Hooda thunkit???

Robert Cammaroto, who was in charge of issuing federal security directives to airlines in 2001, said the Federal Aviation Administration could have moved its just-under-three dozen armed federal air marshals from foreign to domestic flights, tightened security checkpoints and directed flight crews to resist rather than cooperate with hijackers. And he said most of these steps could have been ordered by FAA within a matter of hours and remained in effect indefinitely.

In 2001, ``we believed airplane bombings would not involve suicide,'' Cammaroto told a U.S. District Court jury which must decide whether Moussaoui is executed or imprisoned for life.

But defense attorney Gerald Zerkin got Cammaroto to concede that the FAA was aware before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that terrorists had considered flying a plane into the Eiffel Tower in Paris and that he was aware of al-Qaida suicide missions on land and sea. Cammaroto said he didn't know if al-Qaida's suicide attacks would be extended to civil aviation.

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"By the time a CIA briefer gave President Bush the Aug. 6, 2001, President's Daily Brief headlined ‘Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US,’ the president had seen a stream of alarming reports on al Qaeda's intentions. So had Vice President Cheney and Bush's top national security team, according to newly declassified information released yesterday by the commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks…In April and May 2001, for example, the intelligence community headlined some of those reports ‘Bin Laden planning multiple operations,’ ‘Bin Laden network's plans advancing’ and ‘Bin Laden threats are real.’" (Washington Post, 4/14/04)

Clearly, the warnings were urgent. But it was a direct threat on the life of the President that apparently led to the PDB request. President Bush noted: "I asked for the briefing. There had been a lot of threat intelligence from overseas. Part of it had to do with Genoa, that I had to attend."

National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice mentioned the Genoa G-8 Summit twice during her testimony before the 9/11 Commission but without offering any details. During today's hearings 9/11 Commissioner Ben-Veniste referred to the Genoa warnings and to air defense preparations based on those warnings, which included restricting air space.

During his press conference the President said that if he had had "an inkling" that people would hijack planes into buildings he would have moved "heaven and earth" to prevent it. However, the public record strongly suggests that the President had far more than inkling. In fact, it was just such a threat that the President says led him to request the August 6th PDB.

Note these press reports: July 2000, US intelligence reports another spike in warnings related to the July 20-22 G-8 summit in Genoa, Italy. The reports include specific threats discovered by the head of Russia's Federal Bodyguard Service that al-Qaeda will try to kill Bush as he attends the summit. [CNN, 3/02] The reports are taken so seriously that Bush stays overnight on an aircraft carrier offshore, and other world leaders stay on a luxury ship. [CNN, 7/18/01]


http://www.911citizenswatch.org/print.php?sid=226