I haven't "demonized" Kerry in a while, mostly because it got boring. It still is. Here I'll let former FAA officials do it for me.
Former FAA security officials say the Massachusetts senator had the power to prevent at least the Boston hijackings and save the World Trade Center and thousands of lives, yet he failed to take effective action after they gave him a prophetic warning that his state's main airport was vulnerable to multiple hijackings.
"With the concept of jihad, do you think it would be difficult for a determined terrorist to get on a plane and destroy himself and all other passengers?" he warned. "Think what the result would be of a coordinated attack which took down several domestic flights on the same day. With our current screening, this is more than possible. It is almost likely." The toll from such an attack would be economic, as well as human, he predicted with chilling accuracy.
Sullivan followed up by having the undercover videotape hand-delivered to Kerry's office.
More than 11 weeks later, Kerry finally replied to his well-informed and anxious constituent. "I have forwarded your tape to the Department of Transportation's Office of Inspector General [DOT OIG]," he said in a brief July 24, 2001, letter, a copy of which I've obtained.
Yet Sullivan had made it clear in his letter that going to his old agency was a dead end. He and other agents had complained about security lapses for years and got nowhere. "The DOT OIG has become an ineffective overseer of the FAA," he told Kerry. Sullivan suggested he show the tape to peers on committees with FAA oversight. He even volunteered to testify before them.
But he never heard from Kerry again.
This story has been buried in the mainstream press, but imagine the attention it would get if, instead of the DOT OIG, Kerry had forwarded it to the White House. Imagine the different story our "war hero" could spin then!
But more to the point, why isn't the 9/11 Commission looking into this? This is closer to a warning than any of the jaw-flapping we've heard out of the dog-and-pony show.
Posted by JohnGalt at April 13, 2004 10:32 AM