Inquiry Fails to Find Data on Hijackers
WASHINGTON — An internal Pentagon investigation has found no proof that a classified military intelligence program identified Mohamed Atta or any of the other Sept. 11 hijackers before the attacks or found that they were living in the United States, officials said Thursday.
Several senior Pentagon officials said their investigation found five members of the intelligence program codenamed Able Danger who recalled the existence of a large chart of suspected Al Qaeda operatives as far back as 2000 that they said included Atta's name or photograph. But the Pentagon found no evidence that such a chart existed.
The findings of the investigation contradict allegations that the military intelligence program may have had information in 2000 that could have led to Atta's arrest and prevented the terrorist attacks.
In recent weeks, three members of the team, which was disbanded in the spring of 2001, have publicly stated that Able Danger identified Atta and as many as three other hijackers at least a year before the attacks on New York and the Pentagon. One of them, Army Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, said he tried to warn the FBI about the presence of Atta and the other terrorists in the United States.
But Shaffer said he was blocked by Pentagon lawyers concerned about the repercussions of admitting that the team was gathering intelligence on Atta because he was in the country on a U.S. visa.
Many current and former U.S. officials have expressed skepticism about whether the military intelligence operation actually identified Atta and the other conspirators as part of Al Qaeda before Sept. 11.
This week, the Senate Judiciary Committee announced that it would hold a Sept. 14 hearing to sift through conflicting claims about Able Danger, which was set up in 1999 to gather information about Al Qaeda cells worldwide. Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said Shaffer and other team members "have made some pretty serious statements and that ought to be investigated."
At a news briefing Thursday, Pentagon officials conceded that their investigation had answered most, but not all, of those questions about the military intelligence unit, which analyzed vast amounts of computerized information to detect links and patterns in global terrorism.
Maj. Paul Swiergosz, a Defense Department spokesman, said Pentagon investigators reviewed 9.5 million documents, e-mails and other military records, and interviewed more than 80 individuals, including Shaffer and Able Danger's team leader, Navy Capt. Scott Philpott.
