General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Clapper & Feinstein finally admit that ALL phone records going back 7 years are being collected [View all]leveymg
(36,418 posts)The mainstream theory that this happens because of inattention or lack of resources is largely a myth. In the case of the Flt. 77 hijackers for instance, a warning cable was drawn up by the FBI liason officer at the CIA Counterterrorism Center that detected the entry of al-Hazmi and al-Midhar at LAX on January 15, 2000, but that cable was never sent. Why? Did the FBI analyst fall asleep? Was she overworked and the cable got mixed up with some other papers on her desk? Did the dog eat it? No. The Assistant Director of CIA/CTC ordered her to withhold it after the Director, Cofer Black, briefed his boss, CIA Director Tenet, who had an active ongoing interest (Tenet was briefed numerous times) about the AQ planning summit in Kuala Lumpur the pair had attended immediately before they arrived.
To the contrary: it's very dangerous to not want to know how terrorist attacks happen and why they are often entirely preventable but happen, anyway.