From Publishers Weekly
This eye-opening investigation into anti-American terrorist activities would have been even more shocking if information hadn't already started to dribble out about the inadequacies of the FBI and CIA in tracking and preventing such activities. But every page of this information-packed report seems to announce ineffectual actions, missed opportunities and frustrated agents on the ground blocked by the FBI hierarchy, turf battles and political lack of will. Even by the mid-1990s, when al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden were well known to U.S. authorities, strong action wasn't taken because, one State Department official says here, their acts hadn't exceeded an "acceptable level of terrorism." The 1998 African embassy bombings, for instance, could likely have been prevented, according to the authors. The plot is tangled, but through it Miller, Stone and Mitchell follow two threads from 1990 up to September 11, 2001: first, "the cell," actually a series of terrorist cells, beginning with the one responsible for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing a cell that, in one of their most illuminating revelations, the authors trace directly back to El Sayyid Nosair, convicted of murdering Rabbi Meir Kahane in 1990. The second thread is the Joint Terrorist Task Force, an FBI/NYPD squad whose sharp and dedicated members are the heroes of this tale, doggedly investigating the cells and their connections when not blocked by higher-ups. Miller, now coanchor of ABC TV's 20/20, scored an interview in 1998 with bin Laden, whose chilling words he repeats here ("You will leave [Saudi Arabia] when the youth send you in wooden boxes and coffins"). Miller, Stone (a noted criminal investigative journalist) and Mitchell (a senior editor at The Week) connect a lot of dots in this frightening and important book. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
9/11 The attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon crystallized for Americans a reality already well known in other parts of the world: terrorism exists. This book, authored primarily by Miller, an investigative reporter and coanchor of ABC's 20/20, along with reporter Stone and Mitchell, a senior editor at Week, is a sprightly account of how various American law-enforcement agencies, including the FBI, the CIA, and New York City's Joint Terrorism Task Force, struggled to identify and prosecute the shadowy band of international terrorists operating within our borders. It is a cloak-and-dagger tale of missed opportunities, turf wars, and confusion that begins with the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and culminates in a detailed look at the last months of the hijackers, led by the inscrutable Mohamed el Amir Atta. The authors have interviewed dozens of participants on both sides of this interminable struggle and have produced a useful chronicle of the events that led up to the horrendous attacks. It will take years for all the evidence to come out about how the United States coped with international terrorism at the end of the 20th century. This work represents a good place to start learning about what happened. Recommended for most collections.Ed Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From AudioFile
ABC Reporter John Miller is one of the few journalists who has interviewed Osama bin Laden, and one of the few who reported on terrorism long before bin Laden became a household word. Miller's knowledge of the Islamic terrorist movement is encyclopedic. In THE CELL, Miller, with reporters Michael Stone and Chris Mitchell, details the birth of bin Laden's movement, how it grew, and why bin Laden and his followers focus their hatred on America. Miller reads the book with the authoritative voice of a news reporter who knows the story and wants to learn more. While acknowledging that the 9/11 attack may have been unpreventable, the authors explain why bureaucratic and political shortcomings led to the FBI and CIA's failure to uncover the plot, and raise concern as to why so many warnings went unheeded. D.J.S. © AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Booklist
Miller and his coauthors report on investigations in the 1990s into Islamic terrorist conspiracies against America, particularly New York City. This book has several angles that recommend it for a public disconcerted by hearing how officialdom missed harbingers of September 11. It reveals that, according to Miller's source, "Max," an al-Qaeda defector, a hijacking plot was afoot by April 2001. Like other tips, this one was not acted upon. Miller's work offers abundant information about how certain Islamic fanatics came under law enforcement's suspicion--and how that suspicion waxed or waned. Amazingly, many of those who set off the 1993 truck bomb at the World Trade Center were known by the FBI and the NYPD, but their investigations were shut down, according to the authors' sources, for mundane bureaucratic reasons. When the smoke cleared from that attempt to topple the WTC towers, authorities belatedly realized they had tracked the bombers before, in the investigation of the murder of Israeli right-winger Meir Kahane in 1990. The authors connect the dots to figures involved in subsequent plots, including the notorious Ramzi Yousef and Omar Abdel Rahman, both convicted of the first WTC bombing. Intelligence detail about the September 11 hijackers culminates this fact-heavy account, which also includes the story behind Miller's 1998 television interview with Osama bin Laden. Although slightly disorganized, this book offers the investigators' perspective and also meets the current surge of interest in who knew what when. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


New York Times Book Review
"[The authors] bring high credibiltiy to this streetwise, gritty police procedural . . . an important addition to the growing literature . . ."


