The Long Fuse, S01E07: "Blinking Red"

Runtime: 34:34 · Season One · A Will Sigmon Media production Season / Episode: 1 / 7 · episodeType: full

Cold open

There is a kind of person whose whole job is reading. Cables, intercepts, reports from foreign services. In the spring of two thousand one, the people who did that job all noticed the same thing at about the same time. There was more. The Commission put it in one sentence. "In the spring of 2001, the level of reporting on terrorist threats and planned attacks increased dramatically to its highest level since the millennium alert." [low] The President would…

About this episode

April to August 2001: the threat reporting grows so loud that, in the 9/11 Commission's words, "the system was blinking red." Episode 7 is the American side of that summer: the drumbeat of warnings, the reports that pointed overseas, the Phoenix memo, what the airlines were told, and a case opened in Minneapolis on August 15. The warnings were loud. Why did no one know where to look?

Disclaimer: a dramatization based on public records, including The 9/11 Commission Report, court filings and trial testimony. Some scenes and dialogue are reconstructed or composited. Voices are AI-generated and are not intended to resemble any real person. Not affiliated with or endorsed by any person or agency depicted. Allegations in court filings are unproven claims. No private victim is named beyond the public record, and people the Commission identified only by pseudonym keep those pseudonyms.

Content note

This episode discusses terrorism and the events leading to the September 11 attacks. No victim is voiced or depicted. No hijacker speaks.

Beat outline / chapters

These are narrative beats from the production script, not timed audio chapters.

• A WINDOWLESS ROOM, WASHINGTON. Before dawn, spring 2001
• Opening titles
• TIRED OF SWATTING AT FLIES. Washington, March to April 2001
• THE DRUMBEAT. April to May 2001
• CRESCENDO. June to early July 2001
• THE FEW THAT POINTED HOME. May to June 2001
• ZONE DEFENSE. Washington, May 2001
• JUNE ELEVENTH. New York, 2001
• CONDITION DELTA. June 21 to July 31, 2001
• THE ROOM THAT WAS TOLD TO KEEP QUIET. July 2 to July 9, 2001
• WHAT THE AIRLINES WERE TOLD. May to September 2001
• FIRST CLASS. Summer 2001
• PHOENIX. July 10, 2001
• IT COULD NOT GET ANY WORSE. Late July 2001
• THE PAGE. August 6, 2001
• ARCHITECTURE, ARTS, LAW, POLITICS. August 2001
• EVEN IF I DO IT BY MYSELF. Kandahar, summer 2001
• MUKHTAR. August 28, 2001
• THE SEARCH. New York, early September 2001
• SEPTEMBER 4, 2001
• SEPTEMBER 9 AND 10, 2001
• TIME RUNS OUT

Key people

• CIA / FBI analysts (as named in Commission)
• The Record (narrator)

Key places

• A WINDOWLESS ROOM, WASHINGTON. Before dawn, spring 2001
• TIRED OF SWATTING AT FLIES. Washington, March to April 2001
• THE DRUMBEAT. April to May 2001
• CRESCENDO. June to early July 2001
• THE FEW THAT POINTED HOME. May to June 2001
• ZONE DEFENSE. Washington, May 2001
• JUNE ELEVENTH. New York, 2001
• CONDITION DELTA. June 21 to July 31, 2001
• THE ROOM THAT WAS TOLD TO KEEP QUIET. July 2 to July 9, 2001
• WHAT THE AIRLINES WERE TOLD. May to September 2001
• FIRST CLASS. Summer 2001
• PHOENIX. July 10, 2001

Sources

Bibliography

• CR6. The 9/11 Commission Report (2004), ch. 6, "From Threat to Threat"
• CR7. The 9/11 Commission Report (2004), ch. 7, "The Attack Looms"
• CR8. The 9/11 Commission Report (2004), ch. 8, "'The System Was Blinking Red'"
• PDB. President's Daily Brief, August 6, 2001, "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US" (declassified April 10, 2004; reproduced in CR8)
• OIG. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, A Review of the FBI's Handling of Intelligence Information Related to the September 11 Attacks (2004; released 2006)
• LW. Lawrence Wright, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Knopf, 2006) [secondary]

The 9/11 Commission Report: https://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/report/index.htm

