Boston Marathon Bombing Questions

BostonMarathon Bombing Questions

"Something is rotten in the state of Denmark." InHamlet Shakespeare introduced us to the smell test.  It would behoove us to apply the same test to the Boston Marathon Bombing. 

On April 15, 2013 two bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon while the city of Boston enjoyed its annual celebration of Patriot Day.  Three people died and 264 were injured by the bombs which exploded 210 yards apart and 13 seconds apart.[i]  Three days later the FBI asked the public for assistance in identifying the two persons of interest carrying backpacks and walking through the crowd near the finish line on released surveillance camera video. 

The official story, as it unfolded, didn't make sense.  If Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev were in fact "radicalized" Muslims and bombed the Boston Marathon, why did they not issue some sort of statement about what they were doing and why?  If they were not interested in becoming martyrs to their cause, it could have been done anonymously.  Their family ancestry is from Chechnya and the official story is that Tamerlan was "radicalized" after visiting Russia and the Caucasus region in the summer of 2012.  It was Russia that went to war to keep Muslim Chechnya from gaining independence from Russia.  Why did the Tsarnaev brothers not orchestrate an attack against Russian interests?

Of course I can understand the Tsarnaev brothers becoming "radicalized" because of illegal, immoral U.S. wars against Muslims in numerous countries.  Why did not his radicalization occur when he was in the U.S.?  We are told that the "radicalization" occurred when Tamerlan visited his ancestral home Chechnya that had fought for independence from Russia.  If this is when he was "radicalized", it would seem like Russia would be the country he would be most disposed to retaliate against.  Instead, we are told to believe that his "radicalization" was against the U.S., Russia's chief rival. 

Why did the Tsarnaev brothers not in the least try and conceal their identity?  They were intelligent and had to know that there are video surveillance cameras almost everywhere in public now. 

If the bombing was a statement against U.S. wars against Muslim people, why didn't they make that statement in writing or verbally so that the public would become aware of their cause?  Wouldn't at least their family and friends have knowledge of their "radicalization"? 

I started to do a little online research and wrote an unfinished draft of an article called "Boston and Beyond".  It appears further below.  I was becoming overwhelmed with the scope of the omissions in the official story and my own inability to make sense of it. 

Radicalize For Peace

I then started and finished another article "Radicalize For Peace"

http://www.intrepidreport.com/archives/author/nick-egnatz

which just mentioned a few of the inconsistencies of the official Boston bombing story and primarily dealt with U.S. citizens committing to a culture of resistance to capitalism's endless wars, militarization and empire; inequality; destruction of the environment and undemocratic democracy. 

I would be portraying myself as a much braver person than I actually am, if I did not admit that I had some concern about possible retaliation for writing and posting "Boston & Beyond".  Not that I have let that affect what I have written in the past.

"Justice American Style: The Obama War on Dissent"  http://www.intrepidreport.com/archives/9831

and                                           

"Who Are the Real Criminals?" http://www.intrepidreport.com/archives/9577

being the latest examples. 

But there was concern on my part.  If in fact, the FBI and or CIA were part of some operation to save us from terrorist bombs that went horribly wrong or even worse had planned on exploding them, then why would they not want to silence anyone that started connecting the dots?  Let me make this clear, I don't assign complicity in the Boston bombing to the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security or any other government agency.  What I do allege is that the official story that has been told just does not make sense and that a completely independent investigation is necessary to restore citizen confidence in our government.  The corporate/mainstream media is doing nothing to bring about greater understanding of what happened in Boston. 

Ignored Bombshell

Then on May 22nd this bombshell appears in the establishment New York Times and yet the corporate press continues to not ask questions: "Deadly End to F.B.I. Queries on Tsarnaev and a Triple Killing"^[ii]  Ibragim Todashev was shot by an FBI agent in Orlando, FL condo after confessing that he and Tamerlan Tsarnaev had killed three people in the Boston suburb of Waltham on Sept 11, 2011.  Notice that it happened on the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.  An inquiring press just might be interested in the significance of this date.   

The FBI's description of the events has changed several times since we were informed that Mr. Todashev was shot and killed by an FBI agent interrogating him in Orlando, Florida. 

