Transcripts For KQED Frontline 20170906

Threat to the United States. And we better not take them for granted because they are here to hurt us. Narrator but people at fbi headquarters thought john oneill was too much of a maverick, and they stopped listening to him. You could be flagged as a problem, and your career could pretty much be over. Narrator oneill left the fbi and took a new job as head of security at the World Trade Center. Of all the places to go to work and of all the ways that you could lose your life. Narrator tonight, frontline investigates the internal power struggle at the heart of the fbis failure on september 11. Frontlinis made possible by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. And by the corporation for public broadcasting. Major support for frontliis provided by the john d. And catherine t. Macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant, and peaceful world. More information is available at macfound. Org. Additional support is provided by ford foundation, working with visionaries on the front lines of social change worldwide. At fordfoundation. Org. The park foundation, dedicated to heightening Public Awareness of critical issues. The john and Helen Glessner family trust, supporting trustworthy journalism that informs and inspires. And by the frontline journalism fund, with major support from jon and jo ann hagler. Tonights program contains graphic imagery. Viewer discretion is advised. Narrator there was, after the horror of september 11, the inevitable question did anyone in the government know . The move from chicago to headquarters in washington was a big promotion for special agent john oneill. He drove all night from chicago and went straight to the office on a sunday morning. Hed just arrived when the white house called. dial tone telephone dialing telephone rings it was a sunday morning. Fbi. But i was in my office and i was reading intelligence, and i saw a report that indicated that the man who had plotted the World Trade Center bombing in 93, the ringleader, Ramzi Ahmed Yousef. He was about to move within pakistan, and there was a small window, a closing window, to catch him. And so thinking there might be somebody at the fbi on a sunday morning, i called. Narrator oneill had made his reputation investigating whitecollar crime, drug rings, and Abortion Clinic bombings. I said, whos this . And he responded, well, who the hell are you . Im john oneill. And i explained to him, im from the white house and i do terrorism, and i need some help. And i told him our story on the classified phone line, and he went into action. Narrator in 20 years, hed chased a lot of bad guys, but nobody like ramzi yousef. Yousef is one of the most dangerous people on the planet, very smart. Getting him and incapacitating him was a significant Public Safety issue, and john oneill recognized that, was not about to take no for an answer anywhere before he was taken into custody. telephone dialing telephone rings white house. Oneill put together an arrest team that managed to catch Ramzi Ahmed Yousef in pakistan, just before he moved into afghanistan, which wouldve been beyond our reach. It was a pretty intense couple of days, but it worked. Narrator for the next six years, oneill and his agents would follow the bloody and complex trail from ramzi yousef to Osama Bin Laden. The picture was still fuzzy i mean, it was by no means sharp that there was an emerging global islamic fundamentalist terrorist network that was becoming more and more engaged in the objective of attacking american targets. When yousef fled from the trade Center Bombing in 1993, among the places he went, really right before he was apprehended in pakistan, was to the philippines, where he was mixing the bombs to blow up, you know, 12 jumbo jets in a 48hour period and was not far away from at least attempting to carry out that plot, which would have resulted in thousands of deaths in two days. Narrator from the beginning, oneill obsessed about the details of the ramzi yousef case. He dug into that plan to blow up the planes, known as the bojinka plot. Investigators had found a connection with the World Trade Center bombing that led to yousefs coconspirator, ahmad ajaj, and a terrorist training manual with a title that would translate into al qaeda the base. They uncovered a list of phone numbers called by yousef and other World Trade Center conspirators from their safe houses. One of those numbers belonged to Osama Bin Laden, identified by an early cia report as an islamic extremist financier. I think if you ask most terrorism experts in the mid1990s, well, what about this man bin laden . , most people in the mid1990s would have said, ah, yes, the financier. The terrorist financier. What oneill said was, no, this man is not a financier. The money is money for a purpose. The purpose is building a worldwide terrorist Network Based out of afghanistan, the point of which is going after the United States and after governments friendly to the United States, particularly in the arab world. Narrator once convinced bin laden was a threat to america, oneill began a campaign within the fbi to sound the alarm. The first time i ever heard the name Osama Bin Laden was from john oneill, and john oneill was very much aware of who he was, who his group was, al qaeda. Narrator over time, robert bear bryant would become second in command at