1991, a joint session of the United States Congress approved a "resolution on the use of force" — the closest we have come to a Constitutionally-required "declaration of war" since December of 1941. Three days after the resolution passed, the sun set on the last day of Operation Desert Shield. When the sun rose the next morning, Baghdad had experienced the first "thunder and lightning" of Operation Desert Storm.
But, from an Islamic point of view, the war began on the day that the talks broke down. From the point that Baker and Aziz failed to negotiate a peaceful resolution, the Islamic mindset is that the two countries were at war. The resolution from Congress was, in the Islamist mind, a mere rubber-stamp formality. On the Islamic calendar, the talks broke down on the date 22 Jumada t-Tania 1411. Now, fast forward to the date 22 Jumada t-Tania 1422.
Or, on the Gregorian calendar, 11 September 2001.
But, as I began to write in my never-published book on the "9-11" attacks, (the title was Business as Usual, from the post-attack speech by President George W. Bush), that date was also the 60th anniversary (on the Gregorian calendar) of the groundbreaking ceremony for a building that was one of the engineering marvels of its day: The Pentagon. And, keep in mind that Osama bin-Laden is a civil engineer by training and by trade. (He comes from a family of civil engineers; one of the wealthiest families in Saudi Arabia.) One of the key sentences from that book was, "Osama bin-Laden is not a stupid man; he is an evil man." The terrorist mastermind took into account — albeit, from an Islamist viewpoint — a date that should've been a resounding insult to Americans.
Apparently, bin-Laden underestimated our lamentable American penchant for historical nonchalance.
So, let's see if we can spark some interest. Put on your thinking caps. Follow the dominos. Lets see if we can learn to avert disaster. We must learn the lessons of history, or be doomed to repeat them.
Recent news from WorldNetDaily reports that terrorists have apparently accuired the capability to build a thermobaric bomb. So, you might ask, "What is a thermobaric bomb, and why should I care about it?" To understand the future of terrorism, you need to look to the past. And, to understand what happened last month on the ground in Pakistan, you need to understand what happened last decade in the air off Long Island.
The type of thermobaric bomb described in the above-linked WND report was, by American munitions standards, fairly crude (but effective). The bomb in Pakistan apparently used an aluminum powder to create a cloud of flammable dust immediately ahead of the blast wave from the bomb. When the bomb's fireball caught up with the blast wave, it ignited the dust, and created an even larger explosion. This is the same concept behind the fuel-air MOAB — nicknamed "the Mother of All Bombs," in mocking reference to Saddam Hussein's threat to give the United States "the mother of all battles" if we invaded Iraq. (Historical note: after his capture by American commandos, Hussein received "the mother of all trials" in an Iraqi court, which then sentenced him to "the mother of all hangings.")
The official myth of the Flight 800 disaster is that a "random spark" in the center fuel tank caused the airliner to be cleanly cut into two major sections by a jet-fuel explosion. The fact that jet fuel is not explosive (except under very specific condidtions) seems to have escaped FBI investigators, who were busy looking for a way to save President Bill Clinton's political skin in an election year. The fact is that Flight 800 was brought down by a missile strike. (Actually, the 747 was hit by three missiles, according to a detailed engineering report that I have in my possession.) One of the missiles that intercepted Flight 800 contained a type of fuel-air explosive in its warhead. The presence of oxidizer-pellet shrapnel in the bodies of crash victims proves this point.
So what?
The recent bombing in Pakistan was apparently the work of al-Qaida. Why would they attack their Muslim brothers? Because, from the Islamist viewpoint, Pakistan was a traitor. In the current (never-ending?) war against terrorism, Pakistan has cooperated — albeit reluctantly at times — with the United States. The hotel that was bombed in Islamabad was owned by an American company. (And, not just any company. The hotel chain's founder, J. Willard Marriott, was personal friends with President Ronald Reagan. Terrorists had a lasting fear of "President Ray-Gun," who ordered the Navy F-14 jets that bombed Muammar Qaddafi's tent.) The terrorists wanted to send a message to their betrayers.
The message was in the date.
