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Controversial book recalls WTC hero John O’Neill

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

Clarke refers to O’Neill, who was 49 when he died, as his “closest friend” in the Bureau. Many things bound the men together, such as a similar background and approach to work. But most important was a shared worldview, central to which, from the mid-1990s on, was the belief that al Qaeda posed the greatest military threat to the United States.
O’Neill, the Atlantic City-born Irish American who took over as head of security at the World Trade Center just days before the attacks, became something of legend after his death, helped by major articles in New York and the New Yorker magazines, and then later in 2002 a PBS “Frontline” special entitled “The Man Who Knew,” in which Clarke featured prominently.
Clarke and O’Neill worked together in Washington on the Counter Security Group, which brought together the senior counterterrorism officers of the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Council, the Departments of State and of Defense, and the military.
In their book “The Age of Sacred Terror,” Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon write: “O’Neill and Dick Clarke took to each other quickly, coming to see each other as the only ones who had registered the true danger of al Qaeda. Like Clarke, O’Neill was known to have rough edges.”
They continue: “He [O’Neill] has been described often and correctly as larger than life. In Washington, amid the sea of drab suits and Florsheims, he stood out, a tall, tough black Irishman in broad-lapelled double-breasted suits and dainty loafers, with a gun tucked in his waist. In CSG meetings, where bland Midwestern tones and Southern drawls predominated, he punched his points with New Jersey gravel.”
In “Against All Enemies,” Clarke writes: “Like me, he was from a working-class background and he tended to straight talk that some found abrasive.”
In the book, Clarke recounts working with O’Neill on the preparations for the Atlanta Olympics, and the investigation into the bombing at that event, and the inquiry into the Flight 800 disaster. They also looked at the possibility that the Aum cult might be planning an attack in New York City, similar the one it carried out on the Tokyo subway.
By the time of the Millennium preparations in 1999, O’Neill was the FBI’s special agent in charge of national security in New York City. He was at Times Square at midnight on Dec. 31. Clarke argues forcefully that attacks were prevented at that time by good police work, and that the same urgency was missing after the new administration took office in 2001.
In the documentary “The Man Who Knew,” Clarke said his friend operated like a ward politician at times, one who had considerable energy, charm, presence and style. In his book, he continues in the same vein. “O’Neill could have passed for a Boston Irish congressman who read GQ magazine,” he writes.
O’Neill joined the FBI as a desk clerk after college, when he was 24. He worked his way up the ranks.
“He may not have had a Ph.D. from MIT or something like that, but his IQ was clearly off the charts,” Clarke said in the PBS program. “I might have been chairing the meeting, but he was building a team and we were all on his team.”
He described his friend’s main goal and obsession, which he shared: “[W]hat John O’Neill was trying to do was to get a momentum going in the FBI to look seriously for those cells, to look for the connections, which, frankly, most FBI offices were not doing. It was not one of the priorities in most FBI field offices.
“He was very demanding; he was demanding both up and down; both to his superiors and his subordinates. He set a very high standard of what should be done.”
O’Neill was far from perfect in the conduct of his personal and his professional life, his friends conceded after his death. He didn’t tell his girlfriend that he’d been married and was the father of two children, with whom he was close, until some time after their relationship had begun. He antagonized his superiors and broke the rules on occasion.
During his investigation into the attack on the USS Cole in the Yemen, O’Neill clashed bitterly with the U.S. ambassador.
O’Neill had some strong supporters within the FBI, but after being passed over for promotion several times, and becoming increasingly frustrated with the bureau’s approach to the terror threat, he decided to resign in 2001.
No longer a civil servant, Clarke can write frankly in his best-selling book: “O’Neill did not fit the narrow little mold that [FBI] Director Louis Freeh wanted for his agents. He was too aggressive, thought outside the box. O’Neill’s struggle with Freeh was a case study in why the FBI could not do the homeland protection mission.”
Freeh himself left in the spring of 2001, though O’Neill’s days were numbered anyway. His departure eventually took place in humiliating circumstances. On Aug. 19, 2001, during his last week, a report appeared in the New York Times, under the headline “FBI is investigating a senior counter terrorism agent.” Few doubted that it was leaked by a very high source in the FBI. It referred to O’Neill’s most serious infraction. A year earlier, his brief case containing classified documents was stolen at a conference, then found with a couple of objects missing. A fingerprint analysis showed that the documents weren’t touched.
The Times report also mentioned that O’Neill was leaving and taking a private security job.
Less than a month later, O’Neill was in his new office at the North Tower when the first plane crashed into it. Outside he made several calls on his cell phone, then reentered the building in an attempt to save lives. His remains were recovered several weeks later.

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