Lindauer: No, they did not. After the attack, it became clear that neither country could have been party to the conspiracy. Gadhaffi and bin Laden hated each other. Back in 1995, Libya was the first country in the world to warn Interpol about Osama, and urge an international warrant for his arrest. Saddam's government hated him, too. Baghdad considered Osama's extreme brand of Sunni fundamentalism to pose a serious destabilizing threat to Iraq's moderate Sunni elite. Osama was a wrecking ball to Arab governments. They all despised him.
In fact, we pushed Iraq so hard for intelligence in the months before 9/11 that afterwards Iraqi diplomats aggressively challenged our U.S. claims of ignorance. A couple of diplomats put it to me bluntly: "Obviously you knew it was coming, because you kept telling us about it. So why didn't you stop it? Why didn't you do something before this, instead of blaming us now? You should be blaming yourselves."
No, even before the 9/11 attack, I deduced that Dr. Fuisz's advance intelligence was derived from an entirely different source. It just happened to be one I had not expected.
Collins: All right. Who did you warn about this attack?
Lindauer: By early August, 2001, our team was gravely concerned that an attack was "imminent."
When Robert Mueller was nominated to be Director of the FBI, we dallied with going to his confirmation hearings to put a buzz in the ears of congressional staffers about our fears.
Instead, Dr. Fuisz instructed me to telephone U. S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's office.
In mid-August, I phoned the staff of his private office at the Justice Department, which probably consists of about 20 people. Identifying myself as an asset covering Libya and Iraq, I made a formal request that his private office issue an emergency alert throughout the department for any fragment of intelligence pertaining to possible airplane hijackings or airplane bombings. I explained that we expected a major attack involving that scenario, and we urgently needed cooperation from all other agencies.
Ashcroft's office told me to contact the Office of Counter-Terrorism at the Justice Department, and repeat what I had just told them. I did so immediately.
Collins: What happened after that?
Lindauer: I didn't stop there. Most Americans would be stunned to know that in mid-August, 2001, our team was so convinced a 9/11 style attack was imminent that I visited my second cousin, Andy Card at his house in Arlington, Virginia, so that we could warn him.
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