Lo and Behold! We have a new voice speaking on the subject of Able Danger – someone never before heard from:

Rep. Curt Weldon, Pennsylvania Republican, correctly asserts the terrorist attack on America on September 11, 2001, could have been averted.

The assertion was based on his efforts as early as 1999 to create a national collaborative or fusion center.
…
Mr. Weldon first sought help from Eileen Preisser, who ran the Information Dominance Center at the U.S. Army’s Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA) at Fort Belvoir, Va. He then asked this writer to work with Ms. Preisser to see how the Army initiative could be expanded into a national effort.

Well ‘this writer’ is “F. Michael Maloof … a former senior analyst in the Office of the Defense Secretary” and he is no low level person. We also now have an indication of where the initial resistance may to Able Danger may have come from. I say ‘may’ because I still think the true source of the major resistance was the DoD Counsel’s office.

A theory being completely supported by this authoratative person:

Following the initial DoD turndown, Ellen Preisser and this writer then data-mined unclassified information to report to Mr. Weldon on possible Chinese front companies in the United States seeking technology for the People’s Liberation Army.

It showed how Chinese front companies in the United States listed as U.S. corporations were acquiring U.S. weapons technology from U.S. defense contractors, and improving China’s military capability. Such access to U.S. technology then would allow the Chinese over time to duplicate U.S. military systems down to the widget.

Indeed, a June 27, 2005 article in The Washington Times reported U.S. investigators were concerned with China and its middlemen increasingly and illegally obtaining “sensitive or classified U.S. weapons technology” from U.S. companies.

Reaction to the study on Chinese front companies in the United States from the Army and the General Counsel’s office in the Office of the Defense Secretary was immediate. In November 1999, they ordered the study destroyed, but not before Mr. Weldon complained to then Army Chief of Staff Eric K. Shinseki.

And more – now we have a name of one of the lawyers who at least passed on the word about the pending purge. And yes, it was due to the China study as I predicted – as this notation from what appears to be the actual response (something the DoD cannot seem to locate) clearly shows:

“Preliminary review of subject methodology raised the possibility that LIWA ‘data mining’ would potentially access both foreign intelligence (FI) information and domestic information relating to U.S. citizens (i.e. law enforcement, tax, customs, immigration, etc,” Capt. Lohr wrote.

“I recognize that an argument can be made that LIWA is not ‘collecting’ in the strict sense (i.e. they are accessing public areas of the Internet and non-FI federal government databases of already lawfully collected information),” Capt. Lohr added. “This effort would, however, have the potential to pull together into a single database a wealth of privacy-protected U.S. citizen information in a more sweeping and exhaustive manner than was previously contemplated.”

In effect, the national collaborative center experiment based on the LIWA example was sidelined.

If the concept of the NOAH had been in effect on September 11, 2001, events may have been different. The cost for such a system would have been minimal compared to the heavy cost in human life and resources the nation suffered.

Folks, this is enormous. This person worked with Eileen Preisser at LIWA. Preisser spear headed the new application of data mining technology. Maloof seems to have access to the actual legal response that resulted in the diversion of Able Danger from its initial work. And he makes no bones about it – there was a real possibility of stopping 9-11.

Maloof, interestingly enough, was an aide to Richard Perle: [corrected for late night bleart eyes!]

Wurmser works at Feith’s office, where he and another neocon, F. Michael Maloof, a former aide to Richard Perle, head a secret intelligence unit, named the Counter Terrorism Evaluation Group, or the “Wurmser-Maloof” project. The four- to five-person unit, a “B Team” commissioned by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, uses powerful computers and software to scan and sort already-analyzed documents and reports from the CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, and other agencies in an effort to consider possible interpretations and angles of analysis that these agencies may have missed due to deeply ingrained biases and out-of-date worldviews.

The guy has one damn interesting past:

A veteran Pentagon employee who was a key player in the effort to find links between Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida has been stripped of his security clearance, according to senior U.S. officials.

The employee, F. Michael Maloof, is associated with a Lebanese-American businessman who is under federal investigation for possible involvement in a gun-running scheme to Liberia, the West African nation embroiled in civil war. The businessman, Imad El Haje, approached Maloof on behalf of Syria to seek help in arranging a communications channel between Syria and the Defense Department.

