Pentagon blocking September 11 inquiry: senator
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican chairman of the Senate judiciary committee accused the Pentagon on Wednesday of stonewalling an inquiry into claims that the U.S. military identified four September 11 hijackers more than a year before the 2001 attacks.
The Defense Department barred several witnesses from testifying at a judiciary committee hearing and instead sent a top-level official who could provide little information on al Qaeda-related intelligence uncovered by a secret military team code-named Able Danger.
"That looks to me like it may be obstruction of the committee's activities, something we will have to determine," said the panel's chairman, Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.
Specter also complained that the Pentagon delivered hundreds of pages of documents related to Able Danger late on the eve of the hearing, giving his committee staff no time to review the material.
"The American people are entitled to some answers," Specter said. "It is not a matter of attaching blame. It is a matter of correcting errors so that we don't have a repetition of 9/11."
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the Pentagon considered Able Danger to be a classified matter and declined to participate when the judiciary committee chose to hold an open hearing.
"We have to obey the laws with respect to security classifications," Rumsfeld told reporters.
Witnesses barred from testifying included military intelligence officers and analysts involved in Able Danger, a now defunct operation that used powerful computers to sift through public data in search of intelligence clues.
People involved with the operation have said that Able Danger identified September 11 ringleader Mohamed Atta and three other hijackers as being members of an al Qaeda cell in the early months of 2000.
The Defense Department barred several witnesses from testifying at a judiciary committee hearing and instead sent a top-level official who could provide little information on al Qaeda-related intelligence uncovered by a secret military team code-named Able Danger.
"That looks to me like it may be obstruction of the committee's activities, something we will have to determine," said the panel's chairman, Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.
Specter also complained that the Pentagon delivered hundreds of pages of documents related to Able Danger late on the eve of the hearing, giving his committee staff no time to review the material.
"The American people are entitled to some answers," Specter said. "It is not a matter of attaching blame. It is a matter of correcting errors so that we don't have a repetition of 9/11."
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the Pentagon considered Able Danger to be a classified matter and declined to participate when the judiciary committee chose to hold an open hearing.
"We have to obey the laws with respect to security classifications," Rumsfeld told reporters.
Witnesses barred from testifying included military intelligence officers and analysts involved in Able Danger, a now defunct operation that used powerful computers to sift through public data in search of intelligence clues.
People involved with the operation have said that Able Danger identified September 11 ringleader Mohamed Atta and three other hijackers as being members of an al Qaeda cell in the early months of 2000.
posted by _H_ at 4:18 am
4 Comments:
As much as I would love to know what the hell is going on... I have to say I was surprised to even hear anything about this. I can see from here that there are massive security implications.
But still... give me something, right now its like the cat is half way out of the bag already.
I think thats is the point that i see
if the US government had given 100 % to catching osama etc then this should be a fair and open subject now ,
it is not , and it may well be many years before the people of the US get the FULL story of what did or did not happen
The GOP Specter still saying it's about correcting errors, not blame? So its just another 'institutional failure'?
When will he realize that the mountain of 'institutional failures' this administration has never occurred before? When will they realize that with so many errors to correct, it's still proof positive that somebody is either steering the ship to the rocks, or asleep at the helm? In either case, it adds up to BLAME?
very true Nostradamnthem
in my view it is history itself that will define the blame , and i think history will be very hard
any kind of present responsibilty is just a hopefull dream
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