Was 9/11 an Inside Job? By Mark H. Gaffney
The following is an excerpt from Mark H. Gaffney's book, THE 911
MYSTERY PLANE AND THE VANISHING OF AMERICA.
Regrettably, there is considerable evidence that elements of the Bush
administration were complicit in the 9/11 attack, and may even have
helped stage it. Let us now examine some of what I regard as the most
compelling evidence. However, the following discussion makes no claim
to be comprehensive.
We know that within minutes of the “worst terrorist attack” in US
history, even before the collapse of WTC-2 at 9:59 am, US officials
knew the names of several of the alleged hijackers. CBS reported that
a flight attendant on AA Flight 11, Amy Sweeney, had the presence of
mind to call her office and reveal the seat numbers of the hijackers
who had seized the plane.[1] FBI Director Robert Mueller later said,
“This was the first piece of hard evidence.”[2] In his memoirs CIA
Director George Tenet emphasizes the importance of the passenger
manifests, as does counter-terrorism czar Richard A. Clarke.[3] All
of which is very strange because the manifests later released by the
airlines do not include the names of any of the alleged hijackers. Nor
has this discrepancy ever been explained.
According to MSNBC, the plan to invade Afghanistan and “remove Al
Qaeda from the face of he earth” was already sitting on G.W. Bush’s
desk on the morning of 9/11 awaiting his signature.[4] The plan, in
the form of a presidential directive, had been developed by the CIA
and according to Richard Clarke called for “arming the Northern
Alliance...to go on the offensive against the Taliban [and] pressing
the CIA to...go after bin Laden and the Al Qaeda leadership.”[5]
A former Pakistani diplomat, Niaz Naik, tells virtually the same
story. During a BBC interview, three days after 9/11, Niak claimed
that senior American officials had informed him in mid-July 2001 that
the US would attack the Taliban “before the snows start falling in
Afghanistan, by the middle of October at the latest.”[6] Niak said he
received this information in Berlin at a UN-sponsored international
contact group on Afghanistan. He also predicted, correctly, that the
US attack would be launched from bases in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
But how could US officials know in mid-July that American forces would
invade Afghanistan in October unless they had foreknowledge of the
attack?
Foreknowledge probably also explains why General Richard Myers, the
acting Chairman of the Joint Chiefs on 9/11, announced at the first
post-9/11 meeting of Bush’s National Security Council, held on video-
conference the afternoon of the attack, that “there are forty-two
major Taliban bombing targets.”[7] But how did Myers come to have such
detailed information about military targets in Afghanistan, so soon
after the 9/11 attack?
This important detail belies oft-repeated claims that the US military
was not prepared to attack Afghanistan, and points to extensive war
planning before 9/11. Journalist Steve Coll arrived at a similar
conclusion while researching his 2004 book, Ghost Wars, an excellent
history of the period leading up to the 9/11 attack. Coll interviewed
two Clinton administration officials who informed him that ”the
Pentagon had been studying possible targets in the same spring [i.e.,
1998] that the CIA had been drawing up its secret plan to raid Tarnack
Farm,” located near Kandahar, Afghanistan, where bin Laden had taken
up quarters at the invitation of Taliban leader Mullah Omar.[8]
According to Clarke, at the same meeting on the afternoon of 9/11, CIA
Director George Tenet informed the president that “Al Qaeda had
committed these atrocities.”[9] But, again, how did Tenet know this so
soon after the attack, especially given that “security failures” had
occurred, unless he had foreknowledge?
No Hard Evidence - On September 20, 2001, the Bush administration
officially declared that Osama bin Laden was responsible for the 9/11
attack. Three days later, Secretary of State Colin Powell announced on
Meet the Press that the government would soon release “a white paper”
detailing the evidence against bin Laden.[10] Later the same day, Bush
faced questions from the press about Powell’s remark and backed away
from releasing any additional information. Bush explained that the
government had a lot of evidence but that most of it was classified
and could not be made public. Bush emphasized, however, that the
evidence “leads to one person, as well as one global terrorist
organization.”[11] National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice made a
similar statement during an interview on FOX News. Said Rice: “We have
very good evidence of links between Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda
operatives, and what happened on September 11.”[12] Rice refused to
release any particulars, however, and, like Bush, claimed that the
evidence was “classified.”
