Dec. 28, 2009
Behind the Abdulmutallab Security Breach
Despite Warnings, Terror Suspect Had Active U.S. Visa as Airport Security Missed Other Red Flags
By Armen Keteyian
LINK

CBS News Chief Investigative Correspondent Armen Keteyian has the latest on the investigation into the terror plot by suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.

(CBS) CBS News has learned it was only after Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab launched his terrorist attack aboard Flight 253 that the U.S. State Department discovered he had an active U.S. visa through June 2010, a shocking failure of an airport security system drawing ever-increasing fire.

As first reported by CBS News Monday, the U.S. government twice failed to find Abdulmutallab had an active multiple-entry U.S. visa issued on June 16, 2008 at the U.S. Embassy in London.

According to a law enforcement source, the first failure came on November 19, 2009, the same day Abdulmutallab's father warned officials at the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria about his son. Then again on November 20 in Washington, after Dr. Mutallab's concerns were forwarded there, officials failed for a second time to figure out the 23-year-old Nigerian national held an active U.S. visa.

"When you have a father reporting information about his son that he believes his son may be leaning towards extremists views, he doesn't know where his son is, that's enough for me to be able to say we need to find out what this individual is doing, where he's at, who he's involved with as soon as possible," said Pat D'Amuro, the former head of counterterrorism for the FBI.

The Visa breakdown is one of a raft of potential red flags that were somehow missed, such as the fact that Abdulmutallab paid nearly $3,000 in cash for his plane ticket and checked no bags, carrying aboard only a small bag for a scheduled two-week trip. How did airport screening in two airports fail to detect an estimated 76 grams of the explosive PETN and a syringe packed with a chemical catalyst concealed in a special pouch sewn into Abdulmutallab's underwear.

Why don't the Dutch use these body scan machines that can detect explosives on U.S. bound passengers? Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport has 17 of them. The Dutch say the United States won't allow it. U.S. officials say that's just not true. Either way, experts say the suspect shouldn't have gotten through.

"If he would appear on the El Al flight he would be suspected and the chemical material on his body would have been found very easily," said Pini Schiff, the former director of security for the Israel Airport Authority.

Despite sharp criticism, Homeland Security Head Janet Napolitano took a most-positive approach on Sunday, saying that the "system worked."

Monday, however, that tune had changed.

"You said the system worked. Do you want to take that back or rephrase that?" asked CBS News anchor Harry Smith on "The Early Show".

"Well, I think taking that phrase out of context doesn't make much sense," Napolitano said. "Obviously, we are now going back and looking at what were the events that lead up to this individual getting on this plane."

Al Qaeda ties of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab: How deep do they go?

Investigations into where alleged Northwest Airlines bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab got his explosives point toward Yemen and its local Al Qaeda offshoot. Foreign Policy Magazine's latest Failed State Index named Yemen as particularly troubling.

By Dan Murphy Staff writer, Christian Science Monitor, December 28, 2009
LINK

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the young Muslim man who allegedly sought the mid-air explosion of Northwest Airlines Flight 253 on Christmas, could have found his motivations for carrying out the attack almost anywhere.

Mr. Abdulmutallab, who Al Qaeda in Yemen says was working at their behest, could have found exhortations to violent jihad on the Internet, which is filled with chat rooms and websites praising suicide bombers; in mosque-based discussion groups in London, where he attended school for four years and where a small coterie of militant preachers still whisper into young ears excited about joining a glorious cause; or from a preacher in his home country of Nigeria.

But inspiration is one thing. The explosives and jerry-rigged detonator with which he allegedly tried to kill himself and all 288 passengers and crew aboard the flight from Amsterdam to Detroit are harder to come by. Now, investigators are focusing on where and how he obtained the wherewithal to attempt his attack, and all early signs are pointing to Yemen.

ABC News reported, citing an unnamed FBI employee, that Abdulmutallab told investigators he had been trained in Yemen and that more operatives were being prepared there for similar missions.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, an organization with roots in the jihad against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and with ties to senior Al Qaeda figures like Osama bin Laden, believed to be currently residing in Pakistan, claimed responsibility for the attack on a jihad website that has been used as a conduit for militant propaganda in the past. The Middle East Media Research Institute translated the claim as saying, in part: "The hero ... martyrdom-seeker, brother Omar Al-Farooq, carried out a quality operation on an American plane ... in (an operation) which broke through all modern advanced technological equipment and security barriers in world airports."

