that is to go to the fbi in december, we'll have the operational capacity but you should know about this but you have concerned about oklahoma city as long as we have. this finally gives us grounds to open a proper investigation and let's see what we can find it. probably if that had occurred, and this i was told by the man who is ahead of the atf on the time on the record. he said if we'd kept an informed operation up there, we probably would've found out about the bombing and would have been able to have prevented it. really startling thing to of been told. ..

>> by then, it was really too late. a lot of the people were left in oklahoma city a few days before the bombing. she, herself, was i blew largely suspected of being an informant. what is shocking is that from the point of view of the fbi and the atf, talking to the agents who were deeply concerned about this problem. they fully expected that the fbi but then somebody else, they would send agents in and start to interview people. and they never did. in the meantime, all kinds of other things were going on here in oklahoma city. again, i think that the city was done a great disservice. one thing that was going on was

that there was a huge bureaucratic war going on within the fbi itself. the director at the time was attempting to remove every single division sheep from the country and replacing them with his people. one of the people who he had, in fact, was the special agent in charge, rick had been a candidate. there was in abiding institution. you put somebody in over their head -- he is on the verge of retirement, brings him in and what immediately affected this was the split investigation right away. all of the agents in oklahoma city, some who were very accomplished and very competent to tackle this tragedy, and in

headquarters, there was the place to scramble the operation center that would be open 24 hours a day to keep an eye on what was going on. so there westerman is confusion which led to a lot of misguided decisions. ultimately, the feds found mcveigh within 48 hours. he had been pulled over by a highway patrolman due to missing a license plate. they got him just in time before he was about to be released on bond. they also threw mcveigh, and they were also interested in terry and jane nichols. everything that the task force

here in oklahoma city knew, it was being transmitted by the atf to work around the country. so you had hundreds of potential leakages to the media. sure enough, this happened the same day that mcveigh was taken into custody. both of the nicholas brothers took evasive action to make sure they were not going to be besieged and possibly killed by the feds because they were terribly paranoid anxious about that. also, from an investigation point of view, it meant that any possibility of putting them under surveillance, tapping their phone, seeing who they were talking to, it came to that media within a crashing halt. that was the beginning of getting to what had happened in the situation that had happened. in particular, there were two people seen renting a truck

right before the bombing. john no one was assumed to be mcveigh. john doe two was a total mystery. for a month, they looked everywhere. he was a rather big kid. they thought it was impossible for him to be there without his father. ultimately, they couldn't figure out who this character was. after a month, they decided he didn't exist. and they came out with a series of associations. there was a very convenient way of putting that issue to rest. meanwhile, there were a number of other people who had come to light as particular suspects.

one by one, the fbi and justice department, a number of senior lawyers from washington came out decided to tell these people that you can tell mcveigh we are going to overlook everything else. that happened to five or six different people. the interest in looking at further fields grew narrower and narrower. any kind of an investigation that was extra, it would only give ammunition to the defense team and the child, they could use it to argue. maybe he was just the driver, maybe he was a small player, maybe they weren't real people that were out there doing this. it wasn't something that was decided upon very quickly. to give one example of a major dispute about this, if you ask most investigators from the atf

and fbi, they will would say that they work 24 hours. just to give you an idea of how this was not possible from a robot was set aside the fbi, just as people if you saw something in the days before the bombing. what they found out is that a lot of people had seen a truck the day that it was there in one terry nichols and timothy mcveigh from at least those two were building the bomb -- but they saw a truck several days before it the week before. it couldn't have been the same writer because that writer was rented. at the same time, it was a trick that lead.

to find out what the second rider was doing in the truck. the prosecutors in one of two other people in the fbi felt very humanly this is the craziest thing to do -- it is a fishing expedition, he was giving ammunition to the defense. sure enough, the mention of the second rider in the truck was not even mentioned by the time it came up for trial. there is a whole collection of instances like this. it is a very complicated mechanism. you have investigators, you have their bosses, you have competing interests of the different agency, you have the atf struggling for its rights, you have them disagreeing amongst themselves. this is not something that was known at the time, but they told

