Associate Professor of Criminal Justice
Appalachian
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer
said that “the President did not – not – receive information about the
use of airplanes as missiles by suicide bombers ... Until this attack
took place, I think it’s fair to say that no one envisioned that as a
possibility.”
Then National Security Advisor
Condoleezza Rice said: “I don’t think that anybody could have predicted
that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World
Trade Center, take another one and slam it into the Pentagon, that they
would try to use an airplane as a missile ... even in retrospect there
was nothing to suggest that.”
Further, Vice President Cheney advised
Democrats in Congress to “be very cautious not to seek political
advantage by making incendiary suggestions ... that the White House had
advance information that would have prevented the tragic attacks of
9/11.” He also said that any serious probe of 9/11 foreknowledge would
be tantamount to “giving aid and comfort to the enemy.”
So, read the following reports, all
from major news agencies in the United States, and see if you think
they are telling the truth (just don’t conduct any serious probe into
this foreknowledge, or you might be considered the enemy!) Yes,
many of the reports came before Bush became President, but the point
is, he knew. Everyone in the White House and Congress knew.
What is really amazing is that people
who were there and who had access to the information – in the White
House and in the Congress – have provided strong evidence that the
statements above are false. For example, White House
Counterterrorism Czar Richard Clarke acknowledges that the CIA knew
there were al Qaeda terrorists in the US, and the FBI knew there were
Arabic people taking lessons at flight schools, including some asking
strange questions about crashing planes. Clarke says “red lights
and bells should have been going off. They had specific
information about individual terrorists from which one could have
deduced what was about to happen” (p. 237).
Clarke offers the following as evidence·
Further, former Senator Bob Graham,
who held the highest Democratic position on the Senate Intelligence
Committee, and who organized and co-chaired the Joint Inquiry into
Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist
Attacks of September 11, 2001 (House-Senate Congressional Inquiry),
asserts that President Bush’s statements and those of his
Administration about the 9/11 attacks are inaccurate. Graham
says: “The first was that it was a surprise, a bolt from the
blue. The second was that no one could have imagined such an
attack carried out in such a manner. The third, that since no one
could have envisaged the use of commercial aircraft as a weapon of mass
destruction, no one could be held accountable. The forth was that
for all of the devastation, the attack was basically quite simple,
requiring nineteen people and a sum of money estimated between $175,000
and $250,000" (p. 112). These are all false!
In fact, the threats were many, and we
knew it was coming ... Graham says there were at least 12 instances in
which intelligence found information outlining terrorist plans to use
airplanes as weapons, there were at least 12 instances in which the
plot could have been interdicted but mistakes by individual people
assured it did not happen (and yet not a single person has been held
accountable for their failures), and the plot was very complex and
resilient. In fact, as Graham notes: “I find a pattern of
substantial logistical, personnel, and kills development and financial
support consistent with what the President was told in his fateful
August 6 briefing. I further suspect that the pattern of such
support was more pervasive than is currently known or acknowledged” (p.
113). Graham also says this structure of support was maintained
by a nation-state [and no he does not say it was Iraq!].
Graham asserts that “after September
11, members of the Bush administration would claim that nobody could
have imagined that planes might be used as weapons, during the course
of our inquiry, we found that the possibility had been imagined,
investigated, and interdicted more than once, and that in one case the
Pentagon had been a target”! His examples include:
But of course, there is much, much
more evidence! Consider for yourself the following:
• 1990-1996: Mary Schiavo, former Inspector General
for U.S. Dept. of Transportation (1990-1996) resigned after the FAA
tried to classify her report detailing lax security at the nation's
major airports. Agents were able to sneak fake bombs, hand
grenades, guns and knives through metal detectors. Congress, according
to Schiavo, was not interested in making it hard on the airline
industry, so they swept it under the rug!
• 1993 – A Pentagon expert postulates that an
airplane could be used as a missile to bomb national landmarks.
This idea is not published in the “Terror 2000" report.