The group also claimed that Abdulmutallab was dispatched in revenge for recent US-backed attacks on their operatives, which includes a Yemeni assault in Shebwa on Christmas Eve that the country claimed killed 30 Al Qaeda operatives. That seems unlikely, since Abdulmutallab is believed to have departed Yemen in early December. But that supporters in Yemen of what Mr. bin Laden and his closest aide Ayman al-Zawahiri have dubbed the "global jihad against crusaders and Jews" are feeling under US pressure is not in doubt. The US increased military aid to the troubled regime of Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh to $70 million this year.

Though Abdulmutallab is Nigerian, his mother is from Yemen. Foreign Policy Magazine's latest "Failed States Index" named Yemen as particularly troubling, arguing that "many worry ... [Yemen] is the next Afghanistan: a global problem wrapped in a failed state.” The magazine also said that “refugees and extremists were perhaps Yemen’s most noteworthy imports in 2008" and that "Saudi Al Qaeda members, viewing Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh as too weak to prevent them from organizing and training, have also poured in."

Yemen has a roughly 700 mile-long border with Saudi Arabia and close cultural and religious ties to the oil-rich kingdom. Bin Laden's father was a Yemeni immigrant to Saudi Arabia before World War 1, and the country's lawless northern frontier has long been a weapons transit point for Islamist militants fighting the Saudi monarchy.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is believed to be led by the Yemeni Nasir Wuhaishi. The group was created in early 2008 with an announcement that the loosely knit organization's Saudi Arabian and Yemeni branches leaderships were being merged.

Since then, in addition to their claim of responsibility for the failed Northwest Airlines attack, they've been involved in a number of attacks. Most intriguingly, the group claimed responsibility for a failed August assassination attempt against Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, Saudi Arabia's point man for dismantling Al Qaeda. His would-be assassin posed as a former militant seeking to come in from the cold and arranged a meeting with Prince Nayef. He concealed a bomb that was constructed of PETN, and placed a crude detonator in his underwear. That was the same plastic explosive and method of concealment Abdulmutallab allegedly used.

Some American politicians have speculated that there may be a link between the alleged Nigerian bomber and Anwar al-Awlaki, the US citizen and Yemen-based cleric who appeared to inspire Major Abdul Malik Hasan, the Army doctor accused of murdering 13 of his comrades at Fort Hood in November. Mr. Awlaki was a recent target of a US-backed air strike in Yemen, and until recently ran a popular website urging Sunni Muslims to fight the US, Israel, and other perceived enemies of Islam, and was an e-mail correspondent of Major Hasan's. No evidence has yet emerged that Abdulmutallab was in contact with Awlaki, though Yemen's Foreign Ministry says that he was in the country from early August to early December on a visa to study Arabic in Sanaa, the capital.

Mr. Awlaki claimed on his now-defunct blog that he had been a lecturer at Iman University in Sanaa.

PETN is a widely available explosive, used by world armies and mining companies, usually as an ingredient in plastic explosives like Semtex or in detonation cords. Yemen has long been a major trading and transit hub for weapons. In the summer of 2002, an accidental explosion at a Sanaa warehouse led to the discovery of 650 pounds of Semtex that Yemeni authorities alleged at the time were in the possession of Al Qaeda-linked militants.

As for Abdulmutallab, the recent plot sheds light on an often overlooked fact: While President Barack Obama said in December that "I am convinced that our security is at stake in Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is the epicenter of the violent extremism practiced by al-Qaeda" – most recent international attacks have emanated from elsewhere.

Obama vows to use power to thwart terrorists
By PHILIP ELLIOTT, Associated Press Writer Philip Elliott, Associated Press Writer Mon Dec 28, 6:57 pm ET
LINK

HONOLULU – President Barack Obama on Monday vowed to use "every element of our national power" to keep Americans safe and said the failed Christmas Day plot to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner was "a serious reminder" of the need to continually adapt security measures against changing terrorist threats.

But even as Obama spoke, came word that a State Department warning had failed to trigger an effort to revoke the alleged attacker's visa. And officials in Yemen confirmed that the would-be bomber had been living in that country, where terrorist elements quickly sought to take credit for his actions.

The incident prompted stiffer airport boarding measures and authorities warned holiday travelers to expect extra delays as they return home this week and beyond.

Abdulmutallab, charged with trying to destroy an aircraft, is being held at the federal prison in Milan, Mich. A court hearing that had been scheduled for Monday to determine whether the government can get DNA from him was postponed until Jan. 8. No reason was given.

Calling Abdulmutallab's action an "attempted act of terrorism" Obama vowed to "do everything that we can to keep America safe" and declared: "The United States will more than simply strengthen our defenses. We will continue to use every element of our national power to disrupt, to dismantle and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us."

