Fact #1
The Bush Administration was predominantly made up of members of an
organization called "The Project For A New American Century." This group
produced a document entitled, "Rebuilding America's Defenses" that said the "process
of transformation" they wanted our military to undertake would take an
excessively long time, unless there was a "catastrophic and catalyzing event
– like a new Pearl Harbor."
That document was written in September 2000.
This document even cited that "advanced forms of biological warfare that can
"target" specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm
of terror to a politically useful tool."
A lot of the same people
were part of a group that
wrote a report entitled,
"A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the
Realm" that advocated an aggressive Israeli policy in the Middle East.
Fact #2
The Bush Administration came into office
wanting to go to war
with Iraq. This is so heavily documented that Veteran White House
reporter Helen Thomas
asked the
President about it.
He denied it of course, and used 9/11 as the
justification for what he and his administration have done.
Fact #3
Dick Cheney was the CEO for a company called Halliburton.
During his tenure
there, he gave a speech
at the Institute of Petroleum that said,
"while many regions of the world
offer great oil opportunities, the Middle East with two thirds of the
world's oil and the lowest cost, is still where the prize ultimately lies,
even though companies are anxious for greater access there, progress
continues to be slow."
On 10/11/2005, it was reported that the shares
that Dick Cheney claimed he no longer had with Halliburton, rose
3281% in
one year.
Fact #4
In early 2001, Dick Cheney was put in charge of The National Energy Policy
Development Group, or "Energy Task Force" for short. He prepared for this
during the
transition between the Clinton and Bush administrations. The task force
met with what appears to be every oil executive in existence, even though
they
denied it before Congress.
It was eventually discovered that one of the
topics of discussion during these task force meetings was Iraq's oil
fields. Five months before 9/11. The Vice President's office
fought long and hard to make sure the information from those meetings
never saw the light of day. They even took the fight to the
Supreme Court. Many were suspicious of the
hunting trip that Antonin Scalia, and Dick Cheney went on prior to the
Supreme Court hearing the case.
Scalia was
proud of
the fact that he didn't recluse himself from the hearings. Ultimately,
they sent the fight to an appeals court, and it was
decided that Cheney's Task Force documents may remain secret.
Fact #5
In the months leading up to 9/11, there was an
unprecedented amount of
warnings that "Al-Qaeda" was about to conduct an attack.
So many that
CIA Director George Tenet was said to be running around with his "hair
on fire," and so many that a lot were not taken seriously "because of "warning
fatigue" arising from too many terror warnings." One of those warnings
came in the form of a Presidential Daily Briefing entitled, "Bin
Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." that was initially hidden by the
White House.
Another came on July 10th, 2001 that spoke of an "imminent
threat," that was completely omitted from the 9/11 Report, and then
lied about after it became public knowledge.
Condi even had the
audacity to ask,
"does anybody really believe that somebody would have
walked into my office and said, oh, by the way, there's a chance of a major
attack against the United States and I would have said, well, I'm really not
interested in that information?"
Cheney
said that his,
"Democratic friends in Congress... need to be very
cautious not to seek political advantage by making incendiary suggestions,
as were made by some today, that the White House had advance information
that would have prevented the tragic attacks of 9/11."
Fact #6
There are indications that military action in Afghanistan was planned before
9/11.
On 3/7/2001, the New York Times
reports that Deputy National Security Advisor Steve Hadley chairs an
informal meeting to discuss Al-Qaeda. The approach is "two-pronged and
included a crisis warning effort to deal with immediate threats and
longer-range planning by senior officials to put into place a comprehensive
strategy to eradicate al-Qaeda." On 3/15/2001, Jane's Intelligence Review
reports that the U.S. is working with India, Iran, and Russia "in a
concerted front against Afghanistan’s Taliban regime."
General William Kernan, commander in chief of the Joint Forces Command said that "the
details of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan which fought the
Taliban and al-Qaeda after the September 11 attacks, were largely taken from
a scenario examined by Central Command in May 2001."
On 6/26/2001, it is
reported that "India and Iran will ‘facilitate’ US and Russian plans for
‘limited military action’ against the Taliban if the contemplated tough new
economic sanctions don’t bend Afghanistan’s fundamentalist regime." In late
Summer 2001, the Guardian will
report that "reliable western military sources say a US contingency plan
exist[s] on paper by the end of the summer to attack Afghanistan from the
north."
In early August, a senior Taliban official in the defense ministry
will tell journalist Hamid Mir that "[W]e believe Americans are going to
invade Afghanistan and they will do this before October 15, 2001, and
justification for this would be either one of two options: Taliban got
control of Afghanistan or a big major attack against American interests
either inside America or elsewhere in the world."
The President had plans
for the invasion of Afghanistan on his desk on 9/9/2001. They "outlined
essentially the same war plan that the White House, the CIA and the Pentagon
put into action after the Sept. 11 attacks. The administration most likely
was able to respond so quickly to the attacks because it simply had to pull
the plans “off the shelf."
On 7/21/2001, three former American officials,
Tom Simons, Karl Inderfurth, and Lee Coldren
met with Pakistani and Russian intelligence officers in a Berlin hotel.
At the meeting, Coldren passes on
a
message from Bush officials.
He later says,
"I think there was some
discussion of the fact that the United States was so disgusted with the
Taliban that they might be considering some military action."
Former
Pakistani Foreign Secretary
Niaz Naik
later says he is allegedly told by senior American officials at the meeting
that military action to overthrow the Taliban in Afghanistan is planned to "take
place before the snows started falling in Afghanistan, by the middle of
October at the latest."
Fact #7
On the day of 9/11, a number of key personnel were
"scattered"
across the country, and the world. With few exceptions, including
Dick Cheney. The President of the United States, at a time when America
was "under
attack" from kamikaze hijackers in commercial airliners, in a
highly publicized location, 5 miles away from an
international airport, in a classroom full of children, was not whisked
away by the Secret Service.
His conduct on the morning of 9/11
changed on the first anniversary.
Fact #8
On the morning of 9/11, there were several
military exercises taking place, some of which allegedly
mirrored the events taking place that day. A lot of different people
didn't know whether or not the hijackings were "real-world
or exercise."
According to
Richard Clarke, on the morning of 9/11 at around 9:28am, he says to Gen.
Richard Myers during a video teleconference “I assume NORAD has scrambled
fighters and AWACS. How many? Where?”
Myers, who is at the Pentagon, replies
it's,
“NOT A PRETTY PICTURE, DICK (emphasis mine). WE ARE IN THE
MIDDLE OF VIGILANT WARRIOR, A NORAD EXERCISE (emphasis mine), but… Otis
has launched two birds toward New York. Langley is trying to get two up now
[toward Washington]. The AWACS are at Tinker and not on alert.”
The 9/11
Report only mentioned one of these exercises, Vigilant Guardian, and in a
footnote in the back of the book.
On 2/25/2005, then Rep. Cynthia
McKinney
asked
(realplayer required) Donald Rumsfeld about the exercises that were taking
place on 9/11, but did not get an answer on that day. On 3/10/2005, Rep.
McKinney
asked
Donald Rumsfeld, and Gen. Richard Myers about the exercises again.
The first
question asked by Rep. McKinney was, "whether or not the activities of the 4 wargames going on on Sept. 11th actually impaired our ability to respond to
the attacks."
Gen. Myers responded with,
"the answer to the question is,
no, did not impair our response. In fact, Gen. Eberhart who was in the
command of the North American Aerospace Defense Command as he testified in
front of the 9/11 Commission... I believe...I believe he told them that it enhanced our ability to respond."
