Libertarian pundit Justin Raimondo has written a splendid analysis of the Boston bomber's overseas and other connections in his column today. The bad news is he makes a convincing case they did indeed have not only Islamic extremist connections but also connections to the Chechen mafia – a very bad mix of especially vile people. Read the entire article, it is well worth the effort, but here's a few select tidbits from it:
“To begin with, the brothers engaged in a firefight with police and held their own, throwing bombs at the police as they attempted to flee. Tamerlan was killed in a fusillade of gunfire, but Dzhokhar managed to get away. At least one of them was very familiar with firearms and knew how to use them. Neither has any known military experience: somebody trained one or both. The question is: who?…There are unconfirmed reports that the explosive devices which caused such mayhem at the marathon were set off by a sophisticated triggering mechanism, which, according to an unnamed law enforcement official, aren’t the kind of thing you can jigger from information garnered from a Google search. The same unconfirmed report says authorities are frantically trying to uncover what they believe is a “12-man sleeper cell,” and although this seems like an extravagant claim – how did they come up with the number 12? – I wouldn’t discount it entirely.”
“Nearly unnoticed in the dramatic denouement of Dzokhar’s capture: the apprehension of three people, including Dzokhar’s alleged girlfriend, in nearby New Bedford. The three were later released, but authorities reappeared at their apartment complex on Saturday and apparently detained two of the same men, who are reportedly from Kazakhstan: a van with consular license plates had earlier turned up in front of the complex, and a young woman was seen entering the van in a hurry. The Tsarnaev brothers weren’t lone nuts: they had help.”
“One important detail is that the Russian security apparatus asked the Americans to investigate Tamerlan before he made his trip to Russia two years ago. Here is the FBI statement, with its ass-covering final paragraph averring “The FBI requested but did not receive more specific or additional information from the foreign government.” However, according to a senior congressional aide cited by the Boston Globe, the fault lies with the FBI: “The FBI had this guy on the radar and somehow he fell off.” And the Daily Mail reports:
“Russia reportedly asked the FBI to investigate one of the alleged Boston bombers just six months ago after he was seen meeting an Islamic militant six times – but the agency never responded, it has emerged.”
“The Chechen insurgency is deeply involved in the sale of illegal drugs, and the Chechen Mafia, known as the Obshina, has an ideological as well as a criminal character. A good account of the big overlap between the Obshina and the Chechen guerrilla movement can be found in the late Paul Klebnikov’s Conversations With A Barbarian, which consists of extensive interviews with Chechen Mafia chieftain Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev, whose career included financing pro-rebel newspapers as well as forcing the Russian Mafia out of Moscow and taking over its illicit empire. The late Boris Berezovsky, the exiled Russian oligarch whose recent suicide made headlines, made good use of the Obshina in his efforts to dominate the Russian car dealership market. In return for their protection, the oligarch financed pro-Chechen propaganda and other activities.Boston’s Chechen community is the largest in the United States, and the Obshina has a presence extending as far West as Portland. According to one study, in addition to the Russian Mafia, “at least 150 ethnic-oriented Russian criminal groups had also been identified, including Chechens, Georgians, Armenians, and Russian-Koreans, of which at least 25 were active in various parts of the United States, the Caribbean and Latin America.” Unlike these other Russian-based criminal gangs, the Chechens have an ideological – and religious – coloration: there are reported links between Al Qaeda and the Chechen Mafia.”
Raimondo's conclusion is chilling:
“So what do we have here? The answer, I’m afraid, is a clear-cut case of carefully premeditated Islamist terrorism with an overseas connection. Tamerlan clearly went to Dagestan, and then Chechnya, where he received training and instructions. He returned to America, recruited his brother, and together they carried out the plan. Whether this operation was coordinated by Al Qaeda, or some other group – possibly some Chechen fundamentalist faction, which outsourced the operation to the Obshina – may seem irrelevant, except for the fact that if there is an organized crime connection then we really have a problem on our hands…As the hunt for Dzokhar went on, I saw a lot of denial on Twitter amongst liberals who resisted – and still resist – linking the Boston bombers’ motives to either the Chechen independence movement or radical Islamist ideology. Yet the evidence is staring them right in the face: they simply refused to see it because it didn’t confirm their own politically correct biases.”
More:
Who’s Behind the Boston Marathon Attack? Two lone nuts – or a conspiracy with overseas connections?
Phi Beta Iota: We remain skeptical. What is really new here is that Russia, not Israel, passed on the lead. The alternative explanation is that the FBI played him and sent him overseas, and was using him as bait locally. When the original false flag imploded and two sets of patsies were exposed by the public, this may have been a desperate third “burner” patsy. There is no evidence that the firefight or car hijacking occured as described by the FBI. All evidence from all other sources suggests a disengaged pair of losers, marginally involved in marijuana, who had no clue about the bombing before or after. We have no direct knowledge and await further developments.
See Also:
Collins, Aukai (2002). My Jihad: The True Story of an American Mujahid's Amazing Journey from Usama Bin Laden's Training Camps to Counterterrorism with the FBI and CIA. Lyons Press.
