Taking down the wrong man at Stockwell tube
Was the “armed team” ordered to kill Hussain Osman because he knew too much?By Gavin Gatenby, Possum News Network,
20 August 2005In a way, Hussain Osman – alleged to be one of the “failed” 21/7 London bombers – is a lucky man. If it wasn’t for an operational blunder he’d be a dead man today. The only logical way to read the facts that have now been established about the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes is that Osman was supposed to be shot dead on 22 July. In his stead, the police (or perhaps a military team, seconded to the police) took down the hapless Brazilian electrician by mistake.
“Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, will come under pressure to explain how a sophisticated police operation went so badly wrong.” Wrote Daniel McGrory and Stewart Tendler in The Times of 17 August. But the real issue is this: exactly which aspect of the operation “went wrong”: the shooting or the identification of the target?
Given that de Menezes, wrongly identified as Hussain Osman, was dressed in close-fitting clothing – jeans and a denim jacket – and not carrying anything, there is absolutely no possibility that the surveillance team or the firearms team could have considered he was carrying a bomb.
Thanks to some honest reporting by ITV and to leaks by an unknown investigator with a conscience, we now know de Menezes’ behaviour during his trip to the station and at the station suggested nothing suspicious. He simply walked into the station from the bus. He did not, as the police at first alleged, run into the station or leap over the ticket barrier after being challenged. He even stopped to pick up a free newspaper. Reports that he was chased onto the train with the armed team in hot pursuit have been exposed as nonsense.
Aside from the suspicion that a bulky jacket might conceal a bomb, I can think of only one other semi-legitimate reason why the firearms team might have been justified in using lethal force: de Menezes could possibly have been carrying a gun in a shoulder holster or tucked into the waistband of his jeans in the small of the back. But even in that case there was no reason for the shoot-to-the-head procedure when he was confronted on the train. When the shots were fired he had already been restrained by a plain-clothes surveillance man who led the four-man firearms team onto the train. There was no danger of him drawing a pistol even in the unlikely event he was carrying one.
According to the statement of the surveillance team member reported in The Times:
I grabbed the male in the denim jacket by wrapping both my arms around his torso, pinning his arms to his side.I then pushed him back on to the seat where he had been previously sitting ... I heard a gunshot very close to my left ear and was dragged away on to the floor of the carriage.
Given all these facts, the behaviour of the firearms team was consistent with absolute determination to shoot the subject dead.
The Times reported that the firearms team believed that de Menezes was in fact Hussain Osman, one of the alleged 21/7 bombers. The striking fact is that they deliberately and cold-bloodedly killed the man they believed to be Osman even though they had already determined he could not be carrying a bomb and while he was pinioned and in no position to draw a handgun.
The obvious conclusion is that they were under orders to kill Osman, but why? Why kill him if he could easily be arrested and might, under interrogation, reveal more about the plot and his accomplices?
Either the highly-trained firearms team was actually composed of psychopaths so eager to actually kill somebody that they collectively threw away any opportunity to exercise judgement on whether Osman/de Menezes presented a danger to the public or we must conclude that they were under orders to kill the subject regardless.
And the only logical reason for killing Osman is that whoever arranged the killing knew that whatever Osman might have said under interrogation would lead to the conclusion that the “failed” 21/7 bombings and possibly the 7/7 bombings were false flag operations.
In this respect The Times is guilty of obfuscation when it places emphasis on the supposed failure of the undercover officer with the camera at the block of flats where de Menezes lived to have videotaped him leaving the flats for identification purposes. The Times reported:
His advice was "it would be worth someone else having a look" to ensure that they had the right man. No other officer apparently took a picture of him even though de Menezes had to take a bus journey to the station. Even so, Gold Command at Scotland Yard, which was running this operation, declared a ‘code red’ and handed responsibility to CO19 — the firearms team.
The armed team had been given photographs of the alleged bombers yet no one realised that de Menezes bore no resemblance to them.
The investigation report states that the firearms unit of the police had been told that "unusual tactics" might be required and if they "were deployed to intercept a subject and there was an opportunity to challenge, but if the subject was non-compliant, a critical shot may be taken".
This whole “tragic series of blunders” spin smacks of a further attempt at cover-up. The surveillance man who was supposed to have videotaped the subject (but failed to activate his equipment because he was relieving himself at the moment de Menezes left the building) would have been videotaping in order to gather evidence for later use. His role would have had nothing to do with the actual identification of the subject on that morning because everybody taking part was in possession of photos of the alleged bombers. The problem was, the armed team, acting like a bunch of amateur hit-men, failed to confirm they had the right man.
Of course in the matter of whether to take lethal action it should have made absolutely no difference whether the subject was or was not Hussain Osman, because simple observation would have confirmed that there was no way he could be wearing a bomb and very little chance of him concealing a firearm. When confronted, de Menezes was never challenged and never given the slightest opportunity to demonstrate he was “non-compliant”, which, ostensibly, were the rules of engagement.
Another reason for deep suspicion is the sophistication of the official cover-story and speed with which it was disseminated*. De Menezes had been directly linked to the bombings, he wearing a “bulky jacket” in spite of warm weather. He had run into the station and vaulted over the ticket barrier and had been shot by police after being chased onto the train. This story has the hallmarks of being carefully crafted so that it would appeal even to the sceptics. It was widely assumed by people disturbed at his fate, that de Menezes was probably rather dark-skinned and might have run when first challenged because he feared his pursuers were white racist thugs. The picture deliberately created was of an unfortunate misunderstanding resulting from the general climate of fear in London.
And when the public response turned to revulsion and doubt it was subtly put about that de Menezes had run from the police because he was an illegal immigrant.
The following are just some of the questions that must urgently be addressed by an open and independent inquiry with full powers to subpoena:
• Who at Scotland Yard gave the “Code Red” order that allowed the gunmen a licence to kill the subject? Was it Sir Ian Blair himself? What was that person’s relationship to the members of the armed team? Who briefed the team?
• Who were the “armed team”, and were they from, as has been alleged, a military special operations group (like those made notorious by their role in Ireland)? What are their career histories?
• Who concocted the original police account of the events and peddled it to the media?
*For a superb analysis of the mainstream media’s reporting of the killing and particularly of the role of two supposed “eye witnesses” read "Officer, there's hole in your bit bucket" by William Bowles.
Who duped the London bombers?
By GAVIN GATENBY, Possum News Network
18 July 2005
Citing police and MI5 sources, The Mirror.co.uk, a mainstream British internet publication, has now admitted the probability that the four London bombers were in some way duped by a master bomber . This theory has been widely reported internationally (for example by the Sydney Morning Herald, 18 July 2005).
In the Mirror’s scenario the master bomber cynically tricked his team into thinking that when they pressed the button, they were setting off a timing device that would give them sufficient time to leave the target area. Instead, they pressed the buttons, detonated the bombs and killed themselves as well as their victims.
According to this scenario the bombers were merely expendable low-level operatives whose death would happily remove the probability that, if caught, they would reveal, under interrogation, details about their controllers and other members of the network.
In its way, this admission is a breakthrough that should allow other more plausible scenarios to emerge for investigation. READ THE FULL ARTICLE >>>
