Tragic

CIA Was Warned of Attack

Afghan blast killed seven officers in December.

A blistering CIA report outlines the mistakes the spy agency made that should have prevented an attack that claimed the lives of seven agents at a U.S. base in Afghanistan in December 2009. The CIA had been warned about the assailant, told that he was a double agent. The agency also failed to take necessary security precautions that could have also stopped the attack by the double agent from Jordanian intelligence, suicide bomber Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi. "He had confirmed access within extremist circles, making a covert relationship with him—if he was acting in good faith—potentially very productive," CIA Director Leon Panetta wrote agency employees. "But he had not rejected his terrorist roots. He was, in fact, a brutal murderer."