• 1994 – Phoenix FBI discovers videotapes two men
trying to recruit an FBI informant to be a suicide bomber, one of which
is linked to Sheikh Abdul-Rahman (the blind Shiekh incarcerated in New
York for his role in the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993).
• 1994 – Three planes are crashed or attempted to
crash into buildings this year. A Fed Ex employee tries to crash
a DC-10 into a company building in Memphis but is overpowered by the
crew. A lone pilot crashes a small plane onto the White House
grounds. An Air France flight is hijacked by terrorists linked to
al Qaeda, with the goal to crash it into the Eiffel Tower, but French
Special Forces storm plane before it takes off.
• Bob Graham asserts that since at least 1994,
intelligence agencies received information indicating terrorists were
contemplating using aircraft as weapons, and this information did not
lead to any specific intelligence assessment of this form of threat or
any government reaction to it.
• December 1994 – Ramzi Yousef plants a small bomb on
Philippine Airlines flight to Tokyo as part of a trial run of Operation
Bojinka.
• January 1995 – Philippines disrupts Operation
Bojinka to explode 11 or 12 passenger planes over the Pacific Ocean and
to crash others into prominent US buildings. Philippines warns US
of targets for attack, including CIA headquarters, Pentagon, nuclear
power plant, TransAmerica Tower (San Francisco), Sears Tower (Chicago),
and World Trade Center. Plotter Abdul Hakim Murad is handed over
to FBI in April 1995 and he identifies 10 other men in flight training
who were involved.
• April 1995 – Senator Sam Nunn outlines an attack on
the US Capitol using a radio-controlled airplane (idea taken from Tom
Clancey’s book, Debt of Honour).
• 1996 – FBI investigates US flight schools after
finding a business card for a school in the possession of Abdul Hakim
Murad (who had been training at about 6 schools since 1990).
• January 1996 – US intelligence receives information
of a planned suicide attack on the White House by a plane flying from
Afghanistan.
• July - August 1996 – US officials identify crop
dusters and suicide flights as threats to the Atlanta Olympics.
They ban planes from getting too close to events, deploy Black Hawk
helicopters and US Customs jets to intercept suspicious aircraft,
monitor crop-duster flights near downtown, place armed fighter jets on
standby at local air bases, screen passengers to Atlanta more
carefully, and send law enforcement agents to regional airports to make
sure nobody hijacked a small airplane (these become known as the
“Atlanta Rules”).
• October 1996 – US intelligence learns of an Iranian
plot to hijack a Japanese plane over Israel and to crash it into Tel
Aviv.
• November 1996 – Ethiopians take over a passenger
airliner, let it run out of fuel, and crash it into Indian Ocean off
Comoros Islands.
• 1997 – FBI and CIA have concerns that an unmanned
aerial vehicle (UAV) will be used to attack a US embassy or delegates
overseas.
• January 1997 – “Atlanta Rules” used to protect
against airplane attack for Clinton inauguration.
• February 1997 – White House Commission on Aviation
Safety and Security (Gore Commission) issued its final report,
reference failed Operation Bojinka, and call for increased aviation
security. The commission “believes that terrorist attacks on civil
aviation are directed at the United States, and that there should be an
ongoing federal commitment to reducing the threats that they pose.”
• December 1997 – Retired CIA agent and counter
terrorism consultant Randy Baer meets with a former police chief from
Qatar and learns that Khalid Shiekh Mohammed (KSM) was sheltered in
Qatar by Interior Minister Abdallah bin Khalid al-Thani. He is
also told that KSM is a key aide to UBL and that KSM “is going to
hijack some planes.”
• 1998 – FAA “Red Teams” conduct testing of screening
checkpoints at domestic airports and successfully smuggle through guns,
bombs, etc. and are successful in some case 85% of the time ... high
level FAA officials are made aware of the problem and do nothing
• 1998 – FBI’s international terrorism squad
investigates possible Middle Eastern man taking flight lessons at a
Phoenix airport. FBI agent Ken Williams starts an investigation into
the possibility of terrorists learning to fly.
• 1998 – President Clinton is warned of a possible
plan to hijack a plane to gain the release of Oman Abdul Rahman.
