James Bond, Eat Your Heart Out!

Scott Johnson at Power Line Blog posted an article today about the escape of former Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn from house arrest in Japan. It’s an amazing story. Mr. Ghosn, who is 5 feet 6 inches tall escaped in a box used to transport musical instruments.

The article quotes The New York Post:

In a bizarre scheme allegedly orchestrated by his wife in the US, a group of ex-special forces soldiers posing as musicians specializing in a Gregorian band and toting music equipment strolled past Japanese security guards and entered the pad, according to the Lebanese news channel MTV.

Ghosn, who stands at just under 5-foot-6, climbed into “one of the boxes intended for the transfer of musical instruments,’’ the news station said — possibly a roughly 6-foot-tall double-base case.

He was then carted out in the case when the group left, after a “logical time for a concert had passed,” MTV said.

Japanese authorities had the door to his home under 24-hour video surveillance — but, per an April court agreement, Ghosn’s camp didn’t have to turn over each month’s recordings until the 15th of the following month, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Ghosn is believed to have been spirited out of the country on a chartered Bombardier jet from Kansai International Airport in Osaka — a six-hour drive from Toyko — around 11:10 p.m. Sunday, the Journal said.

The plane landed at Ataturk Airport in Istanbul early Monday, reports said. Ghosn then boarded a smaller plane belonging to the Turkish company MNG Jet Havacilik AS that departed about 30 minutes later for Rafic Hariri Airport in Beirut, Lebanon.

Japanese authorities apparently had no idea that their most high-profile detainee had fled until hours later — and only then, from an MTV reporter.

The station worker approached Matahiro Yamaguchi, the Japanese ambassador to Lebanon, at a party in Beirut around 6 p.m. Monday and asked about Ghosn’s fleeing, The Guardian reported.

The stunned ambassador said his administration knew nothing about it — and spent the next few minutes furiously texting before abruptly leaving the event.

The article in The New York Post continues:

Lebanon authorities claimed Ghosn entered the country legally via the use of a French passport — although it’s unclear how.

Lawyer Hironaka said he still has Ghosn’s three passports, for Lebanon, France and Brazil, that his client had to turn over as a condition of bail.

“It would have been difficult for him to do this without the assistance of some large organization,” Hironaka told reporters.

The article at Power Line Blog reminds us that nothing happens in Lebanon without the approval of Hezbollah. Interesting.

 

 

Will The Mainstream Media Actually Report This?

Yesterday Katie Pavlich posted a story at Townhall.com about President George Bush‘s response to the attacks on 9/11. There are some amazing statements in the article.

The article reports:

According to one of the world’s most deadly and infamous terrorists, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, President George W. Bush wiped out plans for other imminent attacks by quickly invading Afghanistan after 9/11/2001. 

According to a new book detailed by The Federalist and former Bush staffer Marc Thiessen, KSM admitted during enhanced interrogation the President’s swift “shock-and-awe” action not only thwarted plans for follow up attacks to 9/11, but changed Al Qaeda‘s entire strategy. 

…Far from trying to draw us in, KSM said that al-Qaeda expected the United States to respond to 9/11 as we had the 1983 bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut — when, KSM told Mitchell, the United States ‘turned tail and ran.’

‘Then he looked at me and said, ‘How was I supposed to know that cowboy George Bush would announce he wanted us ‘dead or alive’ and then invade Afghanistan to hunt us down?’’ Mitchell writes. ‘KSM explained that if the United States had treated 9/11 like a law enforcement matter, he would have had time to launch a second wave of attacks.’ He was not able to do so because al-Qaeda was stunned ‘by the ferocity and swiftness of George W. Bush’s response.’

As much as I hate war, this shows the wisdom of the attack on Afghanistan following 9/11. It also shows that the ‘law enforcement’ approach to terrorism does not work. Unfortunately, at some point we are going to have to take action against the sponsors of terrorism around the world. That action should not involve ground troops, but we have enough fire power in other areas to get the point across that fomenting terror in America is a losing proposition. It is very obvious that the ‘law enforcement’ approach is not a deterrent to terrorism and that terrorism requires a stronger approach.

These statements by Khalid Sheik Mohammed are an example of why the prison camp at Guantanamo needs to stay open. The facility was very useful in gathering information and planning our strategy in the war on terror based on that information. Unfortunately, because President Obama has tried to close down Guantanamo and has not added any prisoners to the camp–preferring to kill the terrorists with drone strikes–eliminating the possibility of collecting intelligence, any information that could be gained from the prisoners at Guantanamo is at least eight years old. That is a serious problem for those trying to fight the war on terror.

It will be interesting to see whatever approach President Trump uses will be more effective in preventing domestic terrorism in America that the actions taken by President Obama.

Looking For The Underlying Cause Of The Embassy Attacks

CBN News posted a story today about one of the possible causes of the current riots (protests) in the Middle East. Admittedly, the attacks on they Libyan and Egyptian Embassies were probably related to the anniversary of the September 11 attacks and the call for the release of the blind sheik, but there is another aspect of the story.

Gary Lane at CBN reminds us:

At a recent gathering of his supporters in Beirut, Nasrallah (Hezbollah‘s Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah) called on the international community to adopt a law that would prohibit attacks against any “divine” religion.

Each year Muslim nations, often led by Pakistan, propose that the United Nations pass a defamation of religion law. The United States and other Western democracies have beaten back those efforts.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, speaking before the United Nations, stated:

“We are living through a period of unease. We are also seeing incidents of intolerance and hatred that are then exploited by others. Voices of moderation and calm need to make themselves heard at this time,” Ban told the assembly Tuesday.

“We all need to speak up in favor of mutual respect and understanding of the values and beliefs of others. The United Nations must rise to the moment,” he said.

Read the fine print here–the law the Muslims want would prohibit attacks against any ‘divine’ religion. Who determines which religions are ‘divine’?

Hang on to the First Amendment–it is coming under attack from the U.N.

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When Politics Trumps National Security

A U.S. Coast Guard vessel patrols Guantanamo B...

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Today’s Wall Street Journal (no link–subscribers only) has an editorial entitled, “The Daqduq Disgrace.” It deals with terrorist Ali Musa Daqduq, a Hezbollah operative involved in the planning of the kidnapping and murder of American soldiers in Karbala in 2007, who is also guilty of arming and training Iraqi insurgents. Daqduq is in Iraqi custody. It is expected that Daqduq will be released.

The article reports:

The Administration contends that its hands were tied by the U. S.-Iraq status-of-forces agreement negotiated by the Bush Administration, which required Iraq’s consent–not forthcoming–to remove any prisoners from the country. But it’s hard to see why that stipulation would apply to Daqduq, who is not an Iraqi citizen (he is a Lebanese national).

The Administration considered bringing Daqduq to the U.S. for trial in federal court or a military tribunal (showing that the status-of-forces deal was not insurmountable).

The article in the Wall Street Journal points out that the place for Daqduq to go was Guantanamo. Unfortunately, although the Obama Administration has not been successful in its attempts to close Guantanamo, it has refused to send anyone there.

Daqduq will receive a hero’s welcome in either Beirut or Tehran. It is a shame that politics have prevented us from locking up someone who will probably do harm to America in the future.

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