CIA Forewarned Of Umar Mutallab, Didn't Connect Dots

CIA Also Knew About Suspect



The CIA received a vague warning four months ago about the Nigerian suspect in the Christmas Day bombing attempt, although officers did not learn his name until last month, administration officials said Tuesday night.

The revelation, first reported by CBS News, increases the footprint of data about Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab that is known to have existed within the U.S. government before he attempted to blow an Airbus 330 out of the sky using a bomb stitched into his underwear.

The CIA learned the man’s name in November, when his father came to the U.S. embassy in Nigeria and sought help in finding him, officials said.

A U.S. intelligence official defended the agency’s handling of the elliptical information, telling POLITICO: “Abdulmutallab’s father didn’t say his son was a terrorist, let alone planning an attack. Not at all. I’m not aware of some magic piece of intelligence that suddenly would have flagged this guy — whose name nobody even had until November — as a killer en route to America, let alone something that anybody withheld.”

President Barack Obama said in a statement to reporters Tuesday in Hawaii: “[T]here were bits of information available within the intelligence community that could have and should have been pieced together.”

Armen Keteyian, CBS News’ chief investigative correspondent, reported on the “CBS Evening News” that the Central Intelligence Agency had received information in August about a person of interest dubbed “The Nigerian,” suspected of meeting with terrorist elements in Yemen.

“Sources tell CBS News ‘The Nigerian’ has now turned out to be Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab,” Keteyian reported.

“But that connection was not made when Abdulmutallab’s father went to the U.S. embassy in Nigeria three months later — on Nov. 19, 2009 — and gave that warning to the CIA about his son’s ties to suspected al Qaeda operatives in Yemen. In fact, CBS News has learned that none of this information was connected until after the attempted Christmas Day bombing.”

CNN’s Jeanne Meserve quoted “a reliable source” as saying on Tuesday: “The father of terrorism suspect Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab talked about his son with someone from the CIA and a report was prepared, but the report was not circulated outside the agency.”

Sources tell POLITICO that the warning from the father is not that unusual — a reminder of the torrent of disturbing information that government officials confront on a daily basis.

George Little, a CIA spokesman, said in a statement: "[I]n November, we worked with the embassy to ensure he was in the government's terrorist database-including mention of his possible extremist connections in Yemen. We also forwarded key biographical information about him to the National Counterterrorism Center. This agency, like others in our government, is reviewing all data to which it had access — not just what we ourselves may have collected — to determine if more could have been done to stop Abdulmutallab."

During Tuesday’s appearance, the president also said: “It's been widely reported that the father of the suspect in the Christmas incident warned U.S. officials in Africa about his son's extremist views. It now appears that weeks ago this information was passed to a component of our intelligence community, but was not effectively distributed so as to get the suspect's name on a no-fly list.”

That “component” is apparently the NCTC, created on the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission. It’s not clear what analysts there should have done with the information. One possibility would have been to alert FBI agents.

The U.S. intelligence official said: “The United States government set up NCTC — and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence — to connect the dots on terrorism. If somebody thinks it could have been done better in this case, they know where to go for answers.”

Dennis C. Blair, the Director of National Intelligence, said in a statement: "I am committed to working with the President on the review of watchlist policies, practices and procedures. I have assured the President that we will confront any problems head on. While the Intelligence Community has drastically improved information sharing procedures since 9/11 that have made America safer, it is clear that gaps remain, and they must be fixed."


Sources: Politico, CNN, Huffington Post