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| Former FBI Translator Testifies About Indications of Attack Using Aircraft |
| 2004-04-01 |
| A former translator for the FBI with top-secret security clearance says she has provided information to the panel investigating the 11 September attacks which proves senior officials knew of al-Qa’ida’s plans to attack the US with aircraft months before the strikes happened. She said the claim by the National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, that there was no such information was "an outrageous lie". Sibel Edmonds said she spent more than three hours in a closed session with the commission’s investigators providing information that was circulating within the FBI in the spring and summer of 2001 suggesting that an attack using aircraft was just months away and the terrorists were in place. The Bush administration, meanwhile, has sought to silence her and has obtained a gagging order from a court by citing the rarely used "state secrets privilege". She told The Independent yesterday: "I gave [the commission] details of specific investigation files, the specific dates, specific target information, specific managers in charge of the investigation. I gave them everything so that they could go back and follow up. This is not hearsay. These are things that are documented. These things can be established very easily." She added: "There was general information about the time-frame, about methods to be used  but not specifically about how they would be used  and about people being in place and who was ordering these sorts of terror attacks. There were other cities that were mentioned. Major cities  with skyscrapers." .... Mrs Edmonds, 33, says she gave her evidence to the commission in a specially constructed "secure" room at its offices in Washington on 11 February. She was hired as a translator for the FBI’s Washington field office on 13 September 2001, just two days after the al-Qa’ida attacks. Her job was to translate documents and recordings from FBI wire-taps. She said said it was clear there was sufficient information during the spring and summer of 2001 to indicate terrorists were planning an attack. "Most of what I told the commission  90 per cent of it  related to the investigations that I was involved in or just from working in the department. Two hundred translators side by side, you get to see and hear a lot of other things as well. President Bush said they had no specific information about 11 September and that is accurate but only because he said 11 September," she said. There was, however, general information about the use of airplanes and that an attack was just months away. .... |
| Posted by:Mike Sylwester |
| #10 "Those of you who so readily descend into personalities automatically preclude yourselves from consideration as intelligent participants in any discussion." I'm not the one calling our President a "fundamentalist wingnut." BTW, I am a fundamentalist wingnut, too! The minute I see you participating intelligently, I'll "consider" you for a discussion, also. Get over yourself and your awful "ideas." I suggest you go back to DUH Underground...RB really isn't your kind of place! |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-04-02 4:46:28 AM |
| #9 Hey, just because Shrub is a fundamentalist wingnut who may be conflating Middle East policy with eschatology or some old family feud doesn't mean I'm against China getting its ass kicked for trade domination. For that matter, instead of Iraq, it's Iran that more desperately needs their government toppled or nuclear facilities demolished, whichever comes first. Even North Korea was a lot higher than Iraq on the list of priorities. I just have lots of trouble with a putative leader attempting to legislate discrimination into our constitution. Constantly portraying pluralistic America as a Christian nation by intentionally blurring the separation of church and state has only served to invite further terrorist attacks upon our soil. Prematurely rotating the troops most qualified to apprehend bin Laden and Mullah Omar out of Afghanistan so he could settle his daddy's stale hash with a tin pot despot like Saddam is just another button the coat. Even without Edmonds' testimony, there's already been enough lies told about Iraq to make Baron von Munchausen look like Honest Abe. NOTE: Those of you who so readily descend into personalities automatically preclude yourselves from consideration as intelligent participants in any discussion. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-04-02 3:26:50 AM |
| #8 Sheesh! 4 posts come in while I'm pounding the shit out of my keyboard! Sigh. Anyway, fuck Zenster and his lot of cretins. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-04-02 12:13:19 AM |
| #7 Yeah, Ill bet it was "general" -- and "sufficient" is another wonderful non-specific word. It takes an utterly intellectually dishonest moron to believe that hindsight and foresight are the same thing. Those who can barely manage the former expect 20/20 at all times of everyone else in the latter. Zenster, I love your disingenuous intro, where you pretend that you are undecided and awaiting developments. Puhleeze kiss my hairy ass. You are definitely one of the the aforementioned morons - and a tool / sucker (you choose) of posturing, preening, lying political assholes who can't balance a checkbook or program the fucking coffeemaker, yet they expect perfection from others. Especially when it serves their true ends - which are purely political. Collections of these cretins call themselves "commissions" - how official and proper. Right. They sit in judgement of real people doing real work and manage NEVER to have a deliverable on THEIR plate, no no, heaven forbid. Fucktards and cowards. The most purely obscene thing in human existence is criticism from a fucking voyeur. People like you and this FBI translator are a dime a dozen. Gutless and transparently opportunistic. Pray that she's the bombshell your ilk is dreaming of -- Clarke's transparency is already apparent and Rice will finish him off, exposing him and your commission of pol whores. If only they cared one whit for the security of America but, alas, it' is obvious that they do not. Nor do you. Nor do you fool anyone. Fuck off, asshole. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-04-02 12:11:13 AM |
| #6 Clarke has already made a convincing case for the low priority that terrorism received. His "case" is only convincing to those who have drunk the Democrat kool-aid. Anyone with half a brain realizes it was Clarke that dropped the ball for eight years. His "case" is a tissue of lies put together by a bitter, sick little man who wants to get revenge on the people who "dissed" him. |
| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2004-04-02 12:08:29 AM |
| #5 RC, don't you mean SYBIL??! One look at this woman's puss and you know she is Trouble with a capital "T." Zenster, keep dreamin' and living in your meditative state. |
| Posted by: Jen 2004-04-02 12:06:29 AM |
| #4 Everyone knew that some terrorist act in the air was brewing during the summer of 2001. I specifically remember counseling guys to be careful before they traveled over to Asia, Japan in particular. Upon arrival at work 9/11/01 I learned of the attack and remember thinking, "So, that's what it was." This much was public knowledge and in our newspapers, but the specific attack was still a surprise. Where was I working? In the Government, perhaps? No -- a start up in Silicon Valley. |
| Posted by: Anonymous3986 2004-04-02 12:04:38 AM |
| #3 Nice try, lefty. Next time, pick something that doesn't have two strikes against it the second it's posted: (1) being originally posted on CommonWetDreams, and (2) having the UK Independent as a source. As an objective source of information, it's only about a quarter-step above the Daily Worker. I won't even dwell on Ms. Edmonds' ability to divine what was in the minds of senior FBI officials pre-9/11, when she didn't start there until 9/13. |
| Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) 2004-04-01 11:58:46 PM |
| #2 Should Ms. Edmonds' statements be borne out by the evidence, I would like to see impeachment hearings instituted and perjury trials begun for much of the current administration's top security officials. Clarke has already made a convincing case for the low priority that terrorism received. If such dire warnings went entirely unheeded, then the White House has the blood of American citizens on its hands. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-04-01 11:38:19 PM |
| #1 No mention that Sibel is also suing the FBI? |
| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2004-04-01 11:33:57 PM |