• May 1998 – A FBI pilot sends a memo to a supervisor
warning of a large number of Middle Eastern men receiving flight
training in Oklahoma airports.
• August 1998 – CIA asserts Arab terrorists plan to
fly a bomb-laden plane from a foreign country to the World Trade Center
... FBI and FAA do not think the state of aviation in unstated country
makes the attack possible.
• September 1998 – US intelligence learns that UBL’s
next operation might be a crashed airliner loaded with explosives into
a US airport.
• October 1998 – FAA issues 3 warnings to airports
and airliners urging a high degree of vigilance against threats to
civil aviation posed by al Qaeda ... threat specifically mentioned a
metropolitan airport in the Eastern US.
• Fall 1998 – US intelligence learns of a plot to
attack New York and Washington DC with airplanes ... learns that plans
to attack are preceding well and 2 individuals have successfully evaded
checkpoints at a New York airport.
• November 1998 – US intelligence learns of a plan by
a Turkish extreme group to crash an airplane packed with explosives
into a famous tomb during a government ceremony.
• 1998-1999 – FBI issues warnings of possible
terrorists training at US flight schools.
• 1999 – US intelligence learns that an al Qaeda
agent studied at a flight school in Norman, Oklahoma (hijackers
Mohammed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi visited school there in 2000 and
Zacarias Moussaoui trained there in 2001).
• September 1999 – FBI in Oklahoma City visits a
flight school in Norman Oklahoma to investigate UBL’s personal pilot
Ihab Ali who attended there in 1993.
• 1999 – Britain’s M16 domestic intelligence agency
reports to US that al Qaeda plans to use commercial aircraft in
unconventional ways possibly as flying bombs.
• 1999 – FBI learns that terrorists are planning to
send students to US for flight training. FBI’s Counterterrorism Section
issues a notice to 24 field offices to pay close attention to Islamic
students from the target country engaged in training. Ken
Williams’ squad receives this memo too. No investigation is conducted
by any office. A 2000 notice sent out shows there was no indication
uncovered that terrorist group is recruiting students.
• September 1999 – US intelligence suggests “Suicide
bomber(s) belonging to al Qaeda’s Martyrdom Battalion could crash-land
aircraft packed with high explosives ... into the Pentagon, the
headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), or the White
House...”. Report is made by the National Intelligence Council which
advises the President and US intelligence on emerging threats.
• October 1999 – EgyptAir flight 900 crashes into the
Atlantic Ocean off of Massachusetts. The eventual conclusion of
the National Transportation Safety Board is it was intentional crash,
which killed 33 Egyptian military officers.
• 1999 – “Atlanta Rules” used to protect against
airplane attack for North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s 50th
Anniversary in DC.
• 2000 – FBI learns that a Middle Eastern nation has
been trying to purchase a flight simulator in violation of US
restrictions.
• April 2000 – Niaz Khan, a British citizen from
Pakistan, tells FBI of a plot to fly airliners into building. He
was trained on a mock cockpit of 767, including how to hijack a plane
and how to smuggle guns and other weapons on board. He flew to US and
was told to meet with a contact to then meet up with others to fly a
plane into a building. He passes a polygraph given by FBI but he
is deported to London.
• July–August 2000 – “Atlanta Rules” used to protect
against airplane attack for Republican Convention in Philadelphia and
Democratic Convention in New York.
• August 2000 – Italian intelligence wiretaps al
Qaeda cell in Milan, Italy and overhears plan to attack enemies of
Islam with aircraft. Warning is sent to US in March 2001.
• October 2000 – Pentagon conducts an emergency drill
for a crashed airline that had been hijacked and flown into the
Pentagon.
• September 2000 - September 2001 – NORAD conducts
regional war games exercises simulating hijacked airliners used as
weapons to crash into targets; one target is World Trade Center.
In another exercise, jets conduct a mock shoot down of airliners over
Atlantic Ocean. In another, the Pentagon is the target (but this one
was called off). Exercises are called Vigilant Guardian and
Northern Vigilance, and another is being held at the National
Reconnaissance Office which included an airplane being used as a flying
weapon.
