“You want me to crash the nomination hearings this afternoon? Lay a little truth on Congress?”
“No. No, it’s too late for that.”
“Too late for the hearings? Or too late to stop the attack?”
“Both, I think.”
“You think it’s that soon???”
“I think it could be.”
It was the 2nd of August, 2001. I was aghast.
The phone got quiet for a moment.
“We can’t do nothing, Richard.”
“Of course not.”
His snappish reply spoke volumes about the depths of his concern. We’d worked together for seven years by this time, and we could read each other without speaking, if necessary. It would all be communicated in our eyes, messages between us that nobody else could decipher. According to Dr. Fuisz’s way of thinking, anger gained power and force as leverage, when it was controlled and focused. I believed him. He had dealt with some of the most dangerous men on the planet. My relationship with my other handler, Paul Hoven was much more explosive. He pummeled his opponents with expletives. Paul carried a well of rage in his heart from Vietnam. And I was a peace activist turned Asset, covering Iraq and Libya at the United Nations in New York.
It made for some interesting strategy meetings. But Paul and Dr. Fuisz were like older brothers to me. They might growl at me, or treat me like a kid sister who got troublesome. But they never let me down. They shared the jubilation of my victories. They pushed me back if I veered down the wrong track.
But until September 11 broke our hearts, we were all incredibly close.
“I’m going to New York. I’ll ask the Iraqis again. I’ll push them hard, Richard.”
“What? When are you going?” Alarm saturated his words.
“I’m going this weekend.”
“No, no, no. This weekend? Don’t go to New York, Susan. Don’t go.”
“It’s just the weekend. The day after tomorrow. I’ll be up and back.”
“God damnit. I don’t want you to go— I don’t think that’s wise.”
“I’ve got to make one last trip. I’ve been pushing Iraq all summer, Richard. I’ve got to find out if they heard anything from Baghdad. After that, I won’t go back.”
“Yeah, don’t. I don’t want you going back again.”
“And for God’s sakes, Susan, don’t stay overnight. This situation is very dangerous. Get in and get out. Speaking of Mueller’s confirmation—what if this happens before he’s confirmed? There might not be an FBI Director when this goes down. Jesus, what would that mean?”
“You think this attack might happen before he’s confirmed? Oh fuck. That would be like, the end of August? Or September?”
“Yeah, it’s definitely possible.”
“Richard— Am I to understand that you believe this attack is “imminent?”
“Yes, I do.”
“What are we going to do? We’ve got to tell somebody.”
“I don’t know yet.”
I could feel that tension again. It meant he was thinking. And frustrated.
“I’ll come by Monday (August 6th) as soon as I get back from New York. We’ll figure it out. OK?”
“Good. OK Listen to me. I’ve told you before. We’re looking for anything at this point. Even something very small. They might drop something that appears totally irrelevant from where you’re sitting. You might not even understand what it means.”
“I got it. I got it.”
“No, listen to me. Don’t filter this stuff. Don’t wait to see if you can confirm it. Give it to me. We’ll confirm it. Just get it. Don’t try to figure it out by yourself.”
“I understand.”
Our anxiety had been growing since the previous summer. The Lockerbie Trial at a special international court at Camp Zeist in 2000 got us thinking about what the next terrorist strike would look like. The bombings of Pan Am 103 on December 21, 1988, which killed 270 people, and UTA (French airlines) in September, 1989 had been the last attacks involving airplanes before September 11, 2001. Throughout the Trial of the two Libyans, our team worried openly that the pathetic display by Scottish Prosecutors would inspire a sort of “tribute attack” to the success of Lockerbie.
The problem is that while most Americans refuse to accept Libya’s innocence, terrorist groups have always known the truth. And they can’t figure out why the United States has been protecting the real culprits.
