Full transcirpt of Bin Laden tape from 10/29/04

Full transcript of bin Ladin's speech
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Saturday 30 October 2004 11:28 AM GMT

Bin Ladin directed his message at the American people
Following is the full English transcript of Usama bin Ladin's speech in a
videotape sent to Aljazeera. In the interests of authenticity the
transcript, which appeared as subtitles at the foot of the screen, has been
left unedited.
Praise be to Allah who created the creation for his worship and commanded
them to be just and permitted the wronged one to retaliate against the
oppressor in kind. To proceed:
Peace be upon he who follows the guidance: People of America this talk of
mine is for you and concerns the ideal way to prevent another Manhattan, and
deals with the war and its causes and results.

Before I begin, I say to you that security is an indispensable pillar of
human life and that free men do not forfeit their security, contrary to
Bush's claim that we hate freedom. If so, then let him explain to us why we
don't strike for example - Sweden? And we know that freedom-haters don't
possess defiant spirits like those of the 19 - may Allah have mercy on them.

No, we fight because we are free men who don't sleep under oppression. We
want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation.
So shall we lay waste to yours.

No-one except a dumb thief plays with the security of others and then makes
himself believe he will be secure. Whereas thinking people, when disaster
strikes, make it their priority to look for its causes, in order to prevent
it happening again.

But I am amazed at you. Even though we are in the fourth year after the
events of September 11th, Bush is still engaged in distortion, deception and
hiding from you the real causes. And thus, the reasons are still there for a
repeat of what occurred.

So I shall talk to you about the story behind those events and shall tell
you truthfully about the moments in which the decision was taken, for you to
consider.
I say to you, Allah knows that it had never occurred to us to strike the
towers. But after it became unbearable and we witnessed the oppression and
tyranny of the American/Israeli coalition against our people in Palestine
and Lebanon, it came to my mind.

The events that affected my soul in a direct way started in 1982 when
America permitted the Israelis to invade Lebanon and the American Sixth
Fleet helped them in that. This bombardment began and many were killed and
injured and others were terrorized and displaced.

I couldn't forget those moving scenes, blood and severed limbs, women and
children sprawled everywhere. Houses destroyed along with their occupants
and high rises demolished over their residents, rockets raining down on our
home without mercy.

The situation was like a crocodile meeting a helpless child, powerless
except for his screams. Does the crocodile understand a conversation that
doesn't include a weapon? And the whole world saw and heard but it didn't
respond.

In those difficult moments many hard-to-describe ideas bubbled in my soul,
but in the end they produced an intense feeling of rejection of tyranny, and
gave birth to a strong resolve to punish the oppressors.

And as I looked at those demolished towers in Lebanon, it entered my mind
that we should punish the oppressor in kind and that we should destroy
towers in America in order that they taste some of what we tasted and so
that they be deterred from killing our women and children.

And that day, it was confirmed to me that oppression and the intentional
killing of innocent women and children is a deliberate American policy.
Destruction is freedom and democracy, while resistance is terrorism and
intolerance.

This means the oppressing and embargoing to death of millions as Bush Sr.
did in Iraq in the greatest mass slaughter of children mankind has ever
known, and it means the throwing of millions of pounds of bombs and
explosives at millions of children - also in Iraq - as Bush Jr. Did, in
order to remove an old agent and replace him with a new puppet to assist in
the pilfering of Iraq's oil and other outrages.

So with these images and their like as their background, the events of
September 11th came as a reply to those great wrongs, should a man be blamed
for defending his sanctuary?

Is defending oneself and punishing the aggressor in kind, objectionable
terrorism? If it is such, then it is unavoidable for us.

This is the message which I sought to communicate to you in word and deed,
repeatedly, for years before September 11th.

And you can read this, if you wish, in my interview with Scott in Time
Magazine in 1996, or with Peter Arnett on CNN in 1997, or my meeting with
John Weiner in 1998.
You can observe it practically, if you wish, in Kenya and Tanzania and in
Aden. And you can read it in my interview with Abdul Bari Atwan, as well as
my interviews with Robert Fisk.

The latter is one of your compatriots and co-religionists and I consider him
to be neutral. So are the pretenders of freedom at The White House and the
channels controlled by them able to run an interview with him? So that he
may relay to the American people what he has understood from us to be the
reasons for our fight against you?
If you were to avoid these reasons, you will have taken the correct path
that will lead America to the security that it was in before September 11th.
This concerned the causes of the war.

As for it's results, they have been, by the grace of Allah, positive and
enormous, and have, by all standards, exceeded all expectations. This is due
to many factors, chief amongst them, that we have found it difficult to deal
with the Bush administration in light of the resemblance it bears to the
regimes in our countries, half of which are ruled by the military and the
other half which are ruled by the sons of kings and presidents.
Our experience with them is lengthy, and both types are replete with those
who are characterized by pride, arrogance, greed and misappropriation of
wealth. This resemblance began after the visits of Bush Sr. to the region.