the fbi. He was a person that i had immense personal regard for, and we could argue like a couple of thieves in the night. Narrator oneill argued for a plan that would represent a Seismic Shift in the way the fbi had always operated. He would give authority to a new, more analytic agent who would have enhanced technology to fight the new terrorism. That directly threatened the dominance of the group who held sway over the culture the criminal division. From his point of view, it was very clear what had to be done. You would basically have a whole branch of the fbi that would be. Not be touched by the criminal side. Narrator the criminal side the j. Edgar hoover gmen who carried the guns and made cases and arrests. The man who would eventually lead the criminal division, tom pickard, aggressively competed with oneill for the attention of the director, louis freeh. As a former street agent himself, freeh identified with the criminal division, and tom pickard was a longtime friend. To reinvigorate the counterterrorism effort, oneill would try to muscle his way through the bureaucracy that surrounded louis freeh. But in that struggle, oneills personal style got in the way. They said he was too intense, pushed too hard, had what they called sharp elbows. We often talked and joked about the fact that we werent really in the club and we really didnt care. And that was something that john and i had shared on occasion, and there is a difference between those people who spend time in an organization and are happy to make it to the top and have never rolled over a stone or created a problem or solved a problem, you know, just to carefully run through and be there and be promoted. John was not like that. Narrator oneill just didnt do anything the fbi way, where at the end of a long shift, they went home to their families. He was the type of guy who put his arm around you and take you out to dinner and smoke cigars and drink whiskey with at the end of the day, and talk about all the issues in great depth. And he. Thats. He took his business beyond the work hours and well into the evenings, and hed like to do that. Narrator and in the button down fbi, oneill was considered too flashy. It was the presentation. It was as he would call it it was the package. They resented sort of the burberry suit and the white pocket square and the expensive tie and the bruno magli shoes. You know, this wasnt the bureau. I kind of thought he was kind of a dandy. You know, he was impeccably dressed like, his fingernails were polished and his hair swooped back. And a bunch of us kind of, you know, started to call him the prince of darkness. He worked both ends of the candle pretty hard. We had a morning briefing every morning at 7 30. Sometimes he would come in late, and id tell him i wanted him there. I dont care if he came in his slippers and pajamas, be there. And he was. laughter narrator oneills days were spent analyzing fragments of information. There was the story about two of Ramzi Yousefs bojinka coconspirators, Wali Khan Amin Shah and abdul hakim murad. In 1995, murad told a story of middle eastern pilots training at u. S. Flight schools and of a proposal to divebomb a jetliner into a federal building. It was a tantalizing bit of information. Agents were dispatched but then withdrawn. The investigation languished. I had a fairly low opinion of our headquarters throughout my whole career. It seemed like, you know, the headquarters was a very negative place where they would find a million reasons why you couldnt do something as opposed to why you could do something. Narrator James Kallstrom was the powerful boss of the fbis new york office. Watching from a distance, he saw oneills attitude and expertise make enemies among the group that surrounded louis freeh. Yeah, im sure there was some jealousy in the bureaucracy. There always is. You can get by with some sharper elbows for a while, but you need to be right a lot. You know the old saying when you run with the wolves, dont trip, you know . Narrator at headquarters, a whispering Campaign Began about oneills personal life. There was one version married his High School Sweetheart and had a couple of kids. Then there was the truth. John had been separated from his family for some time, and i think john would have said to you his family suffered as a result of that, as a result of his devotion to his job. I think the fbi was his mistress. He loved it. He loved it more than he loved any woman in his life. He loved it. Narrator and he loved valerie james. Very first time i saw john, i did something i had never done before and will never do again. I sent him a drink. He just had the most. He was standing at the bar, and he had the most compelling eyes i had ever seen. Narrator she had her own children, and after a while, they started calling him dad. He hinted he might marry their mom. The trouble was he hadnt told her he was already married. I didnt know for two or three years. And someone that john worked with in the fbis wife told me, and it was bad. I was shocked, you know. My family was shocked. Um. I loved him. It had been two or three years by that point. What are you going to do, you know . Narrator there werent exactly fbi regulations against oneills behavior, but there were unwritten rules of the road, and the whisperers said oneills lifestyle made him unfit for his sensitive job. But for every