Bomb threats
"The US President, George Bush, planned to bomb the pan-Arab television broadcaster al-Jazeera, according to a British newspaper that cited a Downing Street memo marked "Top secret". The Mirror quoted an unnamed British government official as saying Mr Bush's threat was "humorous, not serious".
A source told the Mirror: "The memo is explosive and hugely damaging to Bush. "He made clear he wanted to bomb al-Jazeera in Qatar and elsewhere. Blair replied that would cause a big problem. "There's no doubt what Bush wanted to do - and no doubt Blair didn't want him to do it." Another source said: "Bush was deadly serious, as was Blair. That much is absolutely clear from the language used by both men."
The Mirror said such a strike would have been "the most spectacular foreign policy disaster since the Iraq war itself". The newspaper said that the memo "casts fresh doubt on claims that other attacks on al-Jazeera were accidents". It cited the 2001 direct hit on the channel's Kabul office.
A spokesman for Mr Blair's Downing Street office said: "We have got nothing to say about this story. We don't comment on leaked documents."
http://smh.com.au/news/world/bush-had-aljazeera-attack-in-mind-says-paper/2005/11/22/1132421669272.html
Margaret Thatcher forced Francois Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina's French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to launch a nuclear warhead against Buenos Aires, according to a new book.
"Excuse me. I had a difference to settle with the Iron Lady. That Thatcher, what an impossible woman!" the president said as he arrived, more than 45 minutes late, on May 7, 1982. "With her four nuclear submarines in the south Atlantic, she's threatening to unleash an atomic weapon against Argentina if I don't provide her with the secret codes that will make the missiles we sold the Argentinians deaf and blind." Mitterrand reminded the author it was an Exocet missile that had struck HMS Sheffield. "It was fired from a Super-Etendard jet," he said. "All the materiel was French."
In words that the psychoanalyst has sworn to the publisher, Meren Sell, are genuine, the president continued: "She's livid. She blames me personally for this new Trafalgar … I was obliged to give in. She's got them now, the codes."
http://smh.com.au/news/world/thatcher-threatened-nuclear-strike-says-book/2005/11/22/1132421669266.html
A source told the Mirror: "The memo is explosive and hugely damaging to Bush. "He made clear he wanted to bomb al-Jazeera in Qatar and elsewhere. Blair replied that would cause a big problem. "There's no doubt what Bush wanted to do - and no doubt Blair didn't want him to do it." Another source said: "Bush was deadly serious, as was Blair. That much is absolutely clear from the language used by both men."
The Mirror said such a strike would have been "the most spectacular foreign policy disaster since the Iraq war itself". The newspaper said that the memo "casts fresh doubt on claims that other attacks on al-Jazeera were accidents". It cited the 2001 direct hit on the channel's Kabul office.
A spokesman for Mr Blair's Downing Street office said: "We have got nothing to say about this story. We don't comment on leaked documents."
http://smh.com.au/news/world/bush-had-aljazeera-attack-in-mind-says-paper/2005/11/22/1132421669272.html
Margaret Thatcher forced Francois Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina's French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to launch a nuclear warhead against Buenos Aires, according to a new book.
"Excuse me. I had a difference to settle with the Iron Lady. That Thatcher, what an impossible woman!" the president said as he arrived, more than 45 minutes late, on May 7, 1982. "With her four nuclear submarines in the south Atlantic, she's threatening to unleash an atomic weapon against Argentina if I don't provide her with the secret codes that will make the missiles we sold the Argentinians deaf and blind." Mitterrand reminded the author it was an Exocet missile that had struck HMS Sheffield. "It was fired from a Super-Etendard jet," he said. "All the materiel was French."
In words that the psychoanalyst has sworn to the publisher, Meren Sell, are genuine, the president continued: "She's livid. She blames me personally for this new Trafalgar … I was obliged to give in. She's got them now, the codes."
http://smh.com.au/news/world/thatcher-threatened-nuclear-strike-says-book/2005/11/22/1132421669266.html
posted by Guambat Stew at Wednesday, November 23, 2005
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