that the 9/11 CR and the Joint Inquiry report were either incomplete or untrue in certain respects?
Is Migliori aware of the secrecy on the issue of intel sharing?
As we wait for the unclassified version of the report of CIA 9/11 miscues to be released later this month, we now see the airlines sueing the FBI and CIA to depose agents they think will help absolve them of liability. So far, it is the same cast of characters from the Moussaoui trial, like FBI agents Erik Rigler, Coleen Rowley and Harry Samit, to mention a few.
But, there has been no mention made of Jack Salata, the FAA's liaison to the FBI in the lead up to 9/11, or Robert White, the FAA's liaison to the CIA's Counter Terrorism Center during that time. What information did they give to the 9/11 Commission and the Joint Intelligence Committee? How much of that was redacted and not made available to the public? If anyone wants to know exactly what information the CIA and FBI passed on to the FAA, weren't these two gentlemen the funnels?
(snip)
Isn't it past time to determine exactly what was passed on to the FAA and what the FAA did with that information? If there is a difference of opinion in that regard shouldn't it be exploited so that both sides of the story are told and the victims' families, as well as the American people, are given a more full accounting?
LinkInterview with Claudio Manno (head of the FAA Intelligence Division in the lead up to 9/11) during the Joint Inquiry hearings:
WYDEN: With respect to Al Mihdhar and Al Hazmi, did your agency have the names of those two hijackers prior to September 11, 2001?
MANNO: Know, sir, we did not.
WYDEN: If you had, what steps would have been taken had you had that information?
MANNO: Well, prior to 9/11, we had a process -- and we had a so- called watchlist, which was disseminated to the industry of the other security directive process. In fact, a number of the people that were -- we suspected were involved in the -- what we call the Manila plot -- the Bojinka (ph) plot, as you refer to it -- were on that list.
And, again, what we would -- the purpose of that process was to highlight, for the air carriers, particular individuals -- individuals that had ties to terrorist groups and that presented a threat to aviation who should either be denied boarding or should be, if they showed up for boarding, be called to the attention of law enforcement.
Had we had information that those two individuals presented a threat to aviation or were -- posed a great danger, we would have put them on that list and, you know, they should have been picked up in the reservation process.
LinkIt seems relevant as to how known al Qaeda operatives were able to board the planes in the first place. OTOH, the airlines have already settled many of the cases, so one would think they wouldn't do so unless there was sufficient proof of misconduct or negligence. One of the conditions of the settlement was that the families could not reveal what they learned about the security breaches.
Seymour Hersh first mentioned the theory that ramp workers helped the hijackers in a story he wrote shortly after the attacks for
The New Yorker magazine. In Joe Trento's book
Unsafe at any Altitude, he tells the story of Dulles security checkpoint worker Eric Gill who claimed he saw Nawaf al-Hazmi and Marwan al-Shehhi wearing dirty United Airline ramp uniforms on the night of 9/10!!! Trento also states that al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar were actually Saudi GID agents. If true (Trento stands by his reporting but I realize it isn't a widely accepted notion) that would seem to make the FBI (and CIA) depositions all the more relevant.