1115.org

If you’ve been reading 1115 for a while, you know that we are big supporters of investigative journalist/author Peter Lance. His book A Thousand Years for Revenge (Revenge interview) uncovered the depths of FBI incompetence in the run up to 9/11, and Cover Up (Cover Up interview) broke new ground in the tragic tale of TWA flight 800 which exploded over Long Island in 1996.

His next book (which will be discussed here at length, including a new interview) again focuses on the government’s pathetic efforts at “keeping us safe.” Like Revenge and Cover Up, Triple Cross is based on serious investigative journalism, the kind that is supposed to come in newspapers and magazines, but is all too rare at the moment.

Before Triple Cross has even been published, controversy is running rampant. Its release was supposed to coincide with a special on the National Geographic Channel based on the interviews Lance conducted while writing his book, but current and former government officials have pressured NGC to withhold transcripts:

What was expected to be a controversial documentary that charges that Osama bin Laden’s top spy infiltrated three U.S. security agencies has gotten even hotter, with investigative reporter Peter Lance calling the TV piece based on his book a whitewash that’s “like doing Schindler’s List from Hitler’s perspective.”

The documentary, Triple Cross, is scheduled to air on the National Geographic Channel Aug. 28, with Lance’s book of the same name due out a few weeks later. But their accounts of how bin Laden’s master spy Ali A. Mohamed outwitted the CIA, the FBI and the U.S. Army may be overshadowed by the war of words between Lance and the network.

Lance, who in early treatments of the Triple Cross script was the narrator, was so infuriated by the program’s eventual direction that he refused to appear. National Geographic’s producers at one point held back transcripts of interviews they were supposed to share with Lance, and still won’t let him see the final documentary unless he signs what they call a “non-disparagement agreement.”

As the dispute has grown, some sources interviewed for the Triple Cross documentary have asked National Geographic to be removed from the program.
[…]
Mohamed turned up in FBI surveillance photos as early as 1989, training radical Muslims who would go on to assassinate Jewish militant Meir Kahane and detonate a truck bomb at the World Trade Center. He not only avoided arrest, but managed to become an FBI informant while smuggling bin Laden in and out of Afghanistan, writing most of the al Qaeda terrorist manual and helping plan attacks on American troops in Somalia and U.S. embassies in Africa.

Finally arrested in 1998, Mohamed cut a deal with the Justice Department. His whereabouts remain shrouded in official secrecy.

Lance, an Emmy winner who spent nine years as a producer-reporter at ABC, was one of the first journalists on the trail of the Mohamed story. He told part of it in two earlier books, 1000 Years For Revenge and Cover Up, both harshly critical of counterterrorism efforts, especially at the FBI. He says Triple Cross will be the toughest yet.

”The FBI allowed the chief spy for al Qaeda to operate right under their noses,” Lance said. ”They let him plan the bombings of the embassies in Africa right under their noses. Two hundred twenty-four people were killed and more than 4,000 wounded because of their negligence.” When the FBI finally realized what was happening, he said, it buried the story to hide not just its kid-gloves treatment of Mohamed, but other misbehavior by agents in the case.

But early versions of the documentary script, Lance said, made it look just the opposite. FBI agents and Justice Department officials were interviewed sympathetically, he said. ”The overwhelming impression was that the FBI was on top of Ali Mohamed,” Lance said. “It was outrageous. . . . They hijacked my research and watered down key findings in order to appease some prominent feds.”

If you are interested in the backstory, I’ve posted a PDF of the back-and-forth. If you are on the west coast, Lance will be on KGO 810 AM tonight at 7 PM PDT with everyone’s favorite Libertarian Gene Burns. They should have audio on their site if you can’t get the signal.

More on Triple Cross and the fallout as it unfolds.