As we know, the US government never got around to releasing the
promised white paper. Why not? Was it because the evidence against bin
Laden was too weak to hold up in court? Such was the view of
journalist Seymour Hersh, who cited CIA and Justice Department sources
to this effect in his regular column in the New Yorker magazine.[13]
Foreign intelligence agencies were also busily investigating the case,
but fared no better. For instance, Germany’s Chief Federal Prosecutor,
Kay Nehm, admitted that there was no hard evidence linking bin Laden
with the crime.[14] The lack of evidence prompted former German
Chancellor Helmut Schmidt to speak out against President Bush’s
decision to invoke Article V of the NATO Treaty, mobilizing NATO’s
involvement in the war on terrorism. In Schmidt’s own words: “Proof
had to be delivered that the September 11 terror attack came from
abroad. [Yet,] that proof still has not been provided.”[15]
Osama did not cooperate by acknowledging his role in the attack; on
the contrary. In a statement on September 16, 2001 carried by Al-
Jazeera, bin Laden categorically denied any involvement. Days later,
he repeated this denial during an interview with the Pakistani
newspaper Ummaut.[16] On November 3, 2001 Al-Jazeera released a third
statement, in which bin Laden not only denied involvement but also
accused the Bush administration of waging a “crusader war” against the
Muslim world. To the best of my knowledge, none of these denials were
reported in the US media. Why not?
On October 1, 2001 British Prime Minister Tony Blair told the House of
Commons that the case against bin Laden was proved beyond a shadow of
doubt. Said Blair: "I have seen absolutely powerful and
incontrovertible evidence of his [Osama Bin Laden’s] link to the
events of the 11th of September.”[17] Several days later (on October
4), Blair’s government went public with the evidence to which Blair
had alluded: a “Bin Laden Dossier.”[18] But the evidence turned out to
be short of “incontrovertible,” and in fact was shockingly thin. The
Independent described it as “little more than conjecture,”[19] and an
editorial in the Guardian concluded that the dossier was “almost
worthless from a legal point of view.”[20] The (London) Times agreed,
observing that “There is no evidence presented [in the dossier] that
directly links bin Laden to September 11.”[21]
The Bin Laden Video and the personification of evil - Confronted with
US demands to hand over bin Laden unconditionally, the Taliban was
initially defiant, and refused. However, in early October 2001 two
Pakistani Islamic parties persuaded the Taliban leadership to
extradite bin Laden to Peshawar, Pakistan, where he would be held
under house arrest and tried by an international tribunal.[22] The
deal even included the extradition of bin Laden to the US in the event
of a conviction. However, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf vetoed
the arrangement, no doubt, under heavy pressure from the Bush
administration. But why would the US turn down an opportunity to bring
the arch villain of 9/11 to justice for the crime of the century? Was
it because, as I have already suggested, the US had insufficient
evidence to convict and faced the embarrassing likelihood of an
acquittal?
In fact, the only evidence the US government released linking bin
Laden to 9/11 was a video-tape which supposedly turned up by chance in
Afghanistan. According to the State Department, US military forces
found the hour-long video in Jalalabad on December 9, 2001, shortly
after the US invasion.[23] It purportedly shows bin Laden and several
of his al Qaeda comrades ghoulishly celebrating their successful
attack upon America. The US government released the tape on December
13, 2001 along with an English translation and a Department of Defense
(DoD) press release. The latter included the following statement by
Rumsfeld: "There was no doubt of bin Laden's responsibility for the
September 11 attacks before the tape was discovered."[24] The US media
made much of this confessional tape, as did political luminaries like
New York City Mayor (and presidential hopeful) Rudy Giuliani, who told
CNN that the tape confirmed that the US military campaign against bin
Laden was “more than justified.” Giuliani added: "Obviously, this man
[i.e., bin Laden] is the personification of evil. He seems delighted
at having killed more people than he anticipated, which leaves you
wondering just how deep his evil heart and soul really is."[25]
In the video bin Laden brags about al Qaeda’s role in staging the
attack. But is the footage bona fide? Anyone who has seen the film
knows that the main character bears only the most superficial
resemblance to bin Laden, judging from well-known photos. In addition,
there are major discrepancies. For example, the video shows bin Laden
writing with his right hand when according to the FBI he is a southpaw.
