al Megrahi and the Lockerbie bombing

[Rolfe]

I'd have to look, but I'm sure I read that there was only one missing bomb, in several sources. I hadn't read what you've just posted before.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

By the way, while I'm here, I hadn't come across this theory till now.

http://news.scotsman.com/lockerbie/But-if-he-didnt-do.3299712.jp

ACCORDING to this theory, apartheid South Africa was responsible for the sabotage of Flight 103.

On 22 December, 1988 - the day after the Lockerbie bombing - the Namibia independence agreement was signed at UN headquarters in New York. A 23-strong South African delegation, headed by foreign minister, Pik Botha, cancelled a booking on the flight at short notice.

There was also a last-minute change of travel plan by the UN Commissioner for Namibia, Bernt Carlsson. Carlsson is alleged by some to have been the target of South African military intelligence operatives, having been the architect of Namibian independence. Instead of flying direct from Brussels to New York, Carlsson was persuaded to stopover in London and join the Pan Am 103 transatlantic flight. On the day of the bombing, he arrived at Heathrow from Brussels at 11:06 with a booking to travel onward to New York by flight PA 103 at 18:00. Carlsson was met at the airport by Bankole Timothy of De Beers and taken by car to central London. After the meeting with De Beers, Carlsson was brought back to Heathrow Airport, arriving at about 17:30. His already checked-in suitcase would have remained at Heathrow airport for about seven hours, thus providing South African airside-authorised personnel with ample opportunity to substitute it for the bomb suitcase.

That South Africa Airlines were involved in unlawfully switching baggage that day was confirmed by a Pan Am security officer, Michael Jones, at the Lockerbie fatal accident inquiry in October 1990. Within a week of the death of Bernt Carlsson on flight PA 103, his office safe at the United Nations had allegedly been broken into. And his apartment, which had been sealed by UN security staff, had also apparently been burgled. Neither his girlfriend nor his sister could identify a single shred of anything in his luggage at the property store in Lockerbie.


This isn't an octopus, it's a bloody millipede.

Rolfe.

ETA: I just read the comments on that article, and once again the one person saying the Official Version (of Lockerbie) is the simple truth, turns out to be a raving 9/11 twoofer! Do we have he answer here to why the twoofers aren't delving obsessively into PA103? It's because they are just about the only people who've looked at it who don't think it's a conspiracy?

[FireGarden]

Megrahi (or his lawyers) set out the grounds for appeal:
http://megrahimystory.net/

[Rolfe]

This is just the part that was aired in court in the spring, before they ajourned the appeal hearing because one of the judges was ill. I've read the first document (the internet is running like cold treacle for me tonight for some reason) and it's all very familiar stuff about Gauci's identification.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Megrahi (or his lawyers) set out the grounds for appeal:
http://megrahimystory.net/

That's just getting mentioned in the other thread, must be news.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/18/megrahi-lockerbie-appeal-documents
Why now? Appeals dropped means you can take your case public? I think he'll have a better run here in the open. Public opinion and intelligence being what they are, still, he can just put these documents right up for everyone. As recent comments by Oliver Miles pointed out:
Mr Miles said he had been told by Scottish sources that there was growing anxiety in the Scottish justice department that a successful appeal by al-Megrahi would severely damage the reputation of the Scottish justice system.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6816334.ece
Whew, no appeal! But now... only by shutting down whole websites and destroying runs of newspapers can this road be blocked off now.

Looking forward to the news within this release. I'll be back on it tonight or tomorrow.

[Caustic Logic]

This is just the part that was aired in court in the spring, before they ajourned the appeal hearing because one of the judges was ill. I've read the first document (the internet is running like cold treacle for me tonight for some reason) and it's all very familiar stuff about Gauci's identification.

Rolfe.

Yes, the site says:
Initially, he intends to publish those parts of his Grounds of Appeal which were argued before the Court between 28 April and 19 May 2009.

Thereafter, he will publish the Grounds of Appeal which were due to be the subject of argument before the Court, commencing on 2nd November 2009.

So is it nothing new yet but better soon, or is it already new stuff?

I haven't read it yet, rather taking a little time to look at the body of blahblahblah about the whole story. One angle I find has forced me to read a lot is pulling out bits to answer a complex question: was there a deal? It's a complex question, with different kinds of deals and leverage at wrk. It'll kick ass once I get it put together, but in the meantime, thought I'd invite some discussion with a few of the quotes I'm using. [emph mine throughout]

"It just shows that the power of oil money counts for more than justice. There have been so many attempts to let him off. It has to do with money and power and giving Gaddafi what he wants. My feelings, as a victim, apparently count for nothing." — Susan Cohen
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1917851,00.html

Times poll: 61% think al-Megrahi release was about oil, not compassion
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6812859.ece

Actually I'm thin on quotes for the oil deals aspect. It's so boring and dumb I can't hardly look for them. Anyone have any good ones handy, to save me the hassle? Especially specific allegations... Before anyone argues too much BTW, I realize business concerns have to play some role, if indirect. We can discuss it.

The logic of thinking about bargaining here is more interesting. This writer seems to get the nuances it seems so many others miss:
Perhaps Salmond should have anticipated that Megrahi would receive a "hero's welcome" in Libya. But why that should be additional grounds for keeping Megrahi behind bars remains a mystery. If Megrahi received a hero's welcome in Tripoli my suspicion is that the average Libyan views him as an innocent man returning home, not a national hero who'd successfully carried out a military mission for the greater glory of the motherland.

Other possible deals are more interesting yet. Same author as above:
http://www.spectator.co.uk/alexmassie/5283996/lockerbie-and-occams-razor.thtml
If there is a conspiracy here - and lord knows half the world seems to want there to be one - it lies in the prospect of ministers being advised that Megrahi would have won his appeal. His cancer, if this is the case, proved a blessing since it created a means by which Megrahi could be sent home while also saving everyone's blushes and keeping the Lockerbie files closed.

The truth about Lockerbie will come out one day. Had Mr Megrahi been able to appeal his case through the court, we believe that his conviction would have been overturned. Mr Megrahi made the difficult decision to give up his promising appeal in order to spend his last days with his family.
The colonel's kid believes it was a deal, which of course means there wasn't. He went on though to misspell "either ... or" as "both ... and."
Mr MacAskill’s courageous decision demonstrates to the world that both justice and compassion can be achieved by people of good will.

http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/08/no-heros-welcome-in-libya.html

No there was no deal regarding compassion/appeals - all British government officials are clear on this. I'll quote them later. Good ones?

And countering them are just suspicions - but good ones.

[T]he public is kept in the dark about what Scotland’s Justice Secretary discussed at his meeting with Mr. Al Megrahi at Greenock prison, which was indeed an unprecedented step in Scottish legal history. One thing should be taken for certain, however: If Mr. MacAskill is a man of honour, he will not have made granting the prisoner’s request for ‘compassionate release’ conditional upon the latter’s dropping the ongoing appeal.
http://i-p-o.org/IPO-nr-doubts-Lockerbie_appeal-31Aug2009.htm

I think there may have been some kind of deal. One part of the deal was to have the appeal dropped and the other part was the release on compassionate grounds. Somebody told the BBC. It’s possible that it may even have been the Libyans who leaked it because they wanted the Scots to deliver on their promise and this was a way of tying them in.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6816334.ece

[Caustic Logic]

So I'm aware some of this (above) was already discussed, I just wasn't versed enough at the time I suppose, so I'm coming back to some of this thinking. But I'm also all over, so anything interesting, anyone...

On another note I just read closer a quote from Robert S. Mueller, of course recent-ish FBI director, thought others should be sure they'd seen it, if not already. He wrote to Kenny MacAskill (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/08/letter-to-kenny-macaskill-from-fbi.html) and said this:

your action makes a mockery of the rule of law. […] Your action rewards a terrorist even though he never admitted to his role in this act of mass murder and even though neither he nor the government of Libya ever disclosed the names and roles of others who were responsible.

Haven't they actually handed over some names, or any tips to help the feds get back on the right track? Why wouldn't they be giving names and helping out? I don't get what Muley's saying here. ;)

Your action gives comfort to terrorists around the world who now believe that regardless of the quality of the investigation, the conviction by jury after the defendant is given all due process, and sentence appropriate to the crime, the terrorist will be freed by one man's exercise of "compassion."

How many errors are there in this sentence? Count 'em up.

Bzzt. Wrong. Zero errors. IMO he meant to say things he knows are wrong, having devolved to a purely political being with no more connection to the real factual world.

This is an unprecedented criticism from Muley, says he, usually keeping his mouth shut about fellow law people, says he. Why is he so compelled then to step up and make his voice heard in this case?

because I am familiar with the facts, and the law, having been the Assistant Attorney General in charge of the investigation and indictment of Megrahi in 1991

[Ambrosia]

If Mueller is as familiar with the facts as he claims he is, then wouldn't he be well aware that Megrahi was not convicted by a jury, but by a panel of 3 judges?

I do agree that the decision to release Megrahi makes a mockery of the rule of law though, if it was the case that a deal was struck to cause Megrahi to wilfully drop his appeal in order to gain release.

Had Megrahi continued his appeal and died whilst it was ongoing other "interested parties" such as Swire/Cadman could have continued it and almost certainly would have.

If then, as seems almost certain, Megrahi would have had his conviction quoshed it opens the whole can of worms again.

[Caustic Logic]

If Mueller is as familiar with the facts as he claims he is, then wouldn't he be well aware that Megrahi was not convicted by a jury, but by a panel of 3 judges?

That's the glaring one to me. Also the "all due process" and "quality investigation" parts have their problems. The "appropriate sentence" is kinda wrong too - 27 years to like is too weak for a true PA 103 bomber, but a travesty when dished out on an innocent man. All in all, he's either ignorant of the real "investigation" or he's misconstruing what he saw for political ends.

I do agree that the decision to release Megrahi makes a mockery of the rule of law though, if it was the case that a deal was struck to cause Megrahi to wilfully drop his appeal in order to gain release.

Had Megrahi continued his appeal and died whilst it was ongoing other "interested parties" such as Swire/Cadman could have continued it and almost certainly would have.

If then, as seems almost certain, Megrahi would have had his conviction quoshed it opens the whole can of worms again.

That's kind of what I'm seeing. Robert Black, as Rolfe points out, one of the architects of the whole trial, agrees.
It is sad that Abdelbaset Megrahi has felt it necessary to abandon his appeal.

The Scottish Government Justice Department has unequivocally denied that any suggestion has ever been made <snip> that Megrahi's prospects of being granted compassionate release were dependent upon, or would be improved by, his abandoning his current appeal.

Why, if this is true, did he decide to do it?
[…]
Or could there have been some “deal” between governments which involved abandonment of the appeal as one of its terms? A Libyan official quoted in The Times of Malta has recently referred to a deal or agreement.
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/08/scots-justice-system-must-not-be.html

Speculative, but all good detective work starts that way. One has only to wonder if the dropping (and thus permanent silencing) of the appeal was in fact connected to the release decision just a few days later. The Libyan quote, BTW, is
"The deal is now already in the last steps," the Libyan official, who did not want to be identified, said in Tripoli. "We have an agreement between the two sides not to make any statement until he (al Megrahi) comes home."
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/08/lockerbie-bomber-set-to-be-freed.html
And we have the appeal slaying and the purely compassionate return coming soon after, with that highly unusual meeting between al Megrahi and Kenny MacAskill in between...

Of course there was no deal. If there were, it'd be tantamount to USING the cancer to pressure Megrahi, to whom it mattered most, to chose between tossing his last months into more futile efforts, behind bars, at clearing his name, or to let the world sort it out as it sees fit and spend his last months at home. Your name or your life - pretty cheap buyout, thanks to his going-out-of-living sale. They were hoping the story would die with him and his appeal. Here's hoping it doesn't.

[Rolfe]

When the dropping of the appeal was first announced, my initial instinct was to blame Kenny and that meeting in the prison. It was just too convenient. It's blindingly obvious that the Scottish and UK establishments did not want this appeal to come to court, look at the 6-year delay so far, and when one of the judges got ill they chose to ajourn rather than replace him even though they knew the appellant was terminally ill.

Whether the impulse for secrecy was entirely because of pressure from the USA, or whether US and UK interests were aligned on that, I have no idea. I suspect it doesn't matter after a certain point, because once one step has been taken, all parts of the system become interested in covering up the shenanigans.

So I suspected Kenny, as a fully-paid-up lawyer, of pressurising Megrahi to drop the appeal so that the whole thing could be buried with him. Because otherwise Jim Swire (for one) had explicitly stated he would continue with the action after Megrahi's death. This opinion was reinforced when Megrahi's lawyer (well, one of them, a Libyan I think) came on the BBC news and said that his client had been pressurised to drop the appeal.

However, Megrahi himself has never said that. After he got home, he said that it was quite simple. He wanted to give himself the best possible chance of getting home, and so he decided to make two appilcations - one for compassionate release, and the other for a prisoner transfer. In order to make the second application, he had to withdraw the appeal.

If we look at it more from his point of view, remember that while the appeal was live, all the material was sub judice, and could not be published. If he'd kept it going, he'd have got home, but probably been dead before the hearings resumed. Some comfort. On the other hand, withdrawing the appeal means that he can publish his case as it is no longer sub judice. Maybe he simply thought that he had a chance to influence the bar of public opinion while he was still alive.

If so, it's not working so far. I was expecting to see a few analysis articles, looking at what had been published and commenting on its significance. But I've seen nothing. Just reports of Eilish Angiolini being outraged at Megrahi's temerity in publishing the stuff, as according to her his only proper course if he wanted vindicated was to keep the appeal going and die before it got any further.

Don't know what to think.

Rolfe.

[Ambrosia]

If so, it's not working so far. I was expecting to see a few analysis articles, looking at what had been published and commenting on its significance. But I've seen nothing.

He's not really dropped any bombshells yet. He has vowed to reveal the name of the bomber, presumably along with how he knows it's him.

I get the impression that much of the MSM is being discouraged to comeup with stories that favour Megrahi. Tho if he actually releases evidence that points elsewhere then the news wires might get a little hotter.

[Rolfe]

I get that impression too.

Hey, doesn't most of the world who's looked at this already think it was Abu Talb? Where would be the news in that?

Megrahi originally lodged a "special defence of incrimination" that Abu Talb did it. I belive this was withdrawn by his defence team after some sort of internal disagreements. I was always of the opinion that this part of the defence was merely an attempt to bring before the court all the evidence that was made public against Abu Talb and his associates in 1989-90, before the MSM was told that Libya was the culprit to write their stories about.

How would Megrahi necessarily know who did it anyway, if he wasn't involved?

I think evidence that the original evidence was fabricated would be the dynamite part. Allegations that the timer fragment was planted are all over the web, but never get a mention so's you'd notice in the MSM. It would be interesting if journalists began to feel they could make accusations of that sort openly. Even an easy-to-follow summary of the evidence and the holes in it, in the Herald or the Scotsman, would be interesting about now.

I've just downloaded Trail of the Octopus and it's 150 A4 pages on my word processor. It seems to be telling a similar tale to The Maltese Double Cross, and to have been published about the same time. And there's all these documents on Megrahi's web site. There's simply so much on this, it's hard to know what to concentrate on, or how to get through it all.

Rolfe.

ETA: My main concudrum is, if it was Abu Talb wot done it, then what was a fragment of an MST-13 timer doing in the wreckage, when Talb's group were using ice-cube timers?

And if it wasn't Talb, or a closely-asssociated group, then how come the entire modus operandi, the make and model of the radio-cassette player and the timing of the explosion, were all exactly according to the known methods of that group?

[Rolfe]

More from Paul Foot.

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/media/lockrbie.htm

Rolfe.

[GlennB]

Following a cursory reading of the Megrahi appeal documents ( here (http://megrahimystory.net/downloads/Written%20Submissions%20for%20hearing%20of%20Groun ds%201%20&%202.pdf?)page 29-30), one snippet that stands out immediately :

"When Gauci selected the appellant’s photograph at the photoshow on 15 February 1991, he stated that he was the only one similar to the purchaser “other than the one my brother showed me” (Gauci Day 31/4773). The one his brother showed him was a photograph of Abu Talb from the newspaper. The Crown, in asking the court to rule out the possibility that Talb was the purchaser, relied on the fact that Gauci had failed to pick Talb’s photograph out of other photoshows on 6 December 1989 and 10 September 1990, and on Talb’s own evidence (supported by evidence that he was in Sweden on 5 December and that he had an appointment on 9 December in Sweden) that he was not in Malta on 7 December, the date the Crown said was the date of purchase (Crown Final Submissions Day 78/9454, line 1 – 78/9455, line 8)."

Which includes some more bizarre reasoning by The Crown, namely that Abu Talb - a PFLP-GC member and one of the original suspects - can be ruled out because he wasn't in Malta at the time of the clothes purchase. A time which itself is only established on massively flimsy evidence. And that failed identification of Talb at other times is more significant than failed id's of Megrahi at other times.

The evidence against Megrahi is 100% circumstantial. As such it can only convict if there is no other rational explanation for the evidence, and in this case there is a very plausible alternative. Talb, a known and convicted terrorist with bomb-making 'form', bought the clothes from Gauci's shop, but not on Dec 7th.

Page 67 onwards in the above .pdf contains an excellent (but very lengthy and detailed) analysis of the role and applicability of circumstantial evidence in criminal cases.

[Caustic Logic]

[Talb] was not in Malta on 7 December, the date the Crown said was the date of purchase (Crown Final Submissions Day 78/9454, line 1 – 78/9455, line 8)."

Thanks for finding that. To those familiar with the evidence, this is further evidence, among so many others, that the clothes were NOT bought on December 7.

[Ambrosia]

Hey, doesn't most of the world who's looked at this already think it was Abu Talb? Where would be the news in that?

Megrahi or according to the Sunday Express (http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/122299/-I-ll-reveal-true-identity-of-bomber) "sources close to Megrahi" say a US citizen alias Abu Elias, commander of a Palestinian terror goup. The SE claims to have tracked him down, and they can't have done that if it's Talb, as he is presently incarcerated in Sweden.

FWIW Talb was placed in Malta buying clothes in October 1988. The "Yorkie" trousers found in the suitcase can only have been purchased after November 18th 1988, and Talb is too young going by Gaucis description by about 10 years to have been the buyer.


How would Megrahi necessarily know who did it anyway, if he wasn't involved?


good question.

It would be interesting if journalists began to feel they could make accusations of that sort openly. Even an easy-to-follow summary of the evidence and the holes in it

Megrahi appeal the 2nd according to the docs on his website aren't contesting it as grounds for appeal, so short of some new documentary evidence thats unlikely. Lumpert isn't going to be tried for perjury any time soon as he's not in anyones jurisdiction.


I've just downloaded Trail of the Octopus and it's 150 A4 pages on my word processor. It seems to be telling a similar tale to The Maltese Double Cross

The film is reportedly based on this book.

There are reports (http://www.tdn.com/articles/2009/09/02/top_story/doc4a9dd0696c111590258159.txt) from a disgruntled Hurley who sued Coleman for libel (and who also has his own book out) his suit also included C4 who showed an edited version, but not oddly, the Australian network that screened the whole film, was settled out of court in his favour (Hurley's) in 1996 and the book disappeared off the shelves.

Only it's just got a release in America and a "2009 edition" is available from Amazon :confused:

In support of his libel case Coleman produced this document (http://plane-truth.com/Aoude/geocities/fbis.html), which makes interesting reading.

The book is a lot more detailed. Amongst other things it claims:

There was a warning that detailed PA103 exactly on Dec 20th.

Pan Am 103 had as many as 13 (thirteen) pieces of unaccompanied baggage on board, and noone, not even the airline has an exact count.

The US Govt. knew for much of the Beruit hostage crisis where they were all being held and could have got them out forcibly, but didn't want to blow their line of intelligence.

It kind of hangs on how much you believe Juval Aviv. Interestingly Aviv was indicted for fraud just as the film MDC was released. His lawyer described the fraud indictment "In all my (25) years of practice, I have never seen the resources of the FBI and the US Attorney's Office devoted to such an insignificant, inconsequential, isolated, four-year-old matter." the case was dismissed shortly afterwards, the judge describing the prosecution as "dishonest".

If you're a fan of coincidences, how about this one.

In a 1994 article (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/film-claims-stir-lockerbie-row-1392234.html) in the Independent Dr Swire is quoted as saying of Francovich (MDC film maker) "He told me his life was in danger but that he wanted to do everything possible to find the truth. I liked the chap."

Francovich has a heart attack while going through US Customs at Houston airport in 97, he dies a week later.


ETA: My main concudrum is, if it was Abu Talb wot done it, then what was a fragment of an MST-13 timer doing in the wreckage, when Talb's group were using ice-cube timers?

I can come up with a couple of scenarios that explain an MT-13 but they don't include Talb.


And if it wasn't Talb, or a closely-asssociated group, then how come the entire modus operandi, the make and model of the radio-cassette player and the timing of the explosion, were all exactly according to the known methods of that group?

I am not sure about the make/model of the radio. The Khreesat made bomb recovered by the BKA was in a one speaker radio. The bombeat model has two speakers. The radio had a black plastic casing. an almost identical model using a white casing was sold almost exclusively to Libya. Feraday (I think) got his serial numbers mixed up giving evidence.

Smells like a setup actually, one that duplicates the PFLP-GC MO almost exactly so that they can pin the blame on them if needs be later.

Perhaps a device using *both* timers.

Whats baking my noodle at the moment is that MDC/Octopus says the bomb was switched onto 103 at Frankfurt, instead of the drugs suitcase Jafaar was carrying as part of his sting, *and* the drugs suitcase was "recovered" in the wreckage and spirited away, thats having your cake and eating it that is.

My head hurts.

[Caustic Logic]

It's alright if I leap to a conclusion. I can leap right back if needed. (re: Talb) Ambrosia, you're pretty amazing. Give the head a rest, it's deserved. :) Rolfe also, some great points in the last few posts. I must sleep now, later times all...

[Rolfe]

Whats baking my noodle at the moment is that MDC/Octopus says the bomb was switched onto 103 at Frankfurt, instead of the drugs suitcase Jafaar was carrying as part of his sting, *and* the drugs suitcase was "recovered" in the wreckage and spirited away, thats having your cake and eating it that is.

My head hurts.


I know what you mean. There would have had to be (at least) two drugs suitcases involved in that scenario.

If you want more funny coincidences, Paul Foot also died of a heart attack in an airport (Stanstead, I think).

Yes, I take your point that the radios weren't identical - the Lockerbie one was a stereo while the ones recovered in Frankfurt were mono. However, the similarities are very striking. I'm coming to the conclusion that this was either Jibril's group (or a closely-related group - I read a suggestion that there might have been two parallel groups, on the theory that if one was detected then the other would almost certainly succeed), or an elaborate scheme to make it look as if it was Jibril's group.

Rolfe.

[GlennB]

FWIW Talb was placed in Malta buying clothes in October 1988. The "Yorkie" trousers found in the suitcase can only have been purchased after November 18th 1988, and Talb is too young going by Gaucis description by about 10 years to have been the buyer.


That may be correct, but the only source I can find about Talb and Malta places him travelling there in October, not limiting his stay to October only.
Regrettably this source is the brief Wikipedia article on Abu Talb :rolleyes:

[Ambrosia]

That may be correct, but the only source I can find about Talb and Malta places him travelling there in October, not limiting his stay to October only.
Regrettably this source is the brief Wikipedia article on Abu Talb :rolleyes:

Source is Richard Marquise's book "Scotbom:evidence and the Lockerbie case" "the two sides agreed on pieces of evidence that put Talb as leaving Malta October 26th"

Principally this evidence as is detailed in the trial verdict itself is shown to be Talbs testimony, though there was documentary evidence shown at trial that gives Talb the alibi of being in Sweden on various dates that would preclude a trip to Malta lasting longer than a day or two from 26th October up till mid December. I don't think there is any evidence anywhere to suggest he left Sweden from 26th Oct to after his wife has her first baby on Dec 22nd.

IIRC the film Maltese Double Cross investigated this, and interviewed Talbs wife in 1994 (n oidea when the interview itself was carried out but it would have ben around this time I guess) and she says he went to Malta in Oct, cameback and didn't return there for however much that's worth.

[Rolfe]

The sensible date for the purchase of the clothes was 23rd November. I thought there was evidence that someone in the PFLP was in Malta that day, even if it wasn't Talb?

Sorry, but keeping all this straight is doing my head in.

Rolfe.

[GlennB]

Thanks Ambrosia.

And Rolfe - by now you should have a giant whiteboard on your wall, covered in photos, names, arrows and question marks. Like in the detective films.

[Caustic Logic]

I'm not even going to try to follow this one right now. I'm hearing about headaches, no thanks...

Thought I'd bring this over from the other thread:
However, if we concentrate on the timer fragment, then even there we see evidence of at least an intent to have the fragment in there at least by September 1989, which is still quite a while before Desert Storm was on the horizon. So if the fragment was fabricated, and it's crucial, then I think there must have been some imperative in addition to the whole "we can't alienate Iran right now" stuff that came to the fore in the spring of 1990.
<snip>
I'm having trouble believing that this is all about Desert Storm, the timing is all to pot.
link (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=5128442#post5128442)

This is an important point to consider. I agree there had to be more at work than simple war-with-Iraq considerations. I did just notice for the first time one reason Libya would be targetted AFTER August 1990, in a link you provided, after explaining Syrian assistance in the war:
In other words, as Donald Goddard puts it, from the moment of Saddam's invasion 'nothing more was heard from official sources on either side of the Atlantic about Syrian complicity in the Flight 103 bombing.' From now on the official view of the disaster was that Syria had, in Bush's typically elegant phrase, 'taken a bum rap on this'; and that the people responsible for Lockerbie came from the one Arab state which had denounced the US role in the Gulf War: Libya.
I remember that now. Cuba and Yemen also voted no. All paid a price.

Now on the targeting Iraq timeline, there's a level where things can seem almost "scripted" in grand srategic sweeps, the changing geopolitical zeitgeist. This timeline of the Iran-Iraq (http://www.mideastweb.org/iraqtimeline.htm) war shows the zeitgeist of mid-1988 was US and Iraq working in tandem, partly intentional, partly accidental (Vicennes), like a tsunami to subdue Iran into the August ceasefire. Almost exactly two years later the US was fighting against Iraq. Most run-of-the-mill Gulf War timelines start with late May 1990 and Iraq's charges of economic warfare against Kuwait. One might guess some foreshadowing prior to this, but it's more than shadows.

I've read Ramsey Clark's The Fire This Time (1992). Slanted to be sure, but informative in its way. His intro timeline goes into more detail and further back. Let's go backwards to see how far back the mindshift goes:
February 1990 – General Schwwarzkopf testifies before the Senate of the need for the United States to increase its military presence in the Gulf region. He warns that “Iraq has the capability to militarily coerce its neighbors.”
January 1990 CENTCOM headqyuarters stages a game entitled Look, which tests War Plan 1002-90.
1989 War Plan 1002, originally conceived in 1981 to counter a supposed Soviet threat to the Persian Gulf, is adjusted to designate Iraq as the threat to the region. The plan is renamed War Plan 1002-90.
1988 <snip> A ceaefire agreement is signed between Iran and Iraq in August. U.S. policy towards Iraq shifts dramatically. The Center for Strategic and International Studies begins a two-year study predicting the outcome of a war between the United States and Iraq. [p xxiv-xxv]

Clark explains on pages 19-20 how the Iraqi chemical weapons attack on Iran-supporting Kurds in Halabja, March 1988, was ignored by western media and governments at the time, even after large Kurdish protests at the UN. The zeitgeist of mid-88? He noted it was on September 8, just three weeks after the Iran-Iraq cease fire, that the U.S. decided to announce that their ally had gassed Kurds. A state Dept. spokesman referred to the attack(s) (vaguely related) as “abhorrent and unjustifiable.” The same day, Iraq’s Foreign Minister was in town to meet SoS Schultz, and had the chance to be barraged with unexpected questions and to respond weakly. Within a day “the Senate unanimously voted to impose sanctions” on Iraq – somehow this “never became law” but was seen as “a threat and a humiliation” by Iraq.

So was the necessary mindset there and strong even four months before the Lockerbie bombing? Seems so. This doesn't mean it's THE reason, but shouldn't be scratched as one of the birds to be killed with this stone.

[Bobby]

Have you seen this (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6841390.ece)?

A source who has seen the SCCRC document, told The Sunday Times: “The report says there was no sufficient explanation made of why the court discounted him [Giaka] as a credible witness yet seemed to accept elements within his evidence which asserted that Megrahi was a senior member of the Libyan intelligence service and was involved in the wider conspiracy.

The SCCRC’s concerns about Giaka’s testimony are shared by Michael Scharf, who was the counsel to the US counterterrorism bureau when Megrahi and Fhima were indicted for the bombing. He believes that the case should never have gone to trial.

He claimed the CIA had assured State Department officials that Giaka was “the perfect witness” and there was an “airtight” case against Megrahi and Fhima, who was cleared. “This is a bit like the OJ Simpson case, where the prosecution, together with the US government, tried to sex up the case and tried to hide the flaws,” he said.

Interesting, no?

[Rolfe]

Oh yes.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Thanks Ambrosia.

And Rolfe - by now you should have a giant whiteboard on your wall, covered in photos, names, arrows and question marks. Like in the detective films.


We could do with, at the very least, a list of what is undisputed (could be a very short one!), a list, grouped by subject, of all the anomalous bits of evidence or alleged evidence together with a note of their provenance and an assessment of their credibility, and a synoptic list of all the suggested explanations.

I see the one that says the South Africans did it has now been superseded by one that says it was an accident, but one the US aithorities had to cover up.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

We could do with, at the very least, a list of what is undisputed (could be a very short one!), a list, grouped by subject, of all the anomalous bits of evidence or alleged evidence together with a note of their provenance and an assessment of their credibility, and a synoptic list of all the suggested explanations.

I see the one that says the South Africans did it has now been superseded by one that says it was an accident, but one the US aithorities had to cover up.

Rolfe.

It was an accident that triggered semtex laced fuselage metal, built by SA and installed by Libyans possed up by Megrahi. Obviously.

I had a question about the BBC's Conspiracy Files video -
The link again: (http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=7160854996287567609#docid=-327765978162851498)
Others can pull this up and follow along. I felt like it was manipulative all in all, but iit DID do a decent job of covering the stuff it did - the Helsinki warning, the PFLPGC connections and that track, the questions over Giaka AND Gauci AND the timer fragment. Most of the time it seems like they'd fit right in in this thread, but then at the end it gets all like "we know Lybia did it, just not who... thhey won't quite admit it still... bloody bastard and we're doing oiil deals now... oooh! And he's going to appeal again, even tho he lost [sic] the first one...

Anyway, since I was surprised at what they covered and in some detail, Rolfe, what do you say? Does this reflect good journalism and thirst for truth, or simply the fact that all this stuff is already out there and they can't be seen as dodging?

Case in point - 17:00 in - Juval Aviv - tied right into the iranian-backed PFLP "no evidence" theory - right to its backing from this CIA drug-for-hostage theory, debunked by Oliver North, left for dead, with the Iran-Syria/PFLP leaads attached and inert. Hardly mentioned for rest of video leaving Libya the only plausible candidate. Then they let questions fly, scatter, get paper-thin (see 36:15), and leave again Lybia, naggling questions aside.

[Rolfe]

I was impressed by the coverage of the Helsinki warning, which seemed to put it to bed completely (one more bloody coincidence to add to all the rest). However, when I saw what they did with the Frankfurt baggage transfer, my warning lights all came on.

They presented this, in an interview with the baggage clerk who saved the printout, as an unaccompanied bag from KA180 out of Luqa definitely having been transferred to PA103A. This is not true. The baggage records at Frankfurt seem to have been all over the place, and it's anybody's guess what they mean. As far as I understand it, there were several unidentified bags transferred to that flight, but just one that might have come off the Luqa flight. Depending on how you interpreted some semi-legible worksheet, and whether the guy's watch was right or not. Paul Foot explains it in quite a lot of detail. The fact remains that Luqa had the most watertight records of all, and it's virtually impossible for anything untoward to have gone on there.

My interpretation is that the investigators were trying to torture the evidence to show that a bag had come through from Luqa, because they knew the clothes had been bought in Sliema.

Once I realised what they'd done with the Frankfurt baggage evidence, I started to doubt some other bits, including the neat tidying away of the Helsinki warning.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Not aslepp jut yet now either. :) That saved printout story seemed weird to me too. I haven't reviewed it tho...

On the Helsinki warning I'm still struck with the coincidence of it, and that it reportedly DID serve to keep VIPs from dying. Can it really be coincidence? Sure. Must it be? No.

So you're someone who's become hip to the coming attack but not wanting to stop it, but to prevent someone you know from getting on the plane, perhaps. You also don't want to reveal your foresight of the actual plot for investigators later on. How do you do it? Just like this. You scan case files - ah, an old quarrel between to Arab guys involving false phone leads. Tack it onto that as the source, then feed tactically correct info (right airport and time) but specifically attached to wrong pretext facts. Voila. Instant "unrelated hoax" and "bizarre coincidence" that keeps some vital people off a plane and perhaps feeling indebted to some mysterious protector... and a "dead end" for investigators.

Something to consider.

[Ambrosia]

The thing to remember about TV programs and documentaries in general is that more often than not they are working from an "angle" and that in order to make a program fit within it's alotted time much ends up on the cutting room floor.

The Conspiracy Files seems to me to have the angle that all Conspiracy Theories are rubbish, and it sets out to prove that this is the case.

The Helsinki warning was one of a number of warnings reportedly received by the authorities. While it was proved to be a hoax, what of the others?

I don't recall them mentionning Lumpert in the program, tho I need to watch it again. The single most important piece of physical evidence in the whole case is the MST-13 fragment. Despite Hans Kochler having an article about Lumperts "confession" on his website presumably in the time period when the BBC were researching this program (It was first shown in Aug 2008) it's not mentionned.

There are other niggling problems as well e.g. the program doesn't quite get details about Juval Avivs report right, it mentions "Gadaffis 4 year old adopted daughter" as a victim of the US 1986 raids, when she was reported as being 15months old. They use a CGI representation of both the MST-13 fragment, and also of a complete board which match completely, however the pictures of the board from the evidence at trial and the pictures of the fragment itself do not match exactly (the position of the "1" is wrong) Bollier is interviewed but they use Swiss and English language, why both? near the end the narrator says "one fact was hard to explain away" and in the next breath explains it away. It cites the conclusion of the SCCRC report, but calls it's work a "3 year independant investigation" , which actually took over 3yrs and 9 months.