enemy oneill made at headquarters, it seemed hed made an ally elsewhere. One of them, in the midst of her own struggle with louis freeh and the headquarters bureaucracy, he kept secret. The attorney general had seen john at meetings, knew he was an expert from his position at the fbi, and she would frequently say, well, what does john think . There were times i was sitting in her office and shed ask that, and id say i didnt know, and she said, well, call him. And literally, i would be dialing johns cell phone from the attorney general of the United States office. And you know, hed get on the phone, hi. How are you . And i said, look, im in ms. Renos office. And so, if she wanted to know, she knew she had the ability to reach out to him. This made him, in fairness, a little bit uncomfortable. He knew that this would not have been looked upon kindly by other people in the bureau. Narrator around washington, oneills allies and drinking buddies began to warn him that he should take his al qaeda crusade to a field office; he should leave headquarters. You got to be careful whose toes you step on, particularly in washington, because theres some pretty big shoes, and he. He created some headaches for himself at headquarters because he did manage to step on some toes. Narrator there was an opening in the new york city division. The boss up there, Jimmy Kallstrom, was also a tough guy, a thorn in washingtons side. He grabbed oneill saved him, really. At headquarters, they were happy to see him go. And on january 1, 1997, john oneill moved to new york. miles daviss blue in green playing it was a promotion assistant special agent in charge of counterterrorism and national security. Hed be in charge of a team of about 350 agents. And best of all, it was in new york. New york was the Flagship Office of the fbi. Its where it happens, in new york. I mean, thats where you wanted to be if you were an fbi agent. So its only natural that john oneill, whos you know, his whole life was the fbi, from what i could see would want to be in new york. Narrator in the new york office, they were still piecing together the evidence in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Theyd also had new information that bin laden had been involved in the shooting down of two american black hawk helicopters in somalia. The confession of captured al qaeda member Jamal Ahmed Al fadl told of Osama Bin Ladens efforts to develop chemical weapons, buy weaponsgrade uranium, and to spread the Al Qaeda Network into europe. Oneill was becoming obsessed, haunted by the specter of bin laden. My dad had a lot of video of Osama Bin Laden. Whatever was out there was actually in his apartment. He studied him several times. Watched the videos, i know, several times. He would watch videotapes. He would read whatever material he could get his hands on. We had a fax in the house. People would fax him information all the time. John would sit in bed or sit on the couch or wherever and constantly underline everything. He was obsessed by him. I think theres no question about it. He always knew that there was so much more that he didnt know, and thats what spooked him. What spooked him and what really used to drive him crazy was what he didnt know and how much was out there that he didnt know. Two bombs minutes apart exploded without warning friday outside the u. S. Embassies in nairobi, kenya, and dar es salaam, tanzania. We had turned on the tv, watching cnn, and john oneill put it together in relatively short order and was convinced in his own mind that al qaeda was behind that. That clearly was the event that changed bin ladens profile dramatically because it was such a major event. Two embassies done simultaneously showed a great deal of sophistication in the organization. So this was a major event. Narrator but at headquarters, the brass were engaged in a procedural dispute. Were in the command center, and people are being pulled in. Im over there. Theres all sorts of Senior Bureau people there. Everybodys coming together. And the reason that this becomes a significant question almost immediately is because the fbis got to deploy people overseas. Theyre going to deploy people initially to kenya and tanzania. And whos going to be the onscene commander . Narrator oneill believed his experience and expertise made him the obvious choice to lead the investigation as the onscene commander. elevator dings but down in the sioc, there were those who wanted to cut new york and oneill out. telephone dialing telephone rings fbi. Narrator on the q. T. , townsend called oneill. And he was, to say angry, disappointed, hurt. There becomes this bureaucratic arm wrestle over whos going to be the office of origin. Narrator oneill desperately needed the help of u. S. Attorney mary jo white. U. S. Attorneys office. He and i were both very adamant that the new york field agents who were most knowledgeable about bin laden and the Al Qaeda Organization get over to africa as quickly as possible as the investigation was unfolding, because those first few days are often the most critical to whether you capture somebody or not, or figure out whos involved. Narrator and as it happened, Deputy Director bear bryant was out of cell phone range, on vacation. So the head of the criminal division, one of those men in louis freehs inner circle, tom pickard, was temporarily in charge. He decided the new