National security experts blast Bush & 911 Commission

Date: September 13, 2004

To The Congress of The United States:

The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States ended its report stating that "We look forward to a national debate on the merits of what we have recommended, and we will participate vigorously in that debate."

In this spirit, we the undersigned wish to bring to the attention of the Congress and the people of the United States what we believe are serious shortcomings in the report and its recommendations.

We thus call upon Congress to refrain from narrow political considerations and to apply brakes to the race to implement the commission recommendations. It is not too late for Congress to break with the practice of limiting testimony to that from politicians and top-layer career bureaucrats-many with personal reputations to defend and institutional equities to protect.

Instead, use this unique opportunity to introduce salutary reform, an opportunity that must not be squandered by politically driven haste.

Omission is one of the major flaws in the Commission’s report. We are aware of significant issues and cases that were duly reported to the commission by those of us with direct knowledge, but somehow escaped attention.

Serious problems and shortcomings within government agencies likewise were reported to the Commission but were not included in the report. The report simply does not get at key problems within the intelligence, aviation security, and law enforcement communities. The omission of such serious and applicable issues and information by itself renders the report flawed, and casts doubt on the validity of many of its recommendations.

We believe that one of the primary purposes of the Commission was to establish accountability; that to do so is essential to understanding the failures that led to 9/11, and to prescribe needed changes.

However, the Commission in its report holds no one accountable, stating instead "our aim has not been to assign individual blame". That is to play the political game, and it shows that the goal of achieving unanimity overrode one of the primary purposes of this Commission’s establishment.

When calling for accountability, we are referring not to quasi-innocent mistakes caused by "lack of imagination" or brought about by ordinary "human error". Rather, we refer to intentional actions or inaction by individuals responsible for our national security, actions or inaction dictated by motives other than the security of the people of the United States.

The report deliberately ignores officials and civil servants who were, and still are, clearly negligent and/or derelict in their duties to the nation. If these individuals are protected rather than held accountable, the mindset that enabled 9/11 will persist, no matter how many layers of bureaucracy are added, and no matter how much money is poured into the agencies. Character counts.

Personal integrity, courage, and professionalism make the difference. Only a commission bent on holding no one responsible and reaching unanimity could have missed that.

We understand, as do most Americans, that one of our greatest strengths in defending against terrorism is the dedication and resourcefulness of those individuals who work on the frontlines.

Even before the Commission began its work, many honest and patriotic individuals from various agencies came forward with information and warnings regarding terrorism-related issues and serious problems within our intelligence and aviation security agencies.

If it were not for these individuals, much of what we know today of significant issues and facts surrounding 9/11 would have remained in the dark. These "whistleblowers" were able to put the safety of the American people above their own careers and jobs, even though they had reason to suspect that the deck was stacked against them. Sadly, it was.

Retaliation took many forms: some were ostracized; others were put under formal or informal gag orders; some were fired. The commission has neither acknowledged their contribution nor faced up to the urgent need to protect such patriots against retaliation by the many bureaucrats who tend to give absolute priority to saving face and protecting their own careers.

The Commission did emphasize that barriers to the flow of information were a primary cause for wasting opportunities to prevent the tragedy. But it skipped a basic truth.

Secrecy enforced by repression threatens national security as much as bureaucratic turf fights. It sustains vulnerability to terrorism caused by government breakdowns. Reforms will be paper tigers without a safe channel for whistleblowers to keep them honest in practice.

It is unrealistic to expect that government workers will defend the public, if they can't defend themselves. Profiles in Courage are the exception, not the rule.

Unfortunately, current whistleblower rights are a cruel trap and magnet for cynicism. The Whistleblower Protection Act has turned into an efficient way to finish whistleblowers off by endorsing termination.

No government workers have access to jury trials like Congress enacted for corporate workers after the Enron/MCI debacles.

Government workers need genuine, enforceable rights just as much to protect America's families, as corporate workers do to protect America's investments. It will take congressional leadership to fill this hole in the 9/11 Commission's recommendations.

The Commission, with its incomplete report of "facts and circumstances", intentional avoidance of assigning accountability, and disregard for the knowledge, expertise and experience of those who actually do the job, has now set about pressuring our Congress and our nation to hastily implement all its recommendations.

