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FINAL REPORT PART 1 December 10, 2002 THE JOINT INQUIRY THE CONTEXT PART
I FINDINGS
AND CONCLUSIONS Factual
Findings 1. Finding: While the Intelligence Community had amassed a great deal of valuable intelligence regarding Usama Bin Ladin and his terrorist activities, none of it identified the time, place, and specific nature of the attacks that were planned for September 11, 2001. Nonetheless, the Community did have information that was clearly relevant to the September 11attacks, particularly when considered for its collective significance.
2. Finding:
During the spring and summer of 2001, the Intelligence Community
experienced a significant increase in information indicating that Bin
Ladin and al-Qa’ida intended to strike against U.S. interests in the
very near future. 3. Finding:
Beginning in 1998 and continuing into the summer of 2001, the
Intelligence Community received a modest, but relatively steady, stream
of intelligence reporting that indicated the possibility of terrorist
attacks within the United States. Nonetheless,
testimony and interviews confirm that it was the general view of the
Intelligence Community, in the spring and summer of 2001, that the
threatened Bin Ladin attacks would most likely occur against U.S.
interests overseas, despite indications of plans and intentions to
attack in the domestic United States.
4. Finding:
From at least 1994, and continuing into the summer of 2001, the
Intelligence Community received information indicating that terrorists
were contemplating, among other means of attack, the use of aircraft as
weapons. This information
did not stimulate any specific Intelligence Community assessment of, or
collective U.S. Government reaction to, this form of threat.
5. Finding:
Although relevant information that is significant in retrospect
regarding the attacks was available to the Intelligence Community prior
to September 11, 2001, the Community too often failed to focus on that
information and consider and appreciate its collective significance in
terms of a probable terrorist attack. Neither did the Intelligence Community demonstrate sufficient
initiative in coming to grips with the new transnational threats.
Some significant pieces of information in the vast stream of data
being collected were overlooked, some were not recognized as potentially
significant at the time and therefore not disseminated, and some
required additional action on the part of foreign governments before a
direct connection to the hijackers could have been established.
For all those reasons, the Intelligence Community failed to fully
capitalize on available, and potentially important, information.
The sub-findings below identify each category of this
information. Terrorist Communications in 1999 5.a.
During 1999, the National Security Agency obtained a number of
communications – none of which included specific detail regarding the
time, place or nature of the September 11 attacks -- connecting
individuals to terrorism who were identified, after September 11, 2001,
as participants in the attacks that occurred on that day.
Malaysia Meeting and Travel of al-Qa’ida Operatives to the United States 5.b.
The Intelligence Community acquired additional, and highly
significant, information regarding Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi
in early 2000. Critical
parts of the information concerning al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi lay dormant
within the Intelligence Community for as long as eighteen months, at the
very time when plans for the September 11 attacks were proceeding.
The CIA missed repeated opportunities to act based on information
in its possession that these two Bin Ladin-associated terrorists were
traveling to the United States, and to add their names to watchlists.
Terrorist Communications in Spring 2000
5.c.
In January 2000, after the meeting of al-Qa’ida operatives in
Malaysia, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi entered the United
States. Thereafter, the Intelligence Community obtained information
indicating that an individual named
“Khaled” at an unknown location had contacted a suspected
terrorist facility in the
Middle East. The
Intelligence Community reported some of this information but did not
report all of it. Some of
it was not reported because it was deemed not terrorist-related. It was
not until after September 11, 2001 that the Intelligence Community
determined that these contacts had been made by future hijacker Khalid
al-Mihdhar while he was living within the domestic United States.
5.d. [Redacted for national security reasons] The
Phoenix Electronic Communication 5.e. On July 10, 2001, a Phoenix FBI field office agent sent an
“Electronic Communication” to 4 individuals in the Radical
Fundamentalist Unit (RFU) and two people in the Usama Bin Ladin Unit (UBLU)
at FBI headquarters, and to two agents on International Terrorism squads
in the New York Field Office. In
the communication, the agent expressed his concerns, based on his
first-hand knowledge, that there was a coordinated effort underway by
Bin Ladin to send students to the United States for civil
aviation-related training. He
noted that there was an “inordinate number of individuals of
investigative interest” participating in this type of training in
Arizona and expressed his suspicion that this was an effort to establish
a cadre of individuals in civil aviation who would conduct future
terrorist activity. The Phoenix EC requested that FBI Headquarters consider
implementing four recommendations: ·
accumulate a list of civil aviation university/colleges
around the country; ·
establish liaison with these schools; ·
discuss the theories contained in the Phoenix EC with
the Intelligence Community; and ·
consider seeking authority to obtain visa information
concerning individuals seeking to attend flight schools. However, the FBI headquarters
personnel did not take the action requested by the Phoenix agent prior
to September 11, 2001. The
communication generated little or no interest at either FBI Headquarters
or the FBI’s New York field office. The FBI Investigation of Zacarias Moussaoui 5.f.
