In what looks like another failure in the Bush administration to protect the world’s citizens from terrorism, reports today say the FBI knew that Mumbai would be attacked three years before it happened. David Headley was a paid Drug Enforcement Agent in 2005. Headley was arrested on domestic assault charges that year after his wife was told that Headley had married another woman in Pakistan and fathered children there.
His wife complained to FBI officials that Headley bragged about his work with the DEA and his training in Pakistan with terrorist militia. She also told the FBI that Headley had traveled five times to Mumbai. Headley had been scouting locations to carry out a terrorist attack in India.
DEA says that Headley’s work as an informant was closed because Headley “wasn’t producing anything.” As far as Headley’s wife’s tips were concerned, the FBI says it is flooded with tips on suspected terrorists and terrorist plots. Headley separated with the DEA well before the Mumbai attacks. One possible reason the FBI did not act forcefully is because Headley and his wife had been in a domestic dispute.
However, in the days after Headley’s wife reported her husband, FBI investigators did not stop Headley who had been traveling across the globe to find cities for his militant group, Lashkar-eTaiba- to attack. Instead, they probed his wife. Meanwhile, Headley traveled abroad disguised as U.S. businessman. He also met with terrorist organizers in Pakistan.
Headley pleaded guilty to charges of terrorism in the Mumbai attacks last March. He also said he was guilty of participating in a plot to take hostages and behead them at a Danish newspaper. That plot failed.
The U.S. anti-terrorism force told Indian officials about a possible terrorist attack on Mumbai in 2008.
As Headley sits in jail, he is cooperating with authorities. His wife’s identity remains undisclosed due to safety concerns.
When the World Trade Center was attacked by terrorists, Congress accused the Bush administration of ignoring previous warnings and memoranda that alerted the government of Osama bin Laden’s threats against the U.S.
