Part I

The Case Against G.W. Bush:
a Preliminary "Hearing" in the Court of Common Sense

     At the VERY LEAST, Bush allowed 9/11 to happen. But the evidence indicates his quilt involves more than just a huge intentional sin of omission — this now seems certain. So it is ulcer-fomenting to watch him, Cheney, Condoleeza Rice and their PR army try to sell America yet another Big Lie — that they had no idea such a thing as 9/11 could happen...they could never have imagined it in their wildest dreams...they had no specific warnings...there was nothing unusual about the summer 2001 warnings, etc. etc. ad nauseum. I have compiled some material that clearly shows that the above litany is blatantly, arrogantly false. But first, let's hold a preliminary hearing in the "Court of Common sense.

      To see through a wall of propaganda and determine what's really going on, one must tune out the spin completely and take a good, objective look at what has been DONE and what the parties involved have to GAIN by their actions. Let's take a look at the well documented facts:

      First, when Bush, Rice and the other top Reichmeisters discarded the warning on August 6, Bush's approval ratings had sunk to just 49% — this is the red zone for a president. As any political expert or presidential historian: Hit 45%, and impeachment may soon loom on the horizon.

      Second, Bush's actions throughout his entire life show a clear and consistent pattern: without exception, he has always chosen the path that will benefit himself and his corporate friends the most and will do so in the face of even the most outraged criticism.

      Third, the stolen election of 2000 proves that Bush was willing to participate in a very daring, very large scale crime in pursuit of power.

      Fourth, Bush's father's approval ratings went from shaky to astronomical within a month of declaring war on an "evil terrorist" leader back in 1991 This lesson could hardly have been lost on Bush, Jr.: Start a war and the emotions of the public can be whipped up to a point that will push presidential approval ratings way, way up.

      So, given the above facts as "evidence," what do you imagine a self-serving man who has faced no serious opposition from Congress, the press, or the American public would be likely to do? A bookie would most certainly lay odds that Bush would stand aside and allow an event like 9/11 to happen.

      Another action that must be considered in the cold hard light of day is Bush's behavior after 9/11. He seized upon national fears, worked at intensifying them, and immediately, without waiting for Congress or serious discussions with other nations, called for an attack on Afghanistan and a global war on terrorism. At the same time, he worked through John Ashcroft with stunning swiftness to dismantle civil liberties. These are not the actions of a leader who wants to keep his nation calm, reassured, and standing tall in its principles in the wake of tragedy. It is the actions of an opportunist who knows, from watching his father's presidency, that the window of opportunity for consolidating his power will be narrow: Bush Sr.'s approval rating high lasted only a few months).

      Last, why would Bush admit to having been warned about 9/11 in the first place? In the corporate and political world, this admission is a strategy that has been used over and over by creeps who are guilty of huge crimes and know the heat is on. By confessing to a lesser charge, they try to draw the heat away from the main, more dangerous issue. Ken Lay, the head of Anderson, and every criminal who has ever copped or tried to cop a plea bargain have used this ploy. If Bush were innocent of any complicity in 9/11, why should he make ANY statement? It is always the guilty who feel the need to make statements: "I am not a crook!" "I never had sex with that woman!" Or how about that row of tobacco industry CEO's who all swore that none of them knew their product was harmful or addictive?

      So, based on the evidence, I would say we have a phony president who is as guilty as hell and knows that someone has the goods on him and is breathing down his neck. He is gambling that by making a preemptive strike while he still has control of the media, he can spin a protective wall around himself. Thus we have Dick Cheney appearing on 5/19 on Meet the Press, being "interviewed" about the 9/11 flap by his friend and neighbor Russert. Yep, that's right — both interviewer and interviewee live in the feudally exclusive Kalorama suburb of D.C., where houses START at around $1 million. In fact, on the same program, Russert had the arrogance to even mention how he'd seen his buddy out taking the air on his new "It" scooter. How cozy! And this is what is being served to America in the name of a free and honest press. Ya got a problem? Just pick a pal in the press corps and tell him what questions you want him/her to ask you so you can spin them in just the way you want.

      Russert asked Cheney how he responded to charges that the information existed in several reports that showed that a WTC-type attack was a possibility. Cheney responded — incredibly! - that reading all those reports weren't his concern. There's just too darn many of them. Russert let this ridiculous response go totally unchallenged and unqualified.

      Here are the Qs that are missing — the Qs a real journalist would have asked: "So then, Mr. Cheney, just what is your criteria for a report that is important enough for you to read? How do you prioritize what you read or what those under you are directed to call to your attention? What reports on this matter DID you read?"

      It seems an insult to America's intelligence that such questions are not being asked. It's like a grand jury who refuses to ask a murder suspect questions like "Where were you on the night of such and such? What was your relationship to the victim?" but instead says, "Well, here's what we heard from the police that someone thinks you may have killed someone. Go ahead and explain yourself. Don't worry — we won't interrupt you or ask you any uncomfortable questions. And by the way — your good pal who lives down the block volunteered to serve as jury foreman!"

      Here's one last FACT to consider. The GOP spent $40 million to pursue an ultimately meritless case against Clinton that involved diddling an intern and some questionable real estate deals. Since Bush took office, not one dime has been spent by Congress to investigate Cheney and his secret energy dealings, Bush's stolen election, Tom Delay's boiler room scams that have bilked doctors out of millions, the mysterious wild trading of American and United Airlines stock the week before 9/11, or any of the other crimes that were far more serious than Clinton's alleged offenses. Meanwhile, the GOP — so eager to spend millions to investigate an office romance — has worked overtime to block the initiation of any serious investigation into the biggest crime to have ever been perpetrated on American soil that claimed nearly 3,000 lives. WAKE UP AMERICA!!

Part II  

The "Vague Warning" that Mapped out a Blueprint for Disaster

     This past week, after admitting that Bush had been warned of an impending attack in the summer of 2001, the White House has been working furiously to justify its failure to issue a serious domestic travel warning. The story Bush wants the world to buy is that the warnings he received were vague, routine — too general to act upon. Condi Rice wants us to believe that no one in the administration could have dreamed the hijackers would fly into a landmark building. But, as they say in show biz, this is "lies, lies, and damn lies."

      Since 1993, scores of people, collectively, in the White House, Pentagon, State Department, FBI, and CIA have know that an attack like 9/11 was not only a possibility — but an increasingly likely probability. Because I am not writing a book here, I will confine myself to summarizing the most obvious pieces of evidence that Bush and his team had to work with. But they are enough to convict him in any court of opinion.
     
      TERRORISM 2000 REPORT:
     
      Don't confuse this 1993 study with the report turned out by the Bush administration in April 2001 under the same title. The 2001 release, a summary of terrorist activity in 2000, lifted the title of the original document, no doubt as a smokescreen to confuse anyone who might be seeking the 1993 document through a search engine or library archives.

      In 1993, the Pentagon commissioned, via the Dept. of Defense's office of Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict, a think tank-style study of the ways terrorists could execute large-scale acts of terrorism on the U.S. Participants in the $150,000 study consisted of a panel of 41 intelligence/security experts that included former ranking CIA, FBI, State Department and Rand Corp. officials, as well as an ex-KGB general and Israeli intelligence agent.

      One of the problems the team brainstormed over was the various ways an airplane could be used to destroy national landmarks — in fact, the WTC was most certainly on the panel's list of possible targets. One conclusion reached by the team as a future trend in terrorist activity was that extremists would seek to maximize their impact by escalating their attacks from one-at-a-time truck bomb/suicide bomber events to multiple, simultaneous targeting, thereby touting their power and stretching the victim governments' ability to respond.

      The possible terrorist scenarios the team outlined scared the socks off folks in the government. One high-level official described it as "too outrageous." As a result, the team's report, "Terrorism 2000" (a reference to terrorism in the new millennia) was blocked from public release. Even a toned down version that had been proposed as a way to raise public awareness and improve national preparedness was killed! A draft of the report was nonetheless passed on through the Pentagon, the Justice Department and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. There is absolutely no doubt that this information was available to everyone in the Bush Administration, including Ms. Rice. It should have been required reading — especially since many of the predictions made by the report had already come true before 9/11.
     
      FOUR INSTANCES OF PLANES USED AS WEAPONS BEFORE 2001
     
      1994: A Federal Express Flight engineer was apprehended as he tried to storm the cockpit of a DC-10. The engineer, despondent over his impending firing, had planned to crash the plane into a Fed Ex building in Memphis
     
      1994: A pilot stole a Cessna and tried to crash it into the White House. He instead hit a tree on the White House grounds, not far from Clinton's bedroom
     
      1995: An Islamic fundamentalist group hijacked an Air France flight and loaded the plane with 27 tons of fuel in Marseilles as a way to turn it into an incendiary bomb when they crashed it into the Eiffel tower. This plan was thwarted when special forces stormed the craft before it could leave Marseilles.
     
