Naik stands by his initial account of the July meeting. The Americans "felt that the time had come that the Taliban government should be ousted by any means which is feasible," he says. "The various threats were being tied down into a concept of how to proceed further. I think the major objective was to oust the Taliban, and the means was a military action followed by a local rebellion and after that to have some kind of U.N. intervention" -- much like what has happened since last October's military initiative began, Naik points out.

The Americans who attended the July meeting dispute Naik's account. Though Brisard and Dasquie chose not to look for them, all were easy to track down. They're all retired, often at home, and keen to talk. Stanford University passed on an e-mail address for Simons, who taught there last year. George Washington University's directory held the contact information for Inderfurth. Coldren is listed in the phone book.

They all insist no military threat was issued to the Taliban. And then they go on to qualify that, a little. They note that the U.S. had long maintained that a military response was likely if bin Laden was found to have masterminded the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole -- but there was no escalation of that existing threat. "The military threat, as I recall it, was absolutely confined to statements by people on our side that the U.S. government was still examining evidence with regard to the Cole and that if the government satisfied itself that Osama bin Laden was responsible, you could predict a military response almost with certainty," Simons says. "Nothing more was said in the meetings, and I was in all the meetings."

In the interviews he did last year, Naik argued that he knew the threat was a significant change in policy for the U.S. because the Americans offered specific details. A Sept. 22 story in the London-based Guardian, for instance, quoted Naik as saying that the attack would be launched "from very close proximity to Afghanistan." Brisard and Dasquie also quote a Sept. 18 BBC story in which Naik says that the Americans mentioned Tajikistan as the likely source of an attack.

Today Naik offers a few more specifics. He says that the discussion in question occurred on July 21; that the talk first occurred in the general meetings, but then continued after the group took a break, when Simons issued the "carpet of bombs" threat. He also argues that the discussion went on long enough to discuss not just the place where the attack would come from, but also the time.

"We asked them, when do you think you will attack Afghanistan?" Naik says, looking back. "And they said, before the snow falls in Kabul. That means September, October, something like that."

Simons opened a loophole for conspiracy theorists in November, when he conceded that a threat might have been issued outside the official meeting rooms, in an interview with the French newspaper Le Monde.

"It's possible that a mischievous American participant, after several drinks, may have thought it smart to evoke gold carpets and carpet bombs. Even Americans can't resist the temptation to be mischievous."

These days, Simons still concedes that alcohol may have played a role in the misunderstanding, noting that "it was possible that someone over-drank at night and said something more alarming."

When I note that "over-drinking" seems an odd way of conducting diplomacy, especially with the country that was harboring bin Laden, Simons insists he's been misunderstood.

"No, no, no," says Simons. "We were there for three nights; [drinking went on] before dinner, during informal talks before dinner. It's not carousing around Berlin. Pakistanis don't drink very much and we're old people. I'm in my 60s. We don't honk around town anymore."

In fact, Simons and the other Americans argue, the very fact that they are old, retired and out of the diplomatic loop makes them an unlikely choice for the transmission of a specific military threat like the one Naik describes. Since they didn't come in with Bush -- Inderfurth, a Clinton appointee, actually quit the day before Bush took office -- they lacked direct access to the decision makers who would put forth such an idea. Plus, Bush had other options. Administration officials were already planning to meet with Taliban representatives when the Berlin meetings occurred, and on Aug. 2, 2001, assistant secretary of state Christina Rocca did just that. Rocca did not return repeated calls for comment.

And with official channels already in use, Coldren argues, why would the White House bother using a bunch or retirees to announce an imminent military strike?

I keep pushing: Since the diplomats admit they discussed the possibility of a U.S. military reprisal for the Cole bombing, couldn't that, in some quarters, be construed as a threat? Simons says no, there was no mention of when the Cole investigation would finish, and thus no talk of when the military response would come. "There was not an escalation in the U.S. stance," Inderfurth insists. "There was no discussion about a strike plan. None of us would have been privy to such a plan."

Asked if there was any mention of a military threat, Coldren responded with gusto. "I was at that session and heard nothing along those lines," he says. "Nothing about when, nothing about where. Nothing about a threat. I would think it would have made our former Soviet officials stand up and pound the table -- that is, staging a military raid from Uzbekistan or Tajikistan." Coldren added in an e-mail: "I have not caveated my statements by saying 'nothing like that was said to my recollection .' I have a very good memory for what people say, even at such meetings. To have missed such a discussion I would have had to be totally dead to the world -- and I wasn't."

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