THE CHART….Oh crikey. Eric Umansky has Curt Weldon’s latest story about his famous chart. Here’s my nickel summary:
Weldon’s military buddies showed him the chart two weeks after 9/11. He was so shocked he didn’t even bother to look at it, let alone make a copy. He just handed it over to Stephen Hadley in a daze.
Three years later he’s working on his book. He calls his buddies, but they don’t have another copy of the chart. So they recreate it for him, and oh-by-the-way did you know that Mohamed Atta was ID’d by name and picture on the original chart?
So Weldon’s story is that (a) he’s an idiot who in late September 2001 didn’t notice the name and picture of a man whose name and picture had by then been plastered on TV nonstop for two weeks, (b) he gave away his only copy of the chart to Hadley, (c) the chart he’s been showing off recently is a recreation from memory, and (d) he’s been lying about this all along. And that’s his alibi!
This is ridiculous. The Pentagon needs to step forward and tell us whether or not Able Danger ID’d Mohamed Atta in 2000. There’s no excuse for not providing a definitive statement on this.
UPDATE: Laura Rozen has a good question about Weldon’s latest story too.
