FBI Chief Says Agents Missed Terror Red Flags

New York Daily News ^ | 5/09/02 | RICHARD SISK

[kattracks]

WASHINGTON

FBI Director Robert Mueller said yesterday the bureau should have done more to check on an agent's warning that Arab men were enrolling in flight schools two months before the Sept. 11 attacks.

"I think the recommendations of the agent are something we should've more aggressively pursued," Mueller told a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

Mueller said action on the warning would not have prevented the Sept. 11 attacks, since the men fingered by the agent would be found to have no connection to terrorism or the hijackers.

Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) questioned the FBI's diligence in investigating the July memo from an agent in Phoenix. The memo warned of an alarming pattern of Middle Eastern men taking flight lessons and recommended investigating flight-school enrollments.

Edwards said "it appears that red flags were raised. The FBI has a lot of explaining to do."

Mueller said he did not believe the memo reached the office of then-Director Louis Freeh or was shared with the CIA and State Department.

In a related development, Mueller said the number of agents assigned to the Sept. 11 and anthrax-letter investigations has dropped to 4,000 from 6,000.

Mueller said the investigations "are not in any way stalled. Every day we receive new leads."

Meanwhile, CBS News' "60 Minutes II" reported last night that the attacks might have been prevented if not for an apparent communications breakdown between the FBI and French Intelligence.

The program said the FBI believes the French failed to pass along critical information about alleged 20th hijacker Zacarias Moussaoui shortly before the attack.

The information supposedly linked him to terror mastermind Osama Bin Laden and would have allowed them to learn elements of the plot before it occurred.

The French denied the accusation.

[The Great Satan]

FBI Director Robert Mueller said yesterday the bureau should have done more to check on an agent's warning that Arab men were enrolling in flight schools two months before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Nah. That would've been racist.

[gunnedah]

Your government at work. The left hand and the right hand fail to communicate.Government has never heard the word accountability!Like I say as soon as we make everyone a government employee our troubles will be over.

[ventana]

Then: Everyone will belong to Everyone. V's wife.

[Leisler]

Hey, come on now. They found the starving Weaver family didn't they? They were busy. Besides, you didn't expect them to connect the dots from two embassy bombings, a ship bombing, the garage bombing of the world trade center did you? Remember, their pay checks come in no matter what.

[Free Fire Zone]

FBI Director Robert Mueller said yesterday the bureau should have done more to check on an agent's warning that Arab men were enrolling in flight schools two months before the Sept. 11 attacks.

The FBI has proven its incompetence once again.

Free Fire Zone

[M. Thatcher]

FBI Chief Says Agents Missed Terror Red Flags

Ya think?

[1Old Pro]

FBI Chief Says Agents Missed Terror Red Flags

HUH ?? The agent didn't miss the red flag, he issued a report. The title should be: "Senior FBI personel ignored warnings from field agents."

[1Old Pro]

FBI headquarters ignored its own agent's red-flag warning a month before 9/11

That's the first line in the NY Post, a MUCH more accurate account than the Daily Snooze..

[Mixer]

What do they report this once a week now. Not your fault for posting but the news won't let up about this. Sure there were/are Arab men training in our schools as they have been for decades.

[cynicom]

The top Russian spy of all time sat right in the inner sanctum of the FBI for twenty years and the idiots saw nothing, heard nothing and smelled nothing. How does one expect them to see something wrong with an Arab taking flying lessons????

Bush, Ashcroft and Mueller inherited the mess and have not removed one entrenched deadwood burrowcrat at the top. Those people get in there and get a deathgrip on their jobs, just like politicians.

[sandydipper]

FBI's motto - "Deny and make counter accusations". eg - If they catch you with a steeple sticking out of your pocket - deny that you have ever even been to a church and claim that someone must have slipped the steeple into your pocket while you were not looking.

[swarthyguy]

"said the FBI believes the French failed to pass along critical information about alleged 20th hijacker Zacarias Moussaoui shortly before the attack." - how lame is this? Blame the French?

[hattend]

"Mistakes were made."

Sounds like the Clintonites still infest the FBI.

[Musket]

And how is it that Arabs can come over here and walk right into a motel ownership? Or a convienience store ownership? Smells like state sponsership to me and should be a red flag too.

[oust the louse]

The FBI has proven its incompetence once again.

The fact that Mueller was appointed to that position has enraged agents and upper level agents in the FBI.There were many good life long dedicated Sr level people who were fully qualified to lead the FBI out of the depths of the hell Clinton/Freeh led it into.Many good agents out there who truely care about our country and justice,just a bunch of A$$wipes in charge who haven't a clue.

[ninenot]

connect the dots from two embassy bombings, a ship bombing, the garage bombing of the world trade center did you?

Not to mention the Murrah (OKC) bombing, where an Arabic individual accompanied the now-dead primary suspect IN THE TRUCK right to the FRONT OF THE BUILDING.

Of course, the Arabic suspect is now bye-bye, vamoose, outtahere.