• January 2001 – “Atlanta Rules” used to protect
against an airplane attack for Bush inauguration.
• January - August 2001 – FAA issues 15 warnings to
airliners ... Bush officials claim information is so vague it does not
warrant additional security ... but the warnings remain classified
today.
• February - July 2001 – Trial of embassy bombers in
New York features testimony of 2 UBL associates that received flight
training in Texas and Oklahoma. One UBL aide gives evidence to
government about pilot training.
• March 2001 – Fox’s show The Lone Gunmen depicts an
attack by terrorists using a remote-controlled 727 aircraft against the
World Trade Center (the real attackers turn out to be US government
agents who want to justify continued, large military budgets by
creating fear of terrorism).
• April 2001 – NORAD special operations personnel
imagine a scenario where a terrorist group hijacks plane and flies it
into the Pentagon ... the plan is rejected as too unrealistic.
• April 2001 – FBI translators Sibel Edmonds and
Behrooz Sarshar learn of a warning given to FBI by an FBI informant
that al Qaeda is planning to attack US and Europe with airplanes and
that al Qaeda agents are being trained in US as pilots. Edmonds says:
“President Bush said they had no specific information about September
11, and that’s accurate. However, there was specific information
about use of airplanes, that an attack was on the way two or three
months beforehand, and that several people were already in the country
by May of 2001." Says US claims about not knowing of 9/11 plan were
outrageous lies ..."That's an outrageous lie and documents can prove
it's a lie."
• April 2001 – FAA sends a warning to US airlines
that Middle Eastern terrorists could try to hijack or blow up US planes
and that carriers should demonstrate a high level of alertness.
• May 2001 – Pentagon practices for crashed 757 into
Pentagon.
• June 2001 – German intelligence warns CIA, M16, and
Mossad that Middle Eastern terrorists are planning to hijack commercial
aircraft to use as weapons to attack “American and Israeli symbols,
which stand out.”
• June 2001 – NORAD conducts Amalgam Virgo 01 and
Amalgam Virgo 02, the latter of which involves two simultaneously
hijacked commercial airliners. Fighters are to respond and consider
shooting down planes.
• June 2001 – Men in Cayman Islands are overheard by
Cayman Islands and British intelligence discussing plans to conduct
hijacking attacks in New York City. Information is forwarded to
US intelligence.
• June 2001 – Counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke
gives a direct warning to FAA to increase security measures in light of
impending terrorist attack and FAA refuses to implement them.
• July 2001 – Attorney General John Ashcroft stops
flying commercial aircraft due to an unknown threat assessment ...
Ashcroft will not answer questions about it.
• July 2001 – FBI agent Ken Williams sends a message
warning of suspicious activities involving group of Middle Eastern men
taking flight training lessons in Arizona: subtitle of memo is “Osama
bin Laden and Al-Muhrjiroun supporters attending civil aviation
universities/colleges in Arizona.”
• July 2001 – US intelligence reports a spike in
warnings against G-8 summit in Genoa, Italy. Head of Russia’s
Bodyguard Service reports that al Qaeda will try to kill President Bush
... Egyptian intelligence discovers communication from UBL saying he
would assassinate Bush and other leaders during the G-8 summit using an
“airplane stuffed with explosives” ... US and Italy are sent urgent
warnings ... Germany sends warning of UBL paying German neo-Nazis to
fly remote-controlled aircraft packed with explosives into conference
hall ... Bush and other leaders stay on an aircraft carrier and a
luxury ship away from the area.
• July 2001 – FAA issues a warning telling airlines
to use the highest level of caution and another saying “terror groups
are known to be planning and training for hijackings, as we ask you
therefore to use caution.”
• July 2001 – Egyptian intelligence passes on message
to CIA that 20 al Qaeda members had slipped into US and that 4 of them
were training on Cessnas.
• August 2001 – Britain warns US of al Qaeda attack
involving multiple airline hijackings.
