9/11 PANEL: ATTA TALE WAS BUM TIP

NY Post ^ | 8/13/05 | DEBORAH ORIN

[jimbo123]

The 9/11 commission yesterday defended its decision to ignore a Navy officer's report that military spies targeted lead hijacker Mohamed Atta more than a year before the attacks — and claimed the Navy man wasn't "sufficiently credible."

The statement from commission chiefs Tom Kean and Lee Hamilton came after a flip-flop, in which the panel's staff first denied and then admitted it was told Pentagon spies had linked Atta to an al Qaeda cell in New York in 2000.

-snip-

"The commission's staff concluded that the officer's account was not sufficiently reliable to warrant revision of the report or further investigation."

A skeptical Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) said the statement does nothing to answer why the Able Danger warning wasn't passed on to the FBI.

[tiki]

Congress wants to pass the buck.

[johnny7]

It's a 'gentlemens club'... and many have life-long memberships.

9/11 should have been a wake-up call... it wasn't. It will take the loss of one or more cities before America stirs from its selfish stupor.

I only hope that we still remember how to construct gallows!

[montag813]

Kean and Hamilton are digging their own graves with lies inside of lies. If we actually had a President who cared about people who violate our national security, then we would have a special counsel and grand jury, with potential indictments of Kean, Gorelick, and the other attorneys deeply involved in this coverup. But don't hold your breath, Bush seems much more concerned with maintaining his love-affair with the Clintons than upset them by charging Hillary protegees Sandy Berger and Jamie Gorelick with high crimes or treason. If this was 1952, Sandy Berger would stand a better than even chance of the electric chair for altering and falsifying critical government documents. But in George W. Bush's America, he gets a slap on the wrist.

[DoughtyOne]

If the word bum is going to be used in conjunction with this topic, it should be reserved for the commission members.

[popdonnelly]

Okay, here's what I think, and it doesn't reflect too kindly on Bush. The White House would only agree to a 9/11 Commission if it was assured there would be no partisan attacks. So there was a prior agreement,i.e., the Democrats wouldn't trash the Bush Administration, and the Republicans wouldn't trash the Clinton Administration. When Ashcroft mentioned Gorelick's policy, that broke the underlying agreement. Hence, Ashcroft gets taken to the woodshed by Bush.

But that also means that potentially embarrassing facts won't find their way into the 9/11 Commission Report.

[frankiep]

People should also realize that this is yet another instance where the pubs, and Bush specifically, have been given ammunition to crush the Clinton legacy and deny Hillary her anointed shot at the WH. Lets see if they make good use of it.

I am very sad to say that I have completely lost confidence in Bush ever doing any such thing. I can't even recall how many times he has been handed such damning evidence on a silver platter only to turn around and either ignore it, blow it off as insignificant, or chastise the person responsible for bringing the evidence to light (Ashcroft). How many times do we have to get our hopes up, only to be crushed, that people will actually be held responsible for 9/11, treason, or subversion, before we start demanding something be done, and I'm not talking about "demanding" something be done on an internet discussion board. Another poster hit the nail right on the head when he said that both parties, from top to bottom, have been doing nothing but putting on a grand show for their bases while in reality doing nothing but covering each others asses. I'm sick.

[popdonnelly]

"Kean and Hamilton are digging their own graves with lies inside of lies."

That might be a kind of poetic justice, since they took a subject of great national importance and interest and mishandled it.

[TomGuy]

I found this timeline of 9-11-01 from Center for Cooperative Research:

(9:59 a.m.): Clarke Told Some Hijackers Have al-Qaeda Connections

Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke is told in private by Dale Watson, counterterrorism chief at the FBI, “We got the passenger manifests from the airlines. We recognize some names, Dick. they're al-Qaeda.” Clarke replies, “How the f_ck did they get on board then?” He is told, “Hey, don't shoot the messenger, friend. CIA forgot to tell us about them.” As they are talking about this, they see the first WTC tower collapse on television. [Clarke, 2004, pp 13-14] Some hijacker names, including Mohamed Atta's, were identified on a reservations computer over an hour earlier.


