Clinton Warned on Bin Laden Hijack-Kamikaze Plot

If you don't recall seeing the blaring post-9-11 headline "Clinton Warned on Bin Laden Hijack-Kamikaze Plot," it's not because your memory is failing.

In fact, the big media mostly ignored the story - in marked contrast to today's wall-to-wall coverage of news that President Bush received a pre-9-11 CIA briefing on a possible bin Laden hijack plot.

And while the warning transmitted to Bush gave no inkling that bin Laden planned to transform U.S. airliners into flying bombs and slam them into American office buildings, in fact, Clinton administration intelligence officials were in the possession of detailed information on an al Qaeda conspiracy to hijack several U.S. airliners - including a plan to crash one of the planes into the Pentagon or CIA.

It was called "Operation Bojinka," a 1995 plot hatched by an al Qaeda cell in the Philippines with an eye towards blowing up 12 American airliners. Some would be booby trapped with bombs like Pan Am 103, others hijacked like the four U.S. jets commandeered on 9-11 and crashed into buildings.

Though the mainstream press never demonstrated much enthusiasm for the story, Accuracy in Media's Reed Irvine detailed what the Clinton administration knew - and when it knew it - for NewsMax.com last October.

Citing a Sept. 13 Agence France-Presse report, Irvine noted that Philippine Police Chief Superintendent Avelino Razon had uncovered the plot to "plant bombs in U.S. airliners and hijack others to crash them into buildings like the CIA headquarters."

"Razon said (the plot) was found on the computer of Ramzi Yousef, the organizer of the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center," Irvine reported. "He had fled to Pakistan, but his laptop was found in the apartment he shared with his accomplice, Abdul Hakim Murad. Razon said both were agents of Osama bin Laden."

"Among targets mentioned (in Yousef's computer files) was the World Trade Center in New York..... CIA offices in Virginia and the Sears Tower in Chicago."

Picking up where Irvine left off, the Washington Post quoted a Filipino investigator, who said that as he watched the attack on the World Trade Center on television he exclaimed in horror, "It's Bojinka. We told the Americans everything about Bojinka. Why didn't they pay attention?"

Chief Police Superintendent Avelino Razon told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that the Philippine intelligence report was passed on to the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Joint Task Force on Terrorism.

"It was not given credibility. Otherwise, it could have prevented the destruction of the World Trade Center," he explained.

The Clinton FBI was in full possession of all the frightening facts on Bojinka, but did nothing. Instead, as Reed Irvine revealed, the bureau assured Congress that everything was under control.

"In testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee subcommittee on Terrorism in February 1998, 'Bojinka' - which means 'big bang' - was described by Dale L. Watson, chief of the International Terrorism Operations Section of the FBI, only as a plot to blow up 'numerous U.S. air carriers.'

"He said that the FBI had identified 'a significant and growing organizational presence' of foreign terrorists in the United States. He swore the bureau had them under control."

The Clinton FBI counterintelligence chief told the Senate that as a result of the bombings of the World Trade Center in 1993 and the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995 the FBI had developed an 'enhanced capability' to track terrorist activities.

Is it likely that U.S. intelligence possessed this much information on al Qaeda plans to slam planes into U.S. buildings - and didn't tell President Clinton?

Actually it is, if you believe the account of his former CIA Director James Woolsey, who said Clinton never bothered to meet with him during his stint as the nation's intelligence chief.

What about other administration officials, like Attorney General Janet Reno, who certainly should have known about Bojinka?

During all of 1998 - the same year FBI counterintelligence briefed Congress on the al Qaeda hijack plot - Clinton met with his Cabinet exactly twice: Once in January to lie to them about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky, and again in August to come clean about the affair.

Good link, thanks.
From their site:

Terrorism trial begins in New York
3 men accused of plotting to bomb U.S. planes

May 13, 1996

Web posted at: 11:35 a.m. EDT

From Correspondent Brian Jenkins

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Jury selection began in New York Monday in the federal trial of three men accused of plotting to bomb 11 planes headed for the United States on a single day in 1995.

Ramzi Yousef is charged with masterminding the plot. He also will be tried later this year, accused of planning the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993. Four men are already serving life in prison for that crime.

The alleged plot was discovered in the Philippines in January 1995, when a fire broke out in a Manila apartment 200 yards from the Vatican's embassy, a week before the arrival of Pope John Paul II.

Police were shocked by what they found inside: a smoking mixture of explosives in a sink, street maps and garments like those worn by the Pope's entourage, suggesting a plot to kill the Pontiff.