Boston Globe
"A riveting, frightening, and illuminating book."


Washington Post Book World
"[Has] the feel of a true crime documentary."


USA Today
"It asks the tough questions."


Publishers Weekly
"[An] eye-opening investigation . . . Miller, Stone, and Mitchell connect a lot of dots in this frightening and imporant book."


Book Description
In The Cell, John Miller, an award-winning journalist and coanchor of ABC's 20/20, along with veteran reporter Michael Stone and Chris Mitchell, takes readers back more than 10 years to the birth of the terrorist cell that later metastasized into al Qaeda's New York operation. This remarkable book offers a firsthand account of what it is to be a police officer, an FBI agent or a reporter obsessed with a case few people will take seriously. It contains a first-person account of Miller's face-to-face meeting with bin Laden and privides the first full-length treatment to piece together what led up to the events of 9/11, ultimately delivering the disturbing answer to the question: Why, with all the information the intelligence community had, was no one able to stop the 9/11 attacks?


Download Description
ABC's John Miller has been tracking this story since his coverage of the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993. He was the first American journalist to interview Osama bin Laden. He has a sophisticated knowledge of the structure and workings of bin Laden's and other extremist organizations. And he has extensive sources within the federal and local law enforcement communities now conducting the investigation into the September 11 attacks. In The Cell, Miller and veteran crime reporter Michael Stone will narrate the behind-the-scenes story of this unfolding investigation. Following a handful of key agents and detectives, they will not only describe the step-by-step process of identifying and linking up suspects, but the politics and pressures, the magnitude and feel of the greatest manhunt in the history of the world.


Book Info
An eye-opening investigation into anti-American terrorist activities. Miller and his coauthors report on investigations in the 1990s into Islamic terrorist conspiracies against America, particularly New York City.


About the Author
John Miller is an Emmy Award-winning broadcast journalist, cohost of ABC's 20/20 with Barbara Walters, and one of the few Western reporters ever to have interviewed Osama bin Laden. He lives in New York City. Michael Stone is a veteran journalist who has covered many of New York's most notorious stories, including John Gotti, Robert Chambers, and the Central Park jogger assault, and is the author of Gangbusters. He lives in New York City. Chris Mitchell is a senior editor at The Week. His previous collaboration, Jack Maple's The Crime Fighter, inspired the television drama The District. He lives in New York City.

FROM OUR EDITORS

ABC News journalist John Miller has been tracking the story of international terrorism ever since he covered the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. In 1998, he became the first American journalist to interview terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. Now Miller, with veteran journalist Michael Stone -- and the cooperation of several intelligence officials -- uncovers the covert forces that triggered the horrific events of September 11th.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

In The Cell, John Miller, an award-winning journalist and coanchor of ABC's 20/20, along with veteran reporter Michael Stone and Chris Mitchell, takes readers back more than 10 years to the birth of the terrorist cell that later metastasized into al Qaeda's New York operation. This remarkable book offers a firsthand account of what it is to be a police officer, an FBI agent or a reporter obsessed with a case few people will take seriously. It contains a first-person account of Miller's face-to-face meeting with bin Laden and privides the first full-length treatment to piece together what led up to the events of 9/11, ultimately delivering the disturbing answer to the question: Why, with all the information the intelligence community had, was no one able to stop the 9/11 attacks?

John Miller is an Emmy Award-winning broadcast journalist, cohost of ABC's 20/20 with Barbara Walters, and one of the few Western reporters ever to have interviewed Osama bin Laden. He lives in New York City.

Michael Stone is a veteran journalist who has covered many of New York's most notorious stories, including John Gotti, Robert Chambers, and the Central Park jogger assault, and is the author of Gangbusters. He lives in New York City.

Chris Mitchell is a senior editor at The Week. His previous collaboration, Jack Maple's The Crime Fighter, inspired the television drama The District. He lives in New York City.

FROM THE CRITICS

Boston Globe

A riveting, frightening, and illuminating book.

USA Today

It asks the tough questions.

New York Times Book Review

[The authors] bring high credibiltiy to this streetwise, gritty police procedural . . . an important addition to the growing literature . . .

Washington Post Book World

[Has] the feel of a true crime documentary.

KLIATT