The Grassley Hearing - 10 May 1999
Senator Grassley. I call the hearing to order. I am Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of this subcommittee, and I welcome everybody to the hearing and particularly welcome our witnesses, many who had to go out of their way to be here. We appreciate it very much.
Today's hearing is the result of a 2-year review by the subcommittee into how Federal agencies handled the investigation of what caused the crash of TWA Flight 800. The subcommittee conducted dozens of interviews of professionals from various agencies who were either on the crash scene or were at high levels within the various headquarters of the various agencies.
A consensus emerged from the interviews, supported by documentary evidence, about the conduct of the investigation. The collective testimony from today's witnesses will leave a very clear picture of that conduct, and, of course, it is a troubling picture.
This investigation was run by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. There is much doubt about whether the FBI had statutory authority as the lead agency. There will be more on that point later.
What the public knows about the crash and its cause is what they know through countless press conferences and leaks to the press. The public also has heard numerous conspiracy theories and myths or disinformation.
The purpose of this hearing is to provide a much more real picture of what happened and, hopefully, why it happened. The motivation for the subcommittee's efforts is to continue to help restore public confidence in Federal law enforcement. It is my intention to examine some very basic and systemic problems uncovered in this investigation.
The goal is to have a constructive dialogue with the FBI to ensure similar problems are not repeated in the future. No one will be fingered as a scapegoat. However, if the FBI says today that its problems are of the past and it is now fixed, I will not buy that, and I warn the public not to buy it, either. There is a whole lot more to be done before the root causes of the problem are fixed. It is a systemic cultural problem that transcends any simplistic fix.
I would like to give a word about today's witnesses, because it is not easy for them to be critical of questionable actions that they saw by FBI personnel. These witnesses will likely have to work with the FBI again, and the FBI is bigger and more powerful than their agencies. So there is an intimidation factor here.
But that is not why these witnesses are coming forward. They are coming forward because of what they saw and what they saw offended them, both from a law enforcement standpoint and from the standpoint of public safety. They are coming forward because they truly believe it will serve the public interest and will improve the way that we investigate future incidents. This is an honorable thing for these people to do. The subcommittee appreciates their testimony and I am confident that the public will, as well.
This is a story about how the world's preeminent law enforcement agency, at least in terms of image and expectation, sometimes acted like it did not even have a clue. I believe that each and every FBI agent and employee who showed up on the scene of that tragic crash did the best job they could and had the best motives. The same goes for the employees of the other agencies and groups that worked so hard. Many volunteered to do that, and they sacrificed their time and their commitment to a greater and humanitarian good.
There was a basic problem, however. In my view, it was one of leadership. FBI leadership in the case of the TWA Flight 800 was a disaster. The FBI says that its investigation in this case is a model for the future. The FBI believes that even now. I say that because of their testimony they submitted for this hearing. If the FBI still believes that after this hearing, then I think the American people should be very alarmed about whether or not the FBI gets the message, because this investigation, which by statute was supposed to be run by the NTSB but which was commandeered by the FBI, is a model of failure, not success. And anyone who doubts that is not confronting reality.
The testimony that we will hear today will describe three things. First, it will show how the FBI lacked the proper training to handle an investigation of this type and violated the most basic standards of forensic science in terms of collecting evidence, handling that evidence, and preserving the evidence. It is the kind of thing that would make even rookie cops wince.
Second, we will try to understand the culture within the FBI that allows this sort of thing to happen. Why does the world's preeminent law enforcement agency make the kinds of mistakes that even rookies do not make?
And third, why is it that the FBI would try to prevent critical public safety information from getting to the proper authorities?
A January 1997 ATF report>/u>, which will be discussed today, showed that the cause of the crash of the TWA Flight 800 was a mechanical failure. The FBI did not want that report out. It tried to suppress it. The FBI feared that if the case became a criminal case and went to court, the ATF report would be discoverable through Brady doctrine and might help exculpate the potential suspects.