While we do not intend to imply that all recommendations of this report are flawed, we assert that the Commission’s list of recommendations does not include many urgently needed fixes, and further, we argue that some of their recommendations, such as the creation of an ‘intelligence czar’, and haphazard increases in intelligence budgets, will lead to increases in the complexity and confusion of an already complex and highly bureaucratic system.

Congress has been hearing not only from the commissioners but from a bevy of other career politicians, very few of whom have worked in the intelligence community, and from top-layer bureaucrats, many with vested interests in saving face and avoiding accountability.

Congress has not included the voices of the people working within the intelligence and broader national security communities who deal with the real issues and problems day-after-day and who possess the needed expertise and experience-in short, those who not only do the job but are conscientious enough to stick their necks out in pointing to the impediments they experience in trying to do it effectively.

We the undersigned, who have worked within various government agencies (FBI, CIA, FAA, DIA, Customs) responsible for national security and public safety, call upon you in Congress to include the voices of those with first-hand knowledge and expertise in the important issues at hand. We stand ready to do our part.

Respectfully,

1. Costello, Edward J. Jr., Former Special Agent, Counterintelligence, FBI

2. Cole, John M., Former Veteran Intelligence Operations Specialist, FBI

3. Conrad, David "Mark", Retired Agent in Charge, Internal Affairs, U.S. Customs

4. Dew, Rosemary N., Former Supervisory Special Agent, Counterterrorism & Counterintelligence, FBI

5. Dzakovic, Bogdan, Former Red Team Leader, FAA

6. Edmonds, Sibel D., Former Language Specialist, FBI

7. Elson, Steve, Retired Navy Seal & Former Special Agent, FAA & US Navy

8. Forbes, David, Aviation, Logistics and Govt. Security Analysts, BoydForbes, Inc.,

9. Goodman, Melvin A., Former Senior Analyst/ Division Manager, CIA

Source: Congress

The letter is clearly an indicator that the 911 report is flawed. Those who defend it as the "official story" are not doing themselves nor their country any favors. They are in my opinion an embarrassment to our very foundation for what America stands for.


The "OS" as it has become known isn't an official story at all. Its a report not evidentuary in nature because it assigns blame to no one and that has been the only genuine fact that people agree on. Even those who defend it are no more than conspiracy therorists because they are reading something into this report that is based on opinion rather than hard fact. The Commission's report reads more like a movie script than an official report detailing a terrorist incident. Again this report is not to be taken in the context of evidence and thats where many people who view it as "evidence of what happened" are stuck at.

To date with no other evidence or proof shows beyond a doubt that Usama Bin laden or Al Qaeda was responible for the events on 911. There are many claims and hearsay evidence but nothing has ever been presented to the Armed Services Committe, Intelligence Committe or any other committe including the 911 Commission Committe showing such evidence. The majority of internet forums are abuzz with claims of this & that but at the end of the day, those responible for the terrorists attacks on 911 remain at large and unaccountable for their actions.

Many people refuse to accept this because people need closure in their lives and will stop at nothing to get it. Including making claims that are not based on evidence. Many mainstream citizens (those who rely on mainstream media and other sources) do not fully comprehend what goes on in the world because they are recieving filtered news and politically generated propaganda designed to keep things "in place".




[edit on 17-1-2010 by mikelee]

the articles you continue to post is amazing. All the small details that people forget or didn't know about. I am really impressed with the amount of information you have.
stars for you...

reply to post by Pretaboy925


Thank you. I believe this issue should never be forgotten.

reply to post by mikelee


Really good stuff mikelee. I was just wondering, how would I go to the source where you retrieved this document? I don't see a link but I do see that you've quoted congress as your source.

reply to post by jackflap


U2U sent to you.

