THE OMISSION COMMISSION

There are two SERIOUS questions surrounding the recent ABLE DANGER fiasco.

First – Who, what is the NAME of the individual who made the final decision not to release ABLE DANGER information to the FBI in late 2000? And what input did they base that decision on?

Second – why isn’t ABLE DANGER information included in the 9-11 commission findings? I know the commission has already answered this question. Their answer is that ABLE DANGER (AD) was not “historically significant”. That’s a bad answer – an unacceptable answer and I’ll get to that question here in a minute.

But first … The first question – who kept AD information from going to the FBI a year before 9-11?

We need a name here. Rep. Weldon tells us that he doesn’t really know who made the decision – maybe the DoD, maybe the White House. But both he and LtCol Shaffer are now saying that the reason they weren’t allowed to release the information to the FBI is because “they” (whoever “they” is) were afraid of a backlash and didn’t “want another Branch Davidian situation” to occur. The Branch Davidians keep coming up over and over again in this situation. Why?

Well, if we take Weldon and Shaffer at their word – and they’re correct that someone didn’t want to share AD information with the FBI because they feared another Branch Davidian backlash … Who would have feared another Branch Davidian backlash? Certainly no one in DoD – because DoD wasn’t involved in any of the Branch Davidian standoff. The FBI, ATF and Justice Department took that body-blow - not anyone in DoD.

It doesn’t make sense. DoD – on it’s own, wouldn’t have cited the Waco affair as the primary reason for not sharing the information.

Possible scenario – perhaps DoD lawyers were convinced that the AD information was extremely important and they ASKED the Justice Department or the White House for advice on what to do with it? And perhaps that “someone” in either the Justice Department or the White House told them “What, are you crazy??? This would be like asking for a repeat of the beating we took over WACO!!”

And perhaps that’s the reason the DoD lawyers gave to the AD folks why they couldn’t share with the FBI. They just left out the part about WHO told them not to share – which wouldn’t be unusual. The fact is, if the Pentagon made the decision on it’s own – they wouldn’t have cited Waco and the Davidians as a reason (they just weren’t “touched” by the Waco affair and therefore weren’t sensitive to it).

No, the Pentagon, if anything, would have cited the fact that AD had collected information on legal persons within the United States – and OUTSIDE of military jurisdiction. We have a very long tradition in this country, that we’re rightfully proud of -- of keeping the military out of civilian affairs. So I can see DoD telling the AD guys “We shouldn’t even be collecting this kind of information” – but I can’t see them giving the Branch Davidian excuse or even mentioning the Waco affair at all!

I CAN see the Justice Department saying it though.

This question will be solved if more Pentagon sources come forward. We simply need to find the guy in the Pentagon who made the decision that AD couldn’t share information – and then we pull that guy’s chain. We may very well find that he (or she) made a “phone call” to the Justice Department for advice before making the decision.

This speculation above relies on one thing – that Shaffer is telling the truth on the reason he was given by DoD not share the AD information with the FBI.

To the second question – why wasn’t the AD information in the 9-11 commission’s findings?

Well, the 9-11 commission says that what they received from DoD wasn’t “historically significant”. That answer doesn’t wash. They also claim that they never heard Atta’s name mentioned in connection with AD until the very last minute when a “Naval Officer” who wanted to be interviewed by the commission mentioned it to them. And they say that his testimony was unreliable because he had only looked at a intel chart for a brief time and only “recalled” seeing Atta on it.

That may be but …

They DID have an interview in connection with AD at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan in October, 2003 on ABLE DANGER. If Atta’s name wasn’t mentioned at that briefing – then what was? What was the point of going all the way to Afghanistan on official 9-11 commission business if Atta’s name wasn’t mentioned? In fact, what did AD have to do with anything the 9-11 commission was studying if they didn’t know about Atta before he led the attacks? Why would anyone in DoD even seek such an interview unless they could provide the commission important information on what they knew about Atta?

And how could such a meeting take place without mentioning him? It can’t. They had to have mentioned it. And even a panel of idiots – such as the 9-11 commission would have immediately noted the “historical significance” of the information.

Shaffer by the way, insists that he did mention Atta and the commission immediately began making phone calls to dig into this - and they asked to interview him again. When he returned to the states - he called 'em up to talk to them again. They blew him off. Somehow, what was all fired up important to them the first time he talked to them - they mysteriously lost interest in.

Why wasn’t the commission diligent in getting more information on AD?

Did someone on the commission quickly recognize that the fact that AD information wasn’t shared with the FBI was due to the “WALL”? A WALL that Jamie Gorelick and the Clinton Justice Department erected? Did someone on the commission realize that this AD revelation would lead right back to the welcome mat on the White House’s doorstep – Bill Clinton’s doorstep?

Let’s remember that we’re trying to connect the dots here and fill in the story – because the 9-11 commission doesn’t seem to want to do that. So what’s going on here? Unless Shaffer is just an outright liar then the commission should have known that AD was powder keg information that should have been thoroughly investigated. If everyone on the commission is on the “up and up” then when the commission learned about the DoD’s failure to inform the FBI – they would have joyfully beat the bejabbers out of the Pentagon for this information.

Hey folks, if the ONLY guilty party here is the Pentagon – then no one on the commission would have refrained from blasting away at OSD – that’s a fact. So why didn’t the commission do it?

Connect the dots …

I find LtCol Shaffer to be VERY credible. Consider a few things here. First, he has told one consistent story all along - while the 9-11 commission told a plethora of stories last week alone. Shaffer is also putting his livelihood on the line here - no one on the 9-11 commission is. And, probably most significant to me - the 9-11 commission is made up of a bunch of politicians with an elastic definition of the truth. Shaffer is a military guy and I assume that any Officer that rises to the level of a LtCol has displayed at least a fair ability to adhere to the Army core values. Now, unless we find out fairly soon that Shaffer is under psychiatric care or something like that ...

So this is where we’re at now. And if you look around – the only people who are keeping this story alive in the news is Weldon, Shaffer, and the news media. The commission, aside from their statement last Friday – is pretty silent. Are they hoping the story will go away? Well it won't - it hit critical mass today and all the major news agencies are just fascinated with it.