• Mr. Todashev and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were acquaintances in the Boston area.
• They were both involved in boxing and martial arts together.
• They were persons of interest, but not suspects, in the triple homicide in Waltham on Sept 11, 2011.  Brendan H. Mess, 25; Erik H. Weissman, 31; and Raphael M. Teken, 37 were found with thousands of dollars in cash and marijuana covering their bodies.  Their throats had been slit to such an extent that they were nearly decapitated.[iii]
• Yet, friends reported that Tsarnaev and homicide victim Mess had been lifelong best friends.[iv]
• On the evening of May 21, 3 FBI agents and several Massachusetts state police interrogated Mr. Todashev for at least 5 hours about the Waltham murders.  They had previously questioned him at least two other times.
• Todashev, who had already been questioned previously by the FBI, told a friend earlier that he was worried that he was being “framed” by the FBI.  This doesn't sound like someone who is about to confess to committing a vicious triple murker.[v]
• During this interrogation we are told that Mr. Todashev confessed that he and Tamerlan Tsarnaev committed the triple homicide in Waltham, but this was unrecorded.  We are expected to believe that Mr. Todashev, worried about being framed for the triple homicide, did not have the presence of mind to request a lawyer. 
• Two of the FBI agents then left the scene.  I believe it was Mr. Todashev's condo.  It is unclear whether police officers stayed in the room with the remaining FBI agent or not.  There have been conflicting reports.
• "On the day of the shooting, federal law enforcement officials provided differing accounts of the episode, initially saying Mr. Todashev had a knife. Later they said Mr. Todashev had 'exploded' at the agent and might have had a pipe or might not have had anything in his hands."[vi]
• Later it was reported,"Mr. Todashev, according to the F.B.I., confessed to his involvement in the deaths and implicated Mr. Tsarnaev. He then started to write a statement admitting his involvement while sitting at a table across from the agent and one of the detectives when the agent briefly looked away, the official said. At that moment, Mr. Todashev picked up the table and threw it at the agent, knocking him to the ground.

     While trying to stand up, the agent, who suffered a wound to his face from the table that required stitches, drew his gun and saw Mr. Todashev running at him with a metal pole, according to the official, adding that it might have been a broomstick.

     The agent fired several shots at Mr. Todashev, striking him and knocking him      backward. But Mr. Todashev again charged at the agent. The agent fired      several more shots at Mr. Todashev, killing him. The detective in the room did      not fire his weapon, the official said."[vii]

• The FBI agent shot him 7 times including once in the back of the head.[viii]

"Nevertheless, several friends of the victims noted that each of them had been selling drugs for years and could only recall one episode of violence: Mess was once severely beaten after coming up short in a payment to a drug supplier.

'They had all been [selling drugs] peacefully for a long time without a problem,' one friend said.

But what stands out for friends of the victims struggling to make sense of the possibility that Tsarnaev and Todashev were the killers is the friendship shared by Mess and Tsarnaev. The two young men grew up in the same Cambridge neighborhood, attended the same high school, and often worked out together.

'They loved each other,' one friend said. 'It just doesn’t add up.'"[ix]

On June 9, a full 18 days after Todashev was shot to death, the Orlando Sentinel reported that the U.S. Dept of Justice Civil Rights Division had pledged to conduct a separate investigation into the FBI's fatal shooting.  This in response to the American Civil Liberties Union and the Florida Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations calling for an independent examination of the shooting.  Since both the FBI and the Civil Rights Division are part of the Dept of Justice, the Civil Rights Division inquiry cannot be considered an independent investigation. 

"The FBI has refused to publicly release specific information about the confrontation or how many law-enforcement officials were interviewing Todashev.

Anonymous law-enforcement sources have leaked differing scenarios about what happened."[x]

Todashev’s father, Abdulbaki called for an independent investigation at a Moscow news conference.

“The shot in the back of the head indicates that they were shooting to finish him off,” he said. “My son was interrogated for eight hours by four or five FBI agents and I will never believe he could be in a position to attack any of them. In the very least between the four of them they could have subdued him physically instead of riddling him with bullets.”[xi]

A brief mention of past and present practices of the CIA and FBI.  The CIA tie-in to the case is covered in "Boston and Beyond" below. 

CIA

The CIA has a history of criminality.  This is a list I put together some time ago.

