Is this the memo that could have stopped 11 September?

[hedgetrimmer]

George Bush: told of possible attack five weeks before 9/11.
Picture: PA/Michael Stephens

~SNIP~
Mon 12 Apr 2004
FRASER NELSON POLITICAL EDITOR


Key points

• Bush warned of 9/11 attack weeks before
• Confidential memo released as part of ongoing inquiry
• Democrats argue that Bush did not take threat seriously
• FBI detected patterns of suspicious activity in this country"

Key quote
"It said Osama bin Laden had designs on America. Well, I knew that. I was satisfied that some of the matters were being looked into." - George Bush, on the memo

Story in full THE US president, George Bush, was personally warned that Osama bin Laden could be planning an attack on the United States five weeks before the terrorist atrocity of 11 September, 2001, it emerged yesterday.

A confidential CIA memo has been released by the White House showing Mr Bush was also warned that al-Qaeda was studying a possible plan to hijack commercial aircraft into the US embassy in Kenya.

The document, declassified as part of the inquiry in the United States into the use of intelligence before the 11 September attacks, was seized on by Democrats to argue that the Bush administration failed to take the terrorist threat seriously until al-Qaeda had struck.

Entitled Osama bin Laden Determined To Strike in US, the memo warned that the unsuccessful "millennium plot" to attack Los Angeles International airport on New Year’s Eve of 1999 "may have been part of bin Laden’s first serious attempt to strike in the US".

... more ...

link: http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=412352004

[napi21]

1. I don't mean to be a PIA, but no, it isn't.

There were threats by OBL for years. Was this one strongsr? Maybe yes, but in all fairness, it really wasn't specific.

I do think 911 could have been prevented, but not by this PDB. The FBI & CIA deserve a lot of the blame because they let internal bearuacracy hinder their eficacy.

I don't think GWB is responsible for the 911 attack, but I do think he is responsible for the unnecessary invasion of Iraq, and pi**ing of the rest of the world againt the USA.

Je will pay the price in 2004 by losing the election, and perhaps more than that in the future!

[hedgetrimmer]

2. Could this have helped in the prevention?

The Taliban warned:
"Weeks before the terrorist attacks on 11 September, the United States and the United Nations ignored warnings from a secret Taliban emissary that Osama bin Laden was planning a huge attack on American soil."
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=331115

The Germans warned:
"According to an article in one of the major daily newspapers in Germany, published just after the destruction of the World Trade Center, the German intelligence service BND told both US and Israeli intelligence agencies in June that Middle East terrorists were 'planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack important symbols of American and Israeli culture.'

"The newspaper cited unnamed German intelligence sources, who said that the information came through Echelon, the US-controlled system of 120 satellites which monitors all worldwide electronic communications. Echelon is operated jointly by the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia and New Zealand, although its existence is not officially admitted."
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jan2002/sept-j16.shtml

The Egyptians warned:
"Egyptian intelligence warned American officials about a week before Sept. 11 that Osama bin Laden's network was in the advance stages of executing a significant operation against an American target, President Hosni Mubarak said in an interview on Sunday."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/04/national/04WARN.html

The Russians warned:
According to Russian press reports, Russian intelligence notified the CIA during the summer that 25 terrorist pilots had been specifically training for suicide missions. In an interview September 15 with MSNBC, Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed that he had ordered Russian intelligence in August to warn the US government "in the strongest possible terms" of imminent attacks on airports and government buildings.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/jan2002/sept-j16.shtml

The French warned:
"A key point in unraveling why the FBI failed to follow up leads on Al Qaeda terrorism now centers on the Bureau's contemptuously brushing aside warnings from French intelligence a few days before 9-11."
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0222/ridgeway2.php

The British warned:
"Britain gave President Bush a categorical warning to expect multiple airline hijackings by the al-Qaeda network a month before the September 11 attacks which killed nearly 3000 people and triggered the international war against terrorism."
http://www.sundayherald.com/24822

The Israelis warned:
The London Telegraph: "Israeli intelligence officials say that they warned their counterparts in the United States last month that large-scale terrorist attacks on highly visible targets on the American mainland were imminent."
http://tinyurl.com/28rrh

The Moroccans warned:
"A Moroccan secret agent, Hassan Dabou, had penetrated al Qaeda for two years, breaking cover the summer of 2001 to warn of 'spectacular' attacks in New York in the summer or autumn of 2001. Secret service chiefs are said to have taken seriously the tip from one of its veteran informants and immediately passed on the details to Washington."
Times of London, June 12, 2002

Arab intelligence agencies warned:
"When the hubbub about what the White House did or didn't know before Sept. 11 dies down, Congressional or other investigators should consider the specific warnings that friendly Arab intelligence services sent to Washington in the summer of 2001."
http://www.iht.com/articles/58269.html

Finally, The 800 pager:
Some sources who have read the still-secret congressional report say some sections would not play quite so neatly into White House plans. One portion deals extensively with the stream of U.S. intelligence-agency reports in the summer of 2001 suggesting that Al Qaeda was planning an upcoming attack against the United States—and implicitly raises questions about how Bush and his top aides responded. One such CIA briefing, in July 2001, was particularly chilling and prophetic. It predicted that Osama bin Laden was about to launch a terrorist strike “in the coming weeks,” the congressional investigators found. The intelligence briefing went on to say: “The attack will be spectacular and designed to inflict mass casualties against U.S. facilities or interests. Attack preparations have been made. Attack will occur with little or no warning.”