Then Rep. McKinney asked,
"who was
in charge of managing those wargames?," and was cut off by Rep. Duncan
Hunter. Gen. Myers never gave a name, but he did say, "North American
Aerospace Defense Command was responsible."
She was promised an answer in
writing and as far as I know, never received it.
Fact #9
From the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC), Dick Cheney
allegedly monitored Flight 77 from 50 miles outside of Washington D.C. This,
according to Transportation Secretary
Norman Mineta.
According to Mineta,
"during the time that the airplane
was coming in to the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and
say to the Vice President, "The plane is 50 miles out."
"The plane is 30
miles out." And when it got down to "the plane is 10 miles out," the young
man also said to the Vice President, "Do the orders still stand?" And
the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said, "Of
course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?"
The 9/11 Report states that Cheney didn't arrive in the PEOC until 9:58. No
video conferences from within the PEOC have been made available. No
personnel records for who was in the PEOC have been made available.
The
"young man" Norman Mineta mentioned has never been named, and was never
brought before the 9/11 Commission to testify.
Fact #10
On the day of 9/11,
Donald Rumsfeld started
planning the Iraq War. DoD Staffer
Stephen
Cambone took down several notes with regards to what Rumsfeld was
saying.
"Best info fast... judge whether good enough [to] hit S.H. [Saddam
Hussein] at same time - not only UBL [Usama Bin Laden]" [...] "Go massive...
Sweep it all up. Things related and not." [...] "Hard to get a good case."
Fact #11
Between 9:30pm and 10:00pm on 9/11/2001, Bush
says, "this is a great opportunity. We have to think of this as an
opportunity."
He does so again during his State Of The Union
speech on 1/29/2002. Karl Rove
said, "sometimes history sends you things and 9/11 came our way."
Fact #12
In the days and months following the attacks, several people within the
administration and elsewhere tried to tie Iraq to 9/11. General Wesley Clark
said, "there were many people, inside and outside the government, who
tried to link Saddam Hussein to Sept. 11."
According to George Tenet,
shortly after 9/11, Richard Perle
said,
"Iraq has to pay a price for what happened yesterday, they bear
responsibility."
Former CIA Director James Woolsey
said,
"[I]ntelligence and law enforcement officials investigating the
case would do well to at least consider another possibility: that the
attacks-whether perpetrated by bin Laden and his associates or by
others-were sponsored, supported, and perhaps even ordered by Saddam
Hussein," he writes.
"As yet, there is no evidence of explicit state
sponsorship of the September 11 attacks. But absence of evidence is not
evidence of absence."
Dick Cheney
claimed the
bogus Atta-Iraqi spy meeting had been,
"pretty well confirmed, that he
did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi
intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April, several months before the
attack."
Since that time, they have done so
again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and again,
and even
Hillary did it.
Fact #13
The heads of the Joint Congressional Inquiry into 9/11, Sen. Porter Goss,
and Sen. Bob Graham, along with Sen. John Kyl, met with an alleged
financier of the attacks on the
day of 9/11.
Fact #14
The Joint Congressional Inquiry, which both Bush and Cheney tried to "limit
the scope" of, released a report with
28 redacted pages. Apparently, those
28 pages talk about,
"possible Saudi Arabian financial links." In 2004,
Sen. Bob Graham says that the Bush White House is
covering up Saudi Arabia's possible connection to the two hijackers that
lived in San Diego. He said the information about them, "present[s] a
compelling case that there was Saudi assistance."
He also says that the Bush
Administration directed the FBI "to restrain and obfuscate" any
investigations into the connection. The landlord of the two hijackers was Abdussatar Shaikh, an FBI asset handled by agent
Steven Butler.
The FBI originally tried to
prevent Butler from testifying before the Congressional Inquiry, but
when he finally did, he said that he may have been able to uncover the 9/11
plot if the CIA shared their information on the two hijackers.
He said,
"it
would have made a huge difference." [...] "We would have immediately
opened... investigations. We would have given them the full court press. We
would... have done everything-physical surveillance, technical surveillance,
and other assets."
Fact #15
The Bush Administration was the families' "biggest
adversary" when it came to the creation of a so-called Independent 9/11
Commission. The families had to fight "tooth
and nail," and
lobby to get an investigation because the Bush Administration clearly
did not want
one. Dick Cheney and George Bush
refused to testify under oath before select individuals of the 9/11
Commission even though the families
wanted them to.
They testified together, not in public, and no recordings were allowed. The
families requested the transcripts of their meeting, but were denied. They
made it
difficult for the commission to get funding. They tried to make
Henry Kissinger the Chairman of the commission, but he
resigned after the families started asking too many questions.
Alberto
Gonzales "stonewalled"
the 9/11 Commission's access to the White House. They appointed
Thomas Kean as Chairman,
someone "who will be easily controlled by the administration," and Lee
Hamilton,
a long time friend of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld to be the
co-chair. Hamilton participated in two inquiries that resulted in cover-ups.
The
Iran/Contra Affair inquiry, and the
October Surprise inquiry.
Fact #16
Philip Zelikow was the Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission. Paul
Sperry
explained,
"though he has no vote, (Zelikow) arguably has more sway than any member,
including the chairman. Zelikow picks the areas of investigation,
the briefing materials, the topics for hearings, the witnesses,
and the lines of questioning for witnesses... In effect, he sets
the agenda and runs the investigation."
In 1995, Zelikow wrote a book
with Condoleezza Rice
called, "Germany Unified and Europe Transformed: A Study in Statecraft."
While at
Harvard, "he worked with Ernest May and Richard Neustadt on the use,
and misuse, of history in policymaking. They observed, as Zelikow noted
in his own words, that "contemporary" history is "defined functionally by
those critical people and events that go into forming the public's
presumptions about its immediate past. The idea of 'public presumption'," he
explained, "is akin to William McNeill's notion of 'public myth' but without
the negative implication sometimes invoked by the word 'myth.' Such
presumptions are beliefs (1) thought to be true (although not necessarily
known to be true with certainty), and (2) shared in common within the
relevant political community."
Between 1997 and 1998, Zelikow helped to
write a report that
said "Long part of the Hollywood and Tom Clancy repertory of nightmarish
scenarios, catastrophic terrorism has moved from far-fetched horror to a
contingency that could happen next month. Although the United States still
takes conventional terrorism seriously... it is not yet prepared for the new
threat of catastrophic terrorism."
They predict the consequences of such an
event:
"An act of catastrophic terrorism that killed thousands or tens of
thousands of people and/or disrupted the necessities of life for hundreds of
thousands, or even millions, would be a watershed event in America's
history. It could involve loss of life and property unprecedented for
peacetime and undermine Americans' fundamental sense of security within
their own borders in a manner akin to the 1949 Soviet atomic bomb test, or
perhaps even worse.
Constitutional liberties would be challenged as the
United States sought to protect itself from further attacks by pressing
against allowable limits in surveillance of citizens, detention of suspects,
and the use of deadly force. More violence would follow, either as other
terrorists seek to imitate this great 'success' or as the United States
strikes out at those considered responsible. Like Pearl Harbor, such an
event would divide our past and future into a 'before' and 'after.'"
In
1997, Zelikow and Ernest May wrote a report about John F. Kennedy that is "riddled"
with errors. Zelikow wrote the
pre-emptive war strategy for the Bush Administration. Zelikow said that
the "real
threat" with regards to Iraq's WMD was to Israel. Zelikow tried to
prevent the 9/11 Commission staffers from talking to the Commissioners.
