By 9/12 Mohammed Atta's face and story had been broadcast across the globe. The Egyptian-born al Qaeda hijacker had lived in Hamburg for three years prior to June 2, 2000, when he took a bus to Prague and then boarded a plane the next day for Newark, New Jersey. During the 15 months that followed, Atta traveled along circuitous routes within and outside of the United States, until the September morning when he flew a 767 into One World Trade Center.
Soon thereafter, Czech intelligence heard from a paid informant, a local resident of Middle Eastern descent, who claimed that he recognized Atta's face on TV. The informant said he observed Atta talking with an Iraqi diplomat and suspected spy, Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir Al-Ani, earlier that year in Prague.
To this day, there is no other evidence suggesting that Atta was in Prague during 2001. (The fact that some Czech intelligence officers still believe the informant's story is not evidence.) But right away, unnamed sources began piling on that single source's uncorroborated remembrance. In days following our 9/11 trauma, these differing reports contributed to an overall sense of unease. Today, those other stories -- each with a different twist on the details -- sound as phony as an Elvis sighting.
Those stories represented a key part of Douglas Feith's fraudulent case for war. Before Feith gave his notorious briefing to the White House -- the contents of which he concealed from the intelligence community -- his friends in the media conducted a massive disinformation campaign to promote the imagined Prague sighting. Ground zero for the campaign was the op-ed page of The New York Times, under William Safire's byline. In each of his seven columns below, Safire asserted that an uncorroborated allegation was solid fact, and he smeared those who suggested otherwise. Here's an accounting of the journalistic counterpart to Douglas Feith.
A Foundation of Suspicious and Contradictory Stories
Laying the groundwork for Safire's first column, published on October 22, 2001, were a series of allegations from unnamed or dubious sources, which tended to contradict one another. But in the first weeks following 9/11, no one was scrutinizing the allegations carefully.
September 20, 2001
Bush Grapples With Iraq's Possible Ties to Attacks, The Wall Street Journal
"U.S. officials say they are still examining a report that Mohamed Atta, a suspected hijacker on the airliner that struck the north tower of the World Trade Center, met with an Iraqi intelligence agent, evidently in Prague."
September 23, 2001
Army alert by Saddam points to Iraqi role, The Sunday Telegraph
"Since the attacks, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt that the Iraqi leader had been providing al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, with funding, logistical back-up and advanced weapons training. His operations reached a "frantic pace" in the past few months, according to Western intelligence officials...The CIA also claims to have proof that bin Laden aides were in contact with Iraqi intelligence in the days before the New York outrage."
September 26, 2001
A Broader Campaign: Saddam Was Involved, The Wall Street Journal
"One of the terrorist hijackers, Mohamed Atta, met Iraqi agents in Prague in June 2000, according to Iraqi opposition sources who reported the meeting to U.S. authorities...Were U.S authorities unaware of the connection between bin Laden and the Iraqi regime? Not at all. News of such cooperation surfaced in U.S. circles very soon after the secret rendezvous based on information provided by dissident groups and informants. The meeting has since been reported on...But as former CIA chief James Woolsey says 'whether perpetrated by bin Laden and his associates or by others, [the attacks] were sponsored, supported, and perhaps even ordered by Saddam Hussein.'"
October 5, 2001
Iraq 'Helped Atta'; Fight for freedom; Terror in America, The Sun
"SUICIDE hijacker Mohammed Atta was handed fake passports by Iraqi intelligence agents, the CIA believes...A Czech official said: "This is not an isolated occasion where Iraqi intelligence agents were seen to be meeting with people in Prague. It is not disputed that Atta met an Iraqi agent on this occasion or perhaps on previous occasions. Atta was tailed by Czech agents at Prague airport. It is believed Iraq may have prepared bogus passports for all 19 hijackers."
October 8, 2001
INC CLAIMS SADDAM LINKED TO BIN LADEN NETWORK, Radio Free Europe
"The Iraq National Congress (INC) has linked Osama bin Laden's network with Iraq, according to a release by the INC. In December 1998 Faruq Hijazi, a senior Iraqi intelligence official, traveled to Kandahar tomeet bin Laden personally. He was accompanied by a group of Iraqi intelligence officers."
October 12, 2001
Czech leader denies Atta meetings in Prague, Reuters News
"Atta spent a day in the Czech Republic in transit at Prague's Ruzyne airport, but neither before nor after was he in the Czech Republic," Zeman told a joint press conference with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. "There's no reason to assume that his stay had any connection with the attacks on September 11."
