Barbara Starr, CNN's correspondent at the Pentagon, is reporting that spy satellites have picked up "increased activity in a mountainous region of Pakistan where activity is usually `predictable'". This is why, Starr says, the U.S. believes that reports of Bin Laden "ill from a waterborne illness" may be true, in addition to a source claiming to have caught a glimpse of him. Or, the increase in activity (and truck tire marks) could be due to the Taliban's being pushed back across the border by Afghanistan troops.
Bush can't declassify and release the whole of the NIEs for fear of exposing U.S. intelligence gathering methods, but the Pentagon is blabbing about the information that they're getting from spy satellites and `sandals on the ground.'
Press secretary Tony Snow said releasing the full reports, portions of which Bush declassified on Tuesday, would jeopardize the lives of agents who gathered the information, risk the nation's ability to work with foreign governments and to keep secret its intelligence-gathering methods.
Uh huh.
Filed under: CNN, NIE, national security, Osama Bin Laden is dead, Tony Snow
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