In August 2001, the FBI’s Minneapolis field office, in
conjunction with the INS, detained Zacarias Moussaoui, a French national
who had enrolled in flight training in Minnesota because FBI agents
there suspected that Moussaoui was involved in a hijacking plot.
FBI Headquarters attorneys determined that there was not probable
cause to obtain a court order to search Moussaoui’s belongings under
the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
However, personnel
at FBI Headquarters, including the Radical Fundamentalist Unit and the
National Security Law Unit, as well as
agents in the Minneapolis field office, misunderstood the legal
standard for obtaining an order under FISA.
Therefore FBI Minneapolis field office personnel wasted valuable
investigative resources trying to connect the Chechen rebels to al-Qa’ida.
Finally, no one at the FBI apparently connected the Moussaoui
investigation with the heightened threat environment in the summer of
2001, the Phoenix communication, or the entry of al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi
into the United States.
Hijackers In Contact With Persons of FBI Investigative Interest in the United States 5.g. The Joint Inquiry confirmed that at least some of the
hijackers were not as isolated during their time in the United States as
has been previously suggested. Rather, they maintained a number of
contacts both in the United States and abroad during this time period. Some of those contacts were with individuals who were known
to the FBI, through either past or, at the time, ongoing FBI inquiries
and investigations. Although it is not known to what extent any of these
contacts in the United States were aware of the plot, it is now clear
that they did provide at least some of the hijackers with substantial
assistance while they were living in this country.
Hijackers’
Associates in Germany
5.h. Since 1995, the CIA had been aware of a radical Islamic
presence in Germany, including individuals with connections to Usama Bin
Ladin. Prior to September
11, 2001, the CIA had unsuccessfully sought additional information on
individuals who have now been identified as associates of some of the
hijackers. Khalid
Shaykh Mohammad
5.i.
Prior to September 11, the Intelligence Community had information
linking Khalid Shaykh Mohammed (KSM), now recognized by the Intelligence
Community as the mastermind of the attacks, to Bin Ladin, to terrorist
plans to use aircraft as weapons, and to terrorist activity in the
United States. The Intelligence Community, however, relegated Khalid
Shaykh Mohammed (KSM) to rendition target status following his 1996
indictment in connection with the Bojinka Plot and, as a result, focused
primarily on his location, rather than his activities and place in the
al-Qa’ida hierarchy. The
Community also did not recognize the significance of reporting in June
2001 concerning KSM’s active role in sending terrorists to the United
States, or the facilitation of their activities upon arriving in the
United States. Collection
efforts were not targeted on information about KSM that might have
helped better understand al-Qa’ida’s plans and intentions, and
KSM’s role in the September 11 attacks was a surprise to the
Intelligence Community.
