Sibel Edmonds and the CIA/911 IG report

I haven't spoken to former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds about yesterday's release of the CIA/911 Inspector General's report. I can imagine some of the things that she'd say, though.

On the 'plus' side, she'd probably think that there was some benefit in the fact that there was some individual 'accountability' - after all, George Tenet, his deputy John McLaughlin, and Cofer Black were at least named.

She'd probably scoff at the notion that "information wasn't shared."

And she'd probably scoff at the notion that this was an 'executive summary.'

But most of all...

It's difficult to know where to start with 'But most of all...'

A leading contender is that, whatever the actual specifics of pre-911 intelligence, we have objective, factual, specific evidence that there was a post-911 cover-up (and yes, I'm going to be guilty here of conflating FBI vs CIA intelligence for the purposes of this post)

To take one example, in April 2001, a highly credible asset told the FBI 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;
4) the attack was going to be carried out soon, in a few months.

That information did not appear in the 911 Commission report. At all. Despite testimony from Sibel, and others. This case is documented. For one reason or other, thank goodness, one element of the case - 'four or five major cities' didnt fully eventuate. Still, it was the one piece of intelligence that was most accurate, even if only in retrospect. I've joked before that if a psychic had made the same claims then it would probably have been included in the report as a 'missed opportunity.'

Another candiate for 'But most of all...' might be the fact that the FBI, at the behest of the State Department and the Pentagon, refused to investigate certain issues that involved their friends 'certain diplomatic and business relationships.'

As Sibel says:

Even after 911, we had a lot of intelligence coming regarding some of the terrorist activities, or support network of these terrorist activities, that did not come through the counterterrorism (CT) investigations but through counter intelligence (CI). And I was told, by the agents that I was working for, that the State Dept would come and ask them not to pursue, or transfer, this CI information, relevant to our fight against terrorists, to CT because it would affect certain diplomatic relations. As you said, we had 3000 people lose their lives, here they are putting under various color-coded threat system, and they're compromising our civil liberties with the PATRIOT Act, YET there are certain sensitive diplomatic relations that are worth protecting, that are worth more than our national security and what occured here!

In other words, we can't investigate the actual people behind the people behind 911 because we are making too much money off those relationships. We have to strip you of your civil liberties to protect you from terrorism, but we'll ignore 80% of the causes of terrorism because our wallets, and campaign contributions, depend on it.

Another candiate for 'But most of all...' is the issue of state involvement - by our 'quasi-allies' - in 911. Sibel gave a partial illustration in her fabulous "THE HIGHJACKING OF A NATION" series (more importantly, see Part 2)

I have another important '911' post up my sleeve - but I'll wait a week or two till we approach the anniversary.

In the meantime, here's another of my cheesy videos



Let Sibel Edmonds Speak
Call Embarrass Waxman. Demand public open hearings:
DC phone: (202) 225-3976
LA phone: 323 651-1040
Capitol switchboard phone: 800-828-0498

x-posted at Let Sibel Edmonds Speak

(let me know if you want to be added to my email list for new Sibel-related post. Subject: 'Sibel email list.')