me one this process started. what often happens when you have a major public shamanic event like this, what you end up getting is an outcome driven investigation. there is a sense that we want to get to the end. we have done our part. mcveigh was the one they had heard terry nichols was one that they had secondarily. they focus everything on them. and i think another opportunity and way -- i think if you compare and contrast the mcveigh trial and the nichols trial, whatever you think is the outcome, and i'm certainly not here to say mcveigh shouldn't have had the death penalty or conversely to say that i applaud the fact that nichols did not, that is not something that i feel is my place to tell you is oklahomans. what i do feel that if somebody

is interested in understanding the full truth, there is a sense that both dress had an opportunity to look at the government. i had this opportunity and ask hard questions. do they really know what they say they know? were these witnesses statements reported accurately? were witnesses picked selectively? were there other people that should've been spoken to? are there other indications of evidence? the radical people on the far right had full knowledge of the bombing. why didn't the fbi talk to those people? the nichols team, did an unbelievably thorough job of looking at the evidence against the defendant and asking those hard questions. the government was manage to be embarrassed repeatedly. that was a big part of the reason why that nichols got life

instead of the death penalty. more significantly, that investigative review work. and everything that was generated gave a tennis amount of material to research and historians of the future to understand what happened. the mcveigh defense team really fell down on the job. even shown, in particular, she didn't tell them on the evidence. i think there were places where he could have really shown the government up. just to give two examples, how mcveigh and nichols learned how to build a bomb. there are vast gaps of how that happened. in the summer of 1994, they were messing around with pipe bombs. in the fall of 1994 they expected with more versions of what turned into be the oklahoma

city bomb. according to timothy mcveigh, in the book american experiment a success, mcveigh was actually a failure. and we just don't know how they went from amateur people to those of devastating success. the government just didn't know. i think the defense team to put them on the spot on that. another thing they never proved was that mcveigh was the one who entered the truck on april 17. i can tell you that his fingerprints are not found at the body shop. they couldn't match the signature on the rental form to his signature. there was a problem with john doe one and also a problem with john doe chu.

the suspect had top marks on his face. mcveigh had very smooth skin. there were also problems that the government had been showing that they got from mcdonald's in junction city, where he was caught just before 4:00 o'clock before the body shop and have the rental agreement printed out at 4:19 p.m. there is quite a distance away. it was raining that day. the person who showed up to rent the truck was dry according to all the witnesses. there were a number of things that raise, i think, legitimate questions about the strength of the government's case. there was also most spectacularly, on the morning of the bombing, about 200 people had seen mcveigh. but everyone of one of them saw him with someone else. not a single person said that -- something that matched what mcveigh said. that what he was by himself. not a single one corroborated

mcveigh's version. i think there were many tricks of the defense team and there were opportunities of doing that kind of investigative work i think this was lost i think that some of these others other locations and looked to develop that. looking forward into the future, it matters to oklahoma city because this is your story. why does it matter to the rest of the country? why does it matter in the context of today's preoccupation with keeping the country safe remap homeland security, the threat from al qaeda and others -- i think first of all, it matters because of a lot of mistakes that were made. especially around 9/11. those not sharing information. and also, looking now, i think that there was legitimate reasons to be concerned the

threat from the antigovernment radical right had not have not gone away. we have a situation now where many young men have had bad experiences in iran and afghanistan. they got military training. many were traumatized by what they went through. they came back into the hundreds of thousands here in america to a bad, depressed economy. there are always a small minority who are interested in what they learned in the military to turn against the government. certainly there has been a huge uptick in the number of radical groups like the not see groups, groups affiliated with religion. having an african american president has been a tremendous recruiting mechanism for many of these groups. you have a situation where

despite homeland security and the fact that terrorism is now out and center in the country's preoccupation, you still have this bureaucratic imperative to look at the last thread that came along. most of the money and the manpower and resources are engaged in the fact intent of preventing al qaeda. i was in washington last week. i had the privilege of talking to members of the house house security committee. they are very concerned about this. they feel that others besides al qaeda are not being given enough attention, and they felt with the domestic threat, that it was not being viewed adequately. you have a situation now that a lot of the institutional knowledge of how to handle potential irruption's has gone away. gone away to people who understand that waco, texas was