york team would not take the lead in the investigation, washington would, and john oneill would not get command. This is the world series and hes gotten benched, and thats exactly how he feels about it. And he is very hurt, very upset about it, and. And bitter. Narrator oneill hit the phones. He ended up venting to bear bryant. I said, youre going to have a stroke. He was so intense. Interviewer this is the first guy you heard the word al qaeda and bin laden from. Shouldnt he be there . Well, he wasnt. Interviewer but that wasnt your decision. I got a feeling that wasnt your decision. Well, he wasnt there. Interviewer it wasnt your decision, was it . He wasnt there. Narrator stuck in new york, oneill had to be content to learn as much as possible long distance. Agents in east africa had found another training manual nearly identical to the one found in the World Trade Center bombing. One cooperating witness revealed that bin laden was planning to send operatives to the u. S. For pilot training. A computer found in a raid showed hundreds of targets around the world already surveilled and approved. Oneills agents identified a man named Mohamed Rashed daoud alowahali. He led them to a safe house in yemen that acted as a kind of terrorist telephone exchange, relaying messages to and from bin laden in afghanistan. Certainly after the Embassy Bombing in africa in 98, it was very obvious that what john was saying was right, that this was more than a nuisance, that this was a real threat. But i dont think everyone came to the understanding that it was an existential threat. The question was, yeah, this group is more than a nuisance, but are they worth going to war with . After all, theyve only attacked two embassies, and maybe thats a cost of doing business. This kind of thing happens. Yes, we should spend some time and some energy trying to get them, but its not the number one priority we have. Narrator at just this time in new york, a new crisis was emerging that would eventually get the entire bureaus attention. Oneills International Contacts were on full alert about the upcoming millennium celebrations, and oneill was lobbying for a fullblown fbi response in the United States. The millennium, not only because of what that represented symbolically which, again, raises its danger value tremendously but also because of intelligence we were getting throughout our government had us all extremely concerned. Narrator from the new york sioc, oneill and his team began to track a case that proved his theory that al qaeda had infiltrated the United States. An algerian national, ahmed ressam, had been arrested on the border between canada and the state of washington. Among his possessions, they found bombmaking material and maps. He had circled the los angeles airport on this one. We had always talked about the possibility that there were al qaeda cells in the United States, and we had looked for evidence, and we had encouraged fbi offices other than john oneills office in new york to start looking for evidence. agents chatting narrator the agents dug into the details of the plot. From a plan to blow up the los angeles airport, another trail led from boston to a planned attack in jordan. There were other conspirators in seattle, brooklyn, and manhattan, where oneill was worried about the massive new years eve celebration in times square. Certain documents were found on ressams possession, documents that indicated a new york connection. In fact, a pretty strong connection to new york. Narrator one of ressams coconspirators lived in new york. Abdel meskini was supposed to deliver money and a cell phone to ressam. Oneills agents arresd m. Arrests were made that had they not been uncovered. The plot had not been uncovered and those arrests made, we could have had horrific tragedies around the millennium. We have two Million People, two Million People compressed in a small area here in midtown manhattan. Narrator oneill was one of those two Million People. If al qaeda struck here, this was where he wanted to be. crowd cheering five, four, three, two, one loud cheering music playing and i remember talking to john shortly after midnight. There was a sense of accomplishment. We had just made the arrests in the ressam spinoff, and, you know, certainly we believed that we got everybody that we needed to find, but, you know, youre never really 100 sure of that. And so, i think a lot of the fbi leadership for the first time realized that oneill was right, that there probably were al qaeda people in the United States. They realized that only after they looked at the results of the investigation of the millenniumbombing plot. So by february of 2000, i think senior people in the fbi were saying there probably is a network here in the United States and we have to change the way the fbi goes about finding that network. Narrator if the bureau was finally going to reorganize itself to take on terror, oneill wanted significant influence in that process. He needed a highly visible, powerful platform. As it happened, Jimmy Kallstroms old job, head of the new york office, was open. Oneill pulled out all the stops and made a play for it. But there were some administrative problems on his record. Hed lost a bureau cell phe and a palm pilot. Then there was the time his old buick broke down. Val was with him. He figured hed just pop into an fbi safe house to pick