8/6/01 PDB Memo. Released

[DeeGeMe]

Originally Posted by dissention

They had an employee on MSNBC this morning who resigned from the WH last week and he said that the admin. did not follow up on those "70" field investigations and that the memo was kept hush-hush until he saw it on September 10. Smells fishy.

It gets better--a Republican member of the 9/11 Commission was on the Today show this morning and it would seem that the commision can find no evidence of the 70 field investigations mentioned in the memo. He said that FBI officials would be questioned about this in the hearings this week.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by DeeGeMe

It gets better--a Republican member of the 9/11 Commission was on the Today show this morning and it would seem that the commision can find no evidence of the 70 field investigations mentioned in the memo. He said that FBI officials would be questioned about this in the hearings this week.

Nor will they ever. I am sure some are classified

Again, no one has contradicted my point. The WH and staff are responsible - period.

But, all this implication that W, CR, and others were respeatedly warned and did absolutely nothing is just tommyrot in my book. None of the evidence from anyone, including Clarke, supports that.

BTW - W is a schmo and needs to get the boot.

[strandinthewind]

It seems the WH in July 2001 ordered the FBO to do something as evidenced in this NY Times Art. today.
_______________________________________________________________
from http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/12/po...68738453237481

Disclosures Put F.B.I.'s Actions Under Scrutiny

April 12, 2004
By ERIC LICHTBLAU


WASHINGTON, April 11 - New disclosures about the warnings President Bush received before Sept. 11, 2001, are fueling a central question for the commission investigating the attacks on that date: What exactly was the F.B.I. doing that summer to deter an attack by Al Qaeda on American soil?

The answer, Mr. Bush said on Sunday, was that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was investigating known links to Osama bin Laden in the United States, with 70 active cases reported that summer. "That's great, that's what we expect the F.B.I. to do," he told reporters.

Critics of the F.B.I., however, say the bureau missed
numerous opportunities to head off the attacks.

Agents that summer were tracking tantalizing leads that included a suspicious flight student in Minneapolis, an ominous warning in Phoenix and a phone call to a United States embassy in the Middle East.

But investigations were stymied by miscommunication, dead
ends, bureaucratic and legal obstacles and unclear
priorities, officials say. And it is still unclear what the bureau's response was to a classified White House memo in July 2001, which officials said directed all 56 field offices to increase surveillance of suspected terrorists.

The commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks will hear testimony this week from current and former law enforcement and intelligence officials, including Attorney General John Ashcroft; his predecessor, Janet Reno; Robert S. Mueller III, the director of the F.B.I.; and Louis J. Freeh and Thomas J. Pickard, former directors.

Among the main questions will be whether the bureau
responded aggressively enough to warnings in the summer of
2001 and whether the internal changes made since go far
enough to solve structural problems.

A joint Congressional committee concluded last year that
the F.B.I. and the Central Intelligence Agency had failed
to heed warnings about Al Qaeda's desire to strike the
United States and that intelligence officials had "missed opportunities to disrupt the Sept. 11 plot."

Slade Gorton, a Republican member of the Sept. 11
commission, said on "Fox News Sunday," "It seems to me the F.B.I. has more questions to answer than Condoleezza Rice or Dick Clarke or anyone we've had testify before us so far."

Mr. Gorton said he was interested "in these so-called 70
field investigations."

"I don't know where they were," he said. "I don't know what they did. I don't think they got to a point where anyone could take action on them."

A senior F.B.I. official who spoke on condition of
anonymity said the 70 investigations cited in the White
House briefing "show that we were actively looking at what
was going on with anyone who might be connected to bin
Laden, but we did not have specifics on the plot."

Lee H. Hamilton and Richard Ben-Veniste, Democratic members
of the 9/11 panel, said in interviews on Sunday that this week's hearings would be critical in reaching recommendations about the F.B.I.'s future role in fighting terrorism.

Mr. Ben-Veniste said, "There's general agreement that
despite the extraordinary individual efforts of F.B.I.
agents, there is a dysfunctional element in the operation
that interfered with its efficient counterterrorism
functions" before Sept. 11.

Mr. Hamilton, the co-chairman of the commission, said Mr. Mueller "wants genuinely to change the culture of the F.B.I."

"The question is how effective is that effort and how long-lasting will it be when you have different leadership." Mr. Hamilton said.

At the time of the attacks, the bureau was undergoing a
change in leadership, with Mr. Freeh having left in June
2001, and it was consumed with internal problems like the arrest of an agent, Robert P. Hanssen, on espionage charges and the disappearance of documents in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

But critics said such issues did not fully explain the
bureau's inability to piece together strands of information before Sept. 11.