      1995: Abdul Hakim Murad confessed to planting timed explosive devices on eleven U.S. airline flights in an attempt to create a "multiple attack" event (as outlined in the "too outrageous" Terrorism 2000" report). The same terrorist group also planned to crash on airplane into CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, and another into the Pentagon (But Condi didn't dream anyone would ever try such a thing in 2001?). This scheme was not a wild and fevered plot. It was in the advanced planning stages — to the point where specific flights had already been selected. Murad himself was going to be the suicide pilot who hit the CIA HQ. Where did he get his pilot training? In a U.S. flight school.
     
      CLINTON ADMINISTRATION TOOK "VAGUE THREATS" MORE SERIOUSLY THAN BUSH: Why Only One Person Died during the Summer Olympics of 1996
     
      One of Bush's favorite lines is that his government is much tougher than Clinton's was at keeping Americans safe. But the only group Bush has seemed seriously interested in cracking down on is innocent American citizens. In 1996, terrorist activity warnings that were considerably less specific than those Bush received in 2001, were coming into the Clinton administration and suggested that the summer Olympics in Atlanta would be the most likely focus of such activity. In response, Clinton (whose administration commissioned the original "Terrorism 2000" report) deployed Black Hawk helicopters and special jets to intercept any suspicious aircraft. That same summer, federal agents monitored crop duster flights within hundreds of miles of Atlanta, while agents combed through airports throughout northern Georgia on the lookout for potential hijackers.

      From 1996 until Bush took office, FBI agents actively investigated activities of Muslim students at flight schools. It was well known by that time to the FBI that terrorists used U.S. Flight schools for their training. Yet under Bush, even urgent requests by FBI agents to act on tips about suspicious students (like the tip from the Phoenix flight school) were ignored.
     
      THE SPECIFICS OF THE "VAGUE WARNING"
     
      The most glaring lie Bush is using in his current spin is his claim that the warnings he received were too vague to act upon. But the facts all by themselves scream "Liar!"

      From April, 2001 right up to the day the WTC and Pentagon were slammed, urgent warnings of impending large-scale attacks by terrorists had been issued to the Bush administration from multiple sources. Germany, Egypt, Russia and Israel all delivered alerts that accurately foretold the scale of the attack and that it would involve a prominent landmark of some type. This would automatically put the WTC and Pentagon on the short list, especially as both landmarks had been targeted before (as mentioned above, the Pentagon attack was averted).

      Through Echelon, the German intelligence agency BND warned the U.S. and Israel both in June that Middle Eastern terrorists were "planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack important symbols of American and Israeli culture." This is hardly vague, and hardly refers to an "overseas danger" to Americans (which of our prominent landmarks is in Europe or Asia, pray tell?).

      On June 13, Egypt sent an urgent warning that a plane stuffed with explosives could be used as a weapon against George Bush. It was assumed, incorrectly at that time that the target could be the G-8 summit in Genoa, held in June 2001.

      Vladimir Putin was so certain of the information he received in the summer of 2001 of an impending attack that he personally instructed Russian intelligence to tell Bush "in the strongest possible terms" (his own words on Sept. 15, 2001) of an impending attack involving airports and government. The Russians told the CIA that 25 terrorist pilots had been specially trained to execute suicide missions. It was around the same time that the FBI was receiving tips about suspicious Arabic men in U.S. flight schools.

      In August, 2001, the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad warned the CIA and FBI that as many as 200 Al Qada members were infiltrating the U.S. and planning "a major assault on the U.S. " against "a large-scale target" in a setting where Americans would be "very vulnerable."
     
      THE NSA CRACKED BIN LADEN'S ENCRYPTION CODE BY FEBRUARY 2001
     
      Even before April, the Bush administration HAD TO KNOW something was up and probably had info that was even more specific than the warnings given above. According to UPI correspondent Richard Sale, by February 2001, the National Security Agency had broken Osama bin Laden's communications encryption system. We know that the encryption was broken because the Bush administration reported AFTER 9/11 that it had intercepted encrypted calls OBL made to his mother two days before the attack, saying "In two days, you're going to hear big news, and you're not going to hear from me for a while." If this message was intercepted before the attack, what others were intercepted as well that the Bush administration did NOT reveal? Mostly likely six months' worth of terrorist planning.
     
      THE CIA KNEW OF SUSPICIOUS AIRLINE STOCK TRADES BY SEPTEMBER 7
     
      And last but not least, the CIA knew a week before the attack WHICH airlines were most likely to be hijacked. The Agency maintains an advanced program called Promis which monitors unusual stock market activity, SPECIFICALLY as a way to anticipate potential terrorist attacks. Promis provides 24-hour continuous real-time data on stock market activity and the FBI and Justice Department have both admitted that Promis was up and running all through the summer and fall of 2001. So there is no doubt whatsoever that as early as Sept. 7, the CIA knew that something was going down and knew which airlines were being targeted. Even a third-grader could have put this information together with the long litany of warnings above from foreign sources and come up with the conclusion that an American or United Airlines craft was going to be hijacked in the near future and most likely used to crash into a landmark, quite possibly the World Trade Center.
     
      MORE SMOKING FACTS:
     
      According to the official government Web site of the Military District of Washington (www.mdw.army.mil), the Pentagon ITSELF planned in detail how it would respond to just such a scenario from October 24-26 2000. And this was no low-level exercise, since it took place in the Office of the Secretaries of Defense conference room! This story was run in Unknown News and picked up the same day by Democrats.com, which fortunately, kept a copy, because within 24 hours, the story — along with the entire Military District website — was scrubbed by the White House!
     
      The model used in this simulation and the response plan was developed by Don Abbott, who is the founder of FieldSoft, a company that makes emergency response software programs/systems, including FDonScene. This program, according to the FieldSoft site, " is the first — and only — fire service, software application specifically designed for incident commanders and their staff in-the-field. The commercial off-the-shelf software (COTS) product is designed to support in field operations for any type of emergency response". Basically, FDonScene is an automated COTS tool that actively facilitates control and coordination of people, procedures, events, and other resources with the touch of a finger. "The application is specifically designed for fast, simple and easy use by the incident commander, as well as members of the command staff."

      Bush was without doubt very familiar with FdonScene because it was first endorsed by the Texas Fire Chiefs Association while he was governor (1998). And, as the FieldSoft brochure mentions, "FieldSoft has engineered software necessary to integrate FDonScene with a consequence management system under development by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)." So this is definitely a program well known to and used by the military.

      Now, in light of this, consider this fact: By a "miracle" of coincidence, the FDonScene program had been set up and made ready to go for use by the emergency response teams at the WTC disaster just a few days before the disaster, as if in anticipation. The brochure boasts: "Over 700 victims passed through the Atlantic Highlands Ferry Port in New Jersey following the September 11, 2001 WTC attack. Two fire departments, three local police departments, as well as representatives from county, state, and federal agencies were on hand to assess and assist the victims as they embarked. Emergency units on the scene included 40 ambulances, an FD communications unit, a decontamination unit, and 10 pieces of fire apparatus. A communications unit member on scene at the Port, who had seen a ninety minute demonstration of the software a few days earlier, brought a trial copy of FDonScene on line and used it to track people, resources, and events. A second person watched how the software was being used, and took over operation of it a few hours later. Overall, the software was operated successfully for 14 hours.Nowhere can any reference to WHO the "unit member" was, or who the "second person" was.

      In another FieldSoft "success story" for a different product, the same ominous vagueness is found: "The Organization of American States (OAS) planned a major meeting in a North American city. Intelligence gathering operations revealed that anarchists planned to disrupt the meeting. The local police service evaluated a number of software systems that could be used to help manage law enforcement activities from the joint operations center (JOC). PDonScene was elected 3 weeks prior to the opening ceremonies. The software was configured and in place at the JOC as delegates commenced OAS activities. PDonScene was used throughout the 4 day event to manage hundreds of local, provincial, and federal law enforcement officers. The software helped law enforcement managers successfully manage peaceful labor — and not so peaceful anarchist — demonstrations by thousands of people; at several different venues throughout the community. "We [the agency] purchased the software because operation of it looked simple," stated a JOC Staff Sergeant. That Sergeant went on to say that "we found it [PDonScene] exceptional in that it showed the situation in real time with both [officer] names and call signs".
     
      **** July: Shortly after the Bay of Pigs crisis, the Kennedy administration allowed the FAA to pass a rule that permitted commercial airline pilots to be armed. The rule was passed to protect flights from possible hijacking by Cubans. Although no airline ever availed themselves of this right, it seems very strange that the rule was rescinded in July 2001, right at the HEIGHT of the most serious terrorist warnings to be issued by intelligence sources in decades. It seems, instead, that this should have been the time for the Bush administration to insist that pilots be armed! Just like the timing of everything that happened in the second half of 2001, we sniff something a lot more foul than politics
     
      ***** Mid-August: A flight school in Minnesota flight reported Zacharias Missouri to the local FBI office after Missouri requested training in how to fly a jet, but not in how to land or take off. Although Moussaoui was arrested, agents did not search his computer and thus missed vital clues.
     