Scene-by-scene source notes

• 1. A WINDOWLESS ROOM, WASHINGTON. Before dawn, spring 2001. Quote: CR8 §8.1, "The Drumbeat Begins". The room, the coffee and the printer are invented staging. The analyst is an unnamed composite who says nothing about any report's content.
• 3. THE DRUMBEAT. April to May 2001. SEIB described: CR8 §8.1. CSG discussed the Abu Zubaydah reports on April 19; the briefing "the next day" headline "Bin Ladin planning multiple operations": CR8, fn 8. Abu Zubaydah, "a major figure in the millennium plots": CR8 (paraphrase of the text). "The drumbeat of reporting grew louder"; "Bin Ladin public profile may presage attack"; "Bin Ladin network's plans advancing": CR8, May 2001. CR8 does not give the dates of the two May headlines, so none are spoken. Clarke's May 29 note to Rice and Hadley, quoted sentence: CR8, fn 10–11 region. Black's "7 on a scale of 1 to 10, as compared to an 8 during the millennium": CR8, fn 11. Clarke, Rice, Hadley and Black are named and not voiced; only CR-quoted words are attributed to them. Abu Zubaydah: captured 2002 and held at Guantánamo, never charged. On air he is only "a man… a major figure in the plots around the millennium", which is the Commission's description.
• 4. CRESCENDO. June to early July 2001. "An even higher peak of urgency"; the list of countries; "possibly Rome"; "the danger could be anywhere, including a possible attack on the G-8 summit in Genoa": CR8, "High Probability of Near-Term 'Spectacular' Attacks". The late-June advisory, "spectacular", and the headlines "Bin Ladin Attacks May be Imminent" and "Bin Ladin and Associates Making Near-Term Threats": CR8, fn 14. Clarke's June 28 note: both quotations verified against the official text; the bracketed expansion "[Defense Intelligence Agency]" in CR8 is omitted on air. "Very, very, very, very": CR8. The June 30 headline and the Saudi alert: CR8. The deception doubts and the June 30 SEIB "Bin Ladin Threats Are Real": CR8. CR8 names Wolfowitz as questioning the reporting; he is not named on air, which keeps the episode from seeming to assign blame. Disruption operations in 20 countries, operatives detained, "perhaps averting attacks against two or three U.S. embassies", and the Fourth of July concern with the alert maintained afterwards: CR8 fn 19–20. Capitalization follows CR8.
• 4b. THE FEW THAT POINTED HOME. May to June 2001. Early-May walk-in (London, Boston, New York); the May 16 embassy phone call, "high explosives"; the May 17 CSG agenda: CR8. June 12 CIA report on KSM's recruiting: CR8 fn 12. "Khaled", the presumption that he was KSM, the July photo identification, "seen primarily as another freelance terrorist, associated with Ramzi Yousef", and links "not recognized at the time": CR8, late-leads KSM passage, fn 108 and 111. June 22 CIA notice to station chiefs and the State notice to embassies: CR8 fn 12. KSM was charged by military commission and has not been convicted; on air he is described only as CR8 and E01 describe him.
• 4c. CONDITION DELTA. June 21 to July 31, 2001. CR8 §8.1, fn 15 (CENTCOM Delta in six countries; Fifth Fleet; Jordan exercise; Gulf embassies' review; Yemen embassy closed; FESTs on four hours' notice; "rolling 24 hour basis"), fn 21 (Cheney–Abdullah July 5; Genoa airspace and antiaircraft batteries; the President attended), fn 23 (Ashcroft July 5 briefing; "addressed only threats outside the United States"), fn 29 (FAA circular July 31: "reports of possible near-term terrorist operations . . . particularly on the Arabian Peninsula and/or Israel"; no credible evidence; "plan and train for hijackings"). All verified against the official text on 2026-10-17. Paraphrase outside quotation marks. The closing reflection is ours. This resolves the "FAA information circulars: hold" note below for the July 31 circular only.
• 5. THE ROOM THAT WAS TOLD TO KEEP QUIET. July 2 to July 9, 2001. July 5 meeting: agency list, overseas focus, "told not to disseminate", the attendees' interpretation, and "An NSC official recalls a somewhat different" instruction: CR8 fn 21–22 and §8.1. Presented as contested, both sides stated, unadjudicated. July 9 meeting, 37 officials from 27 agencies, "exercise extreme vigilance": CR8 fn 25. The diagnosis quote: CR8. "More than a year": Hazmi and Mihdhar reached Los Angeles on January 15, 2000 (CR6; CR7). CR7 fn 1. NON-ADJUDICATING.