a disaster, and. [inaudible] the siege by federal law enforcement. of the people who are involved in that are no longer in federal law enforcement. a lot of people during the late part of the decade understood the people, understood what happened. many of them have gone into retirement. i'm not here to tell you the fbi doesn't know what it's doing. because i don't know what the fbi is doing. it's not an agency that is very forthcoming with its operational decision-making. but i do think there are legitimate questions about what went wrong. how are the lessons being articulated and learned. how can the effects of 9/11 be appreciated, and are we ready to face threats. i can certainly tell you that restrictions on intelligence

gathering have been lifted. the fbi came on to say that we are not going to investigate because we are not allowed to -- that is gone. there are other things that are still negative in terms of their ability to address threats. the fbi and atf still hate each other. it hasn't helped anything. when the atf was involved recently in the scandal of guns -- the fast and furious operation, many of the guys were fuming, there was literally his smoke coming out of their airs, -- they behave this way, nothing has changed. they also argue, and this is the outside the box top, and independently of the second amendment, and they don't want to get into that particularly, it has to be a problem with anyone who has a criminal

intention -- that they have tremendous access, far more than other countries, to deadly firepower. there is a tremendous amount you can access legally, but there's also determine this amount you can access illegally in terms of explosive materials. you can buy ammonium nitrate without ringing alarm bells. they are not that hard to get ahold hold of. this is something that should concern everybody. so i have gone on for quite a long time. i would love to know your experiencesfrom other things that may have concerned you, whether the very fact that somebody comes from outside oklahoma and talks about this -- isn't something that upsets you, isn't something that you welcome? i am not an authority, only to the extent that i have gathered information. some of you may be authorities

and i would love to hear what you have to say. i will do the modern since i'm the only one up here. and i will try to call on everybody wants before i have to come back for a second time. sir, you first. >> what really caught your attention at oklahoma city? all of the world you have seen bad things. one major focus a book on this incident? >> eberly stemmed from the first time i came here. which was in 2001. i was working for a british newspaper called the independent. i knew very little about it. i had this great idea, as everyone else did, two guys from the hotline had pulled this together. they had been caught, and now they would be punished. that is really the end of the story. until i read american terrorists, which is a book

interview with mcveigh, and i thought to myself, i don't know much about this case, but this does not add up. i don't believe this. it seems like a part of the story is missing. it seems like mcveigh is reprising his role. there has to be more to it. then i realized that i presented at trial -- the government wanted to get to the bottom. the book says over and over we knew that we were right because mcveigh confirmed it. to me, to set up all kinds of alarm bells. what is going on here? i came to oklahoma city. i started asking questions. i had heard 1 million theories about all the things that are being missed, why would they be missed, etc. i did a lot of digging myself at a time. really come, although questions remain unanswered. it was only one there was a possibility of getting ahold of the full government is vile and talking to everybody who is involved on the inside

investigation, there was this fabulous opportunity for me to look at a major historical event in a way that had never been done before. that, to me, was a gift of projects. express i had is less important than the outcome. i did my very best to hear everybody come in to try to account for everything. there are many things i don't know. one of the rules that i teach when i teach journalism, and it is important to tell the difference between what you know and don't know to make that very clear to the reader. that is what i tried to do with this project. there are puzzles that i manage managed to solve, and others i didn't. i hope i can ask questions a little bit more sharply than the questions that were asked before. >> first of all, thank you for coming. i read your book. >> thank you. >> [inaudible question]

colonel george wallace [inaudible question] my question is that, like i said, i really loved the book. [inaudible question] my question is about the subtitle. i would like your viewpoint -- i fail to see current officeholders office holders who may have been involved with cover-up, including eric holder, who is attorney general of the united states,. [inaudible]

janet napolitano, who was a federal prosecutor verizon at the time, where they risk recruiting people for his plot. i was wondering why you chose not to go after them -- those people who now hold offices of power, who am i think him in my opinion, were directory responsible and chest with a role in the cover-up. first of all, i mentioned right at the beginning of my presentation that when i went to the memorial for the first time in 2001, i really -- it hit home. i talk to people. there was a grandmother that i talk to.