[26]
Two independent translators and a third expert on oriental studies
also took issue with the English translation of the Arabic released by
the DoD. During the program "Monitor,” which aired on the German TV
channel “Das Erste,” the three experts stated that "at the most
important places where it [i.e, the video] is held to prove the guilt
of bin Laden, it [i.e., the translation] is not identical with the
Arabic."[27] The experts also disputed the US claim that the tape
proved foreknowledge. Gernot Rotter, professor of Islamic and Arabic
Studies at the University of Hamburg, stated that "The American
translators who listened to the tapes and transcribed them apparently
wrote a lot of things in that they wanted to hear but that cannot be
heard on the tape no matter how many times you listen to it." While
this does not necessarily exonerate bin Laden, it does raise
questions. If, as Bush claimed, the US had solid evidence of bin
Laden’s guilt, then why make false claims?
Evidently, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agrees with
the skeptics. The FBI’s on-line web listing of “Most Wanted
Terrorists” includes a page devoted to Osama bin Laden. According to
this official post, which may be viewed by anyone with access to
cyberspace, bin Laden is wanted by the FBI for the August 1998 attacks
upon US Embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya,
which killed over 200 people.[28] However, the page makes no reference
to the events of September 11, 2001. Nor is there any mention of the
video discussed above. In June 2006, when blogger Ed Haas learned
about this, he was understandably puzzled and contacted FBI
headquarters by phone seeking an explanation. Haas talked with Rex
Tomb, the FBI’s Chief of Investigative Publicity, who informed him
that “The reason why 9/11 is not mentioned on Osama bin Laden’s Most
Wanted page is because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting bin
Laden to 9/11.”[29] Haas was dumbfounded, and said: “But how is this
possible?” Tomb replied that “bin Laden has not been formally charged
in connection with 9/11.” He then explained why not:
“The FBI gathers evidence. Once evidence is gathered, it is turned
over to the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice then
decides whether it has enough evidence to present to a federal grand
jury. In the case of the 1998 United States Embassies being bombed,
bin Laden has been formally indicted and charged by a grand jury. He
has not been formally indicted and charged in connection with 9/11
because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting bin Laden to
9/11.” [my emphasis][30]
This admission by the FBI is astonishing and raises fundamental
questions about the war on terrorism, as well as the role of the US
media. Was Osama bin Laden convicted for the cold-blooded murder of
nearly 3,000 innocent Americans in the US court of public opinion by
means of a media circus? Did the US government and the corporate media
collude to deceive the American people? If so, then a colossal
miscarriage of justice has occurred.
Consider also the strange statement made by President Bush at a press
conference on March 13, 2002. When asked about the progress being made
to catch bin Laden, Bush replied that “we haven’t heard much from him.
[i.e., bin Laden] And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of
any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is. I, I’ll
repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him.” [31] [my
emphasis] But why this almost lackadaisical attitude about the arch-
villain whom Bush had promised to track down to the ends of the earth?
What had become of the president’s laser-like determination? Bush
explained that bin Laden had ceased to be a terrorist threat due to
the US occupation of Afghanistan. Yet, by at least one account, the US
forces at Tora Bora displayed almost unbelievable incompetence during
the pursuit of bin Laden, as a result of which the accused and most of
his entourage escaped.[32] Was this the plan, all along?
A no less strange remark made a few weeks later (April 6, 2002) by
General Richard Myers, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, suggests
that bin Laden’s getaway had been approved at the highest level. Myers
told CNN that “the goal has never been to get bin Laden.”[33] I
personally found his statement incomprehensible, since at the time
Osama was public enemy number one. Did the US allow bin Laden to
escape because the Bush administration judged he was more valuable at-
large? We can’t be certain, because by this time there were also
numerous reports that bin Laden was dead.[34]
Did President Bush know when he made the above statement that bin
Laden was already deceased? This would explain Bush’s casual demeanor.