• August 2001 – Russian President Vladimir Putin
warns US that suicide pilots are training for attacks on US.
• August 2001 – US intelligence learns of a plot to
crash airplane into US Embassy in Nairobi.
• August 2001 – Actor James Woods relays concerns of
four Arabic-looking men who look suspicious in first class aboard his
flight ... flight staff notifies FAA ... Woods is not interviewed by
FBI until after 9/11 ... all four are believed to have been involved on
9/11 and were believed to be on one of their practice runs for 9/11.
• August 2001 – the “bin Laden Determined to Strike
In US” memo is given to President Bush while he was on vacation at his
ranch in Crawford, Texas ... it reads in part: “bin Laden wanted to
hijack US aircraft to gain the release” of Oman Abdul Rahman and others
and tells of “suspicious activity in the US consistent with
preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent
surveillance of federal buildings in New York.”
• August 2001 – Zacarias Moussaoui is arrested in
Minneapolis, MN with letters that connect him to Malaysia (where a
meeting of al Qaeda operatives occurred under the watch of the CIA in
2000) and some of the hijackers. He also has an unexplained
$32,000 bank balance, two knives, fighting gloves, shin guards, and has
prepared for violence through physical training. He paid $8,300
for flight training, mostly in cash, to use a 747 aircraft simulator.
He asked “how much fuel is on board a 747 and how much damage could it
cause if it hit anything”? He has no aviation background, little
previous training, and no pilot’s license, he wants to fly only as an
ego-boosting thing, he is extremely interested in the operation of the
plane’s doors and control panel, and wants to know how to communicate
with flight tower. He is evasive and belligerent when asked about his
background. He mostly practices flying in the air rather than taking
off or landing. The flight school sends information to the FBI
and receives little interest, so it contacts them again as says: “Do
you realize how serious this is? This man wants training on a 747. A
747 fully loaded with fuel could be used as a weapon.” Moussaoui
is arrested but not connected to the 9/11 attackers until after 9/11.
• August 2, 2001 – FBI headquarters Radical
Fundamentalist Unit agent calls FBI Minneapolis office supervisor that
he is getting people “spun up” over Zacarias Moussaoui. The supervisor
says he is trying to get people at FBI headquarters “spun up” because
he is trying to make sure Moussaoui does “not take control of a plane
and fly it into the World Trade Center.”
• August 23-27, 2001 – FBI agents in Minneapolis are
convinced Zacarias Moussaoui is planning to do something with a plane.
One agent writes he might “fly something into the World Trade
Center.” They decide to pursue a Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant – in more than 10,000 requests over 20
years, every single warrant has been granted – yet FBI headquarters
decides against it due to a mistaken understanding by its legal experts
of the FISA rules.
• August 24, 2001 – A Minneapolis FBI agent contacts
CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center and calls Moussaoui a “suspect 747
airline attacker” and a “suspect airline suicide attacker.” FBI
headquarters chastises the Minneapolis office for contacting
headquarters without permission.
• Bob Graham explained the Moussaoui failure by the
FBI, and in doing so, discussed in depth the warnings that should have
been clear. From June to July 2001, the National Security Agency
(NSA) noted an increase in threat activity (the third such rise since
the winter). The US military declared ThreatCon Delta and all
ships in the Persian Gulf were sent to sea. And Attorney General
John Ashcroft began traveling only on government jet. Graham says
this was “opposed to the commercial aircraft Attorneys General normally
take, despite the fact that senior FBI and CIA officials knew of no
specific threat against the Attorney General” (p. 72). In July
2001, when the FBI’s Phoenix office sent a memo voicing concern that
UBL might be using US flight schools to infiltrate America’s civil
aviation system, it was ignored by superiors and never reached the
FBI’s Minneapolis office (which arrested Zacarias Moussaoui one month
later for suspicious activities at a flight school). This is
called stove-piping (when information did not move across FBI field
offices).