Zelikow tried to insert a
false connection between Iraq and 9/11 into the 9/11 Report, but
the families, and
the staffers fought against it. It has been alleged that he may have
taken direction from Karl Rove who, according to Philip Shenon, was
concerned about the 9/11 Commission because "in the wrong hands... [it]
could cost President Bush a second term."
The allegation regarding Rove
drove the September Eleventh Advocates (formerly known as "The Jersey
Girls") to call for
an entirely new investigation. Only Rawstory.com covered that story.
In
early 2003, Philip Zelikow and Ernest May
wrote a complete outline
of the final 9/11 Report. Zelikow, Kean, and Hamilton decided to keep this
outline a secret from the commission staffers.
When "it was later disclosed
that Zelikow had prepared a detailed outline of the commission's final
report at the very start of the investigation, many of the staff's
investigators were alarmed."
He rewrote the 9/11 Report to be
more favorable of
Condoleezza Rice. During the time of the 9/11 Commission,
the families called for
the resignation of Philip Zelikow, but were denied that request.
After
the 9/11 Commission was finished, Philip Zelikow
was given a
job with Condoleezza Rice at the State Department.
Fact #17
NORAD gave
three
different timelines with regards to their response on the day of 9/11.
Sen. Mark Dayton slammed the 9/11 Commissioners for what the 9/11 Report
said about NORAD. On 6/17/2004, 9/11 Commissioner
Jamie Gorelick will question Gen. Myers about NORAD's mission.
"In my
experience, the military is very clear about its charters, and who is
supposed to do what. So if you go back and you look at the foundational
documents for NORAD, they do not say defend us only against a threat
coming in from across the ocean, or across our borders.
It has two missions,
and one of them is control of the airspace above the domestic United States,
and aerospace control is defined as providing surveillance and control of
the airspace of Canada and the United States. To me that air sovereignty
concept means that you have a role which, if you were postured only
externally you defined out of the job." [...]
"I would like to know, as
the second question, is it your job, and if not whose job is it, to make
current assessments of a threat, and decide whether you are positioned
correctly to carry out a mission, which at least on paper NORAD had."
At the
end of this exchange, Gen. Myers asks, "did I answer both questions?" Jamie Gorelick responds, "yes, and no, and my time has expired." According
to information collected by
Dean Jackson,
NORAD's mission at the time, coincided with Jamie Gorelick's understanding
of it.
On 8/2/2006, the
Washington Post reported that,
"the Pentagon's initial story of how it
reacted to the 2001 terrorist attacks may have been part of a
deliberate effort to mislead the commission and the public" and
that "the 10-member commission, in a secret meeting at the end of its tenure
in summer 2004, debated referring the matter to the Justice
Department for criminal investigation."
Later, it was reported that
NORAD's mistakes were due to "inadequate forensic capabilities" and
"poor record-keeping."
William P. Goehring, a spokesman for the Inspector
General's office, said that "the question of whether military commanders
intentionally withheld the truth from the commission would be addressed in a
separate report that is still in preparation."
To my knowledge, that report
has not been released as of this date. Here are some excerpts from Thomas
Kean and Lee Hamilton's book, "Without
Precedent."
"There were also discrepancies between things NORAD was
telling us about their performance on the morning of September 11—things
that the agency had stated publicly after 9/11—and the story told by the
limited tapes and documents the commission had received…. These were
puzzling and disturbing developments, and they account in part for some of
the more bizarre and inaccurate conspiracy theories about 9/11." [...]
"Farmer believed that NORAD was delivering incomplete records with the
knowledge that the commission had a fixed end date that could be waited
out." [...]
"Throughout the course of our inquiry, the topic that invited
the most skepticism—and thus the most conspiracy theorizing—was the
performance of the FAA and NORAD on the day of September 11, 2001." [...]
"Fog of war could explain why some people were confused on the day of 9/11,
but it could not explain why all of the after-action reports, accident
investigations, and public testimony by FAA and NORAD officials advanced an
account of 9/11 that was untrue."
On 9/17/2001, NORAD
gives a briefing to the White House.
9/11 Commissioner Bob Kerrey will
say "it feels like something happened in that briefing that produced
almost a necessity to deliver a story that's different than what actually
happened on that day."
Fact #18
Different pieces of evidence have been destroyed or is being withheld from
the public. Kevin Delaney, the quality assurance manager for the New York
Air Route Traffic Control Center,
destroyed
a tape recorded by six Air Traffic Controllers on the morning of 9/11,
"by
breaking up the plastic housing and cutting the tape into small fragments,
depositing the remnants in trash cans throughout the Center. 2.5 terabytes
of information regarding Able Danger
was destroyed in April/May 2000. The CIA
destroyed
interrogation tapes."
In 2003, a book was written by Gail Swanson entitled, "Behind-the-Scenes:
Ground Zero" that is a "collection of personal accounts" from people
that were at Ground Zero on that day. In that book, Firefighter Nicholas
DeMasi says,
"at one point I was assigned to take Federal Agents around the
site to search for the black boxes from the planes. We were getting ready to
go out. My ATV was parked at the top of the stairs at the Brooks Brothers
entrance area. We loaded up about a million dollars worth of equipment and
strapped it into the ATV. When we got into the ATV to take off, the agent
accidentally pushed me forward. The ATV was already in reverse, and my foot
went down on the gas pedal. We went down the stairs in reverse. Fortunately,
everything was okay. There were a total of four black boxes. We found
three."
The 9/11 Commission says those black boxes were not found. Most
of the steel from the WTC
was removed, cut into smaller sections, and either melted at a recycling
plant or shipped out of the U.S. Fire Engineering magazine
wrote,
"We are literally treating the steel removed from the site like
garbage, not like crucial fire scene evidence."
Fact #19
Several Whistleblowers have come forward over the years with information
pertinent to the 9/11 attacks. Most were
ignored or
censored by the 9/11 Commission.
Some of these people are:
-
John M. Cole (Senior
Counterintelligence Operations Manager-FBI)
-
Bogdan Dzakovic (Former Red Team
Leader-FAA)
-
Sibel Edmonds (Language
Specialist-FBI)
-
Behrooz
Sarshar (Language Specialist-FBI)
-
Melvin A. Goodman (Former Senior Analyst/
Division Manager-CIA)
-
Gilbert Graham (Retired Special Agent,
Counterintelligence-FBI)
-
Coleen Rowley (Retired Division Counsel- FBI)
-
John Vincent (Retired Special Agent, Counterterrorism-FBI)
-
Robert Wright
(Veteran Special Agent, Counterterrorism-FB)
-
Mark Burton (Senior Analyst- NSA)
-
Mike German (Special Agent, Counterterrorism-FBI)
-
Lt. Col. Anthony
Shaffer, and Scott Philpott.
9/11 Family Member Patty Casazza
said
"Sibel came
to, actually, the four widows, and asked us if she could get a hearing with
the Commission because nobody of the Commission was responding to her
requests to testify. And part of the problem with testifying, um... as
someone who's working for one of the agencies, is that, they have to be
careful with state secrets, what they reveal.
And, in order to be a
whistle-blower, and not be retaliated against, most whistle-blowers
need to be subpoenaed, cause then their co-workers, and those who
might retaliate against them, know that under penalty of, ya know, law, they
could be... um... ya know, accused of being traitors and what not, and put
in jail, or executed. So, most whistle-blowers were... did not come
forward on the basis of what happened to Sibel Edmonds.
Um, Sibel
brought us many whistle-blowers, and I submitted them personally to
Governor Kean, who was the Chairman of the Commission. And I said,
"these people are not being subpoenaed. They will not come before the
Commission voluntarily unless they are subpoenaed." And, he promised
me... to my face that "every whistle-blower would be... indeed heard."
