CIA’s 9/11 Report Declassified: CIA Investigation Unsatisfactory, No Evidence Of Saudi Involvement

The CIA’s 9/11 report has just been declassified and released, and there are few surprises.

CNN is reporting that the Office of the Inspector General of the CIA, who investigated the CIA’s handling of the investigation into the 9/11 attacks and finished their investigation in 2005, declassified and released their report 10 years to the date of completion. The document, weighing in at almost 500 pages — with many pages redacted (blanked out) — concluded that there was a list of systemic problems that contributed to the CIA missing warnings concerning Osama Bin Laden’s master plan to hijack planes and make them weapons of mass destruction.

Though the CIA’s 9/11 report doesn’t bring anything new to the table, it does help solidify other government reports that found the same systemic problems.

“Concerning certain issues, the team concluded that the (CIA) and its officers did not discharge their responsibilities in a satisfactory manner,” the report states.

The CIA 9/11 report followed a congressional report that concluded that the American intelligence community did not have a comprehensive battle plan against al-Qaeda. The CIA 9/11 report also states that during the investigation, there was no evidence of any laws being broken or any form of misconduct during the CIA investigation.

According to Gawker, one of the more intriguing facets to the CIA 9/11 report is the final segment, which supposedly detailed the role, if any, of Saudi Arabia in the 9/11 attacks. The final segment took 30 pages in the original CIA 9/11 report, but all but one page had been redacted. What was left gave little information. One glaring entry was that the CIA office of the Inspector General could not tie Saudi Arabia or any of its high-ranking officials to al-Qaeda, deferring to the Department of Justice and the FBI, since the CIA 9/11 report had no access to the DOJ or FBI files and information.

What’s even stranger is that as ready as the CIA 9/11 report was with deferring to the FBI or DOJ, the final 26 pages of the report, which was to focus on Saudi Arabia’s involvement, were redacted. Even with many high-ranking officials firmly believing that there were some ties between Saudi Arabia, often referred to as the 20th hijacker, and al-Qaeda, the CIA 9/11 report does not show any connection. And, if the original report did, the redacted report would eliminate any mention of a tie-in.

While many think there is no tie-in or cover-up, the special security relationship between the United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, plus America’s reliance of foreign oil might be enough of an incentive to keep any tie-in knowledge secret.

[Image courtesy of Gil C / Shutterstock.com]