They also say they found computer disks containing detailed plans to blow up U.S. airliners.

The alleged plot involved leaving bombs on flights that would take off from Tokyo, Seoul, Taipei, Hong Kong, Bangkok and Singapore.

Vince Cannistraro, former director of the CIA's Counter terrorism Division calls it, "Extraordinarily ambitious, very complicated to bring off, and probably unparalleled by other terrorist operations that we know of."

Kenneth Timmerman, director of the Middle East Data Project, believes the sophistication of the plot is a sign the intelligence agency of another country is behind it.

Some see the hand of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein; others the government of Iran.

Fingerprints on a bomb recipe notebook found in the burned apartment convinced the FBI that the brains behind "Project Bojinka" was Yousef, a young engineer born in either Iran or Pakistan, also accused in the World Trade Center bombing.

Authorities think Yousef flew out of New York just hours after that explosion, later launched a failed plot in Thailand to bomb an Israeli consulate, and wound up in the Philippines.

The FBI believes he staged a test for Project Bojinka in December 1994, leaving a bomb under a seat on a Philippine Airlines flight, killing a Japanese tourist.

According to Cannistraro, "His particular, peculiar evil genius was to devise a method of putting together a liquid explosive that could not be detected by the security apparatuses in effect at most airports at that time."

"This is somebody who is really a world class operator. . And I don't think we have seen someone like this, as accomplished as this, ever," said Timmerman.

Yousef was finally caught in Pakistan, and the FBI brought him back to New York.

Philippine police captured his co-defendant, Abdul Hakim Murad when he tried to clean out the apartment in Manila. He was a childhood friend of Yousef in Kuwait.

A third defendant, Wali Khan Amin Shah, an Afghani, was arrested in Malaysia last December.

Lawyers for the three men say their trial might take three or four months.

Grab/download these links before they vanish!

What the Clinton adminstration did do according to the reports was extensive.. Following the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, the new president sent stringent anti-terrorism legislation to Congress as part of his first crime bill, including new deportation powers and a federal death penalty for terrorists.

In 1996, Mr. Clinton once again sent anti-terror legislation to the Republican-controlled congress yet key parts were not passed by Congress. Their reasons were that they felt the parts infringed on civil liberties. Interestingly, those parts not passed in 1996 were passed after 9/11. (http://www.cnn.com/US/9607/30/clinton.terrorism/) (http://www.cdt.org/policy/terrorism/cnss_habeas.html)

Also in 1996, President Clinton signed Airport Security measures into law (http://www.cnn.com/US/9610/09/faa/) based upon wide-ranging security measures recommended by Vice President Al Gore's aviation security commission (http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A17818-2001Dec9?language=printer). Interestingly, key senators on the Senate Aviation Subcommittee shot down mandated changes recommended by Gore and the White House and instead urged "further study." (Eight of the nine Republicans on the subcommittee had received contributions from the major airlines.)

"Among those attacking the Gore Commission recommendations, incidentally, was the New Republic, which noted that "two billion dollars a year to guard against terrorism and sabotage" would amount to "a cost per life saved of well over $300 million." The cost of such libertarian dogma must now be measured in thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars." (salon.com)

On 20 August 1998, President Clinton amended Executive Order 12947 to add Usama Bin Laden and his key associates to the list of terrorists, thus blocking their US assets--including property and bank accounts--and prohibiting all US financial transactions with them. The Washington Post, among others, reported. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/eafricabombing/stories/strikes082398.htm)

The United States conducted a bombing run -- Operation Infinite Reach -- against bin Laden's facilities there on 20 August 1998.

President Clinton took additional steps as outlined in this executive order dated July 1999 (http://www.afghanradio.com/special/us_sanction_july41999.htm) and as announced in the world media - such as Radio Free Europe (http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/1999/07/F.RU.990707135633.html)

This second report, known as the Hart-Rudman report, was completed in late 2000 and submitted to the Bush administration in January, 2001. But the Bush administration officials told former Sens. Gary Hart, D-Colo., and Warren Rudman, R-N.H., that they preferred instead to put aside the recommendations issued in the January report by the U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century. Instead, the White House announced in May that it would have Vice President Dick Cheney study the potential problem of domestic terrorism -- which the bipartisan group had already spent two and a half years studying -- while assigning responsibility for dealing with the issue to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, headed by former Bush campaign manager Joe Allbaugh. (http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/09/12/bush/)At the same time, he proposed to cut FEMA's budget by $200 million. Bush said that day that Cheney would direct a government-wide review on managing the consequences of a domestic attack, and "I will periodically chair a meeting of the National Security Council to review these efforts." Neither Cheney's review nor Bush's took place.

