Page 129 - Intelligence Failure News Today

Im busy, busy, busy, busy. thank goodness for angies list. from roofers to plumbers to dentists and more, angies list -- reviews you can trust. oh, angie? i have her on speed dial. thursday congress will hold hearings on the boston bombings and a big question will be was there an intelligence failure in tom is in new york and lee is in indiana. good to see both of you. both chairing the 9/11 commission which looked into the events leading up to the 9/11 attacks and what was broken in our intel...

>> youre telling us in addition to having no wmd stocks before the war, for the reasons you gave, saddam chose not to have those weapons. is that correct? >> that is correct. >> those are stunning statements. >> it was a terrible mistake. the cia had said we would find stockpiles that we didnt find. it was a disaster. >> you believed it was true at the time? >> yes, so did they. they shouldnt have. i mean there were a lot of people in the agency, in the community, that knew some of this informat...

To having no wmd stocks before the war, for the reasons you gave, saddam chose not to have those weapons. is that correct? >> that is correct. >> those are stunning statements. >> it was a terrible mistake. the cia had said we would find stockpiles that we didnt find. it was a disaster. >> you believed it was true at the time? >> yes, so did they. they shouldnt have. i mean there were a lot of people in the agency, in the community, that knew some of this information wasnt, you know, as solid as...

Intelligence failures. whats your view of what actually has happened here? >> you know, with every criticism thats made after the incident, after the president has praised the behavior of law enforcement, it doesnt mean that we dont have oversight. thats not to say that there was something that they should have done that they did not do, but it is to say that they have to learn from whatever they didnt do that they wish they had done. >> im thinking specifically of tamerlan tsarnaevs trip to t d...

Bombings? >> its hard to say. obviously this is breaking news, jon. the question is were they involved in this plot? or are they just useful idiots that helped out a college buddy? we just dont know that at this point. hopefully their detention will lead us in some direction in terms of that information as to whether this was a localized plot or if it may have connections through them to overseas. once again we dont want to jump the gun on it but we do want to know exactly how they were involved...

But to have the attorney general of the united states get up and focus on backlash against muslims, has there been backlash against muslims in the wake of boston? is this a time for the attorney general to be effectively scolding americans, not to be bigoted and not to be ignorant? >> megyn, the attorney general of the united states needs to do us all a favor. catch the terrorists. thats what he needs to be doing. catch the terrorists and dont allow individuals to be mirandized after only 16 hou...

Suspects. an official says a russian wire tap caught the mother and the older tsarnaev brother talking about jihad in 2011 but the information was not shared with u.s. intelligence officials until after the attacks. today congressman peter king responded to the apparent intelligence failure. >> if the russians are giving the fbi the information they had regarding the mother and the son and their views on the mothers radicalization and the sons radicalization it would have changed the investigati...

Literally resonate around the world. they can do something obviously like 9/11, but even something like the boston marathon bombings, where three people are killed and scores injured, but its not a huge disaster, yet it has resonance in every corner of the globe. thats the kind of theater they want. in fact, if you look at the history of al qaeda, youll see that the leaders used to watch disaster movies all the time, because they loved that spectacle. in some ways 9/11 was an effort to replicate...

They say without question. so from your perspective, what is the relationship in terms of sharing intelligence between the united states and russia? >> the relationship is complicated and difficult. we know that the russians in the past have listed people on terror lists that were not terrorists for political reasons. concerning the boston marathon bombers, they gave us a good tip. in this instance it was the united states that is probably guilty of intelligence failures. it was not the russians...

There are 1,000 detectives devoted to nothing but intelligence and counterterrorism. now, having said that, its also true that almost no other city in america and certainly in the world is quite the target that new york city is. because its a financial center, a media center, you get a big target in new york, and you get global attention instantly. which is one of the reasons that the security alert has been so high for so long in new york city. its not just to keep a repeat of 9/11 from happeni...