And,
most were not heard. Sibel was only heard because we dragged her in
and surprised the Commission on one of the days we were meeting with them...
that we had her with us. Um, we met other whistle-blowers on the side of the
road in Maryland, ya know, to hear what they could tell us.
None of them
revealed state secrets to us by the way (laughs)... um, but, they had
information... and basically, the Government knew... ya know, other than
the exact moment... they knew the date, and the method of which the attacks
were supposed to come. (pauses) And none of this made it to mainstream
media. None of it made it into the Commission.
And yet, again, all of
your Representatives, on the day that the Commission book came out, were on
their pulpits saying, "What
a fabulous job this Commission has done. A real service to this nation."
And it was anything but a service. It was a complete fabrication."
Within
the last year, Sibel Edmonds agreed to break the gag order that was placed
on her, and tell her entire story to the media. The only paper to
take the challenge was the Sunday Times. The media in this country did
not give her the time of day with
one exception
that I know of, and it wasn't prominently displayed.
Sibel's story mentions
the same alleged financier
of the 9/11 attacks that Sen. Porter Goss, Sen. Graham, and Sen. Kyl met
with on the morning of 9/11.
Fact #20
Apparently,
Lt. General
Mahmood Ahmed, the head of the Pakistani ISI, someone who met with
U.S. elected and appointed officials in the weeks before 9/11, on the
day of 9/11, and in the days after 9/11, ordered
possible MI6 Agent
Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh
to wire transfer $100,000 to
Mohammad Atta. The
9/11 Families'
submitted a
question to the 9/11 Commission about this incident.
Deputy Assistant
Director of the FBI's Counterterrorism Division,
John S. Pistole stated
that their investigation,
"has traced the origin of the funding of 9/11 back
to financial accounts in Pakistan, where high-ranking and well-known
al-Qaeda operatives played a major role in moving the money forward,
eventually into the hands of the hijackers located in the US."
In January
2002, during a visit to India, FBI Director
Robert Mueller was
told about Saeed Sheikh's involvement in the 9/11 attacks by Indian
Investigators.
Apparently, "on the eve of the publication of its report, the 9/11
Commission was given a stunning document from Pakistan, claiming that
Pakistani intelligence officers knew in advance of the 9/11 attacks."
On
3/3/2006, the
Friday Times reported that "Pakistan gave tens of thousands of dollars
through its lobbyists in the United States to members of the 9/11 inquiry
commission to ‘convince’ them to drop some anti-Pakistan findings in the
report." This according to FO Official Sadiq. According to the Pakistan
paper
Daily Times, this story about bribery "triggered" U.S. media interest.
I
don't remember seeing any mention of this story at all. If you know of an
American media outlet that investigated this story, and reported on the
results of that investigation, please let me know. On 4/10/2006, Pakistan
officially
denied the allegations of bribery.
“Pakistan has never indulged in the
illegal activity of bribing or buying influence anywhere in the world,” said
a statement issued by the FO spokesperson here on Sunday.
On 10/1/2001, Lt.
Gen. Ahmed and Saeed Sheikh may have been involved in
another "terrorist attack" together. Recently, it was reported that
Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh has been
running a
terrorist network from prison, and was planning to assassinate President
Musharraf. Former ISI Chief Hamid Gul
recently
defended Lt. Gen. Ahmed regarding the allegations of the wire transfer.
On 3/15/2002, Condoleeza Rice is asked a question about Lt. Gen. Ahmed.
"Dr.
Rice, are you aware of the reports at the time that ISI Chief was in
Washington on September 11th, and on September 10th, $100,000 was wired to
Pakistan to this group here in this area? While he was here meeting with you
or anybody in the administration?" Her response was, "I have not seen that
report, and he was certainly not meeting with me."
The
transcript of this has "ISI Chief" replaced with "--."
Fact #21
On the morning of 9/11, shortly after the first impact, a homemaker by the
name of Maria will get a phone call from her neighbor.
"She grabbed her
binoculars and watched the destruction unfolding in lower Manhattan. But as
she watched the disaster, something else caught her eye."
She notices a
group of people sitting on top of a white van. She
says, "they seemed to be taking a movie."She calls the police. At 3:31pm
on 9/11, the FBI
issues a BOLO (be on the lookout) that says,
"White, 2000 Chevrolet
van...with 'Urban Moving Systems' sign on back seen at Liberty State Park,
Jersey City, NJ, at the time of first impact of jetliner into World Trade
Center.... Three individuals with van were seen celebrating after initial
impact and subsequent explosion. FBI Newark Field Office requests that, if
the van is located, hold for prints and detain individuals."
At 3:56pm on
9/11, these individuals are
arrested.
On 9/14/2001, the owner of Urban Moving Systems
flees to Israel. Because of
great pressure in late October 2001, the arrested men, allegedly Israeli
spies, are
released in November 2001.
One of the men
claims "our purpose was to document the event."
Fact #22
No one has been held accountable, and instead, people that don't deserve it,
have been promoted.
Fact #23
On 9/11/2006, 9/11 Family members Donna Marsh O'Connor, Michele Little, and
Christina Kminek, along with Kyle Hence (Executive Producer of 9/11: Press
For Truth), and Paul Thompson (www.historycommons.org,
author of "The Terror Timeline"),
called for
a new investigation (RealPlayer required) at the National Press Club in
Washington D.C. I believe
this
is the only news outlet to cover it.
Over the years, different family
members like
Bob
McIlvaine,
Lorie
Van Auken,
Daniel
Wallace (RIP),
Barry Zelman,
Manny
Badillo, and
Patrick Welsh have spoken out for the truth.
The September Eleventh
Advocates have released
letter
after
letter after
letter
after
letter after
letter
after
letter after
letter
after
letter after
letter
after
letter after
letter
trying to get some truth.
The media has been silent.
Fact #24
The United States Government has not fully cooperated with international
investigations into 9/11. With regards to
Abdelghani Mzoudi, the United States "would not allow Mzoudi’s defense
to cross-examine bin al-Shibh," and as a result he was acquitted.
During an
appeal, "Kay Nelm, Germany’s top federal prosecutor, again appeals to the US
State Department to release interrogation records of bin al-Shibh to the
court. However, the US still refuses to release the evidence, and a list of
questions the court gives to the US for bin al-Shibh to answer are never
answered." With regards to Mounir El-Motassadeq, his conviction having to do
with the 9/11 attacks was
overturned after finding that "German and US authorities withheld
evidence."
He was later
convicted for his "Al-Qaeda" membership, but not for 9/11.
Fact #25
As I mentioned in the introduction, the Mainstream Media has not covered the
questions concerning the 9/11 attacks as they should, and for the most part,
with the exception of
small town news, have attacked those that do.
According to
James
Goodale, the founders of the United States "enacted the First Amendment
to distinguish their new government from that of England, which had long
censored the press and prosecuted persons who dared to criticize the
British Crown."
On 10/31/2005, Reporters Without Borders
reported that
the United States ranked 44th in the world for Freedom Of The Press "mainly
because of the imprisonment of New York Times reporter Judith Miller and
legal moves undermining the privacy of journalistic sources."
At the
recent RNC, several journalists, including
Amy Goodman of
DemocracyNow were
arrested.
Over the years, the Mainstream Media has essentially used
George Bush's
policy
of never tolerating "outrageous conspiracy theories concerning the attacks
of September 11th - malicious lies that attempt to shift blame away from the
terrorists themselves, away from the guilty." At first, and still, they have
referred to anyone that questions the events of 9/11 as "Conspiracy
Theorists."
