The Tucker Carlson Show - October 07, 2025


The 9⧸11 Files： They Could Have Stopped It ｜ Ep 3


Episode Stats

Length

23 minutes

Words per Minute

159.1946

Word Count

3,687

Sentence Count

255

Hate Speech Sentences

14


Summary

CIA Director George Tenet said in summer of 2001, quote, the system was blinking red . FAA issued a circular to airlines warning of heightened increase in hijackings . NORAD simulated a foreign hijacked airliner crashing into a building in the United States as part of a training exercise . 9-11 Commission report says George W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice had ample warning that al-Qaeda was plotting an attack .


Transcript

00:00:00.240 The Bush administration did everything it possibly could to undermine an actual investigation into what happened on September 11th.
00:00:08.240 But why? What were they trying to hide?
00:00:10.640 There's an old saying in Tennessee, I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee, that says,
00:00:14.880 Fool me once, shame on, shame on you.
00:00:24.060 If you fool me, we can't get fooled again.
00:00:25.860 Well, for one thing, the United States had incredible intelligence on bin Laden and his plans, precise intelligence, actionable intelligence.
00:00:33.640 On August 6th, 2001, President Bush received a presidential daily briefing.
00:00:38.780 Its title, literally, Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.
00:00:43.660 It continued, Al-Qaeda members, including some who are U.S. citizens, have resided in or traveled to the U.S. for years,
00:00:50.840 and the group apparently maintains a support structure that could aid attacks.
00:00:54.820 And then it added this.
00:00:56.840 FBI information indicates patterns of suspicious activity consistent with preparations for hijacking.
00:01:03.380 Bin Laden was mentioned no fewer than 40 times in the president's daily intelligence briefing.
00:01:08.240 CIA Director George Tenet said that in the summer of 2001, quote, the system was blinking red.
00:01:14.880 So how far-fetched was it that Al-Qaeda might hijack airplanes and fly them into buildings?
00:01:20.320 Not very far-fetched, it turns out.
00:01:22.100 In May 2001, an intelligence report concluded this.
00:01:26.860 Operatives may hijack airplanes, end quote.
00:01:29.580 The FAA issued a circular to airlines warning of heightened increase in hijackings.
00:01:34.920 And then in July of 2001, the FAA issued another circular, this one noting that, quote,
00:01:40.820 currently active terror groups were known to plan and train for hijackings and were able to build and conceal explosives and luggage.
00:01:49.900 Between 1999 and 2001, NORAD, which defends North American airspace, simulated a foreign hijacked airliner crashing into a building in the United States as part of a training exercise.
00:02:01.220 And they were not alone.
00:02:03.020 The National Reconnaissance Office, a little-known intelligence agency that runs our spy satellites and remote-controlled surveillance planes,
00:02:09.640 was planning an exercise in which an errant aircraft would crash into one of its buildings.
00:02:15.200 That exercise was on September 11, 2001, and planned to take place just a couple of miles from Dulles Airport.
00:02:22.700 That's where the American Airlines flight number 77 had taken off before it crashed into the Pentagon.
00:02:28.780 In other words, the idea of al-Qaeda hijacking an airplane and flying into a building was entirely plausible before 9-11.
00:02:37.380 Officials knew it could happen, and there were other signs as well.
