William, if you do write such an article, here's the kind of stuff I'm talking about that more people need to know.
Late 1998-January 2001: The US permanently stations two submarines in the Indian Ocean, ready to hit al-Qaeda with cruise missiles on short notice. Six to ten hours advance warning is now needed to review the decision, program the cruise missiles and have them reach their target. On at least three occasions, spies in Afghanistan report bin Laden's location with information suggesting he would remain there for some time. Each time, Clinton approves the strike. Each time, CIA Director Tenet says the information is not reliable enough and the attack cannot go forward. (Washington Post, 12/19/01, New York Times, 12/30/01) The submarines are removed shortly after President Bush takes office (see Late January 2001 (B)).
August-September 2000: An unmanned spy plane called the Predator begins flying over Afghanistan, showing incomparably detailed real-time video and photographs of the movements of what appears to be bin Laden and his aides. Clinton is impressed by a two-minute video of bin Laden crossing a street heading toward a mosque. Bin Laden is surrounded by a team of a dozen armed men creating a professional forward security perimeter as he moves. The Predator had been used since 1996 in the Balkans, but its use is stopped in Afghanistan after a few trials when a Predator crashes. The White House presses ahead with a program to arm the Predator with a missile, but the effort is slowed by bureaucratic infighting between the Pentagon and the CIA over who would pay for the craft and who would have ultimate authority over its use. Officials say the dispute is not resolved until after 9/11. (New York Times, 12/30/01, Washington Post, 12/19/01) However, it is later reported that by May 2001, the Predator "proved ... that it could find and kill individuals." (Washington Post, 3/13/03) On September 15, 2001, CIA Director Tenet tells Bush, "The unmanned Predator surveillance aircraft that was now armed with Hellfire missiles had been operating for more than a year out of Uzbekistan to provide real-time video of Afghanistan." (Washington Post, 1/29/02) So someone is lying or mistaken about when the Predator was used and when it was armed.
December 20, 2000: Counter-terrorism expert Richard Clarke submits a plan to "roll back" al-Qaeda in response to the USS Cole bombing. The main component is a dramatic increase in covert action in Afghanistan to "eliminate the sanctuary" for bin Laden there. However, since there are only a few weeks left before the Bush administration takes over, it is decided to defer the decision to the new administration. However, one month later, the plan is rejected and no action is taken (see January 25, 2001).
January 25, 2001: Richard Clarke, National Security Council Chief of Counterterrorism and holdover from the Clinton administration, submits a proposal to the new administration for an attack on al-Qaeda in revenge of the USS Cole bombing. In the wake of that bombing, Bush stated on the campaign trail: "I hope that we can gather enough intelligence to figure out who did the act and take the necessary action ... there must be a consequence." According to the Washington Post: "Clarke argued that the camps were can't-miss targets, and they mattered. The facilities amounted to conveyor belts for al-Qaeda's human capital, with raw recruits arriving and trained fighters departing – either for front lines against the Northern Alliance, the Afghan rebel coalition, or against American interests somewhere else. The US government had whole libraries of images filmed over Tarnak Qila and its sister camp, Garmabat Ghar, 19 miles farther west. Why watch al-Qaeda train several thousand men a year and then chase them around the world when they left?" (Washington Post, 1/20/02) Clarke also warns that al-Qaeda sleeper cells in the US are a "major threat." Two days later, the US confirms the link between al-Qaeda and the USS Cole bombing. (PBS Frontline 10/3/02) No retaliation is taken on these camps until after 9/11. (Washington Post, 1/20/02)
January 31, 2001: The final report of the US Commission on National Security/21st Century, co-chaired by former Senators Gary Hart (D), and Warren Rudman (R) is issued (see also September 15, 1999). The bipartisan report was put together in 1998 by then-President Bill Clinton and then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich. The report has 50 recommendations on how to combat terrorism in the US, but all of them are ignored by the Bush Administration. Instead, the White House announces in May that it will have Vice President Cheney study the potential problem of domestic terrorism, despite the fact that this commission had just studied the issue for 2 1/2 years. According to Senator Hart, Congress was taking the commission's suggestions seriously, but then, "Frankly, the White House shut it down... The president said 'Please wait, we're going to turn this over to the vice president'... And so Congress moved on to other things, like tax cuts and the issue of the day." Interestingly, both this commission and the Bush Administration were already assuming a new cabinet level National Homeland Security Agency would be enacted eventually even as the general public remained unaware of the term and the concept. (Salon, 9/12/01, download the complete report here: USCNS Reports)
