FBI Agent: The CIA Could Have Stopped 9/11

[Octafish]

59. Why did AG John Ashcroft stop flying commercial aviation in July 2001?

Warned of a "threat," the then-attorney general began flying aboard government charters when flying home to Missouri for his weekend fishing trips.

Ashcroft Flying High

CBS News
February 11, 2009 9:23 PM

Fishing rod in hand, Attorney General John Ashcroft left on a weekend trip to Missouri Thursday afternoon aboard a chartered government jet, reports CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart.

In response to inquiries from CBS News over why Ashcroft was traveling exclusively by leased jet aircraft instead of commercial airlines, the Justice Department cited what it called a "threat assessment" by the FBI, and said Ashcroft has been advised to travel only by private jet for the remainder of his term.

"There was a threat assessment and there are guidelines. He is acting under the guidelines," an FBI spokesman said. Neither the FBI nor the Justice Department, however, would identify what the threat was, when it was detected or who made it.

A senior official at the CIA said he was unaware of specific threats against any Cabinet member, and Ashcroft himself, in a speech in California, seemed unsure of the nature of the threat.

"I don't do threat assessments myself and I rely on those whose responsibility it is in the law enforcement community, particularly the FBI. And I try to stay within the guidelines that they've suggested I should stay within for those purposes," Ashcroft said.

Asked if he knew anything about the threat or who might have made it, the attorney general replied, "Frankly, I don't. That's the answer."

CONTINUED...

http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-303601.html

As absurd as it sounds, Ashcroft's not even the worst of Them.

The next level down is occupied by George W Bush, the Coward of Crawford. Jim Hatfield wrote Bush, warned by Russia, Italy and who knows who else, was sore afraid of bin Laden aerial attack at G-7 summit in Geneva in April 2001 he wouldn't sleep inside the anti-aircraft missile protected luxury hotel on land, but elected to stay offshore, safer aboard a US destroyer. The story was the last thing Hatfield, author of "Fortunate Son," saw published before his suicide cough murder.

Why would Osama bin Laden want to kill Dubya, his former business partner?

By James Hatfield

Editor's note: In light of last week's horrific events and the Bush administration's reaction to them, we are reprising the following from the last column Jim Hatfield wrote for Online Journal prior to his tragic death on July 18:

July 3, 2001—There may be fireworks in Genoa, Italy, this month, too.

A plot by Saudi master terrorist, Osama bin Laden, to assassinate Dubya during the July 20 economic summit of world leaders, was uncovered after dozens of suspected Islamic militants linked to bin Laden's international terror network were arrested in Frankfurt, Germany, and Milan, Italy, in April.

German intelligence services have stated that bin Laden is covertly financing neo-Nazi skinhead groups throughout Europe to launch another terrorist attack at a high-profile American target—his first since the bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen last October.

According to counter-terrorism experts quoted in Germany's largest newspaper, the attack on Dubya might be a James Bond-like aerial strike in the form of remote-controlled airplanes packed with plastic explosives.

Why would Osama bi Laden want to kill, Dubya, his former business partner?

CONTINUED...

http://web.archive.org/web/20060906150015/http://www.onlinejournal.org/Special_Reports/Hatfield-R-091901/hatfield-r-091901.html

I'd download the copy off of the Wayback Machine. For some reason, I can no longer find it at Online Journal.

The amazing Amy Goodman still hosts an interview with the feller.

Thank you for grokking all these years, Enthusiast. Your friendship means the world.