They have done so
again, and
again, and
again, and
again, and
again, and
again, and
again, and
again. The Mainstream Media has also repeatedly focused on what is
considered the "fringe"
of the 9/11 Truth Movement, and has ignored the more credible researchers.
Several celebrities have spoken out for 9/11 Truth. Each time one has done
so,
almost in unison, the Mainstream Media has attacked them. They have done
so
again, and
again, and
again, and
again,
and
again.
They have portrayed those who question the official account as "unpatriotic,"
and also as "terrorist
sympathizers." As pointed out in Fact #23, the media has also
ignored the 9/11 Family Members who question the official account, but
they have also given a lot of attention to people like Ann Coulter that have
attacked some of those family members
again, and
again,
and again.
The September Eleventh Advocates
responded to Coulter's remarks. The media has heavily promoted movies
like "Path To 9/11"
which are factually incorrect, and ignored movies liked "9/11:
Press For Truth," which calls into question the entire 9/11 Report, and
is endorsed by the family members that fought for it.
The MSM have also
repeatedly said that if you question the official account of 9/11, you are
dishonoring the family
members.
Fact #26
The 9/11 Commission was
mandated
to give a “full and complete accounting” of the attacks of September
11, 2001 and recommendations as to how to prevent such attacks in the
future."
The 9/11 Commission had the power of subpoena, but rarely used it.
Instead, they used what were called "document
requests" which could be, and were ignored. As mentioned in Fact #19,
several whistleblowers were brought forward, but were either
censored or
ignored by the 9/11 Commission.
Early on, the 9/11 Commission didn't
hold people under oath. At one point, an
advertising
campaign was started that asked for people to be held under oath. The
following are some quotes from 9/11 Commissioners Thomas Kean and Lee
Hamilton from their book "Without
Precedent."
"The two sides decided to split the difference, allowing
eighteen months for the inquiry—a period of time that proved insufficient"
[....]
"The White House also suggested some candidates for executive
director for our staff. The importance of this position cannot be
overstated" [...]
"…we seriously only considered one candidate: Philip Zelikow…. Zelikow was a controversial choice. In the 1990s, as an academic,
he had co-authored, with Condoleezza Rice, a book about German unification,
and he later assisted Stephen Hadley in running the National Security
Council transition for the incoming Bush administration in 2000-2001" [...]
"After Philip Zelikow came on board as executive director, he began
recruiting and interviewing candidates…. Zelikow was selected with little
consultation with the rest of the committee, but several commissioners had
concerns about the kind of inquiry he would lead" [...]
"We soon encountered
problems, both in obtaining information and with the laborious conditions
placed on our access to some information" [...]
"We decided against an
aggressive use of subpoenas for several reasons…. Furthermore, we knew that
many of the most important documents we sought were potentially the subject
of an executive privilege claim—meaning that the president might not be
legally compelled to share that material with another branch of government,
even with a subpoena" [...]
"We were supposed to be independent, not
necessarily confrontational. We were investigating a national catastrophe,
not a White House transgression; this was 9/11, not Watergate" [...]
"Senior
officials from the FAA and NORAD—Jane Garvey and Craig McKinley—made
statements about the timeline of 9/11 that were later proven to be
inaccurate" [...]
"Many interviews were recorded, though we were not
permitted to record those conducted with current officials from the
Executive Office of the President" [...]
"We were set up to fail." The
9/11 Family Steering
Committee was made up of 12 family members, including the "Jersey
Girls."
They monitored the commission, they worked with the staffers of
the commission, and they provided 100's of well researched questions for the
commission to answer.
According to 9/11 Commission Chair Thomas Kean,
"They
monitor us, they follow our progress, they've supplied us with some of the
best questions we've asked. I doubt very much if we would be in existence
without them."
The 9/11 Commission
only answered 30% of the families questions.
Fact #27
The level of fear that resulted from the attacks of 9/11 was nourished and
maintained, and still is to this day. Reich Marshal Hermann Goering once
said "of course the
people don't want war.
But after all, it's the leaders of the country who
determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people
along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or
a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be
brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for
lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to
greater danger."
On 6/23/2007, Glenn Greenwald wrote about how insurgents in Iraq were being
referred to as "Al-Qaeda" more frequently. He
states,
"what makes this practice all the more disturbing is how quickly and
obediently the media has adopted the change in terms consciously issued by
the Bush administration and their military officials responsible for
presenting the Bush view of the war to the press."
Fox News once
suggested "Al-Qaeda" was responsible for starting California Wildfires.
Keith Olbermann ran two stories that I know of
regarding the
political usage of "terror threats." The New York Times recently ran a
massive story on how military analysts with "ties to military
contractors" were being used by the Pentagon to "shape terrorism coverage
from inside the major TV and radio networks."
They "have echoed
administration talking points, sometimes even when they suspected the
information was false or inflated."
Fact #28
The 9/11 Report was, and is promoted as a triumph. The Washington Post
reported that it is "a useful analysis of the changes that have taken
place since, as well as the changes that have not taken place, " and calling
the commission's unanimity and comprehensiveness "impressive."
WaPo also
reported that,
"the final report is a document of historic sweep and
almost unprecedented detail, offering the sort of examination of a highly
classified subject that customarily would not be possible for decades after
the fact. From the findings of spy agencies to the tactics of fighter
pilots, from the conversations of heads of state to the verbatim texts of
secret presidential briefings, this is the government laid bare."
The New
York Times
reported that it was "uncommonly lucid, even riveting," and is an
"improbable literary triumph." Time Magazine
said the report was "meticulous in its reconstruction of the attacks and
unflinching in its conclusions about why the government failed to stop
them." The 9/11 Commission's report was
nominated
by the National Book Foundation in 2004 for best in Non-fiction.
Former
Representative Katherine Harris
referred to the 9/11 Report as "one of the most important publications
of our age." Senator Hillary Clinton
said the 9/11 Commission's report was "a great testimony to the their
willingness to search hard for the truth, to get at the facts." Senator
Charles Schumer said the 9/11 Commission did an "incredible job."
In 2004,
Bush's Presidential Campaign said "the Commission's report makes the case
for the policies that U.S. President Bush has been pursuing in the War on
Terror and eliminates any doubt that the best defense against the threat of
global terror is a strong offense." Bush said, "I agree with their
conclusion that the terrorists were able to exploit deep institutional
failings in our nation's defenses that developed over more than a decade."
A
different kind of praise for the 9/11 Report has come in the form of
requests for "9/11-Type Commissions" for other horrible events in America's
history such as
Katrina and the recent "financial
crisis."
Fact #29
Osama Bin Laden has not been indicted for the 9/11 attacks.
Some time before
9/26/2001, FBI spokesman Rex Tomb says, "there’s going to be a
considerable amount of time before anyone associated with the attacks is
actually charged." He continues, "To be charged with a crime, this means we
have found evidence to confirm our suspicions, and a prosecutor has said we
will pursue this case in court."
On
9/23/2001, then Secretary of State Colin Powell is asked, "will you
release publicly a white paper which links [bin Laden] and his organization
to this attack to put people at ease?"
He responds by saying
"we are hard at
work bringing all the information together, intelligence information, law
enforcement information. And I think in the near future we will be able to
put out a paper, a document that will describe quite clearly the evidence
that we have linking him to this attack."
The following day, then White
House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer when asked about Powell's statement says,
"I think that there was just a misinterpretation of the exact words the
secretary used on the Sunday shows... I’m not aware of anybody who said white
paper, and the secretary didn’t say anything about a white paper yesterday."
On 10/4/2001, Tony Blair will present a paper that makes the case for Osama
Bin Laden's involvement before Parliament. It says, "this document does
not purport to provide a prosecutable case against Osama bin Laden in a
court of law.”
