Toronto: Debunking "Incompetence" as Bogus

The So-Called "Intelligence Failure" of 9/11

Facts on Public Record Clearly Show FBI Had Three 9/11 Hijackers Under Surveillance

By John A. McCurdy (Hamilton Public Inquiry Into Sept. 11)

Globalresearch.ca -19 September 2003

Update: German Version of GNN Aftermath released

A transcript of McCurdy's panel presentation in Toronto at the Bloor Cinema screening of Guerrilla News Network documentary, "Aftermath: Unanswered Questions From 9/11."

I would like to focus on what 9/11 Skeptics call the official narrative, or story, of what happened on September 11, 2001. In May 2002, a series of government and media disclosures revealed that U.S. intelligence and military communities had had a great deal of foreknowledge of the method of attack, the targets, and at least some of the 9/11 hijackers. Nevertheless, it was argued, there had been no decisive "smoking gun" evidence pinpointing exact specifics about the attacks, which might otherwise have rendered them preventable.

The range of dissenting official voices that spoke out against the handling of Sept. 11 by the Bush administration, however, was noticeable. Internet journalist and editor Russ Kick collected a number of these statements together at his website, The Memory Hole, in July.

On June 1, 2002, Assistant Attorney General Michael Chertoff told the press: "As of September 10th, each of us knew everything we needed to know to tell us there was a possibility of what happened on September 11." Two days later, Senator Richard Shelby said of 9/11: "They don't have any excuse because the information was in their lap, and they didn't do anything to prevent it." Three days after Shelby, on June 6th, Senator Arlen Specter put the matter even more decisively: "I don't believe any longer that it's a matter of connecting dots. I think they had a veritable blueprint, and we want to know why they didn't act on it." [1]

The comments of these two Senators, moreover, cannot be dismissed as politically partisan. Shelby, at the time, had been the ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, and member of the joint intelligence committee investigating 9/11. Specter had also been a Republican member of the joint intelligence committee investigating 9/11.

Building on the so-called "failure to connect the dots" official narrative, and the disturbing comments of Chertoff, Shelby, and Specter, let's turn to a small sampling of information available in the public domain pertinent to "connecting the dots" of the 9/11 attacks. My three examples were published by the corporate media - one by ABCNews.com, the other two by Newsweek. In doing so, I want to challenge and disagree with two truisms of the ""intelligence failures": first, that the public has no right to think about - let alone question - the intensely suspicious decisions made by the CIA, supposedly with respect to "information hoarding" (the so-called intelligence "turf wars"); and second, the claim that the FBI had not collected full intelligence on 9/11 hijackers Nawaf Alhazmi, Khalid Almihdhar, and Hani Hanjour.

On May 23, 2002, ABCNews.com pubished John McWethy's article, "FBI Was Warned of Sept. 11 Hijacker," the story of Phoenix, Arizona FBI informant Aukai Collins, and author of My Jihad. Collins established a strong relationship with Hani Hanjour while Hanjour was taking flying lessons. He claims he told the FBI all about Hanjour. "The FBI knew Hanjour lived in Phoenix ... knew his exact address, his phone number ... even what car he drove." Though the FBI denied Collins' claim, ABCNews.com sides with Collins. "The FBI either failed to monitor Hanjour's communications, or Hanjour practiced extraordinary skills in hiding his intention - because the FBI never regarded him as a threat."

Now, take the ABCNews.com article, and compare it with two others from Newsweek: "The Hijackers We Let Escape," by Michael Isikoff and Daniel Klaidman, published June 10, 2002; and Michael Isikoff's "Exclusive: The Informant Who Lived With the Hijackers," from September 16, 2002. [2]

Together, these article reported that the CIA monitored a key al-Qaeda planning meeting in Malaysia in January 2000 at which 9/11 hijackers Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid Almihdhar had been present. The two were then tracked by the CIA to California. The official story states that, for unknowable reasons, the CIA decided not to inform the FBI, or the INS - the Immigration Naturalization Service. But if that is so, how is it that Alhazmi and Almihdhar were personally approached, while taking flying lessons in San Diego, by another FBI informant, who not only helped one open a bank account, but also became their landlord? This informant claimed he had no reason to be suspicious of the two Saudi men, and that consequently his FBI case officer allegedly chose not to further investigate Alhazmi or Almihdhar...

Please read the full article at Global Research

John A. McCurdy is the author and editor of the Hamilton Public Inquiry Into Sept. 11, published online in August 2002. He has been actively working to establish a well organized and interconnected community of Canadian 9/11 Skeptics. Contact John McCurdy at: atilan2001b@yahoo.com

Infos and Order at hbuecker.net

HINTERGRÜNDE - 11.SEPTEMBER

der Dokumentarfilm auf DVD :

AFTERMATH

Originalversion mit dtsch. Untertiteln 35 min.

uraufgeführt OMU bei Veranstaltung in Berlin Tempodrom 7.9.2003

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