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This Phoenix nonsense is a repeat of the Schippers-Robert Wright
episode in Chicago. Will the Mass Media stall for time
by 'discovering' 911 foreknowledge in every city with an FBI office?
According to a Times story, 'Thousands of FBI agents have rounded up
more than 1,300 suspects across America since September 11, but they
have failed to find a single al-Qaeda cell operating in the United
States'. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1164-232311,00.html
This would support Michael Ruppert's idea that the al-Qaeda network
in America is largely a fiction concocted by the those in US
Government responsible for 911. The trick is to have the 'network'
appear solid enough to have some semblance of reality, yet elusive
enough to fox anyone from tracing the 'rabbit trail' back to the CIA,
DEA or whatever.
As with the JFK assassination, have your competing cover stories
ready. Before the aeroplane attacks:
1. have CIA-MI6 controlled journalists plant stories of 911
connections to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China, Israel, Iraq, Iran,
Russia, Newfoundland (you can't trust those Newfies!)
2. add some Moslem and Israeli kids visiting America for good measure
(there's enough CIA fronts and assets in those countries to hire them)
3. plus the FBI 'discovering' parts of a non-existent terrorist
network throughout America
And you'd have so much signal noise that W and his friends can claim
to be overwhelmed by info overload.
MacNamara
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60179-2002May22.html
FBI Memo Author Did Not Envision Sept. 11
By Bill Miller and Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, May 23, 2002; Page A08
The Phoenix FBI agent who wrote a memo last summer warning about
possible terrorists at U.S. flight schools told lawmakers yesterday
that he never expected officials at FBI headquarters to respond
immediately to his suggestion for an investigation and that he never
envisioned the kinds of attacks that took place Sept. 11.
Although his memo cautioned that al Qaeda members might be training
at U.S. aviation schools, FBI agent Kenneth Williams told
congressional panels in secret hearings yesterday and Tuesday that
none of the information in the document could have led investigators
to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks, according to officials familiar with
his testimony.
In fact, Williams has said, he marked his memo "routine," knowing
that it typically takes 60 days for such documents to go through the
chain of command at FBI headquarters. Williams's July 10 request that
investigators canvass flight schools for al Qaeda terrorists never
made it beyond FBI's counterterrorism division, where it was quickly
rejected as unworkable and speculative, sources have said.
Williams and his supervisor, Bill Kurtz, have spent the past two days
on Capitol Hill, caught in the political storm over whether the FBI
and government agencies overlooked possible warning signs of al
Qaeda's Sept. 11 attack. They have been accompanied by FBI Director
Robert S. Mueller III, who has promised reforms, including a new
Office of Intelligence to better analyze information.
Mueller told reporters yesterday that he is determined to make the
FBI "a better bureau and to make it capable of handling the
information that is coming in, particularly on counterterrorism
matters but also on counterintelligence and other matters." He
provided lawmakers with a blueprint but did not make it public.
Williams declined comment after concluding his testimony yesterday.
According to those who have heard his account, Williams has echoed
recent explanations by FBI leaders that his memo came at a time when
agents were preoccupied with the investigation of the 2000 bombing of
the USS Cole in Yemen and a large volume of intelligence reports
suggesting a possible attack.
"He says it takes 60 days for a routine memo to clear, that he felt
it did not deserve urgent status, that he never envisioned planes
being flown into buildings at any time," said Sen. Richard J. Durbin
(D-Ill.). "I think he gives his side of the story and all of it is
plausible and credible.
"I will tell you, though," Durbin added, "that although he did not
come up with the exact September 11 scenario, what he presented in
that memo was so close to the fact pattern that emerged on September
11 that, as you read it, it just takes your breath away."
He added that one factor that caused Williams to write the memo was
an interview he conducted with an extremist flight student from the
Middle East who said some "absolutely frightening" things about the
United States.
The FBI presentations began Tuesday with the Senate Judiciary
Committee, and continued yesterday in presentations to the House and
Senate intelligence panels. Instead of quelling criticism, however,
the question-and-answer sessions led to calls for a more thorough
investigation.
The Phoenix memo was never shared with the CIA or any other agency,
officials have said. Nor was it forwarded to FBI investigators in
Minnesota who in August arrested alleged Sept. 11 conspirator
Zacarias Moussaoui after he raised suspicions at a flight school
there. And the memo was not part of an Aug. 6 CIA briefing to
President Bush that raised the possibility of airline hijackings by
terrorists.
Mueller has acknowledged that the FBI should have responded more
aggressively to Williams's memo but has emphasized that nothing in it
would have allowed authorities to thwart the attacks. Bush spokesman
Ari Fleischer has said that the president's August briefing was
general in nature and its import should not be magnified in hindsight.
Vice President Cheney has called some lawmakers' criticism of Bush
inappropriate while the nation is at war. Last night on CNN's "Larry
King Live," he said that "when members of Congress suggest that the
president of the United States had foreknowledge of the attack on
September 11, I think that's outrageous. That's beyond the pale.
Somebody needs to say that ain't criticism, that's a gross,
outrageous political attack."
But Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.) of the intelligence panel said
yesterday's testimony was "very disturbing, and we hope to learn
more." He said the committee, which has already questioned one
Minnesota agent, plans to summon others soon.
"The information coming from Phoenix and the information coming from
Minneapolis was stifled here at FBI headquarters," Shelby said.
The Phoenix memo was transmitted electronically to FBI headquarters,
distributed to two counterterrorism units there and sent to the
counterterrorism team in New York, where some of the FBI's top anti-
terror experts worked.
The request for a canvass of U.S. flight schools was deemed "closed,"
or rejected, because authorities determined they lacked the manpower
to handle the task, sources have said.
A senior FBI official said Tuesday that the decision on the canvass
was made by the Radical Fundamentalists Unit. The same official said
yesterday that the earlier information was in error, and that the
FBI's Osama bin Laden Unit was responsible.
FBI officials have said that the memo speculates about possible al
Qaeda links to flight schools. But the bin Laden unit was assigned
the task of considering Williams's request because of the agent's
references to the terrorist leader.
� 2002 The Washington Post Company
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