00:02:40.660 During the presidential transition in 2000 and 2001, nine months before 9-11,
00:02:45.420 Bill Clinton told President Bush,
00:02:47.780 I think by far your greatest threat is bin Laden and al-Qaeda.
00:02:52.740 In January of 2001, Philip Zelicow, the future executive director of the 9-11 Commission,
00:02:58.940 attended a briefing in which Condoleezza Rice, the future national security advisor,
00:03:03.300 was warned by Sandy Berger, that would be Bill Clinton's outgoing national security advisor,
00:03:08.600 that, quote,
00:03:09.340 the biggest national security threat facing this country is al-Qaeda.
00:03:12.980 On July 10, 2001, the CIA director, George Tenet, and his counterterrorism deputy,
00:03:18.280 Jay Kofor Black, were so alarmed by intelligence pointing to an impending attack by al-Qaeda
00:03:23.320 that they demanded an emergency meeting at the White House with Condoleezza Rice and her Security Council staff.
00:03:29.520 In fact, on the morning of the attacks,
00:03:32.280 director of central intelligence, Tenet, told a U.S. senator,
00:03:35.260 quote,
00:03:35.500 I wonder if it has anything to do with this guy taking pilot training.
00:03:39.560 And of course it did.
00:03:40.400 By any measure, including according to the heavily biased commission report,
00:03:45.380 George W. Bush, and particularly Condoleezza Rice,
00:03:49.000 had ample warning that al-Qaeda was plotting an attack.
00:03:52.240 And by all accounts, the U.S. intel agencies were fully aware the hijackers were in the United States.
00:03:57.640 And in fact, it helped at least two of them get to the United States.
00:04:01.280 U.S. intelligence was so strong at the time, on the morning of the attacks,
00:04:04.980 the majority of the hijackers were flagged at the airport for additional screening.
00:04:10.320 The question is, how did they wind up on the watch list in the first place?
00:04:14.280 The report never tells us.
00:04:15.780 Well, my name is Mike Scheuer.
00:04:18.680 I worked at the CIA for 22 years.
00:04:22.200 And from 1995 until 1999, I was chief of the Osama bin Laden unit.
00:04:27.980 I would say it was 1983 to 1992.
00:04:33.160 I worked on Afghanistan.
00:04:35.980 I worked on the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan.
00:04:40.940 Bin Laden was a popular name during the war against the Soviets.
00:04:44.300 We knew he was fighting in Afghanistan with the Mujahideen.
00:04:49.320 He was the poster boy for jihad in Saudi Arabia.
00:04:53.260 So he was well-known throughout the Arab world.
00:04:55.820 Osama bin Laden was born in 1957 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, into a well-connected and wealthy family.
00:05:01.820 He was one of 50 siblings.
00:05:03.620 His father built a multi-billion-dollar construction business,
00:05:06.460 reconstructing, among other things, the cities of Mecca and Medina.
00:05:09.620 In 1979, Osama bin Laden moved to Afghanistan to fight the Soviet invasion there.
00:05:14.500 After the war, he returned to Saudi Arabia.
00:05:16.520 But he was eventually exiled to Sudan because he was openly critical of the Saudi government's close ties to the United States.
00:05:22.940 In 1996, he returned to Afghanistan and declared war on the U.S.
00:05:26.960 In 1996, bin Laden announced what he said was his declaration of war against the United States.
00:05:35.380 And it's a very compelling document to this day because it doesn't have anything to do
00:05:41.180 with what the American people were told about either Islam or al-Qaeda or Osama bin Laden.
