Intelligence Matters

The CIA, the FBI, Saudi Arabia, and the Failure of America's War on Terror

By: Bob Graham, Jay Nussbaum

Narrated by: Jonathan Marosz

In this explosive, controversial, and profoundly alarming insider’s report, Senator Bob Graham reveals faults in America’s national security network severe enough to raise fundamental questions about the competence and honesty of public officials in the CIA, the FBI, and the White House.

For ten years, Senator Graham served on the Senate Intelligence Committee, where he had access to some of the nation’s most closely guarded secrets. Following the attacks of September 11, 2001, Graham co-chaired a historic joint House-Senate inquiry into the intelligence community’s failures. From that investigation and his own personal fact-finding, Graham discovered disturbing evidence of terrorist activity and a web of complicity:

• At one point, a terrorist support network conducted some of its operations through Saudi Arabia’s U.S. embassy–and a funding chain for terrorism led to the Saudi royal family.
• In February 2002, only four months after combat began in Afghanistan, the Bush administration ordered General Tommy Franks to move vital military resources out of Afghanistan for an operation against Iraq–despite Franks’s privately stated belief that there was a job to finish in Afghanistan, and that the war on terrorism should focus next on terrorist targets in Somalia and Yemen.
• Throughout 2002, President Bush directed the FBI to limit its investigations of Saudi Arabia, which supported some and possibly all of the September 11 hijackers.
• The White House was so uncooperative with the bipartisan inquiry that its behavior bore all the hallmarks of a cover-up.
• The FBI had an informant who was extremely close to two of the September 11 hijackers, and actually housed one of them, yet the existence of this informant and the scope of his contacts with the hijackers were covered up.
• There were twelve instances when the September 11 plot could have been discovered and potentially foiled.
• Days after 9/11, U.S. authorities allowed some Saudis to fly, despite a complete civil aviation ban, after which the government expedited the departure of more than one hundred Saudis from the United States.
• Foreign leaders throughout the Middle East warned President Bush of exactly what would happen in a postwar Iraq, and those warnings went either ignored or unheeded.

As a result of his Senate work, Graham has become convinced that the attacks of September 11 could have been avoided, and that the Bush administration’s war on terrorism has failed to address the immediate danger posed by al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Hamas in Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and Somalia. His book is a disturbing reminder that at the highest levels of national security, now more than ever, intelligence matters.©2004 Senator Bob Graham and J. Nussbaum; (P)2004 Books on Tape, Inc.

Critic reviews

Advance praise for Intelligence Matters

“Intelligence Matters is a work of great patriotism, a searing insider’s account of the government’s ineptitude, and at times deceit, both on 9/11 and in the war in Iraq. Senator Graham is unflinching in a damning and persuasive indictment of President Bush, the FBI and the CIA. This is no liberal, conspiratorial, antiwar polemic, but rather a convincing argument by a hawk in the war on terror as to why the country is less safe today because of blunders made by President Bush. Intelligence Matters also makes a meticulous–and at times startling–case for official Saudi Arabian complicity in the 9/11 plot. This is an important book and a must read for anyone concerned with the war on terror and the future of America.”
–GERALD POSNER, New York Times bestselling author of Why America Slept

Very Interesting and Eye Opening

This is a very well-written, easily-understood book, and the narrator is excellent. I was surprised to discover that our government and its agencies had 12 occasions to probably stop the 9-11 terrorist attacks. This book is quite an eye-opener, written by Bob Graham who was/is in a position to know what went on.

This is the kind of book I can listen to more than once.

A must listen!

Senator Bob Graham has done an outstanding job of meticulously detailing the intelligence failures related to the 9/11 terrorist attack. This is an eye-opening book and raises serious concerns about the health of democracy in America. Had Senator Graham not written this book we would be blissfully ignorant of the political distortions surrounding 9/11. This is a must read (listen) for those who care about the future and safety of America!

very interesting and insightful.

loved it!
well written , exceptional performance and exciting insights into the intelligence committee.
some parts were very technical but un

Bush Bash Fest

I'm a libertarian, So I don't have a dog in this political infighting... but this is mostly a Bush-bash-fest and clearly an "I could have done a better job" essay.

While there's some interesting facts and intelligence presented, it's clear that Senator Graham (and the Democrats) are bitter about the Bush Administration, and that taints much of what is presented as "Evidence".

I'd have found it MUCH more interesting if it wasn't so clearly slanted politically while the author claims to be a centrist. The constant political observations make you wonder if the "facts" are true, or are just the opinions of someone that dislikes Bush.

What "appears" to be "obvious intelligence" is only hindsight, which is 20/20.. it was not mentioned that the intelligence services sift through THOUSANDS of these threats and suspicious activities each year, yet the author wants to present the case that the FBI should have CLEARLY seen this needle in the haystack... AFTER the fact it's obvious, of course, but things always are After the fact.

To be honest, I didn't find out anything really new, just a few facts that took what I already knew a bit further, and (again) I am suspicious that these "facts" may be tainted by politics.

Good book, terrible reader

It is very interesting to get the insight of the chairman of the senate intellegence comittee on the current terrorist threat and organizations that comabat it. On the one hand, Grahm is a partisan senator who vigourously dissaproves of the acts of the Bush administration. On the other he is far more in the know than the endless line of pundits who have churned these issues over the last few years. Jonathan Marosz
is the worst reader I have come across and I said I would never listen to him again, but this book was worth putting up with him.