Colonel got permission to disclose pre-9/11 data

Washington Times ^ | August 22, 2005 | Shaun Waterman

[bobsunshine]

Also from the article:

"Col. Shaffer he said he had met with Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Stephen Cambone and Lt. Gen. Norton Schwartz, the staff director for outgoing Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard B. Myers.

"They knew that this would be the next logical step," Col. Shaffer said, and the officials did not ask him to refrain from going public."

[tractorman]

So far, the MSM is doing a nice job spiking this story.
I wonder how much longer they can hold out.

[small voice in the wilderness]

Have you seen this? Interesting...

[Brilliant]

Until the day after the 2008 election. Then they will suddenly report it like it is breaking news.

[cricket]

Interesting how the focus has become the 'messenger'; rather than the message.

[ALOHA RONNIE]

.


NEVER FORGET


CLINTON let BIN LADEN Slip Away and Metastasize

http://www.Freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1467967/posts


NEVER FORGET


.

[cricket]

That said. . .I guess the Dems never thought the Repubs would have the 'whatevers' to do precisely this. Some real surprised Demrat players, no doubt.

[longfellow]

Anyone notice the national geographic special last night on 9/11 didn't mention klinton til after the Cole bombing?

[Just mythoughts]

Maybe they are waiting to see if the public has any interest in finding the "TRUTH" of 9/11, and what a complete and total disaster Clintonism really was, is and will be.

[Sacajaweau]

It's the right time to get this out. It goes directly to the credibility of the Special 9-11 commission and reflects Bubba's interest in the commissions report.

Bubba will just deny any knowledge of Able Danger.....until someone says and can prove...."Bubba, Gorelick, Berger and Clarke (and the FBI and CIA) knew about the cell" and BUBBA made the decision to bury it".

I'm going to look and see what Hillary had to say about the Special 9-11 Commission before it came about.

[sono]

Not true ... they listed all the failures during the previous administration to act and get Bin Laden.

[nuffsenuff]

Why do Congressmen have more balls than Senators?

[geezerwheezer]

I kept thinking this fellow soldier wasn't just a cut above stupid! He is a real crackerjack and I'm damned glad he's on our side! We need more true honest and able folks to come forward and start telling us the truth-WE CAN HANDLE THE TRUTH !! I'm like most Americans, I'm sick of the bullshi* we've been fed, and I'm damned sick of the lies we've been told. Thank God for soldiers like Col. Shaffer.

[visitor]

Lt. Col. Shaffer was on C-SPAN WASHINGTON JOURNAL YESTERDAY [08-21-05]

http://www.c-span.org/homepage.asp?Cat=Series&Code=WJE&ShowVidNum=9&Rot_Cat_CD=WJ&Rot_HT=206&Rot_WD=&ShowVidDays=100&ShowVidDesc=&ArchiveDays=30

Under "Recent Programs" find the link 08-21-05.

Is there anything he said yesterday about lost documents that would discredit his recollection of Able Danger?...rto

[longfellow]

Yes they kept saying "administration" but not Klinton by name. and I only saw one pic of him when he was talking about catching those responsible for the Cole. Which we all know was b.s.

[katykelly]

Yes, they listed failures during the 'previous administration', but they never used clinton's name until after the Cole.

[longfellow]

They have done that before.

[shield]

Coverup 101...by 'toons' inept administration....

[foreshadowed at waco]

Catch it again tonight--part 1 at 7PM EST--they mention Clinton for the 93 WTC bombing--also the Lewinsky affair and the bombing of the aspirin factory--true they don't out and out condemn him for his failures leading up to 9/11 but they do make it very clear that bin Laden was greatly underestimated and that Clinton's approach to terrorism was sporadic and weighed down by legal worries...

I think many people forget that prior to 9/11 very few Americans (except for the enlightened here at FR) cared about OBL, terrorism, and bombings because it was happening OVER THERE--even the USS Cole didn't really outrage many people--it would have taken more guts than Bill Clinton could even dream of possessing for him to stand up and demand support from the American people to fight bin Laden--but he was a poll driven wimp who, essentially, needed to score a lot of chicks to feel like a man...he hurt this country, I agree, but he was elected to be Dr. Feeelgood not a military leader--heck his salutes looked more like he was tipping his hat.

[mercy]

MULTIPLE SOURCES AVAILABLE:

This is up on Captains Quarters Blog now:


The Washington Times reports that although Col. Tony Shaffer remains the only person connected to Able Danger to willingly part with anonymity, several other sources met with the press on August 8 when the story went public, including members of the AD team. The meetings with reporters came with the explicit blessings of key Congressmen and the "tacit" approval of the Pentagon, Shaffer says:

House Republican leaders approved in advance plans by a military intelligence official to go public with details of a top-secret Pentagon project code-named Able Danger. ...

"I spoke personally to Denny Hastert and to Pete Hoekstra," Col. Shaffer said. Mr. Hastert, Illinois Republican, is speaker of the House, and Mr. Hoekstra, Michigan Republican, is chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.


"I was given assurances by [them] that this was the right thing to do. ... I was given assurances we would not suffer any adverse consequences for bringing this to the attention of the public," Col. Shaffer said.


Col. Shaffer said his conversations with Mr. Hastert and Mr. Hoekstra took place before he and members of the Able Danger team spoke as anonymous sources to reporters in the offices of Rep. Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Republican, on Aug. 8.



This last paragraph gets repeated by Shaun Waterman as fact later in the article, saying that "members of the Able Danger team" joined Shaffer on at least one occasion on August 8. This should change some evaluations of this story. Now we have multiple sources, including people who had their hands on the data, telling reporters what they know about the identification of Mohammed Atta and three other 9/11 hijackers over a year before the attacks. Up to now, the assumption has been that only two sources came forward, one of which (Shaffer) only worked in a liaison capacity.


This explains why the New York Times and other media ran the story despite the anonymous sourcing. It also explains some of the inconsistencies between the first reporting on the story and Shaffer's interviews later. We had all assumed that Shaffer and the Navy captain were the only two original sources for the story. However, the original articles on Able Danger just mention "sources" as a generic term, and if the team members took part in this press conference on August 8th as the Washington Times says, then the information gleaned would have had more detail than Shaffer knew from first-hand experience.


We need to have these witnesses come forward publicly. At the least, we need the Times and other media outlets that participated in this August 8 meeting to confirm the number and nature of these sources, even without their names