Late January 2001: The BBC later reports, "After the elections, (US intelligence) agencies (are) told to 'back off' investigating the Bin Ladens and Saudi royals, and that anger(s) agents." This follows previous orders to abandon an investigation of bin Laden relatives (see September 11, 1996), and difficulties in investigating Saudi royalty. (BBC, 11/6/01) FTW An unnamed "top-level CIA operative" says there is a "major policy shift" at the National Security Agency at this time. Osama bin Laden could still be investigated, but agents could not look too closely at how he got his money. (Best Democracy Money Can Buy, by Greg Palast, 2/03) Presumably one such investigation canceled is an investigation by the Chicago FBI into ties between Saudi multimillionaire Yassin al-Qadi and the US embassy bombings (see August 7, 1998) and other terrorist acts, because during this month an FBI agent is told that the case is being closed and that "it's just better to let sleeping dogs lie" (see October 1998). Reporter Greg Palast notes that President Clinton was already hindering investigations by protecting Saudi interests. But, as he puts it, "Where Clinton said, 'Go slow,' Bush policymakers said, 'No go.' The difference is between closing one eye and closing them both." (Best Democracy Money Can Buy, by Greg Palast, 2/03)
Late January 2001 (B): Even as US intelligence is given conclusive evidence that al-Qaeda is behind the USS Cole bombing (see January 25, 2001), the new Bush administration discontinues the covert deployment of cruise missile submarines and gunships on six-hour alert near Afghanistan's borders that had begun under President Clinton (see Late 1998-January 2001). The standby force gave Clinton the option of an immediate strike against targets in al-Qaeda's top leadership. The discontinuation makes a possible assassination of bin Laden much more difficult. (Washington Post, 1/20/02)
February 9, 2001: Vice President Cheney is briefed that it has been conclusively proven bin Laden was behind the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole (see October 12, 2000). Bush has been in office a matter of days, when secret pipeline negotiations with the Taliban have begun. The new administration has already twice threatened the Taliban that the US would hold the Taliban responsible for any al-Qaeda attack. But, fearful of ending those negotiations, the US does not retaliate against either the Taliban or known bin Laden bases in Afghanistan in the manner Clinton did in 1998. (Washington Post, 1/20/02)
March 7, 2001: The Russian Permanent Mission at the United Nations secretly submits "an unprecedentedly detailed report" to the UN Security Council about bin Laden, his whereabouts, details of his al-Qaeda network, Afghan drug running, and Taliban connections in Pakistan. The report provides "a listing of all bin Laden's bases, his government contacts and foreign advisors," and enough information to potentially kill him. The US fails to act. Alex Standish, the editor of the highly respected Jane's Intelligence Review, concludes that the attacks of 9/11 were less of an American intelligence failure and more the result of "a political decision not to act against bin Laden." (Jane's Intelligence Review, 10/5/01)
March 8, 2001: The United Nations and the European Union direct their members to freeze the assets of some al-Qaeda leaders, including Sa'd Al-Sharif, bin Laden's brother-in-law and the head of his finances, but the US does not do so (see UN list). Their assets are finally frozen by the US after 9/11 (see October 12, 2001). (Guardian, 10/13/01)
April 2001 (C): Ahmed Shah Massoud, leader of the Northern Alliance fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, has been trying to get aid from the US, but his people are only allowed to meet with low level US officials. In an attempt to get his message across, he addresses the European Parliament: "If President Bush doesn't help us, these terrorists will damage the US and Europe very soon." (Time, 8/4/02)