Members of Congress, meanwhile, questioned how a man flagged as a possible terrorist managed to board a commercial flight into the United States carrying powerful explosives and nearly bring down the jetliner. Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., said Monday that the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that he chairs would hold hearings in January.

Meanwhile, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula claimed responsibility for the thwarted attack as retaliation for a U.S. operation against the group in Yemen. Yemeni forces, helped by U.S. intelligence, carried out two airstrikes against al-Qaida operatives this month in the lawless country that is fast becoming a key front in the war on terror. The second one was a day before 23-year-old Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab attempted to bring down a Northwest Airlines flight as it prepared to land in Detroit.

Yemen has long been an al-Qaida stomping ground. But officials fear that deepening instability in the Middle Eastern nation may be giving new opportunity for the terror group to establish a base to train and plan for attacks on the West.

A statement posted on the Internet by al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula said Abdulmutallab coordinated with members of the group and used explosives manufactured by al-Qaida members.

Solving one mystery of Abdulmutallab's pre-Detroit path, the Yemeni Foreign Ministry said Monday that he was in Yemen from August until early December. He had received a visa to study Arabic in a school in San'a. Citing immigration authorities, the statement said Abdulmutallab had previously studied at the school, indicating it was not his first trip to Yemen.

Obama, on vacation in his birthplace of Hawaii, acknowledged the attack showed the need to increase the United States' defenses. He detailed the pair of reviews that he has ordered to determine whether changes are needed in either the watchlist system or airport screening procedures.

"This was a serious reminder of the dangers that we face," he said. "It's absolutely critical that we learn from this incident."

Obama's remarks Monday were the first heard from him on the Christmas Day scare three days earlier.

Officials said that was deliberate — an effort by the White House to balance the need for the president to show concern but also to not unduly elevate a botched incident and thereby encourage other would-be attackers.

Back in Washington, federal officials met to review their layered system of watchlists and other procedures to examine how to avoid the type of lapses that led to the attack.

Abdulmutallab's family in Nigeria released a statement that that his father had reached out to Nigerian security agencies two months ago. The statement says the father then approached foreign security agencies for "their assistance to find and return him home."

U.S. officials say that is how Abdulmutallab came to the attention of American intelligence, just last month, when the father, prominent Nigerian banker Alhaji Umar Mutallab, reported his concerns to the American Embassy in Abuja. A senior U.S. official said the father was worried that his son was in Yemen and "had fallen under the influence of religious extremists." The father did not mention any specific threat.

These concerns landed him among the about 550,000 names in the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment database, known as TIDE, which is maintained by the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center. Other, smaller lists trigger additional airport screening or other restrictions, but intelligence officials said there wasn't enough information to move him into those categories.

Another apparent lapse concerns Abdulmutallab's visa.

Britain had refused to grant him a student visa in May, but there was no apparent effort to revoke his U.S. tourist visa, issued in June 2008 and good for multiple entries over two years.

The embassy visit by Abdulmatallab's father triggered a Nov. 20 State Department cable from Lagos to all U.S. diplomatic missions and department headquarters in Washington. It was also shared with the interagency National Counter Terrorism Center, said State Department spokesman Ian Kelly.

The NCTC, which has responsibility if any visas are to be pulled over terrorism concerns, then reviewed the information and found it was "insufficient to determine whether his visa should be revoked," Kelly said.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded Monday that the aviation security system failed, backtracking from a statement Sunday in which she said it worked.

Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., joined the GOP critics of that statement. "They just don't get it," said Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee. "The system didn't 'work' here." Hoekstra, who is running to become his state's governor, included his criticism in a campaign e-mail that asked supporters for donations.

The White House said Obama's low-key response was carefully calibrated.

The plane had been on the ground in Detroit for two hours on Friday before officials first informed Obama. Advisers said they wanted to make sure they had complete and accurate information before going to the president but, even so, Obama's first briefing with national security and homeland security advisers lasted less than 15 minutes. Obama's motorcade was rolling toward the gym minutes afterward.

Two days later, when another flight from Amsterdam to Detroit came under suspicion, it was about 90 minutes after it landed before Obama was informed of what had been a false alarm.

Throughout the weekend, Obama has mixed vacation activities with crisis monitoring. He played golf on Saturday with friends and was playing basketball with aides when that second flight landed in Detroit on Sunday. He went from there to a beach and a gourmet restaurant dinner in the evening.