when i saw the sad picture on the fence just outside the memorial, that was the moment when something in my stomach flipped and i thought this is just the most ghastly thing that could possibly happen. that emotional reaction is what in many ways sassanian chemie interested in this story for a long time. she is someone i have spoken to on and off for years. i on are people that are able to speak out, they have thoughtful felt like this about what happened to them and why -- absolutely, i share what you're saying. in terms of the other issues you brought up with napolitano. let me talk about napolitano. she was u.s. attorney in phoenix. there was determine this amount of law enforcement interest in kingman, arizona. an army buddy who ended up cutting a deal with michael

forte who was there with his wife lori, there was a whole community of antigovernment activists, mix together with people who are involved in the crystal meth trade. it is quite an assembly of people. there was a man who ran a group called the arizona patriots who mcveigh almost certainly knew. i started out this project very interested in the narrow and go. all the way through -- that's short version of what i found is this. there were one or two people who should, i believe, be scrutinized much more closely. one man in particular by the name of steve cockburn who was a chemist. he had worked in beverly hills, california. a very bright guy, also very unstable. he knew how to build explosives. and the government asked of him

a number of things, including suspicions about machine guns, which was collet on video in california. there was arrest warrant put out for him in the summer of 1994. it appears he knew mcveigh. the fbi, they established mcveigh and they exchanged records. the decision was made in may 1995 that they were going to overlook everything about cockburn, except what he could tell him about mcveigh. it corroborates the fact that they had been in touch, mcveigh tried tried to recruit him. they overlooked a number of things about cockburn. even the fact that his own local had said that you have always been afraid that his uncle had said that he was afraid of him being a bomber and he was fully capable of creating a bomb.

he said on the day of the bombing, he looked to the tv and claim some kind of ownership for. he talked about bombing the transport before the bombing. coming back to napolitano, i'm not sure that was her decision. again, it was from the documentation. woman by the name of donna goodfellow. she was the one who signed off on that decision. i don't know what the mechanics of that were, most likely come in the decision came from very high up in washington. and also for the reasons i love related earlier. they made the decision to get the stuff on that day. i also know that people within the fbi made assessments on

this. i'm not sure if that is correct. my suspicion is he should've been looked at closely. i'm not aware of janet napolitano directly closing down any lines of investigation herself. which is not to apologize for her, necessarily, it is just what you notice and what you don't know yet eric holder -- he was, i'm not sure exactly what it's doing in 1995. in 1997 he became the deputy attorney general. there was someone who sparred fiercely with louis freeh. i'm not going to go into the murky details, it's all in the book. but essentially there was a tremendous bureaucratic battle between the justice department who wanted -- both justice and fbi had reasons to want to find

somebody to blame for the fiasco that waco, texas, and this was getting hot and heavy. the fbi him i had in turn had gotten into this game of chicken. this got into the way of that investigation. the director of the time was first in charge of the investigation. then he became the subject of a scandal. and he was kicked out of the fbi altogether. it was tremendous we disrupted. i want to address cannot issue very well. this man die very violently it appears, bludgeoned to death -- initial ruling is a suicide. that was in subject to review

based on the lawsuit brought by his brother who is a lawyer in salt lake city. i look into this fairly closely, and again, it comes under the rubric of i don't know. i never found any evidence in terms of paperwork, in terms of people talking about it who had confirmed that, which doesn't mean it's not the case, it just means that i don't know. >> quack -- >> [inaudible question] >> as far as i know, first, there was information on that. somebody who is on death row with mcveigh wasn't somebody

that a federal agent -- >> [inaudible question] >> he wasn't the first one. anyway. he had been convinced that his brother was involved in the investigation. there were several suits filed for freedom of information act -- let me talk. thank you, i want to give everyone else a chance to talk to. just say briefly, he is performing a valuable public service by bringing documents to like him and he was a big part of the project. as far us versus brother was concerned, it was a big i don't know. the focus is it burkett -- how the investigation unfolded and the things that were directly related to the investigation that we know about for sure. things we can document to talk about. we made a decision we were going to talk about this particular

issue. now, someone else gets a chance to ask. >> the access that you had to terry nichols, i am curious about how were you able to get that access? >> that's a great question. at the time we started, he was still prevented from having access to the media due to the patriot act. that was real problem. i can't tell you how we did it, but roger charles, my coworker was responsible for finding a way to get access to terry nichols. it was invaluable. i will tell you also that terry nichols has been completely silent from the time he was arrested and brought into federal custody, in till about 2004, when he was finally learned that he was not going to be put to death. he started writing a term in this amount about what he knew.