Yet, either way, from the standpoint of propaganda it hardly mattered
whether bin Laden was dead or alive. His larger-than-life reputation
could be sustained simply by neglecting to confirm his death, and the
legend is what counted. His persona could also be “spun” in various
ways and made to serve political expedience. Indeed, by this logic bin
Laden was even more valuable dead because a living breathing bin Laden
might at some point be apprehended, in which case the Bush
administration faced the unwelcome prospect of a very public trial at
which the terrorist would have an opportunity to tell his side of the
story to a listening world. And this, of course, had to be avoided.
If we can believe the 9/11 Commission Report, the case against bin
Laden was greatly bolstered by the capture and subsequent confession
in 2003 of the alleged 9/11 mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM).
The problem, of course, is that the official story about the plot
against America is wholly based on secret CIA interrogations that have
never been independently confirmed, and must therefore be viewed as
suspect. But even if we accept the testimony of KSM in 2003, this does
not explain the rush to war in 2001. Nor does it explain President
Bush’s decision to go to war against Saddam Hussein, a decision
reportedly made in July 2002.[35]
Previous cases of terrorism had already demonstrated the wisdom of
proceeding with caution, since knee-jerk responses can (and do)
misfire. For example, after the 1995 bombing of the Murrah Federal
Building in Oklahoma City, US investigators at first suspected a
Mideast connection. But this was proved false, and similar errors were
made after the 1988 downing of Pan American Flight 103 over Lockerbie,
Scotland. Although initial evidence pointed to Syria or Iran, a
thorough forensic investigation ruled these out and eventually
implicated Libya. The 9/11 Commission Report itself describes the
latter case as “a cautionary tale about rushing to judgment in
attributing responsibility for a terrorist act.”[36] So, why the rush
to war after the September 11 attack? If the Bush administration had
conclusive evidence that al Qaeda was responsible, why not release it?
Was the Bush White House tight-lipped because the actual evidence
would have exposed the complicity of the US military and intelligence
community? A stunning story that broke in the US press in 2005 points
to such a conclusion.
Able Danger - As it happened, a legitimate US military counter-
terrorist operation known as Able Danger was tracking Mohamed Atta and
his cohorts as early as January-February 2000. The operation, based at
Ft. Belvoir, Virginia, was small but extremely high-tech, as it
employed advanced computers to sweep the internet, a methodology known
as as data-mining. In May 2000, however, when Able Danger’s success
became known throughout the Defense Department, the officers who ran
it were ordered to shut it down and destroy their data.[37] One
officer reportedly was threatened with prison if he refused. Later,
the Pentagon attempted to block Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on
Able Danger, and in 2005, when this failed, the Pentagon refused Able
Danger staffers permission to testify before the committee.[38]
One intelligence officer who later testified anyway, Lt. Col. Anthony
Shaffer, was targeted for harassment. The question is why? Of course,
the standard explanation is that the military bureaucracy made gross
blunders and later sought to cover up their incompetence. But there is
another possibility. Was Able Danger shut down because this honest
operation threatened to unmask the covert planning for the September
11 “attack”?
What is clear is that the Pentagon’s self-serving attempts to gag and
discredit Lt. Col. Shaffer are not to be believed. In February 2006
Shaffer told the House Armed Services Committee that during the summer
of 2000 he and other officers involved in Able Danger attempted on
three separate occasions to warn the FBI about the terrorist threat
posed by Mohamed Atta. But the meetings never happened. Each time they
were canceled at the last minute by high-level Pentagon attorneys.[39]
Nor has the Pentagon ever provided a satisfactory explanation as to
why.[40]
Some time after the dissolution of Able Danger Shaffer was reassigned
to Bagram Air Base, in Afghanistan, where in October 2003 he succeeded
in bringing the existence of Able Danger to the attention of the 9/11
Commission. This apparently happened due to a chance encounter with
Philip Zelikow, Executive Director of the commission, and several
commission staffers who were then on tour, gathering firsthand
information about the US war on terrorism. Lt. Col. Shaffer told the
House committee that after he briefed the commission staff about Able
Danger’s success in identifying Mohamed Atta and other alleged 9/11
hijackers, Zelikow came up, handed him his card, and asked him to
“please contact me upon your return to the states so we can continue
this dialogue.”[41] However, three months later when Shaffer did just
that he was surprised to discover that Zelikow was no longer
interested in Able Danger. But why wouldn’t he be?
