Did DoD lawyers blow the chance to nab Atta?
By Jacob Goodwin In September 2000, one year before the Al Qaeda attacks of 9/11, a U.S. Army military intelligence program, known as Able Danger, identified a terrorist cell based in Brooklyn, NY, one of whose members was 9/11 ringleader Mohammed Atta, and recommended to their military superiors that the FBI be called in to take out that cell, according to Rep. Curt Weldon, a longtime Republican congressman from Pennsylvania who is currently vice chairman of both the House Homeland Security and House Armed Services Committees. The recommendation to bring down that New York City cell — in which two other Al Qaeda terrorists were also active — was not pursued during the weeks leading up to the 2000 presidential election, said Weldon. That s because Mohammed Atta possessed a green card at the time and Defense Department lawyers did not want to recommend that the FBI go after someone holding a green card, Weldon told his House colleagues last June 27 during a little-noticed speech, know