      ***** Early September: (from a letter from a reader):I was listening to "The Connection" on PBS this morning. The subject was terrorism (of course). During the show, a man called in who said his wife was a VP at an all-girls college. Just before 9/11, a Saudi prince called up and said to cancel his daughter's registration for the fall and send him a refund. On 9/11, at 9:30, Saudi security was there to pick up 3 princesses from the school. The man said his wife called the FBI, but they didn't pay any heed to her. Hopefully, you will hear that from this link:
     
      This incident most certainly was reported to the FBI after September 11 and most clearly indicated there could be a Saudi connection — yet the Bush administration has refused to pursue an active investigation of Saudi ties to Sept 11 and instead focused entirely on Afghanistan — though NONE of those responsible for Sept. 11 came from Afghanistan, and, as it turns out, none trained there — they all trained in Europe or the U.S. (flight schools!). However, there was nothing in it for Bush to bomb Saudi Arabia — we already get their oil!
     
      FOR CONSPIRACY THEORISTS ONLY!!
     
      Now here's a new wrinkle for conspiracy theorists who believe that the hijacked planes were actually remotely controlled from the ground and that the hijackers were actually themselves turned into suicide mission patsies. Put this name into your system: Dov Zakheim
      BACKGROUND
      1985 to 1987 he was deputy under secretary of defense for planning and resources, and held various other senior Pentagon posts in the Reagan administration. He was previously with the Congressional Budget Office. Zakheim is currently corporate vice president of the Systems Planning Corporation (SPC), a high-technology research, analysis, and manufacturing firm, and chief executive officer and president of SPC International, Inc. In 1998, Zakheim, an expert in ballistic missiles, worked in 1998 with Rumsfeld Commission. More significantly, he is a long-time Bush associate, having served as a policy advisor to the governor during the 2000 campaign. In May, 2001, Zakheim was sworn in to the Bush Administration as Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) of the DOD.
     
      Here's the wrinkle: Zakheim's company produces advanced Command Transmitter Systems, designed to provide "remote control and flight termination functions through a fully redundant, self-contained solid state system." The unit is just 5 feet high and can be mounted easily on a mobile platform. Although designed to control unmanned flights such as Global hawk from remote positions on the ground, one British aviation engineer said after 9/11 that the planes used in the attacks were could have been equipped with, or suitable for, such remote control units.
     
      Here's a letter from a reader:

      Hi, Cheryl,
      I was listening to "The Connection" on PBS this morning. The subject was terrorism (of course). During the show, a man called in who said his wife was a VP at an all-girls college. Just before 9/11, a Saudi prince called up and said to cancel his daughter's registration for the fall and send him a refund. On 9/11, at 9:30, Saudi security was there to pick up 3 princesses from the school. The man said his wife called the FBI, but they didn't pay any heed to her. Hopefully, you will hear that from this link.
      Peace,
      Heather G.

     
      This incident most certainly was reported to the FBI after September 11 and most clearly indicated there could be a Saudi connection — yet the Bush administration has refused to pursue an active investigation of Saudi ties to Sept 11 and instead focused entirely on Afghanistan — though NONE of those responsible for Sept. 11 came from Afghanistan, and, as it turns out, none trained there — they all trained in Europe or the U.S. (flight schools!). However, there was nothing in it for Bush to bomb Saudi Arabia — we already get their oil!
      Excellent four-part series on 9/11
      "Was the U.S. Government Alerted to the September 11 Attacks?

Part III  

Osama Bin Laden Hunter O'Neill Was Killed at WTC:
Was He Also a Casualty of the Bush Administration?

     Until he resigned in August of 2001, John O'Neill was the director of counterterrorism for the FBI's New York office, not far from the WTC. O'Neill investigated the bombings of the World Trade Centre in 1993, a US base in Saudi Arabia in 1996, the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar-Es-Salaam in 1998, and the USS Cole last year.
      In the course of these investigations, he became one of the world's top experts on Osama Bin Laden and Al Quada, determined to hunt Bin Laden and his followers down and bring them to justice. Those who worked with him said he "lived, breathed and ate terrorism." A scrappy, stubborn Irishman with a quick temper, a fondness for the ladies, and a reputation for being brutally blunt on some occasions, and pushy on others, O'Neill was often frustrated by the button-down boundaries of the modern FBI. But he was one of the best sleuths the agency had — as anyone who worked with him would be quick to acknowledge. U.S. attorney Mary Jo White says this of O'Neill:: "John went at it comprehensively, yielding things from people in London or people in Yemen we never otherwise would have gotten." Another admirer, former FBI director Louis Freeh remembers O'Neill as " the paramount, most knowledgeable agent we had in the FBI, probably in the government, with respect to counterintelligence matters."
      After years of investigating OBL and Al Quada, O'Neill came to the conclusion that "All the answers, everything needed to dismantle Osama bin Laden's organization can be found in Saudi Arabia." That conviction went with him to his grave. Unfortunately for O'Neill and 3,000 other men and women, at every turn after January 2001, the Bush administration blocked the efforts of the "most knowledgeable agent it had" to investigate Saudi ties to Bin Laden.
      O'Neill saw through Bush from the start and by the summer of 2001 declared that the main obstacles to investigating Islamic terrorism were U.S. oil corporate interests and the role Saudi Arabia played in furthering those interests. Bush not only thwarted an FBI investigation of the bin Laden family, he kept the specific nature of his family's business ties to the Bin Ladens as secret as Cheney's energy task force list. A few disturbing facts are known, however. For example, Bin Ladens were investors in the Carlyle Group, the secretive energy-and-arms corporation cofounded by George Bush, Sr.. Carlyle was earlier reputed to have been a major stakeholder in Central Asian oil interests, though they have, not surprisingly, dropped from the foreground in the past year. Bin Laden money was also sunk into George W. Bush's first oil companies. A Bin Laden was involved in BioPort, the company that G.W. Bush granted a federal contract for producing anthrax vaccine, even though the company had failed three FDA inspections. It is hard to imagine, given this cozy history, that O'Neill had much use for the Bush clan. It must have truly enraged him when he learned (as he inevitably must have, given his position inside the intelligence grapevine) that Osama bin Laden had flown to Dubai for 10 days for treatment at the American hospital, where he was visited by local CIA agent Larry Mitchell on July 12. But let's backtrack to the year before 9/11, back to the fall of 2000.
      In October of 2000, after entering the Port of Aden off the coast of Yemen, the USS Cole was hit by suicide bomber. The blast killed 17 and injured 35 Americans. O'Neill was sent over to investigate, as head of the FBI team. Accompanying O'Neill to Yemen were over 100 FBI agents, laboratory experts and forensics specialists, as well as FBI Director Louis J. Freeh. From the earliest moments of the investigation, O'Neill was sure Bin Laden was responsible. However, from the start, his efforts to work the case were sabotaged by US ambassador to Yemen, Barbara Bodine. Bodine refused to cooperate in the investigation or to encourage Yemenis to cooperate. Despite repeated death threats against agents, she refused to allow them to carry the type of weapons O'Neill considered adequate. O'Neill reportedly called Louis Freeh in the middle of the night once expressing anxiety about the safety of his men. The clash between O'Neill and Bodine went steadily from bad to worse, peaking when Bodine publicly called O'Neill a liar. Incredibly, Bodine claimed that through her actions, she was merely trying to keep diplomatic relations running smoothly.
      But a look at Ms. Bodine's history suggests a very different motivation. Throughout her career, Barbara Bodine has served primarily under rightwing old boys and in areas where the oil interests of said old boys are being furthered. Under Reagan, she served as Deputy Principle Officer in Baghdad, Iraq. Under Bush, Sr., she served as Deputy Chief of Mission in Kuwait and was there during the Gulf War. She has also worked for Bob Dole, and far more ominously, for Henry Kissinger. So, in 2000 we find her in Yemen, and though a Clinton appointee, impeding the Clinton administration's efforts to conduct an investigation of a crime of terrorism in which the chief suspect is the son of a Bush family business associate.
      What makes Bodine's actions toward O'Neill particularly indefensible is that there is credible evidence that she herself was to blame, at least in part, for the Cole disaster. Kie Fallis, a Defense Intelligence Agency counterterrorism analyst, had issued a report before the disaster, warning of the danger of just such an attack in Yemen. As it turned out, the report was suppressed by senior DIA officials, and by Bodine and Gen. Anthony Zinn, who decided to allow the Cole to enter the Port under the lowest grade of security permitted in the Middle East — though they were both aware of the warning. Fallis quit in protest the day after the bombing.
      The report Fallis refers to was "officially" issued six hours after the attack by the NSA. The report said terrorists were known to be actively engaged in "operational planning" for an attack and had traveled to Dubai and Beirut in preparation for this attack. Yet, on Oct 29, senior intelligence officials issued a statement claiming that the warnings they had received were too vague to have justified issuing a stronger alert. Sound familiar?
      The Clinton administration intervened in the investigation, and an arrangement was made that at least made it possible for agents to question suspects (thanks to Bodine, even this had been impossible before). O'Neill returned to the States for the holidays. By that time, Bush had succeeded in pulling off the theft of the presidency. O'Neill was barred from returning to Yemen to continue his investigation. Shortly after he returned, while attending a seminar in Tampa, O'Neill's briefcase, which contained some sensitive papers, was stolen. Although the briefcase was found intact shortly afterward, with only a cigar lighter missing, the incident later proved to be something much more than a petty theft, as you shall see.
      From this point on out, incidents, actions, and decisions become so complex and interwoven that a chronology seems the best way to present the information.
     
