Triple Cross

Triple Cross: How bin Laden's Master Spy Penetrated the CIA, the Green Berets, and the FBI--and Why Patrick Fitzgerald Failed to Stop Him

Now there is an interesting title. Perhaps there is even some truth to it. No doubt it should provide many hours worth of material to gnaw on.

So how about a review?

While I was deciding how I should start a review of Peter Lance's new book - I remembered a quote from Monica Gabrielle, one of the 9/11 widows, in a documentary about 9/11: "The one thing that I personally was hoping for was another Woodward and Bernstein with regard to 9/11. Someone, anyone that was willing to put their teeth into this."

Well, we have found that person, and his name is Peter Lance. In his third book on the origins of the 9/11 plot and the failures of the FBI and others to stop the attack, Lance focuses on Ali Mohamed - yet another figure relegated to footnotes in the "9/11 Report" who Lance shows played a central role in Al Qaeda's plan of attack. Not only did he help create the "Brooklyn Cell" which supported the 9/11 hijackers, but he wrote the training manual for Al Qaeda and created training camps for hijackers, all while the FBI thought he was on their side as an informant!

The best part of Triple Cross is the way Lance weaves together the different strands of the 9/11 story and enhances them with his own original reporting on each. For example, the book quotes from numerous interviews Lance conducted with Tony Shaffer, Curt Weldon, and other members of the Able Danger team. While not a full history of Able Danger, it has by far the most complete version in any book published to date.

Some have expressed frustration at the delays in publication, but I can attest to the fact that Lance needed the extra time in order to include all of the latest details from the interviews National Geographic conducted for their documentary based on his book, and the latest developments in the Able Danger and Greg Scarpa Jr. scandals. It is a great read, and uncovers a lot of new information about the 9/11 plot.

I was twigged to that book by this Jack Cashill newsletter Libby Prosecutor Threatens Critic. Curiouser and curiouser.

Fitzgerald does not approve of the book’s thesis, a thesis embedded in the original subtitle, “How Bin Laden’s Master Spy Penetrated the CIA, the Green Berets and the FBI – and Why Patrick Fitzgerald Failed to Stop Him.” And he is doing everything he can to prevent the book’s paperback publication.

Fitzgerald’s efforts have caught the unflattering attention of Newsweek, New York Magazine, and even activist librarians.

The book deals specifically with the FBI’s failure to stop the master spy in question, Ali Mohamed, who had infiltrated the Bureau, the CIA and the Green Berets at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

Of particular interest to me, Lance details how the Ali Mohamed case intersected with the TWA Flight 800 case, a subject that Lance is not afraid to tackle.

More generally, the book documents the role Southern District New York (SDNY) Fitzgerald played in the war on terror, a war that Lance claims Fitzgerald badly mismanaged before September 11, 2001.

And now I don't know what to think. What is Fitz trying to hide? Why is he trying to get all unsold hardback copies confiscated?

Cross Posted at Classical Values