Victims’ family members Lorie Van Auken (right) and Kristen Breitweiser (left) are shocked to learn Tom Wilshire blocked a cable to the FBI about Khalid Almihdhar’s visa.[Source: Banded Artists]Doug Miller, an FBI agent assigned to Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit, reads CIA cables reporting that 9/11 hijacker Khalid Almihdhar has a US visa and drafts a cable to the FBI to inform it of this. The CIA obtained the information through a tap on Almihdhar’s phone in Yemen (seeDecember 29, 1999) and by monitoring him as he passed through Dubai (seeJanuary 2-5, 2000) on his way to an al-Qaeda summit in Malaysia (seeJanuary 5-8, 2000).
Draft Cable- Miller writes that Almihdhar has a US visa (seeApril 3-7, 1999) and that the visa application states his destination is New York and he intends to stay for three months. The draft cable mentions the tap on Almihdhar’s phone, his planned travel to Malaysia, and the links between his phone and the 1998 East African embassy bombings (see10:35-10:39 a.m., August 7, 1998andOctober 4, 2001). It also says that the CIA has obtained photographs of Almihdhar and these will be sent separately. Miller asks the FBI for feedback resulting from an FBI investigation.
Blocked- A CIA officer known as “Michelle” accesses Miller’s draft about an hour after he writes it. The cable is then blocked on the orders of the station’s deputy chief, Tom Wilshire, as a few hours after Miller drafts the cable Michelle attaches a message to it saying, “pls hold off on [cable] for now per [Tom Wilshire].”[US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 240]Miller is also told, “This is not a matter for the FBI.”[WRIGHT, 2006, PP. 311]
'No Reason to Kill the Message'- Author James Bamford will later comment: “A potential terrorist and member of al-Qaeda was heading for the US, the FBI’s jurisdiction—its turf—and he [Miller] was putting the FBI on notice so it could take action. There was no reason to kill the message.”[BAMFORD, 2008, PP. 19]Miller will later say he has no “rational answer” as to why the cable was blocked, but will speculate that Alec Station officers were annoyed he had encroached on their territory.[CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY, 10/1/2008]Michelle drafts a cable falsely saying that the information about Almihdhar’s visa has been shared with the FBI (seeAround 7:00 p.m. January 5, 2000) and there will be a discussion the next day about whether the cable should be sent (seeJanuary 6, 2000). The Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General will later call the failure to pass the information to the FBI a “significant failure” but will be unable to determine why the information was not passed on.[US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 250]The 9/11 Commission will know of the incident, but will relegate it to an endnote in its final report, omitting Wilshire’s role entirely.[9/11 COMMISSION, 7/24/2004, PP. 502]The CIA inspector general will falsely claim that the cable is not sent, “[a]pparently because it was in the wrong format or needed editing.”[CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, 6/2005, PP. XV]

A CIA officer known only as “Michelle” sends out a cable saying the information that 9/11 hijacker Khalid Almihdhar has a US visa has been sent to the FBI “for further investigation.” The cable does not state how the visa information was passed or by whom. Michelle is with Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit. The cable, which is lengthy and summarizes information about Almihdhar and three other operatives planning an al-Qaeda summit in Malaysia, is sent to some overseas CIA stations, but not the FBI.[US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 243]The CIA, which will be criticized for its apparent failure to tell the FBI of Almihdhar’s visa after 9/11, will repeatedly tout this cable as evidence that it had actually informed the FBI of Almihdhar’s visa, or at least thought it had done so.[US CONGRESS, 9/20/2002;NEW YORK TIMES, 10/17/2002;US CONGRESS, 7/24/2003, PP. 146;TENET, 2007, PP. 195]However, this appears not to be true, as after 9/11 the FBI will be unable to find any record of receiving such information and the CIA will be unable to find any record of having sent it.[9/11 COMMISSION, 7/24/2004, PP. 502;US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 249-252]In addition, as Michelle blocked the relevant notification to the FBI on this day (see9:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. January 5, 2000) and insists it not be passed the next day (seeJanuary 6, 2000), she must know the claim the information about Almihdhar’s visa had been passed is false. Michelle will apparently lie about this cable to the Justice Department’s inspector general (seeFebruary 2004) and CIA Director George Tenet (seeBefore October 17, 2002andShortly Before April 30, 2007).

Mark Rossini, an FBI agent on loan to Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit, protests in vain against a decision to deliberately withhold information about one of the 9/11 hijackers, Khalid Almihdhar, from the FBI (see9:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. January 5, 2000). One of his colleagues, Doug Miller, had tried to inform the FBI that Almihdhar had a US visa the day before, but had been blocked by a 29-year-old CIA officer known as “Michelle” and the unit’s deputy chief, Tom Wilshire. According to author James Bamford, Rossini was “perplexed and outraged that the CIA would forbid the bureau’s notification on a matter so important.” Rossini will later say: “So the next day I went to her and said, ‘What’s with Doug’s cable? You’ve got to tell the bureau about this.’ She put her hand on her hip and said, ‘Look, the next attack is going to happen in Southeast Asia—it’s not the bureau’s jurisdiction. When we want the FBI to know about it, we’ll let them know. But the next bin Laden attack’s going to happen in Southeast Asia.”[BAMFORD, 2008, PP. 19-20]Rossini protests, saying, “They’re here!” and, “ItisFBI business,” but to no avail. Even though he is an FBI agent, he cannot pass on notification to the bureau without permission from his superiors at Alec Station.[CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY, 10/1/2008]Michelle will be promoted after 9/11.[MAYER, 2008, PP. 16]In the run-up to the 9/11 attacks, Wilshire will write an e-mail expressing his fear of an al-Qaeda attack in Southeast Asia, specifically Malaysia (seeJuly 5, 2001), and will give this as a reason he does not communicate information about Almihdhar and his partner Nawaf Alhazmi to the FBI in May 2001 (seeMay 15, 2001). It will be alleged after 9/11 that the notification may be withheld to stop the FBI interfering with an illegal CIA-linked operation to monitor the hijackers in the US (see2006 and After).