Terrorist
Communications in September 2001 5.j. In the period from September 8 to September 10, 2001 NSA intercepted, but did not translate or disseminate until after September 11, some communications that indicated possible impending terrorist activity. CONCLUSION –
FACTUAL FINDINGS
In short, for a variety of reasons, the Intelligence Community failed to capitalize on both the individual and collective significance of available information that appears relevant to the events of September 11. As a result, the Community missed opportunities to disrupt the September 11th plot by denying entry to or detaining would-be hijackers; to at least try to unravel the plot through surveillance and other investigative work within the United States; and, finally, to generate a heightened state of alert and thus harden the homeland against attack. No one will ever know what might have happened had more connections been drawn between these disparate pieces of information. We will never definitively know to what extent the Community would have been able and willing to exploit fully all the opportunities that may have emerged. The important point is that the Intelligence Community, for a variety of reasons, did not bring together and fully appreciate a range of information that could have greatly enhanced its chances of uncovering and preventing Usama Bin Ladin’s plan to attack these United States on September 11th, 2001. SYSTEMIC FINDINGS Our review of the events surrounding September 11 has revealed a number of systemic weaknesses that hindered the Intelligence Community’s counterterrorism efforts before September 11. If not addressed, these weaknesses will continue to undercut U.S. counterterrorist efforts. In order to minimize the possibility of attacks like September 11 in the future, effective solutions to those problems need to be developed and fully implemented as soon as possible. 1. Finding: Prior to September 11, the Intelligence Community was neither well organized nor equipped, and did not adequately adapt, to meet the challenge posed by global terrorists focused on targets within the domestic United States. Serious gaps existed between the collection coverage provided by U.S. foreign and U.S. domestic intelligence capabilities. The U.S. foreign intelligence agencies paid inadequate attention to the potential for a domestic attack. The CIA’s failure to watchlist suspected terrorists aggressively reflected a lack of emphasis on a process designed to protect the homeland from the terrorist threat. As a result, CIA employees failed to watchlist al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi. At home, the counterterrorism effort suffered from the lack of an effective domestic intelligence capability. The FBI was unable to identify and monitor effectively the extent of activity by al-Qa’ida and other international terrorist groups operating in the United States. Taken together, these problems greatly exacerbated the nation’s vulnerability to an increasingly dangerous and immediate international terrorist threat inside the United States. 2. Finding: Prior to September 11, 2001, neither the U.S. Government as a whole nor the Intelligence Community had a comprehensive counterterrorist strategy for combating the threat posed by Usama Bin Ladin. Furthermore, the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) was either unwilling or unable to marshal the full range of Intelligence Community resources necessary to combat the growing threat to the United States. 3. Finding: Between the end of the Cold War and September 11, 2001, overall Intelligence Community funding fell or remained even in constant dollars, while funding for the Community’s counterterrorism efforts increased considerably. Despite those increases, the accumulation of intelligence priorities, a burdensome requirements process, the overall decline in Intelligence Community funding, and reliance on supplemental appropriations made it difficult to allocate Community resources effectively against an evolving terrorist threat. Inefficiencies in the resource and requirements process were compounded by problems in Intelligence Community budgeting practices and procedures. 4. Finding:
While technology remains one of this nation’s greatest
advantages, it has not been fully and most effectively applied in
support of U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
Persistent problems in this area included a lack of collaboration
between Intelligence Community agencies, a reluctance to develop and
implement new technical capabilities aggressively, the FBI’s reliance
on outdated and insufficient technical systems, and the absence of a
central counterterrorism database.
5.
Finding: Prior to
September 11, the Intelligence Community’s understanding of al-Qa’ida
was hampered by insufficient analytic focus and quality, particularly in
terms of strategic analysis. Analysis
and analysts were not always used effectively because of the perception
in some quarters of the Intelligence Community that they were less
important to agency counterterrorism missions than were operations
personnel. The quality of
counterterrorism analysis was inconsistent, and many analysts were
inexperienced, unqualified, under-trained, and without access to
critical information. As a
result, there was a dearth of creative, aggressive analysis targeting
Bin Ladin and a persistent inability to comprehend the collective
significance of individual pieces of intelligence.
These analytic deficiencies seriously undercut the ability of
U.S. policymakers to understand the full nature of the threat, and to
make fully informed decisions.
6. Finding: Prior to September 11, the Intelligence Community was not prepared to handle the challenge it faced in translating the volumes of foreign language counterterrorism intelligence it collected. Agencies within the Intelligence Community experienced backlogs in material awaiting translation, a shortage of language specialists and language-qualified field officers, and a readiness level of only 30% in the most critical terrorism-related languages. 7. Finding: Prior to September 11, the Intelligence Community’s ability to produce significant and timely signals intelligence on counterterrorism was limited by NSA’s failure to address modem communications technology aggressively, continuing conflict between Intelligence Community agencies, NSA’s cautious approach to any collection of intelligence relating to activities in the United States, and insufficient collaboration between NSA and the FBI regarding the potential for terrorist attacks within the United States. 8. Finding:
The continuing erosion of NSA’s program management expertise
and experience has hindered
its contribution to the fight against terrorism.
