Reply #29: I'm amazed that people so easily look past the segmentation and use words like...

[JackRiddler]

"Pakistan" and "US" as though these are unitary subjects taking actions.

It's not even true that "ISI" or "CIA" are simply one thing. Making sense of anything requires acknowledging that these are highly compartmentalized, multi-headed entities (sometimes with the compartments at odds with each other) and mostly hidden from our view (or even their own view). In the black-budget, black-box world you can say with reliability that there are divisions and departments and units, networks running among units, operations involving units, political administrations, contractors and allies, and many layers of legend generated to cover it all up in the name of "national security." But beyond that we speculate and not even insiders know all that goes on with specificity.

If it's so logical to think ISI elements harbored OBL, then it's equally logical to think they did this in concordance with the policies of USG elements (their financial sponsors and collaborators in the war on the Pashto tribal areas, hello!) who wanted to maintain the OBL myth and the "war on terror."