"The F.B.I.'s budget for counterterrorism was vastly
increased prior to 9/11, and its failure to take serious
note of the threat is really just unfathomable," said
Daniel Benjamin, a former National Security Council aide.

Mr. Freeh, in an op-ed article for Monday's issue of The
Wall Street Journal, defended the Bush administration for
its "prompt response and focus on terrorism."

He added, "The fact that terrorism and the war being waged
by Al Qaeda was not even an issue in the 2000 presidential campaign strongly suggests that the political will to declare and fight this war didn't exist before Sept. 11."

In the weeks and months before the attacks, as an alarming
rise in possible terrorist warnings was detected, F.B.I.
agents pursued leads that signaled the possibility of an
attack within the United States:

¶In the United Arab Emirates, the United States Embassy received a call in May saying that "a group of bin Laden supporters was in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives," according to a briefing that was given to Mr. Bush on Aug. 6, 2001, and was declassified on Saturday.

¶In Phoenix, an F.B.I. agent warned superiors in July that
he suspected extremists might be training at American
flight schools and urged a nationwide inquiry.

¶In Minneapolis, a French citizen named Zacarias Moussaoui
was arrested on immigration charges in August after
arousing suspicions at a flight training school.

¶In Seattle, interrogations of Ahmed Ressam, arrested in
1999 in a failed attempt to blow up Los Angeles
International Airport, revealed details about Qaeda's
tactics.

¶In New York City, the bureau had detected "recent
surveillance of federal buildings," pointing to possible preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, according to the Aug. 6, 2001, briefing memorandum.

¶In Yemen, an investigation into the 2000 bombing of the
Navy destroyer Cole brought the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. close
to 2 of the 19 eventual hijackers.

But the leads ultimately went nowhere. Supervisors deemed
the Phoenix memorandum too speculative. A Minneapolis agent said headquarters had blocked her office from conducting a more aggressive investigation into Mr. Moussaoui, now charged with conspiracy in the Sept. 11 plot. Miscommunication between the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. prevented investigators from discovering that the two hijackers linked to the Cole bombing were living in San Diego. Men suspected of casing New York buildings were found to be Yemeni tourists, and the United Arab Emirates report also appears to have been unconnected to the Sept. 11 plot, White House officials said.

"You add all the different leads together and you see
colossal, glaring failures," said Kristen Breitweiser,
whose husband died in the attacks. "The overriding question
is, what did we do in the summer of '01, knowing that there
was going to be an impending domestic attack by Al Qaeda?"
________________________________________________________________

[gldstwmn]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Yes, it mentions the 1993 WTC attacks in an historical context. It says

"Clandestine, foreign government, and media reports indicate Bin Ladin since 1997' has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the US. Bin Ladin implied in US television interviews in 1997 and 1998 that his followers would follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and 'bring the fighting to America.'"

What part of the gravity of that statement escaped them? All of it, apparently.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by gldstwmn

What part of the gravity of that statement escaped them? All of it, apparently.

Then explain to me whyt the FBI had at least 70 open investigations. What more did you want W and/or CR to do personally. I just do not get that people think they did absolutely positively nothing but sit in their rear ends. They reacted to the threats earlier that Summer. They were reacting when they got this memo. They continued to react. Even Clarke admits that

Again, I think they are resp. because it happened on their shift, but you cannot truthfully say they did 100% nada IMO - the facts just do not support it.

BTW - not a personal attack (as you know)

[gldstwmn]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...2/MN229389.DTL

Willie Brown got low-key early warning about air travel

Phillip Matier, Andrew Ross
Wednesday, September 12, 2001



For Mayor Willie Brown, the first signs that something was amiss came late Monday when he got a call from what he described as his airport security - - a full eight hours before yesterday's string of terrorist attacks -- advising him that Americans should be cautious about their air travel.

The mayor, who was booked to fly to New York yesterday morning from San Francisco International Airport, said the call "didn't come in any alarming fashion, which is why I'm hesitant to make an alarming statement."

In fact, at the time, he didn't pay it much mind.

"It was not an abnormal call. I'm always concerned if my flight is going to be on time, and they always alert me when I ought to be careful."

Exactly where the call came from is a bit of a mystery. The mayor would say only that it came from "my security people at the airport."

Mike McCarron, assistant deputy director at SFO, said the Federal Aviation Administration "routinely" issues security notices about possible threats. He said two or three such notices have been received in the past couple of months,

but none in recent days.