All told the program is not bad, in closing it states that facts may yet come to light in the appeal which will confirm or lay to rest some of the Conspiracy Theories about Lockerbie, and that thats the very least the families of the 270 victims deserve, I certainly agree with that much 100%.

[Rolfe]

I thought it was good too. The ending seemed as if they really, really wanted to have debunked the conspiracies but realised they couldn't do it.

However, remember this is the BBC. They're not as independent as all that. And this was post Gilligan. Do Not Rock The Boat. It's a known fact that the UK government does not want certain things about this affair to come to light, so I wouldn't necessarily expect a BBC programme to adopt a completely open-minded approach.

The Frankfurt baggage thing was quite bad, actually. If it had been as they said, that an unaccompanied bag had really definitely come through from Luqa on KM180, then that would have been a huge pointer to shenanigans at Luqa that day, which is where Megrahi was. But that wasn't the case at all, and was known not to be the case. Paul Foot's account was dated 2001, and took its material directly from the Camp Zeist evidence - all of that was available to the production team, but they chose not to use it in favour of a very simplified and positively misleading account.

This was either very sloppy reporting/editing, or it was deliberate slanting of the evidence to make it look a lot clear cut than it really was.

In contrast, have you looked at the three Al Jazeera films on the subject? (OK, two-and-a-bit.) I was struck by the willingness to go places the BBC seemed to be shying away from. Though I admit all the films (four different productions, if you count the Al Jazeera material as just one) are beginning to get conflated in my head now.

Rolfe.

[Ambrosia]

Are you including Gideon Levys "Lockerbie Revisited" which is in Dutch, but the interviews in it are all English?

[Rolfe]

No, haven't seen that one. Do you have a link?

I was including The Maltese Double Cross, Lockerbie and the CIA, The Conspiracy Files and Flight into Darkness (and its follow-ups).

Rolfe.

[Ambrosia]

Lockerbie Revisited (http://www.disclose.tv/action/viewvideo/22580/Tegenlicht__Lockerbie_revisited/)

[Caustic Logic]

However, remember this is the BBC. They're not as independent as all that. <snip>
The Frankfurt baggage thing was quite bad, actually. If it had been as they said, that an unaccompanied bag had really definitely come through from Luqa on KM180, then that would have been a huge pointer to shenanigans at Luqa that day, which is where Megrahi was.
<snip>
This was either very sloppy reporting/editing, or it was deliberate slanting of the evidence to make it look a lot clear cut than it really was.

The coincidence this sloppiness comes down supporting the government line is too much to ignore. This wrongly-framed piece of evidence is not questioned anything like Giaka, and it's the first point on the line that points to the video's end where they get all indignant about Ghaddafi the appeal.

In contrast, have you looked at the three Al Jazeera films on the subject? (OK, two-and-a-bit.) I was struck by the willingness to go places the BBC seemed to be shying away from. Though I admit all the films (four different productions, if you count the Al Jazeera material as just one) are beginning to get conflated in my head now.

I will check them out, but not yet. I hope they're good and fact-based without too much over-the-top woo. I could see that happening and shoot themselves in the foot. My head's not crowded enough just yet to get too conflated but I'm sure I'll get there. :)

Ambbrosia, excellent observations. Thanks.
near the end the narrator says "one fact was hard to explain away" and in the next breath explains it away.
The hard question is basically "why did they "admit responsibility but not guilt" and pay up IF they weren't guilty?" They didn't answer it fairly there, just conveyed the Libyan line with incredulity. How they framed this was so piss poor. "playing with words" = "cynical game" = "blood money"

[Rolfe]

The Al Jazeera film isn't woo. It interviews some very credible people.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Lockerbie Revisited (http://www.disclose.tv/action/viewvideo/22580/Tegenlicht__Lockerbie_revisited/)


OK, officially wow. It's frustrating only understanding about two thirds of it, but I got the message. It's recent, too - only last year, clearly. By the way, take it from me, don't trust Peter Fraser as far as you can throw him. The only one I'd trust less would be Colin Boyd.

The theory they're putting forward in the first part is the one I've been sort of toying with, based on a few things I read.

Khreesat was released by the German police remarkably fast, even though normal people might think there was a ton of evidence against him. One source I read said he made a single telephone call, and then he was released. Did I just hear Marquise confirm that? Something about him working for Jordan, so they let him go?

The other source I read suggested that his bombs were supposed to be dummy ones - but later, one of them killed a German bomb disposal expert. The suggestion was that he was a triple agent - allowing the CIA to believe he was working for them, but working for the PFLP-GC all along.

So he and a couple of others were released, in order to protect them as sources and keep their intelligence coming. Either in the genuine belief that they weren't going to bomb anyone for real anyway, or taking the chance because they were too important/useful to sacrifice.

Then they successfully blew up PA103, and it was realised that the release had been a huge mistake. Maybe it was even realised that a bombing was possible, hence all the warnings flying around, but it was a risk that was taken for intelligence reasons.

A few weeks into the investigation, and it's realised the police are getting there, and there is a very embarrassing place. Not to mention too sensitive to reveal, for intelligence reasons. So the backtracking and the soft-pedalling start.

I have no idea how that scenario fits in with the CIA operatives on the pkane, or the drugs, or the alleged missing body. I have no idea whether the CIA were on the scene so fast to conceal things the plane might have been carrying (relating to the passengers), or to find out if it was indeed Khreesat's work and misdirect if it was.

In fact I'm totally guessing, but that's the one I tend to keep coming back to.

The chain of custody of that timer fragment stinks to high heaven. Thurman says he had it in America. Others say no, it never went there. In fact they're very very definite about it. That cop Henderson is extremely definite. Quite a little row they had about it.

Oh, I dunno. Time for bed, really. But what an interesting film!

Rolfe.

[Bobby]

Not sure if you've seen the latest from Private Eye, here (http://www.private-eye.co.uk/sections.php?section_link=hp_sauce&article=104&) and here (http://www.private-eye.co.uk/sections.php?section_link=hp_sauce&article=105&). Nothing new in there, but an interesting recap nonetheless.

[Rolfe]

Thanks a lot!

Rolfe.

[Bobby]

An interview with the Britsh PM is available for download here (http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/fivelive/mayo/mayo_20090923-1614a.mp3) until 9/30. Around the 26 minute mark he provides a brief summary of the UK gov't stand on the issue of Megrahi's guilt.

[Rolfe]

I ain't bothering with that, but if Gordon Brown told me it was a nice day out there, I'd go check for myself.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Just thought I'd put these slightly off-topic musings in this thread.

I was born and brought up about 50 miles from Lockerbie. I didn't know the town well (though I did canvass parts of it for the 1999 Scottish election), but as it's on the main route to England I was always aware of it. More so from 1982 when I moved to England, and travelled home by train many times. Lockerbie was (and probably is) one of the stops on the main London Euston to Glasgow Central west coast route, on the stopping trains I favoured to allow me to get out at my own intermediate station.

I remember exactly where I was on the evening of 21st December 1988 when I heard the news. I'd been watching the 7pm Channel 4 news broadcast, and the broadcast was just finishing a few minutes before 8 o'clock. As the programme came to its end I stood up to go to the kitchen for something (probably clearing my dirty crockery). Instead of finishing, however, the announcer began to read a news flash about a plane having crashed on Lockerbie.

I remember standing in the doorway of my living room, listening to the horrific news (pictures didn't come till later), simply rooted to the spot. (At that time the reports were a bit inaccurate, for example they said there was a report that the nearby village of Tundergarth was in flames, but that turned out not to be true. Also not true was that people driving on the A74 road which skirts the town had been killed.)

There was no such thing as 24-hour news channels then, or none that I could access, but I watched the BBC 9 o'clock news then the ITV News at Ten, and it just got worse and worse. The later reports had some video footage showing flames roaring into the night sky.

Next day they started showing daylight pictures of the wreckage and the smouldering hole that was Sherwood Crescent. It began to be obvious that the passengers must have been aware of what was happening when the plane blew apart, and that some were probably conscious for at least part of the fall from 34,000 feet up. Possibly nobody was killed in the air, everybody was killed by impacting the ground at terminal velocity.

Later, the awful story of the family the engines landed on became public. They were all killed apart from a teenage boy who'd gone to a neighbour's house to mend his bike, as the neighbour had an electric light in his garage. I think there was also an older son who wasn't living at home. The subsequent history of these young men was appalling, ending in suicide.

At the time, I selfishly began to wonder how I was going to get home for Christmas. I was intending to drive up to Scotland only 48 hours later, and the only road I knew was the A74, on which bits of plane had fallen. I recall a long journey with a lot of hold-ups, but it wasn't actually as bad as I expected. I remember looking to my right as I finally passed Lockerbie, but it was pitch dark and there was nothing to see. If Sherwood Crescent was still burning, or if there was a pall of smoke hanging over the town, I didn't see it.

Over Christmas and New Year there wasn't much else on the news. It just got worse and worse, as the news about the local people killed on the ground emerged, and people started talking about a bomb. We weren't used to that, because the IRA had never targeted Scotland, and it was all so close to home.

Before I left to return to England on 2nd January I fished out a large-scale Ordnance Survey map and plotted a route to avoid the A74. I did that in daylight, which was just as well as it involved unmade farm roads and forest tracks. I remember looking across at the stationary lines of traffic on the main road, much of which was still coned off. Again, the journey took a while, and it was late before I got back to England.

The incident has been in the news almost constantly ever since, what with anniversaries, and news about the tragedy of the boy who was mending his bike, and news releases about the investigation. I don't remember when people started talking about a cover-up. There was muttering when the investigation suddenly switched from Iran/Syria to Libya, and the original indictment against the Libyans, but we were assured the authorities had "incontrovertible evidence" of their guilt so nobody really went digging. It all went quiet for ten years, with just the occasional article about the failure to extradite the accused - and the anniversaries, and the developing news about how the town was recovering (or not recovering in certain cases).

In 1999 when I was doing the political canvassing, nobody was talking about it. It wasn't the sort of thing a stranger was going to raise in conversation. However, one of my fellow-canvassers who was from Dumfries passed on some accounts she'd had at the time, from people who'd been in the town centre doing late Christmas shopping and thought the sky was falling in, and didn't know if whatever it was had hit their own homes and their own families or not.

It wasn't till Camp Zeist that the "conspiracy theories" really started to circulate, fuelled by the manifestly threadbare nature of the evidence we'd all been told was so incontrovertible, and the bits of the "special defence of incrimination" that got through to the court. Journalists started remembering how in 1989 and 1990 we were all being told that it was the work a Palestinian group, and dug out the old articles which made a lot more sense than the Libyan tale, and there we are.

Rolfe.

[realdon]

I found this. 450 pages of FOIA DIA documents relating to PanAm 103
available to the public on the DIA website

They are not in chronological order but the dates are prefixed by IRDT, DOI or ACQ
They contain lots of "Black holes"

Bear in mind they are information reports and not finally evaluated.
They were at the time of release NOFORN Not for Foreign nationals (to view)
WNINTEL Warning Notice -- Intelligence Sources & Methods Involved


www@dia@mil/foia/panam103@pdf (substitute the @)

Interesting finds so far ( Pdf page no's)
P3 Nov 91 para 1.A
P6 Post desert storm ? Para 4
P111 Sept 89 Wrong aircraft , Jabril and Libya
P115 Iran,Libya and Syria co operation
P138 Nov 91 Jabril and Libya, Megrahi and others Timer set in london
P156,159,163 First reports
218 Nov 91 "Libyans still sweatin"
252 DIA Brief

Lots of stuff to suggest that Libya and Gaddafi were the fall guys in this affair and Gaddafi shot himself in the foot getting into bed with Iran who insulated themselves against blame for Pan Am 103. But got vengance for the Airbus downing in the gulf.

Gaddafi speaking at the UN and being able to pitch his tent on US soil in the last few weeks looks like he has managed to scramble out of the hole he dug

David

[realdon]

Sorry link is

www.dia.mil/Foia/panam103.pdf (http://www.dia.mil/Foia/panam103.pdf)

cant post links yet so substitute @ with .

David

Fixed your link for you

[Caustic Logic]

Lots of stuff to suggest that Libya and Gaddafi were the fall guys in this affair and Gaddafi shot himself in the foot getting into bed with Iran who insulated themselves against blame for Pan Am 103. But got vengance for the Airbus downing in the gulf.

Gaddafi speaking at the UN and being able to pitch his tent on US soil in the last few weeks looks like he has managed to scramble out of the hole he dug

David

Wow, this sure sounds like amazing stuff. I've got it open now but dang, no time to really get in. More stupid real world stuff. I'll check it out later, thanks for the tip! If it's got black it's in the know and fit for info scavenging...

[Ambrosia]

yay another 450 pages of reading...

thanks for the link :)

As Richard Marquise is fond of pointing out: "Intelligence is not evidence"

With that in mind below are excerpts from the DIA Briefing December 1989. Presumably the contents of said briefing are based on mostly evaluated intelligence reports, being a year after the disaster [pg 252 -255 of the pdf linked to above] (emphasis mine)


Iran probably was the state sponsor for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) attack on Pan Am 103. ... The PFLP-GC possesses a demonstrated technical expertise, operational experience, and organizational stability not enjoyed by other rejectionist Palestinian terrorist groups. Iran found these qualities attractive and sought to exploit them. The PFLP-GC is fast becoming an Iranian proxy. Destroying Pan Am 103 to avenge the July 1988 US shootdown of an Iran Air airbus may represent the result of such Iranian/PFLP-GC cooperation. ...

Pan Am flight 103 exploded in mid-air over Lockerbie, Scotland, on 21 December 1988
as a result of a sophisticated, barometrically-triggered explosive device probably fabricated by the PFLP-GC. ...
Electronic fragments found in the wreckage revealed the bomb was concealed
inside a Toshiba radio/cassette player. DIA believes the device was placed aboard Pan
Am 103 in Frankfurt, West Germany. ...

Following a tip concerning an imminent terrorist attack, West German
authorities uncovered an extensive PFLP-GC terrorist cell in fall 1988. Subsequent analysis of materiel confiscated from this PFLP-GC cell has provided strong circumstantial evidence linking the cell to the bombing.
...

Additionally, the PFLP-GC may have been motivated [apart from the already noted in the report Iranian Airbus shooting] to target US interests to discredit
Arafat and his November 1988 initiative to open a Palestinian-US dialogue out of anger with Arafat's moderation and conciliatory entreaties toward Israel. Specifically, the PLO's renunciation of terrorism and willingness to negotiate a settlement with Israel probably heightened the threat from rejectionist Palestinian groups, such as the PFLP-GC, to conduct terrorist operations against US, Israeli, and pro-Arafat targets.
...

DIA continues to discount Libyan or Syrian involvement in the bombing of PanAm 103 because there is no current credible intelligence implicating either. Although Libya provides financial suport to the PFLP-GC and traditionally seeks to discredit Arafat, these factors probably are not suffcient motive for Qadhafi to undertake such a spectacular terrorist attack against US interests. In fact ... Qadhafi has made an effort to distance Libya from terrorist attacks. He probably fears another retaliatory bombing by the US; in particular a raid on the chemical facility at Rabta.

[Ambrosia]

excerpts from pg 296/297 intelligence summary dated March 1991.

This document has been scanned wonkily and some of the text from the left hand edge is missing, red text indicates letters I have added that do not appear in the original document in an effort to make it make sense. (emphasis mine)


Results of Lockerbie investigation may become public.
The Lord Advocate of scotland, Peter Fraser disclosed on 12 March that he may make public the criminal investigation into the bombing of Pan Am 103 by 21 December 91 (the third anniversary of the incident). Fraser stated that if the deadline has been reached and he is satisfied that the investigation has progressed as far as possible, he will reveal the "whole story of the hunt for the bombers of Pan Am 103."

...

Lord Fraser's remarks should be taken seriously.
It has been expected that if reports from the Lockerbie task force are insufficient to bring anyone to trial, Fraser would discuss closing down the investigation with Chief Constable Esson. There is no doubt that a considerable amount of political pressure is being felt by Lord Fraser to bring the case to resolution as quickly as possible.
Even the American relatives of victims group has publicly endorsed Fraser's statements.

... Serious repercussions will be felt if Fraser closes[?] the case and divulges information derived from the criminal investigation. The disclosure of much of the information possessed by Fraser could seriously jeopardize U.S. prosecutive efforts.

Various intelligence and police activities, sources, and methods - as well as the identities of Investigators and suspects - may become public. Should this type of information be disclosed, it could have a negative impact on future relations among the various intelligence and police organizations involved with respect to the sharing of sensitive foreign intelligence and police information.

Indictments were made against Megrahi and Fhima 13th November 1991 in Scotland and the following day in the US. One month, one week, and one day before Lord Frasers deadline referred to in this intel report.

[realdon]

Interesting snippet from P111 dated 24th Sept 89

"The misson was to blow up a Pan Am flight that was to be almost entirely booked by military personnel on Christmas leave. The flight was supposed to be a direct flight from Frankfurt, GE to New york, not Pan Am flight 103 which was routed through London.UK. The suitcase containing the bomb was labled with the name of one of the US passengers on the plane and was inadvertantly placed on the wrong plane possibly by airport ground crew members in Frankfurt. The terrorist who last handled the bomb was not a passenger on the plane"


Well according to net searches there was an earlier flight out of Frankfurt direct to New york that day, Pan AM 67. If the 103 bomb had been aboard this flight it would have detonated well over the Atlantic and we would be unlikely to be discussing this now.


Also note that a whole swathe of stuff has been blacked out on pages 12 - 18 all relating to Libya and originating from Frankfurt

David

[Rolfe]

I'm losing count of the number of theories. Is that the sixth distinct one?


Jibril and the PFLP-GC
Libya/Gadaffi
MIHOP to get rid of McKee
MIHOP to get rid of the South African guy (sorry, past my bedtime)
Accidental detonation for illegally-transported ordnance
and now Wrong Plane

Yes, that's six.

I already saw that document in the pdf, someone linked to it earlier. I didn't realise it was so long though.

There's so much information available now it's hard to keep track of what's been said, and how many documents there are. I haven't even read the entire AAIB report yet. And I've not got through much of The Trail of the Octopus either.

Some things just get more peculiar the longer you look at them, like that surreal clothes purchase in Malta. I don't know whether the real answer's something that hasn't been suggested yet (or has received little attention), or whether to stick with the obvious (Jibril).

I don't even know if the timer fragment was planted or not.

I'm going to bed.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

The wrong plane story's got a strong feel to it, worth looking at. However... what about the Heathrow break-in and the timing coincidence based on that? How does this scenario fit in with barometer/timer settings to blow as it did? Etc?

[Rolfe]

The main difficulty with this incident is the sheer level of coincidence surrounding it, and so the difficulty in knowing what to accept as coincidence and what to look at with a suspicious eye. There are several other convincing scenarios that have the bomb introduced at Frankfurt (that's the MO in The Trail of the Octopus as well, though PA103 is the target), and in all of these we have to take the Heathrow events as coincidence.

If PA103 was the wrong plane, it means we also haven't a hope in hell of being able to account for the cancellations from the VIPs (Botha etc), or the drug courier on the flight, or the CIA operatives on the flight. All coincidence.

I could certainly accept that as a reasonable coincidental explanation for the 38-minute detonation though. As I could for the accidental detonation triggered by the VHF radio transmissions.

However, the Wrong Plane explanation is dated September 1989, and the Accidental Detonation theory is also long-standing - I recall hearing that one years ago, too. If either of them was that compelling, or had significant evidence to support it, I'd have thought it would have attracted support from at least some of the people who have been studying the incident for decades.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

The main difficulty with this incident is the sheer level of coincidence surrounding it, and so the difficulty in knowing what to accept as coincidence and what to look at with a suspicious eye. There are several other convincing scenarios that have the bomb introduced at Frankfurt (that's the MO in The Trail of the Octopus as well, though PA103 is the target), and in all of these we have to take the Heathrow events as coincidence.

Alleged Heathrow incidents. Didn't this only come to light years later? I'm not entirely clear there obviously. The feeling faded - something there was appealing, but ...

If PA103 was the wrong plane, it means we also haven't a hope in hell of being able to account for the cancellations from the VIPs (Botha etc), or the drug courier on the flight, or the CIA operatives on the flight. All coincidence.

The warning was against flights from Frankfurt to America, so basically any Pan Am flights from there in the time frame. How many of these specifically were to be on 103 and cancelled, and how many just cancelled some PA flight in that time due to the warning, plus presumptions? I'm unclear there too. Many questions.


I could certainly accept that as a reasonable coincidental explanation for the 38-minute detonation though. As I could for the accidental detonation triggered by the VHF radio transmissions.

However, the Wrong Plane explanation is dated September 1989, and the Accidental Detonation theory is also long-standing - I recall hearing that one years ago, too. If either of them was that compelling, or had significant evidence to support it, I'd have thought it would have attracted support from at least some of the people who have been studying the incident for decades.

Sometimes maybe true versions have a way of staying out of discussions. But really, I don't know. That feeling faded a bit, might be something, but...

[ricbritain]

Private Eye did a fairly deep analysis a few years back. It's been a while, but I recall that they came to the conclusion that al Megrahi was a patsy. A couple of the points from the story I do remember were supposed discrepancies about the number of bodies found in one particular field; and that luggage was mysteriously retrieved from another field, a cover story fed to the press about looters in order to prevent others doing so. (I do remember from the news a story about looters in the fields).

It was a special edition, so it might be possible to obtain a back-copy.

It wouldn't be the first time Private Eye has gone all out to support an 'alternative theory' only to years later be completely wrong. They don't make much noise about it when it happens though. So that doesn't really count for much.

[Ambrosia]

It wouldn't be the first time Private Eye has gone all out to support an 'alternative theory' only to years later be completely wrong.

For example?

[Guybrush Threepwood]

For example?


While I would normally defend Mr Hislop's Organ, and think that their Lockerbie work is extremely good, their performance on Andrew Wakefield and MMR was woeful.

Like all sources you shouldn't take what they say as gospel, but they are nowhere near as bad as many people make out they are.

[Rolfe]

It wouldn't be the first time Private Eye has gone all out to support an 'alternative theory' only to years later be completely wrong. They don't make much noise about it when it happens though. So that doesn't really count for much.


What's that actually supposed to mean?

The Internet is groaning under the weight of presentations of this material, including a number of sources many people would regard as reputable. The Eye's journalist Paul Foot was one of the few people who sat through the entire trial at Camp Zeist, and produced one of the most comprehensive factual digests of the evidence available.

However, if you don't like that, you can of course go to other sources, starting with the report of the Air Accident Investigation Board, the Court judgement, and the report of the official UN observer at the trial.

Then you can look at the material prepared for the appeal Megrahi abandoned when it was clear he couldn't live to see it heard by the Court.

There are at least five separate documentary films dealing with the confusions and question marks in the case - the first dated 1994 and the most recent being first aired in April of this year. All of these can be viewed online.

Doubts about this verdict, and information about the grounds for the doubts, are quite obviously not unique to Private Eye.

Rolfe.

[Ambrosia]

The point I am making is that the "Lockerbie" work was all done by Paul Foot.

Paul has long track record of producing quality accurate stories. (John Poulson, Birmingham 6, Bridgewater 4, Colin Wallace) The possible exception being the A6 murder case where he was convinced of Hanrattys innocence and DNA evidence from 2002 does point to Hanratty without being 100% conclusive.

It might well be fair to point to MMR and say "hang on the Eye isn't always right about stuff" but the Eye is not the work of one journalist, and Paul Foots work seems emminently credible.

You might have a point saying that "as the Eye says so it doesn't mean all that much." The same is not true of Paul Foot. I find his word to carry much weight.

[Rolfe]

Yes, but we've arrived at a fine state of affairs if we, who depend on fairness and objectivity find ourselves looking for 'undercurrents'. The Libyan affair was a total nonsense. The truth of that crime is hidden deep in the bowels of the intelligence community. And the Libyans and most people knew that years ago. The man was in all probability completely innocent. That is my view, at least.


Chaps, we may have to reconsider. Either this is the first sane thing Especially has said since he joined the forum, or we are all completely mistaken.

Rolfe.

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Chaps, we may have to reconsider. Either this is the first sane thing Especially has said since he joined the forum, or we are all completely mistaken.

Rolfe.


Meh, I'm happy to file that one under the stopped clock or blind pigs and acorns heading. I'm sure if you probe deeper he's probably a Lockerbie no-planer.

[Caustic Logic]

Chaps, we may have to reconsider. Either this is the first sane thing Especially has said since he joined the forum, or we are all completely mistaken.

Rolfe.

I'm going with the sane option, and maybe not even the first. It would be remarkable to keep talking that much and not say a few sane things. But man, they are few and far between...

[commandlinegamer]

I wouldn't put too much stock in that Especially post. The undercurrents thing was a reference to a post I made about my perceiving the BBC to have an undercurrent of defiance against the government. But it was only my opinion; I had no real evidence of such a thing.

[Rolfe]

Well, no, it was just a bit of a shock to the system to see Especially say something I actually agreed with.

Even if he had said water is wet, I'd have had the same reaction.

Rolfe.

[ricbritain]

For example?

The 1983 murder in England of 78 year old Hilda Murrell. At the time Private Eye and many other media outlets put her death down to everything other than what the police actually said it was, namely a vicious random murder. In the 80's nuclear power was the fashionable cause for concern and private eye ran several convincing (to some) articles claiming various links. Not unlike the space they give for Megrahi. They weren't the only ones. There were many books written on the subject, plays written and generally 'specialists' made a living from the conspiracy theory of the day. However with the advent of modern technology in 2002 the case was reopened and with the aid of DNA the killer was found and prosecuted in 2005. It had nothing at all to do with nuclear power, the British government, the USA or Russia, as had been postulated throughout the media. I'm not sure what Private Eye had to say on the matter.

The point I was trying to make was that although Private Eye is a quite reputable and often reliable source of information it is not infallible, and just because it ran an issue dedicated to Megrahis innocence is not something to be wholly relied upon.

[ricbritain]

What's that actually supposed to mean?

Rolfe.

All it means is that just because Private Eye supports a stance and writes a convincing argument against the official line does not mean its right. Of course that does not mean it definitely isn't. It seems there is a lot of supporting evidence for his innocence, but there was a lot of support for the other case I mention above. I am undecided and like to keep an open mind. I very much doubt we will ever find out for sure.

[Rolfe]

I don't know that it ever "ran an issue" dedicated to Megrahi's innocence. What it has published is a 32-page A4 booklet with Paul Foot's articles on the matter collected together. It's Paul Foot's journalism at issue here, and the fact that it was published in Private Eye is relatively incidental.

Foot was one of the few (possibly the only?) journalist to sit through the entire court hearing at Camp Zeist. He thus had a perspective on the evidence not necessarily obtainable from simply reading the published documents. I thus find the report to be a very useful resource - not least because he avoids making the hyperbolic claims to be found in some other sources. Actually, as far as claims go, he really only seems to be saying that the evidence against Megrahi doesn't stack up, and there's something fishily political going on here. Which is the view of a lot of people who aren't publishing in Private Eye.

Maybe the best place to start is the two reports by the official UN observer assigned to the trial. The idea that "it's only Private Eye, what do they know" isn't really tenable when you read his opinion on the matter.

Report on the main trial proceedings (http://i-p-o.org/lockerbie-report.htm)
Report on the first appeal hearing (http://i-p-o.org/koechler-lockerbie-appeal_report.htm)

Read that lot, before deciding this is just the Eye looking for circulation.

Rolfe.

[Klimax]

Well, no, it was just a bit of a shock to the system to see Especially say something I actually agreed with.

Even if he had said water is wet, I'd have had the same reaction.

Rolfe.

Where? i don't see any in this thread and what I have seen elsewhere was bad...

[Rolfe]

I can't actually quote it now, because the "quote" button doesn't appear for posts by suspended members. However, it was in the thread he started about the BBC (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=5173246#post5173246). Commandlinegamer happened to remark....

The BBC has been accused of anti-SNP bias and of promulgating the left-wing line during the recent Megrahi brouhaha. One merely has to look at the blog entries for reporter Brian Taylor over the last month or so to get a flavour. A couple of BBC Scotland journalists in particular have come in for criticism to the extent to which they have tried to garner pro-government, anti Libya opinion from the general public.


Especially's reply was this.

The Libyan affair was a total nonsense. The truth of that crime is hidden deep in the bowels of the intelligence community. And the Libyans and most people knew that years ago. The man was in all probability completely innocent. That is my view, at least.


Stopped clock, blind pig and all that, I suppose.

Rolfe.

[Klimax]

I can't actually quote it now, because the "quote" button doesn't appear for posts by suspended members. However, it was in the thread he started about the BBC (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=5173246#post5173246). Commandlinegamer happened to remark....

It is because thread is closed,so quoting is disabled,but it is possible through PM->copy&paste to get it.

And thanks.(I am reading that thread...)

[Caustic Logic]

It is because thread is closed,so quoting is disabled,but it is possible through PM->copy&paste to get it.

And thanks.(I am reading that thread...)

Here's the sane quote, Klimax:

The Libyan affair was a total nonsense. The truth of that crime is hidden deep in the bowels of the intelligence community. And the Libyans and most people knew that years ago. The man was in all probability completely innocent. That is my view, at least.
I don't know what all the hype's about. ;)

[Caustic Logic]

News - Megrahi's new documentation seems to show that Tony Gauci and his brother were paid $3 million for their testimony. Shoulda got it more straight for that much. It's all the buzz, as can be seen at Robert Black's blog for this month so far. Re-posts from the Spokesman (Bertand Russell Peace Foundation), Michael Meacher's blog, Sunday Times of Malta, The Herald of Scotland, so far.
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009_10_01_archive.html

[Rolfe]

Yes. The story about the $3 million was around for most of the summer, but didn't seem to be corroborated. If it's in the Appeal papers, though, it's corroborated. I had also read that Tony and Paul are now living in Australia - I hadn't heard the "in luxury" part before, but I thought that must be the case.

The interest in these new papers is largely in the illumination of the Gauci family. Tony Gauci was described (by Peter Fraser) as "an apple short of a picnic". It's fairly clear he remembered something, but exactly what isn't as clear as I thought it was. (I thought his first statement was reliable, but even that is a bit dubious in places.) Paul Gauci and the father seem to have been the controlling influences, but unfortunately it was the rather simple one who actually made the sale and had to make the identification without direct prompting.

So we have a picture of Tony having some idea of the circumstances of the sale, and a description of the purchaser. This is followed by a dozen or so more interviews where the police try to get him to remember more - specifically, to remember stuff about items they want him to remember about. Oh, and they want him to identify the purchaser. Specifically, they want him to identify Megrahi, so they downplay the age and height differences between Megrahi and his original description. Gauci does think the purchaser was Abu Talb, but doesn't pick him out when given the chance. When he identified Megrahi, he actually seems to have thought he was identifying a picture of Abu Talb.

Mainly, Gauci is trying to please the police. He wants to give them what they want. So he didn't sell the man a shirt. Then he remembered selling him a shirt. He was over 50 and over 6 feet and heavy-set. Or maybe not. I'm not so good on ages (or heights? this from a man who reputedly could pick the right size out for a customer just by looking at him). The Christmas lights weren't up. Oh, they were just putting the Christmas lights up. No, didn't I say the Christmas lights were up when this happened? Does he really know what he remembers after this lot? I doubt it.

And as for him picking out Megrahi in court, well, really. You'd have to be dimmer even than Tony not to know you're supposed to pick out the guy in the dock, and Fhimah looked quite different from all the descriptions he'd been rehearsing. Even then, he apparently had to be prompted a bit. And in any case, as a couple of people said, there had been so much publicity by this time, with a number of pictures of Megrahi in circulation, that anyone who had never clapped eyes on the guy could have picked him out by that time.

A moderately bright person who wanted the reward would have been a lot clearer, and eventually given a much more confident identification. But a rather dim, slow, apple-short-of-a-picnic guy who was being pressurised by Big Brother to get it right for the money might come over exactly like that. I love the way they decided to give Paul $1 million of his very own for supporting Tony and getting him to step up to the mark.

The Herald ran with this one day this week, on the front page and an inside page (I think it was Monday but I'd have to check the paper recycling basket). No letters (or maybe one short one) and no follow-up. It's not buzzing enormously.

But I totally fail to see how that can be described as a reliable identification, given the contradictions, the changing of the story, the passage of time, and the uncertainty. Gauci never did say, that's the guy. He only ever said he resembled the guy. It looks as if Megrahi did look a bit like the purchaser, except he was younger, not so tall, and not so heavily built.

That case should have been thrown out ten years ago.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Sorry to bump all these threads, just another thought I posted on the wrong one but here's hwere it belongs:

$4 Million Reward Offered in Pan Am Case

By Pierre Thomas and Thomas W. Lippman
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, March 24, 1995; Page A30
The FBI yesterday announced a $4 million reward for two Libyan intelligence officers charged with the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, and said it planned a worldwide information blitz seeking help in bringing them to justice.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv...ward032495.htm

See the poster for it as shown in Conspiracy Files, adapted by me (http://i133.photobucket.com/albums/q62/chainsawmoth/127-911/PA-103GIVEUSPOSTER.jpg). Clever. Suitcase bombers, we bomb back with cash, this cash could be yours if whatever. We're serious, these guys, we know it, support the war effort. Buy bonds. Offer false leads. We got filters...

Okay, so point here is this legendary $4 million dollar offer was only put up in 1995. Now, what evidence that mattered had they not already secured by then? The Mebo chip, the baggage printout, both were secured and IDd and understood by mid-1990, and helped form the 91 indictment. Giaka was in protection and off Malta and cooperating by 91 I hear. When was gauci secured? That's less clear to me, but well before 95, right?

Now, Giaka's gotta have been payed out of this, if grumbled over too. The Gaucis were paid $3 million we know of. Thurman was able to "retire" fine. I don't know about Erac. Marquise insists no one was offered money for their testimony. Only Bollier says he was offered the $4 million back in 91 IIRC. Meh.

So... did this official offer ever get paid out for anything new after 95? If not, why no more evidence unless this was a ghost of a case? Was the offer in effect before 95? Was it just a smokescreen to post-facto explain any previously agreed payouts like those to the Gaucis? Oh no, that was all BEFORE 95, so it doesn't apply we didn't buy THAT... Really, after all the evidence they had by 91, why offer up any money for a few more tidbits unless you really expect to get no more? And why even then? Simply for a public relations "blitz?" To get those faces out there and show how serious they were?

ETA: Another plea for debunk-like counterpoints! Cmon folks! I'm blogging this stuff. Many of you worry about conspiracy theorists spoutimg dangerous nonsense on the unternets, and here I am giving you an opportunity to stop the stuff at the gate and you're all just acquiescing. Shameful!

