AND AS THAT "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" BANNER FLUTTERED ON THE USS LINCOLN

...Al Qaeda is still in business.

May 14, 2003 | RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) -- Nonessential U.S. diplomats were ordered out and other Westerners made plans to leave Wednesday after coordinated suicide attacks linked to al-Qaida killed at least 25 bystanders at compounds housing foreigners.

The overall death toll rose to 34, including at least seven Americans and nine attackers, Saudi officials said Wednesday.

The United States had said eight Americans died, but Saudi officials insisted it was seven and the State Department in Washington later said it could confirm only at least seven. The count could be complicated by the fact that some of the dead held more than one citizenship.

The Saudis said nearly 200 people were wounded, most not seriously, and 40 of those were believed to be Americans.

Al-Qaida, the terror group linked to the Saudi attacks and Sept. 11, had railed against the presence of foreign troops in Saudi Arabia, home to the holiest Muslim shrines. The attacks on civilians came as the United States is pulling out most of the 5,000 troops it had based in Saudi Arabia. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said last week that most would be gone by autumn.

A question, of course, is why are they attacking Riyadh when we're in the process of pulling out? My guess is that this is a going-away fuck-you from Bin Laden to the Saudi Govt for the whole US-troops-on-sacred-soil thing. Look, mr OBL, you got what you wanted, do more civilians have to die? You had a chance to be a bigger man after President AWOL -- your family friend, mind you -- just killed thousands of Iraqi civilians. Anyway, if anything though, this clearly illustrates that we have not necessarily made the world any safer by blowing up Iraq.

In a related note, while perusing the open thread at Daily Kos, I noticed an old McCain quote from 2000 unearthed by Kos reader Daryl Pearce:

In the 2000 election, John McCain said, "We saw the tragedy of the USS Cole and it reminds us its a dangerous world, the senator said, referring to the suspected terrorist attack that killed 17 American sailors aboard the Navy destroyer as it docked in the Yemeni port of Aden Oct. 12. We need a steady hand on the tiller, we need the kind of leadership that George W. Bush and [vice-presidential candidate] Dick Cheney will provide this country so we cannot have those kind of tragedies ever happen again. (link)

How's he doin?