• This “Phoenix memo” was sent by Kenneth Williams,
who first became concerned with Libyans with suspected terrorist ties
working for US aviation companies in the 1990s. Williams was
later told about Arabs in a local mosque involved in aviation
training. In April 2000, Williams watched a man name Zakaria
Mustapha Soubra, a Lebanese national studying aeronautical safety in
Arizona. Williams interviewed Soubra at his apartment and Soubra
was defiant. He had photos of UBL and injured mujahedeen fighters
on his wall. Soubra’s car outside had a license plate on it that
came back of a man named Mohammed al-Qudhaeein who had been detained in
1999 for trying to get into the cockpit of an America West flight from
Phoenix to Washington, DC. Al-Qudhaeein was traveling to a party
at the Saudi embassy and his ticket had been paid for by the Saudi
government. The FBI did not even investigate the case! In
2000, al-Qudhaeein was put on the State Department’s TIPOFF terrorist
watch list after US intelligence learned he might have received
explosives and car bomb training in Afghanistan. In August 2001,
al-Qudhaeein applied for a visa to reenter the US but was denied
entry! Perhaps he was an additional hijacker?
• Williams was taken off of counterterrorism to work
an arson case in early 2001. The arson case was closed in April
2001 and he wrote an electronic communication (EC) to FBI headquarters
in Washington, DC (this is the Phoenix memo). The continuing
investigation of Soubra found six associates also involved in aviation
training. While Williams did not know it, it was discovered that
Soubra knew Hani Hanjour through a local religious center and carpooled
with him to flight school. On at least five occasions, they were
at the same flight school on the same day and at least once, they flew
together! In July 2001, Williams finished his EC and sent it to
the Counterterrorism Division at FBI headquarters. READ the memo
on pp. 44-45. Williams’ recommendations, if followed, would have
prevented 9/11. Graham says that “had William’s recommendations
been acted upon promptly, liaisons with the flight schools would have
found at least one and perhaps as many as three other hijackers still
developing their flying skills” (p. 47). ECs are sent to the
specified units and then forwarded to the individual assigned to the
lead. Williams sent the EC and requested that both the Radical
Fundamentalist Unit and the Usama bin Laden Unit consider his
recommendations. Both of these are operational units (that
investigate specific crimes) but it did not go to an analytic unit
(which considers long-term, strategic issues). It was ultimately
forwarded to an FBI intelligence analysts in Portland, Oregon along
with a note specifying Williams’ theory. The agent did not take
any action or share it more widely and the lead was closed by officers
in the RFU and UBLU on August 7, 2001. As it turns out, way back
in 1983, the INS asked the FBI for assistance in locating Libyan
nationals engaged in aviation or nuclear-related education! In
1998, the head of the FBI Oklahoma City Field Office contacted
headquarters to express concern about the large numbers of Middle
Eastern males at Oklahoma flight schools. In 1999, the FBI
received word that a terrorist organization was planning to send
students to the US for aviation training. In response, the
Counterterrorism Division at FBI headquarters sent a communication to
twenty-four field offices asking them pay close attention to Muslim
students from the country who were engaged in aviation training in
their areas. No FBI field offices followed up on this
instruction. The investigation was dropped in November 2000 when
the INS failed to respond to an FBI letter asking them to search
databases for individuals from the target country studying in the US!