      . CHRONOLOGY LATE JANUARY 2001 THROUGH SEPTEMBER 11 2001
     
      Late January: Within 10 days of being sworn in until a few weeks before 9/11, Bush becomes preoccupied — obsessed, some have whispered — with trying to cut a deal with the Taliban that would make Afghanistan a new playground for American oil interests. The game plan involved swiping the oil-rich Caspian region from Russian control — proving just how loyal Bush is to his "soul mates" (Putin). From January through August, a time during which he felt sure he could cajole or pressure the Taliban into playing ball, Bush did not consider the Afghan religious despots "evil." In fact, he is reported to have described their repressive regime "as a source of stability in Central Asia" that would provide the ideal environment for the construction of an oil pipeline
     
      February 2001: In a masterpiece of conflicting signals, Bush, after expressing interest in negotiations, orders the Taliban government offices in U.S. closed. The Taliban responds by saying it might be willing to turn over Osama Bin Laden
     
      March 2001: Laila Helms, daughter of former CIA director Richard Helms, brings one of Mullah Omar's advisors, Sayed Hashimi to Washington. During that visit, Hashimi meets with the directorate of Central Intelligence at the CIA and the Bureau of Intelligence and Research at the State Department. At one meeting, says Helms, Hashami proposes that the Taliban would be willing to hold bin Laden in one location long enough for the U.S. to locate and destroy him. However, this offer is refused by the Bush administration.
     
      April through August: one warning after another of terrorists attack directed against the U.S. come into the Bush administration, from the UK, Russia, Egypt, Israel, France, Germany, and Russia.
     
      Early May: FBI director Louis Freeh, after being the subject of an intensive rightwing smear campaign (see various NewsMax stories as prime samples) quits — or, more accurately, is forced out.
     
      May: Bush gives Taliban $43 million in what is reported to be a "pot sweetening deal"
     
      June: Freeh now gone, the last of the FBI agents investigating the Cole are suddenly pulled out of Yemen, ostensibly because of the lack of progress and danger.
     
      June: O'Neill meets with French intelligence expert Jean-Charles Brisard in Paris and expresses his frustration at the Bush administration. He tells Brisard he believes the key to making headway against terrorism lies in Saudi Arabia, but that oil interests lie in the way of any serious investigation.
      Brisard and his associate Guillaume Dasquié, an intelligence analyst and the editor of Intelligence Online, dedicated their book "Bin Laden: the Forbidden Truth" (released in France in November 2001) to O'Neill. The book has been vigorously avoided by U.S. publishers and everyone in the mainstream U.S. press except Paula Zahn, who has presented excerpts of it.
     
      July: Francesc Vendrell and Tom Simmons (former ambassador to Pakistan)meet with Taliban in Berlin on Bush administration's behalf. A deal that offers a coalition government and a pipeline is proposed to the Taliban. When Tom Simmons threatens the Taliban with military action as alternative to not accepting the deal, the Taliban reps storm out of meetings.
     
      July: Possibly as a way to mollify the Taliban, Bush directs FBI to back off Osama Bin Laden
     
      July 6: In response to public pressure, the FBI is sent back to Yemen, but O'Neill is told he is barred from entering the country.
     
      July 10: 'An FBI agent named Kenneth Williams who is based in Phoenix AZ sends a memo to John O'Neill that he suspected an OBL hijacker in training was taking flight lessons at a local flight school. The memo never gets further than whoever O'Neill transmitted it to. And, knowing O'Neill's history, there is no doubt the info was transmitted.
     
      July 12: Osama bin Laden receives treatment at an American hospital in Dubai and is visited by CIA agent Larry Mitchell
     
      July: O'Neill meets again with French intelligence analyst Brisard, this time in NYC. He again expresses frustration at Bush's refusal to pursue OBL or Saudi terrorist ties seriously. It is absolutely certain that O'Neill by now realized that even the memo from Williams would not be followed up on.
     
      First week of August: Christina Rocca, director of Asian affairs at the State Department, meets the Taliban ambassador in Islamabad to reopen negotiations. Her message from Bush according to intelligence reports repeated in Brisard and Dasquie's book. "Either you accept our offer of a carpet of gold, or we bury you under a carpet of bombs." This offer is refused.
     
      August 6: The most serious terrorist attack warning is delivered to Bush. At this point, it should have been clear to the Bush that, having just four days before threatened the Taliban with military action, there would be a very good chance that something serious might happen, perhaps in the nature of a preemptive strike. Yet it is at this point that Bush decides against taking serious action on the threats.
      WHY?
      This is a president who has just delivered an ultimatum to the Taliban, yet has no plausible pretext for "carpeting" Afghanistan with bombs. This is also a president whose approval ratings have sunk to below 50% who needs something BIG to pull them back up. And there on his desk is an opportunity for his problems to be solved
     
     . Early August: Dick Clarke, the president's terrorism czar at the National Security Council, tells O'Neill he would like to put his name is as his successor. "It would be a powerful position," fellow agent Barry Mawn says. "That person would have direct contact with the FBI and turn around and influence top Cabinet people, and possibly even the president."
     
      Mid-August: A flight school in Minnesota flight reports Zacharias Missouri to the local FBI office after Missouri requested training in how to fly a jet, but not in how to land or take off. Although Moussaoui is arrested, agents did not search his computer and thus missed vital clues.
     
      August 19: New York Times reports that O'Neill is suddenly under investigation for the "brief case incident." Tom Pickard, second in command at FBI tells O'Neill he can pretty much kiss the promotion chance goodbye. It is clear O'Neill, like Freeh, is being squeezed out. "Friends of O'Neill have said that Pickard, who was very cozy with Ashcroft and the Bush team, acted as the number one road block to O'Neill's efforts to progress in the agency at this time. After Sept. 11, Pickard, who, unlike O'Neill and Freeh, had NO experience invetsigating terrorism (his speciality was white collar crime) was placed in charge of the Sept. 11 investigation and also the anthrax investigation. In November, Pickard retired."
     
      Late August: O'Neill quits the FBI
     
      Early Sept.: O'Neill takes a job as head of security for the WTC. He mentions to friends in New York that he fully expects the building to be targeted by terrorists in the future.
     
      September 7: The CIA's Promis program begins picking up unusual trading activity for United and American Airlines.
     
      September 11: On O'Neill's second day of work on the 34th floor, the WTC is hit by the first plane. O'Neill makes it out of the building safely, calls his son to say he is OK,. then goes into the other tower to help guide those still inside to safety. Minutes later, O'Neill, along with hundreds of others, is dead, killed by the terrorist the Bush administration refused to allow him to pursue to the best of his ability.
     
      History will be kind to John O'Neill. It will not be kind to George W. Bush.

Part IV  

The Pentagon Tragedy — a Plot that Keeps on Thickening

     One of the things that has bothered me since the morning of 9/11 is how little attention the Pentagon tragedy received. All you could hear screamed from the media and White House for months was WTC! WTC! WTC! Heroes of Flight 93! Heroes of Flight 93! It was an endless litany — education through repetition. In fact, 9/11 became synonymous, almost forcibly, with the WTC. Yet over 200 people died at the Pentagon, including the ill-fated passengers on Flight 77 — right at the heart of the city that is the symbol of our democracy. Why so little focus on this tragedy?

      I believe it is because of all the events of 9/11, the crash of Flight 77 into the Pentagon was the most telling...it was the hottest, smokiest of the smoking guns. The key to the whole mystery may well lie in this five-sided building built by FDR's administration. First, here's a little long-overdue background on the Pentagon.