those writings increased over time. once we got access to him, we estimate hundreds of questions, to which he gave extremely detailed answers. it's not that we believe everything he told us, but it gave tremendous texture and depth to the story and put a lot of things -- a lot of new light onto the issues. i'm extremely grateful to terry nichols for his contribution as a researcher. i also think he is being forthright in admitting his responsibility for a number of criminal activities, directly related to the bombing. whether everything he told us was exactly the truth, that is something that we pause very carefully about. we could not have had the book in the form that it is without terry nichols. for that, at least, he deserves recognition. >> yes? >> the gentleman behind you. >> [inaudible question] >> can you turn it up a little

bit? >> i'm sorry. >> the series of lawsuits that were filed on jesse -- he was trying to get the. [inaudible] the central intelligence agency were trying to find -- [inaudible question] >> that is quite right. [talking over each other] [talking over each other] >> [inaudible question] those that were inside the building and others saying they were taking a computer class but there it at the time this happened -- whipsawed whipsawed

[inaudible question] [inaudible question] [inaudible question] >> was much talked about at the time and cents. for the video cameras, i can tell you unequivocally they were working. how i noticed? tom mann who is head of the productive unturned service two months before the bombing, there in black and white it says the videocameras on the outside of

the building are not working. as i told you earlier, he and judge the judge wanted to do something about this. i don't want to dwell too much on him, but jesse had sued the government believing that these cameras might exist and there might be footage from those cameras. and one of these comedies of errors, the people in the department of the fbi clearly don't know -- i don't think anybody at the fbi ever saw it. i was given information directly. i'm not sure if we could focus on legal grounds, we will fight it and uncover either way. this has been going on now for years. i can tell you definitively that the cameras were not working. the cia thing is actually different part of what jesse is suing over. i believe that one side.

his first explosion, the fact that a lot of people, not just in the offices, but many people felt that this was a double slump. this was the initial shaking and a much bigger blast that came between seven and 11 seconds later. this was something that the geologists thought might have been pointing to a double exposure. then they explain why they felt i was mistaken. i have spoken to a tremendous number of explosive experts. the explanation that was given to me is that what happened when you have a big explosion like that is it creates a vacuum. a few seconds after the blast, you get something called a negative blast with ersatz backend and that was what impacted the building hardest. much harder than the initial explosion. that was the effect across so many people to die.

yes? >> you mentioned the explosive devices. [inaudible question] [inaudible question] >> all i can say on that subject, both terry nichols and timothy mcveigh, they gave detailed description of the composition of the bomb. i show endless experts in government come out of government -- they all said both these devices would essentially work. what is interesting is they are very different from each other. different in terms of how they describe the bomb being built on the 18th, which raises the question, mcveigh claimed to be

the mastermind. but he had way less detail, and his design seems much less logical than nichols was. the question now in the book was -- does this raise the possibility of nichols being the mastermind of the bomb or someone else showing them what to do. again, this is another big open question. i heard from no credible explosive experts that it was not possible to transfer the bomb the way to mcveigh described it being transported. let somebody else have a go. >> [inaudible question] it was quite a different experience in the smudges all of a sudden -- [inaudible question]

it was an emotional thing that everybody downtown experienced. not only to people personally involved, at the building, but the whole downtown area. the whole downtown area experienced part of the emotional shock. i don't know how quickly that happen, but i know you get out after a while but you couldn't get back in. do you know anything about that? >> actually, there was a big problem in terms of investigating the bombing in the way in which everything was set up on the crime scene. it actually wasn't done properly and was a big part of the reason why the fbi failed to gather forensic evidence to be able to make any meaningful conclusions about the device that exploded, and they were absolutely taken to court over that. first of all, because the defense had a terrific lawyer of

defense from texas who pulled them apart piece by piece. secondly, because the justice department inspector general came out with a report on crime in the middle of the jury selection -- blasting oklahoma city and how they had done their work backwards. they had taken their evidence from elsewhere to draw conclusions about the composition of the bomb. they effectively blew the chance to put together a compelling case for what had happened. there were a number of. [inaudible] the first impulse was to save as many lives as possible after the bomb exploded. it was a crime scene and a chaotic scene. it was about 1030 in the morning, at one hour and a half after the initial blast. which gave them a chance to set

