You guys know who Sibel Edmonds is – right? Sibel Edmonds speaks Farsi, Turkish and Azerbaijani. She was hired after September eleventh by the FBI to translate pre-9-11 intelligence gathered by the agency. She has publicly accused the U.S of having considerable evidence that Al Qaeda was planning to strike the United States using airplanes as weapons.
“Over four years ago, more than four months prior to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, in April 2001, a long-term FBI informant/asset who had been providing the bureau with information since 1990 provided two FBI agents and a translator with specific information regarding a terrorist attack being planned by Osama bin Laden. This asset/informant was previously a high-level intelligence officer in Iran in charge of intelligence from Afghanistan. Through his contacts in Afghanistan he received information that: (1) Osama bin Laden was planning a major terrorist attack in the United States targeting four or five major cities; (2) the attack was going to involve airplanes; (3) some of the individuals in charge of carrying out this attack were already in place in the United States; and (4) the attack was going to be carried out soon, in a few months. The agents who received this information reported it to their superior, Special Agent in Charge of Counterterrorism Thomas Frields, at the FBI Washington field office, by filing “302” forms, and the translator, Mr. Behrooz Sarshar, translated and documented this information. No action was taken by Frields, and after 9/11 the agents and the translators were told to keep quiet regarding this issue. The translator who was present during the session with the FBI informant, Mr. Behrooz Sarshar, reported this incident to Director Mueller in writing, and later to the Department of Justice inspector general. The press reported this incident, and in fact the report in the Chicago Tribune on July 21, 2004, stated that FBI officials had confirmed that this information was received in April 2001, and further, the Chicago Tribune quoted an aide to Director Mueller saying that Mueller was surprised the 9/11 Commission never raised this particular issue with him during the hearing. Mr. Sarshar reported this issue to the 9/11 Commission on Feb. 12, 2004, and provided them with specific dates, locations, witness names, and the contact information for that particular Iranian asset and the two special agents who received the information. I provided the 9/11 Commission with a detailed and specific account of this issue, the names of other witnesses, and documents I had seen. Mr. Sarshar also provided the Department of Justice inspector general with specific information regarding this case.” - Sibel Edmonds Where Is Accountability?
Former FBI translator turned whistleblower, Sibel Edmonds is now appealing her case to the U.S. Supreme Court. In March 2002, she was fired and she has been fighting now for nearly 3 years to blow the whistle on US government failures prior to 9-11. She has faced fierce opposition from the Bush administration, the FBI and some in Congress. This week, she grabbed headlines again after Vanity Fair published a major story about her. What is making news from that piece are allegations surrounding Illinois congressman and Republican Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.
Vanity Fair alleges that Hastert may have been the recipient of tens of thousands of dollars of secret payments from Turkish officials in exchange for political favors and information. In the article, titled “An Inconvenient Patriot,” Edmonds says that she gave confidential testimony about the payments to congressional staffers, the Inspector General and members of the 9/11 Commission. Edmonds says that she heard of the payments while listening to FBI wiretaps of Turkish officials who were under surveillance by the FBI.
Love of country led Sibel Edmonds to become a translator for the F.B.I. following 9/11. But everything changed when she accused a colleague of covering up illicit activity involving Turkish nationals. Fired after sounding the alarm, she’s now fighting for the ideals that made her an American, and threatening some very powerful people.
"On top of the usual prohibition against disclosing classified information, the Bush administration has smothered her case beneath the all-encompassing blanket of the “state-secrets privilege”—a Draconian and rarely used legal weapon that allows the government, merely by asserting a risk to national security, to prevent the lawsuits Edmonds has filed contesting her treatment from being heard in court at all. According to the Department of Justice, to allow Edmonds her day in court, even at a closed hearing attended only by personnel with full security clearance, “could reasonably be expected to cause serious damage to the foreign policy and national security of the United States.”
Doesn’t surprise me. The govt. failed over and over again, during Clinton and early Bush to heed the signs, and this story was made public quite a while ago, though maybe not as specific as the citation. This was the claim of Clark and that other guy who wrote the Anonymous books (I keep forgetting his name, once it was revealed).
I thought this would be a thread about the whistleblower who accused wrongdoing in the the contracts over in Iraq, particularly damning of Halliburton. Disgusting. Heard all about on Savage the other day, fwiw.
this hasn’t got a lot to do with the OP, but I wonder about this whenever something similar is spoken about…
IF the US government had tried to do “something” prior to 9/11 to stop it, would the general public have gone along with it? Think about after 9/11, and all the complaining that has gone on about the added security at airports and other public places. Or the new rules in place about mailing or shipping things. Or even the suggestions over dealing with illegal aliens, etc.
I’m in no way saying that if the government had indisputible evidence prior to 9/11 they shouldn’t have moved. But I’m just wondering how much the public would have put up with WITHOUT an attack already occuring. Sort of the hind sight being 20/20 type of thing?
While I can see your point, Missy, I’m fairly certain investigators can make a great deal of progress without violating anybody’s civil liberties, (or making new laws to restrict civil liberties), provided they actually tear themselves away from the sunglasses / black suit store long enough to do some investigating.
Don’t you think that doing nothing is pretty inexcusable? I mean, NOTHING. That’s kind of a slap in the face, isn’t it? There’s not much ethical difference between doing something and failing and doing something and succeeding, but the difference between failing at doing something and succeeding at doing nothing is night and day.