Military Coups Against Democratically Elected Governments

Supported by the CIA

1)     Cuba (1952)

2)     Iran (1953)

3)     Guatemala (1954)

4)     Zaire (1961, 1965)

5)     Dominican Republic (1963)

6)     Brazil (1964)

7)     Indonesia (1965)

8)     Greece (1967)

9)     Laos (1967-1973)

10)Ecuador (1961, 1963 and unsuccessful 2010)

11)Chile (1973)

12)Nicaragua (1979-1990)

13)Haiti (1991, 2004)

14)Venezuela (unsuccessful 2002)

15)Honduras (2009)

These governments were all democratically elected and they were all leftist to some degree.  The CIA either actively or passively supported military coups deposing these democratically elected leftist governments for non-elected military juntas that proceeded to murder thousands upon thousands of innocent civilians, trade unionists, socialists and communists.  This was all done with the collusion of every U.S. president of the last 60 years.

The CIA's actions have hardly been limited to the above 15 countries.  We can rest assured that they have been quite active sowing unrest in just about every country across the globe that has balked at accepting the hegemony of Western capitalism.  These countries are listed because they were democratic until the CIA assisted in the military coups against democracy.  Since the mid 1970s it has been the official stated policy of the U.S. government to promote democracy.  U.S. policy makers realized that the then longstanding U.S. practice of supporting dictators across the globe vastly increased the likelihood of socialist revolution so the U.S. was forced to abandon dictators and began to promote democracy.  The only caveat being that the democracy promoted was not actually democratic, but had its allegiance to supporting Western capitalism at the expense of the real needs and wishes of the people.     

FBI

"COINTELPRO (Counter Intelligence Program) was a series of covert and at times illegal, projects conducted by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) aimed at surveying, infiltrating, discrediting and disrupting domestic political organizations.  

The FBI has used covert operations against domestic political groups since its inception; however, covert operations under the official COINTELPRO label took place between 1956 and 1971.  COINTELPRO tactics have been alleged to include discrediting targets through psychological warfare; smearing individuals and groups using forged documents and by planting false reports in the media; harassment; wrongful imprisonment; and illegal violence, including assassination."[xii] 

The FBI's stated motivation was "protecting national security, preventing violence and maintaining the existing social and political order."  FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover issued directives governing COINTELPRO, ordering FBI agents to "expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit or otherwise neutralize" the activities of these movements* and their leaders.[xiii] (Emphasis mine)

*A partial list of movements cited: Southern Christian Leadership Conference, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Congress of Racial Equality, black nationalists groups, the American Indian Movement, a broad range of organizations labeled 'New Left', Students for a Democratic Society, Weathermen, almost all groups protesting the Vietnam War, student demonstrators protesting the Vietnam War with no group affiliation, the National Lawyers Guild, organizations and individuals associated with the women's rights movement, groups seeking independence for Puerto Rico and a United Ireland. 

The above material is from Wikipedia's website quoting from the Senate Committee Investigation and Report.  Although I have no reason to question its accuracy, I have attempted to access the official Senate Report online at different government sites and have been warned that proceeding to the site could attack my computer.   

Occupy Attacked: More recently the FBI is up to its old tricks, spying on and entrapping members of peace/social justice groups and the Occupy movement.  This illegal government activity against peaceful/non violent protestors in the FBI's own words all came to a head in late 2011 when every permanent occupation in the U.S. was brutally attacked by the police.

"FBI documents just obtained by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF) pursuant to the PCJF’s Freedom of Information Act demands reveal that from its inception, the FBI treated the Occupy movement as a potential criminal and terrorist threat even though the agency acknowledges in documents that organizers explicitly called for peaceful protest and did 'not condone the use of violence' at occupy protests.

The PCJF has obtained heavily redacted documents showing that FBI offices and agents around the country were in high gear conducting surveillance against the movement even as early as August 2011, a month prior to the establishment of the OWS encampment in Zuccotti Park and other Occupy actions around the country. 

