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Congressional Report Released on U.S. Intelligence Pre-9/11

Aired July 24, 2003 - 14:07   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: On that very point, just down Pennsylvania Avenue, Senator Bob Graham, who is part of that joint committee that released that report is addressing reporters, talking about exactly what happened in the intelligence world leading up to 9/11. Let's listen.
(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

SEN. BOB GRAHAM (D), FLORIDA: I need not remind that you this was a historic effort. For the first time in the history of the United States Congress two standing committees joined to conduct a special inquiry. The joint effort had its own investigative staff led by the extremely capable Miss Eleanor Hill (ph). The staff reviewed nearly 1 million documents, conducted approximately 500 interviews. We held 22 hearings last year, nine of them open to the public.

The result is this document of nearly 900 pages, which includes both findings of fact and recommendations for reform. I am immensely proud of the commitment and the hard work that the members of the House and Senate intelligence committees gave to this review, especially our co-chairman, Representative Porter Goss.

O'BRIEN: All right. Senator Bob Graham continues there. First of all, we want to apologize for the audio foul-up there. We'll get that straightened out. And -- that-- our engineers will have an opportunity to do that while we shift gears and talk to CNN's Bob Franken, who is in our DC bureau, not far from where the senator was speaking, to give us a synopsis of this report. No smoking guns but a lot of missed opportunities, right, Bob?

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, right.

As a matter of fact, we've been reporting on the leaks that have come from agencies who possibly had a vested interest who are saying the conclusion had been no smoking gun, that there had been something that would have alerted folks to the fact there was an attack upcoming, saying that the emphasis was they were not at fault.

But in a briefing that was conducted not a short -- not a long time ago, just a little bit ago, the people were telling us, No, that's not the conclusion at all. That as a matter of fact, there's all kinds of evidence that the intelligence agencies, had they been doing their jobs, might have been able to prevent the September 11 attacks.

For instance, this comment from this report that goes about 800 pages: "We will never definitively know to what extent the community," meaning the intelligence 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 Osama bin Laden's plan to attack the United States on September 11, 2001."

This was a recurring theme as the report goes through. It's 800- plus pages -- that there is a miserable communication -- it was even worse before September 11 -- between various government agencies. There was a focus, as we've been reporting, on the two hijackers who are among the five, according to government officials on the plane that, crashed into the Pentagon, who spent a considerable period of time in San Diego, even dealing with an FBI informant. But the FBI agents, according to the report, labored with this lack of communication. The CIA did not share its information, the agents did not know what was going on.

The report goes on to say, "What is clear is that the informant's contacts with the hijacker, had they been capitalized on, would have given the San Diego FBI field office perhaps the intelligence communities best chance to unravel the September 11 plot." As I said, that's a theme that goes on throughout -- missed opportunities -- according to the people on that committee.

Now, one of the complaints has been that the U.S. government was really, really tough about declassifying information for the release of the report. What was particularly glaring was information about the Saudi government. A lot of it was blocked for public release. A number of U.S. government officials complained, says the report, to the joint inquiry about a lack of Saudi cooperation in terrorism investigation. This has been a complaint that...

O'BRIEN: Bob Franken, we've got to interrupt you. I'm sorry. We've got to head over to the Pentagon.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




9/11>


Aired July 24, 2003 - 14:07   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: On that very point, just down Pennsylvania Avenue, Senator Bob Graham, who is part of that joint committee that released that report is addressing reporters, talking about exactly what happened in the intelligence world leading up to 9/11. Let's listen.
(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

SEN. BOB GRAHAM (D), FLORIDA: I need not remind that you this was a historic effort. For the first time in the history of the United States Congress two standing committees joined to conduct a special inquiry. The joint effort had its own investigative staff led by the extremely capable Miss Eleanor Hill (ph). The staff reviewed nearly 1 million documents, conducted approximately 500 interviews. We held 22 hearings last year, nine of them open to the public.

The result is this document of nearly 900 pages, which includes both findings of fact and recommendations for reform. I am immensely proud of the commitment and the hard work that the members of the House and Senate intelligence committees gave to this review, especially our co-chairman, Representative Porter Goss.

O'BRIEN: All right. Senator Bob Graham continues there. First of all, we want to apologize for the audio foul-up there. We'll get that straightened out. And -- that-- our engineers will have an opportunity to do that while we shift gears and talk to CNN's Bob Franken, who is in our DC bureau, not far from where the senator was speaking, to give us a synopsis of this report. No smoking guns but a lot of missed opportunities, right, Bob?

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, right.

As a matter of fact, we've been reporting on the leaks that have come from agencies who possibly had a vested interest who are saying the conclusion had been no smoking gun, that there had been something that would have alerted folks to the fact there was an attack upcoming, saying that the emphasis was they were not at fault.

But in a briefing that was conducted not a short -- not a long time ago, just a little bit ago, the people were telling us, No, that's not the conclusion at all. That as a matter of fact, there's all kinds of evidence that the intelligence agencies, had they been doing their jobs, might have been able to prevent the September 11 attacks.

For instance, this comment from this report that goes about 800 pages: "We will never definitively know to what extent the community," meaning the intelligence 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 Osama bin Laden's plan to attack the United States on September 11, 2001."

This was a recurring theme as the report goes through. It's 800- plus pages -- that there is a miserable communication -- it was even worse before September 11 -- between various government agencies. There was a focus, as we've been reporting, on the two hijackers who are among the five, according to government officials on the plane that, crashed into the Pentagon, who spent a considerable period of time in San Diego, even dealing with an FBI informant. But the FBI agents, according to the report, labored with this lack of communication. The CIA did not share its information, the agents did not know what was going on.

The report goes on to say, "What is clear is that the informant's contacts with the hijacker, had they been capitalized on, would have given the San Diego FBI field office perhaps the intelligence communities best chance to unravel the September 11 plot." As I said, that's a theme that goes on throughout -- missed opportunities -- according to the people on that committee.

Now, one of the complaints has been that the U.S. government was really, really tough about declassifying information for the release of the report. What was particularly glaring was information about the Saudi government. A lot of it was blocked for public release. A number of U.S. government officials complained, says the report, to the joint inquiry about a lack of Saudi cooperation in terrorism investigation. This has been a complaint that...

O'BRIEN: Bob Franken, we've got to interrupt you. I'm sorry. We've got to head over to the Pentagon.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




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