AP: Clinton Adviser Probed in Terror Memos [Sandy Berger is the focus of a criminal investigation]

WASHINGTON - President Clinton (news - web sites)'s national security adviser, Sandy Berger, is the focus of a criminal investigation after admitting he removed highly classified terrorism documents from a secure reading room during preparations for the Sept. 11 commission hearings, The Associated Press has learned.

Berger's home and office were searched earlier this year by FBI (news - web sites) agents armed with warrants. Some drafts of a sensitive after-action report on the Clinton administration's handling of al-Qaida terror threats during the December 1999 millennium celebration are still missing.

Berger and his lawyer said Monday night he knowingly removed handwritten notes he had taken from classified anti-terror documents he reviewed at the National Archives by sticking them in his jacket and pants. He also inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio, they said.

"I deeply regret the sloppiness involved, but I had no intention of withholding documents from the commission, and to the contrary, to my knowledge, every document requested by the commission from the Clinton administration was produced," Berger said in a statement to the AP.

Berger served as Clinton's national security adviser for all of the president's second term and most recently has been informally advising Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites). Clinton asked Berger last year to review and select the administration documents that would be turned over to the commission.

The FBI searched Berger's home and office with warrants earlier this year after employees of the National Archives told agents they believed they witnessed Berger put documents into his clothing while reviewing sensitive Clinton administration papers, officials said.

When asked, Berger said he returned some of the classified documents, which he found in his office, and all of the handwritten notes he had taken from the secure room, but said he could not locate two or three copies of the highly classified millennium terror report.

DECEMBER 1999 : CLINTON'S BROTHER HOLDS TALKS WITH NORTH KOREA- ON THEIR INVITATION) "….The singer brother of US President Bill Clinton held talks with North Korean officials on the eve of his rare concert Sunday with pop singers from the two Koreas, Pyongyang's media said. The meeting between Roger Clinton and North Korean officials led by Kim Yong-Sun, chairman of the Korea Asia-Pacific Peace Committee, took place Saturday, according to North Korean state radio monitored in Seoul. Details of the talks were not given. The president's brother had been invited by the committee, one of North Korea's key international trade bodies……" - DRUDGE 12/5/99

DECEMBER 1999 : (DEAL SIGNED WITH N KOREA TO BUILD TWO NUCLEAR REACTORS) "....A U.S.-led consortium signed a $4.6 billion deal Wednesday to build two nuclear reactors in North Korea, a reward for the communist nation's promise to freeze and eventually dismantle its suspected nuclear weapons program. The contract was the final phase of preparations to build the U.S.-designed reactors in Kumho, a rural village in North Korea's northeast. "Today's event reflects the improving political climate surrounding the Korean Peninsula," said Desaix Anderson, the consortium's executive director, after signing the contract in Seoul with Choi Byung-soo, the president of the South's state utility company, Korea Electric Power Corp. ....." - Associated Press 12/15/99 Sang-Hun Choe

DECEMBER 1999 : (MALAYSIA : AL QAEDA : AL MIDHAR) Malaysian police surveillance of Al Qaida in Malaysia in December 1999. Khalid al Midhar, one of the 19 suicidists was videotaped meeting with al Qaida supporters in Kuala Lumpur at a Islamic conference. This was 18 months prior to his joining the hijackers in the US. This road, if it was uninterrupted, leads to al Qaida http://www.edwardjayepstein.com/question_nato.htm

DECEMBER 1999 : (MILLENIUM PLOT, ORGANIZERS OF PLOT TO BOMB RADISSON HOTEL N JORDAN ARE ZUBAYDAH & ZARQAWI) Officials believe Abu Musab Zarqawi and Abu Zubaydah, Osama bin Laden's operations chief, were chief organizers of a foiled plot to bomb the Radisson SAS Hotel, in Amman, Jordan, which is popular with American and Israeli tourists. The attack was to take place during millennium celebrations, but Jordanian authorities stopped it in late 1999. - "U.S.: Top al-Qaeda operative recently in Baghdad," AP, October 2, 2002