Again - I’m not making judgement calls (or commenting on what I would have liked to have seen done), I’m just thinking about how the “general population” of the US seems to operate in these circumstances. As long as it doesn’t “inconvenience” them, then it’s ok. But if it DOES, then we hear holy heck about it. Look at gas prices - you keep hearing the screams over the price, but SUVs are still top sellers.
We have an awful lot of laws in this country already that are in place “just in case” something happens, or to try and prevent something from happening (gun ownership laws, liquor and drunk driving laws, being two big ones) and people constantly go on and on about how their rights are being violated. I’m just curious what would have happened if something had been in place with no attack occuring.
The evidence reveals that the US allowed 9-11 to happen. If the government had heeded all the warnings and evidence prior to the attack – it never would have happened. This isn’t anything new, the US also had advance warning about Pearl Harbor, and the Gulf of Tonkin was a complete fabrication. The government knows what it takes to get Americans to commit to war.
The Bush Administration had plans to go to war with Afghanistan and Iraq from day one – 9-11 made it possible. Even the Bush Administration’s PNAC/RAD documents written in the 90s say that nothing short of a “Pearl Harbor type event” will compel Americans to back what is outlined there.
The plot to fly US passenger airlines into public targets was revealed in 1995 when authorities uncovered the Bojinka Project. That plan by Al Qaeda described hijacking passenger airlines and flying them into the WTC Towers, Pentagon, White House, Congress, CIA headquarters, Sears Tower, Transamerica building, etc. The knowledge of the plan was undeniable, and their response was non-existent. The Bush Administration clearly looked the other way knowing it would function as a catalyst for their plans. This is one of the most monumental cover-ups of our time. Sibel Edmonds role is just one piece of the puzzle.
Remind me again, who was president in 1995 when the non-existent response didn’t take place?
I see similar neglect in both Admins while you infer that it was more than neglect by Bush. You didn’t say how Clinton Admin dealt with it.
Your statement “The Bush Admin clearly looked the other way knowing it would function as a catalyst for their plans” is not clear at all.
But for the sake of argument (which we do well here), I’ll go ya one better: the Bush Admin refuses to strengthen up the Southern border even though people from know terrorist countries have been intercepted there. Bush wants one of them to slip a suitcase nuke in and take out, oh, Phoenix, so he can make money for his friends by invading somewhere… Because losing a major city to nuclear terror isn’t bad really, the White House has bunkers!
9-11 happened during the Bush Administration. US Intelligence was fully aware of the Bojinka Project, and claims (according to Bush Administration testimony) that the concept of airplanes flying into public buildings took them completely by surprise is a fallacy. There were many warnings from every angle that were deliberately ignored. When a passenger plane had lost communication and severely altered course the failure to intercept it is obvious if you consider the fact that years earlier a golfer’s private jet was surrounded by F-15s within minutes simply for losing contact after the crew was asphyxiated… and that plane didn’t even leave it’s course. The point is that the Bush Administration left all the doors unlocked for this event and had complicity to insure it succeeded.
Gilder, the way the story is being played today involves lawyers preventing the info from being shared with the FBI, according to a Senator today. Bush took office in January of 2001. He spent the next four or five months continuing to staff his Cabinet etc etc. He retained some of the same people, the “permanent” govt. types versus his political appointees.
I think that the system is broken here but I still can’t go the distance to agree about them “clearly” looking the other way. The inference I heard was that Atta was in the country legally and it would “look bad” to harass him as well as violate some posse comitatus turf dispute of military involvement over domestic security, especially after the Waco debacle and the Oklahoma CIty early-ID issue.
Expect to hear more about Jamie Gorelick and Sandy Berger before this is over. It’s hard for me not to feel that Berger was trying to corral documents pertinent to being informed about the terrorists in his “visit” to the archives.
But I will agree, if that’s the right word, with this: any government that claims to be waging a war on terror while it leaves a porous border open, ignores the invaluable contribution of private citizens (remember the flight school guy who called the FBI?), doesn’t call upon John Q. Public to CONCRETELY volunteer to identify terrorists and continues to do this PC bs of frisking granny at the airport is not waging a war against it at all, domestically.
The right claims that this failure proves that being overly-PC has prevented us from “getting real” about who the terrorist are, even when informed of their intentions. If our govt. is really hamstrung by the ACLU and rabid PC Leftist politicians from frisking Mohammed because of how it looks, then there is no difference in the two parties, which surely disappoints many who voted for Bush.
You mean the way it’s being played in the mainstream media.
After the US government confirmed that Lt General Mahmoud Ahman, the head of Pakistan Intelligence (ISI) had directed $100,000 be wired to WTC hijacker Mohammed Atta, he was pressured by the US to step down in order to avert an investigation. Mahmound Ahman was actually in Washington visiting the White House on 9-11, the connections were dubious.
Almost all the terrorist pilots received their training at 2 flight schools owned by Arne Kruithof and Rudy Dekkers. Dekkers, who had been recently indicted in his native country, Holland, on financial charges that may include fraud and money laundering, purchased his school just as the Saudi pilots showed up for training. When the local authorities became suspicious they alerted the FBI who responded by telling them to back off.
Not exactly. The neo-cons prevented us from “getting real” by intentionally ignoring the fact that the Bojinka Project was underway.
This is very important. While I’m not commenting (because I honestly don’t have enough information to comment) on what should or shouldn’t have been done prior to 9/11 - why wasn’t there the same outcry after Waco? The FBI and the ATF messed that one up royally by playing “it’s MY job, not yours”, yet nothing really was done about it.