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3067907 /


On Edit: above info from teach1st on following link: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=480464&mesg_id=480477&page=

[bahrbearian]

11. Enough said.

[aquart]

3. A bit disingenuous, if I may say.

Bush will certainly pretend that this morsel of a memo existed in a vacuum free of any other associated information or inferences, but it is just not true.

Not when Pentagon people canceled plane reservations and a CIA agent phoned his New Jersey mom from the MidEast on Sept. 10, 2001 to tell her not to go into NYC the following day FOR ANY REASON.

The information was known. It was known by people in the highest places. THEY CHOSE TO DO NOTHING. Wait. They saved themselves.

WHO BENEFITS? George W. Bush and his cronies. No one else.

They knew. They profited. They deserve to be hanged.

May they never sleep.

[Zhade]

6. "They deserve to be hanged."

Yes. They do.

[booksenkatz]

7. Damn skippy!

Looking at the totality of information this gang had, not just the single 8-6-01 memo, it sure was actionable as far as John Ashcroft was concerned, as well as plenty of others whose lives were more valuable than yours and mine! I'm so sick of this "it wasn't actionable" horseshit.

Why weren't the airlines and airports alerted?
Where were the F-16's?
Why was the Pentagon not defended?
Why wasn't Tower 2 evacuated?
How can he say, "Man, that's one terrible pilot" with a straight face?
Why were there missiles on top of his resort building in Sarasota?

Damn straight they knew.

[Just Me]

13. Perhaps the Bush family's intimate "connection" to the bin Ladens

would have helped? Ya' think?!?!?!?!?

Perhaps,...well, I won't go THERE!!!

Perhaps the "rulers of the universe" really did not give a damn.

[Pinko Commie]

4. Osama Who?

At best, the "Push, Push in the Bush" administration is guilty of being asleep on duty. At best.

I suppose that since the PDB did not contain the date, time, city, state, and zip of the 9/11 attack, it was not specific enuf to do anything but, say, head for Crawford or get in some golf.

The simple fact is, if the administration had taken things seriously, the information held by the CIA and FBI that Bush claims he never got would have bubbled to the top. But then he might have had to disappoint his family friends and business partners, the Bin Ladens.

[Old and In the Way]

5. Someone needs to ask about the Bush-bin Laden relationship

and how that impacts on our national security.

(1) Bush recalls subs from on station after getting into office.
(2) Predator removed from OBL surveillance.
(3) Focus on Iraq.....Saudi Arabia's neighbor and secular enemy.
(4) The bin Laden flights out of the country
(5) The escape from Afghanistan (AQ/Pakistani's)
(6) bin Laden / Harken Oil investments
(7) bin Laden / Carlyle Group
(8) 15 Saudi Hijackers and no retaliation against Saudi Arabia
(9) No connecting the dots after 8/6
(10) Removal of Air Bases from Sadi Arabia
(11) SA investments in Bush/associates = $1.5BB
(12) James Baker leading defense of SA against $1BB victims of 9/11 suit.

Just how many trillions is Saudi Arabia invested in our economy? Has the Bush family created a national security risk for this country? Could Dimson be blackmailed? Whatever happened to "drain the swamps"?

[DoYouEverWonder]

8. Even on Aug 7, 2001

and despite the fact that the day before Bu$h had just been briefed about bin Laden being determined to strike in the US, all W was interested in was Saddam.



http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/08/20010807-2.html

Remarks by the President to the Pool
Ridgewood Country Club
Waco, Texas

August 7, 2001


Q Also today, apparently the Iraqis fired upon some allied planes in the no-fly zone and we bombed, apparently, some of the sites there. What do you have on that?

THE PRESIDENT: I've been briefed on it. As you know, our military can make decisions as they see fit to protect our pilots -- unless, of course, it's close to Baghdad, in which case it requires my approval. The missions that took place were fully in accordance with established allied war plans.

As I said, Saddam Hussein is a menace, he's still a menace and we need to keep him in check, and will.

Q Are they ratcheting it up, though? We've had a lot of incidents lately.

THE PRESIDENT: No -- are they, the Iraqis? He's been a menace forever, and we will do -- he needs to open his country up for inspection, so we can see whether or not he's developing weapons of mass destruction.

[damnraddem]

9. No one can say for sure that with Gore in WH 9/11 wouldn't have happened

But I believe it.

[The_Casual_Observer]

10. according to chimp & co. NOTHING could have prevented it

Absolutely nothing could have been done, it was just like the sun setting, inevitable.

This has been his "defense" since day one. Of course he is full of shit, he simply didn't do anything. I honestly don't know why they bothered to even prepare PDBs for chimp, since he can't read.

[Slide]

12. By itself, the memo was a little flimsy, IMO...

but coupled with the mass of other intelligence there are many obvious steps Bush could have taken to prevent 9/11. A swift grounding of all domestic flights, coupled with a roundup of all Arabic men holding airline tickets would have ensured the immediate safety of our nation. (Over the last 20 years or so, ALL successful hijackings, worldwide, have been conducted by Middle Eastern men, traveling alone, on foreign passports.) These suspects should have been arrested nationwide without hesitation and held until the full threat was uncovered and neutralized. This is so obvious that neglecting this BASIC precaution amounts to an impeachable offense.

I fully believe that President Gore would have prevented the tragedy of 9/11.