Posted on 09/20/2005 9:08:30 PM PDT by bobsunshine
Able Danger: Pentagon Spikes Witnesses While Shaffer Reveals New Source
The New York Times reports this evening that the Pentagon has blocked its military witnesses from testifying on Able Danger at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings tomorrow. Senator Arlen Specter registered his surprise but plans on holding the hearings anyway (h/t: AJ Strata):
The Pentagon said today that it had blocked a group of military officers and intelligence analysts from testifying at an open Congressional hearing about a highly classified military intelligence program that, the officers have said, identified a ringleader of the Sept. 11 attacks as a potential terrorist more than a year before the attacks.
The announcement came a day before the officers and intelligence analysts had been scheduled to testify about the program, known as Able Danger, at a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee. ...
Mr. Specter said his staff had talked to all five of the potential witnesses and found that "credibility has been established" for all of them.
"There are quite a few credible people who are prepared to testify that Mohamed Atta was identified long before 9/11," he said. "Now maybe there's more than one Mohamed Atta. Or maybe there's some mistake. But that's what we're trying to find out."
The Pentagon might think that withdrawing its witnesses will keep Able Danger from breaking wide open, but they will find themselves sorely mistaken. This only demonstrates that the program found something that the Pentagon still wants hidden. If that includes a finding that their program not only found Atta and other AQ terrorists over a year before the attacks, but also predicted the USS Cole attack three weeks before it happened, and that the Pentagon shut down the program anyway, eighteen Senators will want to know why.
In fact, the withdrawal of the witnesses clearly shows that the story has substance and isn't a case of mistaken identity. Had this just been an identification of a second Mohammed Atta, as Specter postulates, the Pentagon should have no problem putting its witnesses on the stand. Nothing about a mistaken identity would create a classification problem for the hearing tomorrow.
QT Monster has a transcript from tonight's interview of LTC Tony Shaffer on the Jerry Doyle radio show. Shaffer says Donald Rumsfeld himself gave the order to stop the witnesses from appearing at the Judiciary Committee hearing:
JD: Well, when you say DoD, where's this coming from at DoD? Is this instructions to DoD from higher ups? Is this people in DoD who are afraid of what information gets out? I mean who is the person who's making this happen? AS: What I will tell you is I was told by 2 DoD officials today directly that it is their understanding that the Secretary of Defense directed that we not testify tomorrow. That is my understanding.
However, Shaffer says that former Major Eric Kleinstadt, now a civilian contractor, will still testify at the panel. Kleinstadt received the orders to destroy the Able Danger database. Specter's insistence that the hearings go forward probably hinges on Kleinstadt's ability to testify to the information that got destroyed, who ordered its destruction, and why. From that point, the committee could unravel an entire command sequence that will uncover how Able Danger got missed by the 9/11 Commission.
Another interesting fact got mentioned in Shaffer's interview. He spoke about a Dr. Eileen Pricer. One of the more mysterious potential sources of the Able Danger story involved a female PhD that could corroborate Shaffer and Phillpott, the woman who actually developed the Atta identification in the first place. I Googled Eileen Pricer and got just one hit -- but it's a doozy.
It turns out that Dr. Pricer testified before a closed session of Congressional subcommittee on national security exactly one month after 9/11. That testimony isn't available, but Rep. Christopher Shays mentions her on the record in the next day's public testimony:
Mr. Shays. In a briefing we had yesterday, we had Eileen Pricer, who argues that we don't have the data we need because we don't take all the public data that is available and mix it with the security data. And just taking public data, using, you know, computer systems that are high-speed and able to digest, you know, literally floors' worth of material, she can take relationships that are seven times removed, seven units removed, and when she does that, she ends up with relationships to the bin Laden group where she sees the purchase of chemicals, the sending of students to universities. You wouldn't see it if you isolated it there, but if that unit is connected to that unit, which is connected to that unit, which is connected to that unit, you then see the relationship. So we don't know ultimately the authenticity of how she does it, but when she does it, she comes up with the kind of answer that you have just asked, which is a little unsettling. Unsettling? Christopher Shays described Able Danger thirty-one days after the 9/11 attacks. What else did Eileen Pricer tell the Congressional subcommittee on national security on October 11, 2001? Did Pricer tell Shays that the information no longer existed but did at one time?
Senator Specter should invite Christopher Shays to have a seat on the witness bench, and he should also start issuing subpoenas for the witnesses that the Pentagon wants to silence. We need answers, and we need to know that our country will fight terrorism with every tool at its disposal.
Sorry for the double post.
I have a new wireless mouse (which will be returned today) because it does not let me type much without a lot of trouble.
What is going on?
I'm getting audio and video just fine at 10:17 AM ET.
weldon is not coming off as a nutcase.He has been involved in the past with some interesting things in the past.
someone talking about how people will have egg on their face and that is why people want it shut down.
Thanks, Oxen. I'm listening now - that is a better link for me than another one posted on this thread.
Senator Grassley:
"This info needs to get out. What's at stake is whether Congress can fulfill it's constitutional authority."
specter saying he associates himself with grassley on this remarks.It appears they won't let this die.
I'm pretty new here. Can someone explain to me why on God's green earth anyone in the administration, least of all W, would want to protect the Clintons?
THat's a question we're all asking.
Weldon is my hero....he has an answer for every question...
saying, yes he did talk to the National Security Advisor..
CHARTS!!!!!
Who did Weldon give the chart to?
Some think it has something to do with FBI files.
Weldon: This chart is a chart of AQ around the world. Most of it is from before 9/11. The data was mostly obtained from the '93 attack, the attack on the USS Cole and the attack on the African embassies.
They identified cells worldwide including the Brooklyn cell.
I couldn't get who Weldon gave the chart to but whoever it was says he was going to show it to the man who Weldon says is the president.
Weldon: Charts included drug cartels, Chinese nationals, etc. One of the witnesses was the VP of Orion.
Weldon: The second chart is the most important. This is AQ today. I;ve been told by military liaisons that we can't do this kind of massive data anlysis so what I've been working with is the army and navy. They've even given us the budget numbers.
It's a massive effort of what AQ is doing worldwide.
"I couldn't be more disappointed than I am at Rumsfeld....I can't figure this out."
Maybe not. What if it's a political gambit by Rove and company? Make it look like the Pentagon is covering up.
This will cause an immediate reaction from the Left and headlines screaming COVERUP. The Dems will demand "the truth" and Rummy will give it to them, right up the ole whazoo! ;-)
Drug Cartels. That is a possible flag if you know some of our government's history.
No, darnit-- domestic duties keep me away.
After squaring the house away, I have to shove off & run eraands, including feeding my MIL's nasty old cat(s), who view me as The Evil Alien Intruder. Back ASAP.
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