When an Intelligence Story Isn’t - ProPublica

When an Intelligence Story Isn’t - ProPublica

On Jan. 27, The Washington Post published [1] a front-page article with a startling disclosure [2]: American intelligence and military officials were targeting U.S. citizens for "killing or capture." The story quoted an unnamed official as saying that the Central Intelligence Agency and Joint Special Operations Command had drawn up lists of suspected terrorists and that both agencies had identified three Americans targeted for what the CIA used to call [3] "termination with extreme prejudice.’’

Several days later, The Tribune Washington bureau published an equally compelling story on the front page of The Los Angeles Times and in other Tribune Co. newspapers. It reported that the CIA was about to add its first American to its list of people targeted for attack, Anwar al Awlaki, the New Mexico-born cleric linked to the Fort Hood attacks and the attempted Christmas Day airplane bombing. The third paragraph declared that "No U.S. citizen has ever been on the CIA’s target list.’’