Famed terrorist Abu Nidal freely proclaimed his role in the bombing of Pan Am 103,32 on behalf of the Fateh Revolutionary Council. He steadfastly disputed that the two Libyans executed the attack. Translated as “father of the struggle,” Abu Nidal founded one of the first and most feared global terrorist organizations committed to hijacking airplanes and extorting multi-million dollar ransoms. Nidal was credited with launching terrorist strikes in 20 countries that killed or wounded 900 people over two decades.33 He joined the civil war in Beirut in the 1980s, teaming up with Islamic Jihad (later known as Hezbollah) and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—General Command (PFLP-GC). After Beirut, he holed up in Libya until 1998.
After his death in a shoot out with Iraqi Intelligence in Baghdad in July 2002,34 there was much talk of Nidal’s confession to the Lockerbie conspiracy. His family and friends acknowledged his central role in the bombing of Pan Am 103, and expressed regret that an innocent Libyan had got convicted for Nidal’s crime.
Britain and the U.S. have refused to accept Nidal’s confession. The question is why?
The real masterminds of the Lockerbie bombing were professionals, not baggage handlers or airplane ticket agents like Libya’s two men, Abdelbaset Al Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fahima. They played high stakes terror games at the master level through a vast and highly dangerous network of accomplices. Blaming Megrahi, because of prejudice towards his Libyan nationality, was absurd and racist. It surprised nobody when his so-called accomplice, Fahima, got acquitted in January, 2001. The only shocker was that Megraghi did not go free with him.
Scottish prosecutors made such a poor showing at Trial that the failure of the Scottish Court was gossip throughout the Arab world.
In Dr. Fuisz’s opinion, the politicization of Lockerbie and the weakness of the Court’s forensic evidence carried much greater hazards. In the months before 9/11, Dr. Fuisz frequently bemoaned how the United States had seriously damaged its credibility in terrorist circles, as a consequence of Lockerbie. Terrorist groups now questioned if, for all the mighty resources of U.S. Intelligence, the United States was too stupid to catch the real terrorists. Or else the U.S. was afraid, because the real terrorists are “too big.”
Either of those beliefs would create a powerful and irresistible provocation for the upcoming generation of jihadis, Dr. Fuisz argued. Younger terrorists watching the Lockerbie Trial would be inspired to launch some sort of tribute to the heroes who came before, and were too great to take down. Tribute attacks are fairly common in those circles. Dr. Fuisz feared this judicial fiasco would be the ultimate temptation.
On that basis, our team mapped out an extreme threat scenario that the next major attack would most likely involve airplane hijackings or airplane bombings.
On August 2, 2001, during Robert Mueller’s confirmation hearing, Dr. Fuisz and I suspected our worst strike scenario was about to hit the mark with devastating accuracy.
None of us wanted to be right. We fervently believed, however, that a major terrorist conspiracy was actively in play.
I remember it all so vividly, like a home movie playing before my eyes, winding back and starting again. So painful to watch. So disappointing in its aftermath.
In April, 2001 I received a summons to visit Dr. Fuisz at his office in Great Falls, Virginia. We met weekly anyway. On this occasion, he rang my home and asked me to come straight away. He inquired when I planned my next trip to the United Nations in New York. He wanted to talk before I left, and he wanted me to go soon.
My back channel to Iraq and Libya
existed to communicate messages back and forth from Washington, since those countries had no official ties with the United States. In our unique capacity, my team kept a special line open for intelligence on terrorist activities that Tripoli or Baghdad might uncover, and need to share with the West. Even under sanctions and global isolation, the importance of intelligence to block terrorism was recognized as a necessary exemption to U.S. foreign policy. I was designated as the covert recipient for such communications, heavily supervised by the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency.
And so I visited Dr. Fuisz immediately. He instructed me to demand that Libya and Iraq must hand over any intelligence regarding conspiracies involving airplane hijackings or airplane bombings. He insisted that I warn Iraqi diplomats that Baghdad would suffer a major military offensive— worse than anything Iraq had suffered before— if the U.S. discovered Saddam’s government had possessed such intelligence and failed to notify us through my back channel.
