QT Monster's Place

The USS Cole Bombing, Badawi and the Yemeni's

As I noted last week, it had been reported that Jamal al-Badawi, had been released from prison in Aden, Yemen. Badawi is a suspect in the USS Cole Bombing, an al-Qaeda terrorist attack on our country.

The State Department now says that Badawi is now in prison in Aden, Yemen.

More excellent information is here and here.

vadkins
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USS Cole Bombing Terrorist Released in Yemen

Outrageous:

Al-Qaeda terrorist Jamal al-Badawi, who particpated in the attack on the USS Cole and has a bounty on his head from the United States, surrendered to authorities in Yemen—and was promptly released after making a promise not to do any more nasty terror stuff.

More links from lawhawk.

vadkins
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The USS Cole Bombing: What Did the Government Know in Advance?

There is mounting evidence that the government knew enough prior to al-Qaeda's bombing of the USS Cole in 2000, that the USS Cole should never have been refueling in Aden, Yemen on the day of that attack. Mike Kasper the creator and blogger of the Able Danger Blog, has a top-notch post/summary. From the New York Post on 9/17/2005:

September 17, 2005 -- WASHINGTON — Members of a secret Pentagon intelligence unit known as Able Danger warned top military generals that it had uncovered information of increased al Qaeda "activity" in Aden harbor less than three weeks before the attack on the USS Cole, The Post has learned.

In the latest explosive revelation in the Able Danger saga, two former members of the data-mining team are expected to testify to the Senate Judiciary Committee next week that they uncovered alarming terrorist activity and associations in Aden weeks before the Oct. 12, 2000, suicide bombing of the U.S. warship that killed 17 sailors.

Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, the Defense Intelligence Agency's former liaison to Able Danger, told The Post that Capt. Scott Phillpott, Able Danger's leader, briefed Gen. Peter Schoomaker, former head of Special Operations Command and now Army chief of staff, about the findings on Yemen "two or three weeks" before the Cole attack.

"Yemen was elevated by Able Danger to be one of the top three hot spots for al Qaeda in the entire world," Shaffer recalled.

Shaffer and two other officials familiar with Able Danger said contractors uncovered al Qaeda activities in Yemen through a search of Osama bin Laden's business ties.

The Pentagon had no immediate comment.

Be sure to read Mike's entire post.

Here's a USS Cole clip from ABC's movie, The Path to 9/11

Able Danger resources in the blogosphere:

• Able Danger Blog
• Able Danger Blog Roll: Complete list of Able Danger news article and blogosphere posts (updated through 5/22/2007)
• AJ Strata's Able Danger archive at his blog, The Strata-Sphere (recent post, The Clintons and Able Danger is here be sure to read the comments too)
• Ed Morrissey over at Captain's Quarters has many archived Able Danger posts on the 911 Commission category page (see the last post there entitled, Confirmation of Able Danger Raises Even More Questions, which also has lots of interesting comments/trackbacks)

vadkins
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Able Danger Blogroll Updated

This blog, QT Monster's Place, is the home of the Able Danger blogroll. The Able Danger blogroll dates back to about August 2005. July/August of 2005 is the time period during which the Able Danger story broke.

Anyway, I just updated the blogroll today. On the right column of this blog, you'll find the latest few links of news stories and blog posts concerning Able Danger-just scroll down-and on another blog page, I maintain the entire 1303 item list of Able Danger links.

vadkins
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Able Danger Blog Roll Updated Today

My blogging efforts of late have been sporadic at best. However, today I was able to update the Able Danger Blog Roll in the left column of this blog page. The entire Able Danger Blog Roll with over 1200 links is here.

The Able Danger Blog remains the best single source of information on this important, 9/11 related story.

vadkins
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Pentagon Rejects "Able Danger" Accusations by Keith Phucas

This article was first published in the Times Herald on Oct. 2, 2006

NORRISTOWN — The Pentagon shot down claims by members of the "Able Danger" data-mining project who said they had knowledge of Sept. 11 hijacker Mohamed Atta more than a year before the attacks.