Then, all hell broke loose when Shaffer dutifully informed his
commanding officer about the contact. From that point on Lt. Col.
Shaffer was subjected to the sort of military hazing that is usually
reserved for green recruits. His security clearance was cancelled. He
lost access to his office computer and all of his classified materials
about Able Danger, which, he later learned, were destroyed.
Subsequently, the Pentagon dismissed his testimony, claiming it was
unsupported by hard evidence, an obvious example of Catch-22. Shaffer
also learned that he was under investigation, although no formal
charges were ever filed against him. He was told “off the record” that
he had “pissed off” one or more high-ranking officers.
Several of Shaffer’s colleagues from Able Danger corroborated his
story, but it didn’t matter. His military career was over, destroyed.
[42] Shaffer’s testimony before Congress is riveting and is essential
reading for anyone interested in 9/11 truth. In their 2006 book
Without Precedent, Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton, co-chairs of the 9/11
Commission, deny that Able Danger had ever identified Mohamed Atta
before 9/11.[43] But their assertion, much belated, is just not
credible. Their own final report on 9/11 makes no mention of Able
Danger. It is abundantly clear that even though Lt. Col. Shaffer
notified the panel about this important counter-terrorism operation
the commissioners made no attempt to investigate it, and since Kean
and Hamilton failed to do so how can they now credibly claim to know?
Obviously, their denial is based on information they received, much
later, from the Pentagon.
Kean and Hamilton write that their staff “received all of the
Department of Defense documents on Able Danger and had found no
mention of Atta.”[44] But their claim is not persuasive, since we know
that 2.5 terabytes of intelligence data about Able Danger had already
been destroyed (in 2000), not to mention the information on Shaffer’s
hard drive (in 2004). The question for the co-chairs is simple: What
assurance could they possibly have that the documents they received
from the DoD about Able Danger tell the full story? Obviously, they do
not. More to the point, why would Kean and Hamilton believe the
Pentagon over the testimony of Lt. Col. Shaffer? By this time the co-
chairs already had good reason to suspect that the Pentagon, not
Shaffer, had deceived them in the hearings.[45]
Eavesdropping on bin Laden - The fact that Able Danger was shut down
in May 2000, long before Bush entered office, raises disturbing
questions. Was covert planning for 9/11 already underway during the
Clinton administration? It is curious that in 2002 CIA Director George
Tenet told a closed session of a joint House-Senate panel
investigating the 9/11 “security failure” that al Qaeda‘s planning of
the September 11, 2001 attack started as early as 1998.[46] But how
could Tenet know this unless the CIA had been tracking bin Laden, all
along? As a matter of fact, we know they were! According to several
UPI reports, the National Security Administration (NSA) acknowledged
in February 2001 that the use of advanced Echelon software enabled the
US intelligence community to eavesdrop on thousands of bin Laden’s
cell phone calls over a period of years. US officials disclosed that
even after bin Laden began to encrypt certain calls in 1995, his
“codes were broken.”[47]
The date 1998 is doubly curious. That same year Tenet informed the
Senate Intelligence Committee that the CIA’s strategy to defeat al
Qaeda included the recruiting of al Qaeda operatives.[48] In his
memoirs Tenet goes even further with an assertion that is remarkable
for its candor. He writes: “the [9/11] commission failed to recognize
the sustained comprehensive efforts conducted by the intelligence
community prior to 9/11 to penetrate the al Qaeda organization.” [49]
I had to re-read this passage several times just to believe my own
eyes. Did the CIA recruit terrorists who were then used as patsies on
9/11?