• Graham asserts that had the Minneapolis FBI Field
Office seen these memos and requests, it might have broken the 9/11
plot when it arrested Zacarias Moussaoui. Moussaoui was not a
typical flight school student for he did not have a pilot’s license,
was not employed by an airline, and had not logged any flight
hours. His suspicious activities concerned flight school
employees – he had extreme interests in operation of the plane’s doors
and control panel, he repeatedly said he would love to fly from
London’s Heathrow Airport to JFK Airport in New York, and he paid
$6,800 in cash. Employees say he discussed how much fuel is on a
Boeing 747 and the damage such a plane could do if it were to hit
something. A flight manager contacted a friend at the FBI and
Moussaoui was arrested for being “out of status” (overstayed his
visa). Minneapolis informed FBI headquarters of Moussaoui’s
detention by the INS and it asked the CIA and the FBI’s legal attache
in Paris for any information they could get on him. The FBI and
INS went to his hotel and seized his laptop computer and belongings,
yet they were told they need a warrant to search them. The FBI
could have gotten a FISA warrant but it decided against this
route! So they decided for the French to search his belongings
and not get a FISA warrant. According to Graham, the FBI’s legal
attache in Paris reported that Moussaoui had been in Chechnya assisting
Chehen rebels which could have been enough to secure a FISA search
warrant. The FBI mistake was thinking that Moussaoui had to be
connected to an organization that the State Department listed as a
foreign terrorist organization (which was not a FISA
requirement). FISA does not require it be a “recognized foreign
power” just a foreign power. So they spent about 3 weeks trying
to connect the Chechen group to al-Qaeda! The FBI did not even
try for a normal criminal search warrant and did not even make his
presence public, which could have disrupted the plot!
• According to Graham, Minneapolis sent a memo to FBI
headquarters stating that Moussaoui’s “possession of weapons and his
preparation through physical training for violent confrontation” gave
them reason to believe he “and others yet unknown” were conspiring to
take control of an airplane. Minneapolis contacted the CIA’s
Counterterrorism Center for more information on Moussaoui and a
Minneapolis case agent sent an email on August 21, 2001 to the
supervisory special agent in the RFU who was handling the matter.
It said: “It is imperative that the [US Secret Service] be appraised of
this threat potential indicated by the evidence ... if [Moussaoui]
seizes an aircraft from Heathrow to NYC, it will have the fuel on board
o reach DC.” Yeah, not to mention the World Trade Center!
On August 23, two FBI agents visited the Airman Flight School in
Oklahoma City where Moussaoui first learned to fly ... one of the
agents had visited the school in 1999 to investigate the training there
of UBL’s personal pilot!
• August 2001 – FAA issues a warning to airlines that
terrorists have made breakthroughs in disguising weapons as cell
phones, key chains, and pens.
• August 2001 – Spanish police record conversations
from calls in Britain to Spain saying “in our classes, we have entered
the field of aviation, and we are even going to cut the Eagle’s throat.”
• August - September 2001 – NORAD practices for
hijackings of planes from the states of Utah and Washington.
• September 2001 – NSA intercepts phone calls from
Abu Zubaida, UBL’s chief of operations, into US (which are still
classified) ... British intelligence intercepts call from UBL to man in
Pakistan with specific information as to attack including time frame
(which are still classified).
• September 2001 – Author Salman Rushdie is banned by
US from taking internal US flights due to “intelligence of something
about to happen.”
• September 2001 – Sydney Olympics officials reveal
that “A fully loaded, fueled airliner crashing into the opening
ceremony before a worldwide television audience at the Sydney Olympics
is one of the greatest security fears for the Games.” Australia
puts 6 planes in the air at all times to intercept wayward aircraft
(planning is also underway for the 2002 Winter Olympics in Utah to
defend against plane attacks when 9/11 occurs).
• September 4, 2001 – FBI headquarters sends a
message to US intelligence community about the Zacarias Moussaoui
investigation. Warning is given to the FAA but the FAA does not issue a
security alert to the nation’s airports.
• September 9-11, 2001 – NORAD runs Operation
Northern Vigilance which deploys fighters to Alaska and Northern Canada
to monitor Russian air force exercise in Russian arctic. US fighters
are thus diverted from US. Exercise is cancelled at 9 am on 9/11.
• September 10, 2001 – Eight hours prior to the
attacks, San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown receives warning from his
security people at the airport to be cautious when traveling ... he is
headed for New York
• September 10, 2001 – President Bush is staying at
the Colony Beach and Tennis Resort on Longboat Key, FL. Surface to air
missiles are placed on roof of the resort.
• September 2001 – Pentagon officials, including US
generals, are warned not to fly and cancelled trips for the morning of
September 11
So, there it is. Tell me again how we
did not see this coming and how President Bush and members of his
Administration can honestly say they had no idea using commercial
planes as missiles was even a possibility?!?