00:05:48.200 America was targeted for attack because we're the brightest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world.
00:05:53.980 The basis of the declaration of war from him was, get out of our land.
00:05:59.280 That was a compelling message within a Middle Eastern framework that had been dominated by
00:06:05.140 the United States government and the Israelis since the end of World War II.
00:06:10.160 Since then, the United States has been repeatedly attacked in the region.
00:06:13.720 Now the fanatics behind this bomb have given the French soldiers and their American counterparts
00:06:18.400 10 days to leave Lebanon or die.
00:06:20.820 In 1983, a group called Islamic Jihad murdered more than 300 U.S. Marines at a military barracks in Beirut.
00:06:28.000 At the time, it was the largest non-nuclear explosion since Nagasaki.
00:06:32.020 The four-story concrete building collapsed in a pile of rubble.
00:06:35.560 More than 200 of the sleeping men were killed in that one hideous, insane attack.
00:06:39.800 In 1993, a Pakistani national called Ramzi Youssef bombed the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan.
00:06:45.620 The key question now, was this a one-off attack or the start of a campaign of bombing?
00:06:51.660 By 1996, al-Qaeda had emerged as the single clearest threat to the United States.
00:06:56.900 In response to that threat, the CIA created something called ALEC Station,
00:07:00.640 otherwise known as the bin Laden unit, which Mike Scheuer ran.
00:07:03.880 But as it turned out, not everyone at the CIA wanted to help fight al-Qaeda.
00:07:07.980 We wanted some basic information about Osama bin Laden, his bank accounts, his health information, his educational information, very basic things.
00:07:19.340 We kept sending a message because it was important.
00:07:23.080 We were building a base of data.
00:07:25.120 And so the COS in Saudi Arabia at the time, John Brennan, we didn't know if he was dealing with them on the issue or not.
00:07:36.060 And so we finally sent a message that said, didn't say pretty please, but said, please do this as quickly as possible.
00:07:44.960 He called Tenant.
00:07:47.820 And that was the end of that.
00:07:52.060 Don't send Brennan any more of these notes.
00:07:55.500 So whatever the reason was, I don't know.
00:07:59.760 But, you know, if you identify a liaison service who you know has information you need,
00:08:06.980 it's not impossible to persuade them to do it since we defend Saudi Arabia, especially in that case.
00:08:14.040 We were told not to send any more cables on that issue to Riyadh.
00:08:18.380 Just because I was the chief of operations on Osama bin Laden didn't mean there wasn't somebody else working on the same issue in an opposite direction.
00:08:26.980 And as it turned out, the opposite direction carried the day with the approval of presidents.
00:08:34.180 As Brennan was withholding critical information on bin Laden,
00:08:37.880 the CIA's counterterrorism center started developing a plan to capture bin Laden at a terrorist training facility known as Tarnak Farms.
00:08:45.620 Tarnak Farms is where he lived.
00:08:47.880 We knew Osama bin Laden, his family, Zawahiri's family,
00:08:54.680 and a couple of other, the most senior al-Qaeda people were going to be there.
00:09:00.380 And initially the administration went along with it.
00:09:03.620 The plan was finalized with the help of friendly Afghan tribal leaders.
00:09:07.340 It was even rehearsed twice in the United States in late 1997.
00:09:10.700 All it needed was approval from the White House.
00:09:13.900 On March 7, 1998, Richard Clark, who headed the Interagency Counterterrorism Security Group,
