Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) liaison to Operation Able Danger, Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, told the 9/11 Commission’s executive director Philip “Zelikow and company that the operation had identified ‘two of the three cells which conducted 9/11’ and they included lead hijacker Mohammed Atta. The Atta reference would prove explosive, since by then, the commission was well on its way toward concluding that no U.S. intelligence service had detected Atta’s presence until after the 9/11 attacks.” Congressman Cult Weldon (R-PA) said, in an interview with author Peter Lance on May 15, 2006: ” ‘that the LIWA [Land Information Warfare Activity, the group behind Operation Able Danger] data miners had already proven that they could outshine the CIA. Now here was confirmation by an officer with the DIA [Shaffer] that Able Danger had been able to identify Atta more than a year before the 9/11 Commission said he was on the radar screen.’ ”
– Peter Lance, Triple Cross, Pages 392-393