FBI blew it--so says the 9/11 report

[AR182]

i think both the fbi & the cia need to be over hauled.


Exclusive?The 9-11 Report: Slamming the FBI


By Michael Isikoff
NEWSWEEK


July 28 issue ? The FBI blew repeated chances to uncover the 9-11 plot because it failed to aggressively investigate evidence of Al Qaeda?s presence in the United States, especially in the San Diego area, where two of the hijackers were living with one of the bureau?s own informants, according to the congressional report set for release this week.

THE LONG-DELAYED 900-page report also contains potentially explosive new evidence suggesting that Omar al-Bayoumi, a key associate of two of the hijackers, may have been a Saudi-government agent, sources tell NEWSWEEK. The report documents extensive ties between al-Bayoumi and the hijackers. But the bureau never kept tabs on al-Bayoumi?despite receiving prior information he was a secret Saudi agent, the report says. In January 2000, al-Bayoumi had a meeting at the Saudi Consulate in Los Angeles?and then went directly to a restaurant where he met future hijackers Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi, whom he took back with him to San Diego. (Al-Bayoumi later arranged for the men to get an apartment next to his and fronted them their first two months rent.) The report is sure to reignite questions about whether some Saudi officials were secretly monitoring the hijackers?or even facilitating their conduct. Questions about the Saudi role arose repeatedly during last year?s joint House-Senate intelligence-committees inquiry. But the Bush administration has refused to declassify many key passages of the committees? findings. A 28-page section of the report dealing with the Saudis and other foreign governments will be deleted. ?They are protecting a foreign government,? charged Sen. Bob Graham, who oversaw the inquiry.
The report criticizes the Pentagon for resisting military strikes against Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan prior to 9-11, and the CIA for failing to pass along crucial information about Almihdhar and Alhazmi at a terrorists? summit in Malaysia. But the FBI gets the toughest treatment. A few months after al-Bayoumi took them to San Diego, Almihdhar and Alhazmi moved into the house of a local professor who was a longtime FBI ?asset.? The prof also had earlier contact with another hijacker, Hani Hanjour. But even though the informant was in regular touch with his FBI handler, the bureau never pieced together that he was living with terrorists. The bureau also failed to pursue other leads, including a local imam who dealt with several key 9-11 figures. The report, one congressional investigator said, ?is a scathing indictment of the FBI as an agency that doesn?t have a clue about terrorism.? Furious bureau officials say the report misstates the evidence. They say the bureau checked out al-Bayoumi?now back in Saudi Arabia?and concluded he had not given the hijackers ?material support.? As for Almihdhar and Alhazmi, ?there was nothing there that gave us any suspicion about these guys,? said one FBI official.

 

[StevieD]

This sounds like it is going to get a lot more dirtier before it's over.

 

[AR182]

i agree, stevie, especially with the possible connection between a saudi official & two hijackers. it also doesn't look good with the administration constantly ignoring any saudi gov't. connection with 9/11.

 

[dr. freeze]

what do you expect when all the CIA and FBI funding has been placed into putting 2 cops in nearly every local grocery store?

 

[djv]

I hope and believe. Most Americans always new that Bin Laden did not sit in some cave in some far off place and come up with the 9/11 plan. We can be fools some times but not all the time.
You can check back here as far as you wish. I been on our boys in Wash DC for giveing the Saudies a free pass. They new where a lot of this plan came from. They new where the money came from.
We instead blew up a desert and some caves looking for Bin. Then to make it look good we jumb in to Iraq. So now we have to fu???? up places. No Bin, No Nukes, No Saudie ass on the line. Some low level dudes in Cuba nothing else. Borders here at home wide open. Dont believe this has a thing to do with how many cops we have. If any thing we still need more.

 

[StevieD]

Part of the problem might be that the guys running this thing are the same guys that have been screwing up our relations with those countries for years! Since 9-11 they are called experts but it is their "expertise" that has us in the mess we find ourselves in.

 

[Turfgrass]

Let's just give them a bunch of money and maybe they will go away!

 

[AR182]

dr. freeze quote:"what do you expect when all the CIA and FBI funding has been placed into putting 2 cops in nearly every local grocery store?"


i always thought that cops are funded by city & state funds, & not federal funds like the cia & fbi. is this not true?

 

[dr. freeze]

dont you remember Clinton signing all those federal police bills -- in effect putting tens of thousands more police on the street?

lots of federal money is going towards police now

 

[Hoops]

NEW YORK - In the nearly two years since the World Trade Center attack, the Police Department has posted detectives overseas, taught officers exotic languages and acquired a mobile lab to detect chemical or biological attacks ? all of it courtesy of Pfizer, Motorola and other donors.

The money is contributed to the New York City Police Foundation, a little-noticed charity whose marriage of philanthropy and public safety is being replicated nationwide.

Police departments with shrinking budgets and a growing list of duties are using nonprofit foundations to solicit donations for new, and sometimes controversial, projects.

"Running a modern police department is not a cheap proposition," said Karen Wagener, president of the Los Angeles Police Foundation. "The model of having these public-private partnerships is the way things are going."

In the past five years alone, at least 10 foundations have been launched around the country, said New York City Police Foundation president Pam Delaney, whose group gives seminars on establishing them. Atlanta, Detroit, Omaha, Neb., and Oakland, Calif., all have police foundations based at least in part on New York's.