00:09:19.500 described the plan as embryonic to then-National Security Advisor Sandy Berger,
00:09:24.260 even as the CIA was conducting its third rehearsal of the action.
00:09:29.460 Military officers in the Pentagon reviewed the plan,
00:09:32.480 and despite some mild misgivings that could have been attributed to interdepartmental rivalries,
00:09:37.100 they generally expressed their satisfaction.
00:09:39.700 They supported it.
00:09:40.860 Legal justifications were prepared in advance from the CIA to the NSC for approval.
00:09:45.680 The Attorney General of the United States, the FBI director,
00:09:48.520 and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York,
00:09:50.980 where bin Laden was to be tried if he was captured alive,
00:09:53.920 were all briefed on the plan.
00:09:55.560 The CIA ran a fourth rehearsal between May 20th and May 24th,
00:09:59.980 with the expectation that the plan would be executed in late June of that year,
00:10:04.020 and no later than late July.
00:10:05.580 And yet, less than a week later,
00:10:08.100 the CIA's assets in the field were informed that the operation
00:10:11.160 had been suspended by the Clinton administration.
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00:11:49.120 When we wrote the operational plan,
00:11:52.880 you have to keep in mind,
00:11:55.440 speaking to the policymaker,
00:11:57.180 you have to keep in mind
00:11:58.360 that they have their families there.
00:12:03.320 And if there is violence,
00:12:05.380 if they don't surrender,
00:12:06.480 they're liable to be people killed.
00:12:09.860 Noncombatants.
00:12:10.860 They said, okay, we'll go ahead with it.
00:12:12.660 So that one went almost to the starting gate,
00:12:18.500 and one of the last dumps of overhead imagery we got
00:12:23.340 happened to show a child swing set,
00:12:28.320 and they suddenly said, oh, we can't do that.
00:12:30.800 What if that picture gets out,
00:12:32.000 and we, you know, we'll be responsible.
00:12:34.080 A clear pattern emerged throughout
00:12:36.080 Shoyer's tenure at Alec Station.
00:12:38.060 Whenever there was a chance to kill or capture
00:12:40.520 Osama bin Laden,
00:12:41.660 the Clinton administration chose not to do it.
00:12:44.000 We had an operation that was planned
00:12:46.000 to kidnap bin Laden within Afghanistan.
00:12:50.260 The plan was supposed to unfold
00:12:52.280 just days before al-Qaeda
00:12:53.860 bombed the American embassies
00:12:55.420 in Kenya and Tanzania.
00:12:56.820 It was a plan that required
00:12:59.520 getting him out of the country
00:13:02.500 and then taking him to another country.
00:13:04.840 And it was approved,
00:13:06.840 and then it was, at the last minute,
00:13:08.700 it was unapproved.
00:13:10.280 And then a week later, the embassies went up.
00:13:12.700 The greatest fear tonight
00:13:13.840 is that what has happened here
00:13:15.580 will herald some alarming new phase
00:13:18.100 in international terrorism.
00:13:20.540 About four o'clock in the morning,
00:13:22.240 George Tenet, who was the DCI at the time,
00:13:25.640 calls my office number,
00:13:26.620 and I pick it up and said,
00:13:27.680 yep, Shoyer.
00:13:29.160 I said, yeah.
00:13:30.460 And somebody else put him on
00:13:32.780 and he said,
00:13:35.820 can we revive that program?
00:13:37.240 The president wants to know
00:13:38.180 if we can revive the program
00:13:39.720 on the capture operation.
00:13:42.020 By Tenet's words,
00:13:43.280 realized they missed an opportunity
00:13:44.740 perhaps to stop the operation.
