By now, everyone has figured out that the information leading to the terror alert in NY, Newark, and DC is three years old. So right now, we're scambling over really old data that might not be operative any more.
I'm wondering whether Al Qaeda supporters in Pakistan did this deliberately, to throw us off the scent of what is really active for a bit of time.
Already, the Pakistanis seem to be sifting the information that gets through to us, at least with regards to the "father" of their nuclear program, AQ Khan. As the Assistant Sec. State
testified before Congress recently, we have not talked directly with Khan. So, while we have gotten valuable information secondhand from Khan (for example, about Libya's nuclear program), we may not have gotten answers to some other really pressing questions (such as, has Pakistan transferred nuclear weapons to Saudi Arabia, as they are rumored to have done, or how much have they dealt to Iran, or who else have they dealt to that we haven't even imagined yet). Everything that has passed onto us has been passed on through the Al Qaeda-friendly Pakistan intelligence agency, ISI.
And this may be happening with the latest Al Qaeda sources, who were the source of the three-year old Al Qaeda intelligence.
Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, the high value target in whose presence the "computer geek" with the valuable laptop was, may still be in Pakistani custody--he certainly wasn't handed over immediately. And it's not clear, but it seems like there was a delay before the laptop was handed over.
When the urgency of the information that was emerging from both sources became apparent, it was immediately passed on to American officials who have been working increasingly directly with Pakistan in the fight against al-Qa'eda.
So I'm wondering. Is it possible that Ghailani and his computer geek had more current information on their laptop, but that has not yet been handed over to the US? Is it possible that the really incriminating information has been destroyed (although, I'm sure the US can reconstruct this info on the laptop). Is it possible that they used the outdated surveillance information to throw the US off the scent of other active plans?
I don't have any proof that this has happened. But there is evidence that the US didn't get this information firsthand. And there is plenty of evidence that ISI has a lot of people who would like to help out Al Qaeda. So how do we know whether any information we get secondhand from Pakistan is worthwhile???