At a time when some of our compatriots were dazzled by America and hoping
that these visits would have an effect on our countries, all of a sudden he
was affected by those monarchies and military regimes, and became envious of
their remaining decades in their positions, to embezzle the public wealth of
the nation without supervision or accounting.
So he took dictatorship and suppression of freedoms to his son and they
named it the Patriot Act, under the pretense of fighting terrorism. In
addition, Bush sanctioned the installing of sons as state governors, and
didn't forget to import expertise in election fraud from the region's
presidents to Florida to be made use of in moments of difficulty.
All that we have mentioned has made it easy for us to provoke and bait this
administration. All that we have to do is to send two Mujahideen to the
furthest point East to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida,
in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human,
economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of
note other than some benefits for their private companies.
This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and
the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the
Mujahideen, bled Russia for ten years, until it went bankrupt and was forced
to withdraw in defeat.

All Praise is due to Allah.

So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of
bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah.
That being said, those who say that al-Qaida has won against the
administration in the White House or that the administration has lost in
this war have not been precise, because when one scrutinizes the results,
one cannot say that al-Qaida is the sole factor in achieving those
spectacular gains.
Rather, the policy of the White House that demands the opening of war fronts
to keep busy their various corporations - whether they be working in the
field of arms or oil or reconstruction - has helped al-Qaida to achieve
these enormous results.

And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House
and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United
States, even if the intentions differ.

And it was to these sorts of notions and their like that the British
diplomat and others were referring in their lectures at the Royal Institute
of International Affairs. (When they pointed out that) for example, al-Qaida
spent $500 000 on the event, while America, in the incident and its
aftermath, lost - according to the lowest estimate - more than 500 billion
dollars.

Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated a million dollars by the
permission of Allah, besides the loss of a huge number of jobs.
As for the size of the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical
numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.

And even more dangerous and bitter for America is that the Mujahideen
recently forced Bush to resort to emergency funds to continue the fight in
Afghanistan and Iraq, which is evidence of the success of the
blee-until-bankruptcy plan - with Allah's permission.
It is true that this shows that al-Qaida has gained, but on the other hand,
it shows that the Bush administration has also gained, something of which
anyone who looks at the size of the contracts acquired by the shady Bush
administration-linked mega-corporations, like Haliburton and its kind, will
be convinced. And it all shows that the real loser is...you.
It is the American people and their economy. And for the record, we had
agreed with the Commander-General Muhammad Ataa, Allah have mercy on him,
that all the operations should be carried out within twenty minutes, before
Bush and his administration notice.

It never occurred to us that the commander-in-chief of the American armed
forces would abandon 50 000 of his citizens in the twin towers to face those
great horrors alone, the time when they most needed him.

But because it seemed to him that occupying himself by talking to the little
girl about the goat and its butting was more important than occupying
himself with the planes and their butting of the skyscrapers. We were given
three times the period required to execute the operations - All Praise is
Due to Allah.
And it's no secret to you that the thinkers and perceptive ones from among
the Americans warned Bush before the war and told him, "All that you want
for securing America and removing the weapons of mass destruction - assuming
they exist - is available to you, and the nations of the world are with you
in the inspections, and it is in the interest of America that it not be
thrust into an unjustified war with an unknown outcome."
But the darkness of the black gold blurred his vision and insight, and he
gave priority to private interests over the public interests of America.

So the war went ahead, the death toll rose, the American economy bled, and
Bush became embroiled in the swamps of Iraq that threaten his future. He
fits the saying, "Like the naughty she-goat who used her hoof to dig up a
knife from under the earth"
So I say to you, over 15 000 of our people have been killed and tens of
thousands injured, while more than a thousand of you have been killed and
more than 10 000 injured. And Bush's hands are stained with the blood of all
those killed from both sides, all for the sake of oil and keeping their
private companies in business.

Be aware that it is the nation who punishes the weak man when he causes the
killing of one of its citizens for money, while letting the powerful one get
off, when he causes the killing of more than 1000 of its sons, also for
money.
And the same goes for your allies in Palestine. They terrorize the women and
children, and kill and capture the men as they lie sleeping with their
families on the mattresses, that you may recall that for every action, there
is a reaction.
Finally, it behooves you to reflect on the last wills and testaments of the
thousands who left you on the 11th as they gestured in despair. They are
important testaments, which should be studied and researched.

Among the most important of what I read in them was some prose in their
gestures before the collapse, where they say, "How mistaken we were to have
allowed the White House to implement its aggressive foreign policies against
the weak without supervision." It is as if they were telling you, the people
of America, "Hold to account those who have caused us to be killed, and
happy is he who learns from others' mistakes," And among that which I read
in their gestures is a verse of poetry, "Injustice chases its people, and
how unhealthy the bed of tyranny."

As has been said, "An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure."
And know that, "It is better to return to the truth than persist in error."
And that the wise man doesn't squander his security, wealth and children for
the sake of the liar in the White House.
In conclusion, I tell you in truth, that your security is not in the hands
of Kerry, nor Bush, nor al-Qaida.
No.

Your security is in your own hands. And every state that doesn't play with
our security has automatically guaranteed its own security.
And Allah is our Guardian and Helper, while you have no Guardian or Helper.
All Peace be Upon he who follows the Guidance.
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