[Rolfe]

That is interesting. I thought the reward was very strange all along. It's not so unusual to offer a reward for information that leads the police to identify the perpetrator, but offering a reward for help in convicting a named person is very unusual, surely. (That link is broken by the way.)

I think the indictment against Megrahi and Fhimah was in 1991. That's when Gadaffi refused to extradite them, and the UN sanctions were imposed. I'm sure at that stage the story was that there was "incontrovertible evidence" against them. And I'm not aware of any further evidence that was secured after that date. I think they stopped interviewing Gauci after late 1990.

I can't understand what they hoped to achieve by the reward offer. They had their evidence, allegedly. They knew where the accused were, in Libya with no extradition. Were they advertising for someone to go and kidnap them or what?

All we know about the reward is that the Gaucis allegedly got $3 million. Giaka's evidence was thrown out, and in any case his main reward was the witness protection programme and the salary the CIA was paying him. I don't see any reason to libel Mrs. Erac, as there's nothing against her except a rather unusual, coincidental story. Nobody has ever suggested she reveived any money, and I can't actually see any great motivation for anyone going to the trouble of subverting her and fabricating a link to Malta at that stage of events.

I'd love to know the reason for that reward offer. Did I mention your link is broken?

Rolfe.

ETA: OK, found it, it's here.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/panam103/stories/reward032495.htm

According to the article, it was about trying to bribe Libyans or other Arabs who might have information about how the pair might be apprehended, possibly information about them occasionally having ventured out of Libya.

Seeking to rekindle international interest in the bombing, the FBI and State Department said they will work with the U.S. Information Agency to communicate with persons in Libya who might assist in bringing the suspects to court.

[....]


Federal officials also plan to use radio, facsimile and matchbook covers written in Arabic in the campaign, which will concentrate on the Middle East and North Africa. In addition, the FBI will circulate traditional wanted posters and a glossy new poster showing a suitcase full of money to attract tips.


[....]


While both men are now believed in Libya, Bryant noted the bureau has received intelligence the two occasionally have left the country.


Nevertheless, it's perfectly clear that the Gaucis, especially Paul, were very keen indeed to be paid for their evidence, and every reason to suspect they were trying to please the police for this reason.

http://www.megrahimystory.net/downloads/pp60%20-%20231%20Grounds%20of%20Appeal.pdf?

[Caustic Logic]

I s'pose actually reading the article would help.

Indeed, good catch: the reward (publicly at least) was about physically getting their men, rather than the evidence they needed to get them. Which they already had.

So the suggestions I've seen around that this money might be tied to testimonies and evidence are misleading. Conspiracy Files did mention it in that context.

The amount does simulate somewhat what the Gaucis finally got (up to 4, they got at least 3 we know of). Four million is the exact amount "ebol" claimed to be offered, itself good evidence they were not running around offering 4 million to all witnesses. There might be something to this of the smokescreen category, but it's not an in-the-open "of course we paid for information" type of deal.

[Caustic Logic]

They knew where the accused were, in Libya with no extradition. Were they advertising for someone to go and kidnap them or what?

That appears about the closest thing they were looking for.

I don't see any reason to libel Mrs. Erac, as there's nothing against her except a rather unusual, coincidental story. Nobody has ever suggested she reveived any money, and I can't actually see any great motivation for anyone going to the trouble of subverting her and fabricating a link to Malta at that stage of events.

Mentioning her and Thruman was hyperbole. I don't see reason to rule out secret, highly sensitive rewards, but nothing to support it either. Thurman is actuall perhaps the less likely, since all he did was look at pictures and say "yup." It was thhe American go-ahead in a previouslt Bitish operation, however, so an important yup.

Nevertheless, it's perfectly clear that the Gaucis, especially Paul, were very keen indeed to be paid for their evidence, and every reason to suspect they were trying to please the police for this reason.

http://www.megrahimystory.net/downloads/pp60%20-%20231%20Grounds%20of%20Appeal.pdf?[/QUOTE]

I did skim that, big document. It would be stupid to pay these guys by the terms of publicly announced reward system. However, having people believe it was that system, swindled or twisted by a moneygrubbing witness, might have been preferable to the real trade-off becoming public. Paying people money to show the bros "their position is recognised and they continue to receive the respect their conduct has earned." Conduct was to steer Tony into an increasingly Megrahi-implicating stance over the course of a dozen-plus re-interviews. That is hard work, not some simple task like telling clearly what you remembered and being done with it. Hard work deserves good pay, dontcha think?

[Mr.D]

I'm continuing to follow this thread with no small amount of fascination.

Still a bit behind in digesting some of it but at least one question has popped into my head that I don't think I've seen addressed.

Is there any evidence that PanAm 103 was specifically targeted?

[Caustic Logic]

I'm continuing to follow this thread with no small amount of fascination.

Fascination, huh? Great, thanks!

Still a bit behind in digesting some of it but at least one question has popped into my head that I don't think I've seen addressed.

Is there any evidence that PanAm 103 was specifically targeted?

Yes, apparently you are a little behind, but at least you stepped up and said something, which is way more than most are doing. That's a question with different answers, depending what you mean. The official story is yes, the suitcase was tagged to go through Frankfurt to PA103. I'm not sure but I think it's presumed they'd have the timetable and know roughly when it was to be over the mid-Atlantic, and instead set the timer for its very edge at farthest, making an overland crash most likely, depending on delays. As happened. Boy, that was dumb...

On this I love the BBC Conspiracy Files (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVmD9ZUzruk&feature=related) opening line:
"In the end, it came down as most things do to a simple twist of fate. 600 seconds, that's all that was left. Had the bomb ... exploded just ten minutes later, the plane would have been over open water, and all the evidence most likely lost at the bottom of the sea. But as it was the bomb blew up over land <snip, just 15 seconds of video and no words between the undoing> The investigation turned on one tiny piece of evidence ... this fragment <of a TIMER> was the breakthrough that cracked the case."
So the timer was set to "simple twist of fate" mode?

Anyway, I don't have a handy source where the presumed intent was stated clearest and most officially. You could check the Opinion of the Court PDF (http://www.scotcourts.gov.uk/library/lockerbie/docs/lockerbiejudgement.pdf) (2001), using searches for relevant words/phrases, like "tags" "interline" "routed" etc.

Officially I know of no reason this flight was targeted in particular except that it fit the right criteria in general. Rolfe will certainly have more insights on that, and hopefully this will help you get a grip on some other questions, and so on...

Side-note that ties in a bit, opinion of the court
[38] Luqa airport had a relatively elaborate security system. All items of baggage checked in were entered into the airport computer as well as being noted on the passenger’s ticket. After the baggage had passed the sniffer check, it was placed on a trolley in the baggage area to wait until the flight was ready for loading. When the flight was ready, the baggage was taken out and loaded, and the head loader was required to count the items placed on board. The ramp dispatcher, the airport official
on the tarmac responsible for the departure of the flight, was in touch by
radiotelephone with the load control office. The load control had access to the computer and after the flight was closed would notify the ramp dispatcher of the number of items checked in. The ramp dispatcher would also be told by the head loader how many items had been loaded and if there was a discrepancy would take
steps to resolve it. ... <snip, more there>

[Rolfe]

I'm Is there any evidence that PanAm 103 was specifically targeted?


Sorry, another tl;dr post coming up....

There are two answers to that, I think. One is that apart from a very isolated suggestion from one online source that the bomb was really intended for a direct Frankfurt to New York flight but was mis-directed, nobody has seriously claimed otherwise. If it had been a serious possibility, like with actual evidence, I would have expected the point to have been raised at least somewhere in the voluminous documentaries and discussions published by the serious investigators.

What the suggestion does address is the blatant insanity of the timing of the explosion. (Actually, it's odd how infrequently this is mentioned.) Many discussions state blandly that the bomb was intended to explode mid-Atlantic, but because the plane was late, Lockerbie happened. This is nonsense. The plane was only about 15 minutes late. It was scheduled to leave the stand at 6pm, and it more or less did that. How long does it take a plane to leave the ground, from leaving the stand, usually? Ten minutes? PA103 left the ground at 6.25, due to rush-hour traffic at the airport. That's fifteen minutes late, which is frankly nothing. Even if it had been on time, on the route it took, it would barely have cleared the coast. If it had taken the more southerly route it apparently usually took, had it not been for a bad weather system, it might have ditched in the Irish Sea. Maybe.

They had the whole bloody Atlantic out there. Four or five hours of it. WHY?

There would have been no reasonable advantage to crashing the plane on land. Trying to cause additional ground casualties that way is a small chance. Once you've cleared Manchester, habitation is the exception. Lockerbie was really bad luck. All you achieve is to leave shed-loads of evidence (literally!) for the authorities to rake over. (If you really want the chance of a crash on a city, short of a suicide hijacking, your best bet is to aim for the destination city and hope the plane is up to time - that way, even if it's late, you still get your crash.)

So, the 7.03pm explosion makes no sense in the context of PA103. It might make good sense in the context of a different flight that was supposed to be well out over the Atlantic at that time. However, if that was the case, show us the evidence, not just speculation. (And since there is no positive evidence of how the bag got on PA103, whose it was, or where it came from, you're struggling.)

If there were such evidence, then we could dismiss the 38-minute explosion, which was bang on schedule for a Khreesat-make device loaded or activated at Heathrow, as just one more spooky coincidence to join all the others surrounding this flight. But I've not seen any such evidence, merely assertion and speculation.

The second answer really hinges on whether many of the other spooky coincidences were really coincidences or not. We know there were various warnings floating around about a possible attack on a transatlantic Pan Am flight, some mentioning Frankfurt to New York (which would of course cover a direct flight as well). Evidence of people "in the know" about these warnings having changed their travel plans is usually attributed to a general avoidance of all flights in that category. However, there have been serious suggestions that those really in the know were aware that PA103 on 21st December was the specific target - even to the point that it was a LIHOP of some description.

The plane appears to have been used for smuggling heroin. One of the dead passengers was a known drug courier. Some of the most persistent CTs hinge on the suggestion that a drug suitcase was taken off and the bomb suitcase substituted (see The Trail of the Octopus). The point being that the drug suitcases were being routed past the security inspections wholesale, which is why the bomb wasn't detected. If this is the case, then there is no question of a mistaken plane.

There were a number of CIA operatives on the flight. One CT version suggests that these people were being specifically targeted. Some authors go further and link the CIA operatives to the drug smuggling, and a "drugs for hostages" deal parallel with the Oliver North "arms for hostages" affair. Which of course is one possible reason for a cover-up. There certainly seems to have been something on that flight that the US authorities didn't want to fall into the wrong hands, if even half the stories about US agents interfering with evidence on the ground from the very early stages are even close to true. There's even a suggestion that a body was spirited away.

Then again, the South African part of the CT also implies specific knowledge that PA103 was the target. Pik Botha was booked on the flight, but inexplicably at the last minute his itinerary was changed so that he caught the earlier PA101 flying the same route. Conversely, Bernt Carlsson was originally intended to catch an earlier flight (to the same conference), but may have been deliberately delayed by SA authorities so that he ended up on PA103. There is a CT that says the South Africans knew the plane was the target, and simply took appropriate steps to make sure their own people weren't on it and someone they wanted rid of was.

I haven't investigated these aspects in detail. There are certainly problems with some of these assertions, but I don't know how deep they run. It's a helluva lot of smoke to have absolutely no fire attached, but I don't know. What's the chances of any random transatlantic flight being that far up to its neck in intrigue?

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Sorry, another tl;dr post coming up....
.

Lol. Sorry I'm a jerk sometimes about things like that. I suppose a veneer of smartass is one of my shields. I actually did read that, thanks for the SA VIP summary. I think I get that part better now. Compelling, but could well be coincidental.

ETA: Right brain says: of course, South Africa did the bombing itself, and framed North Africa, for some super-Rhodesian Pan-White-African-Anglo-American arching axis psyop or... hmm, nevermind. Hmmm... Mandella has been really active in all this...

[Rolfe]

I got the link to this article from Robert Black's blog.

http://www.hlrecord.org/opinion/who-was-really-behind-lockerbie-1.632554

I note Marquise is again very active in the comments section. I feel he may be protesting too much. It's all a bit pointless, in a way. Perhaps he just wants to set the record straight, right enough. But then, it's very easy just to parrot the official line and announce that your sooper-seekrit inside knowledge allows you to pontificate any way you like. Who can say?

I see another comment declaring that there was "overwhelming" evidence against Megrahi. Maybe he could show it to us, because I cannot find it anywhere in the Court publications.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

And the plot thickens even further. More from the Black blog (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/farcical-scenes-as-baroness-kinnock.html).

Labour Peer Baroness Kinnock has been unexpectedly replaced in her post as Europe minister, only hours after pledging to investigate whether Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi was pressured into dropping his ongoing appeal against conviction before being transferred to Libya. [....]

In a debate in the House of Lords on Monday Lord Lester of Herne Hill said he was “very concerned about the circumstances in which Megrahi was persuaded to drop his appeal and to go and die in Libya.”

“I saw him in Barlinnie myself. I would like to know, and I would like the Government to find out whether, when he was visited in prison, it was made clear to him that if he dropped his appeal he would be allowed to go and die in Libya, so that there would then be no appeal and the relatives—Dr Swire and the others—would never know the truth,” he said.

“I would therefore like an assurance that there was no quid pro quo and no pressure put upon him. The Government may not know the answer, but they should find out. Was any pressure put on Megrahi that he would be sent to die in Libya only if he dropped the appeal?”

Baroness Kinnock said in response that she was “not aware of what the answer might be,” but would ask for advice and respond.

Within hours, Kinnock had been replaced amid what the Daily Mail described as “farcical scenes” as her replacement, junior minister Chris Bryant “broke with protocol and announced his new role on the Twitter website before Downing Street or the Foreign Office had a chance to issue a statement.”


You couldn't make this up.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

I see Private Eye is back on the case.

Lockerbie: the $3 million questions (http://www.private-eye.co.uk/sections.php?section_link=in_the_back&article=138&issue=1247).

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

Tam Dalyell raised an important question in the Hiuse of Commons in 2002. He was concerned with the destruction of records pertaining to Lockerbie.

He stated, "Now that the appeal is over, what steps are being taken to preserve the productions amassed by the Crown for use in the Lockerbie trial? Can an assurance be given that they will not be destroyed in the same way as certain police note books have apparently been destroyed?"

Dalyell went onto to the matter of police notebooks. Former Woman Police Constable Mary Boylan, a thoroughly credible retired police constable had stated:

"Towards the latter part of 1999, I was asked to attend at Dumfries Police Station, to give a statement to the Procurator Fiscal regarding my duties at Lockerbie. Almost eleven years had elapsed since the disaster, so I phoned 'F' Divisional HQ at Livingston Police Station to request my notebook to refresh my memory. I was told that someone would be in touch with me, and after a few days I was informed that my notebook could not be found. Shortly after this I read in a Scottish broadsheet that Lothian and Borders Police notebooks had been destroyed."

Her statement continues:

"I recovered the handle and rim of a brown coloured suitcase (Production Label No. unknown to me). This was entered in my notebook. PC Forrest corroborated the find and signed my notebook and production label.

Towards the latter part of 1999 . . . On attendance at Dumfries Police Station I was asked to describe some of the debris from memory. I was then shown the suitcase rim with handle I had found and was asked to identify it, which I did. The Production Label with my signature and that of PC Forrest, and of others whom I did not know, was still attached. A photograph was then shown to me of the said suitcase rim I had found, plus other pieces of the suitcase material. I recognised the rim but not the material. I asked the Fiscal about the significance of the suitcase and he said he could not tell me. What he did say was that the owner of said suitcase was a Joseph Patrick Curry and that I would be hearing and reading a lot about him at the time of the trial."

This full statement is available through google and typing the key words: Dalyell, Lockerbie, Notebooks.

[Professor Yaffle]

Buncrana's link:

http://www.i-p-o.org/lockerbie_dalyell.htm

[Rolfe]

Oh. Thanks. Every time you think you've begun to get your head round this, some other huge confounder emerges.

It's like a huge tangled ball of string, maybe several bits of string, and several ends dangling. Which end is the key to unravelling it? I have no clue!

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Frankfurt baggage records disappear. Police noteooks disappear.

I was tentatively thinking about one tiny piece of planted evidence. But just how big is this, and is it ridiculous to think it could be as big as some people suggest?

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Tam Dalyell raised an important question in the Hiuse of Commons in 2002. He was concerned with the destruction of records pertaining to Lockerbie.

He stated, "Now that the appeal is over, what steps are being taken to preserve the productions amassed by the Crown for use in the Lockerbie trial? Can an assurance be given that they will not be destroyed in the same way as certain police note books have apparently been destroyed?"

Dalyell went onto to the matter of police notebooks. Former Woman Police Constable Mary Boylan, a thoroughly credible retired police constable had stated:

Joseph Patrick Curry, huh? Never 'eard of 'im. I'd heard before about destroyed notebooks, but this is a very interesting new tidbit. I'll check out the link later on. Thanks!

[Rolfe]

I'd heard this mentioned, but only when I was at the stage of being totally overwhelmed by anomalous information.

Tell you what, Googling his name gets you nothing. Just pages repeating what Tam said, and lists of the victims, and other people of the same name.

Rolfe.

[Professor Yaffle]

Apologies if this has already been linked to, I've lost track in trying to keep up with all of this. When searcing for references to Joseph Patrick Curry (again the reference comes as part of Tam Dayell's speech), I came across this collection of documents compiled by Hans Koechler - you can read some of it online:

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=XuX1PGGrH38C&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_v2_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=&f=false

[GlennB]

Joseph Patrick Curry, huh? Never 'eard of 'im.

"killed in the line of duty"

[Rolfe]

Apologies if this has already been linked to, I've lost track in trying to keep up with all of this. When searcing for references to Joseph Patrick Curry (again the reference comes as part of Tam Dayell's speech), I came across this collection of documents compiled by Hans Koechler - you can read some of it online:

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=XuX1PGGrH38C&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_v2_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=&f=false


I think you might find that most of these are available from Hans Kochler's own web site.

http://www.i-p-o.org/lockerbie_observer_mission.htm

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

"killed in the line of duty"

Hey, Glenn's back! I did the searches now - I have to wonder just who would be telling random cops on the case that a US Special Forces guy was going to be blamed for this. Depends on who, and how they found out, etc.

I have always wondered about the suitcase and just what's known about it - were the tags blown off or what? I should know that...

... Fifty-six fragments which showed various signs of explosives damage were identified as forming part of what had been a brown hardshell Samsonite suitcase of the 26" Silhouette 4000 range (“the primary suitcase”). The nature of the damage indicated that it had been inflicted from within the suitcase.

It was argued on behalf of the accused that the suitcase described by Mr Bedford could well have been the primary suitcase, particularly as the evidence did not disclose that any fragments of a hard-shell Samsonite-type suitcase had been recovered, apart from those of the primary suitcase itself. ...


Rolfe covered their strange logic with the Bedford suitcase earlier. Here they're saying 'Well there was only one like that around the explosion, and it was the one from Malta, so whatever Bedford's talking about is irrelevant, somehow. EOS.' Anyway, there's nothing about ID with it, I don't know how one would know it was a certain person's (or tagged as such), except by looking at the tag or the contents. Was there an attempt to recover fluttering tags and find a possible match to the primary suitcase with some forensic voodoo?

I'm just not sure what to make of it.

[Rolfe]

I don't think we can conclude that Curry was going to be blamed for the bombing. He was killed, remember?

I was thinking more about the possibility that the bomb bag had been switched for his bag at some stage. But then, he travelled from Frankfurt, didn't he, and the Bedford suitcase was seen before PA103A landed from Frankfurt.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

I don't think we can conclude that Curry was going to be blamed for the bombing. He was killed, remember?

I was thinking more about the possibility that the bomb bag had been switched for his bag at some stage. But then, he travelled from Frankfurt, didn't he, and the Bedford suitcase was seen before PA103A landed from Frankfurt.

Rolfe.

Sorry, I got two lines crossed there - but that a SF guy was specified as the suspicious point-of-entry person, perhaps the owner of the bag replaced with Bedford's samsonite, which raises questions. Then I see you think Curry came in from frankfurt after all, so apparently not... I guess what I'm saying is I'm a little suspicious when someone reveals that a major clue that will later unravel the whole case is just casually handed to low-level people to later reveal. Suspicious but open-minded.

[GlennB]

But Boylan states:
"What he [the Procurator Fiscal] did say was that the owner of said suitcase was a Joseph Patrick Curry and that I would be hearing and reading a lot about him at the time of the trial."

Well, that a member of US Special Forces was killed in the bombing would, perhaps, be briefly newsworthy. That Boylan would be 'hearing and reading a lot about him at the time of the trial' appears very unlikely from the p.o.v. of that time. Unless Curry was more than a coincidental victim. The CTist in me thinks that the Proc.Fisc. was maybe a little over-excited about how he saw things panning out and blabbed something to Boylan that he(?) should have kept under his hat. But then I constantly fight my own CTist tendencies and sometimes lose.

p.s. I've been following virtually your every word, folks ;) Excellent stuff it is too, though as mentioned this particular pile of spaghetti is growing and has more dangly ends almost by the day, it seems. As Dalyell said "There is a whole literature on this subject—one almost needs to be a professor of Lockerbie studies—"

[Rolfe]

I see there were reports earlier today that Megrahi has died (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/lockerbie-lawyers-deny-reports-that-megrahi-has-died-1.927621), however this has been denied by his legal team. It does sound as if his condition is very poor, however.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Apparently he is not dead just yet, as there's no more news on it.

In other news, as calls for an inquiry into Megrahi's release seem to have paid off. MacAskill's "quasi-judicial" decision has led to speculation of a deal over his appeal (drop it and go), and others want to investigate oil deals with Libya and their affect on releasing a convicted mass-cal terrorisist:

MPs will investigate the release of the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing as part of a wider probe into relations between Westminster and Holyrood, it has been announced.
...
Throughout the controversy, Westminster insisted that decisions on Megrahi were the sole responsibility of the Scottish Government.

And the Scottish Government said the decisions were made by Mr MacAskill alone, acting in a quasi-judicial capacity.
...
Peter Wishart, a member of the committee and SNP MP for Perth and North Perthshire, said:
...
“We will quite rightly not consider the decisions made by the Scottish Justice Secretary.”

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/politics/inquiry-into-megrahi-release-announced-1.927714

So I guess that may cover the possible oil deals with Libya only. ??

[Rolfe]

Dunno. I only know that there seems to be a huge political will to thwart that appeal, and then as soon as that is achieved to crow that Megrahi "will die a guilty man" and dismiss everything he says with "well you should have thought of that before you abandoned your appeal, so shut up, mass murderer."

I'd pay good money for a factual text that wasn't running with an agenda or theory, but merely presented what was known for sure, and what could be established regarding the credibility (or otherwise) of claims that can't be objectively verified.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

To clarify the above, they won't be able to examine any of the reasons or decisions, oil or no, sine the only thing that mattered was macAskill's reasons, and those won't be talked about. Since it's about 'the release of al Megrahi,' I presume they'll be looking at narrower questions like which door was he escorted out of, in what weather, taken to what airplane, etc. Should e historic.

Dunno. I only know that there seems to be a huge political will to thwart that appeal, and then as soon as that is achieved to crow that Megrahi "will die a guilty man" and dismiss everything he says with "well you should have thought of that before you abandoned your appeal, so shut up, mass murderer."

I'd pay good money for a factual text that wasn't running with an agenda or theory, but merely presented what was known for sure, and what could be established regarding the credibility (or otherwise) of claims that can't be objectively verified.

Rolfe.

On the bolded... how much? ;)

On dying a guilty man and not yet, your wonderful Scotman paper has dipped to a ghoulish level (http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Megrahi-outlives-six-other-criminals.5763045.jp?), counting his survival time compared to other compassionate releases under macAskill. As one commenter said, but spelled better, "What? Not dead yet? Sack MacAskill!"

[Rolfe]

Now that is quite disgusting. A new low has been reached. (I don't read the Scotsman, and the Herald hasn't printed that one that I noticed.) Of course the Hootsmon hates the SNP like poison, so I suppose it shouldn't be that much of a surprise, but really, have they no sense of decency at all?

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Every Single Time I sit down to post on one of the PA103 threads, a picture of the plane on the grass, or of Megrahi, comes on the TV.

Now, the police are re-opening the enquiry, and they are going to re-examine the forensic evidence. However, it seems as if they are taking Megrahi's guilt - or at least the "it was Libya" theory - as read, despite the SCCRC report. They're not going to look at Jibril or Abu Talb, but about Megrahi's supposed co-conspirators.

Christine Creech/Grahame thinks this has more to do with stifling other enquiries such as her FoI requests than finding out any actual truth.

Lockerbie Families Welcome New Inquiry (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/lockerbie-families-welcome-new-inquiry-1.928318)

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Uh, here we go again. Every TV news bulletin I watch has footage of Maid of the Seas lying on the grass at Tundergarth, and Sherwood Crescent in flames. I wake up to the normal breakfast radio news team raking over the case One More Time. This is a seriously hot topic, and while I think our conversation is constructive and productive, I'm very surprised by how few people are participating.

Anyway, I sat down to eat breakfast, opened the dead-tree paper which had been delivered earlier in the morning, and here's what was in it. (This paper is probably the best source for the Pan Am 103 case, because it's the national Scottish paper covering that turf. And the Scotsman has just forfeited any right to be called a serious newspaper.)

The front page (not headline).

Lockerbie relatives' cautious welcome for review (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/lockerbie-relatives-cautiously-welcome-review-1.928396)

Relatives of the Lockerbie bombing victims have welcomed a review of the criminal investigation into the atrocity but warned that it should not stand in the way of a full public inquiry.

Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was among the 270 killed, said yesterday a desktop review of the criminal inquiry has always been the excuse to block a full investigation into how Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie on December 21 1988. [....]

He also told reporters yesterday: "I think if they are really going to have a meaningful investigation then that is all well and good and long overdue. But if it is just a dodge to prevent an investigation into why the lives of those killed were not protected then I would be livid."


Inside article, page 9. Actually, the online version is quite a bit longer and more detailed than what is in the printed paper - as well as having a different headline. Oddly, there seems to be nothing in the printed paper about Henderson - the police point of view is solely represnted by Patrich Shearer. Quite a lot from Henderson online though.

Police hunt for eight 'high level' Lockerbie accomplices (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/crime-courts/police-hunt-for-eight-high-level-lockerbie-accomplices-1.928583)

Detectives investigating the Lockerbie atrocity want to talk to eight suspects linked to the bombing, according to a former head of the investigation.

Stuart Henderson, a former detective chief superintendent with Lothian and Borders Police, led the Lockerbie Incident Control Centre from 1988 until 1992.Chief Constable Patrick Shearer of Dumfries and Galloway Police said officers were following new lines of inquiry after Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi dropped his appeal against conviction. [....]

Mr Henderson told the paper: "We submitted eight other names of people that we wished to interview that were strong suspects. Unfortunately, we never got that opportunity.

"I am delighted they are making moves to see if there is anything further, because no matter what anybody says, we did not ever say it was just Megrahi we were after. We never said that.

"We were after his bosses."

It is reported the "high level" suspects were all male and have never been ruled out of the investigation into the explosion onboard Pan Am Flight 103 which killed 270 on December 21 1988. [....]


Main editorial, page 12. This starts to ask some more searching questions.

Lockerbie questions (http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/herald-view/lockerbie-questions-1.928424)

[....] The view persists that the main suspect was not Libya but Iran, which had an obvious motive: revenge for the Iranian airliner shot down by the Americans earlier in 1988 with the loss of 290 lives. Suspicion initially focused on Ahmed Jibril, leader of a Syrian-based Palestinian terrorist group linked with Iran. Conspiracy theorists maintain that it became politically inconvenient to implicate either Iran or Syria at a time when the western allies needed their support during the first Gulf War. The more prosaic reason is that investigators failed to pinpoint any evidence that a prosecutor could use to convict either an Iranian official or Jibril. The same applies to Abu Talb, another Palestinian, later jailed for terrorist offences and who had circled the fateful day – December 21 – in his diary. Another aspect of the case that deserves further investigation is a suspicious break-in at the secure baggage area of Heath­row Airport the night before the explosion, an incident not raised at the original trial.

This police review of the Lockerbie case raises several questions. Given how much uncertainty surrounds what happened, would a major wide-ranging investigation not be more appropriate? And is it right to entrust such a review to just four officers from the Dumfries and Galloway force, headed by an officer who was involved in the original investigation? A limited review that does little more than cover old ground would serve little purpose except, possibly, to delay the wide-ranging independent government inquiry into the atrocity demanded by relatives of the British victims. As Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora died in the disaster, argues in a letter published in The Herald today, the “ongoing criminal investigation” has been repeatedly used to deny relatives the full inquiry they demand and deserve. [....]


And that letter, on page 13 (scroll to last letter).

Original suspect in Pan Am atocity should be the starting point for further examination of evidence (http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/herald-letters/monday-26-october-2009-1.928426)

[....] The ongoing criminal investigation has been used repeatedly as a reason for denying us the full inquiry into the truth as to why our families were not protected back in 1988. We are entitled under human eights law and now the Inquiries Act 2005 to an inquiry.

If further serious meaningful investigation really is to be pursued by the police and Crown Office as to who else might have contributed to the murder of our loved ones in 1988, I would be the first to applaud it. Mohammed Abu Talb, the original suspect in the bombing, has now been released from jail and, according to the Crown Office, was not granted immunity against prosecution over Lockerbie, though appearing as a prosecution witness at the Camp Zeist trial. That might be no bad place to start looking for the truth. Honest further investigation is almost bound to embarrass the Zeist verdict, on which the Crown Office’s reputation depends heavily.

The UN’s specially appointed international observer at the Lockerbie trial, Professor Hans Koechler of Vienna, found the verdict against Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi incomprehensible and a travesty of justice.[....]


Listening to the BBC reporting of the matter, it was clear that Megrahi's guilt is not to be questioned, despite the report of the SCCRC which stated that he might heve been the victim of a miscarriage of justice. Rather, this is all about identifying his "co-conspirators".

Duh? It was always contended that he had co-conspirators. And I don't just mean Fhimah. The question we should be asking is, why now? Why did this investigation ever sit on its laurels with the indictments against Megrahi and Fhimah, right back in 1991 or whenever? Even more importantly, when Fhimah was acquitted ("no case to answer", remember?), and it was quite obvious that Megrahi could not possibly have done what he was alleged to have done on his own, why was this new investigation not launched then. In 2001?

The first thing that happened last night was Christine Grahame on TV saying this was all highly convenient, as the "ongoing investigation" meant that her FoI requests could now be denied. And indeed, it does seem as if this is nothing but a ploy to prevent inquiry into the possibility that someone other than Megrahi put that bomb on the plane, by instituting an ongoing enquiry into who may have helped him. By reviving the case in this way, it ensures that official investigation doesn't go anywhere near any alternative explanations, while allowing any other investigations to be blocked.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Sinking feeling. Sounds like a lame investigation of the same old crap. Don't even bother investigating the MST-13 paperwork or missing Senegal timer, or the lack of BKA response over Frankfurt Airport's records. Looking for Megrahi's "bosses?" How much deeper will they insist on plunging into this delusion? Why not also look into who really sponsored the MacGuire family and gave them that gelignite chalk? That's worth asking after, isn't it? Surely they didn't act alone! To paraphrase the Conspiracy Files, "the big ones got away." Let's go for it, those Senegal arrestees and Gaddafi himself! Maybe Iran is involved too, paying Libya, there is a world of witnesses and clues to be found. Sanctions this time, or bombs?

Your first link above is broken, even from Google, guess they pulled or moved it. Another similar headline:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/lockerbie-families-welcome-new-police-inquiry-1809424.html
Abdelbasset al-Megrahi, has been convicted of the attack which the authorities insist was carried out by Libya. But many British families of those who died believe the full truth of the attack has yet to be revealed.
And there are others who feel not even part of the truth was reveled by that conviction. How in the hell do you get eight new accomplices when it took such machinations just to secure a 50% conviction of the first two? New technology, I presume. So let's just elaborate on it, "for the families"TM.

Sorry for the rant that adds no new information.

[Caustic Logic]

It was always contended that he had co-conspirators. And I don't just mean Fhimah. The question we should be asking is, why now? Why did this investigation ever sit on its laurels with the indictments against Megrahi and Fhimah, right back in 1991 or whenever? Even more importantly, when Fhimah was acquitted ("no case to answer", remember?), and it was quite obvious that Megrahi could not possibly have done what he was alleged to have done on his own, why was this new investigation not launched then. In 2001?

Ah! Well, ... ahem. You see, well, ... 2001 was a different year. And, uh... certain limitations, diplomatic something... bureaucracy... inter-agecy feuding?

The first thing that happened last night was Christine Grahame on TV saying this was all highly convenient, as the "ongoing investigation" meant that her FoI requests could now be denied. And indeed, it does seem as if this is nothing but a ploy to prevent inquiry into the possibility that someone other than Megrahi put that bomb on the plane, by instituting an ongoing enquiry into who may have helped him. By reviving the case in this way, it ensures that official investigation doesn't go anywhere near any alternative explanations, while allowing any other investigations to be blocked.

That could well be it. I'm having a hard time visualizing even Mr. Henderson or anyone producing a whole new second novel expanding on the secrets revealed in part one. That's just too much. A ploy to maintain the staus quo with delays and things again put out of range until a few more people get older and tireder, then maybe they can finally scrape the whole thing gracefully off their shoe well out of eyesight. That does sound entirely plausible.

[Rolfe]

Link not broken for me.

The official reason for reopening this case now is that Megrahi dropped his appeal so there are now no ongoing legal matters relating to it. It's news to me that ongoing legal proceedings stops the police investigating whether an accused person had accomplices. Nobody ever mentioned this as a problem over the past 17 years when no other suspects were being sought.

They were wittering on about DNA on the radio this morning while I was getting dressed. Yeah right, they'll get meaningful DNA from the dregs of an explosion that happened over 21 years ago, after the evidence has been trawled over for explosives residues and all sorts - not.

Robert Black has a bit more to say about this (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/eight-other-high-level-suspects.html).

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Mmm, maybe I was too hasty in dismissing the possibility of DNA evidence coming up with something. If the DNA of a suspect were to be found on any of the clothes packed in the bomb suitcase, that would certainly be pretty sensational. I only hope that stuff has been stored sufficiently well that DNA evidence would be preserved and contamination impossible.

Christine Grahame (blogged by Robert Black (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/police-challenged-over-lockerbie-dna.html) today)

Ms Grahame has called on Detective Chief [Inspector] Michael Dalgleish who is heading the current review of evidence related to the Lockerbie bombing to explain why materials which it was claimed were packed along with the bomb were only checked for DNA in 2006.