More great stuff. I've been reading everything you and a few others have posted on this topic...I agree, it should never be forgotten. I love it when OS tards chime in saying that the truth movement is disrespectful to the victims of 911. I find it funny for two reasons: we are all victims of what happened that day. The other, 2 close friends of my family, firefighters, were buried under mountains of rubble and lies on 9/11/01. I only wish I could give this the time and effort you have, but I am grateful for all you have done.
Hey where's the regulars??? Hoop, Swampy, Dereks...kind of quiet in here without them

reply to post by odd1out


Thanks. I'm sure the regs will be in here when they get time, I have no doubt there. Although a couple of them are on my ignore list due to their rhetorical questions. They'll be plenty of replys.

reply to post by odd1out


I've been here most of the evening....did you have a question for me? Because my big thing has always been National Security and how our elected officials have screwed us over on it for over thirty years, not intentionally, but screwed us just the same.

You have opened my eyes to this whole OS issue even wider now

I randomly too one of the names from the list of signers and put it in GOOGLE and found the testimony which just reads like SF.

Furthermore, the White House Commission in 1997 stated in part, "…Red Team type testing should also be increased by the FAA, and incorporated as a regular part of airport security action plans. Frequent, sophisticated attempts by these Red Teams to find ways to dodge security measures are an important part of finding weaknesses in the system and anticipating what sophisticated adversaries of our nation might attempt…." As a former Team Leader of the Red Team it was my sole job to execute this mandate. Some of my colleagues and I, using Red Team type tactics, did find major vulnerabilities in aviation security. We reported these through our chain of command. The managers in FAA (including the highest offices in FAA) deliberately choose to ignore our warnings. This is particularly grievous in light of the ever-growing terrorist threat of which they were also aware. For example, FAA issued 15 terrorism warnings to the air carriers in the year prior to 9-11. On April 6, 2000 the Associate Administrator of FAA for Security stated in open testimony before the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation Subcommittee on Aviation Security, "…[M]oreover, members of foreign terrorist groups and representatives from state sponsors of terrorism are present in the United States. There is evidence that a few foreign terrorist groups have well-established capability and infrastructures here…."

and then this

The specific issues I outlined in my Whistleblower Disclosure included the following:

1. In 1996 I worked on a 6-month project in which we injected simulated bombs through the checked baggage system at a major European airport. We were successful in getting 31 out of 31 of these simulated explosives on US commercial aircraft. No action was taken to remedy this security problem and we have never been back to this airport to re-test security. In fact our results were so deplorable that FAA prevented us from testing in this manner at any foreign airport ever again.

2. In year 2000-01, in other testing conducted at a different major European airport the Red Team obtained equally abysmal results, even though this airport had the latest bomb detection equipment. FAA Security management was equally remiss in not correcting these problems.

From here

Something tells me the problem is still there

[edit on 18-1-2010 by shakespear1]

reply to post by Swampfox46_1999


Swampfox...I think it's always good to have an opposing view. Personally, I haven't quite made up my mind on a few issues so I consider myself somewhat open minded. But, I have become convinced that the story "they," and maybe even you, would have me believe, is full of holes. Long before my search for facts, was my initial gut level reaction on the day of 9/11/2001; BS!~ I was truly surprised a few years back, an internet novice, to find this pocket of freaks like me all over the web.
The one thing that confuses me, is that some people seem to have their minds made up; this includes "truthers" as well as those that accept the OS. Since the OS is the "ONLY" explanation out there that has "OFFICIAL" merit, it would seem to many that the OS camp would not need to argue any further. I mean, the story is socially accepted as fact is it not?. Those seeking to discredit the OS are, BY FAR, the minority, at least those willing to speak up anyway.
If you agree with that, then my question is: why come to a web-site such as this, ATS, to argue with a fringe group about something, that according to you, needs no further argument? Why does a member of the majority make it a point, or a vocation, to follow threads about 911 and seemingly exhaust countless hours cleaning up after "truthers." Your signature seems to make the point well, at least in you own mind. If you Google ATS, you see it described as "Uncovering Government Secrets" "Conspiracy theory" discussion, etc.
I have considered that maybe some people in the OS camp could even be fictitious posters; puppets of "truthers" used to make the OS camp appear completely...well, stupid. It probably goes both ways with that happening. I have admitted that possibly blind patriotism exists, and I simply can't empathize. The motto here is "DENY IGNORANCE" and excuse my leap here, but it seems to imply the act of subjectively ignoring/lack of knowledge. Couple this with the subject matter here at ATS, and well, it baffles me why some people are here day after day, hour after hour.
My lady is a blind patriot, raised by a blind patriot. Her dad works in Philadelphia and is a BIGWIG for the Nat. Parks Svc. for exhibits and sites like the liberty bell, independence hall, Betsy Ross' house, and the list goes on, and on. She will NOT hear the word "conspiracy" within earshot. She knows my position with regard to 911. She disagrees with it quite adamantly. She absolutely refuses to argue/debate, though I've tried to involve her, I dropped the pursuit very quickly. She KNOWS what happened that day and she had never tried to sway me from my doubts. I have come to understand this as the true definition of respect; without it, there would be a war in my living room.
I find a strange difference between the OS camp and the "truthers" when, (and I stress-when) you find them at a place like ATS. It's like the OS camp barges into the living room of the truther to get their "panties in a bunch..."
What contribution does a person make to ATS, to threads theorizing holes in the OS, when their minds are snapped shut to such theories? Why is the OS camp camping in my FRICKIN living room??? I mean ain't CNN, FOX, MSNBC bad enough...ain't the commission enough...ain't the REPORT published if I wanted to hear it?
Whew... Mike, sorry to have done pretty much what I see so many others doing (and it really bugs a LOT of members, me includued)...de-railing a thread...mea culpa...I'm a hypocrite.

