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What about Saddam? And was this the foretold 'train wreck' of the FBI? By
Les Roka In the rush to target suspects for Tuesday's attacks, few journalists have returned to the scary scenario of February 1993 when the World Trade Center was bombed. It is becoming more difficult to find the skeptical voices who challenge the virtually unanimous indictment that Osama bin Laden was the mastermind behind this week's acts of terrorism. One notable exception, however, has been CBS News. Interviews with Milt Bearden, a distinguished senior diplomat who may be the most knowledgeable American source about Afghanistan, and Professor Laurie Mylroie, who has written two highly regarded books about Iraq and Saddam Hussein, suggest that American officials should seriously consider the possibility that the Iraqi government was the direct state sponsor of the attacks. Both warned that to do otherwise could be even more tragic than the tremendous scenes of pain and destruction we continue to witness. In an article published in the Winter 1995-1996 issue of The National Interest, Mylroie voiced her concerns that the American government and media were too quick to dismiss the plausible prospect that Saddam Hussein was directly responsible for the World Trade Center bombing in 1993. She sharply criticized the relationship between the FBI and national security agencies. Her prose is stunning for its prescience: "Clearly, discontent with the FBI is growing among those agencies as issues such as international crime -- and with them the Bureau's international role -- assume a more prominent role in the post-Cold War world. Indeed, one State Department official described the FBI's unwillingness to share inforation as 'the train wreck coming' -- meaning that given the FBI's lack of expertise in international politics, there may well come a time when the Bureau will be sitting on information that, in the hands of others, could have been used to avert a disaster." In other words, Mylroie warned that the lack of coordination among our nation's law enforcement, diplomatic, and security agencies would create "a niche for terrorism" within the country and the "lack of any adequate response to the two major bombing conspiracies may have already begun to undermine the credibility of the threat of deterrence."
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