Mysterious September 11 Breakfast Meeting on Capitol Hill

[Guest guest]

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO308C.html

 

The 9/11 Joint Inquiry chairmen are in " conflict

of interest " :

 

Mysterious September 11 Breakfast Meeting on Capitol

Hill

by Michel Chossudovsky

 

Global Outlook , Winter 2003

www.globalresearch.ca 4 August 2003

 

The URL of this article is:

http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO308C.html

 

Michel Chossudovsky, is the author of " War and

Globalisation, the Truth behind September 11, Global

Outlook, Shanty Bay, On. 2002.

 

The chairmen of the Joint Inquiry on 9/11 Sen Bob

Graham and Rep Porter Goss are in " conflict of

interest " . Or are we dealing with something far more

serious?

 

The chairmen of the Joint Inquiry have dubious links

to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) which

is known to have actively supported Al Qaeda and the

Taliban.

 

Moreover, according to intelligence sources, including

the FBI, Pakistan's ISI played a role in financing the

9/11 terrorist attacks.

 

The two Joint Inquiry chairmen Sen Bob Graham and Rep

Porter Goss were fully cognizant of the " Pakistani ISI

connection " and the role played by its former head,

General Mahmoud Ahmad.

 

Why then did they choose to exclude an examination of

the role of the ISI from the Joint Inquiry's 858 page

Report?

 

While hinting to " Saudi support and involvement " in

9/11, the Report fails to mention that the Pakistani

government, its military and intelligence apparatus

(ISI), have actively supported and financed a number

of terrorist organizations, with the support of

Washington.

 

Was it " an intelligence failure " to seek the

cooperation of the Pakistani government in the " war on

terrorism " in an agreement brokered by the head of the

ISI, a spy agency, which is known to support the

Islamic brigades?

 

This support by Pakistan's ISI to various " Islamic

terrorist " organizations was pursued prior as well as

in the wake of 9/11, despite the commitment of the

Pakistani government to " cooperate " with Washington

 

In late August 2001, barely a couple of weeks before

September 11, Senator Bob Graham, Representative

Porter Goss and Senator Jon Kyl were on a top level

mission in Islamabad, which was barely mentioned by

the US media.

 

Meetings were held with President Pervez Musharraf and

with Pakistan's military and intelligence brass

including the head of Pakistan’s Inter Services

Intelligence (ISI) General Mahmoud Ahmad. Amply

documented, the ISI is known to support a number of

Islamic terrorist organizations. (See Council on

Foreign Relations (CFR) at

http://www.cfrterrorism.org/coalition/pakistan2.html )

 

According to the FBI, Indian Intelligence and several

press reports, the ISI Head was instrumental in

providing financial support to the 9/11 terrorists.

General Mahmoud Ahmad had allegedly ordered the

transfer of $100.000 to the presumed 9/11 ring-leader

Mohamed Atta.

 

On the morning of September 11, the three lawmakers

Bob Graham, Porter Goss and Jon Kyl (who were part of

the Congressional delegation to Pakistan) were having

breakfast on Capitol Hill with General Ahmad, the

alleged " money-man " (to use the FBI expression) behind

the 9/11 hijackers. Also present at this meeting were

Pakistan's ambassador to the U.S. Maleeha Lodhi and

several members of the Senate and House Intelligence

committees. This meeting was described by one press

report as a " follow-up meeting " to that held in

Pakistan in late August.

 

When the twin towers were attacked, General Mahmoud

Ahmad, head of Pakistan’s intelligence service, was,

in Senator Graham's own words, " very empathetic,

sympathetic to the people of the United States, "

(Stuart News Company Press Journal (Vero Beach, FL),

September 12, 2001).

 

Bob Graham's description of the General Ahmad,

contrasts with that of the Washington Post:

 

" On the morning of Sept. 11, Goss and Graham were

having breakfast with a Pakistani general named Mahmud

Ahmed — the soon-to-be-sacked head of Pakistan’s

intelligence service. Ahmed ran a spy agency

notoriously close to Osama bin Laden and the Taliban. "

(Washington Post, 18 May 2002).

 

While the Joint inquiry has collected mountains of

intelligence material, through careful omission, the

numerous press and intelligence reports in the public

domain (mainstream media, alternative media, etc),

which confirm that key members of the Bush

Administration were involved in acts of political

camouflage, have been carefully removed from the Joint

inquiry's hearings.