The bombing took place on the 21st of September (Pakistan time), and the hotel was apparently a known meeting place for American intelligence agents. Back in Washington, it was still the 20th of September when the bomb exploded. And, on the Islamic calendar, the 20 September 2008 came on 19 Ramadan 1429. The 19th of Ramadan is a sad day on the Islamic religious calendar. It marks the anniversary of an attack upon the first Imam, the prince Ali Abu-Hasan. He was stabbed while praying in a mosque, and he died two days later. (Interestingly, he was born on Friday the 13th.) The attacker was considered a man that had access to the mosque; thus, a traitor to Islam. That was the message: Pakistan is a traitor to Islam.
As has been pointed out by intrepid investigative author Jack Cashill, the downing of Flight 800 coincided with National Liberation Day in Iraq. On the Islamic calendar, Flight 800 was downed on 01 Rabi al-Awwal 1417. Perhaps not merely coincidentally, 01 Rabi al-Awwal is also the annual National Day of the Islamic government of The Maldives. If I were to research the official calendars of the "57 states" belonging to the Organization of Islamic States, I would probably find national holidays on all of them. The date 01 Rabi al-Awwal is the start of the Islamic calendar. It marks the Hijra — the migration of Muhammed from Mecca to Medina. To the devout Muslim, the Hijra would be an approximate equivalent of the Epiphany (the baptism of Jesus) to the devout Christian.
And, there is a definite message there.
The downing of TWA Flight 800 was, in the minds of Islamist terrorists, a "migration" of sorts. The title of Cashill's book on the topic, First Strike, asserts that the missile strike was the actual beginning of a holy war against America. All other attacks — such as the 1993 vehicle bomb in the basement of the World Trade Center or the bombing of Philippene Airlines Flight 434 (which also affected the center fuel tank of a 747), both carried out by Ramzi Yousef (the understudy of Khalid Sheikh Muhammad) — were merely "probe" attacks in preparation for the jihad. And, given the dramatic increase in the severity of subsequent attacks, history has proven Cashill correct.
There is more — much more — to this connect-the-dots view of Islamist war against America. For example, just prior to the downing of Flight 800 was the attack on the Khobar Towers barracks complex in Saudi Arabia (25 June 1996; 08 Safar 1417). The Saudis were viewed by the Islamist radicals as double-minded for hosting the Americans that had attacked Iraq. So, just like their counterparts 1380 years earlier, on the same date (08 Safar, at the Battle of Siffin), the Islamists attacked those that they considered to be "impure" Muslims. And, if I can come up with this information while typing a blog (for free, I might add) in my home-office, imagine what I might discover if the government actually hired me to use my military experience to do this type of analysis full-time to prevent such attacks.
Then again, it might not work out if they "can't handle the truth"*. For example, the government claims there is absolutely nothing suspicious about the sudden crash of an Alabama Air National Guard F-16 fighter on 11 Sep 2002. The cause of the crash was a jet engine turbine blade that suddenly came loose during flight. The crash and fire were made worse because the pilot could not jettison his external fuel tanks — due to a faulty control switch that can only be accessed by removing the control panel inside the cockpit. The switch had been routinely checked not long before the crash. There is no evidence of sabotage — because the unit commander never called in the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI) or the FBI to augment the crash investigation. (The official crash report says so, and I have a copy.) The jet belonged to the same unit as a young lieutenant named George W. Bush three decades prior. That same unit, on the same day as the crash, did a flyover of the Alabama State Capitol to comemorate the "9-11" attacks. Of course, the date and the unit are all "mere coincidence," and any talk of sabotage is merely "right-wing conspiracy mongering." Right? Of course, right — just like it was "not an act of terrorism" when a Muslim college student suddenly drove his car onto a sidewalk and ran over more than a dozen fellow students ... while shouting anti-Israel slogans. A mere coincidence — just like when Flight 800 blew up all by itself ... on one of the highest dates on the Islamic calendar.
Mere coincidence, or are all these calendar anniversries the smoking guns of Islam?
* Of course, one way to avoid being suddenly fired for telling the truth about Islamist terrorism is for me to get elected to Congress. Hmmmmmm.
© Tom Kovach
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