"Senior Pentagon officials who want to expand the war against terrorism to Iraq authorized a trip to Great Britain last month by former CIA Director James Woolsey in search of evidence that Saddam Hussein played a role in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, U.S. officials said...The one-time CIA chief acted with the blessing of senior Pentagon officials, including Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and Undersecretary for Policy Douglas Feith, said current and former U.S. officials."
"AMERICAN investigators probing anthrax outbreaks in Florida and New York believe they have all the hallmarks of a terrorist attack - and have named Iraq as prime suspect as the source of the deadly spores...Last autumn Mohamed Atta is said by US intelligence officials to have met in Prague an agent from Iraqi intelligence."
LONDON, Oct 16 (CTK) - "The Egyptian government believes that one of the September 11 suicide terrorists, Muhammad Atta, received deadly spores of anthrax from an Iraqi diplomat when they met in Prague, the British daily The Guardian writes today."
Needless to say, all of those unsubstantiated allegations from unnamed sources turned up nothing.
Safire's Columns Set Up the Premise Feith's Notorious Slide Presentation
In his seven columns touting purported Atta sighting as a verifiable fact, Safire unleashed his vitriol on skeptics.
1. October 22, 2001
"What about a connection between Osama bin Laden and Iraq's Saddam Hussein? Because the Scowcroft set at the National Security Council is still in denial about its blunder a decade ago that permitted Saddam to stay in power, the C.I.A. professes to see no collaboration in Baghdad...."[Consider] what is known... this summer's observed contacts of Al Qaeda's suicide-hijacker Mohammed Atta with Iraqi spies under diplomatic cover in Prague.
"...it is absurd to claim -- in the face of what we already know -- that Iraq is not an active collaborator with, harborer of, and source of sophisticated training and unconventional weaponry for bin Laden's world terror network."
"The undisputed fact connecting Iraq's Saddam Hussein to the Sept. 11 attacks is this: Mohamed Atta...flew from Florida to Prague to meet on April 8 of this year with Ahmed al-Ani, the Iraqi consul."
"Soviet propagandists used to touch up photographs to remove the face of a Kremlin official who had fallen from favor, making him a ''nonperson.''"The same disinformation technique is now being used to wipe out the fact of a meeting in Prague in April, 2001..."
"A misdirection is in play in the CIA's all-out attempt to discredit an account of a suspicious meeting in Prague a year ago...""If the report proves accurate, a connection would exist between al-Qaida's murder of 3,000 Americans and Iraq's Saddam. That would clearly be a casus belli, calling for our immediate military response, separate from the need to stop a demonstrated mass killer from acquiring nuclear and germ weapons. Accordingly, high CIA and Justice officials -- worried about exposure of the agency's inability to conduct covert operations -- desperately want Atta's Saddam connection to be disbelieved."
"The C.I.A. has even stopped discrediting reports from Czech intelligence about a different point of Qaeda-Saddam contact: the meeting between the Sept. 11 hijackers' leader, Mohamed Atta, and a top Saddam spymaster in Prague."
Senator Carl Levin publicly identified Feith's dishonest actions on July 8, 2004.
In the summer of 2002, Under Secretary Feith prepared several versions of a classified
briefing on the Iraq-al Qaeda relationship. The briefing was given first to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, then to Director Tenet and the CIA in August, and finally to the staffs of the Office of the Vice President (OVP) and the National Security Council (NSC) in September. The version of the briefing given to Vice President Cheney's staff included several slides that were not included in the version given to the CIA.
"One of those slides, which has since been declassified at my request and is attached, was
critical of the way the Intelligence Community was assessing the Iraq-al Qaeda relationship. Under Secretary Feith has acknowledged to Armed Services Committee staff that he added two other two slides which concerned the Atta meeting issue, and which were not part of the briefing given to the CIA."
One slide in Feith's presentation addresses "Fundamental Problems with How Intelligence Community is Assessing Information." Since Iraq and Al Qaida have a motive to hide their relationship, contends Feith, "the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." It's a pithy little aphorism that only makes sense if you are a paranoid crackpot.
Perpetuating the Fraud Post-Invasion
After Bush declared, "Mission Accomplished," the news media began to notice that the case for war was a sham, Safire and other neocon acolytes began resuscitating the bogus story about the Atta meeting in Prague. Safire also made a point of defending Feith.
"Two blockbuster magazine articles last week revealed evidence that Saddam's spy agency and top Qaeda operatives certainly were in frequent contact for a decade, and that there is renewed reason to suspect an Iraqi spymaster in Prague may have helped finance the 9/11 attacks.
"Deniers derogate as ''cherry picking' Feith's intelligence summary available to senators: ''The Czech counterintelligence service reported that the Sept. 11 hijacker [Mohamed] Atta met with the former Iraqi intelligence chief in Prague, al Ani, on several occasions.'"