Ms Grahame has also called on the police to confirm that a report dated 18th October 2006 by the Forensic Science Service commissioned on behalf of the Crown Office did find a DNA profile in the remains of an umbrella which the prosecution claimed was one of the items Megrahi had bought in Malta, but that it did not match his DNA.


Rolfe.

[JihadJane]

ETA: Another plea for debunk-like counterpoints! Cmon folks! I'm blogging this stuff. Many of you worry about conspiracy theorists spoutimg dangerous nonsense on the unternets, and here I am giving you an opportunity to stop the stuff at the gate and you're all just acquiescing. Shameful!

You are implying that state agents planted evidence. You must really hate authority. I bet you hate your dad too.

Furthermore, what about Occam's Razor, entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem ?

;)

[Rolfe]

I think Occam would have had apoplexy over this one. It seems to be necessary to multiply hypotheses to an absolutely insane degree, and even then some anomalies are left dangling.

Of course we're suggesting agents of the state planted evidence. That's what about 80% of the people who've studied this incident seem to be asserting. Does anybody really think that has never, ever been done? The only question here is, is it a plausible suggestion?

So far, we have a maybe.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

You are implying that state agents planted evidence. You must really hate authority. I bet you hate your dad too.

Furthermore, what about Occam's Razor, entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem ?

;)

That is a pretty debunker-like statement, in a sense, as has swayed me over. Certainly if a conviction was handed down by Scottish Judges after hearing evidence put together by Scottish police and American FBI, the simplest explanation is that it was a fair and sound verdict.

What's that about explaining ALL the facts? Aw, c'mon!

Okay, that was brief flip. In the news: Scottish authorities announce (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/police-boss-dismisses-lockerbie-case.html) the investigation is not re-opened, it's just being reviewed as it sits, as has been done beofore to see if it should be officially re-opened. Henderson et al. are seeming keen to do so and go after Megrahi's BOSSES! The US ambassador to the UK stresses (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/lockerbie-us-will-not-divorce-uk.html) the two countries will NOT be getting a "divorce" over the release of Megrahi, as upset as they are he didn't die in writhing agony and loneliness in prison, and especially angry how his wife kids got to hug him one last time. If they had lnown, in fact, the US would have extradited the kiiller to a decent American prison where he'd be sure to die. Professor Robert Black explains (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/lockerbie-extradition-suggestion-was.html) why this is nonsense and wonders why the guy would say something so stupid.

And finally, following suggestions by Dr Swire, et al, an investigation is (reportedly) opening - in Malta, of witness Tony Gauci's testimony (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/malta-to-investigate-evidence-of-key.html). This is bound to be interesting one way or another.
A Maltese legal official told The Daily Telegraph: "Tony Gauci is an area where we have to investigate more thoroughly and we are preparing for this.

"There was never enough proof, to be frank, on the circumstances of his evidence and there is pressure coming from many quarters on Malta to move to resolve the issue." (...)

[Bobby]

You are implying that state agents planted evidence. You must really hate authority. I bet you hate your dad too.

Furthermore, what about Occam's Razor, entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem ?

;)

Welcome aboard. To my knowledge the conviction of Megrahi essentially boils down to eye-witness testimony that Megrahi was the purchaser of certain items of clothing. The eye witness concerned does not appear credible, or, at least, the manner in which his testimony was presented to the court was biased. It is clear that the defence was not provided all the details of the investigation (for instance they were not told of the break in at Heathrow), which makes it plausible to believe they were also not told that the eye witness had said another person looked more like the purchaser of the clothing than the accused. While this may be a challenge to authority, it's one that has been made on several different occasions wrt the British judicial system (unsafe convictions).

[Rolfe]

If it had suited the authorities to "prove" that Abu Talb bought those clothes, then Gauci would have identified him for them, just as easily (and probably just as definitely!). They could have built just as good a circumstantial case against him as they did against Megrahi. (The marked calendar, the trip to Malta including 23rd November 1988, the clothes bought in Malta in his flat, the association with Khreesat and Jibril, and so on and so on.)

But it didn't suit the politicians and the spooks. And there are a lot of heavy hints floating around that the CIA had solid evidence that the PFLP-GC did the dirty, but didn't pass this on to the FBI. Instead they leant on Giaka to make stuff up about Megrahi and Fhimah they hoped would hold up in court.

Rolfe.

[geni]

They were wittering on about DNA on the radio this morning while I was getting dressed. Yeah right, they'll get meaningful DNA from the dregs of an explosion that happened over 21 years ago, after the evidence has been trawled over for explosives residues and all sorts - not.



DNA fingerprinting is getting better all the time. Long shot but posible.

[Rolfe]

Yeah, I did rethink that remark after reading some more commentary. If they found DNA belonging to a suspect on something identified as being in the bomb bag, and the world could be convinced it hadn't been planted, it would be a very big deal indeed.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

When new science rather than new thinking is the proposal, expect more abuse of the latest forensic science has to offer.

In the news, Malta's PM denies the rumors (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/pm-insists-malta-will-not-probe-prime.html) of a specific Gauci probe. Prof. Black agrees it's best to hold out for a more all-inclusive UN probe rather than get too narrow. It was Hans Kochler, not Jim Swire, calling specifically for a Gauci-specific probe (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/10/call-on-malta-to-question-lockerbie.html) by Malta.

Our good fiend Juval Aviv is back (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/lost-cctv-tape-reveals-true-lockerbie.html) saying he's got, or knows of, whatever, the "lost" CCTV footage of a Frankfurt handler loading a bown Samsonite onto PA103A. He can't show it to us because of the CIA or something. But he'll also describe the video and audio he has to put it all together
“The video shows a baggage handler called Roland O’Neill,” said Mr Aviv. “He picks up the suitcase and realises it is heavier than usual. He goes to the phone and makes a call.

“Then he takes the case and puts it on the trolley. All the phones were tapped, so I also had a tape of the phone call.

“O’Neill called the CIA guy at the embassy in Bonn. He said, ‘This is O’Neill, I have the suitcase but it is much heavier than usual’. The CIA guy says, ‘Yes, we know, let it go’.”

How on Earth can you deny that kind of total proof that's definitely hidden away somewhere?

PM Gordon Brown has ruled out (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/lockerbie-inquiry-ruled-out-by-gordon.html) a more expansive, enabled Lockerbie probe as inappropriate. As Foreign Secretary David Miliband had said, any investigation "should be a matter for the Scots" and no one else. Had the timer ben set differently, it would be a matter for some school of fish out there off Newfoundland.

ETA: And Chomsky speaks! (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/chomsky-on-lockerbie.html)

[Rolfe]

Why would a suitcase containing a radio-cassette player with 450g of Semtex in it be "much heavier" than a suitcase full of heroin?

That's frankly nuts. The bomb suitcase had the radio-cassette bomb, only 450g of Semtex remember, and rather less in the way of clothes than a normal piece of luggage, by all accounts. It should have been lighter than most suitcases, and certainly lighter than a bag full of heroin, not heavier.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Why would a suitcase containing a radio-cassette player with 450g of Semtex in it be "much heavier" than a suitcase full of heroin?

That's frankly nuts. The bomb suitcase had the radio-cassette bomb, only 450g of Semtex remember, and rather less in the way of clothes than a normal piece of luggage, by all accounts. It should have been lighter than most suitcases, and certainly lighter than a bag full of heroin, not heavier.

Rolfe.

I kind of thought the same thing, but it pales next to the image him actually sitting in some room watching this hidden video, with the secret wiretap audio, and these two guys having just this detailed conversation. And he's the take it to the media just don't bring proof guy anyway, so hidden this crap would not be. My opinion of Mr. Aviv just went up. He's being quite helpful with this new phase, being very up front and clear about his intentions so we can all just happily ignore and keep moving.

However, since a guy was specifically named - unusual specificity - don't be surprised if he surfaces and 'verifies' that's just what happened. Also maybe that won't happen, I dunno.

A lot of back and forth on investigations lately. Apparently there's some kind of widespread interest in or expectation of one, perhaps being tested or tired out.

[Rolfe]

Read Coleman. He describes all that too, same names. And the polygraph interrogations of the baggage handlers.

I have no frickin idea, frankly. I have no idea why Pan Am would employ a fantasist to investigate the affair on their behalf.

It's kind of interesting the number of people who have been smeared and discredited (or against whom attempts have been made to smear and discredit).

Lester Coleman
Allan Frankovich
Juval Aviv
Oswald le Winter
Jim Swire
David ben Aryeah (look at the first comment on this blog entry (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2008/08/david-ben-aryeah-on-sccrc-annual-report.html) - the reason why we have to sign in to comment on Robert black's blog now)

Has anyone tried to smear Robert Black or Hans Kochler, I wonder?

BTW, look what I just found (http://www.lesleyriddoch.co.uk/2009/08/the-maltese-double-cross.html). Lesley Riddoch is a highly respected Scottish journalist who for years fronted an excellent politics show on Radio Scotland.

I don't know who's right. But it does seem to work - it doesn't matter if the material is out there, even as a film or a book, if the smearing has been done right it just lies there and only the conspiracy theorists pay any attention to it.

Rolfe.

[realdon]

A bit more random stuff here from a detectives tale by John Crawford.
Now this book will certainly not win the Booker prize but...

DCI Crawford was on site early doors 22nd Dec and was involved in body recovery and the search for evidence, they were told on arrival by superiors that "they would be investigating murder on a massive scale" (P27) Someone seem to have come to this conclusion pretty quick or may be DCI Crawford was a bit sleepy and wasn't paying attention perhaps "they could be.." etc

After the searching was over he then became part of the team investigating the autumn leaves files, the timer fragment. He wine and dined Bollier when he came to Scotland for interview. Went to Jordan to assist with Khreeset He also spent alot of time in Malta. He said he was just a small gog etc and was not party to all information just an intrepid plod on the trail.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Nh9_p8RjikQC&pg=PP1&dq=Lockerbie+Incident:+A+Detective%27s+Tale#v=onep age&q=&f=false

Pages 58 to 63 are interesting as he recounts how he had problems with the production labels and had to go back and find items at Dexstar that had been mislaid.

Page 65 he tells how a DCI Cairns and McColm
"had found a small piece of aluminium in H sector. This turned out to be a piece of the luggage container in which the bomb had exploded and a piece of the timer mechanism had been blasted into the corner of it"

Well here we have another bit of bad memory, assumption whatever as we know that this was actually a piece of the Toshiba radio. Or do we ?

D

[Rolfe]

Probably bad memory. These two bits of circuit board tend to get confused by a lot of people. But I can't believe the Dextar operation was secure - particularly from an insider with nefarious intent.

I just have a bit of a problem with the intent and means being there to plant anything like that timer fragment as early as January.

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

It seems impossible to provide a plausible way for Megrahi, or anyone for that matter, to have introduced an unaccompanied bag at Luqa Airport on Dec 21 1988. Both the airport and the airline Air Malta would appear to have provided, and to those with expert knowledge on how these airline and baggage systems operate, irrefutable documentation showing it was virtually impossible for a bag to be inserted, and indeed the records of KM180 completely support this conclusion in respect of their passenger and baggage reconciliation on that day. Given this, if there are no arguments to what has been probed and concluded on these threads, then that puts Megrahi, although not necessarily Libya, out of the frame altogether in relation to the charges alleged by the US and UK authorities for his part in the bombing of flight 103.

There is some evidence that unaccompanied bag(s) were loaded onto PanAm 103a in Frankfurt, possible through various means, although it appears from the arguments of the prosecution that, the rouge bag that appears at the station assigned to collect baggage from the Malta flight, had to be the bomb bag. As has been demonstrated on here, that is simply not the case.

The distinct, and lets be honest, questionable lack of official records for Frankfurt handling of baggage, by virtue leaves me highly suspicious of the Erac printout, the reasons for it's initial retainment, and it's subsequently major significance in somehow linking origination of the bomb with the Air Malta flight despite the far more incontrovertible evidence that was made available from the very beginning by Air Malta and Luqa airport authorities. The fact that if indeed the bomb suitcase was introduced either from the KM180 flight, or inserted at the coding station where the baggage arrived from Malta, also ignores the security measures that bag would need to negotiate through the Frankfurt system, where although discrepancies are found in their baggage reconciliation with passengers, their baggage system operators did x-ray all baggage loaded onto PA103a. In addition, the warnings that had been issued and the exposing of the PLFP cell just outside Frankfurt and their Toshiba bombs containing barometric timers, would surely have resulted in a step-up in security around German Airports, especially the baggage areas with the x-ray examiners forewarned about the possible Toshiba Radio disguise.

Perhaps, as has been suggested by a few, there were covert activities in operation at Frankfurt involving 'controlled drug deliveries' and therefore disclosure of all relevant records could have exposed illegal surreptitious operations which could be highly damaging to the US, UK and German governments. To expect that these kinds of covert activities are not operated at State level is unrealistic. The theory of the 'drugs for hostages' deals and the integral part played by Frankfurt and Heathrow put forward by Aviv, Coleman and Francovich is one which carries immeasurable rewards, but clearly also inherently very grave risks for all those involved. I would not completely rule out the possibility of ingestion of the suitcase containing the bomb at Frankfurt, but on the balance of what is known, I tend to think Heathrow the more likely.

The poor security and baggage reconciliation at Heathrow was ably shown by the story given to the court by Bedford and Kamboj, the baggage handlers at Heathrow loading luggage onto 103. Despite Bedfords claim of two suitcases, unknown to him, were placed in the container from which the bomb exploded, and that had been left unguarded at the PanAm gate, the judges then provided novel interpretations of how the bags Bedford viewed could not be the bomb simply because of extraneous positioning claims, when the most patent evidence that a rogue samsonite suitcase had been introduced at Heathrow was compelling.

The break-in at Heathrow, at the PanAm gate no-less, reported so soon after it occurred by Ray Manley, seems to have been simply cast aside by the police who recorded it. This despite a PanAm plane being blown out of the sky later that same day. Even more disturbingly, it seems there was a concerted effort to conceal this breach of security until it finally became known only at the first appeal by Megrahi in 2002. Why on earth would information like that be suppressed? It becomes even more perturbing given what we now know of the, in comparison, scant evidence pertaining to security at Luqa and with Air Malta. Great effort has seemingly been made to either conceal or divert any attention away from the more substantial and significant areas of evidence which exist at Heathrow and Frankfurt in favour of the more fanciful and indeed preposterous notions as laid out by the prosecution case that Luqa Airport, and therefore Megrahi, were instrumental in the bombing of flight 103.

Perhaps, if there was a 'controlled delivery' in operation incorporating the DEA (under the auspices of the CIA), the German BKA and British MI6 on 21 dec, using Frankfurt and Heathrow Airport, then we have good reason for those agencies to steer the investigation away from those areas. Better still, the loss of all records and any evidence which does come to light is either ignored, or if possible must point the investigators in another direction entirely? Perhaps the first assumption made was that the attack on 103 had utilised the controlled delivery to insert a bomb? My own thoughts have drifted towards two operations (the drug sting and the attack on 103) as entirely separate. The covert operation happening from Frankfurt, while the bomb suitcase was inserted at Heathrow. Perhaps with the knowledge of a covert drug operation, any group wanting to bring down an Airline, would know to inflict their attack during this operation would present any government or investigators with a real dilemma?

The loss of documentation from Frankfurt obscures any real conclusive evidence of anything untoward, or legitimate, taking place at that airport, while the suppression of the break-in and the apparent gaping holes in security at Heathrow together with the Bedford suitcase are just quietly (hopefully) and discreetly ignored as though not noteworthy far less worth further investigation? Given the intelligence on Khreesat's devices, and the public knowledge that the BKA had simply released the 'caught red-handed' bomb-maker Khreesat back to Jordan, it would be imperative that any evidence discovered and any investigation instigated, should not be allowed to dig too far into this - for it would be absolutely obvious to everyone that this would be the most likely course of inquiry and Khreesat the clear suspect - and would be the first focus of any investigation.

I have a VHS copy of the Maltese Double Cross taken from it's one and only public showing on UK's channel 4 in 1995. I really should endeavour to have this transferred and uploaded, if not for making a slightly better copy available online, then for the 'Lockerbie Debate' that was broadcast immediately after the film, which I also recorded. The discussion, primarily focussing on the film's assertions, included Allan Francovich, Jim Swire, Jim Duggan (representing US families), David Leppard (Sunday Times) and Oliver 'Buck' Revell who headed the FBI investigation prior to Richard Marquise. The discussion made for fascinating viewing reaching a dramatic point when Jim Swire probed Oliver Revell on the fact his son had been booked on Pan Am 103 only to change and fly home on a different date. Swire asked quite bluntly if this had been as a result of the warnings that were made known to many US diplomats, or whether Revell had any prior knowledge of a possible attack on 103. Revell confirmed the change by his son but that this was simply due to a change in his son's work commitments with the US military in Germany and had no connection to any warnings.

All aspects of the Lockerbie disaster deserve close attention, and there are some aspects which deserve the particular attention of Americans and the British such as those examined on here. These will not be addressed by people and press elsewhere. These topics, the ones that are close to home - literally in our backyard - that have been most abysmally ignored or covered up by the US and UK media. There are a few lone voices on both sides of the Atlantic, who are either dismissed as some sort of nutty CT's, or who's cries of foul play by the government slowly fade away isolated in a lonely dark corner. As Flora Swire's fiancé, Hart Lidov said in his highly critical article written for the Columbia Journalism Review on the tenth anniversary of the disaster, "it is unrealistic to suppose that they (those who ordered the bombing) will ever be held accountable. Khomeni, Mohtashemi, Assad, and Khaddaffi did not take an oath of office to protect us - officials of the US government did."

He continued, "In the case of Lockerbie there are innumerable theories, no indisputable proof that any one is correct, and no reason to assume that situation will change at any specific time in the future. Thus any discussion that is predicated on knowing who precisely carried out the bombing is essentially a dead end. The answer may be known by the intelligence services of any of several countries, but it may not be. If it is, there is no reason to expect that it will be divulged except as it suits other political purposes in what may be a very long fullness of time. In the absence of this information are there questions that the press could have addressed - yes, lots of them. Who had an interest in seeing the Pan Am 103 bombing succeed? What do the few facts have become public since Dec. 21 1988 add up to? Did the US security services take appropriate actions in light of what was known? What can be inferred was known based on actions - as opposed to public statements about “what was known”? None of these questions have been addressed by American journalists, or if they have it is in the manner of Michael Wines of the NY Times who like a weathercock points in which ever direction the State Department is blowing, or Steve Emerson, whose continued relationship with Oliver Revell (at least as late as Emerson's WSJ article “Stop Aid and Comfort for Patrons of Terror” 8/5/96) make his reporting of a story in which Revell may in fact be a central culprit, unreliable."

In short, Lidov's claim was not only one of culpability on the part of the US security services, but specifically of Revell and the grave assertion of complicity in bombing. Indeed, Revell so incensed by the allegations made by Lidov, he made application to the US court claiming defamation of character, which was ultimately lost. However, given it's sensitive nature, and time that has elapsed, the full article is very hard to track down, and even although I do have a copy, I don't feel it would be in the best interests of the forum for me to post it in full. Anyone wishing to read the full article, pm me and I will oblige.

[Rolfe]

Probably bad memory. These two bits of circuit board tend to get confused by a lot of people. But I can't believe the Dextar operation was secure - particularly from an insider with nefarious intent.

I just have a bit of a problem with the intent and means being there to plant anything like that timer fragment as early as January.


Realdon, I've been reading that, and it's more complicated than I thought. I've taken it to the MST-13 thread.

Rolfe.

[GlennB]

Not intending to distract from the many excellent and fascinating posts here on this subject, but :

cartoon from The Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/cartoon/2009/oct/26/martin-rowson-lockerbie-bombing-case)

[Caustic Logic]

I have a VHS copy of the Maltese Double Cross taken from it's one and only public showing on UK's channel 4 in 1995. I really should endeavour to have this transferred and uploaded, if not for making a slightly better copy available online, then for the 'Lockerbie Debate' that was broadcast immediately after the film, which I also recorded. The discussion, primarily focussing on the film's assertions, included Allan Francovich, Jim Swire, Jim Duggan (representing US families), David Leppard (Sunday Times) and Oliver 'Buck' Revell who headed the FBI investigation prior to Richard Marquise. The discussion made for fascinating viewing reaching a dramatic point when Jim Swire probed Oliver Revell on the fact his son had been booked on Pan Am 103 only to change and fly home on a different date. Swire asked quite bluntly if this had been as a result of the warnings that were made known to many US diplomats, or whether Revell had any prior knowledge of a possible attack on 103. Revell confirmed the change by his son but that this was simply due to a change in his son's work commitments with the US military in Germany and had no connection to any warnings.

That does sound like excellent viewing. The movie itself is so long, and IMO the copy we have is acceptable, so that's a time-payoff issue, but the after-talk... I didn't even get what Revell's connection was until now - he was the pre-Marquise! (and looking at Lidov now). If you think it's a valuable addition, someone with a video input card could do it easily. I recommend almost any format aside from WMA, perhaps different resolutions - one pro-quality for later, one smaller for uploading. Anyway, excellent post altogether, lotta thoughts.

[Rolfe]

The Channel 4 version was cut down to only 90 minutes. Could you lose a whole hour without damaging the informaton? But the after-chat sounds fascinating. The trouble is, though, that it so seldom settles anything. Oh, so Revell's son's job forced him to change flights? "Well, he would say that, wouldn't he?" Could be perfectly true. Doesn't have to be though.

I didn't see it at the time. Rats. Could have got a Super-Betamax copy, which was the best picture quality you could get at the time - not that dissimilar to a CD on a bog-standard telly. Oh well. I'd sure like to see that discussion.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Buncrana, my thinking is very much tending in the same direction as yours on this. (Which is why I keep trying to knock down that timer fragment, because it doesn't fit with a heathrow introduction.)

I think a lot of what you say about Frankfurt is more appropriate in the "unaccompanied bag" thread, so I hope you don't mind if I take part of your post over there.

I'm slowly making a better transcript of The Maltese Double Cross. The online one is a decent start, but it's got a lot of errors and omissions, and you can't navigate it as it only has one-page-on buttons. I thought we might then try to annotate it with whatever we've managed to establish, or reasonably speculate, about particular passages. But just a PDF of the transcript would be handy.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

All aspects of the Lockerbie disaster deserve close attention, and there are some aspects which deserve the particular attention of Americans and the British such as those examined on here. These will not be addressed by people and press elsewhere. These topics, the ones that are close to home - literally in our backyard - that have been most abysmally ignored or covered up by the US and UK media. There are a few lone voices on both sides of the Atlantic, who are either dismissed as some sort of nutty CT's, or who's cries of foul play by the government slowly fade away isolated in a lonely dark corner.


This touches on something I've been ruminating about. In 1988 the internet was barely a foetus. Nobody could have imagined the form it would take, or that within 20 years anyone with a modem and a phone line would be able to access humungous reams of evidence and discussion without leaving their desk.

But it goes further than that. The development of this sort of public discussion is even more recent. The ability of the internet to bring together people with a common interest to discuss all sorts of matters is an amazing sociological phenomenon. I already have my name on Letters to the Editor in scientific journals, as a co-author with other forum members I have never met, letters entirely written on this forum. A number of such groups was responsible for shredding an entire issue of the journal Homeopathy, on the subject of "the memory of water". Without the internet, it's probable nobody but homoeopaths would even have known the articles existed, never mind read them. Alone, maybe none of us would have bothered to do any more than sound off in private for ten minutes. Alone, maybe none of us would have been able to dissect these papers quite as forensically as was achieved. Collaborating, it was accomplished.

This forum is almost a unique resource in that respect - certainly for CT-related issues, I think. ("Bad Science" is also pretty hot on the SCAM merchants.) Look at what's been done in the field of 9/11. There is a critical mass of posters who have the evidence and the couter-arguments to the nonsense at their fingertips. We've done moon hoaxing and Kennedy and Rosewell and contrails and alien livestock mutilations as well.

If you look at my OP on this thread, you'll see that I came here looking for a similar forensic dissection of the events surrounding Lockerbie. I didn't find a thing. The thread petered out in less than a page. It was suggested that I should become the forum expert. I took a look at the height of the mountain, and declined (at the time).

However, we're now close to a critical mass of interested posters bouncing ideas around, keeping each other on track, and correcting misconceptions, to have the possibility to achieve something. We'll never prove anything, but even providing a balanced look at the evidence and some reasonable interpretations would be a start.

I just want to know what I think. I want to have an opinion, and I want that opinion to be as closely aligned to the known facts as possible. People like us didn't really exist even ten years ago. We couldn't have been conceived of 20 years ago. Is it possible for people like us to contribute to a critical mass that eventually changes perceptions?

I think it's worth a go.

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

This touches on something I've been ruminating about. In 1988 the internet was barely a foetus. Nobody could have imagined the form it would take, or that within 20 years anyone with a modem and a phone line would be able to access humungous reams of evidence and discussion without leaving their desk.

But it goes further than that. The development of this sort of public discussion is even more recent. The ability of the internet to bring together people with a common interest to discuss all sorts of matters is an amazing sociological phenomenon. I already have my name on Letters to the Editor in scientific journals, as a co-author with other forum members I have never met, letters entirely written on this forum. A number of such groups was responsible for shredding an entire issue of the journal Homeopathy, on the subject of "the memory of water". Without the internet, it's probable nobody but homoeopaths would even have known the articles existed, never mind read them. Alone, maybe none of us would have bothered to do any more than sound off in private for ten minutes. Alone, maybe none of us would have been able to dissect these papers quite as forensically as was achieved. Collaborating, it was accomplished.

This forum is almost a unique resource in that respect - certainly for CT-related issues, I think. ("Bad Science" is also pretty hot on the SCAM merchants.) Look at what's been done in the field of 9/11. There is a critical mass of posters who have the evidence and the couter-arguments to the nonsense at their fingertips. We've done moon hoaxing and Kennedy and Rosewell and contrails and alien livestock mutilations as well.

If you look at my OP on this thread, you'll see that I came here looking for a similar forensic dissection of the events surrounding Lockerbie. I didn't find a thing. The thread petered out in less than a page. It was suggested that I should become the forum expert. I took a look at the height of the mountain, and declined (at the time).

However, we're now close to a critical mass of interested posters bouncing ideas around, keeping each other on track, and correcting misconceptions, to have the possibility to achieve something. We'll never prove anything, but even providing a balanced look at the evidence and some reasonable interpretations would be a start.

I just want to know what I think. I want to have an opinion, and I want that opinion to be as closely aligned to the known facts as possible. People like us didn't really exist even ten years ago. We couldn't have been conceived of 20 years ago. Is it possible for people like us to contribute to a critical mass that eventually changes perceptions?

I think it's worth a go.

Rolfe.

Yes, I have often wondered why exactly the whole disaster in Lockerbie, the subsequent enquiry and the resulting court case, never really entered the public's psyche, as many other dramatic historical events, especially those involving mass murder, aimed at in the main, the US. The lack of knowledge about the whole tragedy in the UK is astounding, given the proximity of the disaster and the relatively wide coverage it has received in the media. Admittedly, usually a very subjective media and that which suppports the official investigation and court judgement on Megrahi steadfastly.

These forums, and the collective voices they are capable of bringing together to discuss the vast array of topics is indeed as you say, an "amazing sociological phenomenon". I have often tried in vain to broach the subject of Lockerbie, from social circles, professionally and on other forums, and was all too often met with silence or simple indifference. As I said in my first post, the discussion on here has been reasoned, conversant and objective. It has without doubt provided me with much more knowledge about the events and the evidence of the case, than I previously did over nearly 15 years of following the case. Although, I remember exactly where I was when I heard the news about 103 going down over Lockerbie, it was only while on a visit to Windsor in 1994, that purely by chance I came across a copy of Trail of the Octopus, and decided it looked, more that anything, curious. After reading it, I followed events much more closely.

Questioning oneself was constant, while looking to support one's position with evidence. In the case of Lockerbie, it is undoubtedly a complex weave of many facets where evidence can be found, but, I for one, think you deserve immense credit for persisting in trying to uncover these facts. As you say, who could have possibly imagined 20 years ago, the capabilities that the internet would allow, let alone forums such as this. We are making balanced conclusions on what we do know, and yes I absolutely believe, perceptions can be changed. To what degree, and with what outcomes, is another matter I think.

[Rolfe]

Actually, I think the opinion that "Megrahi was framed" is fairly widespread in Scotland. If for no other reason than that every time it's mentioned it prompts a rash of letters to the Editor and opinion articles from respected journalists saying so. However, not many people are very conversant with the details, and the official line is simply to pretend these opinions don't exist.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

As Flora Swire's fiancé, Hart Lidov said in his highly critical article written for the Columbia Journalism Review on the tenth anniversary of the disaster, "it is unrealistic to suppose that they (those who ordered the bombing) will ever be held accountable. Khomeni, Mohtashemi, Assad, and Khaddaffi did not take an oath of office to protect us - officials of the US government did."

He continued, "In the case of Lockerbie there are innumerable theories, no indisputable proof that any one is correct, and no reason to assume that situation will change at any specific time in the future. Thus any discussion that is predicated on knowing who precisely carried out the bombing is essentially a dead end. The answer may be known by the intelligence services of any of several countries, but it may not be. If it is, there is no reason to expect that it will be divulged except as it suits other political purposes in what may be a very long fullness of time. In the absence of this information are there questions that the press could have addressed - yes, lots of them. Who had an interest in seeing the Pan Am 103 bombing succeed? What do the few facts have become public since Dec. 21 1988 add up to? Did the US security services take appropriate actions in light of what was known? What can be inferred was known based on actions - as opposed to public statements about “what was known”? None of these questions have been addressed by American journalists, or if they have it is in the manner of Michael Wines of the NY Times who like a weathercock points in which ever direction the State Department is blowing, or Steve Emerson, whose continued relationship with Oliver Revell (at least as late as Emerson's WSJ article “Stop Aid and Comfort for Patrons of Terror” 8/5/96) make his reporting of a story in which Revell may in fact be a central culprit, unreliable."

In short, Lidov's claim was not only one of culpability on the part of the US security services, but specifically of Revell and the grave assertion of complicity in bombing. Indeed, Revell so incensed by the allegations made by Lidov, he made application to the US court claiming defamation of character, which was ultimately lost. However, given it's sensitive nature, and time that has elapsed, the full article is very hard to track down, and even although I do have a copy, I don't feel it would be in the best interests of the forum for me to post it in full. Anyone wishing to read the full article, pm me and I will oblige.


Thanks for the link Buncrana. As it's just a link I'm not sure why you don't want to post it, but I'll respect your decision.

I never really thought about who Flora Swire's boyfriend was (were they actually engaged?), and I didn't know he was a journalist or a Lockerbie "truther". That's an interesting page altogether.

However, I note that Mr. Lidov falls into that oft-repeated fallacy that PA103 was late on the fateful evening.

In fact there was the completely unpredictable turn that take off from Heathrow was delayed by an hour, the plane took a longer than usual course over dry land, reaching the preset altitude over Lockerbie, and resulting in all of that awkward evidence for examination - the one thing that Revell and company did not expect, a large amount of forensically examinable material.


It really wasn't. PA103A was late, and the baggage handlers had to move fast to get Maid of the Seas loaded from the Frankfurt jet, but they made it. (As far as I can tell, the Frankfurt baggage wasn't x-rayed at this point. Was this because of the short time, or would it not have been normal practice anyway? Would they have found anything if they had x-rayed it?)

PA103 was scheduled to depart at 6pm. The plane pushed off from the gate a minute or two after six. This is "on time" by anybody's standards. Planes do not, ever, leave the tarmac at their scheduled departure time. They have to taxi to the end of the runway, wait for instructions, and then make their take-off run before they leave the ground. How long does this normally take? Ten minutes? Fifteen?

PA103 left the ground at 6.25pm. That is ten to fifteen minutes late at the most. Even without that negligible (in the context of a transatlantic flight) delay, and even if the plane had taken a more southerly course, it would not and could not have been "far out over the Atlantic" (as others have suggested) when it exploded.

So what's this about the "pre-set altitude"? That pre-supposes a barometric device, not the timer-only device postulated at Camp Zeist. With a barmoetric device it doesn't matter a damn how long the plane is delayed, it will always explode the same time after take-off. So the (erroneous) comment about the time delay is actually a total irrelevance.

What he really seems to be saying is that it was the unusually northerly route that caused the over-land explosion, nothing to do with the delay. That could be quite true, but whichever way you slice it, an explosion only 38 minutes after take-off is chancing it. It could have hit Ireland.

It's a timing that makes sense if what you're relying on is one of those primitive analogue timers which could only be set for a maximum delay of 30 minutes (Khreesat's modus operandi). You know you're going to get an explosion at 30,000 feet, you kind of hope it might be over the sea to destroy the evidence, but you're willing to risk bits of plane being scattered all over the countryside if that's how it pans out.

It doesn't make sense if you have the opportunity to set a longer delay.

The way Lidov presents his argument is quite confused and contradictory, and makes me wonder just how clearly he's thinking about all this. Maybe not so much?

By the way, the "the US authorities knew about PA103 in advance and allowed it to happen so as to allow Iran to level the score for the Airbus" theory has been advanced more publicly than that. Tam Daylell put it forward in a newspaper article quite recently.

I don't think I'm prepared to believe that US personnel would let an aircraft full of innocent civilians take off, knowing it was going to blow up, and do nothing about it. I suppose we have to add it to the list of theories though.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

November 20, Friday, was the day Megrahi had to die by for Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill to avert a fresh row. It has passed and Megrahi lives a bit longer still. Was there a deal? Did they actually know he'd likely live significantly longer than three months?

Oddly, I suspect such a deal. The evidence is he dropped his appeal just after talking in private with MacAskill (a first, I hear) before getting that diagnosis and then, per law, going home. After all, you want something, like an appeal dropped, wouldn't it help to offer something - like an extra month, say - in return? Like water for a thirsty man, life for a dying man is an irresistable lure. It can give you much leverage if you're low or desperate enough to use it...

Speaking of firsts, my reason in bumping, asides from marking the 3-month point, is this neat little list of firsts from a site that makes me feel less clandestine for having the whole trial transcripts now (news later):
6 From the running list of "firsts" which we maintain on the web-site: "The Lockerbie trial has been said to be: 1) the first time that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency has provided documentary evidence to a foreign court, and the first time that it has permitted a former intelligence source to testify in a trial on foreign soil; 2) the first time that LiveNote (http://www.livenote.com) software has been used in a Scottish court to produce simultaneous transcripts; 3) the largest mass murder in Scottish legal history; 4) the first time a Scottish court has sat abroad; 5) the first time in Scottish legal history that serious criminal charges have been tried without a jury; 6) the most expensive and possibly the longest trial in Scottish legal history, employing the largest prosecution and investigation team without even including US Department of Justice personnel; 7) the first time that the United Nations Security Council has pressured a state, through economic sanctions, to surrender its nationals for trial abroad; 8) the first time that a national civilian court has ever conducted an entire criminal trial in the territory of another sovereign country; and 9) held in what is quite possibly the most secure and most high-tech courthouse ever built."
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/lessons/lesoct00.htm

[Rolfe]

Ronnie Biggs is still alive. Ergo, nobody is going to say anything about Megrahi.