(After 10:06 a.m.): Al-Qaeda Agents Heard Saying we've Hit the Targets

According to Newsweek, “shortly after the suicide attacks,” US intelligence picks up communications among bin Laden associates relaying the message: “we've hit the targets.” [Newsweek, 9/13/01]


(11:00 a.m.): Customs Claims to Determine the Names of All 19 Hijackers

Robert Bonner, the head of Customs and Border Protection, later testifies, “We ran passenger manifests through the system used by Customs—two were hits on our watch list of August 2001.” (This is presumably a reference to hijackers Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi, watch-listed on August 23, 2001.) “And by looking at the Arab names and their seat locations, ticket purchases and other passenger information, it didn't take a lot to do a rudimentary link analysis. Customs officers were able to ID 19 probable hijackers within 45 minutes. I saw the sheet by 11 a.m. And that analysis did indeed correctly identify the terrorists.” [New York Observer, 2/11/04] However, Bonner appears to be at least somewhat incorrect: for two days after the attacks the FBI believes there are only 18 hijackers, and the original list contains some erroneous Arab-sounding names on the flight manifests, such as Adnan Bukhari and Ameer Bukhari. [CNN, 9/13/01 (D)] Some hijacker names, including Mohamed Atta's, were identified on a reservations computer around 8:30 a.m., and Richard Clarke was told some of the names were al-Qaeda around 10:00 a.m.


===

This website has an extensive timeline. It seems to lean somewhat anti-Administration, but it has a wealth of data.

I am not sure when any of the hijackers' names made the airwaves, but I do seem to remember it was that day.

[Peach]

Thanks so much for that information, Tom. I remembered them being named that day too and was astounded how quickly we knew who did the attacks.

And this:

Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke is told in private by Dale Watson, counterterrorism chief at the FBI, “We got the passenger manifests from the airlines. We recognize some names, Dick. they're al-Qaeda.” Clarke replies, “How the f_ck did they get on board then?” He is told, “Hey, don't shoot the messenger, friend. CIA forgot to tell us about them.” As they are talking about this, they see the first WTC tower collapse on television. [Clarke, 2004, pp 13-14] Some hijacker names, including Mohamed Atta's, were identified on a reservations computer over an hour earlier.

Well, just shoot me now. Clarke, you POS, trying to blame the CIA about this? And yet we had Operation Able Danger who knew all about this guy and wasn't allowed to talk with the FBI or CIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Clarke knew darned well why they were allowed to board taht plane. I lay the blame for this entire matter at the feet of the Clinton administration. They could have prevented 9/11 by taking action against that group in 1999, and they didn't do it. They could have taken action in 2000, and they didn't do it.

[Liberty Valance]

I don't believe a word these people say anymore.

[freeperfromnj]

Weldon shouldn't force us to take the commissioners' word for that.

Hopefully he won't. He was just on Fox News with Brian Wilson. He said he wants to "put the Commission and their staff under oath to see who's telling the truth and who isn't"

[Libertarian444]

 AXIS OF WEASELS

[Sacajaweau]

I was astounded at the early findings also. Someone had to be watching them. Did they lose track of Atta? If I remember correctly, Atta was running up and down the coast the last few days before 9-11 in rental cars.

[Peach]

Well, we know that Able Danger was well aware of them. And didn't a Colleen somebody from the FBI testify to the 9/11 Commission that they'd been watching them and were receiving reports from flight schools that the guys only wanted to learn to fly, not land?

[longtermmemmory]

gee, you think it is Gorlick comming forward? that must be why names are not being named for the "soruces".

[Kay]

You have pleasant tackfulness in the way you correct. Nice to see.

[Sacajaweau]

Just fly...not land...I think that was Moussaoui who said that to a Florida Flight school teacher....which I believe was why they picked him up about 2 weeks before 9-11. But they couldn't get into his computer because of "search restrictions" I believe. It was the damn wall, I'm sure.

[Peach]

That Wall created a lot of problems for the United States and solved a lot of problems for Clinton.

[freeperfromnj]

Just heard a Fox News Alert: 9/11 Commission defending it's position by saying they didn't think the information that Able Danger offered up was "historically significant"

[Peach]

The Commission had a pre-determined outcome already decided and naturally didn't want anything to interfere with that.

Did you hear what Peter Lance has to say about the Commission? It's here:

http://www.readersread.com/features/peterlance.htm