"'Panel Finds No Qaeda-Iraq Tie'' went the Times headline.''Al Qaeda-Hussein Link Is Dismissed' front-paged The Washington Post. The A.P. led with the thrilling words "Bluntly contradicting the Bush Administration, the commission. . . .' This understandably caused my editorial-page colleagues to draw the conclusion that ''there was never any evidence of a link between Iraq and Al Qaeda. . . .''
"All wrong. The basis for the hoo-ha was not a judgment of the panel of commissioners appointed to investigate the 9/11 attacks...
"What can the commission do now to regain its nonpartisan credibility?
Like Feith, Safire kept shifting around facts and pronouns like some elaborate three card monte in order to give the illusion that "the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." But at the end of the day, Safire and Feith seemed to have "proof" of only one thing, that pathological fabricators are relentless.
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Feith should move to his beloved Israel and get a job at a Likud think tank. And maybe someday he'll show a little remorse for the thousands off people he helped kill and wound, and for the trillions America has spent, for absolutely nothing.
The Feith thing is either an attempt by Feith to have a professional life after the end of this year, by framing himself as a deluded but sincere patriot; or a Con reframing of the whole discredited workup to war, to shore up their idiot base by feeding them a few more lies to swallow without checking them out.
Because you know that Bush-lickers won't check out the lies. They'll listen to Feith's crocodile-tears hurt feelings, and immediately say, "I knew it, we were right all along! Bush is a hero. Saddam and Osama collaborated on 9/11, and Richard Clark did SO make up all that guff about our boy ignoring Al Qaida. And anyway, Clinton did it first, so there!"
Progressives run on facts, like those above. Cons prefer to manufacture and worship "facts" of their own choosing.
----
kill your tv.
Did anyone listen to Feith on NPR"s Diane Rehm show this morning. He was promoting his book that defends the Iraq invasion. He tried placing the failure of the war on Colon Powell. The whole interview was jaw dropping in how he spun the truth. Diane grilled him well.
GWW
GoodwithWood -- You took the words right out of my mouth; I thought Diane asked good questions, and his responses were more than shocking. What a gigantic warmongering AH is Feith!
Maybe folks can log onto NPR and the DR show for Thursday and listen. Feith should be hanging alongside Kristol, Wolfowitz, Cheney, Rummy and of course W.
Think it'll happen? Not a chance; not ever. These neocon ghouls will live on and live w/o punishment or retribution. And the US (and the destroyed country of Iraq) will live with the results of their hideous war; 4000 dead for our country, and counting...
Good Idea Slow2.
If anyone is interested in just how outa touch from reality this man is give the show a listen.
http://wamu.org/programs/dr/08/04/10.php#20379
Dr. Goebbels would be proud.
JBS, a big AMEN. And the bunker mentality lives on...
The people who perpetrated the unnecessary and unwise Iraq invasion need to be held accountable. Through their deceits and miscalculations thousands have died and thousands more have been brutally wounded. Ordinary citizens would not be able to get away with causing such death and destruction.
Please keep in mind that an employee of Feiths Office of Special Planning was arrested by the FBI (part of a sting that included the CIAs cooperation) and charged with espionage against the US for illegally passing on classified documents on Iran to AIPAC members for the purpose of trying to foment war between Iran and the US. Larry Franklin was sentenced to 12 years in federal prison.
The two top AIPAC officials that he was giving this intel to are currently being charged with espionage against the US as well. Their trial is being pushed back by their attorney.
It BLOWS MY MIND that more people are not making the connection between this (this happened AFTER we went to war with Iraq) with the bogus case built for war against Iraq.
Careful there buddy. Don"t talk like that in public or you"ll be declared an anti-Semite and lynched by the media.
Indeed, the connection continues. I saw Rev. John Hagee (head of Christians United for Israel) recently embrace John McCain after endorsing him. A few days ago, Hagee was in Israel being welcomed by Benjamin Netanyahu (head of the Likud party). It may be a new cast of characters but the script sounds very much the same. This time, it's Iran.
Feith is just another neo-con dummy with no real-world experience. That's his excuse. Safire is smart enough to know better, but spewed the same lies anyway. What's his?
Safire's a lying snake in the grass. He don't need no excuse.
If they knowingly lied in an effort to deceive the public and members of the U.S. Government, William Safire and Douglas Feith may have exposed themselves to being charged under U.S. and international law.
As a newspaper opinion columnist Mr. Safire will be afforded some protection by the First Amendment to the Constitution. If so, this may leave only the public and his peers to judge his complicity in the murderous and costly conflagration which he promoted. On the other hand as one of the chief propagandists from this country"s leading newspaper he may not enjoy the same protections should he travels abroad.