NSA continues to have mixed results in providing timely technical
solutions to modern intelligence collection, analysis, and information
sharing problems. 9. Finding:
The U.S. Government does not presently bring together in one
place all terrorism-related information from all sources. While the CTC does manage overseas operations and has access
to most Intelligence Community information, it does not collect
terrorism-related information from all sources, domestic and foreign. Within the Intelligence Community, agencies did not
adequately share relevant counterterrorism information, prior to
September 11. This
breakdown in communications was the result of a number of factors,
including differences in the agencies’ missions, legal authorities and
cultures. Information was
not sufficiently shared, not only between different Intelligence
Community agencies, but also within individual agencies, and between the
intelligence and the law enforcement agencies.
10. Finding: Serious problems in information sharing also persisted, prior to September 11, between the Intelligence Community and relevant non-Intelligence Community agencies. This included other federal agencies as well as state and local authorities. This lack of communication and collaboration deprived those other entities, as well as the Intelligence Community, of access to potentially valuable information in the “war” against Bin Ladin. The Inquiry’s focus on the Intelligence Community limited the extent to which it explored these issues, and this is an area that should be reviewed further. 11. Finding: Prior to September 11, 2001, the Intelligence Community did not effectively develop and use human sources to penetrate the al-Qa’ida inner circle. This lack of reliable and knowledgeable human sources significantly limited the Community’s ability to acquire intelligence that could be acted upon before the September 11 attacks. In part, at least, the lack of unilateral (i.e., U.S.-recruited) counterterrorism sources was a product of an excessive reliance on foreign liaison services. 12. Finding: During
the summer of 2001, when the Intelligence Community was bracing for an
imminent al-Qa’ida attack, difficulties with FBI applications for
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) surveillance and the FISA
process led to a diminished level of coverage of suspected al-Qa’ida
operatives in the United States. The
effect of these difficulties was compounded by the perception that
spread among FBI personnel at Headquarters and the field offices that
the FISA process was lengthy and fraught with peril.
13. [Redacted for national security reasons] 14. [Redacted for national security reasons] 15. Finding: The
Intelligence Community depended heavily on foreign intelligence and law
enforcement services for the collection of counterterrorism intelligence
and the conduct of other counterterrorism activities.
The results were mixed in terms of productive intelligence,
reflecting vast differences in the ability and willingness of the
various foreign services to target the Bin Ladin and al-Qa’ida
network. Intelligence
Community agencies sometimes failed to coordinate their relationships
with foreign services adequately, either within the Intelligence
Community or with broader U.S. Government liaison and foreign policy
efforts. This reliance on
foreign liaison services also resulted in a lack of focus on the
development of unilateral human sources.
16. Finding:
The activities of the September 11 hijackers in the United States
appear to have been financed, in large part, from monies sent to them
from abroad. Prior to
September 11, there was no coordinated U.S. Government-wide strategy,
and reluctance in some parts of the U.S. Government, to track terrorist
funding and close down their financial support networks.
As a result, the U.S. Government was unable to disrupt financial
support for Usama Bin Ladin’s terrorist activities effectively.
RELATED FINDINGS 17. Finding:
Despite intelligence reporting from 1998 through the summer of
2001 indicating that Usama Bin Ladin’s terrorist network intended to
strike inside the United States, the United States Government did not
undertake a comprehensive effort to implement defensive measures in the
United States. 18. Finding:
Between 1996 and September 2001, the counterterrorism strategy
adopted by the U. S. Government did not succeed in eliminating
Afghanistan as a sanctuary and training ground for Usama Bin Ladin’s
terrorist network. A range
of instruments was used to counter al-Qa’ida, with law enforcement
often emerging as a leading tool because other means were deemed not to
be feasible or failed to produce results.
While generating numerous successful prosecutions, law
enforcement efforts were not adequate by themselves to target or
eliminate Bin Ladin’s sanctuary.
While the United States persisted in observing the rule of law
and accepted norms of international behavior, Bin Ladin and al-Qa’ida
recognized no rules and thrived in the safehaven provided by
Afghanistan.
19. Finding: Prior to September 11, the Intelligence Community and the U.S. Government labored to prevent attacks by Usama Bin Ladin and his terrorist network against the United States, but largely without the benefit of an alert, mobilized and committed American public. Despite intelligence information on the immediacy of the threat level in the spring and summer of 2001, the assumption prevailed in the U.S. Government that attacks of the magnitude of September 11 could not happen here. As a result, there was insufficient effort to alert the American public to the reality and gravity of the threat.
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