Bush knew of hijack threat

[Shadedmuse]

This would explain why He was Out of D.C that moroning in Florida/New Orleans/Nebraska and No where near the targeted Cities. And they say Chretien is Corript, I would rather trust Jean and his 500 Beers in the Bush of southern Alberta then george.

U.S. President George W. Bush JR and his top advisers were informed by the CIA early last August that terrorists associated with Osama bin Laden had discussed the possibility of hijacking airplanes, according to reliable sources.

The information, given to Bush as part of his daily intelligence report, lacked specific details about how the terrorist plans would be carried out, the sources said.

The White House said Wednesday night that law enforcement agencies were quietly placed on alert as a result of the intelligence.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer confirmed Bush had been told about the possibility of hijackings but he declined to say what had been revealed during his intelligence briefings.

"There was . . . an awareness by the government, including the president, of Osama bin Laden and the threat he posed in the United States and around the world," Fleischer said. "That included long-standing speculation about hijacking in the traditional sense, but not involving suicide bombers using airplanes as missiles."

A CIA spokesman said the agency routinely passed on intelligence citing the possibility that al-Qaeda might be planning to hijack an airliner as part of a terrorist action against the United States. But a suicide attack involving an aircraft was never envisioned, the spokesman said.

The intelligence briefing on al-Qaeda hijackings, first reported Wednesday night by CBS News, marks the most detailed disclosure of what Bush was told about the possibility of terror attacks before Sept. 11.

It also represents a shift in the official version of events surrounding the attacks on New York City and Washington, which Bush and other administration officials have generally characterized as a sneak attack that could not have been foreseen by U.S. intelligence.

"It's hard to envision a plot so devious as the one that they pulled off on 9/11," Bush said in a January interview with NBC's Tom Brokaw. "Never did we realize the enemy was so well-organized."

The new information adds to the debate over whether more could have been done to halt the attacks. Congress is holding an inquiry into possible intelligence failures before the attacks.

The information provided to Bush was included as part of the president's daily briefing, a highly restricted classified document prepared by the CIA. The document is seen by only a handful of people, White House officials said: Bush, Vice-President Dick Cheney,

CIA director George Tenet, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and, less frequently, Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr.

Until now, the growing congressional scrutiny of possible warning signs before Sept. 11 has focused on the FBI's actions, including the bureau's handling of a memo written in July 2001 by an agent in Phoenix.

A senior U.S. official who has reviewed the classified memo said Wednesday the FBI agent had made a "strong connection" between a group of Middle Eastern aviation students he was investigating and bin Laden's al-Qaeda network. The link was included in the five-page memo sent to FBI headquarters two months before the attacks.

The agent was so concerned that he mentioned bin Laden in the first sentence of the memo, which suggested terrorists from al-Qaeda or other groups might be using flight schools to prepare for a hijacking or bombing plot, several officials said.

© Copyright 2002 Calgary Herald

[damian]

Are you seriously implying that he knew specifically that jets would be hijacked the morning of 9/11 and flown into government buildings so he got out of town???

[tat2]

Quote - "A CIA spokesman said the agency routinely passed on intelligence citing the possibility that al-Qaeda might be planning to hijack an airliner as part of a terrorist action against the United States. But a suicide attack involving an aircraft was NEVER envisioned, the spokesman said."

[davidnb]

The president gets a brief everyday on world events and possible threats. This would include certain events in some countries and of course threats to US. It appears he was advised of possible plane hijackings for possible use of releasing prisoners. Anyone who even remotely suggests that he knew what would happen on Sept11 would have to be crazy.

[condodweller]

I'm no fan of Shrub or his neo-con cronies, but I don't seriously think anyone in the White House, FBI or CIA knew exactly what was going to happen or when it would happen.
To this day, threats against the US continue to come in through various forms of US & International intelligence and they're now being told to the public. Again no specifics or exactly when such acts are going to happen.

[Shadedmuse]

Then Why Did Jr get out of Dodge? He knew he would be a sitting duck in D.C so he left and hid like the coward he is, rather then stay and prevent the attacks from happening. He is a Coward with a large C and should be branded a Coward with a C on his face like they did in the 1800's. He Avaided the draft by going AWOl in the Texas Guard.

[davidnb]

????

[BCTripster]

As soon as I heard Bush was president I said one thing "there's gonna be a war".

I doubt he had any knowledge that 9/11 was the day, so him being out of town is a considence.

