Natural World, BBC2ON 7 AUGUST 1998 al-Qaeda suicide bombers attacked the American embassy in Nairobi. Two hundred people were killed, thousands were seriously injured. This devastating attack and its far-reaching implications
were examined in rigorous detail in the final part of Peter Taylor's Age Of Terror.
This was the story of how the US government failed to heed warnings not only from their own operatives, but also from Osama bin Laden himself. Only weeks earlier, US journalist John Miller had conducted a face-to-face interview with bin Laden, during which he declared that his war against the west would begin very shortly.
Although the FBI had previously made plans to kidnap him, the Clinton administration (then preoccupied with the Monica Lewinsky scandal) eventually aborted the mission, fearful that the accidental death of bin Laden would inspire devastating repercussions. The agents involved certainly had no intention of harming him. In fact, they had gone out of their way to ensure that he would be treated with as much respect as possible: they even procured the least adhesive tape they could find, so that if they needed to gag him, at least his beard wouldn't be damaged.
Lee Reed, a security officer at the embassy, had filed a report detailing the building's vulnerability to terrorist attack. US ambassador Prudence Bushnell also wrote a letter of concern to Secretary of State Madeline Albright. She never received a reply. Even when a man walked in off the street to warn of an imminent attack, Bushnell was told by Washington to regard it as a hoax. Only when the attack eventually took place did Albright call Bushnell. "My God Pru," she said. "I had no idea your building was so vulnerable." When the ambassador told Albright of her letter, there was a stunned silence on the end of the line.
Bushnell spoke candidly of her approach towards injured staff in the days following the attack. She had mastered the art of, in her own words, "leadership weeping," meaning that while it was acceptable for her to have tears in her eyes in front of staff, she must never break down in despair. She could only do that at home, which she did every morning before reporting for duty.
Taylor's investigation was rich in such detail. Cheerful FBI agent Steve Gaudin revealed that he was wearing swimming trunks and flip-flops when he received a phone call ordering him to travel to Nairobi to interrogate a suspect (one of the would-be suicide bombers ran away), while Lee Reed spoke of the bloody handprints that are found on the walls of blown up buildings. These are left by people trying desperately to drag themselves through darkened corridors in a bid to escape.
This sobering film was as much about the devastating physical and mental effects that such attacks have on innocent people, as it was about the global significance of the event. The fact that this particular tragedy could have been prevented rendered it all the more infuriating.
Narrated by Stephen Fry as if he were snuggled under a duvet with a mug of cocoa, the latest instalment of Natural World offered a diverting insight into the Andean world of the spectacled bear. These elusive creatures are the most threatened species of bear, as their tree-top habitat is in danger of extinction thanks to the culling of rainforests. The film revealed that, contrary to scientific belief, these sweet-toothed bears actually do eat meat. Seeing as the rest of their diet consists of bark and beetles, you can hardly blame them.
The full article contains 611 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
