Summary

We still have more to learn about the intelligence dimension of the 9/11 attacks. A number of classified inquiries that were conducted into the role of the various intelligence services remained closed to us. Typically in August 2007, Congress decided to release a short and redacted summary of an investigation by the Central Intelligence Agency completed in 2005 by the CIA’s Inspector General, John Helgerson. His inquiry had discovered that more than fifty people saw a message that focused on two of the members of the team of hijackers who participated in the 9/11 attacks, well before the event. The reluctance to share this information more widely inside and outside the CIA was condemned as a systemic problem. In this respect, the report confirmed the findings of the 9/11 report, which had criticised the lack of sharing between the CIA and FBI. Intriguingly it also added that there was also considerable infighting between the CIA and NSA, which is responsible for US signals intelligence.2