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Edited on Thu Dec-23-10 03:05 AM by rschop
Thanks for the challenge: DUers can judge for themselves if I have figured it out!
From Prior post "BTW, do know what "the wall" is?"
Here is the complete information on the "WALL" with respect to the attacks on 9/11.
On August 22, 2001 Margaret Gillespie, a FBI Agent at the CIA Bin Laden unit, finds out from the INS that both Mihdhar and Hazmi were inside of the US. She takes that information immediately to CIA officer Tom Wilshire and FBI HQ Agent Dina Corsi. Wilshire had earlier indicated in email on July 5, 2001 that al Qaeda terrorists at the Kuala Lumpur meeting were connected to the warnings the CIA had been receiving on a huge al Qaeda attack inside of the US, and on July 23, 2001 that Mihdhar in particular would be found at the location of the next big al Qaeda attack.
So it was clear when he was told Mihdhar and Hazmi were inside of the US he knew immediately they were here in order to take part in this huge attack that would kill thousands of Americans
On August 23, 2001 Margaret Gillespie had the Bin Laden unit issue a worldwide alert for Mihdhar and Hazmi, so the entire CIA hierarchy would have been aware that not only were Mihdhar and Hazmi inside of the US but because of Wilshire’s prior emails, plus the numerous warnings of a al Qaeda attack that the CIA had been receiving since April 2001, that they were (see Tom Wilshire's email on July 5, 2001, DOJ IG report, and his email on July 23, 2001, DE # 939) inside of the US in order to take part in yet another al Qaeda terrorist attack. At the time of the August 24, 2001 6 hour meeting with President Bush, Tenet also knew that Moussaoui had just been arrested as a possible al Qaeda terrorist getting training on a B747, and that Mihdhar and Hazmi were inside of the US in order to take part in a massive al Qaeda attack.
On August 28, 2001, Corsi sent Craig Donnachie (manager at the FBI Intelligence investigation unit at the New York office), her EC to start an intelligence investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi, based mainly on the December 1999 NSA cable. This information was based on a telephone tap of a phone connected to the communications center for the al Qaeda attacks in east Africa, that indicated Mihdhar and Hazmi were al Qaeda terrorists traveling to an important al Qaeda planning meeting in Kuala Lumpur. When Donnachie got this EC on August 28, 2001 he gave it to John Liguori, his boss, who thought this EC connected Mihdhar and Hazmi to the Cole bombing and sent this cable the same day to Bongardt and his team.
Bongardt immediately realized how critical it was to locate Mihdhar and Hazmi quickly before they had any chance to carry out yet another al Qaeda attack and contacted Corsi by phone to get permission to start this investigation (see DOJ IG report). But he was told by Corsi and Rod Middleton, Corsi's boss, that since the information had come from the NSA, the “WALL”, prevented him from possessing this information without written permission from the NSA, that he would have to stop any investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi and destroy the information he had from Cori’s EC on Mihdhar and Hazmi.
Unfortunately we now know that Corsi had already been given written permission from the NSA to pass this NSA information to Bongardt and his team in New York, on August 27, 2001 the day before she tells him he had to stop his investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi. (See release DE #448, the NSA release in writing given to Corsi to pass this NSA information to FBI criminal investigators on the FBI Cole bombing investigation).
Since Bongardt did not see any connection between this NSA information and any FISA warrant, the only real reason he could be denied this information without written permission from the NSA, he asked Corsi to get an opinion from the legal unit at FBI HQ, the NSLU to see in view of the fact that no FISA warrant had been used by the NSA to get this information, if he could take part in the investigation of search for Mihdhar and Hazmi.
On August 29, 2001, Corsi told Bongardt that the NSLU attorney had ruled he and his team could not take part in any investigation for Mihdhar and Hazmi. But page 538, footnote 81 in the 9/11 Commission report says that the attorney, Sherry Sabol, told DOJ IG investigators on November 7, 2002, that she told Corsi since no FISA warrant was connected to this NSA information, Bongardt could take part in any investigation and search for Mihdhar and Hazmi.
When Corsi shut down Bongardt’s investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi she also knew as she admitted to the DOJ IG investigators, that the CIA had a photograph of Walid Bin Attash taken at Kuala Lumpur, (see page 302 of the DOJ IG report) knew that this photo connected Mihdhar and Hazmi to the planning of the Cole bombing and knew that this meant there was no legitimate reason Bongardt should not have been allowed to start an investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi.
In an email back to FBI Agent Steve Bongardt on August 29, 2001, Corsi stated that “if substantial evidence is developed of a federal crime”, (by Mihdhar and Hazmi), this information will be passed over the “wall”.