In fact, the Pentagon Inspector General’s (IG) investigation, which was released last week, rejected nearly all of the many allegations leveled against the Defense Department by Army Reserve Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer over its handling of the secret program to gather information on al-Qaida in 1999 and 2000.

The Pentagon report, released last week, also rejected Shaffer’s accusation that the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), his civilian employer, retaliated against him for revealing the existence of "Able Danger" to 9/11 Commission staff members in 2003.

In 1999, former Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Hugh Shelton, now retired, directed U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) to develop a campaign plan to obtain intelligence on international terrorists.

The program, which began at the Army’s Land Information Warfare Center (LIWA), in Ft. Belvoir, Va., was transferred to defense contractor Raytheon’s Garland, Texas facility and finally to SOCOM in Tampa, Fla.

In 2005, Shaffer told Rep. Curt Weldon that SOCOM lawyers prevented the team from passing on information to the FBI about terrorists linked to a "Brooklyn cell."

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in September 2005, Erik Kleinsmith, a former Army major who worked at LIWA on the data-mining effort, said he was ordered in 2000 to delete 2.5 terabytes of computer data gathered on suspected terrorist.

The report found said the data, that contained the names of "U.S. persons," was destroyed in accordance with Defense Department policy.

The Times Herald broke the story after interviewing Shaffer in the congressman’s Capitol Hill office in June 2005. For the next several months, Weldon characterized "Able Danger" as a missed opportunity that could have thwarted the Sept. 11 terrorist plot and criticized the Pentagon for shutting down the program in 2000.

Weldon was zealous in championing Shaffer, who he believed had been blackballed by the DIA. The day before Shaffer was to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee in September 2005 his security clearance was revoked.

The inspector general’s report said testimony by Shaffer and "Able Danger" colleague, Navy Capt. Scott Phillpott, was riddled with inconsistencies. The military officers and a dozen others worked on the program.

After interviewing Shaffer, Phillpott and civilian intelligence analysts James D. Smith and Eileen Preisser, Pentagon IG investigators concluded their recollections of seeing charts with Atta’s picture or hearing his name prior to Sept. 11, 2001, lacked credibility.

"While we interviewed four witnesses who claimed to have seen a chart depicting (Atta) and possibly other terrorists of ‘cells’ involved in 9/11, we determined that their recollections were not accurate," the report said.

The 90-page report is full of peoples’ differing memories about the former intelligence effort.

During the program, the team mapped out linkages of al-Qaida members on several large paper charts.

In his first interview with Pentagon investigators, Phillpott testified he saw Atta’s picture on one of the charts, however, after being shown a memo he’d signed and the specific chart referred to in the correspondence, he changed his story.

"Well, I mean, obviously there’s a compelling amount of evidence that would make it appear that I did not see Mohamed Atta. I will absolutely grant you that based on what you’re showing me, my recollection could have been wrong," Phillpott admitted to investigators.

By the third interview the Navy officer stated "I’m convinced that Atta was not on that chart, the chart we had."

Shaffer insisted that he attempted to arrange three meeting between the program’s former director, Air Force Col. Robert Worthington, and the FBI to discuss strategies to disrupt terrorist activities.

Shaffer said he set up meeting through his FBI contact, Xanthie Mangum.

But Worthington denied the he was ever scheduled to meet with the FBI to discuss "Able Danger," even after investigators showed him a memo he prepared indicating Worthington planned "on going to LIWA and the FBI the latter part of the week."

In a statement made to FBI agents on Dec. 12, 2005, Mangum said she had "never received any requests to schedule meetings related to Able Danger."

When Pentagon investigators told Shaffer about Mangum’s denial, he insisted he spoke to someone at FBI to arrange meetings.

"It was either her or someone over there (FBI) that we made the meeting with," he testified.

Interviewed a week ago, Weldon said he planned to prepare a formal response to the Pentagon’s report.

"The harassment of (Lt. Col.) Shaffer was not looked into (thoroughly)," he said.

Shaffer’s attorney Mark Zaid was asked via e-mail why he thought the IG probe found no evidence of reprisal against his client by the DIA, despite significant circumstantial evidence.