On Monday, he did not address the public until after a workout and a tennis game with his wife — and went golfing immediately afterward.

Associated Press writers Jennifer Loven, Matt Lee, Eileen Sullivan, Lolita Baldor and Devlin Barrett in Washington; Pamela Hess in New York; Ed White in Detroit; Jon Gambrell in Lagos, Nigeria; Donna Abu-Nasr in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and Mark Niesse in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, contributed to this report.

From Betsy Combier:
The Whistleblowing Airline Employees Association never got any attention from the Bush or Obama administration.

Airline Industry Whistleblowers Urge Obama To Support Whistleblowers

Below was the final letter sent to the United Airlines pilot union representatives, ALPA, before submission of federally-mandated safety reports that subsequently terminated Captain Hanley's 35-year career as a pilot.
August 27, 2003
Captain Mark Seal
UAL Council 52 Chairman
535 Herndon Parkway
P.O. Box 1169
Herndon, Virginia 20172-1169

Dear Mark,

Thank you for your letter expressing your thoughtful and heartfelt concern for the health of my aviation career and retirement.

On September 11, 2001 something hideous happened to civilized humankind. It quit working. Something went terribly wrong. Our government foreign policy and capitalism was not without fault. It drastically and negatively impacted our industry, our airline, my labor union, our careers, our futures and our retirements.

I was hired as an aviation safety professional. I have been both dismayed and perplexed for the past 23 months over the apparent lack of safety and security focus by our union leadership at the MEC level as well as the national level, on the readily apparent terrorist-related threats to our industry.

The ALPA leadership at all levels has been mostly encumbered with economic survival interests in a bankrupt industry for obvious reasons. If the industry were to collapse, safety and security concerns would be moot. Recognizing the politically intricate, “mine-filled” landscape the MEC has had to negotiate and the consequent politically distressful union negotiating posture that has evolved, I have been offered no other recourse but to legally elicit support from other agencies for political furtherance of my security agenda.

The current presidential administration, through complicity with the ATSB, financial institutions and airline industry management, has wrongfully decided to immorally exploit the horrific air disasters of 9/11/01 for global political/economic gains while concurrently extracting unnecessary massive wage, pension, and work rule concessions from airline employees and destroying the safety voice of my union.

I would not be so brash and foolish, even in my wildest imaginings, to attempt to single-handedly confront the U.S. government/ATSB, the banking and airline industries, and the AFL-CIO/ALPA and expect a successful or healthful outcome. That would be a good definition of folly.

My recent correspondence has set into motion a process that cannot be stopped. The worst fear for the government, the ATSB, the banks and the airline industry CEOs are that agencies outside their jurisdiction or political or legal influence or control, may produce damaging, compromising, or otherwise incriminating hard-evidence of extortion, coercion, intimidation or deceit that knowingly violated Federal law. The end result would be public proof that a gross miscarriage of Federal Aviation and Labor law occurred in violation of RICO statutes which would prove conclusively that ALPA, my bargaining agent and safety representative to which I pay union dues, is ONLY guilty of complicity under duress in the careless and reckless operation of commercial jet aircraft potentially causing endangerment to the unwary traveling public and private property.

The entire global airline workforce needs one independent, common voice to collectively address this obvious travesty of Federal justice. It is currently my intention to legally assist in the enabling of such a process to realize fruition. I will do so without violating Federal law, company policy, or the ALPA Code-of Ethics. If, by my affiliation as an ALPA member, such a measure would constitute a conflict of interest for me or would otherwise endanger the current ALPA negotiations or its’ political agenda, then I will, of course, as a matter of political convenience, resign from ALPA to further my own agenda.

My intent is not to jeopardize or cause economic harm to the airline industry or the U.S. economy. I especially do not want to do anything that would further hinder or prevent United Airlines’ emergence from bankruptcy or discredit ALPA or the AFL-CIO. Nor do I intend to compromise the security of the careers of any airline employees. The truth needs to be exposed and the court of public opinion to judge on what devious scheme was concocted to salvage the post-9/11 air transportation industry on the financial backs of the employees while destroying their labor unions.

Reinforced cockpit doors, FAMs, and the TSA do nothing to thwart the threats of SA-18s, exposure to Racin, or plastic explosives in checked or carry-on luggage.