up a bureau car, hed take her home, and that would be that. But headquarters called taking the car unauthorized use of government property. I think what happens in the fbi, its a very militaristic society, and you have to. If youre being investigated by opr, office of professional responsibility, and theres a question, they dont want to promote somebody thats got a cloud over them, even a minor thing like a vehicle. Narrator bear bryant had retired. Louis freeh promoted his longtime friend, tom pickard, to Deputy Director. It was not good news for agent oneill. It was pickard who decided oneill would not lead the investigation in east africa. And now, pickard and freeh decided john oneill would not get the big job in new york. My daddy always said, dont kill your mavericks; they might save your life someday. And theyre the ones that will always have the great ideas, so try to take care of them. And john was a maverick, a brilliant maverick. sirens wailing narrator the buzz around the new york office was that the new boss, barry mawn, wasnt keen on keeping oneill around. Barry was a skeptic. He had heard sort of the headquarters gossip at john oneills style. But it was funny; i can remember saying to john, barry doesnt stand a chance. If you decide to win him over, youll win him over. There was a knock on the door, and john was holding two beers. And he said, well, i understand youre an irishman and you like to drink beer. These are for you. So i laughed. He wanted to stay in new york. He said, i will be your most loyal supporter, and all i ask in return is that you be supportive of me in my efforts. And so i said, well, we got a deal, and well go forward. Narrator as the weeks wore on and just as that investigation about the car incident seemed a thing of the past, oneill attended a conference of other agents in florida. We were meeting in bal harbour, at the marriott. John came in. He is just. I dont remember seeing john as distraught as he was this night. What has happened . He told me he left his briefcase in this room of 150 fbi agents and got a phone call. Couldnt hear on his cell phone, so he just walked outside to take his call. Walked back in, his briefcase was gone. He was completely freaked. Narrator oneills bag contained classified documents. Taking them out of his fbi office was against the rules. And he knew even if there had been nothing in it, his sense was, because the bureau had come down hard on him the time before for something stupid, that even if it was nothing more than he lost bureau equipment, he was going to get. This was going to become a federal case. This was going to be a big deal in terms of the bureau, and it was going to be used to hurt him. Narrator hours later, the bag was retrieved. Fingerprint analysis showed the documents hadnt been tampered with. But the damage was done. John always wanted to be thought of as being close to perfect. And for him to be criticized for Something Like the suitcase, the briefcase incident, whatever the truth value of thaindent was, it hurt him a lot because he always wanted to be thought of as close to perfect perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed and didnt want anybody to think that he was in any way not the number one guy in terms of performance. Narrator at headquarters, they pounced. The fbis office of professional responsibility began a criminal investigation. Oneill was in real trouble. He hired a lawyer and hunkered down to save his job. He was consumed by this job, and the job turned on him. When he would make some foolish mistake, they came down awfully hard on him. Given what his contribution was, given what he had sacrificed, there was a sense of entitlement, and its a terrible sense of unfairness. His view was people above him felt threatened by him, by his expertise, and so didnt really want him around. Narrator as the criminal investigation against oneill dragged on inside the fbi, oneill had his agents paying attention to american embassies, especially in jordan and saudi arabia, and u. S. Military targets, because an egyptian informant had told them an american warship would be hit by al qaeda. Then on october 12, 2000, al qaeda struck. The guided missile destroyer u. S. S. Cole was the target of a suicide mission. 17 sailors died. John came to me and said, its al qaeda, and i totally agreed with him, and he said, you got to get to the director, and we got to get this so the new york Office Responds initially. Narrator it took hours for barry mawn to convince director freeh to let new york take the lead and to authorize oneill as tnscene commander. Interviewer Washington Headquarters of the fbi happy that oneill was going . I. My recollection is that i got questioned on it, is john the best guy to send . And i had no hesitancy and said, absolutely, hes the best guy to send. Interviewer why would they have said that . Well, again, i think it kind of goes back to a little bit of the history john had with some of the folks back there, that there was probably some questioning as, well, do we want to send oneill . He does have sharp elbows. Or his style may be. They were concerned that, uh, he wasnt the best guy to go and that you needed someone more of a diplomat. My view, to a certain extent, is when you have a Major Incident like that, you really dont need a diplomat at that particular point in time. You need somebody that