Maloof is close to influential foreign policy hawks inside and outside government, some of whom lobbied vigorously to get his clearance restored despite objections from government security officers, one official said.

The officials involved all spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were discussing classified matters.

Maloof is a Pentagon veteran who has made a career of attempting to suppress the trade in high-tech goods with military uses. He was awarded the Defense Department’s Distinguished Civilian Service Award.
…
Maloof and David Wurmser, who’s now an aide to Undersecretary of State John Bolton, claimed they had found evidence that Sunni and Shiite Muslim groups, as well as secular Islamic countries, cooperate to harm the United States despite their many differences.

He is not a fan of technology transfer to China. This is may be why the Pentagon was not keen on open testimony.

Before the House Committee on Government Reform
24 June 1999

You asked that I address the Administration’s efforts to curb the flow of dual-use technology to China and efforts to safeguard U.S. facilities. You also asked for my testimony on intimidation or retaliation against government employees who have been involved in these policy areas and have expressed either reservations or opposition to Administration policies.

Couldn’t help but note this bigoted, almost racist comment at KOS on Maloof:

most of the key people assembled at working staff levels were Jews with far-right views. The few who weren’t were from closely-allied groups, like right wing Lebanese Christians. To borrow Bill Clinton’s phrase describing his cabinet — it didn’t exactly “look like America.”

Maloof seems to have had the same problem with the DIA as Shaffer

F. Michael Maloof, until recently a veteran Pentagon security official in the office of Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, said his security clearances were revoked based on false charges by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) that he failed to report contacts with a foreign national he met while working for the Pentagon in the former Soviet republic of Georgia. He later married the woman, who is now a U.S. government translator.
…
The suspension coincided with Mr. Maloof’s work on a special-intelligence analysis that showed previously undisclosed links between Sunni and Shia extremists, including al Qaeda’s ties to Saddam Hussein’s government.

His analysis was bitterly opposed by officials in the CIA and DIA, who disagreed with its findings.

According to Mr. Maloof, one DIA analyst told him, “We don’t like people like you looking over our shoulders.”

And an interesting name pops up with this Maloof

“There is no doubt in my mind that security clearances are used as a weapon by various agencies to push away a perceived problem,” said Mark Zaid, a lawyer who has defended numerous federal employees on security-clearance issues.

Zaid is the very same Zaid that is Shaffer and JD Smith’s lawyer I would wager.

Able Danger just took a helluva interesting turn! The internal battle with the CIA and other intelligence groups is about to break lose. Wonder if this has any connection to why things all of a sudden are opening up???

Boy, could all of these be the same Michael Maloof:

WASHINGTON – Intermediaries for ousted dictator Saddam Hussein made numerous attempts to open secret contacts with the Bush administration to head off a U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, but the administration rebuffed or ignored the efforts, U.S. officials said Wednesday.

Early this year, a Lebanese-American businessman, Imad El Haje, relayed word that Saddam would allow U.S. experts and troops into Iraq to verify that he had no weapons of mass destruction, said the officials, who requested anonymity.

El Haje sent his message through a Department of Defense official, F. Michael Maloof, who was involved in a Pentagon effort to find links between Saddam and Osama bin Laden, and Richard Perle, the head of a Pentagon advisory panel who was a leading advocate of invading Iraq.

UPDATE:

Meant to add a link to TOPDOG last night at 2:00 AM when I posted this (gee, wonder why I forgot!). TOPDOG has post covering a Weldon interview on from FOX where Weldon confirms Able Danger was tipped to the USS Cole bombing somehow. QTMonster had the link to the video.

UPDATE:

You can read Ed Morrissey’s reaction to the news here. Rightfully so, he wonders why Maloof was not interviewed by the 9-11 Omission.

Mac at Mac’s Mind is trying to pop my balloon (just kidding). I think the China connection is huge and Mac doesn’t try and dismiss it either. Just the opposite. I was hoping Mac would know more, or find out more, about Maloof and others named in the articles since he has all these great sources (hint, hint, hint). Me, I read articles and speculate.