• 5b. WHAT THE AIRLINES WERE TOLD. May to September 2001. FAA security directives (none increased checkpoint or on-board security); circulars urging carriers to "exercise prudence"; the CD-ROM and its quoted sentence; 27 special briefings between May 1 and Sep 11, 2001, two on overseas hijacking, none on suicide hijacking or aircraft as weapons, no new measures: CR8 fn 47–48. The FBI counterterrorism head is Dale Watson (CR8 fn 51, verified against the official text); "500 analysts…" is verified against the official text. Restraint note: the CD-ROM line is read once, level, with no music sting. It is the most painful sentence in the chapter, and the dignity line needs it to play plain. Family-sensitivity reviewer: flag this line.
• 6. PHOENIX. July 10, 2001. The memo's date, addressees, quoted phrases, the four recommendations, "His recommendations were not acted on", the managers not seeing it until after 9/11, NY taking no action, and the author's own caveat (a Pan Am 103 scenario; broad aviation references): CR8, "Phoenix Memo", fn 87–89. The date: CR8 says "In July 2001"; the EC is "dated July 10, 2001" per DOJ OIG (2006 release, ch. 3; verified against the official text in the OIG PDF text). The agent is not named (a living person; The closing reflection is ours and consistent with CR8.
• 7. "IT COULD NOT GET ANY WORSE." Late July 2001. Aug 1 FBI advisory; Aug 3 IC advisory, "likely continue indefinitely": CR8 fn 33–34. "Historical in nature": the President's account to the Commission, CR8 fn 36, attributed. No CSG or NSC meeting as a result: CR8 fn 38. The "We have found no indication…" quote: CR8 fn 40. Genoa airspace and anti-aircraft batteries, the President attended: CR8 fn 21. The mid-July delay reporting; Acting Director Pickard's July 19 conference call and the Commission's note that he did not task field offices: CR8 fn 27. The resignation consideration: CR8 fn 31. "The system was blinking red" and "get any worse": CR8 fn 30. The President's question and the PDB title: CR8 text at fn 35 (VERBATIM, verified for E01). The analyst line is invented and has no content.
• 8. EAGAN, MINNESOTA. August 13 to 15, 2001. Training began at Pan Am in Eagan, Minnesota, on August 13; 747 simulators; "none of the usual qualifications"; "did not intend to become a commercial pilot"; "ego boosting thing"; Aug 13, 2001 was a Monday (calendar). The Minneapolis office initiated an intelligence investigation on August 15: CR8. French national, overstayed visa: CR8 fn 93. Jihadist beliefs, $32,000, no plausible explanation, agitation about travel and religion, the agent's quoted conclusion, and the plan being related to flight training: CR8 fn 91. The decision to prevent further training, the INS arrest, and the deportation order of August 17: CR8 fn 92–93. Pan Am manager's Aug 15 call to the Minneapolis Field Office, "suspicious", the $8,000–$9,000 cash payment, and custody on Aug 16: DOJ OIG (2006 release) ch. 4 §B and executive summary. The manager is not named (the OIG doesn't name him either). Cut: the DESK composite line (invented words for a real, if unnamed, person at a pivotal moment). Moussaoui pleaded guilty in 2005 and was sentenced to life in 2006, so naming him is safe; he is not voiced. Qutb's arrival in New York in November 1948 is from LW ch. 1 (SECONDARY; carried into E03). "Twenty-seven days": Aug 15 to Sep 11 (arithmetic).

Credits

Written and produced by Will Sigmon for Will Sigmon Media. Narrated by The Record (AI voice).

Listen next

Next: Episode 8, "The Morning" — September 11, 2001, in the Commission's words and times.

Episode page: https://shows.willsigmon.media/long-fuse/episodes/s01e07

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Disclaimer: a dramatization based on public records, including The 9/11 Commission Report, court filings and trial testimony. Some scenes and dialogue are reconstructed or composited. Voices are AI-generated and are not intended to resemble any real person. Not affiliated with or endorsed by any person or agency depicted. Allegations in court filings are unproven claims. No private victim is named beyond the public record, and people the Commission identified only by pseudonym keep those pseudonyms. The Long Fuse is produced by Will Sigmon Media. The narrator, The Record, and the few unnamed composite characters in the dramatized scenes are synthetic voices; no victim, hijacker or real official is voiced, and documented words are read by The Record as attributed quotations. Quotations from The 9/11 Commission Report keep its spelling, "Bin Ladin".

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