knows what to do and is going to do it and get it done. Narrator oneill and the members of his Rapid Deployment Team Immediately headed for yemen. This was a case that he was really pushing hard on, that he understood that this wasnt just a venue where they set off a bomb, that there were connections between yemen and east africa, and yemen and afghanistan, and yemen and europe, and that there were. This was very much of an important Operational Base for these guys. And that if he could illuminate that base, that he could begin to really put a dent in this network. Narrator but when he got to yemen, oneill discovered how hard his task was going to be. Theyre in impossible conditions the agents. I mean, they dont have anyplace to sleep. Hes got agents sleeping on the floor, theyre working ridiculous hours, its hot as all getout, and theyre in impossible. And its in a hostile environment. We had to move in caravans from the hotel out to the cole or from the hotel to some of the sites where we believed the terrorists and their support network had been, and those were in caravans of ncisfbi personnel, all armed, surrounded by Yemeni Security force personnel, so these caravans would be eight, ten, 12 cars long. It was certainly announcing our presence any time we went somewhere. Everybody in that city knew who we were and where we were going, and it gave us an uneasy feeling. Narrator to protect the hundreds of investigators on the ground, oneill and American Military commanders wanted to show the yemenis a forceful presence guns ready, perimeters established. But much to oneills surprise, that approach quickly angered the american ambassador, barbara bodine, who felt his actions were harming u. S. Yemeni government relations. You had an ambassador who wanted to be fully in control of everything that every american official did in the country and resented the fact that suddenly there were hundreds of fbi personnel in the country and only a handful of state department personnel. She wanted good relations with yemen as the number one priority. John oneill wanted to stop terrorism as the number one priority. And the two conflicted. This results in meetings between the attorney general and state, fbi, cia, and justice. But ambassador pickering is at it hes the undersecretary and the attorney general. I mean, things are getting raised to that kind of a level; this has become such a bone of contention between them. Narrator but on the ground in yemen, the Law Enforcement agents saw a very different john oneill. I think he developed a real sense of closeness with the senior yemeni officials. They referred to him in arabic as alach, which is the brother, and oftentimes referred to him as the commander or your commander. They had a real sense of appreciation for his seniority in the u. S. Government and for what he represented. And i knew that they came to trust john. Narrator for six years, at the center of the fbis counterterrorism effort, oneill and his team had built the evidence on the mounting bin laden threat failed plots to kill hundreds of americans in jordan; ressams explosives headed to lax; an aborted al qaeda plot to blow up another american warship, the u. S. S. The sullivans, and now tcole. The yemenis finally agreed to let the fbi join in the interrogation of one of their most prominent suspects fahad al quso. Oneill and his agents believed al quso knew about bin ladens desire to videotape the destruction of the cole, and possibly a whole lot more. Oneill worked his newly developed Yemeni Police officials and old allies in the cia, but the weeks were taking their toll. Oneill needed a break. Hed get back to al quso after he returned from new york at the first of the year. I have to tell you, when john came home. He got home. I think it was two days before thanksgiving, because he kept telling me he was going to try to be home for thanksgiving, he. John had dropped 20, 25 pounds. Narrator in new york, he plotted his return to yemen. Hed taken a Yemeni Police delegation on a tour of elaines and other hotspots. He was working them, trying to get unfettered access to al quso and what he knew. But then he was told he wouldnt be allowed to return to yemen. Ambassador bodine denied his visa. I mean, john was not rational on the topic of ambassador barbara bodine. Livid would be putting it mildly. I mean, one cant forget that john was very american, but he was also very irish. Interviewer and that means . That means when he got hot, he got hot. And he was hot; theres no question about it. I think he felt that she was on the wrong side. Narrator ambassador bodine would not grafrontlines request for an interview. She was quoted in the new yorkmagazine the idea that john or his people or the f. B. I. Were somehow barred from doing their job is insulting to the u. S. Government, which was working on al qaeda before john ever showed up. This is all my embassy did for ten months. For weeks, the ambassador had been making the case against oneill, even lobbying louis freeh. Finally, her accusations had their intended effect. Headquarters supported her decision not to let oneill back into yemen. John was upset. She was badmouthing him. She had caused a stir at headquarters. I actually think john was more disappointed that our headquarters didnt back us as far as sending him back and taking a stronger stand with the state department. Eventually