:: NEWS COCKTAIL aka BlahBlahBlog ::

:: 4.10.2004 ::

:: Dubya & the 911 Probe ::

Bush's Pre-9/11 al-Qaida Memo Released

From an AP report
CRAWFORD, Texas - A document sent to President Bush before the Sept. 11 attacks cited recent intelligence of a possible al-Qaida plot to strike inside the United States. The White House released the document Saturday.

"Clandestine, foreign government, and media reports indicate Bin Laden since 1997 has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the US," the memo to Bush stated. Bin Laden implied in U.S. television interviews in 1997 and 1998 that his followers would follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and "bring the fighting to America."

The document, declassified Saturday, said that after President Clinton launched missile strikes on his base in Afghanistan in 1998, "bin Laden told followers he wanted to retaliate in Washington." The memo cited intelligence from another country, but the White House blacked out the name of the country.

Efforts to launch an attack from Canada around the time of "Y2K" "may have been part of bin Laden's frst serious attempt to implement a terrorist strike in the U.S." the document states.

Convicted plotter Ahmed Ressam has told the FBI that he conceived an attack at about the same time on Los Angeles International Airport by himself, but that bin Laden lieutenant Abu Zubaydah "encouraged him and helped facilitate the operation," the document said.

Al-Qaida members, some of them American citizens, had lived in or traveled to the United States for years, the memo said.

"The group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks," it warned.

The document said that "some of the more sensational threat reporting" - such as warnings that bin Laden wanted to hijack aircraft to win the release of fellow extremists" - could not be corroborated.

Since 1998, the FBI had observed "patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks." They included evidence of buildings in New York possibly being cased by terrorists.

A senior administration official said that incident involved two Yemeni men seen taking photos of Federal Plaza in Manhattan. The FBI interviewed the men and concluded they were tourists, the official said.

The document also said the CIA and FBI were investigating a call to the U.S. Embassy in the United Arab Emirates in May "saying that a group of Bin Ladin supporters was in the US planning attacks with explosives."

ALSO:
Sony Buys Movie Rights to Clarke's Book

NEW YORK - Former counterterrorism adviser Richard Clarke's best-selling book may soon be a movie. Sony Pictures Entertainment has purchased the film rights to "Against All Enemies," Sony vice chairwoman Amy Pascal told The New York Times for its Saturday editions.

In the best-selling book, Clarke, a counterterrorism adviser to the past three presidents, charges that the Bush administration prioritized Iraq above threats from al-Qaida before and after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

The movie version is to be produced by John Calley, the entertainment group's former chairman, who worked on the 1976 Watergate drama "All the President's Men" at Warner Brothers.

"You could shoot the first 56 pages and have an extraordinary half of a movie, then it goes on to more enthralling stuff," Calley told the Times. "If we were able to do `All the President's Men' with people meeting in garages and whispering in parks, then certainly with someone sitting at a table in the White House we could have a remarkable event."

Clarke retired in 2003 after 30 years in government and reiterated the claims made in his book during testimony before the bipartisan commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks.
Sony Pictures did not disclose terms of the deal.

posted by me

:: 6:43:00 PM [+] ::
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