Xinhua - English

Xinhua - English: "Aug. 17 (Xinhuanet) --

A US military intelligence officer asserted Wednesday that the Sept. 11 Commission failed to thoroughly probe a major intelligence error related to the deadly terror attacks in 2001.

Showing up in US TV network CBS's 'the Early Show', Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer said the panel has not pressed hard enough for documentation of claims that the US Army knew about Sept. 11 hijackers as terror suspects operating within the country before the attacks.

He said he was once a member of an Army intelligence unit code-named 'Able Danger,' which had identified four future Sept. 11 hijackers as al Qaeda members by mid-2000.

However, military lawyers in the Pentagon stopped the unit from sharing the important information with the FBI, saying the four suspects were legal immigrants so information on them could not beshared with law enforcement agencies such as FBI based on relevant government codes.

Shaffer said after the Sept. 11 attacks, he provided the information to the Sept. 11 Commission staffs, but the panel did not include it in its final report released last year.

As a result, there is no suggestion in the report that the US government knew about the hijackers as early as 2000, he said.

'I don't believe they (the commission) ever got all the documents,' said Shaffer.

The officer is the second person to reveal the intelligence lapse.

US Congressman Curt Weldon, also a former member of the 'Able Danger' intelligence unit, made similar claims on Aug. 9."