1999 : (ZARQAWI TERRORIST CELL ROUNDED UP IN MILLENIUM PLOT, ZARQAWI ESCAPED TO AFGHANISTAN & CONTINUED WORKING WITH WMD, LATER WAS IN CHARGE OF TERRORIST TRAINING CAMP NEAR HERAT) In 1999, one group he had set up to carry out attacks against Westerners and Israelis during the Millennium was rounded up by security authorities. Zarqawi escaped and returned to Afghanistan, where he continued his work on chemical and biological weapons. Jordan’s state security court sentenced him in absentia to 15 years’ imprisonment with hard labor. He turned up later in western Afghanistan where he was in charge of a guerrilla training camp near Herat. - "The biowar threat: Jordanian ‘mastermind’ sought," by Ed Blanche, The Daily Star , April 29 2003

(* Now here's an excerpt from an article which makes me wonder if Berger's stolen docs are linked to this in some way- the article looked out of place at the time, like a weird CYA effort for a past administration. Perhaps it was effort to elevate people's roles and revise history to benefit a future campaign including these people.) :

DECEMBER 8, 1999 : (MILLENIUM PLOT? : CLINTON MEETING) WASHINGTON, "The grooms are ready for the big wedding." In another context — sisters getting married in a double service — this would be an occasion for joy. In fact, though, this was chilling news, a coded communiqué intercepted in an overseas telephone call. It was news that had the most powerful people of the most powerful nation gathered, grim-faced, in the windowless Situation Room in the basement of the White House. Among those seated around the massive wooden table Dec. 8, 1999, were Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Attorney General Janet Reno, National Security Advisor Samuel Berger, FBI Director Louis Freeh, CIA Director George Tenet, Richard Clarke of the National Security Council and Michael Sheehan, chief of counterterrorism for the State Department. Tenet had the floor: For months, the Central Intelligence Agency had been picking up sketchy reports about possible terrorist acts planned for the dawn of the millennium. Now, friendly foreign intelligence agencies were pursuing tips of terrifying inevitability. There may be as many as 15 attacks against Americans in the works, Tenet explained. The CIA didn't know where, though U.S. facilities abroad were likely targets. They didn't know exactly when, though analysts suspected it would be during New Year's Eve celebrations. What they did know was who: al-Qaida, the Islamic extremist group headed by Saudi millionaire Osama bin Laden. But bin Laden and his network had been elusive prey. And the latest intelligence reports confirmed that the terrorists were doing more than hiding. They were plotting. Jordanian security agents had intercepted a telephone call between an al-Qaida leader and a suspected Jordanian terrorist. In the call, Abu Zubaydah, the No. 3 man in al-Qaida, said cryptically, "The grooms are ready for the big wedding" — a signal that plans were in motion. So the White House drafted plans of its own. Clarke, Clinton's point man on terrorism, outlined them for the others: First, the administration would persuade friendly governments to sweep up suspected terrorists and arrest, search, deport or simply harass them — anything to disrupt the New Year's Eve attacks. Meanwhile, the State Department's Sheehan would contact the Taliban, the radical Islamic ruling party in Afghanistan, and demand that it turn over bin Laden for prosecution in the embassy bombings. - (Where's Clinton?) December 12, 1999 : http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/news/nation-world/terroristwithin/chapter1.html

(* My note: This seems to be an effort to play up Clarke in the press as being more important than he actually was- don't forget the Millenium plot was only discovered because of an alert customs agent at the border who caught Ressam, not neccessarily because of anything Clarke or anyone else did.)