This production, which we believe is just the tip of the iceberg, is a window into the nationwide scope of the FBI’s surveillance, monitoring, and reporting on peaceful protestors organizing with the Occupy movement.  These documents show that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are treating protests against the corporate and banking structure of America as potential criminal and terrorist activity.  These documents also show these federal agencies functioning as a de facto intelligence arm of Wall Street and Corporate America.”[xiv] (emphasis mine)                                                                               Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, Executive Director of the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund 

Big Banks Helped Coordinate Attack on Occupy                                        

Naomi Wolf describes who was behind the coordinated attacks.  "It was more sophisticated than we had imagined: new documents show that the violent crackdown on Occupy last fall – so mystifying at the time – was not just coordinated at the level of the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and local police. The crackdown, which involved, as you may recall, violent arrests, group disruption, canister missiles to the skulls of protesters, people held in handcuffs so tight they were injured, people held in bondage till they were forced to wet or soil themselves –was coordinated with the big banks themselves."[xv]

This is my original unpublished piece on the marathon attacks.

Boston & Beyond

The Department of Homeland Security has a 2013 overall budget of $59.5 billion per year,[xvi] yet it is unable to protect us from alleged terrorists in Boston that the Russian government had warned the FBI about two years ago.[xvii]  The mother of the alleged terrorists said that FBI had an ongoing relationship with her son Tamerlan, including at least 5 FBI visits to their home between 2008 and 2012.

"They came and asked him, what are you doing, what are you up to?" she recalled. "They said Tamerlan was an influential lad, he had the personality of a leader and they asked me, 'Don't you have any thoughts that he could organise some kind of group of a terrorist persuasion?'" "They said they'd seen what kind of videos he'd been looking at. And they told me that they keep young leaders among Muslims under control so there aren't any bombings, so that they don't fall under someone's influence."[xviii]

The FBI released a video of the 2 suspects, feigned knowledge of their identify, asked the public to identify them and specifically instructed the public to ignore any other leads.  The FBI has a 2013 budget of $8.2 billion[xix].  Coupled with Department of Homeland Security's $59.5 billion, is it unreasonable to assume that they knew exactly who was in the video they themselves released?  All the while, instructing us to pay attention to nothing else.   

" For clarity, these images should be the only ones—the only ones—that the public should view to assist us. Other photos should not be deemed credible and unnecessarily divert the public’s attention in the wrong direction and create undue work for vital law enforcement resources."[xx]

The FBI video may not even be a video.  Online sleuths, less technologically  challenged than I, have determined that the video the FBI instructed people to exclusively use to identify the suspects was made by attaching still pictures together and that is the reason for the ghosted images following the two suspects. 

What were Craft International Mercenaries Doing at the Bombing Site?

One theory being that an identifying logo on one of their caps could be altered so that it could not be identified as the skull insignia of black ops mercenary company Craft International.  Videos show men at the scene just before the bombing wearing Craft International outfits and black backpacks similar to the ones worn by the suspect.[xxi]  Yet no one, including government servants, involved with the Marathon or security for the event has any knowledge of them at all.

Referring to the apparent Craft International mercenaries near the finish line of the marathon, independent journalist Dave Lindorff at ThisCantBeHappening.net asked the question "Why Such Secrecy about Private Military Contractor's Men Working the Event?"[xxii]

Lindorff asked this question, in succession, of:

• Jack Fleming, a public affairs person with the Boston Athletic Assn., sponsor of the marathon
• Commonwealth of Massachusetts Executive Office of Public Safety (man named Terrell) to whom Mr. Fleming above had referred him
• Boston Police Department Public Affairs Office to whom Mr. Terrell above had referred him
• FBI (public affairs person Amanda Cox) to whom Boston Police Dept had referred him
• Craft International to whom the Amanda Cox of the FBI had referred him.  An unidentified woman at first told Lindorff that she was just the answering service.  When Lindorff replied that he was calling the corporate headquarters and knew it was not an answering service she replied “Let me see who I can transfer you to.”  After a long pause she told Lindorff,  “The answer I’ve been given is that you should go to the website, where there’s an email address you can write to with your question.”  Lindorff replied that he had already done that and received no response. 
• U.S.Department of Homeland Security Press Office.  Lindorff talked with a woman named Angela who refused to give her last name and said her office was "only taking inquiries sent in by email."  Lindorff sent in his inquiry by email and had not yet received a reply when he wrote his story.  This is a public agency with a budget of $59.5 billion ignoring a legitimate request for information from a member of the press. 

It comes as little surprise that none of the above agencies were able to provide an answer to Mr. Lindorff's question about Craft International working the event. 

