A Bob Woodward excerpt from a few days back contained a shocker - DCI George Tenet briefed Condoleeza Rice about a dire terror threat on July 10, 2001 and not only did Condi give him the brush-off, but the meeting was not reported to the 9/11 Commission.
I was skeptical at the first report, but now the Times arrives firing the big guns (but read past the ominous headline):
Records Show Tenet Briefed Rice on Al Qaeda Threat
JIDDA, Saudi Arabia, Oct. 2 — A review of White House records has determined that George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, did brief Condoleezza Rice and other top officials on July 10, 2001, about the looming threat from Al Qaeda, a State Department spokesman said Monday.
The account by Sean McCormack came hours after Ms. Rice, the secretary of state, told reporters aboard her airplane that she did not recall the specific meeting on July 10, 2001, noting that she had met repeatedly with Mr. Tenet that summer about terrorist threats. Ms. Rice, the national security adviser at the time, said it was “incomprehensible” she ignored dire terrorist threats two months before the Sept. 11 attacks.
Mr. McCormack also said records show that the Sept. 11 commission was informed about the meeting, a fact that former intelligence officials and members of the commission confirmed on Monday.
...
Officials now agree that on July 10, 2001, Mr. Tenet and his counterterrorism deputy, J. Cofer Black, were so alarmed about an impending Al Qaeda attack that they demanded an emergency meeting at the White House with Ms. Rice and her National Security Council staff.
According to two former intelligence officials, Mr. Tenet told those assembled at the White House about the growing body of intelligence the Central Intelligence Agency had collected pointing to an impending Al Qaeda attack. But both current and former officials took issue with Mr. Woodward’s account that Mr. Tenet and his aides left the meeting in frustration, feeling as if Ms. Rice had ignored them.
Mr. Tenet told members of the Sept. 11 commission about the July 10 meeting when they interviewed him in early 2004, but committee members said the former C.I.A. director never indicated he had left the White House with the impression that he had been ignored.
“Tenet never told us that he was brushed off,” said Richard Ben-Veniste, a Democratic member of the commission. “We certainly would have followed that up.”
Mr. McCormack said the records showed that, far from ignoring Mr. Tenet’s warnings, Ms. Rice acted on the intelligence and requested that Mr. Tenet make the same presentation to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Atttorney General John Ashcroft.
But Mr. Ashcroft said by telephone on Monday evening that he never received a briefing that summer from Mr. Tenet.
“Frankly, I’m disappointed that I didn’t get that kind of briefing,” he said. “I’m surprised he didn’t think it was important enough to come by and tell me.”
Ben-Veniste is normally a reliable Dem attack dog, so if he is not backing this, forget it.
I think the facts are enough to criticize Condi's effort that summer - no need to make stuff up.
UPDATE: Jonathion Landay et al of the McClatchy News Service round out the laugh track, complete with scary headline unsupported by the text:
Rumsfeld, Ashcroft received warning of al Qaida attack before 9/11
By JONATHAN S. LANDAY, WARREN P. STROBEL and JOHN WALCOTT
McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and former Attorney General John Ashcroft received the same CIA briefing about an imminent al-Qaida strike on an American target that was given to the White House two months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
The State Department's disclosure Monday that the pair was briefed within a week after then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was told about the threat on July 10, 2001, raised new questions about what the Bush administration did in response, and about why so many officials have claimed they never received or don't remember the warning.
Questions have been raised!
Later Ashcroft denies all knowledge:
Ashcroft, who resigned as attorney general on Nov. 9, 2004, told the Associated Press on Monday that it was "disappointing" that he never received the briefing, either.
And here comes what mihgt be some weaseling:
David Ayres, who was Ashcroft's chief of staff at the Justice Department, said that the former attorney general also has no recollection of a July 17, 2001, terrorist threat briefing. Later, Ayres said that Ashcroft could recall only a July 5 briefing on threats to U.S. interests abroad.
He said Ashcroft doesn't remember any briefing that summer that indicated that al-Qaida was planning to attack within the United States.
The CIA briefing didn't provide the exact timing or nature of a possible attack, nor did it predict whether it was likely to take place in the United States or overseas, said three former senior intelligence officials.
Ahh! Well, if he forgot the briefing because it didn't cite a threat to the US, that is understandable.
But the 9/11 Commission does remember!
Nor is it clear why the 9/11 commission never reported the briefing, which the intelligence officials said Tenet outlined to commission members Ben-Veniste and Zelikow in secret testimony at CIA headquarters. The State Department confirmed that the briefing materials were "made available to the 9/11 Commission, and Director Tenet was asked about this meeting when interviewed by the 9/11 Commission."
