"The system was blinking red."

[BurtWorm]

From the Executive Summary of the 9/11 Commission Report.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/911report/documents/911ReportExec.pdf

The transition to the new Bush administration in late 2000 and early 2001 took place with the Cole issue still pending. President George W. Bush and his chief advisers accepted that al Qaeda was responsible for the attack on the Cole, but did not like the options available for a response.

Bin Ladin’s inference may well have been that attacks, at least at the level of the Cole, were risk free. The Bush administration began developing a new strategy with the stated goal of eliminating the al Qaeda threat within three to five years.

During the spring and summer of 2001, U.S. intelligence agencies received a stream of warnings that al Qaeda planned, as one report put it, “something very, very, very big.” Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet told us,“The system was blinking red.”

Although Bin Ladin was determined to strike in the United States, as President Clinton had been told and President Bush was reminded in a Presidential Daily Brief article briefed to him in August 2001, the specific threat information pointed overseas. Numerous precautions were taken overseas. Domestic agencies were not effectively mobilized. The threat did not receive national media attention comparable to the millennium alert.

While the United States continued disruption efforts around the world, its emerging strategy to eliminate the al Qaeda threat was to include an enlarged covert action program in Afghanistan, as well as diplomatic strategies for Afghanistan and Pakistan.The process culminated during the summer of 2001 in a draft presidential directive and arguments about the Predator aircraft, which was soon to be deployed with a missile of its own, so that it might be used to attempt to kill Bin Ladin or his chief lieutenants. At a September 4 meeting, President Bush’s chief advisers approved the draft directive of the strategy and endorsed the concept of arming the Predator. This directive on the al Qaeda strategy was awaiting President Bush’s signature on September 11, 2001.

[phillybri]

1. Kick

:kick:

[guitar man]

2. Might that have constituted an "inkling" ?

"I can assure the American people that had we had any inkling that this was going to happen, we would have done everything in our power to stop the attack." -GW Bush

Why is he getting a pass on this one?

[BurtWorm]

4. Why is he getting a pass? Because his party owns the govt.!

Because the commission wouldn't have been allowed if he hadn't been given a pass. The Brits have talked about how to read the Butler report, how to translate it from Lord-speak. We have to translate this one from Republi-speak.

[linazelle]

3. I see more blame shifting

"The threat did not receive national media attention comparable to the millennium alert." :wtf:
They control the media. They did not alert said media. They act as if the media was supposed to warn the intelligencia.

The "report" seems to be well crafted to cover a lot of ass.

[JHB]

5. "Did not receive national media attention comparable to...

...to the millennium alert"?

So suddenly it's up to the press to set our defense and intelligence priorities?

[BurtWorm]

6. You could read that as "the Bushists didn't use the media

as effectively as the Clinton admin did." That's how I read it.

[JHB]

7. How could they...

...since none of them appear to read newspapers.

[BurtWorm]

8. They were too busy selling permanent tax breaks and ANWR drilling

to the red meat eaters on talk radio and FOX news.

[Granite]

9. And they still have no sense of urgency

What really stands out about this report is its urgent calls for systematic reform. Tom Kean, the former Republican governor from New Jersey and Bush's handpicked 9/11 Commsission chair, said this today:

"Every expert with whom we spoke told us an attack of even greater magnitude is now possible and even probable. We do not have the luxury of time," Kean said.

"We must prepare and we must act. The al Qaeda network and its affiliates are sophisticated, patient, disciplined and lethal."

There's little doubt as to Kean's sense of urgency. George W. Bush, meanwhile, said he looks forward to "studying" the commission's report (I'll leave out the snarky comments), and said that, "where the government needs to act, we will." Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) also had a less-than-urgent reaction:

But House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said this week that any legislative action on the panel’s recommendations probably would not occur until after the next president was inaugurated in January, given the limited time Congress has left this year.

“It’s a very difficult time to squeeze out and have the oversight and the testimony to put new legislation in place,” Hastert said.

That doesn't sound like moving heaven and earth, does it?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5485889/

[BurtWorm]

13. Very insightful observations, Granite.

Hastert is a pig. How's that for insightful? ;)

[Granite]

15. Works for me!

:)

[Bluebear]

10. Sorry, Condi needed exact flight and seat numbers.

nt

[Tracer]

11. "The specific threat information pointed overseas."

Golly gee, did the WP forget that the PDB's title mentions a little something about "attacks INSIDE THE UNITED STATES!"?

[BurtWorm]

12. This is actually from the Commission

And that is a damn good point! :wtf:

[sandnsea]

14. Iraq Iraq Iraq

They didn't do anything about bin laden because they were convinced he was in cahoots with Saddam and that taking out Saddam would solve the whole thing. Eliminating al qaeda threat in 3-5 years??? That's the give-away right there. The only way they could have thought they could do that is if they thought Saddam was the entire terrorist problem.