But the FBI had the cart before the horse. You cannot start suppressing information when there is no crime. The vast majority of explosions like TWA are due to accidents, not to sabotage. For the FBI to assume first that an explosion is sabotage reveals its lack of experience in dealing with explosion incidents. Indeed, the FBI rarely investigates explosions and fires. Other law enforcement agencies, most notably the ATF, investigate many explosions and have lots of experience.
The proof is in the pudding. The ATF called the cause of the crash correctly, 10 months before the FBI did. In fact, it is fair to say that the FBI hindered the investigation and the public's and the families' right to know, and in the process, in my view, the FBI risked public safety.
Before we begin, I would like to clarify one critical issue. The FBI's suppression of the ATF report is a serious matter. In testimony from the third panel today, we will hear how the top FBI manager on this case, Mr. Jim Kallstrom, did not want crucial public safety information to go to public safety officials, and that is the National Transportation Safety Board. He succeeded in bottling it up. The NTSB has told us and told us all along that they never received a copy of the report.
Last Friday, pursuant to a document request of the FBI by the subcommittee, we discovered a draft letter dated March 17, 1997, from Mr. Kallstrom to the Chairman of the NTSB, Mr. Jim Hall. The unsigned draft letter said that a copy of the ATF report was enclosed. The FBI is claiming that this draft letter lets them off the hook, saying that they did, indeed, send the ATF report to the NTSB.
The fact is, it does not let them off the hook. I have been through too many Ruby Ridges and Wacos and Richard Jewel investigations to buy into that argument. I suspect that maybe the American public will be equally skeptical.
When the draft transmittal letter came to the subcommittee's attention, I asked the NTSB to verify if such a letter had indeed been received by them. The computerized mail system that logs in all letters to the Chairman showed that no such letter came in. An interview of the appropriate handlers of such letters showed no recollection of that letter.
Moreover, the FBI says that, pursuant to the subcommittee's document request, all relevant documents have been produced. Since no signed, finalized letter appears in the document production, I think it is wise to be skeptical that the ATF report was ever sent to the NTSB. And, in fact, that is what the NTSB has stated. In my view, that means the FBI is still not off the hook in terms of risking public safety in this case.
Source.
The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 dramatized the "systemic" imcompetence of the U.S. intelligence gathering agencies and the American people aren't in the mood to tolerate anyone unqualified by training and experience getting invoved in airliner crash investigations and spreading misinformation about them in press conferences, etc.
And there two additional items of evidence that do not appear to have been included in that investigation by Grassley's Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts,Committee on the Judiciary:
1. A letter to the FBI's James Kallstrom dated 28 March 1997 from the CIA stating that the explosion of the Massive Fireball about a mile above the surface was detected by an infrared sensor aboard a U.S. Defense Support Program (DSP) missile warning satellite and whether the FBI ever provided that presumably classified information to the NTSB.
2. The "302" form - and the routine use of the 302 interview procedure by the FBI and CIA (and other government agencies) even though it does not document and preserve anything said during such interviews.
What brings us back to your comments quoted at the outset of this posting in which your use of the word "they" tarred the NTSB along with the FBI and CIA. Although the 28 March 1997 letter from the CIA to the FBI's Kallstrom confirms that both of those agencies knew about the satellite sighting of the Massive Fireball explosion about a mile above the surface prior to the preparation of their video, where is your evidence that the NTSB was also provided with that presumably classified information prior to the preparation of the NTSB video?
It is the altitude of the Massive Fireball explosion that is the key to understanding what the witnesses actually saw in the timeline of events and if the FBI didn't provide the NTSB with that information, the NTSB had to rely on what the FBI told them the witnesses saw for the visual zoom climb events depicted in the NTSB video - but not on the aerodynamics of the zoom climb because ALL the specs on that had to have come to the NTSB from Boeing at some time during the years prior to preparation of the NTSB video (and would accordingly appear to me to almost certainly be proprietary information).