00:13:46.940 But that got to be a habit
00:13:49.740 throughout the rest of my career there.
00:13:51.840 Less than two weeks after the attacks,
00:13:54.260 Clinton launched cruise missiles
00:13:55.620 at targets he said
00:13:56.800 were associated with bin Laden.
00:13:58.000 Today, I ordered our armed forces
00:13:59.580 to strike at terrorist-related facilities
00:14:01.960 in Afghanistan and Sudan.
00:14:04.160 Our mission was clear.
00:14:06.440 To strike at the network
00:14:07.720 of radical groups
00:14:08.800 affiliated with
00:14:09.920 and funded by
00:14:11.060 Osama bin Laden.
00:14:12.440 But the strike was worthless.
00:14:14.880 In fact, it was embarrassing.
00:14:16.940 The Pentagon targeted
00:14:17.800 suspected terrorist training facilities
00:14:19.600 in Afghanistan
00:14:20.280 and a pharmaceutical factory in Sudan,
00:14:22.940 which U.S. intelligence falsely claimed
00:14:24.860 was making chemical weapons.
00:14:26.440 The pattern became clearer over time.
00:14:28.720 The CIA would offer a way
00:14:30.060 to capture or kill bin Laden
00:14:31.600 and then somebody would call off
00:14:33.100 the strike at the last moment.
00:14:34.360 To me, it's a mystery.
00:14:35.960 To me, going after Osama bin Laden
00:14:39.360 was hard work,
00:14:40.900 but it could have been accomplished
00:14:42.580 by 97.
00:14:44.160 And then from 97
00:14:45.220 till I left in 99,
00:14:46.620 there were 10 more opportunities.
00:14:48.460 And none of them
00:14:49.240 were taken advantage.
00:14:50.540 Kill, capture,
00:14:51.580 whatever the government wanted to do.
00:14:53.200 And the chances kept coming.
00:14:54.780 In May of 1999,
00:14:56.180 U.S. intelligence services
00:14:57.300 had a credible lead
00:14:58.300 that bin Laden was at his compound
00:14:59.780 near Kandahar, Afghanistan.
00:15:01.700 Officials in both the U.S. military
00:15:03.500 and the CIA agreed
00:15:04.960 this was the best opportunity
00:15:06.700 they could hope for
00:15:07.340 to kill bin Laden.
00:15:08.420 They had at least
00:15:09.300 three opportunities to strike,
00:15:11.280 but they never did.
00:15:12.700 Somebody got wet feet.
00:15:14.340 Schoyer was removed from his role
00:15:15.900 running Alex Station in 1999.
00:15:18.500 He was replaced
00:15:19.160 with a figure called Richard Blee,
00:15:21.200 who barely comes up
00:15:22.380 in the 9-11 commission report.
00:15:23.860 On October 12, 2000,
00:15:25.800 the failure to act in bin Laden
00:15:27.160 caught up to the agency
00:15:28.480 and with our country
00:15:29.740 when the USS Cole,
00:15:31.480 a destroyer anchored
00:15:32.400 in Aden, Yemen,
00:15:33.860 was attacked
00:15:34.420 by a suicide bomber.
00:15:35.720 Killed 17 soldiers
00:15:37.100 on the USS Cole.
00:15:38.700 17 American servicemen died,
00:15:41.160 but this time,
00:15:42.140 the government didn't strike
00:15:43.160 anyone or anything
00:15:44.520 in retaliation.
00:15:46.040 The official reason
00:15:46.940 given by the report
00:15:47.900 for the lack of action
00:15:48.860 was that the administration
00:15:50.100 lacked definitive proof
00:15:51.420 that al-Qaeda was responsible
00:15:52.700 for the terror attack.
00:15:54.140 We knew right away
00:15:54.940 it was Osama bin Laden.
00:15:55.940 And then I hear Clinton
00:15:57.260 on the radio
00:16:00.060 or on the television
00:16:01.800 saying,
00:16:03.480 well, my experts,
00:16:05.600 my team,
00:16:06.460 my intelligence community
00:16:08.560 says we can't be sure
00:16:09.780 if it's Osama bin Laden
00:16:12.460 or not,
00:16:13.680 or al-Qaeda or not.
00:16:15.680 And we just stood there
