terrorist strike: "FBI information ... indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country, consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attack." The 9/11 Commission Report outlined the following "opportunities that were not or could not be exploited by the organizations and systems of the time": not watchlisting future hijackers Hazmi and Mihdhar, not trailing them after they traveled to Bangkok, and not informing the FBI about one future hijacker's US visa or his companion's travel to the United States; not sharing information linking individuals in the Cole attack to Mihdhar; not taking adequate steps in time to find Mihdhar or Hazmi in the United States; not linking the arrest of Zacarias Moussaoui, described as interested in flight training for the purpose of using an airplane in a terrorist attack, to the heightened indications of an attack; not discovering false statements on visa applications; not recognizing passports manipulated in a fraudulent manner; not expanding no-fly lists to include names from terrorist watchlists; not searching airline passengers identified by the computer-based CAPPS screening system; and not hardening aircraft cockpit doors or taking other measures to prepare for the possibility of suicide hijackings. With regard to the failures of the US air defense system on the morning of the attacks, the Report explains that: Existing protocols on 9/11 were unsuited in every respect for an attack in which hijacked planes were used as weapons. What ensued was a hurried attempt to improvise a defense by civilians who had never handled a hijacked aircraft that attempted to disappear, and by a military unprepared for the transformation of commercial aircraft into weapons of mass destruction. The Report explains that the emergency response was also "necessarily improvised": there were "weaknesses in preparations for disaster, failure to achieve unified incident command, and inadequate communications among responding agencies ... At the Pentagon, [there were] problems of command and control." See also 9/11 conspiracy theories 9/11 Commission 9/11 Commission Report References Stranger than Fiction investigation by Dr Albert Pastore Further reading 1000 YEARS FOR REVENGE: International Terrorism and the FBI by Peter Lance (2003). Covers the plotting, motives, and unsuccessful investigations of al-Qaeda in the US leading up to 9/11. External links Has someone been sitting on the FBI? – BBC Newsnight Comprehensive List of Terrorists and Groups Identified Under Executive Order 13224 September 11 attacks Anwar al-Awlaki