FBI
was told to blame Anthrax
scare on Al Qaeda by White House officials
BY JAMES
GORDON MEEK
DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU
04/08/08 "NYDailyNews"
-- Saturday, August 2nd 2008 -- WASHINGTON - In the
immediate aftermath of the 2001 anthrax attacks, White House
officials repeatedly pressed FBI Director Robert Mueller to
prove it was a second-wave assault by Al Qaeda, but
investigators ruled that out, the Daily News has learned.
After the Oct. 5, 2001, death from anthrax exposure of Sun photo
editor Robert Stevens, Mueller was "beaten up" during President
Bush's morning intelligence briefings for not producing proof
the killer spores were the handiwork of terrorist mastermind
Osama Bin Laden, according to a former aide.
"They really wanted to blame somebody in the Middle East," the
retired senior FBI official told The News.
On October 15, 2001, President Bush said, "There may be some
possible link" to Bin Laden, adding, "I wouldn't put it past
him." Vice President Cheney also said Bin Laden's henchmen were
trained "how to deploy and use these kinds of substances, so you
start to piece it all together."
But by then the FBI already knew anthrax spilling out of letters
addressed to media outlets and to a U.S. senator was a military
strain of the bioweapon. "Very quickly [Fort Detrick, Md.,
experts] told us this was not something some guy in a cave could
come up with," the ex-FBI official said. "They couldn't go from
box cutters one week to weapons-grade anthrax the next."
jmeek@nydailynews.com
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