Sponsored Content




Intermarkets' Privacy Policy
Support


Donate to Ace of Spades HQ!



Recent Entries
Absent Friends
Bandersnatch 2024
GnuBreed 2024
Captain Hate 2023
moon_over_vermont 2023
westminsterdogshow 2023
Ann Wilson(Empire1) 2022
Dave In Texas 2022
Jesse in D.C. 2022
OregonMuse 2022
redc1c4 2021
Tami 2021
Chavez the Hugo 2020
Ibguy 2020
Rickl 2019
Joffen 2014
AoSHQ Writers Group
A site for members of the Horde to post their stories seeking beta readers, editing help, brainstorming, and story ideas. Also to share links to potential publishing outlets, writing help sites, and videos posting tips to get published. Contact OrangeEnt for info:
maildrop62 at proton dot me
Cutting The Cord And Email Security
Moron Meet-Ups

NoVaMoMe 2024: 06/08/2024
Arlington, VA
Details to follow


Texas MoMe 2024: 10/18/2024-10/19/2024 Corsicana,TX
Contact Ben Had for info





















« A memo for Cindy Sheehan. | Main | US Forces Raid Suspected Iraqi Chemical Factory »
August 13, 2005

Not "Historically Significant:" 9/11 Panel Spins Able Danger Omission

Ummm, sure:

The Sept. 11 commission concluded that an intelligence program known as Able Danger "did not turn out to be historically significant," despite hearing a claim that the program had identified the future plot leader Mohammed Atta as a potential terrorist threat more than a year before the 2001 attacks, the commission's former leaders said in a statement on Friday evening.

Seems sort of significant to me.

The statement said a review of testimony and documents had found that the single claim in July 2004 by a Navy officer was the only time the name of Mr. Atta or any other future hijacker was mentioned to the commission as having been known before the hijackings. That account is consistent with statements this week by a commission spokesman, but it contradicts claims by a former defense intelligence official who said he had told the commission staff about Able Danger's work on Mr. Atta during a briefing in Afghanistan in October 2003.

This is horrible spin. First of all, it shouldn't matter even if the name were only mentioned once. The entire purpose of the 9/11 Comission was to determine what went wrong in our intelligence-gathering, and a single mention of Atta being identified as a terrorist in 1999 or 2000 should have prompted a lot of research.

Can you imagine a post-WWII commission being told that an intelligence officer had intercepted a cable saying "We strike Pear Harbor in 12 days," and the commission later saying, "Well, gee, we didn't delve into that any further because we were only told that once."

I'm glad there's a disagreement on this point, because a disagreement provides the impetus for lots of hours of Congressional hearings on this point. And, as small a point as it is, it provides drama, as it becomes a "Who's lying?" deal.

Hey, sometimes you need sizzle with your steak to get the attention of the MSM.

The Sept. 11 commission report made no mention of the unit, disbanded in 2002, and the statement by Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton defended that omission, saying the operation had not been significant "set against the larger context of U.S. policy and intelligence efforts" that involved Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda.

Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton also noted that the name and character of Able Danger had not been publicly disclosed when the commission issued its public report in 2004. They said the commission had concluded that the July 2004 testimony by the Navy officer, who said he had seen an Able Danger document in 2000 that described Mr. Atta as connected to a cell in Brooklyn "was not sufficiently reliable" to warrant further investigation, in part because the officer could not supply documentary evidence to prove it.

We'll see how much investigation they actually put into coming up with this conclusion.

More... From TKS and Captain Ed.

Both hit upon something curious. The 9/11 has gone from insisting it never heard of this information at all to now claiming they heard of it but thoughtfully considered it and found it not to be "historically significant."

Which is it, guys?

I suppose the obvious answer is "both," in this sense: the Commissioners never heard of this at all, but their staffers decided it wasn't "historically significant."

Well, I know the bona fides, such as they are, of Kean, Hamilton, et al. I don't know who these staffers are at all, if they're young lawyers fresh out of Georgetown or very experienced intelligence analysts, or a mix of both. And I don't know which of these staffers made these decisions. The information does not appear to have been widely shared.

So, which staffers exactly made the decision to spike this information and shield the Commissioners from it?

The very fact that they decided to spike this information, and conceal it from the Commission, makes me doubt their prudence. And, quite frankly, their motives.

Surely this is big enough that it should have been considered by the actual Commissioners, and either included in or excluded from the report according to their expertise (such as it is).


digg this
posted by Ace at 01:26 PM

| Access Comments




Recent Comments
Nova Local: "69 "Local news here quietly discussed that most/al ..."

redridinghood: "Wishing all a blessed Good Friday. ..."

LinusVanPelt : "No. Burr was a POS, certainly. But it was a duel, ..."

Rufus T. Firefly: ">>>Local news here quietly discussed that most/all ..."

Village Idiot's Apprentice: ""Local news here quietly discussed that most/all w ..."

Ben Had: "..., boggles the mind, it does. May Spring bring ..."

Nova Local: " And the names of the two deceased workers who's ..."

... : "We MUST defend Ukraine. And we MUST stop Israel ..."

Dem Propagandists: "Republicans made Obamacare expensive and unafforda ..."

Ben Had: "JT, Good morning. Hope all is well with you ..."

JT: "Hiya BenHad ! ..."

m: "Where's our SFGoth? ..."

Recent Entries
Search


Polls! Polls! Polls!
Frequently Asked Questions
The (Almost) Complete Paul Anka Integrity Kick
Top Top Tens
Greatest Hitjobs

The Ace of Spades HQ Sex-for-Money Skankathon
A D&D Guide to the Democratic Candidates
Margaret Cho: Just Not Funny
More Margaret Cho Abuse
Margaret Cho: Still Not Funny
Iraqi Prisoner Claims He Was Raped... By Woman
Wonkette Announces "Morning Zoo" Format
John Kerry's "Plan" Causes Surrender of Moqtada al-Sadr's Militia
World Muslim Leaders Apologize for Nick Berg's Beheading
Michael Moore Goes on Lunchtime Manhattan Death-Spree
Milestone: Oliver Willis Posts 400th "Fake News Article" Referencing Britney Spears
Liberal Economists Rue a "New Decade of Greed"
Artificial Insouciance: Maureen Dowd's Word Processor Revolts Against Her Numbing Imbecility
Intelligence Officials Eye Blogs for Tips
They Done Found Us Out, Cletus: Intrepid Internet Detective Figures Out Our Master Plan
Shock: Josh Marshall Almost Mentions Sarin Discovery in Iraq
Leather-Clad Biker Freaks Terrorize Australian Town
When Clinton Was President, Torture Was Cool
What Wonkette Means When She Explains What Tina Brown Means
Wonkette's Stand-Up Act
Wankette HQ Gay-Rumors Du Jour
Here's What's Bugging Me: Goose and Slider
My Own Micah Wright Style Confession of Dishonesty
Outraged "Conservatives" React to the FMA
An On-Line Impression of Dennis Miller Having Sex with a Kodiak Bear
The Story the Rightwing Media Refuses to Report!
Our Lunch with David "Glengarry Glen Ross" Mamet
The House of Love: Paul Krugman
A Michael Moore Mystery (TM)
The Dowd-O-Matic!
Liberal Consistency and Other Myths
Kepler's Laws of Liberal Media Bias
John Kerry-- The Splunge! Candidate
"Divisive" Politics & "Attacks on Patriotism" (very long)
The Donkey ("The Raven" parody)
Powered by
Movable Type 2.64