Bombing Terrorists

September 17, 1998
When President Clinton ordered the bombings in Sudan and Afghanistan, most Americans accepted his word that the strikes were necessary. But further evidence raises serious doubts about the necessity of the missions and their effectiveness.

Yesterday I talked about the bombing of a so-called chemical weapons plant in Sudan. If this was a weapons plant, the evidence is lacking and the necessity of bombing it is open to some question and discussion. At the time, the plant was linked to Osama bin Laden. The tie-in doesn't exist. The plant owner never did business with him, and the terrorist hasn't lived in Sudan since 1995.

The tie to Afghanistan is more substantial, but the question here is whether the bombing was all that effective or strategic. The U.S. claim that they destroyed or damaged many buildings in Osama bin Laden's base is a bit of a stretch. These so-called headquarters were nothing more than mud huts and tents in the mountains. Officials claimed to knock out the terrorist's communications infrastructure. But press reports said that he uses portable satellite telephones, not a centralized command-and-control system that can be hit by a missile.

The President and other administration officials claimed that the timing had to do with a gathering of terrorist leaders. But only 21 were killed, even though the U.S. struck barracks at night. Now Secretary William Cohen admits that the terrorist confab may never have taken place at all, but won't discuss it further.

Contrast this with Ronald Reagan, who showed the public decoded Libyan diplomatic cables when he ordered the bombing of Tripoli or published numerous photos to support his invasion of Granada. It does make you wonder if the bombings in Sudan and Afghanistan were more for show than for strategic impact.

I'm Kerby Anderson of Probe Ministries, and that's my opinion.

© 1998 Probe Ministries International