      THE HISTORY OF THE PENTAGON

      When war broke out in Europe in 1939, even before the U.S. entered the conflict our War Department was gearing up for the possibility. However, there was no real home for the Department of Defense — it was scattered across D.C. in 17 different buildings. Back then, there wasn't a whole lot of red tape to cut through — when the green light was given to come up with a place to put the DOD, by God, they came up with a plan — in four days! In this relative blink of an eye, Brigadier Gen. Brehon B. Somervell developed a scheme for a three-story humongous complex capable of housing 40,000 workers (it later grew to five floors after WWII broke out). But, Somervell's plan for a five-sided structure was not, as one might expect, symbolic, or an effort to create a stylized giant chevron. Instead, it was the most practical idea that suggested itself: the 67-acre site chosen (a former Dept. of Agriculture Farm on the Potomac) was bound on five sides by five existing roads. Voila! The Pentagon.

      Cost estimates for the original project was $35 million — about what a couple of out buildings for storing old munitions might cost now! Believe it or not, the project was considered highly controversial. Some complained that it took up land intended for the expansion of Arlington Cemetery. Others said the DOD shouldn't be housed outside the District of Columbia, while some (we jaded 21st centurions would have to laugh at this) complained that the cost was too high.

      One problem Congress wrangled over was what to do with the building once WWII was over. Although some wanted to turn it into a warehouse, most people assumed that the building would become a veterans hospital. It is very telling that no one believed there would be a need for 40,000 defense department workers after the War. That was because no one foresaw that war was soon to become a way of life — in one form or the other — for Americans. This shift to an all-war (ours or someone else's we supply weapons for) all the time focus can be traced to the Cold War mentality that many in high places locked into during the 1950s — Kissinger, Bush Sr., Nixon, etc — and never left (and has never allowed the rest of us to leave).

      In any case, classic monster of a building (over 5 million square feet!) that we call the Pentagon was begun in 1941 a few months before Pearl Harbor (the appropriations bill was signed by FDR in Aug. 1941) Spurred to heroic efforts by the declaration of war in December, the construction crews — 13,000 men at one point — completed the building in an astounding 16 months. As with all government projects, the final cost was nearly three times higher than first estimates (it came in at $83 million).

      Because a war was on, reinforced concrete was used instead of steel in most of the building's structure (in contrast to the WTC, which was a mass of steel beams). There were no elevators — instead, concrete ramps go between levels. The finished building consists of five nested concentric pentagons (called rings), with a 5-acre courtyard at the heart. The building is really a small town — with its own shopping concourse, banks, and even its own subway station.

      In 1993, the Clinton administration decided to upgrade the Pentagon, for many reasons, no least of which was the growing concern over terrorist attacks. In addition to new plumbing, the upgrade included putting in heavy duty fireproofing in the walls, reinforcing the walls, and improving security in general. The final reconstruction strategy called for the work to be divided into five "wedges," each wedge encompassing a corner and a rectangle of the Building. The first wedge to be tackled was the one facing west, covering 1.2 million square feet. By September 2000, work on this wedge was about 70% complete.

      The wedge was supposed to have been completely done by July 2001, but, as with rebuilding any old "house," more problems kept being uncovered. For example, all sorts of interesting goodies were found in the walls: a secure vault no one knew about, old whiskey bottles (hmm, wonder who went to such lengths to hide their booze!), and other items. Then of course, there were supports that needed more reinforcement, asbestos to be removed, etc.

      Among the improvements made to Wedge One: Blast resistant windows and brick backup walls behind the building's limestone outer facade. These inner walls contain a metal fabric mesh similar to the mesh used in vehicle air bags. This mesh was designed specifically to CONTAIN DEBRIS FRAGMENTS in the event of a blast.

      THE BLOODY MORNING OF SEPT. 11

      On the morning of Sept 11, 2001, about 20,000 people were at work in the Pentagon. Almost no one was in Wedge one, except workers who were moving furniture in — the last step before the wedge was reopened for business. When the news of the planes hitting the WTC came, Pentagon personnel were horrified and clustered round radios and television sets to follow the coverage. One man remembered remarking to another worker that he feared the Pentagon was vulnerable to all types of terrorist assaults. Then, at 9:43, there was a huge explosion and fire and smoke rose from wedge one. By evening, it would be known that at least 180 people had been killed, including the 64 passengers on Flight 77. So, what is wrong with the whole Pentagon disaster picture? For starters, here are a few interesting facts:

      As mentioned in Smoking Gun 2 & 3, the Bush administration had PLENTY of information that would lead them to believe the Pentagon and other major national landmarkers were at high risk of a terrorist attack, especially in the summer and fall of 2001. Many warnings had come over the previous 8 years that the Pentagon could be a target of a terrorist attack, not only that but part of a multiple-strike terrorist attack.

      In fact, this possibility seemed so plausible that in November 2000, a disaster response exercise was held by the Military District of D.C. that simulated a plane hitting the Pentagon. So, Sept. 11 finds Bush and several other key administrators safely removed from D.C. — Bush, at a Florida elementary school, is strategically NOWHERE NEAR a national landmark that morning. John Ashcroft has stopped flying on commercial airliners and is in the wilds of Missouri, via private jet, fishing. Cheney is at an "undisclosed location" (his bunker, probably). Jeb Bush, from Sept. 7, has the Florida national guard on standby. A collection of top CEOs of companies based at the WTC are attending a charity event at Offutt Air Base in Omaha at 8:00 AM on 9/11 (rather odd time, doncha think?) — the same base to which Bush flees later in the same day. Rumsfeld is at the Pentagon — but in the wedge FURTHEST from what will be the point of impact.

      So, while the Bush administration and its pals were maneuvering into the safest possible positions, the folks at the Pentagon (and the workers and "expendable" CEOs at the WTC, of course) were left to their fate, no warning given to them at all. Given the above info on the administration's awareness of the threat to the Pentagon, it seems reasonable to expect that the MINUTE the news was heard about the WTC being hit that the Pentagon should have been evacuated IMMEDIATELY as a precaution until further notice. At the very least, after the SECOND TOWER was hit! At that point the multiple-strike scenario should have been so hideously obvious. Yet the workers were left at their posts like sitting ducks.

      Was this incompetence, intent to kill, or....was it something else? Let's try applying a different hypothesis and see how the pieces fit.

      HYPOTHESIS: That person or persons unknown in the Bush administration were involved in planning the attack on the Pentagon.

      Let's examine the likely objectives of the Perpetrator(s)s and their objectives according to this hypothesis compared to actual events.
      Perpetrator's objectives in bold.

      1. minimize loss of life while creating a terrorist event of frightening proportions:

      ACTUAL EVENTS:

      1. Published reports following 9/11 say the number of passengers on all four hijacked flights was remarkably light — under half capacity. There were just 64 people on Flight 77. (Possible modus operandi: One writer has theorized that a computer hacker could have manipulated the bookings for these flights in such a way that they would appear to have been full after a reasonable number of people (not so few that suspicions would be aroused that there was a problem in the booking system) and thus no more passengers could be accepted. )

      2. The plane struck the almost empty, but newly reinforced, fire resistant wedge. In fact, the plane underwent an elaborate maneuver to be able to line its trajectory up with Wedge One — not only that, but to strike the newly reinforced, collapse-resistant WALL in wedge one. A suicide pilot would likely have made a beeline for the building and done a nosedive into the top, which would have caused more random damage.

      3. No one in the Pentagon had been put on alert — from the time of the Bush's receipt of the Aug. 6 memo to the morning of 9/11, when, for over 40 minutes, it was known that a hijacked plane-turned-mobile-bomb was in the air.

      CONCLUSION: In their own sick way the perpetrators tried to keep the loss of life minimized. They kept the number of passengers on the planes to a minimum, then made sure the plane would hit Wedge One, a well-reinforced fire-resistant area where few people would be that day. In addition, they did not issue alerts because they assumed emergency evacuation might place workers in greater danger — many may actually have sought shelter, ironically, in the newly reinforced Wedge. (in an interesting side note, it has been pointed out by some observers that the planes that hit the WTC seemed to aim for the top 1/4 of the towers, as if to avoid destroying the towers and, again, in a bizarre, perverted way, to minimize loss of life).

      2. Eliminate any trace of the plane — a challenge because of the special mesh in the new wall designed to capture any debris.

      ACTUAL EVENTS:

      1. Flight 77 was a Boeing 757, an aircraft that is about 60 feet long, with a wingspan of 125 feet. Yet it appears to have left essentially not a trace of material inside the building. Brig. Gen. Arthur F. "Chip" Diehl III, Air Force, gave this first hand account of the crash site: "No one could believe the catastrophic damage — it was horrible. A whole "wedge" had collapsed; the aircraft had penetrated about three of the five "rings" of the building. There wasn't a single piece of the jet to be seen anywhere."

      2. Several accounts and filmed shots of the event suggest an explosion OUTSIDE the wedge. (see http://www.bosankoe.btinternet.co.uk). Construction foreman Joe Harrington, standing in parking lot near the impact point said: "It seemed like it made impact just before the wedge. It was like a Hollywood movie or something. Thank God all of our crew got out."

      3. Although there was seismic activity associated with the WTC event and Flight 93, both of which involved direct impacts with a solid object, no significant seismic activity was recorded for the Pentagon explosion.

