Free Republic

President Obama said Tuesday that a "mix of human and systemic failures" allowed a Nigerian student allegedly carrying explosives to board an airplane en route to Detroit on Christmas Day, and he vowed to quickly fix flaws that could have doomed a flight carrying nearly 300 passengers and crew members. The president and his top advisers now believe there is "some linkage" with al-Qaeda, and the administration is "increasingly confident" that the terrorist group worked with suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to secure the deadly chemical mixture that he took aboard Northwest Airlines Flight 253, a senior administration official said Tuesday....

US signals intelligence during the war came up short in major turning points, according to an NSA history. WASHINGTON -- US signals intelligence – the much-vaunted ability of American military and spy units to eavesdrop on the radio calls and other electronic communications of an adversary – failed at crucial moments during the Vietnam War, according to a just-declassified National Security Agency history of the effort. The 10,000 cryptographers and other signals personnel in Southeast Asia at the time did not predict the start of the Tet offensive on Jan. 31, 1968. Prior to that, signals intelligence may have actually...

Porter J. Goss, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, delivered a long-awaited internal report to Congress on Monday night that is said to give a harsh assessment of the agency's performance before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Mr. Goss, who was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee before his appointment last year as head of the C.I.A., hand-delivered two copies of the classified report to staff members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees. The copies of the report, which is several hundred pages, were placed in committee safes and were not to be opened at least until...

WASHINGTON, D.C., Aug 9 - From the U.S. Congressional Record U.S. INTELLIGENCE -- (House of Representatives - June 27, 2005) [Page: H5244] --- The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. McHenry). Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 4, 2005, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon) is recognized for 44 minutes. [Page: H5244] Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to discuss for the next 45 minutes the most important topic that will allow us to protect the homeland, provide for the security of the American people and our allies and our troops around the world: our intelligence. Last...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 8 - More than a year before the Sept. 11 attacks, a small, highly classified military intelligence unit identified Mohammed Atta and three other future hijackers as likely members of a cell of Al Qaeda operating in the United States, according to a former defense intelligence official and a Republican member of Congress. In the summer of 2000, the military team, known as Able Danger, prepared a chart that included visa photographs of the four men and recommended to the military's Special Operations Command that the information be shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the congressman, Representative...

The newest work from WND Books reveals exclusive, startling information about how the failure of President Clinton to stop Osama bin Laden's reign of terror helped make the nation ripe for the attack of Sept. 11, 2001. In "Intelligence Failures: How Clinton's Incompetence Undermined America's Defense and Paved the Way for 9/11," author David Bossie uses comprehensive research and previously unreported details from congressional investigations and other sources to document Clinton's frequent and oftentimes shocking mishandling of the secret war he waged with bin Laden. "'Intelligence Failure' systematically records how Clinton's poor judgment, negligence, indecisiveness, and slashing of U.S. intelligence...

<p>MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — New York Gov. George Pataki (search) urged supporters Saturday to back President Bush's re-election by saying Democrats' failure to respond to previous acts of terrorism led the way to the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.</p> <p>Pataki criticized the Clinton administration for not properly responding to the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, attacks on U.S. embassies in Africa, the bombing of the USS Cole (search) and an attack on a U.S. military barracks in Saudi Arabia.</p>

<p>The CIA's Aug. 6, 2001 memo for President Bush should pose serious new credibility problems for the nation's spy agency, not for Bush.</p> <p>Democrats such as 9/11 commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste have sought to paint the memo as a CIA warning that Bush ignored a month before the terror attacks - but it turns out to be nothing of the sort.</p>