Whatever the case, Brown didn't think about it again until he was up, dressed and waiting for his ride to the airport for an 8 a.m. flight to New York, where he was to attend a state retirement board meeting. That was when he turned on the TV, and like millions of other Americans, saw the twin towers of the World Trade Center crumble and the Pentagon go up in smoke.

[gldstwmn]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Again, I think they are resp. because it happened on their shift, but you cannot truthfully say they did 100% nada IMO - the facts just do not support it. :shrug

I never said they didn't do anything. You're putting words in my mouth so to speak. No, I've always thought they were complicit. My question is, how complicit?

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by gldstwmn

I never said they didn't do anything. You're putting words in my mouth so to speak. No, I've always thought they were complicit. My question is, how complicit?

BINGO!!!!!!!!

[dissention]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Then explain to me whyt the FBI had at least 70 open investigations.

Do you live on the moon, Jason? Have you been paying attention? If so, you tell me all about the "70 open investigations" that are spoken of in that FRACTION of the REAL briefing?

HINT: The "70 open investigations" have been called into question by a great deal of government officials.

[dissention]

Originally Posted by gldstwmn

I never said they didn't do anything. You're putting words in my mouth so to speak. No, I've always thought they were complicit. My question is, how complicit?

I'll say it. They didn't do jack to protect us or the 3,000 Americans who died that day. To say the facts do not support that conclusion is utter ****. If you want to say that, you have to draw the exact conclusions when you say they did do something. Where is the proof? I'll tell you: in the White House, under lock and key. That briefing is a phoney and I have no problem saying it. 17 sentences on such a serious topic that the president himself inquired about?! I was born at night, but not last night. Sean Insanity can explain bin Laden and Al-Qaeda better than that briefing. No, that briefing is a distraction and it's a fake. The real meat and potatoes lies in the other 4,000 briefings that talked of Al-Qaeda, mainl ones from May, June, and July of 2001. The WH itself has said that the average length of these types of documents are at least 15 pages long. So, what did they do? What did they do? Nothing. Our national security advisor is a nincompoop with no skills at all that qualify her for her current position. The same can be said for our (un)president. There is no proof that those 70 investigations ever occurred. The FBI denies it. So, what did they do?

[dissention]

Put this in your mouth and chew:

Officials: Pre-9/11 Memo Excluded Data
By JOHN SOLOMON, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Just one day after President Bush (news - web sites) received a pre-Sept. 11 briefing on al-Qaida's effort to strike on U.S. soil, senior government executives received a similarly titled memo that excluded information about current threats and investigations, say federal officials who have read both documents.

The Aug. 7, 2001 memo, known as the senior executive intelligence brief or SEIB, didn't mention the 70 FBI (news - web sites) investigations into possible al-Qaida activity that Bush had been told of a day earlier in a memo entitled "Bin Ladin Determined to Strike in U.S.," the officials said Monday.
The senior executives' memo also did not mention a threat received in May 2001 of a U.S.-based explosives attacks or say that the FBI had concerns about recent casing of buildings in New York, the officials told The Associated Press.

They spoke on condition of anonymity because the senior executives' memo remains classified.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._al_qaida_memo

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by dissention

Do you live on the moon, Jason? Have you been paying attention? If so, you tell me all about the "70 open investigations" that are spoken of in that FRACTION of the REAL briefing?

HINT: The "70 open investigations" have been called into question by a great deal of government officials.

Prove it - you can't and you know it

Clearly ALL sources who have testified before the 9/11 Commission have DIRECTLY STATED the current adminsitration was doing things, they just were not doing enough to connect the dots. I mean that the FBI had files on these people is dispositive of my point and directly contradicts your point

[strandinthewind]

BTW - The Shrub is giving a PRIME TIME press concert tommorow night. W is in hot water on this and I think his Presidency depends on how he does tommorow night. Personally, I hope he fails because I want him out of office.

[dissention]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Prove it - you can't and you know it

Exactly; I can't prove it. Just like the administration can't prove that they were doing something. Where's the proof?

But, while I can't prove anything until someone leaks my suspicions, I know what my heart says.

[dissention]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

BTW - The Shrub is giving a PRIME TIME press concert tommorow night. W is in hot water on this and I think his Presidency depends on how he does tommorow night. Personally, I hope he fails because I want him out of office.

After the way he bombed earlier when talking to the press, who the hell knows.

I thought he was coked out of his gourd, though.