In Oregon, the Portland Police Foundation sent the chief and seven officers to a 10-day Spanish-immersion course in Mexico. In Los Angeles, the foundation bought digital cameras for domestic violence investigations and telescoping mirrors that enable bomb squads to examine hard-to-see places.

Los Angeles' new chief, former New York Police Commissioner William Bratton, is personally raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for L.A.'s foundation.

Critics question whether the practice of mixing private money and police work subverts the usual government protections against favoritism and conflicts of interest. Los Angeles, for example, has been criticized for designating money for consulting contracts with Bratton's former associates.

"When the police foundation goes out and buys things on its own, or hires consultants on its own, all of those protections are not followed," said Erwin Chemerinsky, a University of Southern California law professor.

Police and foundation officials say they guard against the possibility of wealthy donors winning undue influence.

Without question, some donors are helping themselves. The handbag manufacturer Coach, Major League Baseball and the Motion Picture Association of America earmark their donations for the NYPD's trademark-infringement unit, contributing to a $200,000 account that is used to make undercover purchases of counterfeit CDs, clothes and other goods.

Supervising Sgt. Tom McFadden said the funding does not compromise his unit's independence.

"We're not doing it on behalf of Ralph Lauren; we're not doing it on behalf of Tommy Hilfiger. We're doing it to get the person who's doing the counterfeiting," he said.

The New York City Police Foundation has been around for 32 years, but until recently, it funded traditional items, such as police horses. Nowadays, it supports more ambitious projects and has far more money to spend.

Its annual budget has nearly tripled since the World Trade Center attack to roughly $6.8 million in the just-ended fiscal year, enabling the NYPD to undertake projects without having to deal with City Hall red tape.

"It's just an easier, quicker way for us to fund things we need," said New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly.

The foundation provides $200,000 annually to pay the expenses of detectives posted overseas in cities such as Tel Aviv, London and Lyons, France. It arranged for Agilent Technologies to donate a van stocked with gear to detect a chemical or biological attack.

And it funded a $1.2 million high-tech counterterror operations center and $50,000 worth of lessons in Urdu, Farsi, Pashtun and other languages for detectives assigned to intelligence and counterterrorism.

The NYPD is also using the Police Foundation to move into marketing and make money on the new post-Sept. 11 affection for the police. The foundation has hired a marketing agency, the Joester Loria Group, that says it is licensing the NYPD logo for use on action figures, a stuffed plush German shepherd rescue dog, children's bicycles and sleepwear

 

[EXTRAPOLATER]

Developments here--if they are ALLOWED to happen--could be very interesting. I'm curious about just what this informant was doing during his time with the terrorists, what his intelligence-sponsored objective was, AND (importantly) whether or not he remains alive to this day.

The following isn't my idea -- it's actually an idea I'd like to quash if possible -- but it may provoke Hendrix-only-knows.
A guy renting in the same place as I is convinced that there was American intelligence involved in the 911 attacks. Recently he has put forth some strong arguments (this is likely in the news) that Saudi intelligence was involved, which is likely, but his ultra-right-wing-angst has blurred his perspective so much that the thesis of controlling the populace through "fear" and other nefarious controls has presented me with a difficult obstacle in my (thank-Hendrix) few conversations with this guy.

My opinion is that he has more formal education than brains (about a gazillion years at university...I think his Masters is ALMOST done ), but I'm sure that he is not the only one that concludes that American intelligence agencies had much more information (at the very least) than they are letting on.

If oil was a factor in the Irag "thing", to any degree, then there must be a lot of casualties happening there now -- maybe several we are not hearing about right away. The remaining pockets of Iraqi resistance have made it a priority to blow up key reserves and mining depots. This fact makes it clear that whether or not the U.S. was motivated to move in because of oil does not matter at all. The Iraqis, and several other foreign groups (Korea sounds like another damn nightmare for Newsweek to sell in the future) have obviously concluded that oil was an issue, and they are going to try and attack the West via fuel reserves.

Lets go Hydro, lets go!
Lets go Hydro, lets go!

This is important shit. Aristotle must be rolling around in his grave.
Maybe Hendrix taught him how to play guitar ... relieve some of the stress.

Hope to contribute something more in the future, regarding this.
Probably some more insightful and meaningful discussion to come. Certainly relative to what I experienced at my university, say, during my recent "international ethics" course.

Or so they called it.

Peace (as if)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There's a monster on the loose
It's got our heads into the noose
And it just sits there ... watching
(J.Kay/Steppenwolf-Monster-Monster/Suicide/America)

 

[djv]

N Korea I hope not. We give then oil they have none. Bush has his team talking behind the covers on this one. We want to give food and oil to them so they forget about nukes. Same thing Clinton tryed and got blasted here for doing it. But now that Bushs team is doing it. It's better deal. But it is just same thing.
Bush is not going to start a nuke war with N Korea. At least I believe he is smarter then that.
If it's true we still have some Fed money going to police to help add protection for us. Good Deal. At least there spending some of my taxes on something that is needed. Maybe we should hire another 10/15 thousand to protect our borders. To help with our wide open ports.