Admittedly, I was reluctant to deliver such a harsh message. I have always been an anti-war activist. My opposition to violence on both sides accounted for my success in dealing with the Arabs. I don’t issue threats, only appeals to avoid confrontation and aggression. So on my next trip to New York, I soft pedaled Dr. Fuisz’s message. I asked diplomats to send cables to Baghdad and Tripoli, keeping an eye out for possible airplane attacks. But I made no threats of violent reprisal against either nation.
When I got home to Washington, I met with Dr. Fuisz, who demanded to know how Iraq particularly responded to his threat. I had to admit that I stopped short of his full message. But I assured him that I had requested their cooperation.
At that point, Dr. Fuisz became enraged. In all of our years together, I recall no other time that he lost his temper and shouted at me. He stormed up and down the room, letting loose a tirade punctuated with colorful obscenities too profane and violent to repeat. Dr. Fuisz demanded that I must return to New York immediately. I must not be polite or kind. I must tell Iraqi diplomats exactly what he said. “The United States would bomb Baghdad back into the Stone Age, worse than they’ve ever been bombed before, if they discovered a terrorist conspiracy involving airplane hijackings or airplane bombings and failed to notify us. They would lose everything. We would destroy them.”
Except Richard was more anatomically descriptive.
There was one more point that Dr. Fuisz was adamant I must communicate: “Those threats originated at the highest levels of government,” and I quote, “above the CIA Director and the Secretary of State.”
Those were his exact words. And it was not ambiguous. It could only mean President George Bush, Vice President Richard Cheney or Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
Dr. Fuisz was not pacified until I promised to deliver his message with all the force that he communicated. He expressed tremendous satisfaction that I would make sure Iraq understood the warning came from the CIA itself—not from him or me— backed by military and political forces at the highest levels of government “above the CIA Director and Secretary of State.”
The highest geo-political stakes were in play.
Right then I recognized that Richard was motivated by more than a desire to check our trap lines on the terrorist circuit.
Something was moving.
In late April, 2001, Dr. Fuisz was already onto it. He fired back proactively to discourage Arab governments from supporting the conspiracy. Without knowing more, I was determined to help. And so, in May, 2001, I returned to New York and delivered that message exactly as he dictated.
Tension built throughout the summer of 2001. Practically every week, we discussed the 9/11 strike. Only now the threat scenario became more detailed. By June, our focus turned to the World Trade Center.
It sounds uncanny, but our team understood exactly what was going to happen. Our belief in that target was very precise. We believed the attack would finish the cycle started by Ramzi Youssef in the 1993 World Trade Center attack. We fully expected the modus operenda would be airplanes seized by hijackers and used as trajectory weapons to strike the Towers— We also discussed the possibility that a miniature thermo-nuclear device might raze the buildings. That’s why Dr. Fuisz wanted me to stay out of New York. Nobody worried that I might get hurt if the Towers collapsed. My handlers worried about exposure to military grade contaminants in the dust or air, including possible radiation.
Exactly how Dr. Fuisz knew so much, I cannot say. Throughout June and July of 2001, he continued to prod and push hard for any fragment of actionable intelligence from Iraq. After our first conversation in April, he never asked about Libya at all.
Over and over again, Dr. Fuisz demanded that I threaten Baghdad—not Libya— if the strike occurred. There’s no question that months before 9/11, a cabal of pro-War neo-Conservatives at the top of the government was already prepping the Intelligence Community to accept War with Iraq in the aftermath of the strike.
As of May, 2001, Iraqi diplomats had an immediate solution. From the opening days of the Bush Administration, Baghdad had agreed to allow the FBI to send an Anti-terrorism Task Force into Iraq—to monitor radical Jihadis that might attempt to exploit Baghdad’s weakened central authority to launch terrorist strikes on its neighbors. The CIA made this demand through my back channel following the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen, in October, 2000. Iraq agreed to show good will towards Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States.
See how badly CNN and Fox News got it wrong?
When confronted with the 9/11 scenario, Iraq placated the U.S. masterfully: “Perhaps this would be the appropriate moment for the FBI to start its work—” the diplomat suggested. “If the United States is very worried, the FBI should come right away.”