Nevertheless, it continues,
“on the basis of all the
information available [Her Majesty’s Government] is confident of its
conclusions as expressed in this document."
On 6/6/2006, Rex Tomb will
say, "the reason why 9/11 is not mentioned on Osama bin Laden’s Most
Wanted page is because the FBI has no hard evidence connecting bin Laden
to 9/11." This according to
Ed Haas of the Muckraker
Report. On 8/28/2006, the Washington Post will
report about this story.
They state,
"from this point of view, the lack
of a Sept. 11 reference suggests that the connection to al-Qaeda is
uncertain. Exhaustive government and independent investigations have
concluded otherwise, of course, and bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders
have proudly taken responsibility for the hijackings."
They speak to Rex
Tomb who says "There's no mystery here" [...] "They could add 9/11 on there,
but they have not because they don't need to at this point. . . . There is a
logic to it."
According to David N. Kelley, a former U.S. attorney,
"It
might seem a little strange from the outside, but it makes sense from a
legal point of view," said Kelley, now in private practice.
"If I were in
government, I'd be troubled if I were asked to put up a wanted picture where
no formal charges had been filed, no matter who it was."
Contrary to WaPo's
claim that "bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders have proudly taken
responsibility for the hijackings," Osama denied any involvement in the
attacks on three separate occasions.
On 9/16/2001, he
says,
“I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the
recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal
reasons.”
On 9/28/2001, he
says,
"I have already said that I am not involved in the September 11
attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid
telling a lie. I had no knowledge of these attacks, nor do I consider the
killing of innocent women, children and other human beings as an appreciable
act. Islam strictly forbids causing harm to innocent women, children and
other people. Such a practice is forbidden even in the course of battle.…
The United States should try to trace the perpetrators of these attacks
within itself; the people who are a part of the US system but are dissenting
against it. Or those who are working for some other system; persons who want
to make the present century as a century of conflict between Islam and
Christianity so that their own civilization, nation, country, or ideology
can survive. They may be anyone, from Russia to Israel and from India to
Serbia. In the US itself, there are dozens of well-organized and
well-equipped groups capable of causing large-scale destruction.
Then you
cannot forget the American Jews, who have been annoyed with President Bush
ever since the Florida elections and who want to avenge him.… Then there are
intelligence agencies in the US, which require billions of dollars worth of
funds from Congress and the government every year.… They needed an enemy.…
Is it not that there exists a government within the government in the United
Sates? That secret government must be asked who carried out the attacks."
On
12/26/2001, Bin Laden releases a tape that
says the U.S.'s invasion of Afghanistan is "a vicious campaign based
on mere suspicion."
On 9/10/2008, White House Press Secretary Dana Perino will be
asked a question.
"But Osama bin Laden is the one that — you keep
talking about his lieutenants, and, yes, they are very important, but Osama
bin Laden was the mastermind of 9/11 –" Her response is to say that "No,
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was the mastermind of 9/11, and he’s sitting in
jail right now."
Fact #30
The authenticity of video and audio recordings that have been released over
the years allegedly from Osama Bin Laden have been disputed. On 10/29/2007,
MSNBC reported about a
"running debate among video analysts about whether al-Qaida faked" a video
that was
released on 9/7/2007.
The so called "confession video" has been disputed
from three different points of view. The
translation of the tape was disputed.
Professor Gernot Rotter from the
University of Hamburg says,
"this tape is of such poor quality that many
passages are unintelligible. And those that are intelligible have often been
taken out of context, so that you can’t use that as evidence. The
American translators who listened to the tape and transcribed it
obviously added things that they wanted to hear in many places.”
The
date the video was made is
disputed by analyst Maher Osseiran. Several commentators
questioned whether the person depicted in the video is actually Osama.
According to
CNN, Bush was asked about the authenticity of the tape, but "scoffed" at
the idea "that the videotape of Osama bin Laden discussing the September 11
terrorist attacks might not be authentic."
He said,
"It is preposterous for
anybody to think that this tape is doctored" [...] "That's just a feeble
excuse to provide weak support for an incredibly evil man."
Fact #31
The majority of the testimony from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged
"mastermind" of the 9/11 attacks, something the 9/11 Report is heavily
based on, was gotten through
torture, and "third-hand
- passed from the detainee, to the interrogator, to the person who writes up
the interrogation report, and finally to [its] staff in the form of reports,
not even transcripts."
Because of the latter, the 9/11 Commission
decided to add a disclaimer to the chapters that are heavily based on
detainee interrogations. The disclaimer says,
"Chapters 5 and 7 rely heavily
on information obtained from captured al-Qaeda members. A number of these
‘detainees’ have firsthand knowledge of the 9/11 plot.
Assessing the truth
of statements by these witnesses—sworn enemies of the United States—is
challenging. Our access to them has been limited to the review of
intelligence reports based on communications received from the locations
where the actual interrogations take place. We submitted questions for use
in the interrogations, but had no control over whether, when, or how
questions of particular interest would be asked.
Nor were we allowed to talk
to the interrogators so that we could better judge the credibility of the
detainees and clarify ambiguities in the reporting. We were told that
our requests might disrupt the sensitive interrogation process. We have
nonetheless decided to include information from captured 9/11 conspirators
and al-Qaeda members in our report. We have evaluated their statements
carefully and have attempted to corroborate them with documents and
statements of others.
In this report, we indicate where such statements
provide the foundation for our narrative. We have been authorized to
identify by name only ten detainees whose custody has been confirmed
officially by the US government."
The 9/11 Commission became
unhappy because the government's investigators were "not asking the
detainees the kinds of questions [it wanted] answered.”
On 8/6/2007, the New
Yorker
reports that a former CIA official estimates that about "ninety
percent of the information was unreliable." KSM's interrogations are
mentioned as a source in the 9/11 report 211 times.
Fact #32
The Military Tribunals taking place at
Guantanamo Bay are a slap in the
face to those seeking
justice for the crimes of 9/11, as well as to the rest of the world.
The
level of
secrecy is counterproductive. As the September 11th Advocates
state,
"prosecuting these men within a system that is secretive in nature
and lacking in due process, and which uses evidence tainted by questionable
interrogation methods and possibly even torture,
is a dangerous
endeavor." Several other family members have
voiced their concerns about the secrecy.
Unlike
U.S. Federal courts,
"the Guantanamo tribunal permits hearsay evidence
as well as information gleaned from coercion and makes no guarantee that the
accused will be able to confront his accusers or know all the evidence
against him."
As far as the media goes "only a
handful of journalists will be allowed in the courtroom,
confined to a glass enclosed booth where they can be shut off from hearing
testimony on the judge's instructions." [...] "Audio recordings and
pictures of the proceedings are barred."
The ACLU
charged that "the U.S. government is blocking the American Civil
Liberties Union from paying attorneys representing suspected terrorists held
here, insisting that the ACLU must first receive a license from the U.S.
Treasury Department before making the payments."
Once the Supreme Court
ruled that detainees,
"have the right to challenge their detention in
civilian court," the Bush Administration
decided "to rewrite the official evidence against Guantanamo Bay
detainees, allowing it to shore up its cases before they come under scrutiny
by civilian judges for the first time."
A
propaganda film was shown to the court room.
"The video is entitled "The
Al Qaeda Plan," an echo of "The Nazi Plan" made by Oscar-winning director
George Stevens as evidence in the Nuremberg war crimes trials of German
leaders after World War II."
Judge Keith Allred approved the video, but
said, "The planes crashing into the towers and the people screaming doesn't
prove anything."
