No Evidence Pentagon Knew of Atta, Panel Says

[BrendaStarr]

The commission statement raises significant doubts about the likelihood that Able Danger could have identified Atta or other Sept. 11 hijackers as al Qaeda operatives and placed them in Brooklyn in 1999 or early 2000. Atta never lived in New York and did not enter the United States until June 2000, and two other key hijackers mentioned by the intelligence officer in media interviews were not in the country until 2001, the statement said.

...

...a former defense intelligence official, has told media outlets and Weldon that he briefed the commission's executive director, Philip Zelikow, and three other staff members about Able Danger's identification of Atta during an overseas meeting in October 2003. The commission said in its statement that its records of the briefing, held in Bagram, Afghanistan, include no mention of Atta and that none of the staff members who attended recalls such a claim.

The second person, described by the commission as a U.S. Navy officer employed at the Defense Department,...said he briefly saw the name and photo of Atta on an "analyst notebook chart." The material identified Atta as part of a Brooklyn al Qaeda cell and was dated from February through April 2000, the officer said.

...

But the commission statement said that because no documents or other evidence had emerged to support the claim, "the commission staff concluded that the officer's account was not sufficiently reliable to warrant revision of the report or further investigation."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/12/AR2005081201655.html

[madeline_con]

1. "Pentagon Clears Itself of Wrongdoing"

An appropriate headline the story reminds me of.

[progressivebydesign]

2. that's not what was reported last week... total whitewash. n/t

[EST]

3. And cover your ass, when the mission is a soft soap of

the criminal activities of a huge majority of the mob bosses in washington, is defititely in order.

[ngGale]

4. More denial ...

it never happened covers a lot of corruption.

[radwriter0555]

5. which made him PERFECT for the PNAC via the ISI to hire for 911....

I can see that.

[wli]

6. doubtless a DIA/ONI/CIA agent n/t

[punpirate]

7. I do wish folks would remember the original source...

... for this claim--Rep. Curt Weldon, who does have an agenda, and who has depended upon single unreliable sources in the past for some rather outlandish claims.

Weldon has been a principal in administration attempts to force the CIA to shoulder all blame for pre-invasion intelligence faults; he is also trying to promote his Regnery-published book on 9/11 which is chock full of unsubstantiated claims; this most recent "information," as it was originally released, was a clear attempt to put blame for 9/11 on the Clinton administration, not to establish some Bush administration LIHOP/MIHOP motives.

A little more on Weldon's methods and his particular madnesses:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=1688808&mesg_id=1688927

Be sure to read the American Prospect article on his "sources," which I mentioned in another thread, as does Mr. Benchley above.

It's also important to remember that this information has no impact on the actual intelligence being gathered on Atta prior to the 9/11 attacks. If you will all recall, Cheney's repeated assertions that Atta met with an Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague were debunked by documents obtained from the FBI showing that the FBI was tracking Atta through his cell phone calls on the date in question (in March, 2001, as I recall) and had placed him on the eastern seaboard midway between Florida and Virginia, where he was to attend a meeting. The FBI knew of him and was watching him well prior to 9/11.

This assertion of Weldon's is therefore meaningless--it's meant to assert that 9/11 occurred because Clinton locked the FBI out of information on Atta. Now, if the FBI was tracking Atta in early spring of 2001, then they weren't blind to his identity. In whatever ways the FBI or the administration failed in the months leading up to 9/11, it wasn't because the FBI was locked out of the information on Atta.

Cheers.

[annabanana]

9. Thank you punpirate..

The whole Weldon business is a big distraction..and it really muddies the water..

[BrendaStarr]

14. Thanks for that. I'd missed the previous post.

:)

[0007]

8. You think the Pentagon would tell the truth?

Do you think the Pentagon would tell the truth about the authorization of torture?

Do you think the Pentagon would tell us about the missing billions that they can't account for?

Who thinks that the Pentagon has autonomy? In other words does the Pentagon have the capacity to manage one's affairs and make decisions a part from our little dictator?

Everything goes through junior with Rummy and the Generals acting like they're in charge.

[NNN0LHI]

12. You think the Curt Weldon would tell the truth?

That is who is passing this story around with Ø evidence to sell his new book and pin the blame of 9/11 on Clinton.

Don

[0007]

13. Curt Weldon has absolutely no dignity, credibility or any honorable

attribute. In fact, the only thing he does right is to dress up like a human being.

[creeksneakers2]

10. Another RW kook story that didn't last a week.

The full RW version had Jamie Gorelick covering it up at the 9/11 Commission while Sandy Berger stole the incriminating documents. The Times and the Post chased this one but they covered themselves well when they wrote about it.

[underpants]

11. Weldon was just on Fox & Friends retelling the story

When asked "Who would not like this to come out?" he side stepped the question and re-iterated the "Semptember 2000..." timeline implication.


Page 210 of the 9/11 Commission Report states that the Ashcroft DoJ accepted Gorelick's 1995 template/statement on "the wall" blowing the whole RW point out of the water. I am sure that hasn't stopped them.