K. Breitweiser Blog: Enabling Danger (part 1)

http://www.911citizenswatch.org/modu...rder=0&thold=0

Saturday, August 20, 2005 - 02:50 PM
by: Kristen Breitweiser – HuffingtonPost.com – August 20, 2005

The press has recently been reporting on the issue of surveillance pertaining to four "key" 9/11 hijackers.

Specifically, Congressman Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) has gone public with accusations that the Pentagon had four of the 9/11 hijackers under its surveillance in December of 2000. Initial press accounts detailed that four of the 9/11 hijackers -- al Mihdhar, al Hazmi, al Shehi, and Atta -- were identified by a data mining operation (Project Able Danger) run out of the Defense Intelligence Agency.

The revelation of this new information is astounding for two reasons. First, if true, this would mean that four of the key hijackers in the 9/11 plot were in the cross-hairs of our Pentagon one year prior to the attacks during the summer of 2000. Second, it raises credibility issues surrounding the 9/11 Commission since the Commission’s Final Report does not mention—let alone report upon—the Able Danger operation.

Let’s address the concept that DIA had four 9/11 hijackers identified as al Qaeda operatives in 2000. First, why was this information withheld from the FBI when it was allegedly collected by DIA back in the summer of 2000? Second, if this information was not passed to the FBI, was any of this information passed on to the CIA? Third, what difference would it have made if DIA had informed the FBI about these four al Qaeda targets? Fourth, if it indeed exists, where is the Able Danger chart that allegedly contains Atta’s name, and most importantly, have we capitalized on any other information or names contained in that chart?

Withholding from the FBI:
News reports state that the information regarding the 9/11 hijackers was not passed onto the FBI because Pentagon attorneys believed that the targets of the data-mining operation (the four 9/11 hijackers) were green card holders thereby banning the passage of this information to the FBI since laws were in place during the summer of 2000 that banned domestic surveillance of Americans by the FBI. Of course, the DOD attorneys were patently wrong in their interpretation since the four 9/11 hijackers that were identified were merely U.S. visa holders (some of which had already expired and/or were illegal). These men were not U.S. citizens—therefore, the information could have been readily passed to the FBI with no worry of breaking any rules or laws. Nevertheless, the Able Danger information did not get shared with the FBI. (The identities and whereabouts of the DOD attorneys who provided such wrong legal counsel remains unknown—which raises the obvious question as to whether these individuals are still working at DOD and making the same erroneous and deadly decisions.)

It should be mentioned that two of the men mentioned in the Able Danger operation—al Mihdhar and al Hazmi—were already known by the CIA as al Qaeda operatives by late December 1999. Much like DIA and their failure to share information with the FBI, the CIA also failed to share their information about these two men being inside the United States and planning terrorist activities.

In December 1999, CIA was actively investigating and tracking al Mihdhar and al Hazmi as they traveled to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. While in Kuala Lumpur in early January 2000, al Mihdhar and al Hazmi attended a meeting with other known al Qaeda operatives. The meeting was a planning session for the U.S.S. Cole bombing that occurred in October 2000 and for the 9/11 attacks. Our CIA conducted surveillance on this meeting.

After the meeting in Malaysia, Al Mihdhar and al Hazmi arrived in the United States in January 2000. The CIA knew about the two men coming to America, but chose not to tell the FBI about their presence inside the United States on a number of occasions for the 18 months preceding 9/11. Why? Most likely, because the CIA did not want the FBI stepping on their toes while they were conducting an ongoing surveillance operation on these known al Qaeda operatives. At any rate, the record shows that for 18 months prior to 9/11, the CIA conducted surveillance on these two targets while they were in the United States and failed to tell the FBI about it. The question remains whether DIA and CIA were collaborating on their surveillance operations of these al Qaeda operatives or acting independently.

