Secret after-action report cited widespread ineptitude and inadequate riot squads, found closing of open-source intelligence unit may have contributed to tragedy.
Capitol Police compiled a secret after-action review months after the Jan. 6 riots that identified sweeping blunders by the department ranging from delayed deployment of specialized civil disturbance units to the fateful dismantling of an intelligence unit that monitored social media for threats.
Identifying 53 areas of failure needing corrective action, the June 4, 2021 report, obtained by Just the News, produces a far more stark portrait of leadership failures than those offered by Democrat-led investigations, making abundantly clear that the Capitol Police under House Speaker Nancy Pelosi were ill-equipped to defend one of America’s most symbolic and high-value institutions two decades after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Specifically, the report stated that some Capitol Police leaders had received intelligence from outside sources like the FBI warning of the strong potential for violence, including the targeting of lawmakers, on the day Congress certified the 2020 election, but those warnings were not properly distilled into the operational plan given to front-line commanders or highlighted in the summary section known as the “Bottom Line Up Front.”
“The assessment for 1/6 contained a BLUF that did not express the severity of the threat or the fact that USCP actually had knowledge of a plan in place,” according to the report. “The statement that protesters may be armed was included, but it was never expressed with the urgency that they planned to overtake the Capitol and target Members of Congress.”
Instead of clear warnings to its forces, Capitol Police leaders put “a generic, all-encompassing quote” in the operational plan that was too vague to convey the true threat level, the report said.
That intelligence failure was exacerbated, the review concluded, when new department leadership installed after Pelosi became Speaker decided to dismantle the department’s open-source intelligence unit that scanned for threats on social media.
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