But, I do believe the Bush family has ties to the folks who really run the globe, this is all about money and nothing brings on the spending like a good old war of some sorts.

I think the worst is yet to come myself, doesn't look like Peace on Earth is coming anytime soon that's for sure.

[damian]

You've got to be either trolling seriously deluded. What you are implying is just ludicrous.

[Shadedmuse]

When Bush Jr headed up in the white house I thought gee her comes the trade wars with Canada. remember it was Bush Sr who launched trade wars with Canada on Soft wood and Honda Cars made in Canada. and Bush Sr and Mulroney gave us NAFTA I miss Mulroney he was a better man then both Bushes combined.

[peternm22]

Muse,
Maybe the reason he wasn't in DC is because presidents travel... politicians travel... that's what they do. It's not as if him travelling to another part of the country is an unusual occurrance.

Peter

[**DONOTDELETE**]

Trolling in the park one day...

You can't seriously believe this clap trap can you? The US was caught completely by surprise on 9/11. Although they may have had indications of a hijacking, there was absolutely no information about the events that occured. The US felt secure before 9/11 and nothing could prove them otherwise. Until then, domestic terrorism played a much greater role in the threat profile.

Sheesh, Bush never travels unless he's running away? C'mon, get real.

[I_M_Norm_Al]

According to WABC Radio, there is a smoking gun. Bush had the plan to fight the Al Queda on his desk on Sept 9. Matthews on his MSNBC show said the same.

WABC Radio claims that on June 15; CSIS sent a memo to the FBI outlining money transfers, from money raised in Canada" from some Islamic "charity" in Ottawa to the Al Queda. With hindsight, we can see that CSIS that blew this as well, as Atta was using that Toronto print shop as Grand Central Station - for money and info transfers.

CSIS was following that terrorist owner of the print shop for years - yet these things were going on right under their noses.

So to me, all this extra money spent on "additional" security in North America is a big crock of bull. Both US & Canadian "Specialists" couldn't get it right at any cost.

Better to see what the French, Italians and Phillipians do to uncover these plots.

What a load of crap about the US Intelligence not believing that the Al Queda would use sucide bombers. How stupid are they or how stupid do they believe the public is?

Beruit - sucide truck bomb, Africa - suicide car bombs; USS Cole - suicide boaters

plus they knew that the 1992 Trade Center plot was only half done as the plan called for the truck bomb to go off in the basement at the same time as a plane hit the tower.

Incompetence - billions wasted, but the financiers of Bush's campaign got their reward - the new pipelines to the Black Sea and across Afghanistan

[Dede]

If you guys like conspiracy theories, have you heard about he new book that is out in France? From author Thierry Meyssan? It goes step by step about how there are too many missing pieces of information about the attacks (i.e. how come we've never actually seen a plane, or pieces of a plane at the Pentagon ? ) Also an Israely hi-tech company in one of the 2 towers sent an electronic alert to all the pagers in the building an hour before the attacks etc...

The points he makes are interesting (i didn't say I believe him!!) There's a reprint of an interview the author gave on French TV a bit more than a month ago, it's available here:

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/MEY204A.html (Give Alta Vista translator a go if you can't read french)

This site in english is also kinda fun, you have to find evidence of the Boeing crashing into the Pentagon:
http://www.asile.org/citoyens/numero13/pentagone/erreurs_en.htm

And of course, some don't agree with Meyssan:
http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins040902.asp

[Grunge]

Grow up !!! Your rantings are just plain ridiculous.

[howie14]

The real indictment in this case should be of the American intelligence community. No one seems to know what the other guy knows and, as a result, no two pieces of information can be put together so the actual scheme can be discerned.

As far as the Bush Administration goes, the current argument plays right into their hands. Of course Bush didn't have the information necessary to know what was going to happen on 9/11. If the argument is defined by those terms, Bush wins in the long run.

IMO, the real issue should be the vanity of this administration and its efforts to have us believe they never received any information of any kind. This is an arrogant administration which cannot ever admit to a mistake on anything.

Covering up the sketchy information they did have for the past eight months is the mistake they've made, not failing to put all the vague threats together prior to 9/11.

[**DONOTDELETE**]

This may sound bad but ever since the Gulf War, when I was 17, all I kept hearing was how bad the media was, how it distorts everything, how the US government filters everything, how the Canadian papers are pro-Liberal or anti-Liberal, you can't trust what you see on CNN, everyone is corrupt, Windows sucks, etc... I've skipped reading current events. Not entirely, just most of it as I just don't know who to trust. I do hear that the BBC is reputable but I digress.