Bush officials, of course, have steadfastly denied that the US
successfully penetrated al Qaeda before 9/11. But their denials are
less than persuasive in light of Lt. Col. Shaffer’s testimony about
Able Danger, and also because there is no doubt: we know that the
monitoring of phone calls continued. After al Qaeda bombed two US
embassies in East Africa in August 1998, FBI investigators got lucky
and stumbled upon an al Qaeda communications hub in Yemen. According
to writer Lawrence Wright, this proved to be “one of the most
important pieces of evidence the FBI would ever discover, allowing
investigators to map the links of the al Qaeda network all across the
globe.”[50] The hub was a private telephone, anything but high tech.
The switchboard operator turned out to be the brother-in-law of Khalid
al-Midhar, one of the nineteen alleged hijackers. His job in Yemen was
simply to relay messages to-and-from various al Qaeda operatives,
including bin Laden.[51]
From phone records US investigators confirmed a flurry of calls
through the hub before the embassy bombings, and this pattern was
repeated before the attack on the USS Cole in October 2000.[52]
Indeed, it is unclear why US intelligence agencies failed to prevent
the attack on the Cole because, by this time, they were listening. The
al Qaeda hub was allowed to operate right up until September 11, 2001,
and even after. Incredibly, US and Yemeni authorities did not finally
move in and close it down until 2002.[53]
Based on this evidence, gleaned from open sources in the US media, we
must conclude that the US intelligence community was tracking al
Qaeda’s nearly every move before 9/11, and had been for years,
probably including the entry of the alleged hijackers into the US,
their “flight training” and subsequent movements. The phone intercepts
certainly continued.
In June 2002 both the Miami Herald and the Dallas Star-Telegram
reported that in the summer of 2001 the NSA even monitored phone
conversations between alleged 9/11 lead hijacker Mohamed Atta and
alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM).[54] The papers
reported that the NSA “did not recognize the significance of what they
had.” Evidently, we are supposed to believe that the NSA did not pass
along this important intelligence to the CIA. But this is absurd.
After all, the NSA is a part of the US Department of Defense and
exists for the purpose of providing intelligence to the CIA and the US
military. The story in the Miami Herald even acknowledges this, citing
an NSA official who stated under condition of anonymity that it was
“simply not true” that the NSA failed to share the information with
other intelligence agencies.[55] Of course they shared it.
Incidentally, a google search failed to locate the full text of either
of these articles, which apparently have long since been scrubbed from
the internet. To the best of my knowledge they survive in cyberspace
only as thumbnails.
What are we to make of all of this? Did elements of the US
intelligence community know about al Qaeda’s multiple hijacking
operation, all along? Did they, then, covertly piggy-back their own
planning on top of it, thereby insuring the attack’s “success” while
also manipulating it for their own ignoble ends? If true, this would
easily explain why the Pentagon shut down Able Danger in May 2000. It
would explain the Pentagon’s gag order imposed upon the Able Danger
staffers, which blunted a Congressional inquiry. It would also explain
the carefully orchestrated smear campaign aimed at Lt Col. Shaffer,
who did his patriotic duty and was made to pay a terrible price. It
would explain why the DoD fed phony or incomplete information about
Able Danger to co-chairs Kean and Hamilton, and other members of the
commission, to persuade them that the data-mining effort was
“insignificant.” It would also explain why, time and again, during the
period before 9/11, the CIA withheld critical information from the
FBI, information, which, had it become known, would have enabled the
FBI to foil the 9/11 attack. The FBI was always just one or two
critical pieces of information short of putting together the plot. Nor
has the CIA disconnect ever been adequately explained.[56] The
standard excuses, bureaucratic bungling and interagency rivalry, are
simply not persuasive.