our headquarters said, well, lets try and work around not having john go back. And so thats what i had to do. Narrator so, oneill would not be in yemen. The investigation slowed to a crawl. I watched with dismay as the issue of the u. S. S. Cole completely disappeared from the u. S. Scene, completely, again, in a new administration. It was just not on their agenda. Clearly it was not on the agenda of the congress, the media, or anyone else. Again, it went into oblivion. Narrator by spring, intelligence about al qaeda forces in yemen convinced oneill they were about to target his agents. Oneill pleaded with barry mawn to pull them out, and mawn agreed. Oneills investigation in yemen was effectively over. We dont know what would have happened if john could have done his job in yemen and had really had the full backup to go and to really push in yemen, and what kind of networks he could have exposed. But, you know, we do know that there were yemenis involved in the attacks of september 11. So is it possible that if he had been able to really open up that network and really expose that network that he could have in some way deterred the tragedy of september 11 . I dont think we know. But its sad because we wont know the answer to that, but i think there is at least a fighting. He would have had a fighting chance if hed been able to do his job. Narrator by early summer of 2001, other Intelligence Services were putting the Bush White House on full alert. Every single indication was that al qaeda was planning a major attack on the United States. In june of 2001, the Intelligence Community issued a warning that a major al qaeda terrorist attack would take place in the next many weeks. And so in my office in the white house complex, the cia sat, briefed the domestic u. S. Federal Law Enforcement agencies immigration, federal aviation, coast guard, customs, and the fbi was there as well agreeing with cia told them that we were entering a period where there was a very high probability of a major terrorist attack. Narrator in new york, oneill was also convinced al qaeda had picked a target. But he was by now more marginalized than ever at the fbi. And so in july of 2001, when that memo from the Phoenix Office pleading for investigations of flight schools made its way to headquarters, it was not passed on to oneill or mawn in new york. Nor was the struggle that august of the Minnesota Office to investigate the alleged 20th hijacker, zacarias moussaoui. The leaders of the most sophisticated office in the fbi, the office that under oneill had been dealing with these matters for six years, apparently were out of the loop. John had heard the alarm bells too, yet he felt that he was frozen out, that he was not in a capacity to really do anything about it anymore because of his relationship with the fbi. So it was a source of real anguish for him. Narrator 13 months after that briefcase incident, with the investigation still open, a wellplaced leak to a newspaper made sure his government career was over. The new york timeis now starting to ask questions about that incident, both at the Headquarters Level and at the new york field office. In spite of sort of Jimmy Kallstrom and others trying to persuade the New York Times that somebody had an agenda here, this was really sort of ill motivated, it was clear that they were going to run with it. And that was the final nail in john oneills coffin that they were going to use to have him retire. Interviewer did he know who did it . He suspected. Interviewer did he confront them . Yes. Interviewer and what happened . It was completely denied. The person that he felt did it said, absolutely not, wouldnt want to hurt you in any way, shape, or form. Interviewer its been reported that was tom pickard. Thats who john felt it was tom pickard. And john really never knew. He was out to get john for a long time, and john never really knew why. Narrator at the time, tom pickard was interim director of the fbi. Now retired, pickard would not agree to an interview, but in a letter to frontline, he wrote, i did not leak it, and there are no facts that even remotely suggest that i did. Earlier, esquire magazine, pickard was further quoted on the matter the briefcase was a big deal. It was not so much that he lost it; he shouldnt have had those materials with him in the first place. Losing the briefcase just added to it. Lets just say it was not john oneills finest hour. At the end of august 2001, agent oneill ended his 25year career with the fbi. He was 49 years old. Oneill needed to make some money. Just being john oneill had gotten very expensive. Jimmy kallstrom and others made some calls. There was one job in particular he was really interested in. It paid 350,000 a year. But it also had a special kind of significance for oneill. It was chief of security at those buildings ramzi yousef had tried to destroy the World Trade Center. And i joked with him. I said, well, thatll be an easy job. Theyre not going to bomb that place again. And he said, well, actually. He immediately came back and he said, now, actually, theyve always wanted to finish that job. I think theyre going to try again. And of course, thats something ill just never forget. Narrator on the night of september 10, john oneill did what he loved doing, and he did it from his favorite table at elaines. It was classic john. To this day, i can