On June 11, 2001, an analyst at the FBI headquarters named Dina Corsi met in New York City with two of the FBI agents conducting the criminal investigation of the October 12, 2000, USS Cole bombing. Also present was an unnamed CIA supervisor from its Center for Counterterrorism. The attack killed 17 US sailors and wounded at least another 36.
According to the 9/11 Commission Report, Corsi showed SA Russ Fincher and SA Steve Bongardt three surveillance photos (given to her by the CIA’s Tom Wilshire). One of them was of a man named Khalid al-Mihdhar. Another was of Mihdhar standing next to a palm tree with another man. Corsi then asked the agents Tom Wilshire’s question: Was the man in the third photograph Fahd al-Quso? Bongardt, who had interviewed Quso back in February, said no. Neither agent recognized the other two men.
Bongardt pressed Corsi, but she only knew the photos were taken in Malaysia around the Millennium. Bongardt demanded information from the CIA supervisor who only volunteered that Mihdhar was traveling on a Saudi passport. The FBI could not put Mihdhar on the terror watchlist without his date of birth and full passport information, and the CIA hadn’t.
None of the three in those photos was wearing a metal prosthesis; Wilshire had withheld a photo from Corsi. Yet the agents’ answers further confirmed to the CIA that Mihdhar was not Khallad. (More about Khallad, who was later identified to be Walid bin Attash, in a moment.)
A day later, Bongardt sent Corsi an angry e-mail, “[S]omeday somebody will die – and wall or not – the public will not understand why we are not more effective and throwing every resource we had at certain ‘problems.’”
What might have been
A check with the State Department might have discovered that on June 13, 2001, Mihdhar obtained his second visa to enter the US. Yet a watchlist alert to all airlines with flights to the US would have revealed that Mihdhar was arriving at JFK Airport on July 4, 2001.
By July 4, the “lights were blinking red” across the board in the intelligence community. Bin Laden had just issued new veiled threats. FBI agents were conducting thousands of fruitless interviews in Muslim communities in America. Had the FBI agents investigating the Cole bombing known what the CIA knew, FBI surveillance teams surely would have been at JFK.
Mihdhar was met there by the unidentified man in the second photo, Nawaf al-Hazmi. Mihdhar’s arrival completed the American Airlines Flight 77 hijack team. Nawaf took Khalid to their safe house in Paterson, New Jersey.
That day, lead hijacker Mohamed Atta was in Paterson. He purchased airline tickets at a travel agency to Spain (to meet with Ramzi bin al-Shibh), by way of Prague. A few blocks away, the second in command of the 9/11 plot, Nawaf al-Hamzi, was living in an apartment with two other hijackers and a pilot named Hani Hanjour.
That month, Hanjour honed his ability to make turns during descent in 737 simulators at nearby Teterboro Airport. He had already flown up and down the Hudson River, passed the World Trade Center with Essex Airport flight instructors, and flown down to Maryland and near the Pentagon in a rented plane. He learned to fly small planes years earlier while living in Arizona. After Hanjour arrived in L.A. from Germany on December 4, 2000, and was met by Nawaf al-Hazmi, the two moved to Arizona where Hanjour trained and certified as a commercial airline pilot.
At the time, Atta was living in Florida with UA 175 terror pilot al-Shehhi. Had the FBI canvassed local flight schools, they’d have discovered the pair had taken flying lessons. Since April, Atta had met “muscle hijackers” as they arrived in the US. He settled them in, supervised them as few spoke English, and took them to get Florida ID cards and visa extensions, as needed.
Checks with European airline companies would have revealed Atta, Shehhi, Hanjour, and UA 93 terror pilot Ziad Jarrah all flew to Karachi, Pakistan, from Germany during the fall of 1999.
Atta met with Hanjour and Hazmi in Las Vegas on August 13, 2001, according to the 9/11 Commission Report. Interestingly, the FBI’s PENTBOMB (9/11) investigation found an electronic record that Atta’s airline ticket to Las Vegas may have been purchased using Anwar al-Awlaki’s Visa credit card per a redacted 2013 FOIA request response to Judicial Watch. Atta returned to New Jersey on August 23 to again meet with Nawaf al-Hazmi.
Atta decided on the attack date and purchased his airline ticket on August 25. He communicated the date to his fellow hijackers and Ramzi bin al-Shibh in Germany. According to the 9/11 Commission Report, "Binalshibh says he called Atta back to confirm the date before passing it to KSM." Ramzi then flew to Pakistan to inform Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Osama bin Laden.
The other 18 hijackers then purchased their airline tickets for coast-to-coast flights departing around 8 AM Eastern time on September 11, and with nearly identical seating on the four planes in first class, nearest the cockpit, and far forward in business class.
Backing up to May 2001
Tom Wilshire was serving at FBI headquarters as a liaison sent by the CIA. He emailed his supervisors at the CTC requesting permission to share with the FBI that Mihdhar had (in January 2000) a visa to enter the US, Hazmi had flown into Los Angeles from Thailand on January 15, 2000, and surveillance photos taken 10 days earlier at what came to be known as al Qaeda’s ‘Malaysia Summit.’ Those photos were of the pair and 10 others.
When Mihdhar stopped off in Dubai on his way to Kuala Lumpur, the CIA surreptitiously photocopied his Saudi passport and open-ended visa into the US.
Wilshire’s supervisors at the CTC did not answer his email.
Wilshire had also specifically asked them if he could share the surveillance photo of a man wearing a metal prosthesis in place of his right leg. In his email, he called the man a “killer” because the CIA suspected he was Khallad and had masterminded the Cole bombing.
Wilshire then gave Mihdhar’s name and three photos to Corsi to show at the June 11 meeting.
He withheld the photo of the “killer,” information detailed in the DOJ's IG Review of the FBI's Handling of Intelligence Information Related to the September 11 attacks.
In November 2000, FBI Agent Ali Soufan sent a formal request to DCI George Tenet – via FBI Director Louis Freeh – along with Khallad’s passport photo (provided by Yemeni intelligence). Quso, the would-be Cole bombing photographer (he overslept), had identified Khallad. Another Cole bombing suspect told Soufan that he bought a small boat for Khallad. Quso added that he delivered $36,000 to Khallad, in Bangkok, during January 2000 to buy a new prosthesis. Khallad’s leg had been accidentally blown off in an al Qaeda training camp.
Soufan specifically asked Tenet if the CIA had information about Khallad and meetings of al Qaeda in Southeast Asia earlier in 2000. The CIA told the FBI they had nothing for them.
Soufan sent the CIA additional requests for that information in December 2000 and January 2001. He got the same answer.
The CIA withheld information related to the Cole bombing from the FBI.
The 9/11 plot went undetected.
After the September 11, 2001, attacks, the FBI’s investigation discovered that Khallad was Walid bin Attash, one of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s lieutenants. Khallad coordinated with Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri al Qaeda’s support of the Cole bombing. And he found several “good” candidates for bin Laden’s ‘Planes Operation’ among those arriving in Karachi looking to join the jihad and in al Qaeda’s training camps in Afghanistan. He was captured in Karachi on April 29, 2003.
Khallad is currently imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay awaiting trial by Military Commission.