Rofe.

[Caustic Logic]

Ronnie Biggs is still alive. Ergo, nobody is going to say anything about Megrahi.

Rofe.

Apparently not many after all, judging by Black's blog. Only know-nothing Americans ... like Senator Schumer. If the "Lockerbee" bomber (ala Huckabee, Applebee's) is still alive Gordon Brown should have him fly back to Scotland to make up the post 3-months days in prison.
http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/68649-schumer-wants-lockerbie-bomber-back-in-scottish-prison

Friggin Americans, and I am one. (shakes head).

[Rolfe]

Oh, I saw it. About an inch and a half on an inside page of yesterday's paper. Nobody's paying any attention.

The Labour party would love to give the SNP stick about it, but it was the Labour government in England who let Ronnie Biggs out on the same terms about a fortnight earlier than Megrahi was released, so they can't say a word.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

By the way, I got Marquise to tell me (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/fragments-of-truth-continued.html) what special information he has that leads him to be so sure that Merahi is guilty.

There is no reason whatsoever for anyone to believe me. I (and my colleagues on both sides of the Atlantic) collected the evidence and presented it to a Scottish court. It was they--not me--who found the evidence compelling enough to convict Mr. Megrahi. It was they who believed the evidence was proof beyond a reasonable doubt and they are the only ones who needed convincing. None of us involved in the investigation ever believed the evidence was "perfect." It was what it was and we gave it to prosecutors and then to judges. However when I read about all the "evidence" which links Iran to the attack (see MP Grahame's missive of earlier today), that I find quite lacking and not holding a candle to what was presented at Camp Zeist. Perfect--no--beyond a reasonable doubt--based on what three judges wrote in 2001--yes--absolutely and that is all that does matter.


Nothing. Just the same as the rest of the head-in-the-sand brigade. The judges brought in a guilty verdict and that's all that matters, that proves it.

And by the way, my post to which he replied was about the Gauci identification and the introduction of the bag at Malta, I said nothing at all about any case against Iran.

Wow. Just, wow.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

By the way, I got Marquise to tell me (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/fragments-of-truth-continued.html) what special information he has that leads him to be so sure that Merahi is guilty.

Awesome. For those who don't know, Richard Marquise is the former chief of the FBI's whole SCOTBOM investigation. He comments at Blogger, mostly talking with or about Bollier at Robert Black's blog. My favorite comment so far is this one, which I can partly sympathize with is at the bottom of this page: "Spook Terror". (http://spookterror.blogspot.com/2008/08/lockerbie-mueller-thurman-bollier.html)

in response to Rolfe:

Nothing. Just the same as the rest of the head-in-the-sand brigade. The judges brought in a guilty verdict and that's all that matters, that proves it.

And by the way, my post to which he replied was about the Gauci identification and the introduction of the bag at Malta, I said nothing at all about any case against Iran.


Is this a formal logical fallacy? Appeal to having already won the argument (legally)? Uh, we know that, it's the fact that you cheated. "But no, the judges bought it! They said blah blah

And on the Iran argument, to be fair, that is where you tend to lean, as do I, for the likely real explanation. Everyone questioning a theory or supposition should have some alternate explanation for observed facts (eg, re:9/11 "where'd they put the passengers then?")

But all he's doing is appealing to a lack of alternatives (that simply doesn't exist BTW) in a weak effort to bolster their positive claims. Sorry, the "evidence"s positive claims. Ah, can't explain it right, but it's definitely a straw man the way he uses the point. Oh and also a false straw man. How did he describe the evidence against the PFLPGC?

I find quite lacking and not holding a candle to what was presented at Camp Zeist.
Now I'm not a real expert on this aspect, but if the details I've heard from fairly credible people is any clue, the case has quite a nice glowing candle to hold up high. Problem is he's comparing it to the manufactured halogen flood light they brought in, with the ridiculously complete evidence no mere factual case could ever stand up against. (to a certain class of mind anyhoo)

He's also probably forgetting that their star witness was tossed from the case as a liar, that half the accused were found not guilty, and that even so scaled back the fact the case worked has been repeatedly found a "miscarriage of justice" by people who know from these things.

But hey, they did it, squeaked by, and now it's all facty and fit to lock people up over, start a war over, or whatever you want. Why didn't we ever bomb Libya over this anyway?

[Rolfe]

Is this a formal logical fallacy? Appeal to having already won the argument (legally)? Uh, we know that, it's the fact that you cheated. "But no, the judges bought it! They said blah blah


Yes, I think it is a logical fallacy, though as it was very late at night I may have got the wrong one! (I said straw man.) "Your case is flawed because x, y and z points don't stand up." "But it's a better case that the one she made!"

And on the Iran argument, to be fair, that is where you tend to lean, as do I, for the likely real explanation. Everyone questioning a theory or supposition should have some alternate explanation for observed facts (eg, re:9/11 "where'd they put the passengers then?")


Yes, I lean to the Jibril/Dalkamoni/Khreesat et al. theory. Though I don't know how and I don't know who might have assisted them. (They almost certainly got munitions from Libya.) However, I didn't say that on the Black blog.

I'm starting here from not seeing how Megrahi (in person) can actually be guilty of what he was said to have done (put the bomb into the luggage system at Luqa). Now if you accept that, then the question obviously arises, well, where and how was the bomb introduced then, and who did it? It is not necessary to know the answer to these questions to doubt Megrahi's guilt.

I completely disagree with you that "everyone questioning a theory or supposition should have some alternate explanation for observed facts." There is no inherent illogic in observing that the accepted wisdom simply does not fit the observed facts, even if you don't have another explanation that does.

Your "where did they put the passengers then?" example is in fact inapplicable. In that case, you're looking at a ridiculous hole in the twoofer's theory. Indeed, if you put forward an alternative theory, it must be internally consistent and consistent with observed facts. Which is why I'm flying kites here and, not posting them in blog comments or in blogs. I'm trying to see what can't be shot down, first.

But all he's doing is appealing to a lack of alternatives (that simply doesn't exist BTW) in a weak effort to bolster their positive claims. Sorry, the "evidence"s positive claims. Ah, can't explain it right, but it's definitely a straw man the way he uses the point. Oh and also a false straw man. How did he describe the evidence against the PFLPGC?


He's in fact simply saying that his explanation must be correct because he hasn't seen a better one. I think that's possibly the fallacy of the excluded middle? He's ignoring the possibility that neither he nor the person putting forward the alternative theory are correct.

Now I'm not a real expert on this aspect, but if the details I've heard from fairly credible people is any clue, the case has quite a nice glowing candle to hold up high. Problem is he's comparing it to the manufactured halogen flood light they brought in, with the ridiculously complete evidence no mere factual case could ever stand up against. (to a certain class of mind anyhoo)


But the evidence wasn't "ridiculously complete", it was as full of holes as a Swiss cheese (Bollier!).

I think the real problem is that evidence we've been hearing about against the PFLP-GC has been systematically suppressed, probably by the CIA. There are heavy hints about that from a number of sources. Hard evidence against Jibril was not passed to the FBI, so that Marquise could only see this apparent stack of evidence growing against Libya. (Which fell over when tested in court, but somehow the judges didn't notice.)

However, I'm not saying that outside of this discussion, because we have no evidence to support it.

He's also probably forgetting that their star witness was tossed from the case as a liar, that half the accused were found not guilty, and that even so scaled back the fact the case worked has been repeatedly found a "miscarriage of justice" by people who know from these things.


Oh, I said all that in my post. He ignored it.

But hey, they did it, squeaked by, and now it's all facty and fit to lock people up over, start a war over, or whatever you want. Why didn't we ever bomb Libya over this anyway?


We didn't have to. We crippled them with sanctions instead. Libya was vulnerable enough to be sanctioned. Iran wasn't.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

My favorite comment so far is this one, which I can partly sympathize with is at the bottom of this page: "Spook Terror". (http://spookterror.blogspot.com/2008/08/lockerbie-mueller-thurman-bollier.html)


Well, that entire page is a pile of rubbish. If Marquise simply reads the batant CT haverings, then obviously he's going to become more entrenched in his belief in his own righteousness. (I love the way he blamed the nonsense on Black, who had nothing to do with it apart from mildly correcting a mistake in his first blog comment.)

I can see where the cries of "disinfo" come from. Honestly, I'm not entirely joking here. Sometimes I really wonder if anyone can be quite the loon Bollier is making himself out to be.

Remember, in the distant past "before the Wall fell", Bollier was a Stasi asset. However, in The Maltese Double Cross, documents are apparently shown on screen suggesting that the Stasi was suspicious that he was actually a CIA agent of some sort.

He enters the case first, very early, blaming Libya. Nobody pays any attention to him.

Then later, when he's connected to the case again via the tracing of the timer fragment, he goes into buffoon mode. He makes such a fool of himself in court that the judge discounts his evidence. Since then, he seems to have been presenting ever more convoluted and ever more ludicrous "explanations" of how the authorities tampered with the fragment and fabricated it and got their bits mixed up and who knows what else.

Is he deliberately trying to muddy the waters to prevent close scrutiny of the actualite surrounding the timer fragment, and to tar those questioning the Official Version with the label of raving CTers? I have no idea, but the thought occasionally crosses my mind.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Yes, I think it is a logical fallacy, though as it was very late at night I may have got the wrong one! (I said straw man.) "Your case is flawed because x, y and z points don't stand up." "But it's a better case that the one she made!"

That was a separate fallacy. The judges believed the evidence, and the alternate (he guessed or maybe read that you lean towards) is "quite lacking." His presumption could also be a clue that he knows that's the strongest rational alternative, as many are concluding, so it's the growing bud that you snip to kill the whole branch. It's a good sign. People should take a look at the candle it's holding.

It is not necessary to know the answer to these questions to doubt Megrahi's guilt.
[...]
I completely disagree with you that "everyone questioning a theory or supposition should have some alternate explanation for observed facts."

That's true and my wording wasn't quite right. It does of course help, a lot, to show that there are rational alternatives. But t's not necessary to "know" the answer. In this case we have a bomb that blew up Flight 103. It had to get on there somehow, and it's rational to realize there are many different origins and routes possible, making different degrees of sense based on what evidence one does or doesn't have access to.

So no it's not necessary to "know" or even to have a good guess what did happen, in order to suggest an alternate idea. It helps tho.

And most importantly to ever move forward from there, collectively or individually, we'd need a next square to step into. Mainly I think he was anticipating the one and trying to deny that, mostly for the eyes of Mr. Duggan et al. Stay put, eh? There's nothing out there. Etc. So I guess, he wasn't just talking to you at that point.

But the evidence wasn't "ridiculously complete", it was as full of holes as a Swiss cheese (Bollier!).
Surely full of holes of logic, reliability, etc. But as far as having all the points strangely at hand, guy X did A B C D E F G and we can prove them all even though they don't make sense and neither does the evidence if you stop and think about it. So they didn't think about it and Guy X did do A B ... It's not natural light but it illuminated the key 'facts" just right, guess. And my benchmark is the case they built, not the one that came out at the end of trial. They had Giaka seeing the accused both arrive with the very suitcase. did they not? On top of similar cartoonishness from Bollier (http://12-7-9-11.blogspot.com/2009/11/from-zurich-to-malta-to-tripoli-to.html) partly accepted, the one identifiable part of an MST-13 surviving to allow this, and the lucky printout, the finger of Tony Gauci doings its ouija board thing showed the same guy (old man Jenkins!) bought thetimers in Zurich and Tripoli and between the two on Malta bought the clothes, packed them, somehow planted them on a plane that avoided all security at two transfers and then blew up all over the ground. Remarkably complete for being fake.

Well, that entire page is a pile of rubbish. If Marquise simply reads the batant CT haverings, then obviously he's going to become more entrenched in his belief in his own righteousness. (I love the way he blamed the nonsense on Black, who had nothing to do with it apart from mildly correcting a mistake in his first blog comment.)

That was the part I liked. A real doo-de-doo moment. He only even writes a few of his own posts so I never presume Black is saying this unless I look, but he was at a different blog even. Ah I guess it's not that funny.

ETA: OH, and I dug your Bollier summary.

[Rolfe]

That was a separate fallacy. The judges believed the evidence, and the alternate (he guessed or maybe read that you lean towards) is "quite lacking." His presumption could also be a clue that he knows that's the strongest rational alternative, as many are concluding, so it's the growing bud that you snip to kill the whole branch. It's a good sign. People should take a look at the candle it's holding.


I don't think it's that complicated. I think he's just so much in the habit of countering the "it was the Iranians, dummy" argument, that he just comes out with it on a spinal reflex. I don't think he even really read what I typed and appreciated that I was making entirely different points.

I think he's so desperate to hang on to his certainty that he only goes near the easily-debunkable CT theories. He didn't even notice my post was something else.

So I guess, he wasn't just talking to you at that point.


He wasn't talking to me at all. He was regurgitating his standard anti-debunker spiel, that's all.

They had Giaka seeing the accused both arrive with the very suitcase. did they not? [....] and between the two on Malta bought the clothes, packed them, somehow planted them on a plane that avoided all security at two transfers and then blew up all over the ground. Remarkably complete for being fake.


Yes, we were told how the entire plot was going to be revealed in excruciating detail, back to the construction of the bomb and how it got on the plane - and all that completely fell apart when Giaka was exposed as telling porky-pies. Without Giaka's evidence, which we didn't actually have because it was disallowed, it's cobwebs.

It almost seems to me that the judges were acting as if in some way they still thought Giaka can't have been completely making it all up, even after they ruled that he was. No smoke without fire, sort of thing. Even after the connection that made sense of the disjointed bits of evidence was wiped away, somehow the skeleton remained in their judgement.

I keep waiting for someone to come and tell us that Giaka was completely on the level all the time, and that's why Megrahi did it (so that's why we all hate Scotland and we'll never give you another dollar you baby-killers....). It would at least be rational. One could start to enquire as to the reasons for believing Giaka. But no, all we get from everyone from Darth Rotor to Marquise is "three judges looking to their seats in the House of Lords can't be wrong".

ETA: OH, and I dug your Bollier summary.


Another kite, but it's quite a pretty one, if very, very unorthodox.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Well I'm supposed to be in Thanksgiving mode (we did it a day late here for a few reasons). But I've got this odd find nagging at me. From the transcripts I just got, day 21, June 15 2000. Testimony of Allen Feraday. For those who don't have the transcripts (most of us), here's a .doc file daily summary for this day, courtesy the LTBU.
http://www.gla.ac.uk/media/media_78553_en.doc
The issue I'm interested in here is not mentioned in that, nor anywhere else on the internet. So whatever it is, should be brand-new. At issue is a damaged piece of luggage, described as “a purple-coloured holdall” and labeled PH/137. This bag, Feraday agreed, had within it two metal fragments “which both originate from the primary IED suitcase,” so it should be of some interest. From pages 3330-3336:

"Q So from Dr. Hayes' draft report -- and I think you just told us he prepared this part of the report -- we can see that he designated this as explosion-damaged luggage?
A I think it was lightly --
Q Lightly explosion-damaged luggage?
A Yes."

This attitude would help explain Feraday’s own notes (production 1498), in which Keen noted “that nowhere in the index” and in fact “nowhere in your examination notes does the item PH/137 appear.” The witness confirms to both “that's correct, sir. Yes.” If it’s only <i>lightly</i> blast-damaged, it’s not even worth mentioning in your analysis? Next Mr, Keen pulled up a photograph of this item. (Production 181, photograph 91)

"Q It is apparent, is it not, Mr. Feraday, that you have not signed the label as it is photographed in photograph 91?
A That's correct, sir. Yes.
Q But your signature now appears on the label PH/137 in court?
A Yes, sir.
Q When did you sign that label, Mr. Feraday?
A When I had the bag back to write this -- the final report.
Q And what date was that, Mr. Feraday?
A I can't tell you without looking it up again on a list, I'm afraid.
Q Are you saying that that was before December 1991?
A I think it must be, yes. I finished the report by then, so yes.
Q And are you saying that you examined PH/137 before you finished the report?
A Yes, sir.
Q Where are the notes of that examination, Mr. Feraday?
A Well, there aren't any, because as I said, I did not always, when I was looking at them, make any difference between myself and Hayes -- although in this instance I did, and I told him so, that in my opinion you couldn't necessarily put that in the explosion damage. I couldn't convince myself that it was explosion damage. Prior to that, Hayes had written this preliminary report for another purpose -- I think the Fatal Accident Inquiry --"

So if I’m reading this right, he disagrees with the actual PhD scientist, but did no examination of his own to back this up, because they work as a team and agree, except that here they didn’t. Is that what he's saying? The reason for Feraday’s divergence seems to be an unexplained lack of conviction:

"Q And you recall --
A Sorry, I'm waiting for the --
Q I don't think you had finished, Mr. Feraday, so do finish your answer if you wish.
A Sorry. I came to the conclusion that I couldn't myself put it in the explosion – necessarily in the explosion-damaged baggage. I'm not saying it isn't, but I couldn't convince myself. And I still can't. And for that reason, I had a word with Hayes, and we agreed to put it in the second section.
Q So you -- you recall discussing this with Dr. Hayes, do you?
A At some stage I discussed it with Dr. Hayes, but I can't remember exactly when or if, in fact, it was when the -- I wrote the final report. And then Hayes certainly came in, obviously, and read it all and then signed, and we went through each item then. We through the report, if you like, line by line.
Q Line by line, Mr. Feraday?
A Well, he read through it, obviously, line by line."

This implies no disagreement – Hayes was able to check Feraday’s findings and found no problem with the exclusion of PH/137.

"Q If you would like to turn for a moment, Mr. Feraday, to your report 181 at page 51.
A Yes, sir.
Q Now, we can read this section for ourselves, but I'd like to look in particular at the third paragraph on that page, which you corrected during your examination in chief by proposing the insertion, after the fourth word in the first line, of the word "other"?
A Yes, sir.
Q Now, taking the paragraph, of course, in its context, can we read that corrected paragraph. It states: "As there are no other penetration holes in either the holdall or the plastics bag, it appears most likely that these two fragments, which both originate from the primary IED suitcase, were picked up and placed inside the plastics bag, which was then itself
placed inside the purple holdall for convenience of carriage."
A Yes, sir.
Q Now, I have to suggest, Mr. Feraday, that if you insert the word "other" into that paragraph in the context of this section, the paragraph is deprived of sense or content.
A Is ... ?
Q Deprived of any sense or content. It tells us absolutely nothing if you correct it in that way. What do you say to that?
A I am not sure what you mean. But what it would then say is as there are no other penetration -- at the top of the page, I am talking about the ragged horizontal cuts which, obviously, one can see as penetrations. I see them as cuts. Now, in dealing with, first of all, the holdall, there are no other penetration holes in it, other than those that I've already said about the cuts. And in the plastics bag, there were none, the plastics bag which contained the two fragments of metal from the suitcase. So I was left scratching my head as to how they can get inside there, in a plastics bag, if they didn't come through any part of the bag.
Q Do you --
A I can't convince myself they come through the ragged cuts.
Q You recollect the label attached to the plastics bag, Mr. Feraday, having said "two pieces of metal, charred, found within baggage."
A Yes, I do, sir.
Q And you recollect finding penetrations in the side of the bag that went right through to the interior of the bag?
A Horizontal cuts, yes, sir.
Q But you felt it pertinent to remind us that there were no other penetrations in the bag, Mr. Feraday; is that right?
A Not big enough for the -- for anything to do with the two pieces of metal. That's correct, sir, yes.
Q But the penetrations you'd already found were big enough for the penetration of the two bits of metal?
A Oh, yes, sir.
Q Well, that might be an appropriate point, My Lords, if there is to be a short adjournment.
LORD SUTHERLAND: Yes, very well. We'll adjourn for 15 minutes."

His reasoning then seems to be - presented with bomb bag bits found inside plus "not necessarily explosion-damaged" means only surface scratches, not holes sufficient to allow the shards – maybe? And why is he brining the plastic evidence bag into what happened in the explosion? someone please make this make sense.

On the bag itself, I'll let someone else google this one for the very scant clues we have to go on. Go ahead and use "Sophie Hudson." Was there something unusual about where this might have been relative to, say, the Bedford suitcase? Or something? Or is it just an irrelevant patch of oddness?

[Rolfe]

I haven't read that in detail yet, but if you want a new rabbit hole, try this one.

Pan Am 103: what really happened? (http://www.newswithviews.com/guest_opinion/guest164.htm)

ETA: I should maybe mention that this guy is as mad as a bag of spanners.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

I haven't read that in detail yet, but if you want a new rabbit hole, try this one.

Pan Am 103: what really happened? (http://www.newswithviews.com/guest_opinion/guest164.htm)

ETA: I should maybe mention that this guy is as mad as a bag of spanners.

Rolfe.

Looks pretty dumb. On a quick read it seems he's saying it was an accident, not a bomb, but there was a guy in the cockpit with a gun. And some stuff besides that I don't have the patience for. I guess I don't want a new rabbit hole.

On this PH/137, I was hoping for more commentary. Reading Feraday's explanations here I can only paraphrase Michael Palin (IIRC) in The Holy Grail: “what a strange person.” Am I just reading it wrong? The long quotes above are almost continuous, and it seems all that's said about this investigation. That's about all there is to study, I think, aside from two other bits:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2000/05/03/world/main191456.shtml
In an article dated June 5 but obviously filed much earlier, CBS News reported the trial was to be adjourned for two weeks until May 23rd after both sides “reached a deal on how to handle evidence from debris” of the crash. This agreement “also stipulated that a purple hold-all piece of luggage was checked on at London's Heathrow airport by victim Sophie Hudson.”

The trial transcript is just as enigmatic on what this means and why it bears special mention. Testimony of a witness introduced by Mr. Campbell as "my learned junior, Ms. Armstrong" that "the following facts are agreed and should be admitted in evidence." From day 7, May 11 2000, trasnscript pages 1026/1027
If I can go back now to the second paragraph on the first page. 2 (a), that label 134 (police reference PH/137) is a purple coloured nylon-canvas holdall with a pink base and black canvas carry handles; (b) that said holdall was used by Sophie Hudson on flight Pan Am 103 on the 21st of December 1988, and was checked-in baggage; and (c) that the said Sophie Hudson boarded flight 103 and checked in her holdall on the 21st of December 1988 at Heathrow Airport, London.
LORD SUTHERLAND: Thank you, Ms. Armstrong.

I wouldn't mind seeing if there's more out there, but that's it so far. I could swear Rolfe or someone I saw somewhere mentioning a purple caryall, or some such, somehwere, but that also doesn't come up in a GoogleTM brand search.

But considering Feraday's strained logic over this issue, I suspect we may be looking at a valuable clue.

[Rolfe]

I'm still not with you. When I googled the name, all I got was lists of victims.

You're going to have to spell it out for me.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

I'm still not with you. When I googled the name, all I got was lists of victims.

You're going to have to spell it out for me.

Rolfe.

Okay well that confirms that there's no other info about, so to recap the little we know:
Sophie Hudson's purple bag was loaded at Heathrow, I would think checked there as opposed to interline. This fact came up as requiring special mention in court, for some reason. During the explosion, this bag was apparently penetrated by two bits of metal from the bomb suitcase, was later studied by Hayes in this light, and obfuscated from the explosion damage area by Feraday's inexplicable reasoning. It does not seem to have been included in calculating where or how the explosion happened.

This reasoning in turn seems (to me) that even though these shards could fit through the "penetrations," Feraday couldn't *convince himself* this was explosion damage and chose to think of them as surface "cuts." The pieces were just put in the bag from somewhere else, and he didn't find out where. His report first supported this saying there were "no penetrations" in the bag, corrected just before his questioning to "no other pentrations," aside from the "cuts" that *could* allow the fragments through but for some reason he doesn't think that's how they got there.

No damage to the plastic evidence bag is also cited as a clue these didn't fly in thru the cuts and into the evidence bags. This in particular is a ridiculous non-sequitur, so I must be misreading, right?

A I am not sure what you mean. But what it would then say is as there are no other penetration -- at the top of the page, I am talking about the ragged horizontal cuts which, obviously, one can see as penetrations. I see them as cuts. Now, in dealing with, first of all, the holdall, there are no other penetration holes in it, other than those that I've already said about the cuts. And in the plastics bag, there were none, the plastics bag which contained the two fragments of metal from the suitcase. So I was left scratching my head as to how they can get inside there, in a plastics bag, if they didn't come through any part of the bag.
Q Do you --
A I can't convince myself they come through the ragged cuts.
Q You recollect the label attached to the plastics bag, Mr. Feraday, having said "two pieces of metal, charred, found within baggage."
A Yes, I do, sir.
Q And you recollect finding penetrations in the side of the bag that went right through to the interior of the bag?
A Horizontal cuts, yes, sir.
Q But you felt it pertinent to remind us that there were no other penetrations in the bag, Mr. Feraday; is that right?
A Not big enough for the -- for anything to do with the two pieces of metal. That's correct, sir, yes.
Q But the penetrations you'd already found were big enough for the penetration of the two bits of metal?
A Oh, yes, sir.

Reading that again, I'm still unsure how else to read it, but this way it looks so incredibly stupid that... :confused:

[Caustic Logic]

To ammend the above just a bit, I shouldn't have adduced "evidence bag" from "plastics bag." If it was a proper evidence bag he'd likely have called it that. Instead it would seem some careless investigator put them in an ad hoc plastic evidence bag after finding them. I don't see why, but I don't see anything else making sense.

I guess what I'm trying for is a more rational explanation for Feraday's thought process than what I was seeing off the bat which seems Bollier-esque contempt of court loony. Perhaps he just meant, "obviously, the bomb didn't put them in the plastic bag, one of our people did. Therefore, they probably got the scraps from somewhere else, but threw them in there instead." Perhaps if we could see the evidence we'd see why he felt the shards did not just enter through the two tears that did run into the bag. These were made by something, could allow these two pieces, and then some knucklehead could find them in there but separate them into their own plastic bag before carrying on, leaving Mr. Feraday scratching his head later and for whatever intent or effect, almost erasing this piece of evidence from the picture based on his solution.

And to sum up, I suspect this is some class of clue, but of an inconclusive nature. We simply don't have the information to know just what it means. Or do we? Or make some guesses? What do we know about loading procedures at Heathrow and where this bag might have wound up? I suspect it might feed the hull-bomb theories and such more than anything.

Noted anyway.

[Rolfe]

I agree this makes Feraday look like a complete idiot. I've done expert witness work and there's no excuse for that sort of performance.

However, where does it get us beyond that?

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

I agree this makes Feraday look like a complete idiot. I've done expert witness work and there's no excuse for that sort of performance.

However, where does it get us beyond that?

Rolfe.

Well, hmmm. Firstly, I suspect Feraday is not actually an idiot. Therefore, if he seems like one, he may be playing dumb and that's often a clue. Of what exactly I don't know. If I ever learn concrete details of how the Heathrow loading was done, maybe this could mean more. Until then...

Anotther point I meant to make a while back, on the case in general so this is the best thread: MSP Christine Grahame and others are calling for a new international probe into the "linked bombings" of PA103 and Iran Air 655. http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/11/international-probe-call.html
I've always felt if "we" ever did revisit the guilt behind Lockerbie and it pointed to Iran/Syria/PFLPGC/etc. then it should be looked at in context. If This is a tit-for-tat the West just wasn't prepared to continue, we'll need to understand the tat in order to grasp the tit.

[Rolfe]

Hmmm, remember the account of Feraday as having no more qualifications than an HNC that was 30 years out of date? Could be wrong of course, but it gives the impression of someone who managed to get promoted way above his abilities.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Cross-quoting from another thread where I agree it's a bit out of place.

Friendly suggestion. If you have evidence that a conspiracy or a coverup has occurred with regard to an act of terrorist mass murder like Pan Am 103, don't ask us to investigate it with you. Take it to a prosecutor or an investigative journalist, or write up an article yourself and submit it for publication somewhere. Yes, I realize that's the recommendation we give the 9-11 Troofers, but it's sound advice, possibly the only non-spurious advice we give them. Take it to heart.

We do have evidence, and plenty. I see what you're saying about the futility of internet discussion vs. real legal action and such, and I for one am quite serious about it. But there are different tracks, including public opinion that will need to change, I think before it can do so officially. At the moment the proper authorities would be no help, with their heels dug in so deep on the issue. And most important from my end, I'm prepared to give a speech at the UN or whatever, once I figure stuff out better. It's tougher making up your own mind than accepting a ready-made narrative.

Plus people are already writing great articles, books, videos, and probing at least on new official investigations.

So, considering that it's quite possible the real killers were never punished, and the real truth never uncovered, it's worth re-visiting. And for the public awareness track, we're all part of that and can do our parts. Or not I guess. Just a friendly suggestion. :)

[Caustic Logic]

Rolfe being mentioned for excellent contributions at Prof. Black's blog.
I must congratulate 'Rolfe' and Patrick Haseldine on the interesting set of comments re Pik Botha, Carlsson and Pan Am 103. At the same time I hope they will forgive me for pointing out that to us the relatives, this all falls into the category of 'speculation'.
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/12/dr-swire-on-pan-am-103-what-really.html

Jim Swire is awesome. He's obviously highly intelligent. He clearly wants truth and justice over his daughter's death. And yet he refused to accept the carefully prosecuted (intelligent?) case against Libya (the killers?)? What gives, huh?

Personally I entered the Zeist courtroom expecting to see the murderers of my daughter condemned and punished. The effect was the opposite, the evidence and the way in which it was derived and used, convinced me that neither Megrahi nor Fhimah were guilty as charged. But I was left with some relatively reliable information, compared with that derived from the best efforts of those people, may of them so well meaning, who previously had had no access whatever to any means of penetrating the official wall of silence, being obliged to speculate as a result of their (and our) exclusion.

Bolding mine. It really was an evidence-led investigation, as Marquise et al. state. So why does the evidence itself seem led by some made-for-teevee script? Why are most people so confident in the results so reluctant to ever pay close scrutiny to the evidence that led to that wonderful place? All that matters is that once it was put together in such a way that some judges agreed. They never did seem eager to repeat the performance, and the cancer gave them their way to avoid a dangerous repeat for good.

Man am I cynical by now. I think my heart hurts.

[Buncrana]

For those looking in, there were 3 critical aspects to this case which resulted in the conviction of Megrahi. The other threads on this forum cover these aspects, but to summarize:

1. An unaccompanied bomb bag came from Malta as illustrated by Frankfurt airport worker Mrs Erac's printout. [http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=155657]

2. The fragment of timer discovered around the Scottish border pointed the finger towards Libya and thus Megrahi. [http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=153971]

3. The shop owner's recollection of the sale of clothes used in concealing the bomb and the purchaser 'resembled' Megrahi. [http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=158909]


And, as the saying goes, that's all folks. No evidence that Megrahi ever bought this timer. No evidence of Megrahi with the semtex used in making the bomb, and despite over 10 years of investigating, no evidence whatsoever of how Megrahi actually placed the suitcase on the Air Malta flight which then wound it's way around 3 airport security systems and onto 103 at Heathrow. This accusation and evidence presented was so weak that his accomplice in Malta, and co-accused at Zeist, was immediately acquitted of all charges.

1. As the other thread on this forum demonstrates, the were some odd circumstances surrounding the production of Mrs Erac's printout from Frankfurt Airport, when consideration is given to the aspect that no other records from Frankfurt were recovered - or at least disclosed. Mrs Erac's story of how this came to be the only document purporting to show an unaccompanied bag from a baggage station collecting Air Malta luggage - and according to prosecutors, the bomb bag - and then finding it's way onto the PanAm feeder flight have been challenged in some respects. We know initial reports in Germany wrongly stated it was a flight from Frankfurt that had crashed over Lockerbie, which you would therefore expect, naturally, law and security officials to spring into action. Aside from the inaccurate first reports of the crash originating in Germany, Frankfurt was also on high alert for an attempt of sabotage on a aircraft from other investigations in the weeks proceeding 21st Dec 1988. So why was Mrs Erac's record the only document recovered from an airport prepared for a possible airline attack, and why wasn't the bag noticed by airport baggage examiners warned beforehand to look out for bombs contained in Toshiba radios?

2. The timer fragment, it's discovery, it's identification and the chain of records pertaining to it, are also subject to some dispute. As a result, the integrity of the timer fragment itself is questioned, together with the knowledge that the three main 'expert' and 'scientific' protagonists in discovering and identifying the 'fragment' have all been, subsequent to the Lockerbie investigation, discredited in other unrelated work associated with forensic evidence brought to court. Despite repeated denials over the years, and claims that this vital piece of evidence did not leave the UK mainland due to it's critical importance, it has recently been confirmed that this fragment had indeed been examined by various people in various countries outside the UK.

3. The clothes that were contained around the bomb that brought down 103, were recovered and identified as being from a small shop in Sliema, Malta. The shop owner provided many statements to the investigators, including many differing descriptions of the buyer, and some additional information including Christmas lights in the town and weather on the day the purchase was made. However, the shop owner Tony Gauci was recollecting a purchase nine months earlier, so perhaps vague and inconsistent recollections are inevitable. However, despite all these discrepancies, his testimony was accepted by the court and indeed became the main foundation for the bomb originating in Malta and constructed by Megrahi. In 2007 the SCCRC concluded that in it's finding that Megrahi case should be sent to appeal, it had also uncovered evidence that the Maltese shopkeeper had received substantial 'compensation' for his testimony at Zeist further undermining this aspect to the case and investigation.

There are a plethora of other areas which could be decreed as having some significance to the Lockerbie bombing including : CIA, drugs, arms dealers, double-agents, triple agents, Lebanon hostages, South African Apartheid, UN officials, MI6, undisclosed evidence, warnings, tampering of evidence, Bollier and the Swiss timer, duped drugs mule, Iran revenge, paid witnesses and freed terrorists. However, the main critical areas as detailed above, should be of primary concern to everyone, as that was the basis for forming the indictment, and ultimately, the conviction of Megrahi who was incarcerated for 9 years before being released on compassionate grounds.