Doug Miller, an FBI agent detailed to Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit, writes to Tom Wilshire, the unit’s deputy chief, about 9/11 hijacker Khalid Almihdhar. Miller had drafted a cable eight days before to tell the FBI that Almihdhar has a US visa, but Wilshire and another CIA officer had blocked the cable (see9:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. January 5, 2000andJanuary 6, 2000). Miller asks Wilshire, “Is this a no go or should I remake it in some way?” However, Wilshire does not respond. This is apparently Miller’s last attempt to inform the FBI of Almihdhar’s visa. About a month later, Miller will have some draft cables in the CIA’s computer system deleted, but will ensure that this draft cable is saved.[US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 241]The Justice Department’s inspector general will criticize Miller for not following up more and ensuring the information is passed to the FBI.[US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 356]However, Miller will say that he has a relatively low rank at the CIA at this time, and that he could not have passed the information without CIA approval, as he would have been fired.[CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY, 10/1/2008]

Tom Wilshire, a former deputy chief of the CIA’s bin Laden unit currently detailed to the FBI, accesses a number of cables about travel by 9/11 hijackers Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi in 2000 (seeMarch 5, 2000), but fails to draw the FBI’s attention to this or ask the INS whether they are still in the US. The cables report on Khalid Almihdhar’s travel to Malaysia in January 2000, his US visa, al-Qaeda’s Malaysia summit, and Alhazmi’s travel from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Bangkok, Thailand, with another person, and then to Los Angeles. Wilshire had previously blocked a notification to the FBI that Almihdhar had a US visa (see9:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. January 5, 2000). He writes to another CIA analyst about the travel (seeMay 15, 2001), but does not alert the FBI to the fact Alhazmi came to the US. Neither does he check with the INS to see whether Alhazmi and Almihdhar are in the country. When one of his colleagues finds these cables in late August, she will immediately check with the INS and become alarmed when she is told they are in the US (seeAugust 21-22, 2001).[9/11 COMMISSION, 7/24/2004, PP. 266-8, 537;US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 283]The 9/11 Commission will explain his failure to alert the FBI by saying he was focused on a possible terrorist attack in Malaysia: “Despite the US links evident in this traffic, [Wilshire] made no effort to determine whether any of these individuals was in the United States. He did not raise the possibility with his FBI counterpart. He was focused on Malaysia.”[9/11 COMMISSION, 7/24/2004, PP. 268]

Tom Wilshire, a CIA officer assigned to the FBI, sends an e-mail to managers at Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit, saying there is a potential connection between recent warnings of an attack against US interests and al-Qaeda’s Malaysia summit in January 2000 (seeJanuary 5-8, 2000). He notes “how bad things look in Malaysia” and points out that hijacker Khalid Almihdhar may be connected to the radicals who attacked the USSCole(seeOctober 12, 2000). He recommends that theColebombing and the Malaysia summit be re-examined for potential connections to the current warnings of an attack. The e-mail ends, “all the indicators are of a massively bad infrastructure being readily completed with just one purpose in mind.”[US DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, 11/2004, PP. 298]This is one of a series of e-mails sent around this time by Wilshire to Alec Station about al-Qaeda’s Malaysia summit (seeJuly 13, 2001andJuly 23, 2001). Presumably, one of the recipients at CIA headquarters is Rich B, the manager responsible for Alec Station, as he apparently receives at least one of the e-mails (seeJuly 13, 2001).

The FBI launches an internal investigation into its failings before 9/11, but will not publicize the probe’s course or findings. The only thing known about the investigation is that two FBI agents who were detailed to Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit, before 9/11 are interviewed by the investigators and give a different account of their conduct to the version they provide to the Justice Department’s inspector general. The two agents, Doug Miller and Mark Rossini, were involved in the blocking of a CIA cable to the FBI about 9/11 hijacker Khalid Almihdhar (see9:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. January 5, 2000andJanuary 6, 2000) and falsely claimed to the inspector general that they could recall nothing about this (see(February 12, 2004)). However, they tell the internal investigation the truth, that they were ordered by Alec Station’s deputy chief, Tom Wilshire, and another CIA officer to withhold the cable from the FBI.[CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY, 10/1/2008]

Mark Rossini, an FBI agent detailed to the CIA before 9/11, becomes a key briefer at an important daily CIA meeting. According to CIA Director George Tenet, the meeting is one of “the most significant keys to our accomplishments against the terrorists” after 9/11, and its aim is for all stakeholders in counterterrorism at the agency to come together and discuss recent events and steps the agency will take. Although Rossini is not initially involved in the meetings, which start after 9/11 and run for three years, he later becomes one of the first briefers, presumably some time in 2002 or 2003. Tenet will say Rossini “was affectionately called ‘The Voice,’ because his deep baritone imparted a special sense of urgency.”[TENET, 2007, PP. 230-231]Before 9/11, Rossini became aware that the CIA had withheld information from the FBI about one of the hijackers, Khalid Almihdhar. Rossini protested against this once, but then let the matter drop (seeJanuary 6, 2000). He later lied to investigators about what happened (see(February 12, 2004)).