June 2001 (F): The US considers aiding Ahmed Shah Massoud and his Northern Alliance movement. As one counter-terrorism official put it, "You keep (al-Qaeda terrorists) on the front lines in Afghanistan. Hopefully you're killing them in the process, and they're not leaving Afghanistan to plot terrorist operations." A former US special envoy to the Afghan resistance visits Massoud this month. Massoud gives him "all the intelligence he had on al-Qaeda" in the hopes of getting some support in return. But he gets nothing more than token amounts, and his organization isn't even given "legitimate resistance movement" status. (Time, 8/4/02)
June 3, 2001: This is one of only two dates that Bush's national security leadership meets formally to discuss terrorism. This group, made up of the National Security Adviser, CIA Director, Defense Secretary, Secretary of State, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and others, met around 100 times before 9/11 to discuss a variety of topics, but apparently rarely terrorism. In wake of these reports, the White House "aggressively defended the level of attention, given only scattered hints of al-Qaeda activity." This lack of discussion stands in sharp contrast to the Clinton administration and public comments by the Bush administration. For instance, in January 2001 Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger told his replacement Rice: "I believe that the Bush Administration will spend more time on terrorism generally, and on al-Qaeda specifically, than any other subject." (Time, 8/4/02) Bush said in February 2001: "I will put a high priority on detecting and responding to terrorism on our soil." A few weeks earlier, Tenet had told Congress, "The threat from terrorism is real, it is immediate, and it is evolving." (AP, 6/28/02)
Summer 2001 (G): Supposedly, since 1997 there are only fourteen fighter planes on active alert to defend the continental US. But in the months before 9/11, rather than increase the number, the Pentagon was planning to reduce the number still further. Just after 9/11, the Los Angeles Times reported, "While defense officials say a decision had not yet been made, a reduction in air defenses had been gaining currency in recent months among task forces assigned by (Defense Secretary) Rumsfeld to put together recommendations for a reassessment of the military." By comparison, in the Cold War atmosphere of the 1950s, the US had thousands of fighters on alert throughout the US. (Los Angeles Times, 9/15/01 (B)) Also during this time, FAA officials try to dispense with "primary" radars altogether, so that if a plane were to turn its transponder off, no radar could see it. NORAD rejects the proposal. (Aviation Week and Space Technology, 6/3/02)
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What you see above is worse than doing nothing - Bush actually rolled back many of the positive things Clinton had done, stopping the Predator missile, cancelling the submarines, stopping investigations, and so on.
Here's some more on the Predator I haven't added yet:
By early 2001, Clarke and a handful of counter-terrorism specialists at the C.I.A. had learned of an Air Force plan to arm the Predator. The original plan called for three years of tests. Clarke and the others pushed so hard that the plane was ready in three months. In tests, the craft worked surprisingly well. In the summer of 2001, an armed Predator destroyed a model of bin Laden’s house which had been built in the Nevada desert. But Clarke said, “Every time we were ready to use it, the C.I.A. would change its mind. The real motivation within the C.I.A., I think, is that some senior people below Tenet were saying, ‘It’s fine to kill bin Laden, but we want to do it in a way that leaves no fingerprints. Otherwise, C.I.A. agents all over the world will be subject to assassination themselves.’ They also worried that something would go wrong—they’d blow up a convent and get blamed.”
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?030804fa_fact http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-06-25-drones-osama_x.htm http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A30061-2002Oct1.htmlThe above last article also contains more on the obstructionism Clinton faced, which sounds like borderline treason to me:
Shelton, the authors write, returned with a detailed briefing on why a raid by Special Forces could not work. The authors contend that Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, chief of U.S. Central Command, was the principal obstacle to putting "boots on the ground" in Afghanistan. Though Clinton and his top advisers believed otherwise, Simon and Benjamin write, neither the Joint Staff nor Central Command did any "formal planning for a mission to capture the al Qaeda leadership."
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Telling Clinton you drew up plans when in fact you did no such thing? What the fu..?