DECEMBER 14, 1999 : (MILLENIUM PLOT : RESSAM CAUGHT BY US CUSTOMS SERVICE) "Thanks to the quick response of US Customs Agents to behavior deemed suspicious at the Canadian border in Port Angeles on December 14, 1999, Ahmed Ressam was caught trying to smuggle RDX explosives. A wide-ranging investigation, unprecedented in its sweep and scope, succeeded in identifying and arresting other members of the hitherto unknown terrorist cell to which Ressam belonged. A plot to bomb and destroy targets in the United States, although still not publicly identified, had been narrowly averted." - PREPARED TESTIMONY OF STEVEN EMERSON, TERRORIST EXPERT AND INVESTIGATOR, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, TERRORISM NEWSWIRE, INC. BEFORE THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION AND CLAIMS SUBJECT - INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM AND IMMIGRATION POLICY, January 26, 2000

DECEMBER 17, 1999 : (UN SECURITY COUNCIL RELIEVES SANCTIONS ON IRAQ) The UN Security Council voted to relieve the sanctions on Iraq. DECEMBER 25, 1999 : (UK LABOUR MP GALLOWAY SPENDS CHRISTMAS WITH IRAQI OFFICIAL TARIQ AZIZ) - Source Galloway, on Radio 4 program "On the Ropes." on June 17, 2003 according to the story "I was in Iraq on day alleged in memos, admits Galloway," By Sally Pook, Daily Telegraph - UK, June 18, 2003

DECEMBER 26, 1999 : (BOXING DAY HOLIDAY : UK LABOUR MP GALLOWAY IS IN IRAQ, MEETS WITH IRAQI INTELLIGENCE AGENT OVER GALLOWAY'S CUT OF THE OIL FOR FOOD PROGRAM) One of the documents [found by the UK Telegraph in Iraq in 2003] was a memorandum suggesting that on Boxing Day 1999 Mr Galloway met an Iraqi intelligence agent in Baghdad and laid out his demands for a larger slice of the revenue from the sale of three million barrels of oil every six months. It also purported to show him as asking for "exceptional" commercial opportunities. Saddam Hussein's office rejected these alleged requests for more money, explaining that they were unaffordable. -"I was in Iraq on day alleged in memos, admits Galloway," By Sally Pook, Daily Telegraph - UK, June 18, 2003

1999 late : (EVIDENCE ESTABLISHES MONTES TO BE A CUBAN MOLE : DIA BLOCKS MONTES' SELECTION TO MOVE TO CIA DIRECTOR TENET'S NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL) DIA senior intelligence analyst Ana Belen Montes originally came under suspicion of being a spy for Cuba's communist government in 1994. However, DIA and FBI counterspies could not prove she was engaging in espionage and Montes continued passing secrets to Havana until she was discovered in late 1999. ... Montes was placed under surveillance in late 1999 and at one point was selected to work for CIA Director George J. Tenet's National Intelligence Council. The DIA blocked Montes' move by freezing all transfers. - "DIA fears Cuban mole aided Russia, China," by Bill Gertz, washtimes, 2/1/2003

DECEMBER 1999 : (RUSSIAN DIPLOMAT GUSEV IS EXPELLED FROM STATE DEPT FOR SPYING) Russian diplomat Stanislav Borisovich Gusev was expelled from the State Department last December after reportedly being caught gathering department information with an eavesdropping device. - 'Highly classified' State Department computer missing," CNN.com - US - 'Highly classified' State Department computer ..., April 17, 2000

1999 late - 2000 early : (HAMBURG CELL : ATTA & ACCOMPLICES AL-SHEHHI, AL-JARRAH, BAHAJI & BINALSHIBH TRAINED IN AFGHANISTAN) Mohamed Atta and two accomplices trained at Qaeda camps in Afghanistan from late 1999 to early 2000. Four other Arabs from Hamburg attended camps there about the same time, including Marwan al-Shehhi, Ziad al-Jarrah, Said Bahaji and Ramzi bin al-Shibh. It is not known if they trained together - Extracted from "Germans Lay Out Early Qaeda Ties to 9/11 Hijackers, " by DOUGLAS FRANTZ and DESMOND BUTLER, New York Times, August 24, 2002

* My note: Of course, it's worth noting that a guy named Zarqawi was tied deeply into the Millenium Plots ... he is one of the biggest links between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda, and one of the biggest thorns in our side even today.

I can see why a rat would want to hide info on this guy- if they want to keep they "no connections" myth alive.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.