Posted on 09/05/2002 1:32:45 PM PDT by Shermy
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Almost a year after the nation's worst biological weapon attack, the FBI has yet to figure out who sent anthrax-laced letters that killed five people, prompting criticism that its investigation is moving too slowly.
Federal law enforcement sources acknowledged they are not close to making an arrest in the investigation, which began less than a month after the Sept. 11 hijacked plane attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
FBI officials said they believe the person who mailed the letters to two U.S. senators and to the news media last autumn took advantage of the confusion after Sept. 11, but they do not believe the attacks were related to the hijacking plot.
Critics said the FBI waited too long to reach out to the scientific community, that it failed to follow up on some obvious leads and it may have unfairly focused attention on Dr. Steven Hatfill, a germ warfare expert who says he's innocent.
Hatfill is one of about 30 U.S.-based scientists the FBI considers a "person of interest" in its investigation, meaning they have the expertise, ability and wherewithal to produce the deadly bacteria.
Hatfill, whose apartment was searched twice by the FBI and was fired by Louisiana State University, said investigators singled him out because they were under pressure to show progress in the case.
"The assassination of my character appears to be part of a government effort to show the American people that it's proceeding vigorously with the investigation," he told a news conference on Aug. 25 outside his lawyer's office in Virginia.
One FBI critic has been Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, a molecular biologist at the State University of New York at Purchase and the chairwoman of a biological weapons panel at the Federation of American Scientists. She said rapid resolution of the case was critical.
"The significance of the anthrax attacks and our response to it cannot be overstated," she said in an analysis posted on the Internet in June.
FUTURE THREAT COULD DWARF 9/11
"By breaking the taboo on the use of bioweapons, this event has engendered a future threat that could dwarf 9/11," Rosenberg said, adding that the FBI seemed to be "marking time on the off-chance that an unknown informer will turn up with a smoking gun."
Rosenberg said she has sent a new commentary about the anthrax attacks to the FBI, but would not make it available to others. She said she did not want to interfere with the proceeding investigation by making public statements.
Jonathan Tucker, a biological and chemical weapons specialist at the Washington-based Monterey Institute, questioned how the investigation has been handled.
"A lot of people are baffled by the way the investigation is going," he said. "There is growing bewilderment in Congress and among the public about where the investigation is headed."
Tucker questioned why the FBI appeared to focus attention on Hatfill, a former U.S. Army scientist, when it apparently did not have the evidence to indict him.
FBI officials said they want to avoid a repeat of the case of Richard Jewell, the former security guard who was initially identified as a suspect in the 1996 Olympics bombing in Atlanta, but who later was cleared of any involvement.
Tucker also questioned whether the FBI had been overly hasty early in the investigation in excluding the possibility of foreign involvement in the anthrax attacks.
FBI officials said they have no evidence linking the Sept. 11 hijackers with the anthrax attacks. (--are they looking for any??)
They dismissed the story of a Florida doctor who treated one of the hijacking suspects, Ahmed Alhaznawi, in June last year. The doctor said Alhaznawi had a lesion on his leg that was consistent with the skin version of anthrax.
The law enforcement sources said the investigation has been especially difficult because the pool of potential suspects is the same group of scientists upon whom the FBI has had to rely for expertise in identifying the bacteria used in the attacks.
They said scientific protocols had to be developed for testing the anthrax found in one of the letters.
The sources said there was a lack of physical evidence, such as fingerprints on the letters, or apparent eyewitnesses.
"It's not the movies or television. People expect the case to be solved in an hour or two hours. It doesn't always happen that way," one official said.
"Sometimes, it just takes months and months and months of searching and digging," one official said. "You are obviously dealing with someone who is very smart. Smart crooks are harder to catch than dumb crooks."
Now she's got a secret report! Framing Hatfill more? Or does she have a new "profile?" Secrecy lessens exposure to libel law suits.
Memories...
War on terror:FBI guilty of cover-up over anthrax suspect(Rosenberg knows name she says) -6/15-
Ping.
And what if she's wrong? Rosenberg concedes that interrogating Hatfill might not help the FBI crack the case. But she quickly reverts to character. Even if that's true, she says, "the broad principles and the things I've said, I stand behind."In other words, anything goes to serve her left-wing agenda. She is no different from her predecessor at the FAS, Matthew Meselson, who prostituted his scientific credentials for years to support the Soviet propaganda line that the Sverdlovsk anthrax outbreak was due to tainted meat. For these folks, the equation is always the same: Communism = Good, US military = Bad, Facts = Irrelevant.
never in their wildest imagination
could the 09-11-01 gang have thought
that the FBI would not believe
that they had carried out the anthrax attacks!!
If only Atta had had the foresight
to include his uncle's birthdate
or some such confidential information
what a lot of trouble he could have saved us
(many 100's of hours perusing anthrax threads on FR
not the least of it)
There seems to some difficulty absorbing this particular information at the FBI.
Instead of issuing hints, may I suggest you employ the tried and true technique of "colder, warmer".
And, right now, they're "freezing"...
Wouldn't you say the Hatfill well is dry...and it's time to move on to Suspect #5?
"Famous, But Incompetent."
If the connection to Iraq was made last October, we would have been forced into a premature invasion, is what I believe the NSC thought.
Well, we can safely assume that Babs had nothing to do with the culturing and weaponizing of the anthrax. Though she is usually referred to as a "molecular biologist" (as in this article) she is, in fact, a tenured professor in the Environmental Sciences Department at SUNY/Purchase -- the performing arts branch of the school, no less.
Thus, while she might have been competent to play a role in the planning and distribution phases, she would have been useless in the production phase. And, if we are to buy her contention that it was a single "rogue scientist" who both brewed and spread the spores, it couldn't possibly be her...
The WSJ has opened the Oklahoma City affair once more, where the FBI did some of their best bungling.
Disregarding Atta and his flakes of ash is foolish.
Even finding the mailer won't help as I would guess only Atta knew who was making and packaging the anthrax. (Of course there's a whole bunch in and around Afghanistan who knew about the scenario.) It's a "dead men don't tell scenario" so I would guess that the maker is dead and the mailer is barbequing his dinner in Massachusetts (if he/she is still alive).
But let's put it in persective. What the whole incident did was show how we operate under this type of attack.
It made the papers because it was SENT to the MEDIA and the SENATORS. To the perpetrators, it was a show based on our free press system.
So before you're too quick to say "let Saddam be", think about HIS capabilities, his expertise in chemicals which are much more devastating than Anthrax.
Usama discounted that the Anthrax was his plan (his expertise is in buildings) and of course it wasn't his plan per se but it still had his approval.
We need a squeeler out of Quantanamo. I would suggest that our soldiers set up a pig farm and have a roast once a week about 50 ft away from the prisoners quarters. Let's see if we can tick off an unstable squeeler.
Sac
How about this:
War on terror:FBI guilty of cover-up over anthrax suspect(Rosenberg knows name she says)
"...Rosenberg says such a notion was occasionally aired jokingly in the small circle of those who worried about biological terror prior to Sept. 11.
"There have been a number of occasions when we've said in frustration, 'What we need is a biological weapons attack to wake the country up,'" she says..."
And what ever happened to the third guy??? I thought I remember him having a beard which is not the norm in America at present.
Sac
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.