[realdon]

Removed

[Caustic Logic]

Slow times on these threads. I did a new post on my blog about the Vincennes/IA655 incident, trying to understand if the Iranians really had reason to get angry and seek revenge of the 103 type. It gets clearer the more I look.
http://12-7-9-11.blogspot.com/2009/12/ia-655-and-cessation-of-iraq-iran-war.html

[Caustic Logic]

On the above, everyone gets the significance, right? It's widely believed by those not overly-enchanted by the bread crumb trail leading to Libya, that PA103 was Iranian revenge, exacted pretty exactly, for this highly troubling U.S. shoot-down. This is the event "inextricably linked' with Lockerbie, according to the petition circulated in the Scottish Parliament by MSP Grahame. Looking closer, it's little wonder Washington didn't want the two connected in any way. Something had to come between them, because time, original evidence, motive, means, and opportunity all were pushing them together.

The more you know: The Vincennes was designed, tested, and usually used for surface-to-air missions. In July 1988 it was sent for surface-to-surface missions, and only worked its forte in its mistaken actions. Huh.

The function the accident wound up serving was contributing to Iran's growing sense that it could no longer afford the war now that Americans were shooting at them and might just continue. The incident packed a lot of pain into one bad decision, and would two really be that unlikely? Interestignly, I'd suspect the event had an effect on the public unlike much of what they'd already been going through for years. A new (rather more direct) and vastly more powerful enemy, and Fear of heights... Just think again what you're so mad at Megrahi for, recall these people didn't die until hitting the surface. This is almost the definition of terrorism to show that your government's policies might get YOU killed in horrifying ways. X and X has to stop, or the planes might keep falling.

That's the message of terrorism. It's also the message of this accidental outcome of a reckless and otherwise unjustifiable deployment. I know it's harsh to even suggest, but the Iranians are harsh people and they probably saw it just this way. It worked, they cancelled the war rather than risk whatever was in store from outside and/or from below (revolution, etc.). And then some mirror-image atrocity against Americans happened right after that. And we wind up blaming Libya, with the Iranians apparently just giving up after the Autumn Leaves thing.

Who can explain this curious cluster of coinkydinks?

Does it warrant its own thread? Maybe later.

[Rolfe]

Sorry I've been a bit quiet - I've got about a gadzillion Christmas cards and presents still to send.

I don't see any real evidence that the downing of the Airbus was anything more than a negligent accident. And I work beside someone who was right there, serving on the HMS York, at the time. He says that originally the Vincennes tried to blame the York for the loss of the airbus, but the York didn't even have the necessary missiles. They were convinced that they'd shot down a fighter plane, and the airbus was nothing to do with them. However, after about 15 minutes, the penny dropped.

Then the Vincennes and another US warship that was in the area steamed away and left the crew of the York to fish the bodies and the bits of bodies out of the Persian Gulf. The rest of the tale would probably be Too Much Information. They were matching up legs by pairing the shoes at one point.

I am led to believe, however, that revenge for the loss of the Airbus would be seen as a holy duty by the Iranian government, accident or not. There is a complicated theory (Tam Dalyell?) that suggests the revenge should have involved the downing of a number of US passenger jets, and some clandestine deal was done to limit the revenge to just the one, with PA103 being the sacrificial lamb. Not sure I believe that, but it has been alleged.

I was thinking, if I get the cards posted and so on by the weekend, and it doesn't snow, I might drive down to Lockerbie after work on Monday and put a bunch of flowers on the memorial or something. If I can't make it on Monday, I'll go in the springtime. 12th May might be appropriate....

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Sorry I've been a bit quiet - I've got about a gadzillion Christmas cards and presents still to send.

Hey, thanks for taking a minute. I know evryone's gor seasonal stuff going on, even me, just not as much ATM. Actually, wait... oh, this has to be quick.

I don't see any real evidence that the downing of the Airbus was anything more than a negligent accident. And I work beside someone who was right there, serving on the HMS York, at the time. He says that originally the Vincennes tried to blame the York for the loss of the airbus, but the York didn't even have the necessary missiles.They were convinced that they'd shot down a fighter plane, and the airbus was nothing to do with them. However, after about 15 minutes, the penny dropped.

Thanks for that. It's a fascinating case I'm just starting to look at. I don't want to give it a thread in the CT forum, I want to say it was a pure accident. There were so many precusrors for the accident that were willfully set up - well, any event is based on many many realities beneath it combining how thy do... and mistakes do happen, etc. but I can see how Iran felt looking at it all with suspicious eyes, the notion is inescapable. It was an intended accident.

Abdulhasan Bani Sadr President of Iran 1979-1981
30:10
On the shoot-down of IA655 “It was a crime. To the Iranians it was a crime. … The people of Iran have never forgotten. Had it involved any other country, there would have been legal proceedings. A lot of fuss would have been made around the world. But here they destroyed the aircraft and then congratulated themselves."
34:00
On the bombing of Pan Am 103 “Dalhomani spent most of the time in Tehran. He is also an officer in the Syrian Secret Service. Iran ordered the attack and Ahmed Jibril carried it out. With collaboration from the diplomatic missions."

So to the IA655 CT, I won't go further. On the PA103 CT, we needn't go further than acknowledge Iran's perception of the accident was enough to warrant ambitions of in-kind revenge. Just wanted to linger on the issue a moment, to feel why maybe others have NOT wanted to linger on it, as tying it to PA103 would cause.

I was thinking, if I get the cards posted and so on by the weekend, and it doesn't snow, I might drive down to Lockerbie after work on Monday and put a bunch of flowers on the memorial or something. If I can't make it on Monday, I'll go in the springtime. 12th May might be appropriate....

Rolfe.

that would be poignant. It is that time of year. Christmas and Lockerbie forever mixed up together in those parts, huh? It'll fade with time, as people do. But have some nice times this year, huh?

[Architect]

Incidentally, I see that Megrahi's condition continues to deteriorate.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/8423117.stm

[Rolfe]

I saw that on the TV news tonight. It's inevitable, I fear.

I'm not going to get anywhere near Lockerbie tomorrow. I couldn't even get the car as far as the main road yesterday evening because of the snow. The snowploughs and gritters have been out and everything is passable again, but more snow is forecast and it's not weather for 60-mile trips that aren't necessary.

I'll take some spring flowers instead.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

This latest twist in the news makes no sense.

Lockerbie: Megrahi's cancer is spreading (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/world-news/lockerbie-megrahi-s-cancer-is-spreading-1.993449)

No I don't mean that the deterioration of his medical condition makes no sense, it's the later part of the article.

The medical report came as it was revealed that Megrahi had £1.8 million in a Swiss bank account when he was convicted eight years ago. The Crown Office confirmed it refused to grant bail to him as recently as November last year because of concerns he might try to access the money.

The existence of such a large sum in a personal account casts doubt on the Libyan Government’s assertion that Megrahi was simply a low-ranking airline worker.
Ben Wallace, the deputy Shadow Scottish Secretary, described the revelation as “startling”.

"Had this been known at the time, the financial web that linked Libya and Megrahi to international terrorism would have been a major plank in the Crown’s case.

“Far from being the wrong man, this suggests Megrahi was an international co-ordinator of terrorism for Libya,” said the Conservative MP for Lancaster.

Sources close to the Libyan’s defence team said they were aware of the bank account and had several explanations prepared ahead of his trial in the Netherlands in 2000.

These included that the money was given by his employer, Libyan Arab Airlines, to buy aircraft parts abroad in breach of the western trade embargo in place against Libya at the time of the bombing.

Frank Duggan, president of Victims of Pan Am 103, representing American families, said the Swiss bank account was one more reason why Megrahi was not willing to testify.


First, where did this assertion that Megrahi was "a low-ranking airline worker" come from? His airline job was Head of Airline Security for Libyan Arab Airlines, hardly low-ranking in anybody's book. This is a simple fact, and was never disputed.

What is often forgotten is that he had left that job before the Lockerbie bombing to take up a new job as Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies in Tripoli. He wasn't working in the airline industry at all at the crucial time. But again, it's not disputed. That was his job at the time of the bombing. So, not low-ranking, and not even an airline worker.

So far as I am aware, the Libyan government has never made any "assertion that Megrahi was simply a low-ranking airline worker". It would be a pretty silly thing to assert. I suspect a particularly egregious example of the straw man fallacy here. (Invent a silly claim, then point out that it's patent nonsense. Nice.)

He was also probably an intelligence officer. In that respect the Defence strategy (as for most of the case) was to make the Crown prove its assertions rather than either admitting anything or providing explanations. I don't think the Crown ever proved he was a JSO officer after he changed jobs, but I suspect he probably was.

So it's highly probable that he was an international co-ordinator of something for Libya. However, the presence of money in a bank account is not by itself a "financial web that linked Libya and Megrahi to international terrorism". There is still a total absence of evidence to show that Megrahi in person was ever involved in any terrorism, ever handled explosives, ever constructed a bomb. Or that he coupld possibly have got an unaccompanied suitcase on board KM180.

So what about the money?

Well, this part of the Herald report seems to be little more than a re-posting of the Sunday Times article that Robert Black criticised in his blog yesterday (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/12/abdelbaset-ali-al-megrahi-had-secret.html). The money was known about at the time of the court case, and the Defence was prepared to argue "innocent" (or rather, non-Lockerbie-connected) explanations for its being there. The question of that money (if it's still there) wasn't raised by the Crown during the bail hearing. And so on.

Since about 1990 the Sunday Times has been pushing the line that Libya was behind the Lockerbie disaster (a volte-face from their earlier series of articles tracing the atrocity to the PFLP-GC and Ahmed Jibril, apparently led by David Leppard's inexplicable conversion to the Libya theory). Look what the Journalists blog has to say about the writer responsible for the present allegations (http://operation-mockingbird.blogspot.com/2009/12/mark-macaskill-and-lockerbie.html).

Whatever the motivation, it's clear that article is riddled with factual inaccuracies and is as biassed as hell. It's sad to see the Herald repeat it so mindlessly. But given the Herald's readership base, I suspect tomorrow's letters page (recently expanded) will prove an interesting read.

Rolfe.

[zooterkin]

Sources close to the Libyan’s defence team said they were aware of the bank account and had several explanations prepared ahead of his trial in the Netherlands in 2000.
That seems a bit fishy. Surely they only need one explanation, the truth?

[Rolfe]

You'd think so, wouldn't you.

However, this is part and parcel of the defence at the trial, which was to make the prosecution prove their case and not to provide their own narrative. It seems fairly likely that Megrahi was engaged on something not entirely above-board in December 1988, probably sanctions-busting for the Gadaffi regime. It was fairly clear that the Libyan authorities had no intention of revealing what he was actually doing in Luqa airport that morning. And the Libyan authorities had control of the defence, just as the CIA had control of the prosecition.

Preparing a set of obfuscatory smoke-screens would be about par for the course. Revealing what Megrahi was actually up to, not so much. Note also the "sources close to the Libyan's defence team" citation. Nice piece of deniability, or even complete rubbish.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Mr. MacAskill cited those sources when others could also have told him there are actually different reasons to have a million or more in a bank account. I've heard Megrahi's job for Libya described as "sanctions buster." But this was after the bombing. It seems to be from here, a 2002 article I'll have to sign up for later:
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1P2-9989557.html
NELSON Mandela will hear the convicted Lockerbie bomber admit that he was a sanctions-buster for the Libyan regime but deny that he took part in the terrorist attack on PanAm 103 when the former South African president visits Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi in Barlinnie Prison tomorrow.

Labour MP Tam Dalyell, who visited Megrahi in jail two weeks ago, said: "Mandela will ask the same question I did and that was, 'If you weren't involved in terrorism, what were you up to?' Megrahi will give him the same answer. He'll protest his innocence and explain what he did for the Libyan government."

Tying back in with Zooterkin, I Have to agree giving a single reasonable explanation would help re-frame the picture. The various answers are largely more specific subsets of sanctions-circumvention and building commercial ties with the West. Using nearby Malta and neutral Switzerland as bases, it seems.

Did we catch Megrahi's personal response to this issue? (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/12/megrahis-reaction-to-swiss-bank-account.html) It may be his last response to anything. He didn't even bother responding to the "Megrahi's gone missing!" stores a couple days ago.

Twenty-one Years ago today. I'll go have me a moment of silence now. Another will be due July 3.

[Rolfe]

I'm afraid I was digging my car into my driveway at 7.03pm this evening, aided by a couple of neighbours. So the actual moment passed. (I can't see the logic in taking a small snowplough along the pavement, leaving two lines of piled snow across everybody's driveway, but that's what some genius did.)

But today's the day Scotland remembers. I was woken to Pamela Dix speaking on the radio, bemoaning the limbo of not knowing what or who happened to her brother. We won't forget.

I'm just astounded by the ignorance, and frankly the disinfo of the "low-ranking airline worker" assertion. It's good that Megrahi is still well enough to make a response regarding the rest of the allegations at least.

Did you see that Father Keegans was blocked from addressing the 21st anniversary service in Arlington earlier, because they don't want anyone to point out that Megrahi was probably innocent. The Herald published part of the speech he was going to give.

Oh, and Caustic Logic, I've finally figured out what you were on about regarding Frank Duggan. Very very weird. This makes me even more suspicious that the US relatives were essentially bought off. If you got a lot of money from Pan Am because they were allegedly negligent in letting baggage tray 8849 on board PA103A with a bomb on it, and £10 million (no less) from Gadaffi because Megrahi allegedly put the bomb in that case, are you really going to want to hear that it almost certainly didn't happen like that? So what better than an "official spokesman" with no personal interest, whose job is simply to fob off all challenges.

I find "Charles" on the Robert Black blog strangely interesting, although he's looking at the rabbit hole I'm reluctant to venture down.

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

It's so sad and such a shame that amid the sorrow and frustration that must be shared by so many family and friends with each passing anniversary, this time for reflection is soured by spurious media reports and the vitriolic words from the likes of Duggan.

He certainly does not represent all the US families, and quite why his arrogant nonsensical caterwauling is a permanent feature in the media, far less why he is allowed to determine who speaks and who does not at the Arlington memorial, is deeply saddening. I take CL's point, but as I say, AFAIK he certainly does not represent all (perhaps not even a majority) of the US families, although he certainly has the boot spurs and the bombastic characteristics to appear credible and reasoned to some.

[Buncrana]

On the above, everyone gets the significance, right? It's widely believed by those not overly-enchanted by the bread crumb trail leading to Libya, that PA103 was Iranian revenge, exacted pretty exactly, for this highly troubling U.S. shoot-down. This is the event "inextricably linked' with Lockerbie, according to the petition circulated in the Scottish Parliament by MSP Grahame. Looking closer, it's little wonder Washington didn't want the two connected in any way. Something had to come between them, because time, original evidence, motive, means, and opportunity all were pushing them together.

The more you know: The Vincennes was designed, tested, and usually used for surface-to-air missions. In July 1988 it was sent for surface-to-surface missions, and only worked its forte in its mistaken actions. Huh.

The function the accident wound up serving was contributing to Iran's growing sense that it could no longer afford the war now that Americans were shooting at them and might just continue. The incident packed a lot of pain into one bad decision, and would two really be that unlikely? Interestignly, I'd suspect the event had an effect on the public unlike much of what they'd already been going through for years. A new (rather more direct) and vastly more powerful enemy, and Fear of heights... Just think again what you're so mad at Megrahi for, recall these people didn't die until hitting the surface. This is almost the definition of terrorism to show that your government's policies might get YOU killed in horrifying ways. X and X has to stop, or the planes might keep falling.

That's the message of terrorism. It's also the message of this accidental outcome of a reckless and otherwise unjustifiable deployment. I know it's harsh to even suggest, but the Iranians are harsh people and they probably saw it just this way. It worked, they cancelled the war rather than risk whatever was in store from outside and/or from below (revolution, etc.). And then some mirror-image atrocity against Americans happened right after that. And we wind up blaming Libya, with the Iranians apparently just giving up after the Autumn Leaves thing.

Who can explain this curious cluster of coinkydinks?

Does it warrant its own thread? Maybe later.

The Vincennes incident has always left me somewhat uneasy with it's background, the actual incident itself and the conclusions. This whole period of the 1980's was a quagmire for US foreign policy. Supporting Saddam while arming the Iranians against the Russians, could only be one very precarious hot potato to juggle with. I do believe that the moment the missile struck IA655 over the Persian Gulf and the US govt were seen to ignore the transgressions of it's naval officers involved while exhibiting a crushing apathy towards those non-americans killed, the fate of 270 further innocent people's lives were sealed. The dead though are dead, and the murdered remain murdered whether it is by a home-made IED or a multi-million pound production of the corporate arms industry. The dead of one act cannot be called collateral damage while the victims of another are the victims of cowardly murderers.

In this great era of Thatcher-Blairite/Reagan-Bush brutal modernisation the past must be swept aside and we all must whistle a happy tune and move on. A path is dictated, a future is mapped, and without recourse to genuine cerebral activity the happy band must waltz along the directed route with cheery grins and apple cheeks. Those who fail to find their dance shoes, or dare question our methods, are nothing less than Fedayeen deadenders waving a blunt sword over the outstretched neck of your government and fellow countrymen.

Sorry, I'm rambling away here, thinking aloud. As you say, this could be another time, another thread.

[Caustic Logic]

Zooterkin, Architect, thanks for commenting. It's always heartening to see someone else decide this issue is worth talking about, at least a little. To the lurkers, ditto but replace talking with reading.

I'm afraid I was digging my car into my driveway at 7.03pm this evening, aided by a couple of neighbours. So the actual moment passed. (I can't see the logic in taking a small snowplough along the pavement, leaving two lines of piled snow across everybody's driveway, but that's what some genius did.)

The roads have to be cleared. Most of its length the (side-berms?) are a no-brainer deal for passability. At driveways or even side-street entrances plowed over, those just have to be managed locally by the people passing them. This stuff just seems elemental to me after the winter we had last year (94 inches total, a record). Count yourself lucky you got your car in, says I.

Did you see that Father Keegans was blocked from addressing the 21st anniversary service in Arlington earlier, because they don't want anyone to point out that Megrahi was probably innocent. The Herald published part of the speech he was going to give.

That's politics, they say, which has no place in a solemn remembrance. Actually, I suppose it is politics in a real sense. And political interpretations are not a good fit at the solem parts, with the silence and ringing bell and all that. But they always go past that, into the anger or sense of justice or injustice emanating from it. Ignoring the false premise of the official story is tacitly accepting it as the basis of all the post-remembrance activity. And I'd wager if we checked the speeches given, the acceptance was well more than tacit, and the dismissal of certain views was nothing but political in itself.

Oh, and Caustic Logic, I've finally figured out what you were on about regarding Frank Duggan. Very very weird. This makes me even more suspicious that the US relatives were essentially bought off. If you got a lot of money from Pan Am because they were allegedly negligent in letting baggage tray 8849 on board PA103A with a bomb on it, and £10 million (no less) from Gadaffi because Megrahi allegedly put the bomb in that case, are you really going to want to hear that it almost certainly didn't happen like that? So what better than an "official spokesman" with no personal interest, whose job is simply to fob off all challenges.

Didn't realize I was being any more cryptic than usual. Essentially, it seems he was appointed by Presdent Bush to liaise with the relatives and help represent them. I had gotten the impression he was a "victim of Pan Am 103," in the sens of course of losing someone, but it doesn't seem so. His vitriolic certainties and political heavy-handedness didn't SEEM like the way of one driven by genuine loss and hunger for truth. I think he's only been the corps president for a year or two now, but involved longer, and deserves no awe of the kind we can afford those like Dr. Swire who are so driven.

On the American side especially though there is that confirmation bias, as you explained. I sense that for sure. "It just has to be so." Political appointment and/or money seem to be sufficient to amplify the original encoded false signal. I wouldn't be surprised at all if a few genuine victims were also subsidized to speak a little too surely of the justness of the official case. If pressed though, I hope they'd behave differently than Mr. Duggan.

I find "Charles" on the Robert Black blog strangely interesting, although he's looking at the rabbit hole I'm reluctant to venture down.

Rolfe.

I just caught his comments, unsure what to make of it all. No big rush either. It's that time of year.

Buncrana: excellent posts, thanks for helping shake off the slumber momentarily. I appreciate fully your queasiness re: The Vincennes and IA655. Now that I've learned a bit it's too fascinatingly horrible to put down. We do all know the attacked ships Capt. Rogers was going to help were fake signals in a US sting operation to lure out iranians to shoot at right? I said I'd go no further though.

But to summarize, Rolfe says it was probably a "negligent accident," and I guess I'll agree, with the note that "negligent" is a big word. And there is a point where the negligence gets too much to accept as real rather than a cover. I can't say at this point is this case is over that line, or just too darn near it for comfort.

Everyone agrees the Iranians paid out $10 million for revenge. Just some feel they never collected on that, in the over two decades since.

But Megrahi had 1.8 million in an account, which proves... something.

[Caustic Logic]

Aaah! I always wind up with the last word before another lull. Ah well.

On keeping politics out of the memorial service. recall Mr. Duggan de-listed Friar Keegans' speech because his comments (supporting al Megrahi's innocence) had no place in "a day to remember 270 innocent souls murdered in an act of state sponsored terrorism. It is not a day for politics, a discussion of the bomber's trial and conviction or of his health."

I noted above that I agree the solemn remembrance part should be politics free, but it would go beyond that into tacit or more direct embrace of the OFFICIAL politics. So let's check - President Obama sent John O Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism. And he said:

The evidence was clear. The trial was fair. The guilt of Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi was proven beyond a reasonable doubt. His conviction stands. The sentence was just. And nothing—not his unjustified release and certainly not a deplorable scene on a tarmac in Tripoli—will ever change those facts or wash the guilt from his hands or from the hands of those who assisted him in carrying out this heinous crime.

Boy, that's some solemn and meditative non-political stuff there. The victims should be proud to see their deaths still used so shamelessly to cover U.S. official policy.

You know, I really want to ask these "hero's welcome" bemoaners two questions
1) How should Libyans have responded to the return of a convicted murderer of 270 they generally feel is innocent and wrongly convicted? Boos and hisses and a mob dismemberment? Hang their heads in solemn recognition of America's official delusions?
2) Do you really feel, as you people imply so often, the cheers were FOR the murder of the Lockerbie victims? Why so vague, just complaining about the "spectacle" rather than what you think it actually means?

Anyone here who feels they can field that question, I'm all ears.

[Buncrana]

Huh...according to the bold Frank '103 inc' Duggan, it is only the "deniers" and "cranks", as are Robert Black and Jim Swire, who will not and cannot accept the "overwhelming evidence" of guilt on the part of Megrahi. Evidence of which Mr Duggan "doesn't know how to explain it".

Well, quite.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWWg5xivFkI

[Rolfe]

He's a paid shill.

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

Jim Swire, with some of the other 103's victims relatives, have apparently secured the help and advice of renowned and formidable solicitor Gareth Pierce.

This could be the last and yet the most significant and promising step taken by Dr Swire in his quest to discover, at least some, of the truth behind his daughters awful death. Ms Pierce is someone whom any State, legal system, it's judges and lawyers, will be extremely concerned at her involvement. Ms Pierce's lengthy experience (esp. within the British judicial system) and tenacious persistence will be an invaluable addition to Dr Swire's search.

Not to mention, she also has intimate knowledge of some of those involved at the Camp Zeist. The names Feraday and Hayes, not to mention the involvement of RARDE itself, have been center stage in some of the other miscarriages of justice she has exposed.

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/lockerbie-families-sign-up-leading-lawyer-in-bid-for-public-inquiry-1.993737?

[Rolfe]

She's not up to speed yet. She's declaring that the evidence the MST-13 was planted is strong, but as we've seen it's not as easy to knock over as all that. She even seems to be giving some credence to Bollier's substitution claims, but again I think the evidence says that's bunk.

A lot of what she's alleging is just hearsay, or standard "pet theories" regurgitated. She doesn't even seem to have decided which pet theory she espouses. I hope she'll come to a clearer undertanding when she's had a chance to look at the evidence in detail.

The annoying thing is, it's really quite easy to come to the conclusion that Megrahi didn't buy the clothes from Gauci and didn't put the bomb on the plane. If that's the sum total of what is required to be proved then it's not exactly challenging. It's figuring out any sort of coherent narrative about what did happen that's the tricky bit.

I'm afraid she may join so many others in throwing around obfuscating doubt rather than illuminating the issue. I hope I'm wrong though.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

'm ashamed to say I had gotten Pierce and Grahame confused a little. I agree Pierce needs to not flail around so much, but Grahame for her part is A-okay. Her sideline with the movements of PT/35(b) didn't pan out so great (as we predicted), but I re-read here article "Megrahi is home. And he is innocent" and I decided she's in the right space all told and will do about as well as anyone up against the same behemoth.
I am convinced not only that Megrahi was not found guilty "beyond reasonable doubt", the test in Scot's law, but that he is an innocent man. [...] As for any inquiry, that's out there in the long grass. They are people in authority who are relying on Lockerbie fatigue setting in again. It mustn't.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/christine-grahame-almegrahi-is-home-and-he-is-innocent-1776188.html

Thought I'd share two other interesting quoteable conservative politicians:
Margaret Thatcher: “December 21 - Lockerbie bombing.” (not 21 December? Hmmm) - The entire reference to the event in Thatcher’s 914-page memoir The Downing Street Years (1995). "We wish to add nothing to the text" - Her response when asked, by a British PA103 relatives' group, about the book’s silence.
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/12/bernard-ingham-on-lockerbie.html

One I didn't expect - David Frum, American political commnentor, neoconservative, speechwriter for Bush II. IIRC, it was Frum who was (at least half) responsible for the phrase "Axis of Evil."
For years, many well-informed people in the intelligence community have doubted al-Megrahi's guilt in the Lockerbie bombing. They have argued that the bombing was the work of a Syrian based Palestinian group, the PFLP-GC, working for the government of Iran. Among those who support the Iran-did-it theory are: (i) former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon; (ii) Robert Baer, the CIA official who worked directly on the Lockerbie case; (iii) Hans Koechler, the UN Security Council observer at al-Megrahi's trial; (iv) Robert Black, the Scottish lawyer who organized the trial proceedings; (v) Dr. Jim Swire, the spokesman for the families of British Lockerbie victims who lost his own daughter aboard Pan Am Flight 103; and (vi) David Horovitz, editor of the Jerusalem Post.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2009/08/22/david-frum-why-so-little-outcry-from-washington-on-al-megrahi.aspx

[Rolfe]

As I said, Christine Grahame is my local MSP, and I know her slightly. I've had personal email correspondence with her researcher about this issue, and I'm fairly sure she and her team are pretty solid on the research front.

Gareth Pierce, for all her stellar reputation, is very much a Johnny-come-lately to the Lockerbie debate. She is an English lawyer for a start, so it's not really her jurisdiction. I think she's just been reading Paul Foot and similar commentary (possibly even de Braeckeleer), without going too deeply into it as yet. However, she is a smart cookie who has passionate sympathy for victims of the "system", so I hope she reads a bit more, that's all.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Hey cool, my first full re-post by Prof Black.
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2009/12/on-libyas-admission-of-responsibility.html

[Caustic Logic]

Sorry, not quite a full re-post, but it got some attention after Black posted it, and kicked up a bit of info the skeptics might like. An admission of guilt, partial guilt, says a respected guy - Arnaud de Borchgrave (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnaud_de_Borchgrave), via Frank Duggan and Prof. Black. I wrote about the response here:
http://12-7-9-11.blogspot.com/2010/01/admission-of-guilt.html
e-mail, in part, de Borchgrave to Duggan (solicited)
As Gaddafi explained it to me, which you are familiar with, it was indeed Iran's decision to retaliate for the Iran Air Airbus shot down by the USS Vincennes on its daily flight from Bandar Abbas to Dubai that led to a first subcontracting deal to Syrian intel, which, in turn, led to the 2nd subcontract to Libyan intel. As he himself said if they had been first at this terrorist bat, they would not have put Malta in the mix; Cyprus would have made more sense to draw attention away from Libya.

He claims it was after a July 1993 interview that Gaddafi dismissed all his bodyguards and admitted "off the record" that Libyan intelligence had agreed to be involved in Iran's retaliation for IA655. Two tellings at least predate the e-mail.

2009 (http://www.acus.org/new_atlanticist/honor-among-terrorists):
Megrahi was a small cog in a much larger conspiracy. ...
Gaddafi candidly admitted that Lockerbie was retaliation for the July 3, 1988, downing of an Iranian Airbus. Air Iran Flight 655 ... "[R]etaliation, he said, was clearly called for. Iranian intelligence subcontracted retaliation to one of the Syrian intelligence services (there are 14 of them), which, in turn, subcontracted part of the retaliatory action to Libyan intelligence (at that time run by Abdullah Senoussi, Gaddafi's brother-in-law). "Did we know specifically what we were asked to do?" said Gaddafi. "We knew it would be comparable retaliation for the Iranian Airbus, but we were not told what the specific objective was," Gaddafi added."

2004 (http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2004/1/8/23958.shtml):
[Gaddafi] admitted Libya's guilt for the downing of Pan Am 103, but made clear that it was originally an Iranian [plot] ... “So the Iranians subcontracted part of the job to a Syrian intelligence service, which, in turn, asked the Libyan Mukhabarat to handle part of the assignment," Col. Gadhafi explained. "That is the way these things were planned in those days. If we had initiated the plot, we would have made sure the accusing finger was pointed in the other direction and we would have picked Cyprus, not Malta, where some of the organization was done. The others picked Malta presumably to frame us."

Discuss.

[Rolfe]

Well, I've heard a number of alleged private confessions from various suspects in this affair. Jibril is alleged to have confessed. There are any number of people proffering individual pieces of evidence they happen to have, which point this way and that.

What makes this one different? Not a lot, it seems, judging from the discussion on Prof. Black's blog.

Rolfe.

[Architect]

Newsnight Scotland claim to have something new but for some reason I can't get it to work properly:


(http://search.bbc.co.uk/click/p/1/ds/av/t/Lockerbie%2520bomb%2520evidence%2520%2527merky%252 7/id/17231391418241262780095137164700000/sp/07b4f8f7200d1c4f6dc78ffa13a3a136/-/http%253a%252f%252fnews%252ebbc%252eco%252euk%252f today%252fhi%252ftoday%252fnewsid%255f8443000%252f 8443014%252estm)Lockerbie bomb evidence 'merky' (http://search.bbc.co.uk/click/p/1/ds/av/t/Lockerbie%2520bomb%2520evidence%2520%2527merky%252 7/id/17231391418241262780095137164700000/sp/07b4f8f7200d1c4f6dc78ffa13a3a136/-/http%253a%252f%252fnews%252ebbc%252eco%252euk%252f today%252fhi%252ftoday%252fnewsid%255f8443000%252f 8443014%252estm)
Newsnight's Peter Marshall on new BBC findings that undermine crucial evidence used to convict Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.
(http://search.bbc.co.uk/click/p/1/ds/av/t/Lockerbie%2520bomb%2520evidence%2520%2527merky%252 7/id/17231391418241262780095137164700000/sp/07b4f8f7200d1c4f6dc78ffa13a3a136/-/http%253a%252f%252fnews%252ebbc%252eco%252euk%252f today%252fhi%252ftoday%252fnewsid%255f8443000%252f 8443014%252estm)


ETA: Link (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8441796.stm) to text version

[Professor Yaffle]

Brief summary is that the UN European consultant on explosives has done lots of tests blowing up combinations of radio, suitcase etc and in every case (20 explosions), none of the circuit board/timer etc survived the blast, it was just dust. More on newsnight tonight.

[Rolfe]

This is actually a lot more relevant in the thread specifically about the timer fragment (which I will bump).

Newsnight piece has been postponed because the Labour Party tried to depose Gordon Brown today. Possibly Friday, now.

Rolfe.

ETA: I see I'm well behind, it's already up there. Sorry, I heard about this on the morning radio news, but I've been shovelling snow all bloody day.

[Rolfe]

Gordon Brewer has just announced that one of the Newsnicht ("Newsnight Scotland") items at 11pm will be "Should Megrahi ever have been convicted?"

I wish we were allowed to discuss some aspects of this in Politics, but it's apparently verboten.

Rolfe.

ETA: Just watched it, and it seems to have been a repeat of the item already under discussion from yesterday - I think it was shown in England yesterday, hence the slight confusion.

I return this discussion to the thread about the timer fragment, because that's what it was about, it didn't question the identification evidence or the Erac printout.

ETA again: The version on the BBC web site is slightly longer than what I just watched on TV - it has more criticism of Thurman.

[Ambrosia]

So Newsnight have investigated evidence that the MST-13 fragment was planted. The results strongly suggest that it was, and certainly warrant further testing.

Neither the report from Dr Wyatt nor the results of tests carried out pretrial seem to be available.

[Rolfe]

The BBC weren't saying the F-word. Just implying either that the fragment was some random thing that happened to resemble an MST-13 timer and just happened to be there (what??), or maybe that it was indeed a bit of an MST-13 timer, but again it just happened to be there and had nothing to do with the actual bomb. (What????!!)

Did they really come up the Clyde on a banana boat?

Rolfe.

[geni]

Explosions are seriously unpredictable. While glass fiber is something you would generaly expect to be reduced to dust there are plently of reports of oddities surviving explosions.

[Professor Yaffle]

Just noticed this in the Grauniad's listings:


Friday 15th January 2010, 12.30pm
Glasgow Royal Concert Hall : Exhibition Hall

A panel of experts including Dr Jim Swire discuss the issues and outcomes following the release of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi from prison in 2009.


http://www.glasgowconcerthalls.com/whatson/event/93072-Iain-Anderson-in-Conversation-Dr-Jim-Swire

[Rolfe]

Mmmmm. Could be worth a visit.

Rolfe.

[Architect]

Actually, that looks rather worthwhile. I'm not sure if I'm in the Glasgow office that day or not, and will have a look at my diary.

[Rolfe]

I wish it wasn't right in the middle of the working day though. I don't think I can get away, looking at our rota.

Rolfe.

[commandlinegamer]

Too much to hope someone will televise it...

[Buncrana]

I decided to read "The Book of Honor, The Secret Lives and Deaths of CIA Operatives", by Ted Gup while I was away of the last few weeks.

It's an interesting read, although being honest his chapter on Matthew Gannon who was killed on 103 was my primary motive for reading it. This itself was instigated by a comment made by someone on Prof, Black blog a number of weeks ago called 'Baz'. I'm pretty sure in another comment from about a year ago, Baz asserted he was an ex-policeman. There was no indication whether this may have been US, UK, German or indeed another other nations LE agency. I'm assuming he was either Scottish or English, but that's merely a hunch, and I've no idea if he was originally involved in the original investigation or has simply become an interested party.

He also has a blog, "The Masonic Verses - Lockerbie and other Related Scams" available to read here : http://e-zeecon.blogspot.com/ Some of which is interesting and certainly provides another viewpoint for many of the issues discussed here about the 103 disaster.

