While it was unclear whether any of
the reports were in fact signs of the impending attacks on the World Trade
Center and Pentagon ( news
- web
sites), investigators said the agencies never looked closely at the
potential threat of hijacked airliners flying into buildings. Those
assertions came in a 30-page statement by Eleanor Hill, staff director for
the House and Senate intelligence inquiry into the Sept. 11 attacks.
Hill's statement was being presented to committee members Wednesday at
the inquiry's first public hearings. Lawmakers have been meeting behind
closed doors since June, looking into intelligence failures leading up to
the attacks and how they can be corrected.
"These public hearings are part of our search for the truth — not to
point fingers or pin blame, but with the goal of identifying and
correcting whatever systemic problems might have prevented our government
from detecting and disrupting al Qaida's plot," said Sen. Bob Graham ( news,
bio,
voting
record), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Hill outlined 12 examples of intelligence information on the possible
terrorist use of airplanes as weapons, dating back to 1994. The last
example occurred a month before the attacks, when intelligence agencies
were told of a possible bin Laden plot to bomb the U.S. embassy in
Nairobi, Kenya, or crash a plane into it. But it contained no specifics
pointing to the impending Sept. 11 attacks.
In August 1998, U.S. intelligence learned that a "group of unidentified
Arabs planned to fly an explosive-laden plane from a foreign country into
the World Trade Center," says the report. The report was given to the
Federal Aviation Administration ( news
- web
sites) and FBI ( news
- web
sites), which took little action on it. The group may now be linked to
bin Laden, the report says.
Other intelligence suggested that bin Laden supporters might crash a
plane into a U.S. airport, or conduct a plot involving aircraft at New
York and Washington, the report said.
While generally aware of the possibility of this method of attack, "the
Intelligence Community did not produce any specific assessments of the
likelihood that terrorists would use airplanes as weapons," the report
said.
With revelations in the spring that President Bush ( news
- web
sites) had learned a month before the attacks that that bin Laden
wanted to hijack airplanes, the White House defended the lack of
disclosure of the information by saying the president's briefing detailed
plans for traditional hijackings, not the use of airplanes as weapons.
National security adviser Condoleezza Rice ( news
- web
sites) said at the time that the threat was vague and uncorroborated.
"I don't think anybody could have predicted ... that they would try to
use an airplane as missile," Rice said. "Had this president known of
something more specific or known that a plane was going to be used as a
missile, he would have acted on it."
Congressional investigators also said that an intelligence briefing two
months before the Sept. 11 attack warned that Osama bin Laden ( news
- web
sites) would launch a spectacular terrorist attack against U.S. or
Israeli interests.
Between May and July 2001, the National Security Agency reported at
least 33 communications indicating a possible, imminent terrorist attack.
The July 2001 briefing for senior government officials said that based
on a review of intelligence information over five months "we believe that
(bin Laden) will launch a significant terrorist attack against U.S. and/or
Israeli interests in the coming weeks."
But Hill said the credibility of the sources was sometimes questionable
and no specific details about the attacks were available.
"They generally did not contain specific information as to where, when
and how a terrorist attack might occur and generally are not corroborated
by further information," her statement said.
At Wednesday's hearing, leaders of two groups of victims' relatives,
Stephen Push and Kristin Breitweiser, were the first witnesses. Both lost
spouses in the attacks.
Breitweiser, whose husband Ron died at the World Trade Center, told
lawmakers that if the public had been aware of possible terrorist attacks,
airport security could have been bolstered and passengers may have thought
twice before boarding airplanes.
"How many victims may have taken notice of these Middle Eastern men
that were boarding their plane?" said Breitweiser, of Middletown, N.J. She
is co-founder of September 11th Advocates.
As Breitweiser spoke, a group of family members and advocates sitting
behind her began to weep. Mary Fetchet, of Voices of September 11,
clutched a picture of her son and wiped away tears that were streaming
down her face.
The hearings are believed to mark the first time that standing
committees from both houses of Congress have sat together for an
investigation.
The Bush administration has looked to the intelligence inquiry to
produce the definitive report on problems leading up to the attack.
Committee members say they have become frustrated by delays, blamed on
both the difficulties of declassifying information for public hearings and
what they see as lack of cooperation by the administration.
Hill's report notes CIA ( news
- web
sites) Director George J. Tenet has declined to declassify information
on two key issues being looked at by the inquiry: References to
intelligence agencies supplying information to the White House, and
details of an al-Qaida leader involved in the Sept. 11 attacks.
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