00:16:16.620 and said,
00:16:17.000 no, what is he talking about?
00:16:18.920 In this case,
00:16:19.800 the 9-11 commission
00:16:20.660 offers excuses for Clinton,
00:16:22.600 citing an absurd blame game
00:16:24.680 with Clinton administration officials
00:16:26.120 who claimed they were
00:16:26.840 waiting for the legal go-ahead
00:16:28.560 from the CIA and the FBI.
00:16:30.400 But at the same time,
00:16:31.580 then-CIA director George Tenet
00:16:33.200 is reported to have said
00:16:34.540 that he was surprised
00:16:35.660 to hear the White House
00:16:36.640 was awaiting a conclusion
00:16:37.740 from him
00:16:38.300 on responsibility
00:16:39.180 for the coal attack.
00:16:40.500 Everyone already knew
00:16:41.380 who did it.
00:16:42.080 My impression
00:16:42.840 over the course of my career,
00:16:44.760 after over 22 years,
00:16:46.020 is that
00:16:46.360 the first thing
00:16:47.960 the seventh floor
00:16:48.840 ever considered
00:16:50.240 when you brought them
00:16:51.920 in operation to approve
00:16:53.120 was what if we fail
00:16:55.640 and how will we get roasted
00:16:57.380 by the media?
00:16:58.480 It took Bill Clinton
00:16:59.420 just 13 days
00:17:00.740 to respond to the embassy bombings.
00:17:02.640 But for some reason,
00:17:03.720 a reason that has never
00:17:04.420 been explained,
00:17:05.600 he had no response at all
00:17:07.080 to the attack
00:17:07.880 on the USS Cole.
00:17:09.080 Even more bizarre
00:17:10.060 and telling
00:17:10.780 is the Bush administration's
00:17:12.180 explanation
00:17:12.540 for why it didn't respond.
00:17:14.500 It was most clearly
00:17:15.240 articulated
00:17:15.900 by the neocon number two
00:17:17.640 at the Pentagon,
00:17:18.640 Paul Wolfowitz.
00:17:19.560 He described the coal bombing
00:17:20.880 as stale
00:17:21.860 by the time
00:17:22.520 Bush took office.
00:17:23.540 It was just five months
00:17:24.860 after the terror attacks.
00:17:26.500 Wolfowitz wanted
00:17:27.220 something bigger
00:17:28.100 to respond to
00:17:29.060 and soon
00:17:29.800 he got it.
00:17:30.700 It was remarkable
00:17:31.480 to watch this,
00:17:33.280 especially after
00:17:33.980 the man had declared
00:17:34.820 war on us,
00:17:36.120 reiterated it,
00:17:37.440 said,
00:17:37.780 your time is coming.
00:17:39.240 We hadn't had
00:17:39.820 a friend like that
00:17:40.880 in terms of
00:17:41.900 divulging
00:17:42.480 what their true mission was
00:17:43.880 since General Giop.
00:17:45.960 And we didn't listen
00:17:46.940 to him
00:17:47.300 and look where it got us.
00:17:49.060 And look where
00:17:49.600 we are now.
00:17:50.880 Not only 9-11,
00:17:52.380 but the whole,
00:17:54.580 we lost another war
00:17:55.920 to the Afghans.
00:17:57.300 If you want to understand
00:17:58.860 why and how
00:18:00.160 9-11 happened,
00:18:01.700 the years to look at
00:18:02.600 most closely
00:18:03.440 are 1999
00:18:04.600 to 2001.
00:18:06.320 Those years
00:18:07.040 coincided with
00:18:07.780 George Tenet's
00:18:08.620 implementation
00:18:09.260 of what became
00:18:10.080 known simply as
00:18:10.980 The Plan.
00:18:12.080 To formulate this effort,
00:18:13.160 CIA Director Tenet
00:18:14.000 elevated a man
00:18:14.920 called Kofor Black,
00:18:16.680 a former spy
00:18:17.460 who'd risen to head
00:18:18.260 CIA stations
00:18:19.120 in the Sudan
00:18:19.720 and elsewhere
00:18:20.260 to Director
00:18:21.080 of the Counterterrorism Center.
00:18:22.740 To give you an idea
00:18:23.600 of Kofor Black's character,
00:18:25.020 in 2017,
00:18:26.400 he joined Hunter Biden