However, he is fiercely adament about the 'drug theory' postulated by some as having a bearing on the way the crime was carried out as a 'hoax' and deliberate misdirection. Primarily that is, Allan Francovitch, Lester Coleman and John Ashton. Of course others claim it may have played a part, but he vehemently specifically focuses, unfairly imo, on those individuals.

Some might suggest that even if the drugs theory played no part in the actual bombing, it may have been instrumental in how the investigation, and the evidence recovered, would be steered. However, I digress.

He suggested, somewhat alarmingly for me anyway, a few weeks ago, that he did not belive that Matthew Gannon, part of a CIA team on the flight, had not been killed on 103.

....I've been interuppted here, and will come back to this later!

[Caustic Logic]

He suggested, somewhat alarmingly for me anyway, a few weeks ago, that he did not belive that Matthew Gannon, part of a CIA team on the flight, had not been killed on 103.


I also do not believe he was not killed there. :) I just got in e-mail contact with Baz like yesterday. Why does weird timing haunt me here? Nevermind... His name is Barry Walker, former police on Hong Kong, no connection to the case. It's a later interest, mostly spurred by the Ian Spiro story which I only barely know about. He is British, or at least lives in the UK, unless the stuff in the e-mail was untrue.

Also he's been invited to discuss here, but has been using a public library to access the net, and this site comes up as blocked, occult. Funny.

And since we're bumping the thread, I should hope the presentation with Dr. Swire et al gets posted online, but if not - well, mostly it's stuff we already know, probably. I would like to see it though. And I've started a long working essay on my blog - what's up is close to done and shows how proven liar Giaka largely built the case, first mentioning both accused.
http://12-7-9-11.blogspot.com/2010/01/three-year-test-drive.html

Also, annoying quotes from belligerent Americans
http://12-7-9-11.blogspot.com/2010/01/americans-sigh.html

[Buncrana]

I also do not believe he was not killed there. :)

Ahh what becomes the mind after a 12hr, 2 stops and 3 time changes journey home!

I cannot find no sense in that statement!:)

I just got in e-mail contact with Baz like yesterday. Why does weird timing haunt me here? Nevermind... His name is Barry Walker, former police on Hong Kong, no connection to the case. It's a later interest, mostly spurred by the Ian Spiro story which I only barely know about. He is British, or at least lives in the UK, unless the stuff in the e-mail was untrue.

Also he's been invited to discuss here, but has been using a public library to access the net, and this site comes up as blocked, occult. Funny.

Right, so Mr Baz is ex- Honk Kong. I find much of his writing interesting and at times salient, although I find his outright dismissal together with cognizance assertion that Francovich, Goddard, Coleman et al, have posed a dilerberate hoax, unconvincing. Sometimes it would even appear, he doth protest just too much!


As for the sincerely intrepid Mr Matthew Gannon, Gup and Gannon's brother and sister provide, as one might expect, a human touch to another victim on board 103 that evening. It really strikes me sometimes that in the midst of the injustice of the crime, investigation and trial, the stories behind those poor souls who boarded the plane, and indeed living on Sherwood crescent, are crushed behind the brutal aftermaths effect and activities. A look at the passenger list is a grim reminder. 103 continued accruing it's victims long after 1988, even upto 2000, as the story of the Flannigan family is testament to.

Gannon's father in-law, George Twetten, in a curious twist and almost inevitably when we speak abot Lockerbie, was involved at a high level within the agency, and it seems played a role in the clandestine arms to Iran deal. Just down the hall from North and Cannistrano.

"By the summer of 1988, Gadhafi (sic) and Libya seemed to slip off the front pages of the news. The focus of the fight against terrorism moved from Tripoli to Beruit, where American hostages continued to be held. At that point the agency suspected that support for such terrorism came from Iran." (Gup, p188)

As is so often muted, Iran was someone whom the US could not be seen to be outrightly acceptive or even aggressive towards, and while back channels were maneuvering for hostage deals, arming and protecting Iraqi vessels by blasting, erroneously or otherwise, Iranian passengers out of their seats at 30,000ft, results in a political minefield with assured injuries. Gadaffi, unlike Saddam, would not entertain any shadow of US assistance or influence. Gadaffi, unlike Saddam, still strikes a pose across the Northern landscape of Africa and in the ME. Gadaffi could be sponsored by RayBan before 2020! Cannistrano was feeling the African heat too.

"Tensions with that country ran high in the summer of 1988. On the 3rd July, officers aboard the US navy cruiser Vincennes, deployed in the Persian Gulf believed they detected an incoming Iranian F-14 and fired a surface-to-air missile to intercept the aircraft. The target proved not to be a fighter, but a civilian Iranian airliner, an Airbus A300. Flight 655 was blown apart by the missile and disintergrated midair. Two hundred and ninety passengers and crew members were killed. Once again Iran railed against the US as the Great Satan, and once again there was a feeling in the agency of waiting for the second shoe to drop - for Iran to take it's revenge.

Five months after the downing of Iran flight 655, the CIA's Counterterrorism Center needed an Arabic speaking case officer to send to Beruit on temporary duty. A CTC officer had informed Twetten that his son-in-law had been selected for the assigment." (Gup, p188)

Gannon was assigned to be part of the network who had these channels flowing with information into trying to trackdown the location of the hostages held in Beruit. Gup, through Gannon's brother Richard Gannon, confirms Matthew's return travel plans. Originally intending to return on the 22 December, his flight was switched to Wednesday 21st on 103 just prior to his journey home. Gannon's brother states, "even had Matthew known of the Helsinki warning, he would have probably ignored it and travelled anyway. He was that laid back about threats, and had faced far greater while in Beruit." (Gup, p191) He also confirms that Gannon flew from Cyprus to Frankfurt before swtching at Heathrow onto PanAm103. No mention is made at all throughout to Charles McKee, althought in the Maltese Double Cross the PanAm ground crew noted their acknowledgement of each other at Heathrow.

I find it somewhat strange that Baz's outright and intense dismissal of the drugs possibility a 'hoax' citing lack of clear and incontrovertible evidence, while purporting that the timer was brought over by boat from Sweden or Denmark (?), loaded onto 103 through a baggage handler at Heathrow using a Khreesat (style) timer, and Gannon was not on the flight, presumably then alive and well. Displaying not only lack of this same form of evidence he calls for, but perhaps even more spurious given what is offered from various sources about a possible and probable drug sting operation, but also seemingly introducing his very own misdirectives regarding Gannon's death - or not? He even seems unwilling to entertain the possibilty that it may provide the clue as to why, not that Libya was singled out as the instigators of the attack on 103, but why investigators were clearly led off the paths of Frankfurt and Heathrow as the most obvious points of introduction for the bomb bag. One where records were almost wholly concealed and the other where security breaches only hours before the bombing were surpressed for over 12 years.

[Rolfe]

I'm of your mind as regards Baz. I also think the bomb was most probably introduced at Heathrow, and was in the Bedford suitcase, which means that Aviv was mistaken, and those who follow his theory - Coleman, Francovich et al. - are also barking up the wrong tree. However, it's a big jump from that so assert that they knew this to be the case but fabricated evidence to support their theory anyway. Which is what Baz vehemently insists they did.

He seems to have had some correspondence with Francovich before his death, but if he waded in accusing him of outright fraud I wouldn't be surprised if it was unproductive! Francovich uses reconstructions of what he believes happened. This is a standard film-maker technique. He may have been over-enthusiastic. He may have been duped by Jafaar's family. However, to insist that these reconstructions are "fraudulent" simply because you think they are inaccurate is completely unfair.

Some of the film doesn't stand up terribly well. Innes Graham wittering on about helicopters is just silly. Of course there were a lot of helicopters flying around, you loun, how do you think they got the bodies off those hills? And do you really think you saw someone in a helicopter with a rifle, or does the term "telephoto lens" maybe ring a bell? But we can make up our own minds about the eyewitness interviews, it doesn't make it fraudulent.

I agree that the existence of the controlled drugs deliveries and possibly the suspicion that an associated bag switch at Frankfurt had enabled the bomb to get on board might explain a great deal of what happened at that airport, without that actually having happened. But Baz vehemently dismisses any talk of such a thing. You can't even get any real sense out of him on the subject. He just starts railing about fraud and fabrication, end of story. (Much the same way that Patrick Haseldine does nothing but assert that the SA apartheid regime did it, on even slimmer grounds.) And in fact all his fury seems to have been based on the 90-minute edited version of The Maltese Double Cross that was shown on C4 (which I haven't seen), not the full 2 hour 35 minute film.

I think The Maltese Double Cross is the only documentary that gives any sort of sense of the grief and the tragedy of it all. Some of it has longeurs, but when the sound-track plays McCrimmon's Lament while the picture changes from Middle Eastern scenes to the hills of southern Scotland, it sends a few shivers up my spine. Little "irrelevancies" like the Lockerbie townspeople turning out to honour the departing coffins add a lot to the film.

I also think Coleman can be useful, even though it's semi-fiction. He seems to have done quite a lot of research, although his theory that what happened to him was a result of him knowing Jafaar may well be completely off the mark. As the book was written so early, he highlights quite a few things that have been overlooked since, such as the court proceedings against Pan Am and the FAI.

I think if Baz wants to be taken seriously about the Gothenburg ferry or anything else, he has to start producing some evidence. Otherwise what he thinks has no more currency than what I think.

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

While the Chilcot Inquiry in the UK tiptoes it's way around the real issues surrounding the evidence presented, the invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq, and Tony Blair for a man finding profound strength from his faith, yet lacking all contrition, Jim Swire provides yet another succinct and perceptive view.

From Professor Black's 'Lockerbiecase Blogspot' today, 'Some reflections following Tony Blair's appearence at the Iraq Inquiry' (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2010/01/some-reflections-following-tony-blairs.html).

[Buncrana]

Tomorrow morning at 0900 (GMT) BBC Radio 4 carries an interview with Dr Jim Swire discussing aspects of the Lockerbie disaster.

Taking A Stand. Fergal Keane meets Dr Jim Swire (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00qc02y)

[Rolfe]

Damn! (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/politics/documents-on-lockerbie-may-never-be-seen-1.1002870)

Contrary to public expectations following an announcement in December last year, the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) will not yet be able to release its 800-page report on the case, and is unlikely to be able to disclose much information in the future.

Without the approval of all the key players in the case, including Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, the Libyan convicted of the bombing, the Crown Office, Dumfries and Galloway Police and witnesses such as Maltese shopkeeper Toni Gauci, it is unlikely that any of the material could legally be disclosed to the public. Gauci’s evidence was central to Megrahi’s conviction. [....]


I don't know what there might be to find in these documents, but you never know.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Without the approval of all the key players in the case [...] the Crown Office, Dumfries and Galloway Police and witnesses such as Maltese shopkeeper Toni Gauci, it is unlikely that any of the material could legally be disclosed to the public. [....]

Really? Did they have list of "players" made up, with a clear distinction between "key" and "non-key"? Does this mean my own re-posting of, say, Gauci's testimony from the trial is illegal unless I hunt him down in Australia and ask his approval?
”Q Do you remember what the weather was like when the man came to the shop?
A When he came by the first time, it wasn't raining, but then it started dripping. Not very -- it was not raining heavily. It was simply -- it was simply dripping, but as a matter of fact he did take an umbrella, didn't he? He bought an umbrella.” [Day 31, P 4741]

“Q … on the 1st of September of 1989 your memory was that the man purchased the umbrella, he didn't leave it for you to bundle up with the other things he had bought in the shop, but he left with the umbrella and put it up outside the door of the shop because it was raining?
A Exactly.” [p 4815]

"A It wasn't raining. It wasn't raining. It was just drizzling.
Q We'll come to --
A I can't remember the dates. I don't want to say -- I don't want to give out dates if I am not that sure, sir.
Q Indeed. What I am endeavouring to do, Mr. Gauci, with your help, is to illustrate --
A I always thank you, sir. I am here to help you, sir." [p 4816]

"A I don't want to cause confusion. I don't know dates." [p 4820]

[Caustic Logic]

Oh, and my main point, since it doesn't have dedicated thread, I wanted to mention a new piece I did on Khreesat (http://lockerbiedivide.blogspot.com/2010/03/marwan-khreesat-how-many-times-agent.html). I prefer working with narrower, technical aspects - there are just so many unknowable variables with the level of secret agents, intrigue, words and their relation to what actually happened, etc. The main thing I was wondering is if anyone had any critiques of it. I come across a little strong pushing the negligence (or is it?) kind of angle, and since I'm talking about a real, named, Jordanian intelligence agent, I wouldn't want to be so bold if I had read things wrong.

Considering the arrest was Oct 26, his bomb-making work actually began Oct 22, here's Marshman's report on the events of October 24:
“Around 2.00 p.m. Khreesat took a shower. When Khreesat was in the shower, Dalkamoni knocked on the door and said that he was leaving to go to Frankfurt. After getting out of the shower, Khreesat went back to work on the IEDs. At this time he noticed that the fifth device was no longer in the workroom. He did not pay a lot of attention to this, as he was thinking about the upcoming meeting with Abu Elias. Khreesat speculated that Dalkamoni took the fifth device with him, as only Khreesat and Dalkamoni ever went into the room. After working on the IEDs until late that evening, Khreesat went to bed." [Transcripts, Day 72 p 9258]

He was too meet this "Abu Elias" and hand off the bomb(s) so he could handle the getting it on a plane part.

To clarify an issue we had discussed in whichever thread, things have come together for me to say there were five bombs (a sixth is whispered, on what basis I didn't get yet, so I say 5). Four were recovered - the radio in Dalkamouni's car (model Yaesu FT-211RH), two radio tuners (one of which killed Mr. Sonntag and ruined Ettinger) and later a computer monitor. According to Khreesat, the fifth (Toshiba RT-F423, "bronze in colour just like the model in the catalogue” that he was shown) went missing two days before the arrest. Yet as Marshman's report says “Khreesat told the Germans that they should have waited one more day to make the arrests...” Anyway, on the 25th,

Khreesat told his case officer that he had prepared a device and given it to Abu Elias. Khreesat advised that he had assumed that the fifth device went to Abu Elias, as related above." [27 p 9260]

So is it outlandish to conclude:
If this is undercover work, it’s sloppy, and sloppy with bombs is no good. For whatever reason, Khreesat clearly broke the rule against making live bombs, left them lying around amongst known terrorists who wanted to use them, and waited a day before alerting anyone that one of his pieces had disappeared. Khreesat may have been working to help the West, but certainly not with any coordination to ensure a tight net collected all the bombs and runners. The Germans had no idea of his supposed operation, and didn’t even know there were plural devices. Neither Khreesat nor the GID apparently let them know this basic fact, as a note on the way out or at any time until after the Lockerbie bombing. Such negligence could easily lead to a tragedy like that, and to charges of being a triple agent – only playing at playing the PFLP-GC.

?

[Rolfe]

Really? Did they have list of "players" made up, with a clear distinction between "key" and "non-key"? Does this mean my own re-posting of, say, Gauci's testimony from the trial is illegal unless I hunt him down in Australia and ask his approval?


It's the evidence given to the SCCRC that needs permission to be revealed of course.

I can't tell now if there's really something mega the authorities know and don't want to get out, or if it's just knee-jerk backside-covering and just wanting the whole thing to go away.

Haven't read your Khreesat thing yet, but it's a great topic.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

It's the evidence given to the SCCRC that needs permission to be revealed of course.

I can't tell now if there's really something mega the authorities know and don't want to get out, or if it's just knee-jerk backside-covering and just wanting the whole thing to go away.

The new stuff we don't already know, I see. Luckily, they've mentioned a few points (Christmas Lights, overall impression of possible miscarriage, etc.) and Megrahi's controversial papers have their peeks. (Harry Bell's admission re: Dec 7, more to discover). I think we'll be fine without the full papers, as much as they would help.

Haven't read your Khreesat thing yet, but it's a great topic.

Rolfe.

The main points are covered above, really, if you're pressed for time. One confusing thing is the radio model of the bomb recovered from Dalkamouni's car).

Leppard cites: "a black Toshiba Bombeat 453 radio cassette recorder ... 312 grammes of Semtex-H." [p 11]

Trail of the Octopus says, in exact concert:
The BKA had to be content with the bomb it found in Dalkamoni's Ford Taunus -- 312 grams of Semtex-H moulded into the case of a black Toshiba Bombeat 453 radio-cassette recorder fitted with a barometric switch and time delay.

Yet I had put down from the transcripts Yaesu FT-211RH, thinking there was some interesting disconnect. Fail. I just read that passage wrong. Such a radio was seized elsewhere in the raid, but reading closer, it was a Toshiba 453. [day 72, pp 8829-31] So an edit is needed, but otherwise, it's a good piece. One point I'm wondering is how reliable is Khreesat's ID of the fifth (missing) device as a Toshiba RTF423.

[Rolfe]

This is another fascinating line, actually. We hear from Marquise and his colleagues that the reason they went after Libya was "the evidence, stupid". When they started piling up the evidence they had, the Libyan pile was far more impressive than the PFLP-GC one.

Why is it that it seems the other way round to us? Is it because Giaka was a huge weight on the Libya pile, and when he was removed the remainder was pathetic? But then, wasn't it because they were sure Libya did it that they coaxed all these fantasies out of Giaka?

Both sets of evidence are circumstantial. If Jibril did it, we don't know how he got the suitcase into that baggage container. But having said that, we don't know how Megrahi's supposed to have got it on to KM180 either, so we're even stevens on that.

The evidence against Megrahi seems to boil down to

The Erac printout suggesting an unaccompanied suitcase came off KM180 (with Megrahi having been there when that plane took off)
Gauci's so-called identification of him as the mystery shopper
His business dealings with Bollier, who manufactured the MST-13s
A cryptic remark on Fhimah's diary about luggage "taggs".
However, we know Gauci was leant on to make that identification. It was certainly not spontaneously offered. The rest of it, frankly, doesn't amount to a hill of beans.

The other possibility is that they had a lot of evidence against Libya, but then managed to frame the wrong Libyan. However, the MST-13 and the Toshiba manual, plus Gauci's apparently spontaneous opinion that the mystery shopper was Libyan, are hardly a smoking gun, even before you start to look at their plausibility.

Set that beside this stonking pile of circumstantial evidence regarding Khreesat and his mates, and how does it balance? Well, you do the maths.

Some of the Scottish police have said they simply couldn't find any evidence to back up the suspicions regarding the PFLP-GC, and so they had to look elsewhere. Certainly, it's far from a complete narrative. There are gaps. I'm not sure it would entirely stand up in court - I mean a normal court, not Camp Zeist.

But it stands up a lot better than the case against Libya/Megrahi.

What I'm trying to decide is, did they really give up the idea of the PFLP-GC for lack of evidence, and turn elsewhere to find more convincing evidence against Libya, or did they look at the totality of the evidence and decide it pointed to Libya much more than to the PFLP-GC - or was the investigation deliberately steered away from the PFLP-GC, not because of lack of evidence, but because of political unacceptability?

Embarrassment over Khreesat's release in October might be at least part of the reason why nobody wanted the PFLP-GC to come to trial.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Sorry guys, been meaning to pop back into some of the discussions here, but just can't get up the steam at any one time to dig in and assess and have anything to add...

I've been running around commenting, generally scaring discussions into silence. The main thing that's spurred MASS interest the last few days and given me live discussions to mess up, is Kaorl Soikora's statement on July 4 of all days that Megrahi could live another decade or two. Or so it's read an repeated with maximum credulity and indignation.

It'snot necc.a CT issue, but related and complex.First that's notreally what he said, and what he said is of little value anyway, IMO.There's no logic to believing megrahi will live 20 years because of an out-of-context sound bite, but people really seem to believe it over here.None are surprised at this scam.It's an oil-money conspiracy, plain as day. He'll live a long time they all know. They seem confused and unsure whether or not the cancer is real.

Anyway, my main thing I'm now confused about is the latest turn - some "disgusted" Senators wrote to ambassador Sheinwald to ask why Sikora's prognosis was accepted and used to free a Terrorist mass murderer. He responded:
However, it is my understanding that the decision to grant Mr Megrahi’s compassionate release was made on the basis of advice from the Director of Health at the Scottish Prison service, who drew on the advice of a number of medical experts. This group did not include Professor Sikora, the individual quoted in recent press speculation on this issue.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dc/2010/07/brits-deny-docs-libyan-tale.html#ixzz0tM3z3k7r

On that specific point, I wondered if Rolfe or Buncrana or someone else even might know the answer. How did that prognosis come about, on whose dime and time, etc.? How wrong is Sheinwald, and how confused is the media?

Rolfe: You have some insights with this guy, and with medicine. Would you be willing to put together a detailed post on what can be known about the prognosis/release situation? It's something that give me brain freeze every time I try to approach it.

[Rolfe]

Eeek!! Zombie thread! :eye-poppi

There's already a thread discussing this, started by one Caustic Logic I think, but what the hell.

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=176962

Frankly, Karol Sikora is an idiot. Did you read what I posted about him in the other thread? http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=6105068#post6105068

He's clearly operating as a "hired gun" as regards expert witness work. That describes someone who agrees to support the position of the side that is paying him in a legal action. He was obviously doing that with Lisa Norris, and then when it got to the part of that case where the various experts had to sit down together and come to an agreement, he had to admit he was wrong, and backed down.

He's up to some very peculiar stuff on the woo-woo side, as chronicled by the inimitable David Colquhoun. Not necessarily a woo-woo himself, but prepared to support woo, probably for reasons of personal gain or aggrandisment.

So, he's kind of an obvious person for the Libyan authorities to hire when they want an input into the compassionate release negotiations. He's recently on record as saying, in effect, they wanted me to say three months, and when I first looked at the case I thought, no way, that can't be supported, but then when I looked a bit closer I saw it was possible to take that line, so that's what I reported.

Now, he's swung the other way, and is saying well, hell knows, could be ten years could be twenty, bugger me. Which is equally stupid. Sure, it could be 20 years the same way Stephen Hawking has made it to 65 or whatever, but that doesn't mean a prognosis of 2 or 3 years for someone given his diagnosis today wouldn't still be reasonable.

Sikora was on TV here at the time, pontificating his opinions, but I'm not clear how much attention anyone paid to him. Perhaps more relevantly, I read an article last week that said Megrahi's oncologist and urologist weren't consulted. Who knows if that's even true. The prison doctor was consulted, and some other medical authorities, and nobody is saying exactly who.

Why does it matter? If Americans are cross because they think it was all a stitch-up in relation to that BP oil deal (which it wasn't), well, what's the problem? Gadaffi seems to be everybody's new best friend. If the official story is true and Megrahi planted that bomb, he did it because Gadaffi told him to. But somehow it's OK to lionise Gadaffi these days? America is as keen on oil deals as anyone else. America wanted this all sorted out (Megrahi out of the way and Libya in a friendly place) as much as anyone. The rest is just political point-scoring.

The reason it isn't about the oil deal, or not directly, is that the body which had the authority to approve the release couldn't care less about oil deals. In fact, just knowing that the Westminster government wanted Megrahi released because of an oil deal was enough to make them resolve to keep him banged up. However, they also wanted him on the next plane home, so they saved face by refusing to do what Westminster wanted (the prisoner transfer) and went the compassionate release route instead.

Given that anyone who had any influence at all on events wanted Megrahi out of that prison, just who paid whom to provide an agreeable medical report hardly matters.

The sequence of events was that in 2007, the SCCRB gave permission for the second appeal against his conviction. Then followed a long period of wrangling about release of this secret document the defence thought was important evidence, and the most bizarre back-flips being performed by the government to try to prevent its release. The appeal still hadn't come to court in the autumn of 2008, when Megrahi was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Even then, there was press speculation about a compassionate release, but the word was no way, he's nowhere near sick enough. Maybe later.

In the spring of 2009 the appeal came to court, but it was adjourned quite quickly due to the illness of one of the judges. Rather than appoint a substitute, it was decided to adjourn until November 2009, in spite of the appellant being terminally ill. A lot of people were quite cross about this, because it was hoped that some more light might be shed on the enigma that is the Lockerbie bombing.

In July 2009, there was more talk about a compassionate release, and medical reports were being sought and so on. There was general optimism, because it wasn't necessary to abandon the appeal for that to happen. However, there was some sort of undercurrent that the appeal would have to be ditched. It was obvious which way it was going, and when the compassionate release of Ronnie Biggs was announced, everyone knew it was going to happen soon.

Ronnie Biggs is still alive too by the way. It's ridiculous to say, well, he wasn't actually convicted of murder, so it doesn't matter if his prognosis was wrong - it's an exactly parallel case. Biggs doesn't even have cancer. The point is, the Westminster government wanted Megrahi released because of the oil deal, and they realised that the Scottish government was more likely to go the compassionate release route than the prisoner transfer. How much this was actually talked about I don't know, but it's pretty obvious the Westminster justice secretary released Biggs to soften up the ground for MacAskill to release Megrahi.

So, the doctors were split about the prognosis. What would you have done? The guy has cancer. If you decide August is too early, and you're right, you'll only have to go through all this again in a couple of months. And if you still think it's too soon, a couple of months after that, and so on until you finally do release him. Why not just cut to the chase? The more so because if the short prognosis is correct, you could find yourself in the embarrassing position of Megrahi dying in a Scottish jail. This would not be a good thing for UK-Middle East relations, we really don't want that to happen.

So he goes home, and is given another round of chemotherapy, and lives a few months longer than the accepted prognosis.

What's all the fuss about?

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

I forgot about that thread... :blush:
It would be the right spot,but in another forum I for one hardly look at. But it's active... But I'm needed elsewhere, where there is no Rolfe or some of the other smart people here.

Anyway... Thanks for the links and info here. I've gotta run to work for a bit, and will catch up with JREF stuff and hopefully have a worthwhile article up tonight.

Quick points:
Now, he's swung the other way, and is saying well, hell knows, could be ten years could be twenty, bugger me. Which is equally stupid.
Boom.It's just hypothetical words from the mouth of a guy no one trust. Unless what he's saying is useful to them. A lot of people find another reason to get angry about Megrahi's release useful.

it's pretty obvious the Westminster justice secretary released Biggs to soften up the ground for MacAskill to release Megrahi.
I've heard that and it makes perfect sense to me. What would be awesome is for someone to pin that down as best we can from the outside, compare standards and application over time to see how much Biggs' case sticks out.

But somehow it's OK to lionise Gadaffi these days?
On the street,definitely not. Not good for votes,etc. Hardly anyone here is aware but faintly that anyone from the U.S. is doing business there. For the people actually doing the deals or working Congress to that effect, well, the post-2003 rapprochement is cited,and yaddayadda, but obviously it's just money that makes it okay.

Oh, and taking a hard line with Gaddafi's past. That's Megrahi.

So, the doctors were split about the prognosis.
I need to find more specifics on that. Which doctors, etc...

The rest, a good overall view. I may cite it.

[Rolfe]

Who cares? Every single party with an interest in this case wanted Megrahi on the next plane home. That includes most of the parties now making a big fuss about how shocking this is. It's all about political posturing, and that's all there is to it.

The Scottish government actually released him. So, if you're anyone else, you can get political capital out of monstering these dreadful people who let this mass murderer go, while still taking full advantage of the political capital gained by the release. This is being done by all the UK political parties, and the USA, even though all these people had a strong interest in the release going ahead and kept real quiet right up until it happened for fear of rocking the boat.

For goodness sake, what does it matter?

Rolfe.

[Buncrana]

9 months aint nothing if some are expecting Scotland to apologise for releasing someone whom everyone with a vested interest actually wanted released, including the US politicians, if it meant that that appeal would be halted.

US Independence Day and IR655 (http://rt.com/Top_News/2010-07-03/no-us-apology-ir655.html)

[Rolfe]

Thanks for that Buncrana, it's a very perceptive article.

I work beside someone who was right there in the Straits of Hormuz, pretty much beside the Vincennes, when it happened - he was on the British destroyer the HMS York. His opinion of the attitude of the Americans to what happened it pretty much unprintable.

Of course it was an accident, although an accident caused by carelessness and bad practice. A change from one set of co-ordinates to another gave the Vincennes observers the mistaken impression that the plane was diving when it was in fact ascending after takeoff from Bandar Abbas airport. The lighting in the ship was too dim to allow the crew to read the reference books that might have shown them it wasn't a fighter plane.

The Lockerbie incident was, in contrast, pure deliberate intentional murder. So I can see there's a difference. However, never to have apologised for IA655, giving the captain a medal, and actually declaring that it was Iran's fault anyway because there were fighter planes in the area sometimes, just beggars belief.

Is it possible that if the US had come clean about the Vincennes incident, and issued a full and unreserved apology as well as the compensation, the 270 Lockerbie victims might still be alive?

Rolfe.

[foxprorawks]

Wikileaks has something to add:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/07/wikileaks-gaddafi-britain-lockerbie-bomber

[Rolfe]

I'm not sure it adds a great deal, to be honest.

When they heard that something was coming out about Megrahi, BBC Scotland were rarin to go on this on Newsnight Scotland. However, when the specifics came out, they pulled the entire item.

Gadaffi was threatening everyone left right and centre to try to influence Megrahi's release. In other news, rain is still wet.

Rolfe.

[Tolls]

I'm not sure it adds a great deal, to be honest.

When they heard that something was coming out about Megrahi, BBC Scotland were rarin to go on this on Newsnight Scotland. However, when the specifics came out, they pulled the entire item.

Gadaffi was threatening everyone left right and centre to try to influence Megrahi's release. In other news, rain is still wet.

Rolfe.

Quite.
It's not as if we didn't know that there was pressure.
Doesn't change anything, frankly.

[Rolfe]

Getting picky, it shows up the Westminster and Holyrood Labour parties as a bunch of hypocrites, lambasting the SNP and saying the decision was wrong and disgraceful and they would no way have released him, when in fact they were 100% behind it.

But then we already knew that too.

There's actually no indication the SNP caved directly to the pressure Gadaffi was exerting, either. It all seems to confirm what again was blindingly obvious at the time, which was that the SNP wanted Megrahi on that plane for their own reasons, and Westminster was busy behind the scenes making it as easy as possible for them to do that.

Timing of the compassionate release of Ronnie Biggs, anyone? (Who is also miraculously still alive by the way.)

Rolfe.

[Beerina]

Wikileaks: Lockerbie bomber release compassion? No, buckling to threats (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/12/08/wikileaks-libya-threatened-uk-lockerbie-bomber/)


Sigh. :rolleyes:

[zooterkin]

You didn't read the article you linked to, then?

[geni]

Wikileaks: Lockerbie bomber release compassion? No, buckling to threats (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/12/08/wikileaks-libya-threatened-uk-lockerbie-bomber/)


Sigh. :rolleyes:

Nope. In fact fact it looks like the UK's messy constitutional system may have worked out in it's favor this time. Libya threatened the wrong people.

[geni]

I'm not sure it adds a great deal, to be honest.

When they heard that something was coming out about Megrahi, BBC Scotland were rarin to go on this on Newsnight Scotland. However, when the specifics came out, they pulled the entire item.

Gadaffi was threatening everyone left right and centre to try to influence Megrahi's release. In other news, rain is still wet.

Rolfe.

Except it appears that he wasn't threatening the people who's immediate responsibility the matter was.

It is interesting that the final decision appears to have been taken by Salmond rather than Macaskill.

[Rolfe]

Except it appears that he wasn't threatening the people who's immediate responsibility the matter was.


Gadaffi isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. And he may have thought he was threatening people who could then in their turn threaten the people whose immediate responsibility the matter was.

It is interesting that the final decision appears to have been taken by Salmond rather than Macaskill.


No, that isn't actually true. The leaked document says Salmond told Straw in October 2008 that he would take the final decision. That may be so. However, what happened in August 2009 was that MacAskill took the decision (and told all comers to bugger off out of his business, apparently).

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Wikileaks: Lockerbie bomber release compassion? No, buckling to threats (http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/12/08/wikileaks-libya-threatened-uk-lockerbie-bomber/)


Sigh. :rolleyes:


Sigh. The current revelations have precisely the square root of bugger-all to do with whether he was guilty or not.

Rolfe.

[geni]

Gadaffi isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. And he may have thought he was threatening people who could then in their turn threaten the people whose immediate responsibility the matter was.

Well on paper they could even if it would have been politicaly suicidal. However Gadaffi did aparently try slightly better targeted bribery so someone in the libyan goverment must have worked out that Holyrood was of some import.


No, that isn't actually true. The leaked document says Salmond told Straw in October 2008 that he would take the final decision. That may be so. However, what happened in August 2009 was that MacAskill took the decision (and told all comers to bugger off out of his business, apparently).

For a party leader to cease to be involved in a matter once they have already become involved would have been a political anomoly. Adimitedly Salmond being involved would be a constitional anomoly but I would question how free MacAskill was in the decision he made if he knew that Salmond had been involved.

[geni]

Sigh. The current revelations have precisely the square root of bugger-all to do with whether he was guilty or not.

Rolfe.

I'd argue that they elliminate the possibility that any coverup is due to trying to hide the release being due to libyan pressure. If Salmond's today interview is to be belived no one thought to mention the pressure to Holyrood.

[Rolfe]

Well on paper they could even if it would have been politicaly suicidal. However Gadaffi did aparently try slightly better targeted bribery so someone in the libyan goverment must have worked out that Holyrood was of some import.


Indeed. It seems nobody was interested in jelly and ice-cream though.

For a party leader to cease to be involved in a matter once they have already become involved would have been a political anomoly. Adimitedly Salmond being involved would be a constitional anomoly but I would question how free MacAskill was in the decision he made if he knew that Salmond had been involved.


Anomaly or not, the information from those privy to what happened (http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2010/12/media-reaction-to-wikileaks-megrahi.html?showComment=1291816101542#c4675947936 187644626) is that

.... it was 'him and him alone' that made the decision. Cabinet were apparently told in a rather firm and forceful manner that there would be no discussion of the matter, that it was the sole preserve and decision of K MacAskill.


It's far more likely that Salmond was just grandstanding a bit when talking to Straw. The whole thing was fairly hypothetical in 2008. Ten months later when the actual events unfold is a different country.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

I'd argue that they elliminate the possibility that any coverup is due to trying to hide the release being due to libyan pressure. If Salmond's today interview is to be belived no one thought to mention the pressure to Holyrood.


The really interesting question is why does it appear that Kenny MacAskill pressurised or manipulated Megrahi into dropping his ongoing appeal at the time he was released. If the appeal had been allowed to continue, as it could have been, it would have been completed by now.

And the world would be looking for someone else to label as "the Lockerbie bomber".

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Just as an aside, what would be really really interesting is if Megrahi were to hand over to Wikileaks the 800+ page SCCRC report into the Zeist conviction, plus the 13 volumes of appendices.