The world knows that never happened. At the time, I made excuses that the newly ensconced Bush Administration was still getting its footing on foreign policy. Over the summer, Iraq continued to invite the FBI, as U.S. warnings persisted. And I expressed frustration for the slow learning curve of the Bush Administration, which felt unnatural after eight years of rapid and decisive policy-making by the Clinton White House.
The 1990s have been called the Halycon Years of U.S Intelligence. From my perspective as an Asset, the arrival of George Bush felt like driving a high performance Maserati after some fool pours lower grade oil into the engine— and it starts clunking and sputtering and seizing up. You don’t know if the car will keep running until the mechanic’s ready to work on the problem— or if the car will die on the street.
That was Republican Policy on anti-terrorism before 9/11.
Our problem was the CIA had to keep driving that car no matter what. And we had to block terrorist threats against the U.S, regardless of whether the White House was responsive to warnings about those threats— or not.
Before 9/11, the answer was “not.” I doubt I was alone in feeling frustrated.
Throughout June and July, Dr. Fuisz beseeched me not to filter intelligence, or test its accuracy before informing him. During our meetings, he would painstakingly explain how urgently he needed to collect even fragments of actionable intelligence, whether any of it made sense to me or not. He begged me to hold nothing back. He appeared to be frantically searching for anything at all to pre-empt the strike. In fairness, this faction of CIA and Defense Intelligence urgently wanted to block 9/11.
Our threat of retaliation against Iraq struck me as a high stakes gambit, however. I’d cultivated diplomats at the Iraqi Embassy since August, 1996. These were professionally productive relationships that I would not have destroyed for any reason. Concurrently, our back channel was working to build a comprehensive framework that would secure all U.S. objectives in any post-sanctions period. That included a hefty commitment for Baghdad’s support of global anti-terrorism efforts.
Memories of it break my heart still.
On August 2nd, I reassured Dr. Fuisz again.
“I understand what you guys want. I’ve been pushing Iraqi diplomats all summer for intelligence on t
his attack, Richard. They know what’s up?”
“Tell those fuckers again. They’ve never been bombed the way we’re going to bomb them. Understand? If they know something, they’d better tell us. Or we will fuck them. They’ve never been fucked like that before. Make that clear.”
I promised. August 4th would be my last trip to the Iraqi Embassy and the Libya House before that fateful September morning.
Afterwards, I would ache wondering if I had misinterpreted a subtle cue. If I had pushed my contacts hard enough. If I could have pushed harder for Republicans to get off the dime and send the FBI into Baghdad. Above all, I would regret that I did not go back to New York after early August. For years, I would regard the 9/11 strike as my personal failure. On many black nights I would question if Paul and Richard thought so, too. Those doubts would torment me, as I suspect in my heart it tormented them.
For you see, stopping that attack was my job. I’d been a back channel for anti-terrorism intelligence for years. That was the biggest part of my life.
And this time I could not do it.
To all the families, I am very sorry. But Americans would be wrong to conclude that our team did not take that threat very, very seriously. Throughout the summer of 2001, ferreting out actionable intelligence to stop that hijacking conspiracy was our greatest priority.
To appreciate the gravity with which I regarded Dr. Fuisz’s instructions and paranoia, you must first understand his CIA credentials.
As a matter of policy, the CIA never acknowledges the identity of its officers. However I received an extensive debriefing on Dr. Fuisz’s background from my other handler, Paul Hoven, at the time of our introduction in September, 1994. If we were going to work together, I had a legitimate “need to know” whom I was dealing with. Over the next eight years, his bona fides got corroborated repeatedly by my Libyan and Arab sources— and by Dr. Fuisz himself.
Much of his actions in the Middle East were shrouded in secrecy. However, his own curriculum vitae provided some tantalizing clues.
His company, Folkon Ltd. claimed to “perform diverse services in the Middle East, including Syria and the U.S.S.R. from 1980-1990.”35
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