Oddly, I feel somewhat relieved after learning about the many ways in which the CIA and FBI failed to prevent 9/11. Until these stories emerged, I had the terrifying (and erroneous) impression that Al Qaeda succeeded by outsmarting the very smart FBI and CIA. It’s quite scary to think your enemy is smarter and stronger than you are.
It turns out the intelligence community was not smart at all. The FBI knew that suspicious Middle Eastern men were training as pilots, and the CIA knew that two Al Qaeda members were living in the United States under their real names–but nothing was done. That means the 9/11 hijackers may not have been evil geniuses; perhaps they were just plain evil, and they succeeded because we were just plain stupid.
It’s pretty clear the FBI and CIA are aware of their shortcomings and are fixing them. Field agents who send alarms to headquarters are not going to be ignored any longer. So the stories about official negligence, though unsettling, are reminders that the terrorists did not breach the best defense America could muster; they slipped through gaping holes that are no longer so gaping.