[edit on 19-1-2010 by odd1out]

reply to post by odd1out

It's like the OS camp barges into the living room of the truther to get their "panties in a bunch..."

You make a good point and one that I have cited before about the 911 Madness hype and the OSer's. And while ATS pretty much comes down on the side of "truthers" regarding passing out the "911 Madness" banner what ATS ought to be doing, is cracking down on the OSer's who are either OBVIOUSLY here for another purpose and those who incite such responses that ATS deems inappropiate. In other words...those living room crashers! In many posts where that "911 Madness" banner is posted, you can go back-reading and see where although the obvious post recieved the banner, it was actually prompted many posts back.

Thats what I've found to be true anyway. But whatever. I have stopped replying to them because I KNOW who'll end up with the warning and now just edit my ignore list more often.



[edit on 19-1-2010 by mikelee]

reply to post by mikelee


Just as information, this was an unsolicited petition submitted to individual members of the House and Senate. Not the Congress as a whole and not at the request of any member or committee of the Congress. The source is actually a private groups called the "National Security Whistleblowers Coalition".

reply to post by hooper


I know that but I'm not following why you pointed that out to me

It was sent to members of Congress and as such becomes part of the congressional record.

[edit on 19-1-2010 by mikelee]

reply to post by mikelee


Seriously, I don't know that for sure. I don't think that any letter sent to any sitting member of Congress automatically becomes part of the congressional record. I think it has to be read into the record or a member must request that it be added to the record. Letters to members of Congress may become part of the National Archives, but I am not sure that it makes it into the record automatically.

Just trying to make things clear. I have no axe to grind with this group.

reply to post by hooper


Its cool man, no grinding action intended

From my understanding that letter was read on the floor of the Congress because it was sent and addressed to the Congress. Thats why I said that. Unless my source was wrong thats what I understand it to be. I'm always open for clarification though.

reply to post by odd1out

If you agree with that, then my question is: why come to a web-site such as this, ATS, to argue with a fringe group about something, that according to you, needs no further argument? Why does a member of the majority make it a point, or a vocation, to follow threads about 911 and seemingly exhaust countless hours cleaning up after "truthers." Your signature seems to make the point well, at least in you own mind

Why do I come here......

I first came here after running across a reference about Theirry Meyssan's anti-American novel about the Pentagon. I liked that the motto was "deny ignorance"...and Meyssan's book was the height of ignorance. For awhile, it was a civil place to come and discuss 9/11 conspiracy theories and iron out some facts. It has changed over the years, so many people have been taken in by the "truth" movement that the majority of the regular posters on the 9/11 board do not have the motto of deny ignorance anymore, but "promote theories with little basis in reality"


Why am I still here?

I refuse to be run off by conspiracy theorists.