The Scheuer contradiction

[noise]

If al Qaeda was as truly dangerous as he has claimed then why were al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar free to roam the US planning a terrorist attack for 20 months?

Why can't any US officials answer this one question?

[hack89]

1. Scheuer blames Clinton

for not taking bin Laden and al Qaeda seriously. I think that no one saw al Qaeda the way Scheur did - it certainly seems to be a constant theme of the several books he has written on the subject.

[Realityhack]

2. I find that interesting because...

I was under the impression that Clinton took them much more seriously than Bush. Of course it might still not have been seriously enough.

OTOH it could just be normal government SNAFU. Lots of hate groups inside the US go unmonitored and we end up with things like Oklahoma City.

[hack89]

3. You might find this interesting

"Mr. Clarke, of course, was at the center of Mr. Clinton's advisers, who resolutely refused to order the CIA to kill bin Laden. In spring 1998, I briefed Mr. Clarke and senior CIA, Department of Defense and FBI officers on a plan to kidnap bin Laden. Mr. Clarke's reaction was that "it was just a thinly disguised attempt to assassinate bin Laden." I replied that if he wanted bin Laden dead, we could do the job quickly. Mr. Clarke's response was that the president did not want bin Laden assassinated, and that we had no authority to do so." <10>, Washington Times Guest Editorial, July 5, 2006.

[noise]

5. The sharing failure spanned both administrations

January 2000 through August 2001. Even after the USS Cole was attacked the CIA withheld information about al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar though they were linked to Cole plotters by way of the January 5-8, 2000 Malaysia meeting.

Scheuer needs to get his story straight. Either Alec Station was concerned about al Qaeda or they weren't. Sitting on information despite "a system blinking red" in the summer of '01 suggests that Alec Station wasn't all that concerned about al Qaeda. It doesn't say much for US media that they can't pin down such a key issue. In no way does avoidance of this issue honor the victims of 9/11.

[LARED]

4. One thing I find perplexing

is the level of imagination required by Ct'er seems to be nearly limitless when advocating a pet theory that bolsters the inside job meme, but it nearly disappears when needed to explain something that diminishes a pet theory.

[procopia]

6. Perplexing?

You don't think the OCT requires a certain level of imagination? You don't think that imagination likewise disappears when needed to explain something diminishing it? I'm perplexed that you don't see it works both ways.

[LARED]

7. Please expound on how it takes

imagination to explain the so called OCT.