      CONCLUSION: The plane exploded and was essentially vaporized the split second before actual impact with the wall. What actually struck and penetrated the Wedge was not the solid body of the plane but a fireball from the explosion — moving forward with the combined momentum of the moving plane and the explosion. Because the actual explosion occurred in the air and the destruction in the building was due to the fireball and to implosive forces and not a solid-solid impact, there was no seismic activity.

      3. You do not want this airplane intercepted or shot down, because your plot would be revealed if too much evidence becomes accessible (even in the form of plane fragments).

      ACTUAL EVENTS:

      1. The transponder in this plane was turned off — a move seen by investigators as a highly sophisticated action on the part of the hijackers. This renders the plane untraceable by ground control. (I believe there was another reason for this — see below).

      2. Even though it was known by about 8:55 that Flight 77 had been hijacked and that the Pentagon could be a target, no defensive moves are made to protect the Pentagon. F-16s are finally scrambled into the air, but too late. These planes, by the way, are scrambled out of Langley Air Force base. While Langley is about 130 miles southwest of the Pentagon, Bolling AFB just across the Potomac from the Pentagon, is at most 5 miles southeast while Andrews is 10 miles. The Langley F-16 left the ground two minutes before the Pentagon was hit.

      In any case, I find it extremely hard to believe that the most important military command structure in the U.S. is not defended by surface to air missiles! I mean, we are supposed to believe that there are antiaircraft weapons atop the White House but NOT deployed anywhere near the Pentagon? Give us a break!

      4. You want to make absolutely sure that this is as precision hit — nothing left to chance.

      ACTUAL EVENTS:

      1. Eyewitness observers say that Flight 77 performed a 180-degree "G" turn before diving for the center of the long wall of Wedge One. The plane was estimated to be rocketing at an estimated speed of 400 mph. Several experienced pilots have claimed that the final maneuver of the 757 could not have been performed by a human pilot because of the tremendous G-forces that would have been exerted, rending even the simplest movements exceedingly difficult (picture your arms each suddenly weighing about 100 pounds and each finger about 10).

      2. Eyewitnesses and the evidence of a security camera (see http://www.bosankoe.btinternet.co.uk/) show a fiery explosion OUTSIDE the wall.

      3. The transponder was OFF.

      CONCLUSION: The plane was remotely controlled by a command transmitter system at least in the final minutes. There was an explosive device on board that was detonated immediately before impact, probably remotely controlled as well. The timing, trajectory, etc. may have been generated by a software program of some sort that could work this out to the millisecond. The plane's own transponder would have had to have been turned off so that it's operation would not interfere with a second transponder placed aboard by the perpetrators — a transponder designed to pick up the signal of a command system transmitter operated somewhere in the area. Or, of course, the plane's own transponder was not actually off — it was just changed to a new setting. In any case, turning the transponder off would not have helped the hijackers to hide from the battery of sophisticated radars encircling D.C. so this motivation (hiding from radar) does not make any sense. Here's a description of an advanced, "fully mobile" CTS built Systems Planning Corp, the CEO of which is Bush's undersecretary of defense and long time Texas pal Dov Zakheim.pp2 MORE DISTURBING 9/11 FACTS:

      While the workers in the Pentagon who were to die on 9/11 were putting in their last week, serving their country at the nation's military nerve center, one of the co-perpetrators of WTC was walking the same halls, escorted as the special guest of the Bush administration.

      September 4: Lt. General Mahmoud Ahmad, former director of the ISI (the Pakistani version of the CIA), arrives in D.C. In the days leading up to 9/11, Ahmad spent time in the State Department, at CIA headquarters, and at the Pentagon. Wonder if during his visit he passed one of the men or women he was to help murder? Not long before arriving in D.C., Ahmad had overseen the wiring of $100,000 to Mohammad Atta, one of the hijackers aboard one of the planes striking the WTC. This revelation was made in October, after 9/11 by Indian intelligence sources and reported in the Times of India. The news was not reported by U.S. officials or American journalists.

      PLEASE READ IMPORTANT POSTSCRIPT: WHAT DOES INDIA KNOW THAT FRIGHTENS BUSH ENOUGH TO THREATEN HER WITH NUCLEAR WAR?

      Sept. 9: While Ahmad is in D.C., Commander Ahmad Shah Masood, leader of the Northern Alliance, was assassinated by persons connected to the ISI. The 47-year old Masood was a wildly popular, charismatic leader known to Afghans as the "Lion of Panjsher." His biggest goal: the true freedom and independence of Afghans. Fiercely independent and anti-interventionist, he would most certainly have opposed the Bush administration's war plans and would not have played ball with any oil pipeline scheme. The Cold War Clan (as I call the Bushes, Kissinger, Rumsfeld and the rest of the power-hungry old fossils in charge) have never had a use for charismatic leaders — look what happened to Salvatore Allende...or Kennedy, for that matter.

      WHAT DOES INDIA KNOW?

      From all of the accumulated evidence, there is little doubt in my mind that Indian intelligence has the goods on the Bush administration. It was Indian intelligence that "discovered" the links between ISI's Mahmoud Ahmad and the WTC attacks. We suspect this connection was, of course, already known to the Bush administration, who, for all anyone knows, supplied the $100,000. But, according to several sources, Indian intelligence knows far more than this. One Dehli government source told a reporter with Agence France Press last October: "The evidence we have supplied to the US [re: the ISI-WTC connection] is of a much wider range and depth than just one piece of paper linking a rogue general to some misplaced act of terrorism."

      So, if India is the potential source of Bush's downfall, then what better way to silence India than to threaten her, via our now totally dependent "ally" Pakistan (complete with its fraudulently elected president), with nuclear annihilation? Or is this latest "global world crisis" merely yet another Bush-engineered ploy designed to divert attention away from the real danger — THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION. By inducing Musaraff to trump up a "confrontation" with India and convincing the world that nuclear war may be impending, Rumsfeld and Bush can appear to "ride" to the rescue...it also affords them a slick way to get U.S. troops out of the area. In short, whatever this latest scenario is, you can be absolutely sure it isn't what it appears to be. Like everything else about this administration.

Part V

The Events, Planes and Players of September 11: Putting It All Together 

     Psychologists say during the Vietnam war, soldiers were more prone to PTSD than their WWII counterparts in large part because of the way post-action reentry was handled. Vietnam vets were shuffled from the front right back to the states — usually alone, and expected to jump right into life, but often in an atmosphere of tension where they were viewed with suspicion and contempt. There was no time for real healing. The nation was in turmoil, home was not a peaceful place.

      After 9/11, Bush immediately seized on America's fears — instead of helping the nation to heal, to be TRULY united, he whipped up anger, fanned paranoia, created a much deeper divide while forcing people to feel they must give lip service to the new "brand" of patriotism. We were wounded casualties with no where to go to lick our wounds, no atmosphere of hope and security to help soothe our minds and spirits. Instead, we were under constant attack — just like Vietnam vets on those endless missions in the jungle that never seemed to gain any real ground. There was one vague threat after the other, one basic right after the other stripped away leaving us to feel chronically uneasy. Then there was the war against Afghanistan. This frenzy of revenge forced us to mobilize and to push aside any misgivings or (for some of us), to suffer sleepless nights worrying about the consequences of a war we felt was wrong. The weeks, then months, following 9/11 were, in short, a period of relentless stress for all Americans. As a result, many people now say they can't really remember what the specific events were surrounding 9/11 — some can't even remember seeing the time line, though timelines were run in nearly every newspaper and magazine right after the tragedy.

      I think this stress-amnesia syndrome may very well be why George Bush has had such a cake walk until recently. He took advantage of an entire nation that was numbed by shock and grief and unable to defend itself as it might otherwise have done. In short, we couldn't see the sleight of hand through the blur of tears.

      Now we are coming to, shaking off the fog that has confused us and seeing the facts clearly — for the first time, really, it seems.

      Here, presented as clearly as possible for Americans ready to look with cooler heads and drier eyes are the events, players and planes of 9/11.

      Who Was Responsible for What on the Day of September 11, 2001?

      The responsibility for protecting America's skies from terrorist attack falls upon the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD, also simply called the "Space Command."). Established in 1958, NORAD is a U.S.-Canadian command that provides warning of missile and air attack against both member nations, according to the organization's Web site. In the Eastern U.S., NORAD has at its disposal, several Air Force Bases from which F-16s and F-15s can be scrambled at a moment's notice. Among these bases are Otis AFB in Cape Cod, Mass, Griffis AFB in Rome, NY, Andrews AFB just outside D.C., and Langley AFB in Eastern Virginia. NORAD's mission statement on its website states:

      "The Northeast Air Defense Air Sector's area of responsibility covers more than one-half million square miles of airspace including that over New York City; Washington, D.C.; Chicago and other major metropolitan areas."