Remember John O'Neill ... He died for you ... http://www.rememberjohn.com

CNN JUST REPORTED ON PROJECT BOJOINKA -- the warning from the Phillipines that a plane was supposed to fly into the CIA Building in Washington -- without mentioning it occurred during the Clinton administration.

Anyway, below is the salient part of Ari's briefing today.

Did anybody see "Crossfire" tonight? I'm concerned this is all going to be laid on Bush when Clinton was the one who first heard of Bojoinka in 1995. Carville asked whether Bush should lay out everything he knew beforehand to the public immediately, or let it come out in dribs and drabs, as it has. (Couldn't help wondering whether he's trying to get Mary some help.) But I vote for the former.

It will be interesting to see what happens if there are congerssional hearings, as all the democrats now seem to want. It may come back to haunt them.

In the meantime, I hope people will write to Congress and journalism organizations asking the feds for full disclosure as soon as possible. It can only help.

*********************

Q Two on this point. You say information about the threat of hijacking goes back many years. It has been a recurring theme from time to time. Was this August report the first time that this President received an intelligence briefing that linked the prospect of a hijacking to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda?

MR. FLEISCHER: John, I cannot speak and will not speak about everything the President hears in his intelligence briefings, since I'm not in the room when he has his CIA briefing in the morning. But the general knowledge of hijackings has, as I indicated, long been a concern to the government, including this one.

Q So this information is conveyed to the President by the CIA in early August. And you say the concept then was that it was vague and general, and that the idea that this would be a traditional hijacking. Was there no discussion of the previous arrests in the Philippines, information shared with the United States government about people who said, perhaps not reliable, but who said that there was a plan to hijack a plane and fly it into the CIA briefing? Any discussion about arrests in France, where people said there was a plan to fly a plane into the Eiffel Tower?

MR. FLEISCHER: What you're asking about is the so-called dots, and whether or not it was possible for anybody in the government to connect all those dots. And the simple answer to that is, as a result of September 11th, our government learned a lot of things. There were a lot of lessons to be learned, and a lot of changes were made as we evolved from a nation at peacetime to a nation at war.

And as we became a nation at war, the President made a series of changes involving how he receives his information, and involving how we protect the United States. I want to walk you through a couple of those changes that were the result of our nation being attacked.

Q I understand the changes, but was there not enough threshold evidence to think of the threat of using a plane as a bomb?

MR. FLEISCHER: Again, the question is, how does the government connect the dots. And the answer to that question is the series of steps that the President took as a result of the lessons learned from the attack. And those actions were, one, the creation of the Office of Homeland Security, led by Governor Ridge, to pull information together from the various agencies.

The President changed the morning briefings, so the morning briefings, for the first time, began with both the FBI Director and the CIA Director present to share information fully with the President. The FBI reorganized -- the FBI reorganized to an entity that was set up not only now to catch criminals, and find evidence and prosecute them in a court of law, but to prevent the United States from being attacked. A major change that could only result -- as a result of, unfortunately, an attack on our country.

The very fact that we have gone to war is a change. And finally, a recognition by the Congress that the tools available to the intelligence community and to the FBI were not sufficient. And that's why the Congress, to its credit, passed the Patriot Act, giving the administration and the intelligence community and the FBI greater resources to fight terrorism. Those were a series of changes that we made together with the Congress.

Q Are you suggesting that before these changes there was no way to connect those dots, Ari?

MR. FLEISCHER: Goyal?

05-16-02

HILLARY CLINTON SHOULD BE CAREFUL WHAT SHE WISHES FOR. . .

THE REAL PROXIMATE CAUSE OF 9/11

In a Senate speech, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Democrat of New York, called on Mr. Bush to "come before the American people at the earliest possible time to answer the questions so many New Yorkers and Americans are asking."

The New York Times, Democrats Say Bush Must Give Full Disclosure

May 17, 2002

Democrats Say Bush Must Give Full Disclosure

By ALISON MITCHELL

ASHINGTON, May 16 ó After months of unstinting support for President Bush's handling of the war on terror, leading Congressional Democrats changed course today and demanded full disclosure of what Mr. Bush was told last summer about the danger of terrorist hijackings. They also called for a broad public inquiry into what the government knew before Sept. 11.