remember john sitting in a chair, looking up at me with the classic john oneill smile, saying, doesnt get better than this. Narrator the talk, of course, turned to bin laden. He had said to me, were due, and were due for something big. That was just. He said that some things have happened in afghanistan. I dont like, you know, the way things are lining up in afghanistan. And he said, i just. I sense a shift, and i think things are going to happen. And i said, when . He said, i dont know, but soon. And that was just his sense of things. We left about 2 30. John gave me a big bear hug and said, ill see you tomorrow. And john went home, and that was the last i saw of him. It appears that there is more and more fire and smoke enveloping the very top of the building. Oh, my god. That looks like a second plane has just hit. I saw the second plane, and of course by then theres no doubt what the issue is, and i call again and i dont get through, and i leave a message. I knew he should have been there by then. And frankly, im just concerned, as a friend, that hes okay. We got on the phone, and he says, hey, babe, its me. I said, are you okay . He says, yeah, im fine. He said, val, its horrible; theres body parts everywhere. We said a few other things to one another, and he said, okay, ill call you in a little bit. I said, okay. He said, look, im on my way out now. Have you talked to your mother today . And i said, no. He said to me, well, give her a call. Shes worried about you. And i said, okay. He paged me to let me know he was okay, and that was the last contact i had. I was running down the street. Right after i got around st. Vincents hospital, on the y, and i started to run a little bit, i saw the south tower collapse. I knew immediately john was dead. Nt know why i knew; i just knew. And i just slumped down into a chair, and i said, oh, my god, johns dead. And everybody said, dont say that, dont say that, dont talk like that, but. About 2 00 in the afternoon, i said to my assistant. We were just sitting there waiting for him to call, everyone went back to my office, and he never called. Narrator in the aftermath, what john oneill had come so tantalizingly close to discovering became clear. Some of it came from yemen, from that suspect al quso. He told about a secret meeting in malaysia attended by two cole bombing conspirators, Nawaf Alhazmi and khalid almihdar. They had been coming in and out of the u. S. On legal visas. Theyd trained in american flight schools. They, too, had died on september 11, piloting flight 77 as it crashed into the pentagon. Among the 2,977 people murdered on september 11, in the debris of a fallen stairwell under what was once the south tower of the World Trade Center, they found john oneills body. We are announcing the indictment of abacus, a federally chartered bank that has been catering to the chinese immigrant Community Since 1984. That we are part of the cause of the financial crisis, almost laughable. In abacus loan department, mortgages were based upon false documentation. Too big to fail turns into small enough to jail. And abacus is small enough to jail. Its our fathers legacy, and hes passed that legacy on to us. Go to pbs. Org frontline to explore more about john oneill and the fbi. And coming soon, the frontline dispatch, a new original podcast series. Im raney aronson, frontlines executive producer. Were going to be tackling the toughest subjects. I was caught in a car bomb in mosul. The thought of marriage at 14. They were killed by militiamen as they left town. Subscribe now on our website or wherever you listen to podcasts. And sign up for our newsletter at pbs. Org frontline. Frontlinis made possible by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. And by the corporation for public broadcasting. Major support for frontliis provided by the john d. And catherine t. Macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant, and peaceful world. More information is available at macfound. Org. Additional support is provided by ford foundation, working with visionaries on the front lines of social change worldwide. At fordfoundation. Org. The park foundation, dedicated to heightening Public Awareness of critical issues. The john and Helen Glessner family trust, supporting trustworthy journalism that informs and inspires. And by the frontline journalism fund, with major support from jon and jo ann hagler. For more on this and other frontline programs, visit our website at pbs. Org frontline. Frontlines the man who knew is available on dvd. To order, visit shoppbs. Org or call 1800playpbs. Frontline is also available for download on itunes. Youre watching pbs. Hold on, hold on tonight whats the situation there . How do you explain that . Are you ready for this world that we are facing today . Be more. Pbs. We know we have to remember. Its very important to not forget the history. man we have to constantly remind ourselves that these things happened and that they could happen again. I remember as it were yesterday. I remember in the morning pulling the curtains back and seeing someone standing there with a gun. I heard the shots. My father was killed. My brother died. man we saw the tanks in the village, we saw the helicopters overhead, and we knew this was a major act of terrorism and we were in the middle of it. This was the first time terrorism was seen on the worldwide stage