CIA analysts brief the White House Small Group on their preliminary findings that the October attack on the USS Cole in Yemen was carried out by a cell of Yemeni residents with some ties to the transnational “mujahideen” network. According to the briefing, these local residents likely had some support from al Qaeda. The CIA concluded that it had little intelligence to prove outside sponsorship, support, and direction of the operation. (See 911 Commission, p. 194)
The report was later shared with the incoming Bush administration and it likely influenced their decision not to retaliate against al Qaeda, President Bush already expressing that he was done “swatting at flies.” But the conviction not to employ cruise missiles—and to approach terrorism in new ways, “anything but Clinton” (ABC) some described the new policy as being—also stalled any momentum towards understanding the al Qaeda threat. The CIA would scramble mightily to get White House attention with regard to al Qaeda, and though that inattention was later used to excuse the Agency and blame the White House for 9/11, it was, in fact, that November 10, 2000 report that is most instructive. The CIA just lacked hard intelligence—even if the Bush White House paid attention perhaps the plot would have never been uncovered.