      CHAIN OF COMMAND DURING TERRORIST ATTACK:

      A: The FAA reports hijackings and other threats to NORAD's First Air Force Commander, who is based in Tyndall, FLA. On Sept. 11, this was Gen. Larry K. Arnold.

      B: The First Air Force Commander then relays this info to The Commander in Chief (CINC) of NORAD. On 9/11, this was Gen. Ralph "Ed" Eberhardt.

      C: In a grave situation where force seems warranted, the CINC reports to the Commander in Chief...... George Bush. Also notified are Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and acting Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Richard B. Myers.

      The fact that NORAD was well aware that a major attack was a possibility is made obvious by the command's planning, well before Sept. 11, for a major exercise, slated for June 4, 2002. This is from a NORAD announcement:

      "On June 4, 2002, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) will sponsor a multi-agency, bi-national exercise, Amalgam Virgo 02, involving an airborne terrorism scenario over the United States and Canada. The exercise, which was planned prior to the events of Sept. 11, is designed to allow many U.S. and Canadian agencies to test, improve and validate their coordination and operational procedures."

      Regardless of what warnings Bush may have received, NORAD was well aware of the threat to American skies.

      The Planes and Players of 9/11

      THE PLANES

      F-16: (Fighting Falcon) From USAF Fact Sheet: "The F-16 Fighting Falcon is a compact, multi-role fighter aircraft. It is highly maneuverable and has proven itself in air-to-air combat and air-to-surface attack his highly maneuverable aircraft." The craft can go from zero to 500 mph in about 2 minutes. It's top speed is about 1,500 mph, while its typical cruising speed is nearly 600 mph. In other words, if a plane had been scrambled from Andrews, just 10 miles away as the crow (or F-16) flies, it would have been able to engage Flight 77 within 15 minutes from the time the call came in. To decide to scramble a plane out of Langley seems to indicate just one thing: help was intentionally delayed by 10 minutes.

      F-15 (Eagle): (from Air Force Fact Sheet): "The F-15 Eagle is an all-weather, extremely maneuverable, tactical fighter designed to permit the Air Force to gain and maintain air superiority in aerial combat." This plane can reach a maximum astounding speed of 1,875 mph.

      The time required from the notification to scramble to one of these planes being airborne and at top speed is about 12-15 minutes.

      THE PLAYERS

      The Bush administration had in place, on Sept. 11 in the top five posts relevant to the terrorist attack, men who totally support the administration's vision for a "Star Wars" style military, for the militarization of space and the merging of the military with domestic law enforcement agencies into one big "Homeland Security" entity. The five top players were: Larry K. Arnold, First Air Force Commander of NORAD, Ralph "Ed" Eberhardt, Commander-in-Chief of NORAD, Richard B. Myers, Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense, and George W. Bush.

      George W. Bush: Guess we don't need to add much here, except to say that Bush did not make it plain to the public at any time since 9/11 that HE was the person that, according to the established chain of command, called the final shots on 9/11.

      Donald Rumsfeld: Of course, we know all about Mr. Rumsfeld's lust for power. He is a good pal of Ralph Eberhardt and, in fact, in May of 2001, said Eberhardt was his first choice for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Rumsfeld is one of the architects of the military-police complex.

      Larry K. Arnold: Has, since 9/11, helped in the push toward the militarization of America. On February 20, 2002, gave a talk on "Homeland Defense" at the SpaceComm 2002 conference in Colorado that had as its topic: "Shaping Information Operations and Space Leadership" I.e. — the extension of the military not just into the "Homeland," but into space.

      Ralph "Ed" Eberhardt: Eberhardt is a fanatical supporter of the Missile defense scheme and the militarization of space. In fact, in May, 2001, Eberhardt said in a speech that he believed control of space was America's "destiny"! Eberhardt is also an enthusiastic supporter of the merging of law enforcement and the military and making technology such as military spy satellites available to police.

      Richard B. Myers: Less than three weeks after Bush received the now-famous memo of August 6, Myers was named by Bush to the top post in the U.S. military: Chairman of Joints Chief of Staff. This is what a non-American (and thus less spun) news source (Pravda) had to say about that appointment:

      "Gen. Myers was chosen for the job precisely because his views are shared by both of his bosses, President George W. Bush and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. He is considered an active advocate of deploying the National Missile Defense program. He told a news conference that he would be working on the materialization of the idea "relentlessly" and "with his sleeves rolled up."

      Right after 9/11, Myers was caught in a lie when he claimed that no orders were given re: launching aircraft until AFTER the Pentagon was hit, "We did scramble fighter aircraft, AWACs, radar aircraft and tanker aircraft to begin to establish orbits in case other aircraft showed up in the FAA system that were hijacked. That order, to the best of my knowledge, was after the Pentagon was struck." However, Marine Corps Maj. Mike Snyder of NORAD told a Boston Globe reporter that the command had been told about the hijacking 10 minutes before the first plane hit the first World Trade Center tower. Snyder said the fighters remained on the ground until after the Pentagon was hit, even though "fighters routinely intercept aircraft."

      TIMELINE

      American airlines flight 11, a Boeing 767 takes off from Logan Airport in Boston with 92 people, headed for Los Angeles

      8:01: United Airline Flight 93, a Boeing 757, bound for San Francisco, is delayed for 40 minutes on run way, with 45 people on Board

      8:13: Boston Ground control loses contact with Flight 11 First red flag for Flight 11

      8:14: United Flight 175, a Boeing 767, takes off from Logan for Los Angeles with 65 passengers

      8:17: American Airlines Flight 77 (Boeing 757) leaves Dulles in D.C. headed for Los Angeles with 64 passengers.

      8:20: Flight 11 reaches the Hudson River in NY and stops transmitting its IFF signal. Second Red flag for flight 11. Had Bush put the airlines on high alert after August 6 when he received the warning, there is no doubt at all that these warnings would have evoked at very different response...if, indeed, the hijackers had even gotten that far (under a high alert, they very well may have been apprehended at the airports).

      8:24: Hijackers on Flight 11 accidentally broadcasts warning to the passengers over its radio: "Everything will be OK. If you try to make any moves, you'll endanger yourself and the airplane. Just stay quiet."

      Third Red Flag for flight 11

      8:25: Boston air traffic controllers notify other air traffic control centers of hijacking. Why wasn't NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense Command) notified at this time?

      8:27: Flight 11 heads south toward Manhattan; flight attendant Betty Ong calls American Airlines reservations and reports that two flight attendants had been stabbed and a passenger had had his throat slashed. She identifies the seat numbers of the hijackers. Fourth red flag for flight 11 — this one a BLOODY RED and wildly waving, yet it will be about 10 minutes AFTER THIS before NORAD is notified.

      8:33: Last transmission from Flight 11: Hijacker is heard telling passengers not to move.

      8:38: Boston Air Traffic control notifies NORAD that Flight 11 has been hijacked

      8:42: Flight 175 is hijacked. It begins to make a U-turn over New Jersey, reading for its northward assault on Manhattan.

      8:42: Flight 93 takes off from Newark International Airport, headed for San Francisco

      8:43: FAA notifies NORAD that Flight 175 has been hijacked.

      8:44: Two F-15 eagles are ordered scrambled out of Otis Air National Guard Base in Cape Cod If NORAD had been notified (or was it??) at 8:27, when the plane was obviously hijacked and heading to NYC, an F-16 from Otis or Griffis would have been about 10 minutes from Manhattan at this point.

      In addition, since the WTC was high on the list of known targets, and since some of the warnings to Bush indicated airplanes could be used as "bombs," the WTC should have been given an alert and the building evacuated. If evacuation had started at 8:30, there would have been no one in the upper floors when the first plane hit and the loss of life would have been minimized.

      8:45: Flight 11 strikes WTC's north tower at the 80th floor

      8:46: Flight 175 stops transmitting beacon signal

      8:52: Two F-15 eagles take off from Otis If F-15s had been scrambled from Otis at 8:27, they would now be in a position to engage the hijacked flight 175 headed for the WTC

      8:56: Flight 77's transponder is cut. If F-15s had been scrambled from Otis at 8:27, they would now be in a position to engage the hijacked flight 175 headed for the WTC

      9:00: United Airlines learns that Flight 93 flying over western PA may be in process of being hijacked.

      9:00: Flight 77 makes U turn and heads back for Washington This is when the FAA should have notified NORAD, and NORAD should have ordered F-16s into the air FROM ANDREWS. If they had, by 9:15, F-16s may have been in a position to deflect Flight 77 AWAY from D.C. altogether.

      9:02: Flight 175 strikes the WTC at the 60th floor.