So once again, where is your evidence that the NTSB was also provided with the presumably classified information in the CIA's 28 March 1997 letter to the FBI's Kallstrom prior to the preparation of the NTSB video?
____________________
The timeline and location of the major events of the TWA 800 disaster was approximately as follows:
8:31:11 Intact and climbing 747 approaches 13,800 feet.
8:31:12 Initiating Event at 13,800 feet followed immediately by the commencement of the decapitation process.
8:31:43-8:31:47 Streak of light appears.
8:31:47 Explosion of Massive Fireball at 5500-7500 feet.
8:31:55-8:31:57 Splashdown of the Massive Fireball flames.
Source.
http://www.twa800.com/news/as8-99.htm
excerpts
It was billed as an investigation of the investigators. On May 10, 1999, Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) held a one-day hearing with witnesses offering damaging testimony about the Federal Bureau of Investigation's role in the TWA 800 probe. Grassley's opening remarks were particularly critical of former FBI Assistant Director James Kallstrom for failing to uncover the cause of the explosion that killed the jumbo jet's 230 passengers and crew on July 17, 1996.
Grassley's hearing focused on two star witnesses. One was Andrew Vita, assistant director of field operations for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF). The second was William A. Tobin, former chief metallurgist for the FBI. Both supported Grassley's claim that Kallstrom needlessly prolonged the probe.
Vita testified that several months into the investigation the BATF concluded there was no evidence that high explosives caused TWA 800's mid-air disintegration. In late January, 1997, Vita put the BATF's views in an unsolicited, written report to be submitted to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). But, Vita testified, he "met resistance" from the FBI. Grassley says Kallstrom suppressed the report and never forwarded it to the NTSB.
James Kallstrom, now retired from the FBI after an exemplary 28-year career, rebuts the charge as "a bald-faced lie."
He pointed to problems with the BATF report, which he rejected as " premature." At the time it was written, tons of TWA 800 still lay underwater. Kallstrom also had problems with the BATF methodology.
"The report was sophomoric," he told me, "in its science and in its writing. "
But his biggest beef with the BATF was that the flawed report would be poisonous in a courtroom. If the FBI eventually was able to identify suspects and bring them to trial, the report, because it had the weight of a government agency behind it, was precisely the kind of exhibit defense lawyers would parade before a jury to refute the prosecution.
"A defense attorney would have taken that report and jammed it twenty feet up my (expletive deleted)," Kallstrom said.
Nonetheless, Kallstrom informed the NTSB about the report soon after he reviewed it. To his surprise, the NTSB already had a copy. The BATF had apparently delivered the report through back channels.
Grassley did not explore one explanation for BATF's hasty conclusion and independent delivery of the report to the NTSB.
"ATF played a very political role," Kallstrom says. He calls the incident just one example of unusual collusion between the NTSB and other players in the TWA 800 investigation.
Grassley's other star witness, former FBI metallurgist Bill Tobin, is even more problematic.
Tobin testified that Kallstrom adamantly believed a bomb destroyed TWA 800. When traces of the high explosives PETN and RDX were found on the aircraft, Tobin says Kallstrom claimed it was proof of a bomb. Tobin thought otherwise. About six weeks into the probe, Tobin testified, he decided there was no evidence of terrorist act and told Kallstrom the crash was an accident.
Kallstrom had problems with Tobin's analysis. There were two possible ways terrorists might have destroyed TWA 800. One was a bomb, and the other was a missile. Tobin, says Kallstrom, had no experience in the forensic damage caused by missiles. Nor did he have the expertise to analyze aircraft wreckage after deterioration from prolonged salt-water immersion. Tobin's experience was limited to bomb damage on dry ground.
There was another problem. At the time of Tobin's conclusion, much of TWA 800 lay unrecovered. Larry Johnson, a former State Department counter- terrorism official directly involved in the Pan Am 103 case, says the volume of debris found by investigators in that case proved the bomb used was so small it could be "spread out on a kitchen table top." With tons of the plane still missing, Kallstrom felt Tobin's conclusion was unprofessional.
