Before 9/11, Warnings on Bin Laden

nytimes ^ | December 9, 2005 | SCOTT SHANE

[ncountylee]

WASHINGTON, Dec. 8 - More than three years before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, American diplomats warned Saudi officials that Osama bin Laden might target civilian aircraft, according to a newly declassified State Department cable.

The cable was one of two documents released Thursday by the National Security Archive, a research organization at George Washington University that obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act. The other was a memorandum written five days after the 2001 attacks by George J. Tenet, then director of central intelligence, to his top deputies, titled "We're at War."

The June 1998 cable reported to Washington that three American officials, the State Department's regional security officer, an economics officer and an aviation specialist had met Saudi officials at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh to pass along a warning based on an interview Mr. bin Laden, the Saudi-born leader of Al Qaeda, had just given to ABC News.

They said he had threatened in the interview to strike in the next "few weeks" against "military passenger aircraft," mentioning surface-to-air missiles. The cable said there was "no specific information that indicates bin Laden is targeting civilian aircraft," but added, "We could not rule out that a terrorist might take the course of least resistance and turn to a civilian target."

Part of the Tenet memo had been reported previously in Bob Woodward's 2002 book, "Bush At War." The eight-paragraph Tenet letter was a call to arms, declaring "a worldwide war against Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations" and saying that the effort would require "our absolute and total dedication."

[ncountylee]

"three years before Sept. 11, 2001"

Bush's Fault?

[rawhide]

Are you sure about the date? That puts this into Clinton's regime.

[VOA]

bump for publicity

[MNJohnnie]

And once again, the FACTS in the story totally destroy the spin lies the NY DNCTimes try to create. Do any of these "news media" morons have ANY idea how many of these sorts of threats our Government hears week in and week out? Notice how NONE Of the details of the story in ANY way relate to the way the actual attacks were made on 9-11?

NOW, with the usually 20/02 A@@site the Dinosaur media is notorious for, they cherry pick the details to create a complete LIE that some how 9-11 should of been prevented. Complete scum is all they are.

[sageb1]

Tenet damage control?

[JulieRNR21]

Three years before 9-11-01.......Notice that the NY Slimes leaves out the word 'Clinton'so that most Americans do not make the connection.

Had the warning come under Bush's watch the headline would scream.......BUSH TO BLAME FOR 9-11.

[GoBucks2002]

Are you sure about the date? That puts this into Clinton's regime.

Yes, but bin Laden was doing this with the complicity of the father of the Governor of Texas, since his father and he were buddies going all the back to when his father was head of the CIA for about a year in the 1970s. HE was just preparing for when the Texas oilmen would be in office and he would stage these hijackings. This would cause the U.S. to go to war and jack up poil prices, and they would rake in the profits.

< / conspiracy>

[ShotgunWillie]

Usama bin Laden is dead. Had he still been alive, we would have already received numerous video feeds. All we see and hear today are audio feeds purporting to be bin Laden. Where did the videos go, and why are none available? The man is toasty cracker material beneath the desert. Does anyone get it? The U.S. probably blew his balls sky-high. I pity the poor idiot who had to pick Usama's balls from his birdbath.
We got videos galore of Usama after September 11, 2001. Today we get audio tapes. wake up and smell the camel-nut java.
I'll explain this: One Dead Rat. Get the point?
Merry Christmas!

[woofie]

Do you do color commentary for a living?

[The South Texan]

"three years before Sept. 11, 2001"
Bush's Fault?"

Sure. Didn't you know as Texas Governor he was in charge of US Foreign Policy and the Defense of this country? You must have missed that. We forgive you.

[kabar]

The 2001 document echoed an earlier memo about Al Qaeda that Mr. Tenet had sent on Dec. 4, 1998, to top C.I.A. officials and other intelligence agencies, stating: "We are at war. I want no resources or people spared in this effort." But the national 9/11 commission concluded last year that the 1998 memo had "little overall effect" on mobilizing the agencies to fight terrorism.

A bit late Mr. Tenet. Bin Laden declared war on us in his 1996 fatwa, "Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places."

[Shermy]

Terrorist targeting planes.

That's new!

/sarcasm

[justshutupandtakeit]

And what is the relation between that threat in June 98 and the blowing of flight 800 out of the Atlantic sky?

[Dajjal]

BTTT

[biff0101]

Hey Shotgun, lay off the whiskey dude..

[Mo1]

" But the national 9/11 commission concluded last year that the 1998 memo had "little overall effect" on mobilizing the agencies to fight terrorism

Why did they come to that conclusion and if true .. why didn't anyone listen to Tenet?

[SevenMinusOne]

Usama bin Laden is dead. Had he still been alive, we would have already received numerous video feeds. All we see and hear today are audio feeds purporting to be bin Laden. Where did the videos go, and why are none available? The man is toasty cracker material beneath the desert. Does anyone get it?

UBL is certainly not dead and everyone from the NCO's hunting his as$ to the CIC are aware of this fact -

Brave warriors are risking all 24/7 deep in Indian country hunting this evil SOB - Along with several other HVT's that remain out there (Zawahiri, Jalaluddin Haqqani & Gulbuddin Hekmatyar).

He is somewhere along the Afghan / Pakistan border region north of Peshawar - Capturing UBL in the NW Frontier is such an extremely difficult task most just can't comprehend.

We are talking roughly 40,000 square miles of the most rugged terrain on earth! - Furthermore the Afghan / Pakistan border stretches 1,500 miles—roughly the distance from Washington, D.C., to Denver (just to get a clue).

Throughout the NW Frontier (and Baluchistan) Pashtun tribes are completely in control. A group of warlords who are autonomous from any centralized Gov't -

Again the terrain in this region of the world is some of the most brutal on earth -Making any sustained operations a complete nightmare.

As for videos? - UBL is much more concerned with staying alive then with putting out propaganda - Additionally how do you know he hasn't "tried" to put out more then the MSM is aware of? - These type items recovered "in transit" are not the types of materials we release to the press -

Furthermore why UBL may not put out frequent tapes is the obvious - There is a clear vulnerability to releasing audio and video tapes - That being the custody chain of these tapes could be traced back if snatched somewhere along the way (which has happened).

UBL remains alive and eking out a survival...but we'll nail his as$ one of these days -

[csn vinnie]

One more clue, but, really, this sounds like a possible threat to shoot down aircraft in a foreign country. Under the circumstances prevailing in 1998-2001, we would not have done what was necessary to tighten up air security in this country.

(We are still not sufficiently serious.)