Tenet Misled Congressional Inquiry about NSA Surveillance of Hijackers

A recently released document shows that CIA Director George Tenet misled the 9/11 Congressional Inquiry about the intelligence community’s knowledge of the 9/11 hijackers. He claimed that a 1999 communications intercept of a conversation between one of the hijackers, Khalid Almihdhar, and al-Qaeda leader Khallad bin Attash only showed an “indirect link” between al-Qaeda, Almihdhar and fellow hijacker Nawaf Alhazmi, who was mentioned in the conversation.

Former FBI Director: 9/11 Hijacker’s Phone Played “Integral Role” in Cole Investigation

At the 9/11 Commission hearing on Law Enforcement and the Intelligence Community in April 2004, in response to a question about the FBI’s failings from commissioner Tim Roemer, former FBI Director Louis Freeh said:

… It would have been helpful — it would have been helpful — for the FBI at that particular point in time to know the names of those two individuals [Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi]; that the information which was generated in the January 2000 physical surveillance, not by the CIA but by a liaison agency [Malaysia’s Special Branch] — if that information and the initiation for that surveillance, which were phone calls to a central number, which you’re well aware of, which plays a integral role not only in the East African bombings case but also in the Cole investigation;…

Michael Hayden Caught in a Lie

Current CIA and former NSA Director Michael Hayden claimed to the 9/11 Congressional Inquiry in prepared remarks on 17 October 2002:

New FOIA Request Filed: Restrictions on Dissemination of NSA Information

I have filed a new FOIA request for four NSA documents. The documents relate to restrictions on the dissemination of NSA information inside the FBI. The restrictions were implemented in December 1999 because of the surveillance of three US persons somehow linked to Osama bin Laden outside the US by the NSA during the Millennium alert. Had the surveillance been inside the US, a warrant would have been obtained under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and the information would have been covered by the 1995 procedures (a.k.a. “the Wall”). These procedures regulated the passage of information between intelligence agents in the FBI and criminal prosecutors (as well as criminal investigators at the FBI).