Why America Slept: The Failure to Prevent 9/11 - Softcover

Posner, Gerald L.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0812966236 ISBN 13: 9780812966237

Publisher: Ballantine Books, 2004

Synopsis

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 that terrible day? After an eighteen-month investigation, Gerald Posner reveals much previously undisclosed information, including 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; how the CIA tracked–and then lost–two of the hijackers when they entered the United States months before the attacks; the devastating consequences of the crippling rivalry between the CIA and FBI; and the startling account of top al Qaeda captive whose information subsequently led to a trail of mysterious deaths of Saudi Arabian princes and Pakistani military leaders.
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. In the end, Posner makes a damning case that the terrorist attacks could have been prevented.

About this title

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 frequent commentator on television talk and news shows, 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. More information is available at www.posner.com.

About this edition

• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0812966236
• ISBN 13: 9780812966237
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 288