The three former senior intelligence officials, however, said Tenet raised the matter with the panel himself, displayed slides from the PowerPoint presentation and offered to testify on the matter in public.
Ben-Veniste confirmed to McClatchy Newspapers that Tenet outlined for the 9/11 commission the July 10 briefing to Rice in secret testimony in January 2004. He referred questions about why the commission omitted any mention of the briefing in its report to Zelikow, the report's main author. Zelikow didn't respond to e-mail and telephone queries from McClatchy Newspapers.
Zelikow does have a friendly past (and present) with Rice, but why is everyone else, particularly Ben-Veniste, playing along? My guess - this briefing was just as memorable as Tenet would like to remember it.
EVERYTHING NEW IS OLD AGAIN: Apparently Woodward's scoop about a special July meeting was first aired in a discredited TIME story from August 2002:
In mid-July, Tenet sat down for a special meeting with Rice and aides. "George briefed Condi that there was going to be a major attack," says an official; another, who was present at the meeting, says Tenet broke out a huge wall chart ("They always have wall charts") with dozens of threats. Tenet couldn't rule out a domestic attack but thought it more likely that al-Qaeda would strike overseas. One date already worrying the Secret Service was July 20, when Bush would arrive in Genoa for the G-8 summit; Tenet had intelligence that al-Qaeda was planning to attack Bush there. The Italians, who had heard the same report (the way European intelligence sources tell it, everyone but the President's dog "knew" an attack was coming) put frogmen in the harbor, closed airspace around the town and ringed it with antiaircraft guns.
But nothing happened. After Genoa, says a senior intelligence official, there was a collective sigh of relief: "A lot of folks started letting their guard down."
THE WAPO JOINS IN (And smites Woodward's version - emphasis added):
Former CIA director George Tenet told the 9/11 Commission that he had warned of an imminent threat from al-Qaeda in a July 2001 meeting with Condoleezza Rice, adding that he believed Rice took the warning seriously, according to a transcript of the interview and the recollection of a commissioner who was there.
Tenet's statements to the commission in January 2004 confirm the outlines of an event in a new book by Washington Post Assistant Managing Editor Bob Woodward that has been disputed by some Bush administration officials. But the testimony also is at odds with Woodward's depiction of Tenet and former CIA counterterrorism chief J. Cofer Black as being frustrated that "they were not getting through to Rice" after the July 10, 2001, meeting.
...
Members of the commission -- an independent, bipartisan panel created by Congress to investigate the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks -- have said for days that they were not told about the July 10 meeting and were angry at being left out. As recently as yesterday afternoon, both commission chairman Thomas H. Kean and vice chairman Lee Hamilton said they believed the panel had not been told about the July 10 meeting.
But it turns out that the panel was, in fact, told about the meeting, according to the interview transcript and Democratic commission member Richard Ben-Veniste, who sat in on the interview with Tenet. The meeting was not identified by the July 10 date in the commission's best-selling report.
Having just read a novelized treatment of the pre 9/11 period involved, Colin Mackinnon's Morning Spy, Evening Spy,one
is reminded that the Phoenix memo, was
generated the same day as that meeting.
There are other details, that seeming
fool, Moussaoui, was a representative for
Yazid Sufaat, the Malayan businessman who
sponsored the Al Queda get-together that
should have kept Al Hazmi and Al Midhar out of the country. Woodward's,weighty tome, is
as that line about Oakland: there's no there, there. The detailsbehind the
'secret briefing' were a series of NSA intercepts that contained no specifics.
There is some details, that have not leaked
out surprisingly, is the Rihad Massoud
(aide to Prince Bandar)which indicated aspects of the Londonbombing, six monthes before it happened. There's much imput from
Armitage, you see how much that's worth,
Powell, et al. There's practically no Plame
details; which is a relief.
Posted by: narciso | October 04, 2006 at 09:41 PM
BBBBBBBBBWWWWWWWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!
You righty kooks make me laugh!! Hastert is toast, Reynolds top aid resigned today and threw Big Denny under a truck as he left. Hastert is holding a news conference is Chicago tomorrow and odds are that he is resigning.
You thugs and morons are completely and utterly fucked! Welcome to The October Surprise; this time it's ours, and you are taking up the ass. Enjoy it.
Posted by: Chris Finney, Esq. | October 05, 2006 at 12:22 AM