Army Brig. Gen. Gregory Zanetti
said that Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann, the Pentagon official who oversees
the Guantanamo war crimes tribunals, was "abusive, bullying,
unprofessional." Detainee lawyers say that "political interference taints
the proceedings."
On 4/18/2008, it was
reported that the families would be able to watch the trials. According
to Army Col. Lawrence Morris, "we're going to broadcast in real time to
several locations that will be available just to victim families." Later,
the military decided
against that. However, they were going to allow Debra Burlingame, a 9/11
Family Member that happens to be pro-Bush to attend.
Several family members
released a
statement that said, "selectively inviting only 9/11 family members
whose views are in alignment with those of the Bush administration is only
one example of the repeated attempts to infuse politics into what should be
an impartial process that has the goal of achieving justice."
On 10/27/2008,
it was
reported
that "the Pentagon has made plans to bring victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist
attacks -- chosen by lottery -- to watch a hearing of reputed al
Qaeda kingpin Khalid Sheik Mohammed's death penalty trial."
Deputy Defense
Secretary Gordon England said,
"Soon, some of those victim families will
have the opportunity to see firsthand the fair, open and just trials
of those alleged to have perpetrated these horrific acts."
The Miami Herald
cites,
"a long-promised victims witness program, which will enable thousands
of family members of the Sept. 11 dead to watch the eventual trial through
satellite feeds to four U.S. military bases."
On 12/10/2008, a group of 31
9/11 family members, along with the ACLU released a
statement that said,
"many of us do not believe these military
commissions to be fair, in accordance with American values, or capable of
achieving the justice that 9/11 family members and all Americans deserve."
Fact #33
The resulting dust from the collapse of the buildings on 9/11/2001 was
toxic, and people like Condoleezza Rice and Christie Todd Whitman
lied about it so things
like Wall Street could reopen.
As a result, several 1000 9/11 First
Responders, and residents of New York are sick and dying. Both local and
Federal Governments have ignored them in their time of need.
Fact #34
Suspicious trading in the world markets took place before 9/11/2001. On or
around 8/6/2001, what appear to be "suspicious"
put option purchases are made. According to one analyst, "from what I’m
hearing, it’s more than coincidence." In early September 2001, "suspicious"
short selling of reinsurance company stocks take place.
Also in September
2001,
suspicion of insider trading takes place in many other countries,
resulting in the creation of several investigations. The countries mentioned
are Belgium, France, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Monte Carlo, Cyprus, U.K.,
Italy, and Japan. On 10/3/2001, the San Francisco Chronicle will
report that the NYSE sees "unusually heavy trading in airline and
related stocks several days before the attacks."
Some of those companies are
American, Continental, Delta, Northwest, Southwest, United, and US Airways.
In early September 2001, there is a
sharp increase in short selling of American and United Airlines stocks.
Between 9/6/2001, and 9/10/2001,
suspicious trading of put options on American and United Airlines occur.
Ernst Welteke, the President of a German central bank, says that his bank
has done a
study.
"There are ever clearer signs that there were activities on
international financial markets that must have been carried out with the
necessary expert knowledge."
His researchers have found "almost
irrefutable proof of insider trading." During the time of the 9/11
Commission, the families
pressed for answers
about this suspicious trading.
The 9/11 Report states,
"highly publicized
allegations of insider trading in advance of 9/11 generally rest on reports
of unusual pre-9/11 trading activity in companies whose stock plummeted
after the attacks. Some unusual trading did in fact occur, but each such
trade proved to have an innocuous explanation." [...]
"The SEC and the FBI,
aided by other agencies and the securities industry, devoted enormous
resources to investigating this issue, including securing the cooperation of
many foreign governments. These investigators have found that the apparently
suspicious consistently proved innocuous."
Fact #35
The 9/11 Report says,
"to date, the U.S. government has not been able to
determine the origin of the money used for the 9/11 attacks. Ultimately
the question is of little practical significance. Al Qaeda had many
avenues of funding. If a particular funding source had dried up, al Qaeda
could have easily tapped a different source or diverted funds from another
project to fund an operation that cost $400,000–$500,000 over nearly two
years."
The 9/11 Commission repeats this in a document entitled, "The
Financing of the 9/11 Plot."
"To date, the U.S. government has not been
able to determine the origin of the money used for the 9/11 attacks. As we
have discussed above, the compelling evidence appears to trace the bulk of
the funds directly back to KSM and, possibly, Qatari, but no further.
Available information on this subject has thus far has not been
illuminating.
According to KSM, Bin Ladin provided 85–95 percent of the
funds for the plot from his personal wealth, with the remainder coming
from general al Qaeda funds. To the extent KSM intended to refer to
wealth Bin Ladin inherited from his family or derived from any business
activity, this claim is almost certainly wrong, because Bin Ladin was not
personally financing al Qaeda during this time frame. Ultimately the
question of the origin of the funds is of little practical significance.
Al Qaeda had many avenues of funding. If a particular source of funds dried
up, it could have easily tapped a different source or diverted money from a
different project to fund an attack that cost $400,000–$500,000 over nearly
two years."
Fact #36
"Al-Qaeda" has curious connections to intelligence agencies all over the
world. Wikipedia defines "Al-Qaeda"
as,
"an international Sunni Islamist movement founded in 1988. Al-Qaeda have
attacked civilian and military targets in various countries, the most
notable being the September 11 attacks in 2001. These actions were followed
by the US government launching a military and intelligence campaign against
al-Qaeda called the War on Terror."
On 9/28/2006, the Washington Post
reported that,
"a leaked document accuses Pakistan's intelligence
agency of indirectly supporting terrorist groups including al-Qaida and
calls on Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to disband the agency."
[...]
"Indirectly, Pakistan (through the ISI) has been supporting terrorism
and extremism _ whether in London on (July 7, 2005) or in Afghanistan or
Iraq."
The BBC
reports that,
" [The West has] turned a blind eye towards existing
instability and the indirect protection of Al Qaeda and promotion of
terrorism."
On 9/30/2006, the BBC
reported Mumbai Police Commissioner AN Roy's statement that, "We have
solved the 11 July bombings case. The whole attack was planned by Pakistan's
ISI and carried out by Lashkar-e-Toiba and their operatives in India."
On
10/7/2006, the Sunday Times
reports that "captured Taliban fighters and failed suicide bombers have
confirmed that they were trained by the Pakistani intelligence service,
known as the ISI." In March 2001,
Selig Harrison, a
"long-time regional expert" says, "the CIA still has close links with the
ISI."
Harrison is said to have "extensive contact with the CIA and political
leaders in South Asia."
In 2000,
"Ahmed Rashid, longtime regional
correspondent for the Financial Times and the Daily Telegraph" referred to
the U.S. as "Pakistan’s closest ally, with deep links to [Pakistan’s]
military and the ISI."
On 10/19/2007, B. Raman
reported that "Brig Ejaz Shah, a former officer of Pakistan's
Inter-Services Intelligence" [...] "used to be the handling officer of Osama
bin Laden and Mulla Omar, the amir of the Taliban."
When I asked Mr. Raman
"What does it mean to be Osama Bin Laden's "Handling Officer" for the
Pakistani ISI? What is the responsibility of the person that has this
particular job?" his response was,
"The handling officer of a source in
Indian and Pakistani intelligence agencies is the person who looks after
the welfare of the source, keeps him motivated and uses him as needed.
The source cannot meet anybody else other than his handling officer except
the head of the agency. One source--one handling officer is the general
rule. This is to prevent the exposure of the operation and maintain its
deniability. I understand in the CIA they call him the Running Officer of a
source."
