Why America Slept:
The Failure to Prevent 9/11
by Gerald L. Posner
Book Description
The story of the
years leading up to 9/11 is the story of what might have been, and also
serves as a call to the defense of America’s future. Since 9/11,
one important question has persisted: What was really going on behind
the scenes with intelligence services and government leaders during
the time preceding the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks?
After an eighteen-month
investigation that uncovered explosive new evidence through interviews
and in classified documents, Gerald Posner reveals much previously undisclosed
information:
• the identity
of two countries that might have had foreknowledge that a terrorist
attack was scheduled for September 11 on U.S. soil
• a startling account of the interrogation of a leading al Qaeda
captive
• facts about a series of deaths that point to an ongoing conspiracy
by some governments to hide the extent of their earlier relationships
with al Qaeda
• details about a secret deal between Saudi Arabia and Osama bin
Laden
• how the U.S. government missed several chances to kill or capture
bin Laden
• evidence that German intelligence may have protected an informant
who was involved with many of the 9/11 plotters
• how the CIA tracked—and then lost—two of the hijackers
when they entered the United States more than twenty months before the
attacks
• the devastating consequences of the crippling rivalry between
the CIA and FBI as the United States moved unwittingly toward 9/11
In a dramatic narrative,
Why America Slept exposes the frequent mistakes made by law enforcement
and government agencies, and demonstrates how the failures to prevent
9/11 were tragically not an exception but typical. Along the way, by
delving into terror financing, the links between far-flung terror organizations,
and how the United States responded over the years to other attacks,
Posner also makes a damning case that 9/11 could have been prevented.
Why America Slept
lays to rest two years of conjecture about what led up to the worst
terror attacks in America’s history. This breakthrough book presents
an infuriating review of how incompetence and misplaced priorities made
America an easy target for terrorists.
From the Back Cover
In the end, the central question that remained was what did American
intelligence and law enforcement know and what did they ignore? What
mistakes were made along the way on the ground by police, FBI and CIA,
and in Washington and state capitals by policy makers? While hunting
for those answers, there were unexpected discoveries about some American
allies, and what they might have known, and not told anyone, before
9/11. The result is a far more infuriating book than originally expected.
The failure to have prevented 9/11 was a systematic one. It is not just
that investigators failed to get a lucky break early on, nor is it really
even dependent on a series of blunders in the immediate run-up to the
attack. The seeds for failure were sown repeatedly in almost twenty
years of fumbled investigations and misplaced priorities. After a while,
the revelations of ineptitude presented in this book no longer cause
surprise, but only anger.
—from Why America Slept
About the
Author
Gerald Posner, a former Wall Street lawyer, is an award-winning author
of eight books on subjects ranging from Nazi war criminals, to assassinations,
to the careers of politicians. A regular panelist on the History Channel’s
HistoryCENTER, he has also written for many national publications, including
The New York Times, The New Yorker, Time, Newsweek, The Wall Street
Journal, and U.S. News & World Report. He lives in Miami and New
York City with his wife, the author Trisha Posner.
YOUR SOURCE FOR JEWISH
BOOKS, REVIEWS &