NOTE: this literally is the smoking gun, the proof that Corsi, the CIA and the FBI HQ knew that any evidence of a crime immediately nullified the "WALL". This is this one statement that proves that FBI HQ knew they had no legal reason to sabotage Bongardt’s investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi.
Corsi had already had used in her EC to start an investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi, the NSA cable that was based on the tapped phone conversation from the telephone number for the communications center for the east Africa al Qaeda bombings. This connected both Mihdhar and Hazmi not only to the al Qaeda terrorist organization, and the many crimes they had already carried out, but to the east Africa bombings that had murdered over 200 people including 12 Americans.
This was clear substantial evidence of a Federal crime.
She also knew that Walid Bin Attash, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi had been at the Kuala Lumpur al Qaeda planning meeting actually planning the Cole bombing, yet another crime that had killed 17 US sailors. So she already had multiple examples of substantial evidence of federal crimes, information she, the FBI HQ and even the CIA had been hiding from FBI Agent Steve Bongardt and his team.
(NOTE: On page 302 of the DOJ IG report, Corsi admitted that she had known from at least August 22, 2001, that the CIA had this photograph of Walid Bin Attash taken at Kuala Lumpur, knew that the CIA had been concealing this photograph from FBI Agent Steve Bongardt and his team, and even knew by continuing to conceal this photograph, that Bongardt would never have the information he needed to start any investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi.)
What the “WALL”, was in effect was the caveat added to the bottom of all NSA cables, which was intended to prevent FBI criminal agents from getting NSA information that had been obtained using a FISA warrant so that they would not take this evidence intro court and have this evidence thrown out. This caveat was added to all NSA cables out of bureaucratic laziness regardless if the information in the cable had been obtained with a FISA warrant or not. Since FISA warrants were based on the "probable cause that the target of the search warrant was a terrorist or belonged to a terrorist organization", which was less strict that a criminal search warrant that was based on "probable cause that the target had committed a crime or was about to commit a crime", courts did not allow FISA information to be used in criminal trials.
This caveat also said that any restriction on this information was null and void if there was evidence of an imminent terrorist attack against people or property, information on a terrorist attack both the CIA and FBI HQ possessed in August and September 2001
So the "WALL" never applied to the NSA information with respect to the 9/11 investigation. The fact that Mihdhar and Hazmi were al Qaeda terrorists, had been connected to the east Africa bombings, and the planning of the Cole bombing nullified the wall. The fact that the NSA had given written permission to Corsi on August 27, 2001 , and the fact that both the CIA and FBI HQ knew about this huge al Qaeda attack and even knew Mihdhar and Hazmi were going to take part in this attack that would kill thousands of Americans also nullified the “WALL”.
But he “WALL” was used by FBI HQ and the CIA to illegally and criminally hide information from the FBI criminal investigators on the Cole bombing, out and out criminal obstruction of an ongoing FBI criminal investigation into the USS Cole bombing. The CIA did not want the fact that they had photographed Mihdhar and Hazmi with Walid Bin Attash at the Kuala Lumpur meeting, planning the Cole bombing, and just let them walk way to carry out the Cole bombing, so that this information would never get out and make the CIA look culpable in the Cole bombing.
But it is almost unbelievable that when the CIA and FBI HQ found out that Mihdhar and Hazmi were inside of the US on August 22, 2001, and knew they were in the US to take part in an al Qaeda attack that would kill thousands of Americans, they continued to sabotage the FBI Cole bombing investigators by hiding this information and forcing Bongardt to destroy the information he had from Corsi's EC. The allowed the murder of 3000 Americans in order to keep themselves out of prison for criminally obstruction of the FBI Cole bombing investigation numerous times.
So the "WALL" was nothing but a complete fiction as Bongardt told Corsi in email on August 29, 2001.
To keep Bongardt from starting any investigation of Mihdhar and Hazmi, both the CIA and FBI HQ had to hide the criminal conduct of both Mihdhar and Hazmi, which they did numerous times, criminally obstructing the FBI investigation of the Cole bombing.
To hide this huge criminal conspiracy, the 9/11 Commission had to hide the name of FBI Agent Ali Soufan so that every time Soufan made an official FBI request to the CIA for the information the CIA had on any al Qaeda planning meeting in Kuala Lumpur or on Walid Bin Attash, and was told this information did not exists at the CIA, the 9/11 Commission could claim that the CIA just did not share information with other agencies. But if anyone had known about these official requests from Soufan, on at least 6 times, it was clear that the CIA and FBI HQ had been involved in out and out criminal obstruction of Soufan’s criminal investigation of the Cole bombing.
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