Recently, the FBI provided the Fams with a briefing on over 50 terrorist-threat items that can evade TSA security-screening detection. The FAMs sit in first class and do not monitor passenger behavior in the rest of the aircraft. The flight attendants were not briefed or given specific information on the identification of these devices. Since I still do not have the TV cameras that I was promised two years ago to monitor cabin activity, the flight attendants are my only eyes and ears in the back of the airplane. They do not know specifically what they are looking for in terms of camouflaged terrorist devices. We are at risk. TSA is just window-dressing. This is specifically what was stated by the DENTK Security Training instructor to 15 pilots at my last Proficiency Training this past May. The pilots in attendance laughed in agreement. What’s so funny about that?

To openly discuss the nature and identity of these 50 terrorist-threat items in public might negatively and severely impact schedule integrity due to crew concerns or shrink the company bottom line or even worse yet, expose the frailties of our TSA screening devices to the traveling public and create the impression there are weakness in the security system. Imagine that?

Please recall that December 21, 2003 marks the 15th anniversary of the Pan Am 103 air disaster over Lockerbie, Scotland and we still are not screening 100% of the luggage for plastic explosives. Positive bag match is moot. Terrorists are willing to travel with their luggage and die for their cause.

These are just a few examples of the many current breeches of aviation security that are prevalent in our industry. There are more. You and I know it. The traveling public doesn’t. That isn’t fair.

The traveling public has been provided by government and airline managers an illusion of aviation security. Present day commercial aviation security is minimal at best. The real solutions to our security problems are COST-PROHIBITIVE. The only true solution to our security problems within the airline industry is a GLOBAL POLITICAL ONE. Impeachment of the current depraved political process is the only correct solution.

President Bush has deemed it appropriate to play politics with other peoples’ lives in the furtherance of his political and economic agenda. I am a pilot, not a politician. I do not play politics with other peoples’ lives. Part of my job is to safely protect other peoples’ lives and to report via appropriate afforded communications mediums, glaring safety and security deficiencies that I observe in my workplace. We have a conflict of interests in this matter. His policies force me to compromise my safety and security policies. The communication processes have broken down. Post-9/11 global political issues have forced me into the political arena. I do not want to be a politician. I want to be a pilot.

We are not steerage-class passengers on the Titanic. Knowing what I know to be true, I cannot look my crew and passengers in the eye in good conscience and continue to perform my duties as Captain without taking positive and corrective political action. I am in a position of control, influence, personal experience and knowledge to assist in effecting a favorable outcome to this situation. I will not just walk away or put on blinders. To do so would be just as immoral and cowardly an act as being an accomplice in this distasteful parody. The once-muffled, collective voice of airline employees will be heard. The truth will be told. Justice will prevail. ALPA will not be implicated.

In the noble and heroic names of Vince Saracini, Jason Dahl, Leroy Homer, and Mike Horrocks I will act. To do otherwise is a disgrace to their memories.

To be a guilty silent partner in a nightmarish, gangster-like extortion scheme that results in gambling with human lives wherein I readily accept remuneration for my involvement, even under duress, would be akin to accepting “blood-money” for my participation. I do not work for “blood-money”; not even in retirement. I will attempt, yet another time, to effect change in the name of safety and security. If unsuccessful, I will leave with or without retirement. I WILL NOT GO SILENTLY.

How many more future hull losses and memorial services will we have to endure before someone of conscience and conviction with moral strength and courage, stands up and unequivocally identifies the immorality and illegality of this nightmare without regard to personal or financial consequences of their action?

If, in the end, physical or economic harm were wrought on me as a result of my participation in these efforts, I can only say, as a lifetime pilot, to endure such a tragic conclusion to a 35-year career in aviation in the name of safety and security of humankind, would be such a phenomenally romantic and poetic final loving gesture and grand finale as I could ever possibly imagine in my grandest dreams.

Remember, Mark, I speak from my aviation soul. No physical, emotional, political, or financial harm can ever come to a man’s soul. The soul from whence I speak is that of a pilot’s. It represents the moral high ground. I cannot lose. I am not Don Shimoda. Reluctance was never one of my weaknesses. The only “Illusion” is the current aviation security system. Thank you, Richard Bach.

Words cannot express my sincere and heartfelt gratitude to you, your wife and your children for years of selfless sacrifice and dedication to the Air line Pilots’ Association, its’ members, and to aviation safety and security interests. I, for one, through my career-long association with you, realize and greatly appreciate the intensity and depth of your involvement. Thank you, Mark.

I do not play politics with other peoples’ lives.

Always,

Your friend and brother pilot,

Captain Dan Hanley

cc: Mr. Bob Nichols, ALPA Atty-at-Law
Captain Al Merone, Vice-Chmn-Council 52
Captain Joseph Genovese, Sec/Treas. Cncl 52