The warnings before 9/11
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 14 August 2019
⏱️ 11 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Throughout 2001 the US authorities were being given warnings that a terror attack was imminent. A Congressional Commission, FBI officers and the CIA were all worried. There were even specific warnings about planes being flown into buildings. Louise Hidalgo has been speaking to former Senator Gary Hart who co-chaired the Congressional Commission that tried to convince the government to take action.
Photo: Smoke pours from the World Trade Centre after it was hit by two passenger planes on September 11, 2001 in New York City. (Credit: Robert Giroux/Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.7 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:08.5 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices. |
| 0:18.0 | What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
| 0:24.6 | poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples. |
| 0:29.7 | If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds. |
| 0:36.0 | Hello and welcome to the Witness History podcast from the BBC World Service with me |
| 0:45.6 | Louise Adaggo. All this week we're looking back at the events surrounding the |
| 0:49.3 | Al-Qaeda attacks against America on September the 11th 2001. |
| 0:54.0 | In the months before 9-11 there was a series of warnings about the likelihood of a major terror attack on U.S. soil. |
| 1:01.0 | And in 2019, I spoke to former Democratic senator and presidential hopeful |
| 1:05.8 | Gary Hart, who was one of those whose warnings were ignored. |
| 1:09.3 | Hold on just a moment. We've got an explosion inside. |
| 1:14.0 | On the 11th of September 2001, |
| 1:20.0 | Islamic extremists flew two passenger planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York. |
| 1:25.8 | 50 minutes later, a third plane crashed into the Pentagon in Washington. |
| 1:30.1 | A fourth plane crashed into a field. It was the biggest terrorist attack on America in its history, |
| 1:36.2 | killing nearly 3,000 people. And it shocked the world in a way few terrorist attacks had done before or since. |
| 1:44.0 | But there had been warnings. |
| 1:49.8 | I don't think I or anyone else identified where it would come from but we were ironclad in our |
| 1:56.4 | conviction we would be attacked somehow sooner rather than later. |
| 2:01.1 | Eight months before the 9-11 attacks, former Senator Gary Hart and the Republican |
... |
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