up a perimeter. that did not happen for quite some time. even once this was set up, there were also kind of security problems. they were repressed people handing out water and food to the rescue workers, which, again, from a human point of view, it is entirely understandable. but it did not respect the integrity of the crime scene. it could've been done better. no one thought to cover the crater. the night of the bombing come there was a term in this brainstorm. the ammonium nitrate was destroyed on contact with moisture. again, the opportunity together evidence could have been used effectively to work out how the bomb was built, who would've built it, all these kinds of things. >> certainly from the point of view of the search and rescue operation. fema came in on the evening of the bombing, in particular, they

never had a disaster that was also a crime scene. the midget not they claimed credit for everything. they really behaved appallingly. that is also in the book. one of the ways they behaved appallingly is they did not respect the request to the fbi in terms of getting onto the crime scene. once it became clear that there were no more people left alive from the fbi should have control of the place. they didn't get control for 11 days. that was seen -- and that was done and it did not do anything for the investigators. >> the day of the bombing i was working at the county assessor's office. which is about two and a half

blocks from where the federal building was. i heard two explosions. >> right, that's what -- >> two explosions. >> everybody did. >> no, they didn't, because people in our community say they didn't hear two explosions. i know what i heard. number two, there has been a rumor that that bomb was not made. [inaudible] but it was made in oklahoma city. i finally got to go to the warehouse where the bomb was supposedly made. it was not made by everything that day. it was not made by timothy mcveigh. he and my second son were stationed at fort riley, kansas,

and they did not make bombs. terry nichols wrote me and told me that that bomb that he and tim made did not look the blow up the federal building because they didn't know how to make bombs and that bomb they made was no good. it was very lumpy. there are a lot of things that seem like nobody wants to talk about. >> let me address one or two of those things. you know, i think a lot of rumors are circulating. i think a lot of troubling hints of information are out there, and i think it is very important to try and distance that. to distinguish that from fiction. it is absolutely true that terry nichols has written that he wants to believe the bomb he built with mcveigh was not the one who blew up the murrah federal building. i don't believe him. he built the bomb, he described

it in detail. he drew a picture of it. it is absolutely compatible with what exploded. the issue of detonation -- >> [inaudible question] >> if you heard both, the negative blast wave makes a term in this amount of noise. the building and taking it makes its immense it determines amount of noise. all i can tell you is i have talked to people -- right, right. >> [inaudible question] >> challenge the credibility if you want. it is fair for you to look at. i offered to you to take it for what it is. what was the other point? about the building bombs and the army? i think it was generally a question about how mcveigh and nichols learned how to build a

bomb. one that was affected. if you talk to people in federal law enforcement, they will tell you it is not that hard to build. the record shows that to the extent that we know about mcveigh and nichols building devices, we have evidence of pipe bombs being blown up in arizona. we have evidence of schooling around with small bombs on a nichols farm in michigan. but nothing on the scale of the bomb that was detonated. i think it is a question of how they built it with the confidence to know that it was going to blow a devastatingly explosion to the building. it is an unanswered question. does anyone else have a question before we come back? yes, go ahead. >> can you talk about [inaudible name] enter interview with him? >> sure. there are a number of disturbing

elements to the story. one is by the name of andrea stark meyer. it is a real mystery to figure out who he is. over the years, there have been suggestions that he is in intelligence agency working for the germans to spy on the neo-nazi movement in the united states, or he might've been working for a u.s. intelligence agency. there have been suggestions that he was a true believing not smack. his grandfather was one of the earliest members of the nazi party. maybe he went to wage war against the no government and was a true believer. i talked to him for about four days straight. it was absolutely fascinating. the reason he became involved in the investigation was primarily because he had met mcveigh at a gun show in 1993. he gave her into his business card. two weeks before the bombing, he made a phone call to oklahoma

city. he said he was going to be coming through shortly. which raises the question, did try to go to that location in the days before the bombing? in the book, i found no conclusive evidence. again, another reason investigation was completely ignored. it also raises the question of what does murrah federal building is no? house involved? is to be the short short version, because some of it is a position and guesswork, the impression i got of him from meeting him and talking to him a great link at all these things, i don't think he would have spoken if he had been involved in the bombing directly. having said that, i think it is a lot. he didn't tell me what he knows. i think he and mcveigh were good friends. he talked very calmly about mcveigh. he had this incredible memory of their every interaction, which suggested to me that it wasn't just 10 minutes at a gun show in