Kallstrom says he dismissed Tobin from the probe. He didn't trust the judgment of an investigator who reached conclusions while so much aircraft wreckage still lay on the ocean floor.
Grassley may not have known that Tobin's criticism of James Kallstrom could have been personally motivated. Nor did he seem aware that the BATF report may have been politically motivated. If he did know his witnesses' shortcomings, Senator Grassley didn't admit it.
Senator Grassley later criticized the FBI for dominating the probe. NTSB Chairman Jim Hall, in Duncan's House reauthorization hearings, said that the NTSB should have been exclusively responsible for the investigation until evidence of sabotage was found. But in the first days after July 17, 1996, only five NTSB crash investigators came to the site--far too few even to have collected the hundreds of witness statements.
Eight weeks into the NTSB's probe, Jim Hall arrived at Calverton, scene of the TWA 800 salvage operation. This changed the relationship between the NTSB and the FBI. Kallstrom recalled: "Then it was clear who was really running the NTSB investigation."
Re: "CIA Letter to Kallstrom"
On November 18, 1997, the CIA produced an animated video simulating TWA 800's final flight. The video explains the 244 eyewitness accounts, many of which suggested that a missile was fired into the aircraft, as mistaken. Because light travels faster than sound, the CIA concluded that witnesses actually saw a flame trail from burning jet fuel before they heard the sound of the plane's explosion, and naturally were convinced that the streak of light leading to the plane occurred before the explosion.
What the CIA did not explain in November was that its video was altered after consultation with the NTSB. In a letter from CIA Director George Tenet to Rep. James Traficant (D-Ohio) dated January 13, 1998, Tenet acknowledges that more than forty changes were made to the video animation at the NTSB's suggestion. After the changes were made, Tenet says the CIA showed the video to "NTSB managers" who approved its release to the general public.
YOU say....
"So once again, where is your evidence that the NTSB was also provided with the presumably classified information in the CIA's 28 March 1997 letter to the FBI's Kallstrom prior to the preparation of the NTSB video?"
I say.......
Did the CIA use it in their video?
YOU say......
"but not on the aerodynamics of the zoom climb because ALL the specs on that had to have come to the NTSB from Boeing at some time during the years prior to preparation of the NTSB video (and would accordingly appear to me to almost certainly be proprietary information)."
Provide YOUR evidence for the assertion... "because ALL the specs on that had to have come to the NTSB from Boeing"
And you say.....
(and would accordingly appear to me to almost certainly be proprietary information).
I say, I agree with Capt Lahr......
"Immediately after the CIA animation of the zoom-climb was shown on national television, Boeing issued a public statement that it had no knowledge of the data used by the CIA for its zoom-climb scenario. Later, the CIA itself stated that the data and conclusions for its zoom-climb came from the NTSB. Therefore, logic dictates that Boeing also has no knowledge of the data used by the NTSB for its zoom-climb scenario. Consequently, the Boeing proprietary information being withheld by the NTSB has no bearing on the zoom-climb. The NTSB is simply using the Boeing proprietary information as a pretext for denying public access to the NTSB zoom-climb calculations. The zoom-climb scenario was fabricated completely in-house by the NTSB. The Air Line Pilots Association criticized the NTSB for not allowing any oversight or participation by the other parties to the investigation. There is absolutely no verification of the NTSB zoom-climb calculations by an outside independent organization. This secrecy by the NTSB violates all of the principles of an open and objective accident investigation. How can the NTSB expect any public confidence in its operations and conclusions?....
I am repeating my appeal for the NTSB zoom-climb calculations. My appeal is based on the Boeing data already published by the NTSB. As pointed out above, the additional Boeing proprietary data that the NTSB is withholding in secrecy has no bearing on the zoom-climb; therefore, it is not a legitimate excuse for denying my appeal."
excerpts
http://twa800.com/letters/lahr-9-27-01.htm
Much of it from the likes of you and your cohorts..