This interpretation would also explain why George Tenet lied during
the 9/11 Commission hearings when he denied his meetings with
President Bush in August 2001. Indeed, it might even explain why
President-elect G.W. Bush retained Tenet, a Clinton appointee, as his
CIA chief. The move was one of Bush’s first decisions as president and
was most unusual, especially given the neocons’ scarcely concealed
scorn for the Clinton administration. However, it makes perfect sense,
assuming that when Bush took office elements of the CIA and US
military were already deeply involved in the covert planning for the
9/11 attack. Continuity at the CIA would have been essential. As far
as I know, writer Ian Henshall was the first to make this connection.
[57] And let us not forget: during the period before 9/11 the CIA
Director visited the White House on a daily basis. Tenet personally
briefed Bush on intelligence issues, an unusual chore for a CIA
Director.[58] But, again, this becomes understandable, assuming that a
major covert operation was in the works, one that entailed extreme
compartmentalization. Only a very few individuals at the top would
have been fully briefed.
bin Laden in Dubai? - A no less shocking story that appeared in the
prestigious French paper Le Figaro on October 11, 2001 points to the
same conclusion. The story claimed that bin Laden was actually under
the protection of US security agencies prior to the 9/11 attack.
According to Le Figaro, bin Laden checked in to the American Hospital
in Dubai on July 4, 2001, just two months before 9/11, where he
received medical treatment over a ten-day period for a serious kidney
ailment.[59]
Dubai is one of the Arab Emirates located in the Persian Gulf. The
story cannot be based on just rumor or hearsay because it includes
many details: Bin Laden was reportedly accompanied by his personal
physician, a nurse, four body guards, and at least one of his
lieutenants. It also states that the local CIA station chief,
evidently a well known figure in the tiny country, was seen entering
bin Laden’s hospital suite during his stay, and immediately after the
meeting caught a flight back to the US. If the story is accurate, bin
Laden held court from his hospital room, welcoming various members of
his extended family, as well as prominent Saudis and Emiratis. It is
no secret that bin Laden suffered from kidney disease. Pakistani Prime
Minister Nawaz Sharif had informed the Clinton administration about
bin Laden’s deteriorating health as early as 1998, during a state
visit to Washington.[60]
A follow-up report in the Guardian (UK) on November 1, 2001 confirmed
the above story and added further details, noting that bin Laden’s
Saudi guests included Prince Turki al Faisal, who was then head of
Saudi intelligence. The article in the Guardian names French
intelligence as the source of the story in Le Figaro. It also claims
the information was leaked because the French were “keen to reveal the
ambiguous role of the CIA and to restrain Washington from extending
the war to Iraq and elsewhere.” Given that bin Laden was already
wanted at the time for the US embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar es
Salaam, why did the US not arrange to have local authorities snatch
the terrorist in Dubai, in order to bring him to justice? Of course,
it goes without saying that bin Laden would never have visited the US
hospital in the first place had he not been confident of his protected
status. Do we dare to connect these dots? Surely the story in Le
Figaro suggests that elements of the US intelligence establishment
knew about the coming 9/11 attack and allowed bin Laden to remain free
to play his assigned role. As shocking as this sounds, if the story is
correct there is no other plausible explanation.
Such a conclusion is further supported by powerful evidence that first
came to light on November 6, 2001, when the BBC program Newsnight
produced FBI documents on British television proving that soon after
G.W. Bush entered office the White House ordered the FBI to “back off”
from ongoing investigations of Osama bin Laden and other members of
his family, some of whom were living in the US at the time.[61] To the
best of my knowledge, none of these stories from European and UK press
were ever reported in the US media. Again, why not?
Were elements of the US government and intelligence community
complicit in the events of September 11, 2001? Did they allow the
attack to happen, or even help to stage it, in order to generate the
pretext for a much more aggressive US foreign policy which the
American people would not otherwise support? Either way, the
implications are shocking, indeed, so shocking that many of our fellow
countrymen (and women) cannot bring themselves to think such thoughts.
Yet, it is a matter of record that the neoconservatives openly
advocated an imperial shift in US foreign policy before the November
2000 election.[62] Moreover, Clinton was already moving in this
direction.
These are grave questions for our nation and we must not fail to
address them. If there is any truth in them we face a Constitutional
crisis unlike anything in our history.