Able Danger

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

Four in 9/11 Plot Are Called Tied to Qaeda in '00

By DOUGLAS JEHL
Published: August 9, 2005
WASHINGTON, Aug. 8 - 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.

In the summer of 2000, the military team, known as Able Danger, prepared a chart that included visa photographs of the four men and recommended to the military's Special Operations Command that the information be shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the congressman, Representative Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania, and the former intelligence official said Monday.

The recommendation was rejected and the information was not shared, they said, apparently at least in part because Mr. Atta, and the others were in the United States on valid entry visas. Under American law, United States citizens and green-card holders may not be singled out in intelligence-collection operations by the military or intelligence agencies. That protection does not extend to visa holders, but Mr. Weldon and the former intelligence official said it might have reinforced a sense of discomfort common before Sept. 11 about sharing intelligence information with a law enforcement agency.

Continued
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/09/politics/09intel.html?th&emc=th

[spooked911]

1. Another eye-roller from the mainstream media

so the Pentagon back in 2000 idenitifed four of the 9/11 hijackers, including Mohamed Atta, as terrorists, and then forgot about them... or something... and then the dog ate their homework.

Pathetic.

Do they really expect us to believe this crap?

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

2. I posted this on GD, and got some inciteful responses about the

main source.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4293698

[spooked911]

3. I doubt Weldon is completely lying about this-- I bet the Pentagon

DID identify these guys back in 2000.

The lie is that it was a bureaucratic fuck-up that they were forgotten about and not tracked.

This is of course the standard governmental excuse for the 9/11 cover-up: the bureaucrats screwed up everything.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

4. I on the other hand believe that they didn't do anything on purpose. n/t

[janedoe]

5. Who says they weren't tracked?

Who says they were forgotten about?

Who says they weren't hired in 2000, to simply play the part.
For all I know, Atta rented a car, parked it at the Boston airport, with the checklist of stuff he was suppose to leave on the seat or somewhere it wouldn't be overlooked, then boarded a plane to Rio, where he'll live happily ever after.

[petgoat]

6. I wish it were just the incompetence theory. Frequently they seem to push

a "Civil Liberties Caused 9/11" line.

[JackRiddler]

7. RUMSFELD QUESTIONED

on this during today's press conference with Myers (saw it on C-SPAN).

Paraphrasing from memory:

Mr. Secretary, can you clarify today's story that four of the 9/11 hijackers were identified as potential terrorists in 2000 by a military intelligence team?

Rumsfeld: No, I can't. That's the first time I ever heard about it, from the story today, and I can't tell you any more right now.

[JackRiddler]

8. Naked lie or outrageous ignorance from NY Times

"The account is the first assertion that Mr. Atta, an Egyptian who became the lead hijacker in the plot, was identified by any American government agency as a potential threat before the Sept. 11 attacks."

No, it is not.

The German press cited German federal police in September 2001 saying that the CIA had Atta and the Hamburg cell under surveillance from January to June 2000, while he and they were still in Hamburg, and that the Americans did not inform the Germans of this at the time. They watched him buy "chemicals" in Frankfurt and visit the U.S. consulate in Berlin that May, where he applied for and received a visa to travel to the U.S.

!!!

[Ouabache]

9. So the ball was dropped in May and June of 2001 ?

And who was in charge of national security in May and June of 2001?

[JackRiddler]

12. Who says the ball was ever dropped?

We're seeing new fragments on the periphery of the real story, which I believe is that Atta and his crew were under surveillance throughout their time in the United States, not just by US authorities but by Mossad agents as well.

Honest officers in various agencies who found out about these guys and hoped to prevent them from doing harm were hindered. Meanwhile, others were watching and making sure that the "potential terrorists" could continue laying down a trail for their later patsyhood as the alleged 9/11 hijackers. (Whether it was they who finally took the 9/11 flights is as yet unanswerable.)

Please see the latest story on 911truth.org here:

NY Times Discovers (Finally) That US Intel Was Spying on Mohamed Atta Prior to 9/11

http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20050810014103123

[DemonFighterLives]

13. I found it amazing that all the elements came together when shrub

came to town. Myer, Mueller, Rummy, Cheney, the patsy's and complicit members of the intelligence community.

How they can attempt to blame Clinton or the intelligence agencies is just pure unadulterated Evil.

[DemonFighterLives]

10. Enable Danger

Of course intelligence knew they were here. These people could not have pulled this off without co-conspirators.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

11. Exactly. n/t