The sharp questions about possible intelligence lapses and about the vigor of the administration's response to terrorist warnings came a day after the White House announced, eight months after the terror attacks, that President Bush had been alerted by the Central Intelligence Agency last summer to the danger of hijackings by terrorists affiliated with Osama bin Laden.

Even some Republicans questioned the government's response to information gathered last summer.

"I think it should have been acted upon, and it wasn't," said Senator Richard C. Shelby of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Senate intelligence committee.

Mr. Shelby was particularly critical of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, saying officials there had been "asleep."

But Democrats were the fiercest. For the first time since Sept. 11, the bipartisan unity over how Mr. Bush has conducted the war on terror appeared to be dissolving in sharp questions, accusations and partisan finger-pointing.

Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the majority leader, said he was "gravely concerned" and asked, "Why did it take eight months for us to receive this information?" Mr. Daschle added that the president should immediately hand the Congressional intelligence committees "the entire briefing that he was given" in August.

Democrats were also seeking an F.B.I. memorandum warning that many Middle Eastern men were training at American flight schools.

Representative Richard A. Gephardt, the House minority leader, said, "I think what we have to do now is to find out what the president, what the White House, knew about the events leading up to 9/11, when they knew it and, most importantly, what was done about it at that time."

Mr. Gephardt, of Missouri, said the long-planned investigation by the intelligence committees was no longer enough. "I don't think this can just be a closed-door secret intelligence investigation," he said. (The joint committee is planning to hold both public and closed hearings.)

Most of the Republicans who spoke publicly today rallied around Mr. Bush, arguing that the information he had received in August in a briefing paper several pages long was too generalized to act on. They said the Democrats were playing election-year politics.

Senator Christopher S. Bond, Republican of Missouri, accused the two Democratic leaders of an "effort to blow this up into a scandal."

"Their unspoken implication," Mr. Bond said, "is that the president knew these attacks were coming and did nothing. That is an insult to the U.S. intelligence community, to the president and the American people."

Senator Trent Lott, Republican of Mississippi, said in a Senate speech tonight that "there is nothing more despicable ó and `despicable' is a tame word ó in American politics than to insinuate the president of the United States knew that an attack on the United States was imminent and did nothing to stop it."

"For us to be talking like our enemy is George W. Bush and not Osama bin Laden, that's not right," Mr. Lott added.

But Democrats, who until now have been reluctant to speak out against Mr. Bush on foreign policy, said it was their duty to seek information.

"We have a right and responsibility to speak out," said Senator John Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat who may run for president. "Preventing another Sept. 11 undoubtedly requires understanding our past vulnerabilities."

The questions over what the administration knew ignited a battle over whether to create a special commission to look into the events surrounding the Sept. 11 attacks.

Senators Joseph I. Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, and John McCain, Republican of Arizona, have long argued for an independent commission. They said they would move quickly to try to create one in an attachment to other legislation, perhaps as early as next week. Mr. Daschle suggested he might support the idea.

Mr. Lieberman, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee in 2000, pointed to an array of warnings to intelligence agencies last summer that have recently been made public.

"If there had been one person receiving all that information, would it have been possible to prevent Sept. 11?" he asked. "That's the question an independent commission has to answer so we never have to ask it again."

Senator Robert G. Torricelli, Democrat of New Jersey, who has also pushed hard for a commission, noted that Vice President Dick Cheney repeatedly pressed Congress last fall to avoid an investigation while troops were in Afghanistan. In light of recent disclosures, Mr. Torricelli said, "that argument just became extremely disingenuous."

One dispute that simmered across the day was about just how much members of Congress knew last August about intelligence warnings.

After Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, pointed to an assertion by Representative Porter J. Goss of Florida, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, that the Congressional panels had been given similar information, Senate Democrats quickly contested the remark.

Senator Bob Graham, the Florida Democrat who is chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, said that the committees were given more general information than the president received last August and that it did not include references to hijackings.

Mr. Daschle, at Mr. Graham's side at a news conference, said, "There is no one in Congress who had that information."

Mr. Goss said all the information in the president's intelligence briefing had been given to his committee as well, but over time. The information, he said, included "no specificity as to time, place, date or method."

The senior Democrat on the intelligence committee, Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, who is also the No. 2 Democrat in the House leadership, joined Mr. Goss at his news conference and agreed that some of the information in the president's memorandum had been available to the lawmakers.

But, Ms. Pelosi added, the president's briefing paper had three pieces of specific information that day in August that the intelligence committees had learned over several months. That, she said, "raised it to a different level" and needed to be part of the Congressional investigation into Sept. 11.

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