Lindorff's story includes a picture from the scene of at least 7 individuals near the finish line where the bombs blew up wearing Craft International outfits (two with black backpacks).  It also has a picture of Tamerlan and his backpack which does not have a white square on top.  While the picture released by the FBI of the exploded backpack has such a white square.  One of the men dressed in the Craft International gear is carrying a black backpack with a white square on top of it.  Is this of no interest to those charged with law enforcement and justice?  Of no interest to the corporate press?  Do our officials think the public would not be interested in such a major discrepancy to the official story? 

Lindorff makes no allegations and only asks the question why is our corporate press not asking these questions? 

Police State Boston?

WCTV News Boston reported that Homeland Security and Boston Police declared martial law[xxiii] and placed the one million residents of the Boston metropolitan area on virtual house arrest while they searched for the remaining alleged terrorist.  Some may quibble and say that the martial law was voluntary.  This video and pictures certainly show all the trappings of a police state[xxiv], rousting citizens out of their homes at gunpoint and then marching them down the street to be searched and questioned again by more police.  Remember they were only looking for one nineteen year old youth that they had a picture of.  After apprehension the surviving alleged terrorist allegedly confessed until he was read his Miranda Rights against self incrimination and then stopped talking.[xxv]

CIA Ties?

Russian newspaper Izvestia reported that elder brother, now deceased, Tamerlan Tsarnaev attended workshops in the summer of 2012 put on by the Non Governmental Organization (NGO) Fund of Caucasus, established in November, 2008, following the Georgian-Ossetian conflict. The main purpose of the organization, according to Izvestia, is “to recruit young people and intellectuals of the North Caucasus to enhance instability and extremism in the southern regions of Russia.”[xxvi]

Izvestia alleged that Fund of Caucasus is tied to U.S. NGO and CIA front Jamestown Fund and Zbigniew Brzezinski, former National Security Advisor to President Carter.  Russians alleged that CIA is active in the Caucasus region fomenting opposition to Russia government in Southern Russia and amongst former Soviet Republics in the area.[xxvii]  

The Fund of Caucasus denies the story.

"The 'Fund of Caucasus' rejects the defamatory information published by the newspaper 'Izvestia' about the possible recruitment of the North Caucasians for serving 'in favor of Georgia and the USA'. The 'Fund of Caucasus' has never organized either seminars or meetings for this reason.
The 'Fund of Caucasus' rejects an acquaintance with Tamerlan Tsarnayev – a participant of Boston attack and has no information about his presence in Georgia.
The 'Fund of Caucasus' rejects the accusation about being involved in promoting extremist intentions and encouraging destabilization in south regions of Russia."[xxviii]

Allegations tying the Tsarnaeva family to NGOs and the CIA open up a whole new can of worms that I do not have the expertise with which to deal.  Tsarnaeva brothers' Uncle Ruslan Tsarni (formerly Tsarnaeva), now an attorney and a well connected oil executive of Montgomery Village, MD was quick to denounce his nephews when they were first implicated in the bombings.  Those paying attention to the real news and not the corporate news now know he has ties to the CIA and was formerly married to Samantha Ankara Fuller, the daughter of a former top CIA official Graham Fuller. 

"CIA official Graham Fuller, who spent 20 years as operations officer in Turkey, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Afghanistan, and Hong Kong. In 1982 Fuller was appointed the National Intelligence Officer for Near East and South Asia at the CIA, and in 1986, under Ronald Reagan, he became the Vice-Chairman of the National Intelligence Council, with overall responsibility for national level strategic forecasting."[xxix]

Ties to NGOs that foment revolution, CIA, FBI; why is this important?  It goes to possible explanations that make sense.  Is it possible that the brothers were doing the bidding of handlers (CIA, FBI) that were staging a terrorist attack as a false flag operation?  Is it possible that the bombs weren't meant to blow up, but that the Craft International personnel were positioned to save the day and something went terribly wrong?  And maybe none of this is true, but only a truly independent investigation will allow us to find out.

Nick Egnatz

Nick Egnatz is a Vietnam veteran. He has been actively protesting our government’s crimes of empire in both person and print for some years now and was named “Citizen of the Year” for Northwest Indiana in 2006 for his peace activism by the National Association of Social Workers.

Contact Nick OccupyNick@yahoo.com