1993. it was a relationship that went on for much longer than that. the impression i got is here he was, his father was a prominent politician in germany. he had a fascinating background, which i dug into. he spent a lot of time in israel. he was put on patrolling and went on hikes with the israeli army. he was the architect of the 1982 invasion of lebanon. he has remarkable access to high-level people. he had some kind of -- intelligence related connection going. he came to united states. one of the first people he contacted was a cia officer by the name of the trustee, who according to murrah federal building he was hoping to get a

job when george bush was defeated, he didn't do the job. it all fell through. everything i found out was falling apart at that point. he became listless, he didn't want to do. he showed no interest in getting a job board leaving the united states. he met with a lawyer whose job was to meet with people in radical parties. he preyed on the hospitality of him and others for a while. eventually, they sent him away to marry one of the young women there. or green card and get a job and get a life. and also get out of their hair, primarily. his response was to start going to gun shows, by the assault rifle he talked about.

he became associated with a lot of the criminals. he and mcveigh had an association. i think he probably knows who else might have been involved in the bombing. he would not go there with me, unfortunately. after the bombing when his name started circulating, and the head of the fbi investigation actually wanted to go after him. he left the country in a great hurry. the fbi chief wanted to grill him. he was overruled in the end. the fbi agent on the phone with them. they asked him questions and they manage to put to rest the outside of investigation. the whole mystery of tran-four is was luck. they should've been the first people the fbi went and talked to. instead, because they had connections -- because george bush was friendly with other

members, they were put on the plane and flown out of the country. that was the end of that. on the other missed opportunity in the investigation, in my opinion. let's do one more question. we've been going for quite a while. one more. keep it brief. >> okay. [inaudible question] i was expecting an investigation into [inaudible question]

>> [inaudible name] was an investigator in the fbi -- he was one of the very few that the fbi managed to go through. it started because the informants told the fbi that he had heard among a group of texas bullish of people they were talking about assassinating fbi agents. the informant help solve problems. he wanted money. everything he said turned out to be unreliable. the story about attempting to assassinate fbi agents are not not be true. just as they were about to close it down, they came up with new stories. came out with a story about somebody who he said was trying to buy weapons on the black market. that part turned out to be true. my investigation of what happened -- in fact, we talk talked to people who started it, it was a total loss and the

informant was never reliable and give them nothing of substance. there were are people that believe that somehow.com was all encompassing this points to some kind of secret knowledge they had of the bombing. i've found no evidence that suggested that whatsoever. >> okay, thanks. i think he very much of their no more questions. i'm going to be signing books. i appreciate you listening. [applause] [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> ladies and gentlemen, i'm not trying to upstage him, but i was somewhat associated with this. >> he is the source of the book. i do the morning show.

we have never looked like we sound. so i don't look like i sound, that's okay. [laughter] number two, i have an offer for you because i know you came here, you are like me and you are seeking the truth. right? this is not going to make it on the video, because i'm going to offer you a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity of a chewer of the bells of this building. which in 1995, housed the fbi offices. the four floors in this building. but it is a walk, and you have to do two flights of stairs of about 10 cents apiece. so if he will do that, and no photography. also, i was never here. that's why it doesn't make the edit. i would be happy to take you on

this tour. is anyone wanting to do that? this is the place that they took tim mcveigh. he was on a helicopter to the base and he came here. i will show you where they took them if you're interested. okay? [inaudible conversations] >> please, get your books signed. >> i'd like to mention one other person that i mentioned earlier, major stanley brown. it is a major in the national guard. he wrote a journal on the day of the bombing that he very graciously shared with me. he hadn't shown it to anybody before. he is a tremendous asset to the book and i want to thank them very much, indeed. [applause] [laughter]

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> event was hosted by full circle bookstore. to find out more, visit full circle bookstore.com. >> coming up next, booktv presents "after words." an hour-long program where we invite posts to interview authors. this week, international author michael sandel and his latest book, "what money can't buy: the moral limits of markets."