CIA director admits failure to stop terrorism
“The same can be said for the National Security Agency, our imagery agency and our analytic community,” Tenet testified before the commission investigating the 9/11 attacks.
He said tight budgets at the end of the Cold War meant that by the mid-90s, intelligence agencies had “lost close to 25% of our people and billions of dollars in capital investment”.
A transformation is under way, he said, and appealed for a long-term commitment in funding. “Our investments in capability must be sustained,” he added.
“While we know al-Qaida was formed in 1988, at the end of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the intelligence community did not describe them until 1999,” the report said.
As late as 1997, the CIA “characterised Osama bin Laden as a financier of terrorism.”
It also noted several reports “mentioned the possibility of using an aircraft laden with explosives”, such as used on 9/11 in attacks that killed nearly 3,000.
Yet the counter-terrorist centre “did not analyse how a hijacked aircraft or other explosives-laden aircraft might be used as a weapon,” the report said. If it had “it could have identified that a critical obstacle would be to find a suicide terrorist able to fly a large jet aircraft”.
Under questioning, Tenet said he did not speak with President George W Bush during August 2001, a period marked by concern over possible terrorist attacks.
“He was on vacation and I was here,” Tenet said.
Readily acknowledging that intelligence agencies “never penetrated the 9-11 plot”, Tenet said, “We all understood bin Laden’s intent to strike the homeland but were unable to translate this knowledge into an effective defence.”