Why does it matter that the FBI was not given the information?
The four men allegedly under surveillance by Project Able Danger, were four key players in the 9/11 plot. They spent from the spring of 2000 through the summer of 2001 coming into regular contact with the other 9/11 hijackers—namely and most importantly, Hani Hanjour and Ziad Jarrah. Additionally, all four of the identified hijackers had contacts at the same flight school that Zaccarias Moussaoui was arrested at by the FBI in August 2001. The hijackers received numerous wire transfers from known al Qaeda operatives—such as Ramzi Binalshibh. They had ongoing contacts with other known al Qaeda operatives including Osama Bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. They trained in U.S. flight schools. They participated in numerous cross-country practice flights during the summer of 2001. They bought flight control manuals and global positioning equipment, knives and pepper spray. They traveled in and out of this country (sometimes to meet with other al Qaeda operatives) on a number of occasions from the spring of 2000 until the summer of 2001. Had the FBI been told about their presence in the United States, most certainly, the 9/11 attacks would have been prevented. How can I say this with such conviction?

Mohammed Atta was the pilot for Flight 11, the plane that hit WTC 1. Marwan al Shehhi was the pilot of Flight 175, the plane that hit WTC 2. Hani Hanjour was the pilot of Flight 77, the plane that hit the Pentagon. And, Ziad Jarrah was the pilot of Flight 93, the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. Let’s look at the details.

Flight 77—al Mihdhar, al Hazmi, and Hanjour
It should be noted that Hani Hanjour, the pilot of Flight 77, lived with al Hazmi for the 9 months preceding the 9/11 attacks. Recall, that al Hazmi was targeted and identified by CIA and allegedly also DIA by the summer of 2000. Thus, when Hazmi and Hanjour met in December of 2000, surveillance would have been active on Hazmi for approximately 4 months. Both Hazmi and Hanjour attended flight school together in the Phoenix area of Arizona (the same Phoenix that was the subject of the "Phoenix Memo" penned by FBI agent Kenneth Williams in the summer of 2001. Williams’ memo discussed strange patterns of middle-eastern men taking flying lessons in U.S. flight schools but the memo was ignored by FBI Headquarters). In the spring of 2001, both Hazmi and Hanjour moved to the East Coast settling in Virginia and then New Jersey. While on the East Coast, Hazmi and Hanjour came into regular contact with the remaining hijackers—the muscle hijackers--that would help them commandeer Flight 77. From December 2000 until the 9/11 attacks, Al Hazmi and Hanjour were inseparable. Thus, had al Hazmi been under surveillance and identified, it goes without saying that Hanjour would have been likewise identified as an al Qaeda operative.

Once identified, the FBI would have learned that Hanjour did not attend school after entering this country on a student visa in December 2000, thereby violating his immigration status and making him deportable under 8 USC 1227 (a)(1)(B). Necessarily, if deported, Hanjour would have been unable to pilot Flight 77 into the Pentagon. As an aside, al Hazmi would have also been deported since he overstayed the terms of his admission, a violation of immigration laws rendering him deportable under 8 USC 1227 (a)(1)(B).

Flight 93—Ziad Jarrah
Ziad Jarrah, the pilot of Flight 93, was a roommate with Mohammed Atta and Marwan al Shehhi while they lived in Hamburg, Germany. Once in the United States, Jarrah attended flight school in Venice, Florida from the summer of 2000 until the summer of 2001. Likewise, during the summer of 2000, Atta and al Shehhi arrived in Florida to take their flight lessons in Venice, Florida. All three had ongoing and continued contacts with one another for the year preceding the 9/11 attacks, and during the summer of 2001 they came into regular contact with the other muscle hijackers that would help them commandeer each of the flights they piloted on the day of 9/11.

It seems likely that if our CIA and DIA had identified both Atta and al Shehhi, they would have likewise identified Jarrah as an al Qaeda operative. Notably, Jarrah left and returned to the United States six times between the summer of 2000 and the 9/11 attacks. Jarrah also made hundreds of phone calls to his girlfriend who remained overseas in Germany during this time period and he also communicated frequently by email. Thus, there were ample opportunities to gather the kinds of information that both DIA and CIA could capitalize upon while Jarrah was living inside the United States.

Jarrah attended flight school in June 2000 without properly adjusting his immigration status, thereby violating his immigration status and rendering him inadmissible under 8 USC 1182 (a)(7)(B) each of the subsequent six times he re-entered the United States between June 2000 and August 5, 2001. Thus, Jarrah could have been either denied entry or deported had our FBI been aware of his identification as an al Qaeda operative. Whether arrested and deported or barred entry into the country, Jarrah clearly would have been unable to pilot Flight 93 on the morning of 9/11.

End Part I