 

3 August 2003

 

The following text published in Global Outlook ,

Winter 2003, provides details on the breakfast meeting

hosted by Sen Bob Gram and Rep. Porter Goss on the

morning of September 11.

 

In late August 2001, barely a couple of weeks

before 9/11, Senator Bob Graham, Representative Porter

Goss and Senator Jon Kyl were in Islamabad for

consultations. Meetings were held with President

Musharraf and with Pakistan's military and

intelligence brass including the head of Pakistan’s

Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) General Mahmoud

Ahmad. An AFP report confirms that the US

Congressional delegation also met the Afghan

ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Salam Zaeef. At this

meeting, which was barely mentioned by the US media,

" Zaeef assured the US delegation [on behalf of the

Afghan government] that the Taliban would never allow

bin Laden to use Afghanistan to launch attacks on the

US or any other country. " 1

 

Note the sequencing of these meetings. Bob Graham

and Porter Goss were in Islamabad in late August 2001.

The meetings with President Musharraf and the Afghan

Ambassador were on the 27th of August, the mission was

still in Islamabad on the 30th of August, General

Mahmoud Ahmad arrived in Washington on an official

visit of consultations barely a few days later

(September 4th). During his visit to Washington,

General Mahmoud met his counterpart CIA director

George Tenet and high ranking officials of the Bush

administration.2

9/11 " Follow-up Meeting " on Capitol Hill

 

On the morning of September 11, the three

lawmakers Bob Graham, Porter Goss and Jon Kyl (who

were part of the Congressional delegation to Pakistan)

were having breakfast on Capitol Hill with General

Ahmad, the alleged " money-man " behind the 9-11

hijackers. Also present at this meeting were

Pakistan's ambassador to the U.S. Maleeha Lodhi and

several members of the Senate and House Intelligence

committees were also present. This meeting was

described by one press report as a " follow-up meeting "

to that held in Pakistan in late August. " On 8/30,

Senate Intelligence Committee chair Sen. Bob Graham

(D-FL) 'was on a mission to learn more about

terrorism.' (…) On 9/11, Graham was back in DC 'in a

follow-up meeting with' Pakistan intelligence agency

chief Mahmud Ahmed and House Intelligence Committee

chair Porter Goss (R-FL) " 3 (The Hotline, 1 October

2002):

 

" When the news [of the attacks on the World

Trade Center] came, the two Florida lawmakers who lead

the House and Senate intelligence committees were

having breakfast with the head of the Pakistani

intelligence service. Rep. Porter Goss, R-Sanibel,

Sen. Bob Graham and other members of the House

Intelligence Committee were talking about terrorism

issues with the Pakistani official when a member of

Goss' staff handed a note to Goss, who handed it to

Graham. " We were talking about terrorism, specifically

terrorism generated from Afghanistan, " Graham said.

 

(...)

 

Mahmood Ahmed, director general of Pakistan's

intelligence service, was " very empathetic,

sympathetic to the people of the United States, "

Graham said.

 

Goss could not be reached Tuesday [september

11]. He was whisked away with much of the House

leadership to an undisclosed " secure location. "

Graham, meanwhile, participated in late-afternoon

briefings with top officials from the CIA and FBI. " 4

 

While trivializing the importance of the 9/11

breakfast meeting, The Miami Herald (16 September

2001) confirms that General Ahmad also met Secretary

of State Colin Powell in the wake of the 9/11 attacks:

" Graham said the Pakistani intelligence official with

whom he met, a top general in the government, was

forced to stay all week in Washington because of the

shutdown of air traffic ‘He was marooned here, and I

think that gave Secretary of State Powell and others

in the administration a chance to really talk with

him’. Graham said. " 5

 

Again the political significance of the personal

relationship between General Mahmoud (the alleged

" money man " behind 9/11) and Secretary of State Colin

Powell is casually dismissed. According to The Miami

Herald, the high level meeting between the two men was

not planned in advance. It took place on the spur of

the moment because of the shut down of air traffic,

which prevented General Mahmoud from flying back home

to Islamabad on a commercial flight, when in all

probability the General and his delegation were

traveling on a chartered government plane. With the

exception of the Florida press (and Salon.com, 14

September), not a word was mentioned in the US media's

September coverage of 9-11 concerning this mysterious

breakfast reunion.