"The (Department of Defense Office of Inspector General) selectively chose information to report on," he wrote in an e-mail message. "It gave significant weight to those who repeatedly changed their stories and failed to question motives, yet sought to penalize Shaffer for staying consistent."

Weldon also pointed out that Mangum, who was supposedly asked to set up meetings at the FBI, was not interviewed by Pentagon investigators.

The Seventh District Republican congressman, who is running against retired admiral Joe Sestak, a Democrat, said previously that Pentagon officials downplayed "Able Danger" revelations to avoid criticism about its failure to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks.

He also said both the Bush and Clinton administrations would feel political heat if the entire story came out.

"It’s a very complicated story," Weldon said. "It’s going to embarrass people in this (Bush) administration and the Clinton administration."

-Keith Phucas can be reached at kphucas@timesherald.com or 610-272-2500, ext. 211.

Is Ali Mohamed in a Witness Protection Program?

I previously speculated as to the whereabouts of Ali Mohamed. Over at the Able Danger Blog interviewed Peter Lance, author of Triple Cross, and asked him where he thinks Mohamed is now since has never been sentenced. Lance says:

...he did not think he was out on the street, but rather in "custodial witness protection" which means that he is behind bars in a federal prison somewhere, but still has the possibility of getting out at some time in the future if he cooperates...

vadkins
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Do You Know Who Ali S. Mohamed Is?

This post at the Able Danger Blog describes how National Geographic entered into a contract with investigative journalist, Peter Lance, to produce a documentary based on his book, Triple Cross. But National Geographic reneged on the deal well into the project:

They took a documentary based entirely on my work which was highly critical of the negligence of (FBI) agents like Cloonan and former AUSA Patrick Fitzgerald - currently the U.S. Attorney for Chicago and Special Prosecutor in the CIA leak case - and make it appear that they were somehow on top of the Ali Mohamed scandal.

The Ali Mohamed scandal? What is that? I really didn't know. So I spent a few hours reading about him in the New York Times archives (subscription required). Sure enough, what Peter Lance has written about this terrorist, Ali S. Mohamed, is confirmed by several articles in the Times, going back many years. I was going to write a timeline of Mohamed's life, but I found an excellent one in the San Francisco Chronicle here. Here are just a few amazing facts about the life of Ali S. Mohamed: he was born in 1952, served as an officer in the Egyptian military, moved to the US, served in the US military at Fort Bragg, was a member of Al Qaeda and an FBI informant, surveilled the US African Embassy buildings and was a conspirator in the bombings of the embassies, trained Osama bin Laden's body guards, was involved with the terrorists who bombed the World Trade Center in 1993, and more. Unbelievably, there is no record at this time that this terrorist has been sentenced for his crimes.

Here's Wikipedia:

"While he was subpoenad in Rahman's trial, Ali Mohammed was not arrested until years later — on 10 September 1998, when he attempted to flee to Egypt after being subpoenaed in the aftermath of the embassy bombings in Nairobi and Tanzania. After eight months of imprisonment without trial, Ali Mohammed entered a guilty plea in May 1999. What happened after that is unclear. The trial proceeded, but there is no record of any sentencing or even a conviction. As late as February 20, 2002, CBS News reported that "Mohammad pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing."[2] There has been no further news of his whereabouts, his sentencing, or whether he was released."

vadkins
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Violating the Military Code: Curt Weldon's Opponent Campaigning in Uniform

So who does Joe Sestak think he is? In what country does he think he's living? Looks like Sestak thinks he's in Cuba or some such. The new blog, Army of Curt, has the photo (along with the links). What a disgrace, pretty creepy actually:

Weldon's opponent Joe Sestak was caught red handed by the Delco Times campaigning in full military dress, a clear violation of the military code

Read the whole thing.

vadkins
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This Is What an Able Danger Chart Looked Like

Mike at Able Danger Blog has posted examples of charts that were probably generated by Raytheon's Genesis project. Go here to see one of these charts. Great reporting on Mike's part!

Technorati tags: Terrorist, 9-11, National Security, Mohammad Atta, Able Danger, Terrorism, Curt Weldon, Tony Shaffer

vadkins
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