Spies and Spooks: The (Mis)Adventures of the CIA

A Major Failure of Intelligence
Terrorism and its new world of disorder visited themselves on the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001, with the attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C. The CIA had indications as early as 1998 that terrorists had wanted to fly planes into the World Trade Center; indeed, the agency noted that two members of al-Qaeda had entered the country prior to the attack. But there was ineffective coordination between the CIA and the FBI. The 9/11 Commission castigated then CIA Director George Tenet for not having an operational strategy in place to deal with terrorism, a charge Tenet denied.

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