Demolition Quotes
O’Neil was one of the great ironies of the War on Terror. For years before 9-11 he had determined that al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden where major threats to America. However, the then Director of the FBI Louis Freeh had repeatedly told the White House and the national Security Council that they were not a major threat. O’Neil kept insisting that more attention be paid to al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden and was a very aggressive personality so much that his supervisors drove him out of the FBI. He then took the job of the Director of Security of the World Trade Center where he continued to warn about al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. He was killed in the 9-11 attack when his predictions came true. The O’Neil case is yet another example of the people who were the most right in our intelligence apparatus were isolated or pushed out if they tried to command the attention of the nation’s policy makers.
This was the directive that gave the CIA authority for its many covert operations.
This is the 17th century French equivalent of base closings. Since there were no legislators from the districts of the closed castles he had to contend with the process was then easy. What is particularly interesting is that they did not just close them and put them to other use. They demolished them, so that subsequent administrations could not change their mind and re-garrison the castles.
The objective was not just to win battles but to make it impossible for the area to support any kind of military operation thereafter.