00:18:27.700 on the board of directors
00:18:28.780 of Burisma,
00:18:29.880 the Ukrainian gas company.
00:18:31.480 But at that time,
00:18:32.360 in late 1999,
00:18:33.760 the core of the future
00:18:34.900 9-11 hijackers
00:18:36.040 were gathering
00:18:36.720 in Afghanistan.
00:18:37.500 These 22 individuals
00:18:39.000 do not account
00:18:39.600 for all the terrorist
00:18:40.360 activity in the world.
00:18:42.500 But they're among
00:18:43.240 the most dangerous,
00:18:44.560 the leaders
00:18:45.660 and key supporters,
00:18:47.480 the planners
00:18:48.280 and strategists.
00:18:51.240 They must be found.
00:18:52.960 Here's a summary
00:18:53.780 of some of the warnings
00:18:54.780 they had.
00:18:55.740 In December 1999,
00:18:57.080 a 23-year-old
00:18:57.900 Algerian man
00:18:58.860 called Ahmed Rassam
00:18:59.960 attempted to cross
00:19:00.940 with a rental car
00:19:01.900 on the ferry
00:19:02.640 from Victoria,
00:19:03.560 British Columbia
00:19:04.160 to Port Angeles,
00:19:05.600 Washington State.
00:19:07.200 Thanks to alert
00:19:08.400 border security
00:19:09.220 in Port Angeles,
00:19:10.600 Rassam was apprehended
00:19:11.660 with hundreds of pounds
00:19:12.920 of explosives
00:19:13.540 in his car.
00:19:14.600 His plan had been
00:19:15.540 to set off a car bomb
00:19:16.860 at LAX
00:19:17.760 on January 1st, 2000.
00:19:20.040 But the biggest
00:19:20.920 warning signs
00:19:22.000 of an appending attack
00:19:23.040 in the United States
00:19:23.860 came in the summer
00:19:24.940 of 2001,
00:19:26.300 just months
00:19:27.060 or weeks before.
00:19:28.900 On April 20th, 2001,
00:19:30.920 a briefing to top
00:19:31.820 Bush administration
00:19:32.580 officials noted
00:19:33.780 that bin Laden
00:19:34.520 planned multiple operations
00:19:36.320 In May 2001,
00:19:38.520 a report was distributed
00:19:39.420 to Bush administration
00:19:40.340 officials noting
00:19:41.100 that bin Laden
00:19:41.860 public profile
00:19:42.820 may presage attack.
00:19:44.580 On May 16th, 2001,
00:19:46.360 an intel report
00:19:47.080 mentioned a phone call
00:19:48.100 to an embassy
00:19:48.780 that bin Laden's
00:19:49.600 supporters were planning
00:19:50.500 an attack inside
00:19:51.680 the United States.
00:19:53.160 On June 12th,
00:19:54.880 a CIA report
00:19:55.680 indicated that
00:19:56.480 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
00:19:57.500 was recruiting people
00:19:58.700 to travel to the U.S.,
00:20:00.440 possibly to aid
00:20:01.460 in terror attacks.
00:20:02.900 On June 22nd
00:20:05.640 of that year,
00:20:06.620 the CIA notified
00:20:07.620 station chiefs
00:20:08.540 about intelligence
00:20:09.440 suggesting an Al-Qaeda
00:20:10.500 suicide bombing
00:20:11.400 in the United States
00:20:12.400 could be on the way.
00:20:14.300 At about the same time,
00:20:15.640 U.S. intelligence
00:20:16.300 issued a terror
00:20:17.280 advisory threat
00:20:18.460 indicating a high
00:20:19.620 probability
00:20:20.300 of near-term
00:20:21.520 spectacular terrorist
00:20:23.140 attacks
00:20:23.640 resulting in
00:20:24.520 numerous casualties.
00:20:26.000 On June 25th,
00:20:27.300 George W. Bush's
00:20:28.080 counterterrorism's
00:20:29.100 star Richard Clark
00:20:29.800 told Condoleezza Rice
00:20:31.460 that six intelligence
00:20:32.960 reports showed
00:20:34.100 Al-Qaeda personnel
00:20:34.980 warning of an
00:20:36.020 impending terror attack.
00:20:37.600 Three days later,
00:20:38.420 he told Rice
00:20:39.240 that something
00:20:39.760 very, very, very,
00:20:41.340 very big
