Successful FOIA Requests (Updated, November 2009)

This is a reposting, with one more document obtained being added at the bottom of the Catcher’s Mitt section. For a list of unsuccessful FOIA requests see here.

Khalid Almihdhar and His Connections to the USS Cole Bombing

One of the main arguments used by British Prime Minister Tony Blair in a key speech on 4 October 2001 that held al-Qaeda responsible for 9/11 was that one of the 19 hijackers “has also been identified as playing key roles in both the East African Embassy attacks and the USS Cole attack.”

Two days later, the New York Times identified the mystery hijacker “as Mr. Almihdhar. United States investigators said they had clearly linked Mr. Almihdhar to the Cole attack and ‘possibly’ to the embassy bombings, senior American government officials said today.”

So what was Khalid Almihdhar’s role in the USS Cole bombing? Was it a “key” role, as Tony Blair claimed? And how come a known al-Qaeda operative managed to evade surveillance, help blow up a destroyer, then enter the US and fly a plane into the Pentagon?