If Douglas Feith lied in his official capacity as Undersecretary of Defense, then he must be prosecuted for Crimes against Humanity along with those who directed him and those with whom he is complicit. He will not be able to hide at some university playing the professorial role of the disinterested intellectual.
AlieNation -- "If he lied?" The record is clear; but, the generosity of the US is abundant. None of these men (and women) will pay a price. And, it is to weep, they will surely continue making $$$ from oil and from professorships (think John Woo). If they don't become CEO's then they'll lobby...
The citizenry collectively ignores their crimes against humanity. It is a sad place we're in today; no one wants to punish these perps. Everyone wants to send 18 yr olds to the pen for a gram of pot or cutting grass w/o a green card. Just let these crimes that have cost blood and money go unpunished. And, oh btw, let's elect McCain, they say, for his "patriotism and love of country." I give up.
I cant remember the guy who said it, but it was something like....pick a pocket and go to jail, rob a bank and go to prison. Rob Big, the penalties are the same, the benefits are greater and chances of getting away with it are even better.
This is old news. Any of you ever read "Fiasco" by Thomas E. Ricks or Woodwards books. I didn't think so. Like I said before. OLD NEWS.
With respect, Tanker Rat, murder is never old news. Complicity in murder is never old news. There is no statute of limitation on on the charge of abetting murder.
No justice, no peace, is not a slogan. It is a fact. While no person must ever be accused of their ancestors' crimes, that means the every person must be held completely accountable for their own. History will not forget.
War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity will never be "old news." Not as long as they go unprosecuted.
Look up the Nuremberg precedents on aggressive war.
Mr. Fiderer, thank you for lining up the case against William Safire. Nazi civilian propagandists were held accountable after WWII. William Safire has convinced me he has a brilliant command of the English language and so this is particularly contemptable.
Intellegence??then how do you explain bush??I say JAIL TO THE CHIEF..the crimes of stern gang..bear and stern against usa..30 billion$ bail out??for these thiefs??KATRINA??NOWAY..
Cost of U.S. War and Occupation of Iraq
$509,483,884,212
Number Of Iraqis Slaughtered In U.S. War On Iraq "1,197,469"Safire...It"s not a coincidence that Pro-Israel Jewish Americans, like Eliot Abrams, Dennis Ross, and Martin Indyk, are usually appointed in charge of Middle East policy, especially the Israeli Palestinian conflict..whyyyyy
Alan Schwartz, welfare recipient. As the chief executive of Bear Stearns, he's getting rather more public assistance than your typical welfare mom -- specifically, $30 billion in federal loan guarantees to help J.P. Morgan Chase take over his firm. But then, Schwartz has had rather more than his share of suffering of late
NY TIMES has BLOOD of THOUSANDS of Americans on its hands... & hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. Especially publisher Arthur "Pinch" Sulzberger and his war-monger-in-chief, William Safire - former Nixon speech writer & unrepentant Nixon apologist.
Mr. Fiderer, thanks for time spent compiling those Safire/NYT lies.
The New York Times was sued, & lost the DEFAMATION OF CHARACTER Lawsuit to, Wen Ho Lee... but in a typical gross miscarriage of American justice, the $1 million judgement Mr. Lee won was only a fraction of the money the Times (and their media consortium) made hawking "CHINA NUCLEAR SECRETS TREASON from Los Alamos Weapons Lab" blaring headline stories. (Sorry about the _shouting_ .... but that is how the Times sells scandals.)
Lyons and Conason wrote the bible compiling the NYT's lies and atrocious reporting from the "Whitewater" 'scandal' in their book, "The Hunting of the President" - documented with 25 pages of 1-line notes!
And all through 2000 Sulzberger, Safire, and most of the writers at the Times sneered at and demeaned Al Gore for his "exaggerations", while Giving Texas Gov. George W. Bush a free pass for AWOL from Texas ANG during the Vietnam war; his "dumping" Harken energy stock after the company's fraudulent Profit/Loss statement; other various scandals (Harriet Meir's Lottery-gate) and of course Texas' busted budget under Gov. Bush
From there, the Times relentlessly pimped Bush-Cheney lies-to-war - a coordinated, premeditated propaganda smear-and-fear campaign straight out of Goebbel's playbook. (As you document.)
Good summary of the neocons contriving excuses for them to impose their will on the world. They feel they know better how to "morally" run everyones lives, in the USA and in all other countries. You can also see how they have used the same tactics on many domestic issues.
and america bought it...WTF???
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Posted April 8, 2008 | 10:53 PM (EST)