00:20:42.260 was about to happen.
00:20:44.520 On June 30th,
00:20:46.000 top U.S. intel officials
00:20:47.280 were warned
00:20:48.020 bin Laden planning
00:20:49.480 high-profile attacks
00:20:51.020 of catastrophic proportion.
00:20:53.800 In July,
00:20:54.480 intelligence reports
00:20:55.280 of an impending attack
00:20:56.200 reached a fever pitch
00:20:57.700 that led to the closure
00:20:58.860 of U.S. embassies
00:20:59.880 in the Middle East,
00:21:01.000 none of this
00:21:01.760 apparently got the attention
00:21:03.040 of the White House.
00:21:04.920 Deputy Secretary of Defense
00:21:06.340 Paul Wolfowitz,
00:21:07.560 the man who thought
00:21:08.180 the coal bombing
00:21:08.980 was, quote,
00:21:09.580 stale,
00:21:10.420 questioned the reporting
00:21:11.420 in a conversation
00:21:12.220 with Bush's
00:21:12.800 deputy national security
00:21:13.840 advisor.
00:21:15.120 On July 12th,
00:21:16.260 2001,
00:21:17.560 acting FBI director
00:21:18.800 Thomas Picard
00:21:19.660 opened Attorney General
00:21:21.340 John Ashcroft's
00:21:22.200 intelligence briefing
00:21:22.960 with the latest
00:21:24.080 on the CIA warnings
00:21:25.340 about an Al-Qaeda attack.
00:21:26.880 Ashcroft responded
00:21:29.040 by saying,
00:21:30.220 I don't want you
00:21:30.740 to ever talk to me
00:21:31.880 about Al-Qaeda,
00:21:32.960 about these threats.
00:21:34.160 I don't want to hear
00:21:34.940 about Al-Qaeda anymore.
00:21:37.660 Picard appealed
00:21:38.440 for more counterterrorism
00:21:39.660 enhancements,
00:21:40.280 meaning funding,
00:21:41.680 an appeal
00:21:42.060 the Attorney General
00:21:42.900 denied on September 10th.
00:21:45.980 The United States
00:21:46.460 was attacked
00:21:47.020 the very next day.
00:21:48.080 By lying
00:21:55.620 to the American public
00:21:56.860 serially
00:21:57.600 and aggressively,
00:21:59.080 the CIA,
00:21:59.980 the Bush administration,
00:22:00.980 and the 9-11 Commission
00:22:02.120 created the perfect condition
00:22:03.940 for conspiracy theories
00:22:05.320 to thrive.
00:22:06.260 Consider, for example,
00:22:07.180 the established fact
00:22:08.120 that in the days
00:22:08.740 before the attack,
00:22:09.880 there was a huge surge
00:22:11.060 in put options
00:22:12.500 against airline stocks.
00:22:14.240 Who beside Al-Qaeda
00:22:15.420 knew the attacks
00:22:16.420 were coming?
00:22:16.900 And who specifically
00:22:18.320 profited from these trades?
00:22:20.340 It seems possible,
00:22:21.480 probably likely,
00:22:22.720 that foreign governments,
00:22:23.920 including supposed allies,
00:22:25.880 knew the plot was coming.
00:22:27.480 Why didn't they warn
00:22:28.380 the United States?
00:22:29.360 And why did U.S. authorities
00:22:30.800 rush to ship
00:22:31.880 all the debris
00:22:33.020 from the attacks abroad
00:22:34.440 almost immediately,
00:22:35.880 making it impossible
00:22:36.780 for engineers
00:22:37.640 to study the crime scene?
00:22:39.600 Those are just
00:22:40.200 some of the questions
00:22:41.000 we will address
00:22:41.660 in the next installment
00:22:42.720 of our series.
00:22:46.900 of terror
00:22:50.340 that
00:22:53.860 by他說
00:22:55.160 forNathan
00:22:56.240 who puk parts
00:22:56.420 will be
00:22:57.100 and
00:22:57.740 who
00:22:58.580 likes to see
00:22:59.720 the flick.
00:23:00.400 I see
00:23:00.940 a forum
00:23:01.020 and
00:23:01.600 I see
00:23:01.880 going in the
00:23:02.060 Oder
00:23:02.220 this
00:23:02.800 or
00:23:03.800 I see
00:23:05.220 going in the
00:23:06.040 soon as you can see
00:23:06.320 in the
00:23:07.500 Sanetti
00:23:08.380 Center.