" A Cloak but No Dagger "

 

Eight months later on the 18th of May, two days

after the " BUSH KNEW " headline hit the tabloids, the

Washington Post published an article on Porter Goss,

entitled: " A Cloak But No Dagger; An Ex-Spy Says He

Seeks Solutions, Not Scapegoats for 9/11 " . Focusing on

his career as a CIA agent, the article largely served

to underscore the integrity and commitment of Porter

Goss to waging a " war on terrorism " . Yet in an

isolated paragraph, the article acknowledges the

mysterious 9/11 breakfast meeting with ISI Chief

Mahmoud Ahmad, while also confirming that " Ahmad :ran

a spy agency notoriously close to Osama bin Laden and

the Taliban " :

 

" Now the main question facing Goss, as he

helps steer a joint House-Senate investigation into

the Sept. 11 attacks, is why nobody in the far-flung

intelligence bureaucracy -- 13 agencies spending

billions of dollars -- paid attention to the enemy

among us. Until it was too late.

 

Goss says he is looking for solutions, not

scapegoats. " A lot of nonsense, " he calls this week's

uproar about a CIA briefing that alerted President

Bush, five weeks before Sept. 11, that Osama bin

Laden's associates might be planning airline

hijackings.

 

" None of this is news, but it's all part of

the finger-pointing, " Goss declared yesterday in a

rare display of pique. " It's foolishness. " [This

statement comes from the man who was having breakfast

with the alleged " money-man " behind 9-11 on the

morning of September 11]

 

(...) Goss has repeatedly refused to blame an

" intelligence failure " for the terror attacks. As a

10-year veteran of the CIA's clandestine operations

wing, Goss prefers to praise the agency's " fine work. "

 

(...)

 

On the morning of Sept. 11, Goss and Graham

were having breakfast with a Pakistani general named

Mahmud Ahmed -- the soon-to-be-sacked head of

Pakistan's intelligence service. Ahmed ran a spy

agency notoriously close to Osama bin Laden and the

Taliban. 6 (Washington Post, 18 May 2002)

 

" Putting Two and Two together "

 

While the Washington Post scores in on the

" notoriously close " links between General Ahmad and

Osama bin Laden, it fails to dwell on the more

important question: what were Rep. Porter Goss and

Senator Bob Graham and other members of the Senate and

House intelligence committees doing together with the

alleged 9/11 " money-man " at breakfast on the morning

of 9/11. In other words, the Washington Post report

does not go one inch further in begging the real

question: Was this mysterious breakfast venue a

" political lapse " , an intelligence failure or

something far more serious? How come the very same

individuals (Goss and Graham) who had developed a

personal rapport with General Ahmad, had been

entrusted under the joint committee inquiry " to reveal

the truth on 9-11. " (see p. )

 

The media trivialises the breakfast meeting, it

presents it as a simple fait divers and fails to " put

two and two together " . Neither does it acknowledge the

fact, amply documented, that " the money-man " behind

the hijackers had been entrusted by the Pakistani

government to discuss the precise terms of Pakistan's

" collaboration " in the " war on terrorism " in meetings

held behind closed doors at the State department on

the 12th and 13th of September. 11 7(See Michel

Chossudovsky, op cit)

Smoking Gun

 

When the " foreknowledge " issue hit the street on

May 16th, " Chairman Porter Goss said an existing

congressional inquiry has so far found 'no smoking

gun' that would warrant another inquiry. " 8 This

statement points to an obvious " cover-up " . The smoking

gun was right there sitting in the plush surroundings

of the Congressional breakfast venue on Capitol on the

morning of September 11.

Notes

 

1 Agence France Presse (AFP), 28 August 2001.

 

2. Michel Chossudovsky, Political Deception, The

Missing Link behind 9/11, Global Outlook, No. 2, 2002,

See also .

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO206A.html ;

See also Michel Chossudovsky, Cover-up or Complicity

of the Bush Administration? The Role of Pakistan's

Military Intelligence (ISI) in the September 11

Attacks, November 2001,

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO111A.html

 

3. The Hotline, 1 October 2002.

 

4 Stuart News Company Press Journal, Vero Beach,

FL, 12 September 2001.

 

5 Miami Herald, 16 September 2001.

 

6. Washington Post, 18 May 2002.

 

7. Michel Chossudovsky, op. cit.

 

8. White House Bulletin, 17 May 2002.

 

Michel Chossudovsky, is Director of the Centre for

Research on Globalization (CRG) and author of " War and

Globalisation, the Truth behind September 11, Global

Outlook, Shanty Bay, On. 2002. . © Copyright Michel

Chossudovsky 2003.