Today, Rawstory reported on New York Times columnist Frank Rich, and his belief that the Defense Department Inspector General’s office’s investigations over the years may have been cover-ups that were “carried out in response to “orders from above.” He said that any report “over the past five or six years during the war in Iraq” may be suspect, and that “there may be a much bigger story here.”
Really?
Maybe that’s why when the Washington Post reported on 8/2/2006 that “the Pentagon’s initial story of how it reacted to the 2001 terrorist attacks may have been part of a deliberate effort to mislead the commission and the public” and that “the 10-member commission, in a secret meeting at the end of its tenure in summer 2004, debated referring the matter to the Justice Department for criminal investigation,” a report was released on 8/5/2006 by the Defense Department Inspector General’s office that said, NORAD’s mistakes were due to “inadequate forensic capabilities” and “poor record-keeping.” A ridiculous excuse within “the past five or six years during the war in Iraq.”
Maybe that’s why when the New York Times reported on 8/9/2005 that “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,” a report was released on 9/21/2006 by the Defense Department Inspector General’s office, and it was reported that, “a review of records from the unit, known as Able Danger, found no evidence it had identified ringleader Mohamed Atta or any other terrorist who participated in the 2001 attacks.” A report that former Rep. Curt Weldon said was created by a an Inspector General that “cherry-picked testimony from witnesses in an effort to minimize the historical importance of the Able Danger effort.” Also within “the past five or six years during the war in Iraq.”
Most people are comfortable with the idea that the Bush Administration and others lied about the Iraq War, wiretapping, torture, among many other things, but refuse to believe they would lie about 9/11. I think it’s time for the world to admit that the 9/11 attacks were covered-up, and there needs to be truth, justice and accountability. Otherwise, the “Post-9/11 World” will destroy us.
With regards to Able Danger, at the very least, people should be held accountable for obstruction of justice, retaliation against whistleblowers, gross incompetence, etc… At the very worst, well, you know…
Fall 1999: Army Intelligence Program Begins Gathering Information on Al-Qaeda
A data mining program called Able Danger was set up by US Special Operations Command (SOCOM) in late 1998. It had been collecting data mostly on Bosnia and China (see Late December 1998). But at this time, it begins collecting data on al-Qaeda. [Government Security News, 9/2005] At least some of the data is collected on behalf of Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Lambert, the J3 at US Special Operations Command. [US Congress. Senate. Committee on Judiciary, 9/21/2005] Eleven intelligence employees are directly involved in Able Danger’s work. Six are with SOCOM’s Able Danger unit. Four more, including Dr. Eileen Preisser and Maj. Eric Kleinsmith, are with the US Army’s Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA), which joins the effort in December 1999. LIWA had been conducing data mining already on a wide variety of topics, including international drug cartels, corruption in Russia and Serbia, terrorist linkages in the Far East, and the proliferation of sensitive military technology to China (see April 2000). [Norristown Times Herald, 6/19/2005; Government Security News, 8/2005; New York Times, 8/9/2005; St. Petersburg Times, 8/10/2005; Bergen Record, 8/14/2005; Government Security News, 9/2005; US Congress, 9/21/2005; US Congress. Senate. Committee on Judiciary, 9/21/2005] Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, running a military unit called Stratus Ivy in the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), will also take part in the effort. According to Shaffer, Stratus Ivy is tasked “to take on ‘out of the box’ ideas, and develop them into real intelligence operations.” So the goal is to use the information gathered by Able Danger to conduct real operations against al-Qaeda targets. [US Congress, 2/15/2006] Using computers, the unit collects huge amounts of data in a technique called “data mining.” They get information from such sources as al-Qaeda Internet chat rooms, news accounts, web sites, and financial records. Using sophisticated software, they compare this with government records such as visa applications by foreign tourists, to find any correlations and depict these visually. [Bergen Record, 8/14/2005; Government Security News, 9/2005] The program will be shut down early in 2001 (see January-March 2001). Read the rest of this entry »
Eliot Spitzer was the Attorney General of New York that refused to acknowledge the call for a new investigation into 9/11, and also refused to allow Dietrich Snell to testify before the Able Danger hearings held by Rep. Weldon. - Jon
Joseph L. Bruno, the State Senate majority leader, is now in full attack mode with Gov. Eliot Spitzer over suggestions that the senator improperly used state helicopters and state police escorts.
This morning, Mr. Bruno called on the state inspector general to investigate “the governor’s abuse of the powers of the State Police” by having them keep logs of his activities when they drove him around, as The New York Post reported this morning. Mr. Bruno also called for the attorney general and the Albany County district attorney to “convene grand juries to assess criminal liability of the governor for his abuse of power.”