I'm not surprised that the US Government knew of what was coming but obviously not 2 planes slamming into the WTC. It's pretty ludicrous to think that the US just sat there thinking they are invulnerable. Bush a coward? the way I see it, the President is always protected first so even if it wasn't a coincidence that he was out of town, it only means that the President has to be around to give commands.

Every day, the secret forces are looking at the world trying to protect us. And yes, their financial interests as well.

I got annoyed at the conspiracy nutbars claiming the luinar landing was faked, but the ones who say the whole 9/11 thing was done by the US government is completely absurd. "Yes, let's go kill +3,000 Americans and ruin New York and the travel industry just to start a war with radical Muslims. Stellar idea! I know, how about cracking open the Pentagon? Let's do that, too!" as opposed to when Clinton bombed Afghanistan back when people said it was just a diversion from Monica.

I haven't read it and I don't plan to, but I can already feel that the french book is absurd. "ou' est le Boeing?" Hello-o? It's the Pentagon. Like they're gonna just leave their fortress open to cameras.

[pauldryan]

Right on the money !!

Paul

[Ranger_Gord]

I personnally think that the CRTC and Heritage Canada are insidious communist Liberal plots, run from the grave by Pierre Elliot Trudeau, in order to turn us all into..............

............. and that explains why we can't rid ourselves of Mr. Teflon.

[Danks]

Who was the wise soul who first said "On the internet, no one knows you're an idiot?"

[Grunge]

You may be on to something Ranger /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

[Todd_Sandrock]

Or just "on something". /forums/images/icons/wink.gif

Todd

[Shadedmuse]

Now that comment is trolling. Trudeau was a great man, you need to say Sorry to Trudeau for those comments.

[howie14]

...and Margaret was a great woman.

On a related subject, do you think we'll ever see a two-part mini series called "Mulroney"?

[Dede]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr>

Trudeau was a great man

<hr></blockquote>
Is that a fact or an opinion? Looking at the cuts the feds are taking at my paycheck, I'm sure we can find a few people that don't think the financial mess he left us with is such a "great thing"! Or the Constitutional mess.... Anyway, no need to respond, I just wanted to point out that some may have a different opinion about the guy... carry on!

[Dede]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr>

I haven't read it and I don't plan to, but I can already feel that the french book is absurd. "ou' est le Boeing?" Hello-o? It's the Pentagon. Like they're gonna just leave their fortress open to cameras.

<hr></blockquote>
I think the point he's making is that he finds it odd that, according to the authorities, the Boeing was pulverised. That's supposed to explain why they couldn't show any plane debris from the site. Yet the only thing they did "find" was one of the black box.

[Satellite_Expert]

Keep listening to Art Bell. I'm sure that he'll have some expert on in 2006 or 2007 with the full story.

[Todd_Sandrock]

I don't know if I could buy Trudeau as a "great man", for a couple of reasons: 1. It was under his watch (and that of his Finance Minister Jean Chretien) that the death-sprial of deficit spending was begun. 2. He was a buuly.

In his favour, though 1. He had a view of a strong, unified Canada, and 2. He had vision.

In short, he was a benevolent dictator.

Today's Liberals still force their vision on us like he did, but their vision seems to be about reinforcement of policies that just happen to benefit industries owned by Liberal-friendly people and institutions, under the guise of Trudeau-esque pro-Canada policies. Cultural policies create a citizen-funded corporate welfare system for cultural industries. Buy-Canadian policies benefit certain aerospace manufacturers, often without their having to compete by tender.

All the Trudeau, but no calories. In short, patronage. At best, ambivalent dictatorship, at worst, malevolent dictatorship.

The Government in it's dictatorial arrogance flouts common rules of acquisition, and when people object, obfuscates and even rewards those who should have been in charge.

BTW, like I've said before, the opposition is just as guilty by ensuring that this system will stay in place forever by their refusal to stop vote-splitting and work in coalition.

[snoman]

Trudeau was a great man all right.
He took us from a surplus and strong currency to a huge deficit and a declining dollar.

[Big_Cheese]

But he gave us our own constitution that his former Justice Minister could sell to the highest bidder.

Did you hear that the owner of the Liberals favourite polling company decided to do his own poll on corruption. He figured the poll, that said 69% of Canadians thought politicians were corrupt, was bogus.

He decided to ask more concise questions. Well he was right: 43% of Canadians think the federal Liberals are corrupt.

Unfortunately true story.