      9:16: FAA informs NORAD that Flight 93 may have been hijacked

      9:17: Federal Aviation Administration closes all airports

      9:24: FAA notifies NORAD that Flight 77 is hijacked

      9:24: NORAD orders three F-16s scrambled from Langley The timing here is absolutely diabolical. It is EXACTLY not enough time for either a jet from Langley, which will be 10 minutes too late, or one from Andrews, which would have had just about 3 minutes between reaching the airspace over D.C. and dealing with the incoming Boeing 757. That Langley was chosen indicates a FEAR that in that 3 minutes a good pilot from Andrews just might have succeeded in aborting the disaster, despite the split second time frame.

      9:25: Air traffic controllers notify Secret Service as Flight 77 makes dramatic maneuver just south of the Pentagon.

      9:29: Bush, at Booker Elementary school says an "apparent terrorist attack" under way. No orders are give to evacuate any buildings in D.C., or to even urge residents and workers to seek shelter.

      9:40: Three F-16 fighting falcons take off from Langley. They reach Washington by 9:55, moving at least 550 mph. — the trip takes 14 minutes. The time from Andrews to D.C.: under 2 minutes. The time from Bolling: almost instantaneous Not only is this a tragedy for the victims of the Pentagon, it was unspeakably cruel to those pilots, who, thanks to their delayed orders, have to live with the crushing feeling of having been 15 minutes too late. Here is a description of Andrews from its website: "Training for air combat and operational airlift for national defense is the 113th's primary mission. However, as part of its dual mission, the 113th provides capable and ready response forces for the District of Columbia in the event of a natural disaster or civil emergency." Yet Bush chooses Langley.

      9:43: Plane crashes into Pentagon — a full 40 minutes after being reported hijacked and the likelihood of its being used as a weapon of mass destruction obvious. You will notice that now, everything seems to start happening — it seems as if everything were put on hold until the Pentagon was struck.

      9:45: White House Evacuates

      9:57: Bush leaves Florida

      10:05: South Tower of World Trade Center collapses

      10:08: Armed agents deployed around White House

      10:10: Plane crashes in Pennsylvania, part of Pentagon collapses

      10:13-10:45: federal buildings in D.C. evacuated

      10:28: WTC north tower collapses

      10:46: Colin Powell heads for D.C. from Latin America Again, notice that Powell is in Latin America, Bush is in Florida, Ashcroft in Missouri, and Rumsfeld in the part of the Pentagon most remote from the impact point.

      1:04: Bush speaks from Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana

      1:27: State of emergency declared in D.C.

      1:44: warships from VA are deployed to protect coast line

      2:00: Bush at Offutt AFB in Omaha NE. — this is not revealed until almost 4:00 pm Also at Offutt that day from 8:00 am on, are several CEOs — at a "charity event" that just happens to be held at a SECURE AIR FORCE BASE? And it just happens that several of the CEOs WOULD HAVE BEEN at the WTC had they not been at Offutt.

      6:54: Bush back in White House

      8:30: Bush addresses nation

      ADDITIONAL TIMELINE NOTES

      Oct. 1: Richard B. Myers Officially Becomes the Number One Man in the U.S. Military

      April 2002: Ralph Eberhardt is proposed as "supreme commander" of NORTHCOM, the mega-military entity pushed for by the Bush Administration

      Putting It All Together:

      With the hotlines that exist between these offices, the time that it would take from the moment the FAA put in its call to Arnold for Bush to respond (allowing 2 minutes tops per communication and 2 minutes dial up and relay to the correct party) would have been roughly 12 minutes, plus or minus as minute or two. The FAA called NORAD at 8:38 am about the first hijacking. It was 14 minutes later — right within the above timing estimates made above — that two F-15s were ordered — by Bush — to be scrambled from Otis AFB.

      The evidence clearly shows that Bush had decided AHEAD OF TIME how to handle Flight 77. The FAA call to NORAD that Flight 77 had been hijacked was made at 9:24 — it was at 9:24 that the order to scramble planes from LANGLEY was given. This means this move had already been authorized by BUSH. How could he have pre-authorized such a response unless he had 1) been told about the plane some minutes before when it was obvious to NORAD's radar system that the plane was headed for D.C. (NORAD did not require an active transponder on Flight 77 to track the plane), or 2) Bush knew before 9/11 that a plane would be hitting the Pentagon at around 9:45 am.

      Bush also had the authority, at all times after 8: 52 (when he obviously gave his first orders re: Otis) to call for an evacuation of the WTC and, at the LATEST, by 9:24 to order federal buildings and landmarks in D.C. to be evacuated. Had he made these orders, hundreds of lives would have been saved. Even if the order to evacuate the second tower of the WTC had been made by 8:55, that precious 7 minutes would have made all the difference to hundreds of WTC workers. The Pentagon workers would have had nearly 15 minutes to evacuate if a call had come in by even 9:30.

      Because he had seen the warnings throughout the summer, and the last, strongest one on August 6, he should have been completely prepared for every scenario he had been briefed on and read to take decisive, urgent action to save lives. But he didn't. Instead, as Pentagon workers sat at their desks or moved down the halls, oblivious to the impending danger, at 9:29, Bush had just finished reading the Hungry, Hungry Caterpillar and was getting ready to announce that an "apparent" terrorist attack was underway. Apparent?

      But let's take a look for a moment at the bigger picture:

      From the first, the plan of the Bush administration has been to extend military power into space while creating a domestic police state in the name of "Homeland Security. In this scheme, the line between military and police would be blurred. Elements of the CIA, which has traditionally worked more with the military have now been folded into the FBI, while yet more restrictions on the power of the agencies over ordinary citizens have been removed.

      For a grim picture of where Bush et al were trying to take America as of August, 2001, see "The Next Battlefield," by Jack Hitt.

      Here's an excerpt from that article: "The political attention devoted to national missile defense, which is an updated version of President Reagan's Strategic Defensive Initiative, has obscured its larger purpose. According to the Strategic Master Plan, N.M.D. is but one part of a triad of technologies — along with improved space surveillance and antisatellite offensive weaponry — that, the Air Force hopes, will lead to total "space control." George Friedman, an intelligence consultant and the author of "The Future of War," calls the national missile defense plan a "Trojan horse" for the real issue: the coming weaponization of space. The cost of expanding our space assets is only now beginning to show itself. Many of the specific systems for space have had their budgets increased in President Bush's first defense-spending."

      The three major proponents of this "new military": Richard B. Myers, Ralph Eberhardt, and Donald Rumsfeld.

      However, in the summer of 2001, the American public's support for the Bush administration's schemes, in general, was weak and waning fast. In August Bush's approval rating had slumped to under 50%. However, within just a few weeks of 9/11, with virtually no opposition from Congress, Myers had been confirmed as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. By April 2002 — a little over 6 short months since 9/11, Rumsfeld, Myers and Eberhardt had announced the formation of the NORTHCOM, the mega-military complex that consolidated their power. Here's an excerpt from an April 18, 2002 article in the Boston Globe:

      "Air Force General Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who was responsible for drafting the new command plan — and who calls the establishment of the new command the most significant structural change in his 37 years in uniform — said yesterday that the Northern Command (NORTHCOM) 'takes the various homeland security missions being performed by various combatant commanders and some agencies and puts them under one commander [to] bring unity and focus to the mission.' Air Force General Ralph E. Eberhardt is slated to head the new command, which will also include oversight of NORAD and the territorial defense missions of the JFCOM."

      In short, 9/11 was used as a spring board for the pre-9/11 Bush scheme. The steps taken in the name of Homeland security that were done in the name of 9/11 were actually already planned well before that event. It was the event that made it possible to implement them. If you want to get an idea of where this merger between the military and law enforcement is headed, how about this statement made by Ralph Eberhardt at the Space Symposium held in Colorado Springs in early 2002: "Over time we can leverage our space assets to support homeland security and law enforcement. " So does this mean the use of military satellites to spy on citizens?

      Now ponder this point: Since Bush took office, he has richly rewarded every person who helped him substantially, usually with top posts or the legislation they wanted. After 9/11, we see Myers and Eberhardt moving up into top posts of incredible power. What were they being rewarded for?

      Now, back to 9/11. The simple fact is, if Bush had not ignored the August 6 (and earlier) warnings of terrorist strikes, and had instead acted decisively and responsibly, the scenario that unfolded on 9/11 would have been very different. First of all, on high alert, the airports may have screened passengers more carefully — some or all of the hijackers may have failed to get aboard their target aircraft. Secondly, if they had succeeded in boarding the craft, the FAA would have been in a state of readiness for a serious event. At 8:25 AM, Boston FAA would have immediately called NORAD, who would have been in readiness, perhaps even with pre-authorized orders from Bush. The WTC would have been on high alert from Aug 6 on and an evacuation could have been undertaken as early as 8:30 — time enough to save countless lives.

      But instead, Bush did not warn the public. When called by NORAD, he failed to respond in a way designed to save lives. In short, the trail of smoke from the smoking gun leads ultimately...and unavoidably, back to G. W. Bush.

© 2002, Cheryl Seal
Cheryl may be contacted at cherylseal@hotmail.com