Six grounds stated by which the conviction "may have been" a miscarriage of justice (you only need one to be upheld for a successful appeal), but only four enumerated in the press release (and one of these was so cryptic as to be uninformative). A document fiercely protected by a Public Interest Immunity Certificate, to the point where even the defence lawyers weren't to be allowed to see it in confidence, and the one person who was to be allowed to see it on behalf of the defence was not to be allowed to communicate with the defence or the defendant after he'd seen it. What was that all about?

All the details of the investigation into the suggested grounds for appeal that weren't upheld by the SCCRC, so we can see whether the reasons for rejecting them were sound or not. All the additional witness interviews and statements.

The day that lot hits Wikileaks, as it may after Megrahi dies, I may have to take early retirement to get through it all.

Rolfe.

[Bunntamas]

Just as an aside, what would be really really interesting is if Megrahi were to hand over to Wikileaks the 800+ page SCCRC report into the Zeist conviction, plus the 13 volumes of appendices.

Indeed. It would be good to see that.
In addition it would be good to understand why Megrahi did not testify at trial and has never come forth with any information about what he was doing on Malta on 21 December 1988 and prior, what his business was with Edwin Bollier (I doubt it was a staircase, or "parts" other than bomb timers), what business (if not planting a bomb) he was conducting in the mid to late 1980's, (clearly it was not airport security) and why he needed a false passport to conduct said unknown business.
In otherwords, what exatctly were Megrahi's duties as an employee of the Libyan Government and why was he emplyed by LAA in 1988 and prior, and why he hasn't come forward with this information to clear his name; at trial, at appeal, with the SCCRC and in any commentary on his web site about the dropped appeal, if he is so allegedly innocent. I highly doubt he will present any of this, for the very reason that all of this information implicates him as either the one who carried out the bombing, or was highly complicit in it. And please, spare me, the "he was never known to be involved in anything before". So what. That doesn't mean he was never involved in anything for which he was not caught. And lastly, if he was such a simple man, why was the highest of high in the LIbyan government so hell bent on risking serious international relations with the UK, Scotland and the US to get him released. Simple man simply building a staircase? NO ****** way.

All the details of the investigation into the suggested grounds for appeal that weren't upheld by the SCCRC

Good point. The number of grounds that wern't upheld by the SCCRC far outnumber the ones that were. And all of the people who whine about how long it took for the SCCRC and the second appeal to come to a decision should look only to Megrahi's council for reasons about delays.

The day that lot hits Wikileaks, as it may after Megrahi dies, I may have to take early retirement to get through it all. HA! Welcome to the party Rolfe. PA 103 Families have been put through this over and over again through multitudes of UK and Scottish bickering and politicing, only to reach serious disapointment in Scotland, whom we (the families) thought were allies, only to learn that they are nothing but whores to the UK and Libya. Sad.
That said, I must say, that that during my viists to Scotland over the years, the scottish people were nothing but kind to me and my family. I truly believe that they have been caught in a web of political and "hostage taking' by their own by their government - not dissimilar to that of the Amercans now. So, my disclaimer, as regards my comments above relates to the Scottish government, and not the Scottish people in general.

Happy Holidaze. :-~

[Buncrana]

Just as an aside, what would be really really interesting is if Megrahi were to hand over to Wikileaks the 800+ page SCCRC report into the Zeist conviction, plus the 13 volumes of appendices.

Six grounds stated by which the conviction "may have been" a miscarriage of justice (you only need one to be upheld for a successful appeal), but only four enumerated in the press release (and one of these was so cryptic as to be uninformative). A document fiercely protected by a Public Interest Immunity Certificate, to the point where even the defence lawyers weren't to be allowed to see it in confidence, and the one person who was to be allowed to see it on behalf of the defence was not to be allowed to communicate with the defence or the defendant after he'd seen it. What was that all about?

All the details of the investigation into the suggested grounds for appeal that weren't upheld by the SCCRC, so we can see whether the reasons for rejecting them were sound or not. All the additional witness interviews and statements.


I think, as has been argued before, it was much easier for the SCCRC to refer the case back to appeal on the basis of the Maltese shopkeeper's evidence being unsupported and unreliable to base a conviction on rather than calling into question the actual investigators, the evidence presented, and the judges conclusions made at Zeist.


The day that lot hits Wikileaks, as it may after Megrahi dies, I may have to take early retirement to get through it all.

Rolfe.


It might not be that long away. "Everyday is expected to be his last" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/09/lockerbie-bomber-megrahi-coma)

[Rolfe]

I think, as has been argued before, it was much easier for the SCCRC to refer the case back to appeal on the basis of the Maltese shopkeeper's evidence being unsupported and unreliable to base a conviction on rather than calling into question the actual investigators, the evidence presented, and the judges conclusions made at Zeist.


I think that's true. If the Gauci ID had been overturned, then the conviction would have collapsed without a doubt. It would have been so much easier to do it that way, rather than dragging RARDE through the muck by looking at the provenance of the timer chip in detail. British forensics from RARDE to the Scottish fingerprint laboratory have had enough egg on their faces over the past years, let's not throw any more at them if we don't have to?

However, Tony Kelly had intimated his intention to bring up the timer fragment and all the rest of it anyway. I don't know if that had any influence on what happened later. Oddly, Tony Kelly later appeared very half-hearted about the appeal, after it was dropped, as if he couldn't have been bothered to fight it. Not sure what to make of that either.

The thing is, I don't necessarily believe the SCCRC when they pre-empt criticism of the forensics service or police procedure by declaring them kosher in an unsupported public pronouncement. Why, they might even be trying to conceal some rather grubby linen they see no point in subjecting to the public laundry! I'd very much like to see the actual evidence on which they based their conclusion that the timer chip wasn't fabricated, for example. Maybe it wasn't, but it sure as hell looks as if it was to me.

It might not be that long away. "Everyday is expected to be his last" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/09/lockerbie-bomber-megrahi-coma)


It's sad, and he was treated very badly, but indeed not nearly so badly as many other victims of miscarriages of justice and summary, flawed justice the world over. (I'm thinking of Guiseppe Conlon here, for starters, then moving on to Stefan Kiszko and Sally Clark, and that's not even moving out of Britain.)

Megrahi himself isn't the issue here, in a strange sort of way. The issue is the appalingly flawed investigative process and the kangaroo court at Zeist, and whatever the hell is being covered up by all that. And that we still have little idea who was responsible for murdering 270 innocent people more than 20 years ago.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

Indeed. It would be good to see that.
In addition it would be good to understand why Megrahi did not testify at trial and has never come forth with any information about what he was doing on Malta on 21 December 1988 and prior, what his business was with Edwin Bollier (I doubt it was a staircase, or "parts" other than bomb timers), what business (if not planting a bomb) he was conducting in the mid to late 1980's, (clearly it was not airport security) and why he needed a false passport to conduct said unknown business.


I've addressed this before, but you never came back to discuss the points I raised.

There are four pretty obvious reasons why Megrahi may have decided not to take the witness stand. First, he may have been advised that the prosecution case was extremely weak and as it is up to the prosecution to prove their case, then taking the stand would not be necessary. Second, the defence never admitted that he was a JSO officer (though he obviously was, I think). Explaining what he was doing in Malta that day may well have involved making precisely that admission. Third, if he was engaged in some shady operation on Gadaffi's behalf that day, then coming clean about that would hardly have been seen as something in his favour by the judges. And finally, it's probable that he was on a covert mission on behalf of the Gadaffi regime. It's extremely likely that he was simply forbidden from revealing any details about it.

As regards Bollier and staircases, I thought you were familiar with the specifics of this case? If so, why do you make statements like that?

It is a fact that on 20th December 1988, while in Malta, Megrahi saw a Maltese joiner about getting an estimate for a staircase to be built in his house in Tripoli. The joiner later travelled to Tripoli to inspect the job and provide an estimate as requested. At one point the defence tried to suggest this was the primary reason for his journey, which was a bit lame given the use of the diplomatic passport. But it never had anything to do with Bollier.

There are a lot of people drifting around the globe engaged in covert, semi-legal and even illegal activities. Bollier had a lot of contacts in the Libyan regime and elsewhere. Spies and intelligence agents aren't just confined to the pages of Ian Fleming's novels. That Megrahi was probably in that category does not mean he had anything to do with bombing Pan Am 103, in the absence of any actual evidence actually connecting him to the actual bomb, you know.

"He won't tell me what he was doing so he must have been bombing the plane" is a complete non sequitur.

In otherwords, what exatctly were Megrahi's duties as an employee of the Libyan Government and why was he emplyed by LAA in 1988 and prior, and why he hasn't come forward with this information to clear his name; at trial, at appeal, with the SCCRC and in any commentary on his web site about the dropped appeal, if he is so allegedly innocent. I highly doubt he will present any of this, for the very reason that all of this information implicates him as either the one who carried out the bombing, or was highly complicit in it. And please, spare me, the "he was never known to be involved in anything before". So what. That doesn't mean he was never involved in anything for which he was not caught. And lastly, if he was such a simple man, why was the highest of high in the LIbyan government so hell bent on risking serious international relations with the UK, Scotland and the US to get him released. Simple man simply building a staircase? NO ****** way.


See my points above. There are many reasons for him not "coming clean" about what he was actually doing with that diplomatic passport that day. There's no reason at all to believe it had anything to do with bombing Pan Am 103, when the evidence indicates the bomb was introduced at Heathrow airport, not Malta, and that the clothes in the suitcase were bought by a heavily-built, six-foot-tall man of about fifty years of age, on 23rd November 1988.

The fact is that he was indeed never known to be involved in anything illegal or terrorism-related before. Which is more than can be said for a number of his compatriots. So, really, on the basis of past form he was always a much less likely suspect than Abu Talb, for example. This is something to be borne in mind.

And no, nobody here is suggesting that he was just a "simple man building a staircase". That doesn't mean he bombed that plane though.

Good point. The number of grounds that wern't upheld by the SCCRC far outnumber the ones that were. And all of the people who whine about how long it took for the SCCRC and the second appeal to come to a decision should look only to Megrahi's council for reasons about delays.


That is a very valid point. The defence went to town and flew every kite there was in the direction of the SCCRC. This had a lot to do with that body taking 3½ years to make its report. (Not so much to do with the subsequent two-year delay before the appeal actually made it in front of the judges, or the glacially slow process of the case once it was there, or the timetable set out apparently deliberately to exceed the estimated life expectancy of a dying man, mind you.)

However, the fact that the majority of these kites weren't accepted by the SCCRC has no bearing at all on the validity of the appeal process. The prosecution only has to fail on one crucial point to fail completely. The SCCRC identified six.

The SCCRC in effect said, "looks like Megrahi didn't buy those clothes." That being so, there is no case against him.

I have very strong suspicions that the timer fragment was in fact fabricated by the CIA and planted in the evidence trail by Hayes and Feraday. And about the provenance of one or two other items that look extremely fishy. However, even if I'm entirely wrong about that, the collapse of the Gauci identification still means there's no case against Megrahi - even if the MST-13 timer and the Toshiba manual and the rest of it are entirely on the level.

I'd like to see the SCCRC's reasons for dismissing the suggestion that the timer chip was a plant. (And for deciding that "the Golfer" is a fantasist, and other stuff like that.) I'd also like to see what this Public Interest Immunity Certificate thing was all about, and a number of other related matters.

This is about understanding the wider aspects of the case, though. The case against Megrahi stands or falls on Tony Gauci's identification, and as far as I can see, that fell in a heap a long time ago.

HA! Welcome to the party Rolfe. PA 103 Families have been put through this over and over again through multitudes of UK and Scottish bickering and politicing, only to reach serious disapointment in Scotland, whom we (the families) thought were allies, only to learn that they are nothing but whores to the UK and Libya. Sad.


I don't think the Scottish police were ever your allies. They were going after the man they were told to go after. I don't think the Scottish court system was ever your ally, except insofar as its desire to get someone convicted whether or not he actually did it, and yours, coincided.

Your interpretation of the release process is, as always, highly partisan and pretty much unrelated to the facts. However, the release process and the conviction are two completely different issues.

That said, I must say, that that during my viists to Scotland over the years, the scottish people were nothing but kind to me and my family. I truly believe that they have been caught in a web of political and "hostage taking' by their own by their government - not dissimilar to that of the Amercans now. So, my disclaimer, as regards my comments above relates to the Scottish government, and not the Scottish people in general.


You seem to feel betrayed that Megrahi was granted compassionate release, and determined to find some fault in the way that process was conducted, even though no such fault has been found despite several investigations and Wikileaks.

I too find reason to take issue with the conduct of that process, though for a completely different reason from yours. My reason is that the way it was handled seems to have been aimed at forcing or manipulating Megrahi to withdraw the appeal.

We will have to agree to differ on this. However, my concern is not the compassionate release in 2009, but the verdict in 2001 which flew in the face of the facts as presented in court, and tossed away most of the rules of evidence in the process.

It scares me far more that my country's criminal justice system can perpetrate a show trial to convict a man on evidence that says he had nothing to do with the crime, and can then engage on a ten-year coverup of this, than that a terminally ill prisoner was granted compassionate release according to due process.

Rolfe.

[WildCat]

Ex-Libyan Justice Minister says Khaddafi ordered al-Megrahi to carry out the bombing (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j6qtJSctAwrwo_nuDJ3lv2m-Eumw?docId=cf63ca33ee80414ca381da8fddbf2b6b):Swedi sh tabloid Expressen says Libya's ex-justice minister claims Moammar Gadhafi personally ordered the Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people in 1988.

Expressen on Wednesday quoted Mustafa Abdel-Jalil as telling their correspondent in Libya that "I have proof that Gadhafi gave the order about Lockerbie." He didn't describe the proof.

Abdel-Jalil stepped down as justice minister to protest the violence against anti-government demonstrations.

He told Expressen Gadhafi gave the order to Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, the only man convicted in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, which killed all 259 people on board and 11 on the ground.

"To hide it, he (Gadhafi) did everything in his power to get al-Megrahi back from Scotland," Abdel-Jalil was quoted as saying.

Also (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5hzplGt9njlSWr7pIlaQx71jc3akA?docId=N01211812 98471859869A):
The Scottish Government says it "never doubted" the safety of the conviction of the Lockerbie bomber following reports that Libyan leader Colonel Moammar Gaddafi ordered the attack.

[Rolfe]

I just typed a reply in the other thread where you posted the same thing.

Why have you no interest in looking at the stacks of actual evidence we've shoved in front of you. but suddenly you're wetting yourself when one of Gadaffi's ex-goons makes a completely unsupported statement while trying to ingratiate himself with the West as the whole shebang blows up in his face?

This is three threads discussing this now.

Rolfe.

[manierisme]

Ex-Libyan Justice Minister says Khaddafi ordered al-Megrahi to carry out the bombing (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j6qtJSctAwrwo_nuDJ3lv2m-Eumw?docId=cf63ca33ee80414ca381da8fddbf2b6b):

Also (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5hzplGt9njlSWr7pIlaQx71jc3akA?docId=N01211812 98471859869A):

In the interest of balance, the former head of intelligence for Rafsanjani in Iran who defected claimed that Iran was responsible for Lockerbie years ago.

http://www.independent.ie/world-news/iranian-defector-claims-he-organised-lockerbie-bombing-373856.html

Neither claim proves anything. I'll be interested to see if any evidence is actually provided by Libyan officials in the near future.

[Rolfe]

Interesting the way nobody seems to want to look or discuss or debate when you spend two years going through the actual evidence with a fine-tooth comb, then one bad guy with an agenda mouths off and suddenly everybody wants to play.

ETA: That claim is so much hot air too, by the way. That Iranian is also saying Megrahi and Fhimah did it. The problem is, Fhimah was acquitted and it's impossible Megrahi himself "put the bomb on the aircraft" from all we know about the evidence. Find someone who claims to know something about goings-on at Heathrow airport about 4 o'clock that afternoon, and that starts to get credible.

Rolfe.

[Caustic Logic]

Mr. Behbehani, the second link, is a strange case. Charles Norrie has a notion he was involved, since according to Lara Marlowe, a young girl named Behbehani was among the passengers killed in the shoot-down of Iran Air 655.

Too bad the Iranian defector's story is silly, and conforms neither with Charles' own 1/2" thick bomb built into the container in London theory, nor any of the more rational London-origin constructs. If that guy wanted to implicate Iran, he hitched himself to the wrong horse, in Megrahi (and Fhimah!). Likewise if this non-Giaka Libyan defector wants to implicate is own country, well, he picked the same horse (jut not mentioning Fhimah yet).

So if we put together these claims of Bebehani and Abdel-Jalil, and the work we've done here over the last 18 months - which is NOT cancelled just because some guy said something - we get this puzzling picture:

1) Gaddafi, personally, ordered Megrahi, personally, to bomb Flight 103, or some American plane.
2) The Iranians, already planning to do this and in possession of excellent weaponry for it, train Megrahi in Iran and his accomplice, and arm them to do it.
3) Megrahi and Fhimah were on Malta the day of the bombing, which is a stupid place to bomb a plane from, and has no credible evidentiary link to the bombing. He failed to follow through, after all the orders and investments, just as someone else was planting a suitcase in AVE4041 up in London at about 4:30.
4) Megrahi and Fhimah were framed anyway, with planted evidence and bribed witnesses.

Any questions?

[Rolfe]

Not really, apart from why is it extraordinarily difficult to get anyone to take seriously the idea that Megrahi didn't do it and was framed, even though there's credible evidence by the shedload to support it, but the minute one of Gadaffi's ex-thugs deserting the sinking ship makes a completely unverified and actually quite senseless statement, the media are all over it like a rash?

ETA: Oh yes another question. Why has everybody deserted the thread that was started yesterday in CE&SI about this? We had Scrut doing his usual, and Wildcat, and a few others pointing fingers and sniggering about CTs. All I did was suggest they read some stuff and come back and argue on the basis of the evidence.

Tumbleweed.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

In a parallel universe, where there was actual evidence that Megrahi did what he was alleged to have done, I'd say it was a sure thing. You don't blow your nose in Tripoli without written permission in triplicate from the colonel. There would have been no other possible reason for him to have done such a thing.

And anyway, he certainly didn't act alone, even in this parallel world. He was never convicted of having put the bomb on the plane - it was recognised he couldn't possibly have done that. He was only convicted of being at the airport where the prosecution had hallucinated the bomb went on the plane, and the inference made that he must have had a hand in it somehow.

But he was there alone, and never went airside, and never met anybody, and didn't even have any checked-in luggage with him. And there was strong evidence that there was no unacccompanied luggage on the flight the bomb was supposed to have been on. Yet, somehow, it was decided that somebody else put the bomb on the plane, but because Megrahi was catching his plane for Tripoli at the same time, he must have had a hand in it.

That's what he was jailed for life for.

So no, even the prosecution didn't think he acted alone!

Rolfe.

[zooterkin]

Come to think of it, does it really matter? We know Megrahi did it, he's been tried and convicted and all credible evidence points to him.
What credible evidence would that be? :confused:

[The Central Scrutinizer]

What credible evidence would that be? :confused:

The evidence that points to his guilt. Unless you want to believe the CIA or the Jews framed him. :)

[Caustic Logic]

The evidence that points to his guilt. Unless you want to believe the CIA or the Jews framed him. :)

CIA. Might be some Jews in there, I dunno. Jalil is full of hot-air. Hi s supposed real-world evidence only lines up with the paper version of the attack, not the 3-D version. The best clues there (not accepted but still the best) have the bomb entering container AVE4041 at about 4:30 PM up in London.

Darat, sorry. But it's important in considering this guy's veracity when he says he's got real-world clues of a crime that only seems to have happened on paper and in legal technicalities.

[Aepervius]

The evidence that points to his guilt. Unless you want to believe the CIA or the Jews framed him. :)

Go read the thread on this forum and otherwise on the story. And you know, sometimes being declared guilty does not mean you are. There were even people which were condemned to death and executed by over zealous prosecutor. Albeit a small minority but the point is , non zero.

I am not saying that that guy was innocent, I am saying there is suffisent doubt on the story to take a skeptical "undecided" opinion.

[The Central Scrutinizer]

CIA. Might be some Jews in there, I dunno. Jalil is full of hot-air. Hi s supposed real-world evidence only lines up with the paper version of the attack, not the 3-D version. The best clues there (not accepted but still the best) have the bomb entering container AVE4041 at about 4:30 PM up in London.

Sounds like you're arguing the case, and directly ignoring Darat's mod box. Rolfe did the same thing and I reported it.

If you want to argue the case, open a thread in CT and do it there. We're trying to keep this thread on track.

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Go read the thread on this forum and otherwise on the story. And you know, sometimes being declared guilty does not mean you are. There were even people which were condemned to death and executed by over zealous prosecutor. Albeit a small minority but the point is , non zero.

I am not saying that that guy was innocent, I am saying there is suffisent doubt on the story to take a skeptical "undecided" opinion.

I'm not interested in arguing the case. There is a CT thread for that.

The courts found him guilty. That means he is guilty, both as a legal matter, and for the purposes of this thread.

[Caustic Logic]

Okay then, for the purposes of this thread Megrahi was obviously ordered to cary out the bombing by Col. Ghaddafi. And while this man Jalil claims direct knowledge of that order, I propose that the two things are not really related. I can't explain why, of course. But I predict no proof forthcoming, with some lame excuse, or perhaps of great interest, a forged document on official paper signed by some other high-level defector. (There seem to be a lot of them all of a sudden). Or something like that. We shall see where it goes.

[quixotecoyote]

The courts found him guilty. That means he is guilty, both as a legal matter, and for the purposes of this thread.

Sounds like you're arguing the case, and directly ignoring Darat's mod box.

If you want to argue the case, open a thread in CT and do it there. We're trying to keep this thread on track.

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Sounds like you're arguing the case, and directly ignoring Darat's mod box.

If you want to argue the case, open a thread in CT and do it there. We're trying to keep this thread on track.

No, just stating a fact. He was found guilty.

So there!

[Bunntamas]

Interesting the way nobody seems to want to look or discuss or debate when you spend two years going through the actual evidence with a fine-tooth comb,

RE: "actual evidence" are you referring to the actual evidence presented at trial and at appeal, which resulted in actual guilty and refused verdicts? Or are you referring to the tabloid trash, blatherings, scribbelings and seriously laughable cartoon animations of CTers on blogs and forums? As you very well know, methinks (and the courts, as well as the mods who - rightly so - consistently send your "two years of 'research' " to the CT forums) the former is considered actual evidence, (hence Megrahi will die guilty as tried and convicted) and the latter is... well... relegated to the CT forum.

then one bad guy with an agenda mouths off

"Bad guy with an agenda mouths off"??? You think the Libyan Ambassador is a bad guy? HAHAHA!
Sorry darling. The real bad guy is the dearly close ally of the Gaddafi Regime, reporting as a Libyan secret service agent to Gaddafi's brother-in-law, Abdullah Senussi - same guy (Senussi) who fled the UK after threatening to assassinate Brittish officials and the Saudi Prince. Bad Guys??? The bad guy is one, so dear to the Libyan regime that Gaddafi sends his thug Sennussi in to argue with the UK and Scottish government whores, who are so hungry for their BP oil deal with Libya that they will do and say anything for Megrahi's release; even bow to the Libyan terrorists' threats that the UK will suffer dire consequences, if Megrahi dies in scottish prison. And of course, the Scottish government whores itself out (once again, for the gazillionth time, over hundreds of years) to the UK and releases the real bad guy.

Libyan ambassador is a bad guy? No, Don't think so. The bad guy is not one who is saying Gaddaffi ordered the bombing of PA103. The real bad guy carried out the bombing of PA103, on orders from his boss and his boss' boss, and is now (hopefully) dealing with the karmic consequenses of hanging by his family jewels (allegedly, according to Scottish government whores and doctors consulting with lame medical consultants; some - if not most- paid for by Libyan legal defense); henceforth in a coma in Libyan hospital on life support (unless that's another CT you cooked up, which I wouldn't doubt).

and suddenly everybody wants to play.

What, you think you, the Justice For Megrahi group, and the other CTers are the only ones who can "play" in this arena? I'm quite certain that A LOT of folks have been sitting on the sidelines after having gotten fed up with the bullying by you and yours. Now they're speaking, you bully / accuse them of "wetting" themselves, being drunkards, and now, "suddenly" playing. Wow. Sorry to enlighten you darling, but it's not sudden. We've all been watching. Some of us have endured your bullying. Others (probably more rightly so, in not wasting their time on responding to your CTs, nasty remarks and bullying) have been watching and waiting for a break on (in addition to the rulings of the courts) what we've known all along as true, to come forth - AGAIN,:

Gadaffi ordered the bombing of PA103, just like all of the other terrorist attacks Libya conducted, Senussi followed Gaddafi's orders, and Megrahi followed Senussi's orders. And Boom. Lockerbie is littered with airliner wreckage and 270 INNOCENT DEAD -at the hands of Gaddafi, Sennusi, MEGRAHI and yes, Bollier. If you and/or CT would have bothered to look into the Gaddafi / Sennusi / Megrahi relationship (instead of hand waving it when I brought it up eons ago when I first joined JREF) in your "research" you might have noticed the issues and complicities here. But no, you're so hell bent on Megrahi's innocence, you accuse others of ignoring the facts and yet you ignore them yourselves.

You can blather all day long for two years and then some. Not everyone will stand up to your bullying or bother to waste their time on your silly CTs. Bottom line is, Megrahi was, is and forever will be a terrorist, aligned with Gaddaffi, via the same family tribe as Sennussi, who is in the same family as Gaddafi. Blood seems to be thick in the Libyan tribes and Megrahi's blood is intertwined with Gaddaffi's via his tribe being the same as Sennusi's. Sadly, the blood on the streets in Libya and Lockerbie is on Gaddaffi's and his thugs hands, same as it is now with the Scots and the UK in releasing Megrahi the terrorist to his terrorist family / tribe in Libya.

Trust me, more of those whom you view as "bad guys" will undoubtedly come forth with REAL evidence; thicker than a flimsy piece of paper (how interesting that R. Black predicted this. He must have a great PR agent playing back-up for him) and the blood on the Libyan regime's (including Megrahi's) hands.

Whatever now / then will you do with all the screeds of text on forums and blogs and time you spent in the Lockerbie CT forums? Whatever could you have done with those two wasted years? Again all around... sad.

~B.

[Bunntamas]

i'm not interested in arguing the case. There is a ct thread for that.

The courts found him guilty. That means he is guilty, both as a legal matter, and for the purposes of this thread.

amen!!!

[Bunntamas]

No, just stating a fact. He was found guilty.

So there!

AMEN again!

[Bunntamas]

FYI - for those of you in the UK, who are new to this argument; I'm an an American, and a family member of one of the victims of PA103. I have been accused by CT comments in this forum of drunken posts, because opposing commenters perceivedthe time-frame of my posts a result of "drunken partying in the wee hours" Said comments were made by those who are apparently are unable to decipher/ comprehend world time differences between the UK / Scotland and that the world does not reovolve around them - go figure.

Admittedly, I made a few posts including typos and run-on rants - out of passion, NOT drunkedness.

I have also been accused of having to be treated with "kid gloves" and responders to my comments having to "walk on egg shells", due to my status as a famiy member of a victim of PA103. Please be advised, that I never requested, nor expected responses to my comments to be treated with any sort of bias, per above as a result of my being a family member.

However, I did expect the comments to twist my comments in such a manner, based on their grasping at having nothing else to which to resort to outside of lame rag media straws and their own scribblels, blatherings and b"Bart Simpson" like cartoons.

Just sayin'. CT Bullies will go to no end to "try" to (unsucsessfully) "prove" their points.
~B.

[Caustic Logic]

RE: "actual evidence" are you referring to the actual evidence presented at trial and at appeal, which resulted in actual guilty and refused verdicts?
Yes, she does mean, and I mean, that actual evidence, as well as the manner (slipshod at best in spots) it was considered. You are pretty adamant about avoiding the evidence, and the absurd intepretations twisted into it, and just skipping to the legal technicality that you've become so deeply attached to (for understandable reasons). Do you ever wonder why the evidence seems so blurry? Is it the always zipping past it without looking clearly?

Or are you referring to the tabloid trash, blatherings, scribbelings and seriously laughable cartoon animations of CTers on blogs and forums?

That too. Anything relevant I crave and devour. The animation of course is mine, and you apparently still don't get what that was I was animating - the complete incompatibility of the evidence Tony Gauci gave with your villain, whom he only pointd at twice and said "similar to the man" and "not [exactly] the man." The actual details of the man, and the day of the sale, prove that Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was in fact "not [at all] the man."

Youtube link to first half (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1mPEIebdzk)

Hint for the observant: I gave Tony an extra finger! And admittedly I set up the height change poorly so it seems less impressive a difference than it is ("six feet or more" to 5'8"). And the shopper's wiggling didn't do what I meant it to. The easily amused could easily bust a gut laughing at this, it's so totally amazingly horrible.

But please do see the second half (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSlFbk3PeFU&feature=related), at 1:50 in for a sequence that should be unsettling to anyone who believes in Megrahi's guilt. I'm sure Bunny gets a giggle too from watching Tony reveal, under oath at the solemn Camp Zeist, that he knows just where his evidence contradicted Megrahi's guilt, that Megrahi must be found guilty for Tony to get his $2 million and avoid a beating from Paul for forfeiting his $1 million, and alters or fudges it at every single discrepant point. Flippin' hilarious, side-splitting comedy gold. Black comedy, of course.

Libyan ambassador is a bad guy? No, Don't think so. The bad guy is not one who is saying Gaddaffi ordered the bombing of PA103.

Ex-Justice Minister, not ambassador. The man who for years ran dictator Gaddafi's "justice" system, and is only now jumping ship. (perhaps the "ex" goes further back, haven't had time to read up much yet) But he's your new hero and darling, birds of a feather, and so on, isn't that the formula? As soon as they become desperate babbling idiots trying to stutter out just what you want to hear, these murderous thugs are your greates allies, and the clear "good guys."

I'd be sickened, Bunntamas, if I could really make a leap like that. I'll leave such acrobatics to others, however.

If I'm still "walking on eggshels," I'm just enjoying the soft crunching sound they make.

[Buncrana]

...in examining one of the grounds, the Commission formed the view that there is no reasonable basis in the trial court’s judgment for its conclusion that the purchase of the items from Mary’s House, took place on 7 December 1988.

Although it was proved that the applicant was in Malta on several occasions in December 1988, in terms of the evidence 7 December was the only date on which he would have had the opportunity to purchase the items. The finding as to the date of purchase was therefore important to the trial court’s conclusion that the applicant was the purchaser.

[...] additional evidence indicates that the purchase of the items took place prior to 6 December 1988. In other words, it indicates that the
purchase took place at a time when there was no evidence at trial that
the applicant was in Malta.

SCCRC Decision (http://www.sccrc.org.uk/ViewFile.aspx?id=293)


Anyone, pointedly those who are breathlessly parroting that Megrahi was found 'guilty', wish to offer any comment on the above?


We are all only too well aware that Megrahi was found 'Guilty' at Camp Zeist and rather that working yourself into an unnecessary lather, which is what it appears, it'd be curious if anyone from the 'Guilty' camp can actually address these critical issues.

Anyone?

Come on don't be shy, let's hear it, because as you know only too well, the 4 year investigation carried out by the SCCRC quite evidently concluded that "that the purchase took place at a time when there was no evidence at trial that the applicant was in Malta."

And that being the case, you and I know quite explicitly that this means one thing and one thing only: Megrahi was not the purchaser of the clothing and any tenuous connection between the bomb and Megrahi alluded to at Zeist is severed.

Oops!

Thus, the courts original 'Guilty' verdict, no matter how endlessly repeated, becomes an untenable and invalid point of argument and looks, quite frankly, desperate and irrational.

[Caustic Logic]

SCCRC Decision (http://www.sccrc.org.uk/ViewFile.aspx?id=293)


Anyone, pointedly those who are breathlessly parroting that Megrahi was found 'guilty', wish to offer any comment on the above?


We are all only too well aware that Megrahi was found 'Guilty' at Camp Zeist and rather that working yourself into an unnecessary lather, which is what it appears, it'd be curious if anyone from the 'Guilty' camp can actually address these critical issues.

Anyone?

Come on don't be shy, let's hear it, because as you know only too well, the 4 year investigation carried out by the SCCRC quite evidently concluded that "that the purchase took place at a time when there was no evidence at trial that the applicant was in Malta."

And that being the case, you and I know quite explicitly that this means one thing and one thing only: Megrahi was not the purchaser of the clothing and any tenuous connection between the bomb and Megrahi alluded to at Zeist is severed.

Oops!

Thus, the courts original 'Guilty' verdict, no matter how endlessly repeated, becomes an untenable and invalid point of argument and looks, quite frankly, desperate and irrational.

Yeah, you CT bully, with your deceptive so-called "legal rulings by an independent review body." The point Bunntams is trying to make, and it seems to slip by you, is he dropped that appeal they authorized, and the judges' ruling stands. Basis in reason or not, they decided that's when the sale happened and so it MIGHT have been Megrahi, despite no identification from Gauci or anyone. And so it was Megrahi, since blah blah blah, and that's all that matters. Guilty=guilty, her side wins, we lose, haha. Shows us bullies right.

[zooterkin]

The courts found him guilty. That means he is guilty, both as a legal matter, and for the purposes of this thread.

Which is not the same as saying that we know he did it, which is what you originally said.

[zooterkin]

...
The real bad guy carried out the bombing of PA103, on orders from his boss and his boss' boss, and is now (hopefully) dealing with the karmic consequenses of hanging by his family jewels (allegedly, according to Scottish government whores and doctors consulting with lame medical consultants; some - if not most- paid for by Libyan legal defense); henceforth in a coma in Libyan hospital on life support (unless that's another CT you cooked up, which I wouldn't doubt).

Sorry, you've lost me. What do you mean by the highlighted portion?

What, you think you, the Justice For Megrahi group, and the other CTers are the only ones who can "play" in this arena? I'm quite certain that A LOT of folks have been sitting on the sidelines after having gotten fed up with the bullying by you and yours. Now they're speaking, you bully / accuse them of "wetting" themselves, being drunkards, and now, "suddenly" playing. Wow. Sorry to enlighten you darling, but it's not sudden. We've all been watching. Some of us have endured your bullying. Others (probably more rightly so, in not wasting their time on responding to your CTs, nasty remarks and bullying) have been watching and waiting for a break on (in addition to the rulings of the courts) what we've known all along as true, to come forth - AGAIN,:
Are you suggesting Rolfe is a bully? If so, I suggest you report the offending posts (assuming there are any; seems unlikely to me, from all the posts of hers that I've read.)