Maybe it was the lawyers’ fault the Atta intelligence got dumped. I thought first it was a lawyer problem and then considered whether it was a self-serving cover story. Today an insider discusses details on Intel Dump. Apparently SOCOM was chastened by their their possible posse commitatus violations stemming from their role in the Branch Davidian siege that they steered clear of the FBI when the Atta intelligence came up. This shows bad judgment, bad research skills, and bad lawyering beyond belief, characterized by the kind of excessive caution that masquerades as prudence.
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To my mind, Col. Shaffer (the insider) resembles Joe Wilson of Valerie Plame fame. Like Wilson, he seems to be a bit of a blowhard; like Wilson, he only has peripheral rather than direct knowledge of the subject at hand (Shaffer was a liason officer rather than an analyst); and like Wilson, he’s probably exaggerated the importance of his own project.
It’s worth finding out more about Able Danger, but it sounds too good to be true: I doubt that Able Danger had clearly identified Atta as a likely anti-American terrorist. (It’s also unlikely that we’d only hear about Able Danger four years after 9/11 if it really were as effective as Shaffer claims.)
I’ve actually yet to see this guy on TV, but I appreciate the insight. Those are all possibilities, as is the possibility that the lawyers were only peripherally responsible for the decision not to pass along information, when in fact it could have been something he just “heard about from hire ups” or other such scuttlebut. It does also appear possible, however, that this group or the Pentagon or both destroyed documnets related to the project, because they should not otherwise take so long to find in response to press inquiries.