On 10/31/2001, Le Figaro
reports that while staying in the American hospital in Dubai, he is
treated by Dr. Terry Callaway.
"He is possibly accompanied by Dr. Ayman
al-Zawahiri (who is said to be bin Laden’s personal physician as well as
al-Qaeda’s second-in-command), plus several bodyguards. Callaway supposedly
treated bin Laden in 1996 and 1998, also in Dubai. Callaway later refuses to
answer any questions on this matter."
"During his stay, bin Laden is visited
by “several members of his family and Saudi personalities,” including Prince Turki al-Faisal, then head of Saudi intelligence."
"On July 12, bin
Laden reportedly meets with CIA agent Larry Mitchell in the hospital.
Mitchell apparently lives in Dubai as an Arab specialist under the cover of
being a consular agent. The CIA, the Dubai hospital, and even bin Laden deny
the story. The two news organizations that broke the story, Le Figaro and
Radio France International, stand by their reporting."
"The Guardian
claims that the story originated from French intelligence, “which is keen to
reveal the ambiguous role of the CIA, and to restrain Washington from
extending the war to Iraq and elsewhere.”
The Guardian adds that during his
stay bin Laden is also visited by a second CIA officer.
"In 2003,
reporter Richard Labeviere will provide additional details of what he claims
happened in a book entitled “The Corridors of Terror.”
He claims he learned
about the meeting from a contact in the Dubai hospital. He claims the event
was confirmed in detail by a Gulf prince who presented himself as an adviser
to the Emir of Bahrain. This prince claimed the meeting was arranged by
Prince Turki al-Faisal.
The prince said,
“By organizing this meeting…Turki
thought he could start direct negotiations between [bin Laden] and
the CIA on one fundamental point: that bin Laden and his supporters
end their hostilities against American interests. In exchange, the CIA and Saudis
would allow bin Laden to return to Saudi Arabia and live freely there. The
meeting is said to be a failure."
"On July 15, Larry Mitchell reportedly
returns to CIA headquarters to report on his meeting with bin Laden."
"French counterterrorism expert Antoine Sfeir says the story of this meeting
has been verified and is not surprising: It “is nothing extraordinary. Bin
Laden maintained contacts with the CIA up to 1998. These contacts have not
ceased since bin Laden settled in Afghanistan. Up to the last moment, CIA
agents hoped that bin Laden would return to the fold of the US, as was the
case before 1989."
"A CIA spokesman calls the entire account of bin Laden’s
stay at Dubai “sheer fantasy."
Luai Sakra,
an alleged CIA informant is said to have trained 6 of the 9/11
hijackers. Ali Mohamed
has
connections to both the FBI and the CIA.
On 3/17/2007, Seymour Hersh
reported that,
"Iran-Contra veterans working out of Dick Cheney's office are using stolen funds from Iraq to arm al Qaeda-tied groups and
foment a larger Sunni-Shia war."
On 4/3/2007, ABCNews
reported that,
"a Pakistani tribal militant group responsible for a
series of deadly guerrilla raids inside Iran has been secretly encouraged
and advised by American officials since 2005.” […]
“Pakistani government
sources say the secret campaign against Iran by Jundullah was on the
agenda when Vice President Dick Cheney met with Pakistani President Pervez
Musharraf in February."
As I pointed out in Fact #20,
"Lt. General Mahmood Ahmed, the head of the Pakistani ISI, someone who met with U.S.
elected and appointed officials in the weeks before 9/11, on the day of
9/11, and in the days after 9/11, ordered possible MI6 Agent Ahmed Omar
Saeed Sheikh to wire transfer $100,000 to Mohammad Atta."
I refer you back
to Fact #35.
Fact #37
Former 9/11 Commissioner Max Cleland had a lot of interesting things to say.
Between January and July of 2003, the Bush Administration
delayed the release of the 9/11 Congressional Inquiry Report until after
the start of the Iraq War. Max Cleland says,
"The administration sold the
connection (between Iraq and al-Qaeda) to scare the pants off the American
people and justify the war. There’s no connection, and that’s been confirmed
by some of bin Laden’s terrorist followers… What you’ve seen here is the
manipulation of intelligence for political ends.
The reason this report was
delayed for so long—deliberately opposed at first, then slow-walked after it
was created—is that the administration wanted to get the war in Iraq in and
over… before (it) came out. Had this report come out in January [2003] like
it should have done, we would have known these things before the war in
Iraq, which would not have suited the administration."
After 1/27/2003, Max
Cleland is
disappointed with the start of the 9/11 Commission's investigation.
Specifically, he is not happy that the Commission,
"will not issue subpoenas
for the documents it wants and will have a single non-partisan staff headed
by executive director Philip Zelikow, who is close to National Security
Adviser Condoleezza Rice."
In May 2003, Max Cleland wanted the 9/11
Commission to
investigate the false claims tying Iraq to 9/11 made by the Bush
Administration. He says, "they were focused on Iraq, they were planning a
war on Iraq, they were not paying attention to the business at hand."
Zelikow, Kean, and Hamilton opposed this.
Phil Shenon will write, "even some
of the Democrats [on the commission] were distancing themselves from him.
Cleland knew he was quickly becoming a pariah."
Cleland will say,
"it was
painfully obvious to me that there was this blanket over the commission"
[...] "Anybody who spoke out or dissented, whether against George Bush, the
White House, or the war against Iraq, was going to be marginalized."
In
November 2003, the Commission, and the White House were
battling over how much access the Commission would have to Bush daily
briefings. Cleland says, "all ten commissioners should have full,
unfettered, and unrestricted access to all evidence."
In December 2003, Max
Cleland is
offered a "position on the board of the Export-Import Bank." He accepts.
Before leaving the Commission, he calls the Bush Administration's
stonewalling of the Commission a "national scandal," and says,
"I’m not going
to be part of looking at information only partially. I’m not going to be
part of just coming to quick conclusions. I’m not going to be part of
political pressure to do this or not do that. I’m not going to be part of
that. This is serious."
On 10/26/2003, Cleland tells the
New York Times
"as each day goes by, we learn that this government knew
a whole lot more about these terrorists before Sept. 11 than it has ever
admitted."
Fact #38
Over the years,
several polls have been conducted that show a majority of people are
concerned about this issue.
In August 2004, 911Truth.org commissioned Zogby
International for a
poll that
concluded "half (49.3%) of New York City residents and 41% of New York
citizens overall say that some of our leaders "knew in advance that attacks
were planned on or around September 11, 2001, and that they consciously
failed to act."
In May 2006, 911Truth.org commissioned Zogby
International for a
poll that
concluded 45% of voting Americans think,
"Congress or an International
Tribunal should re-investigate the attacks, including whether any US
government officials consciously allowed or helped facilitate their success."
In September 2007, 911Truth.org commissioned Zogby International for a
poll that
concluded "51% of Americans want Congress to probe Bush/Cheney regarding
the 9/11 Attacks."
In August 2006, Scripps Howard/Ohio University
conducted a
poll
that concluded, "more than a third of the American public suspects that
federal officials assisted in the 9/11 terrorist attacks or took no action
to stop them so the United States could go to war in the Middle East."
In November 2007, Scripps Howard/Ohio University conducted another
poll that concluded,
"nearly
two-thirds of Americans think it is possible that some federal officials had
specific warnings of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and
Washington, but chose to ignore those warnings."
Fact #39
Several interesting and thought provoking quotes have been made by people
over the years with regards to the 9/11 attacks. Sen. Patrick Leahy
said,
"the two questions that the congress will not ask, because republicans wont
allow it, is why did 9/11 happen on George Bush's watch when he had clear
warnings that it was going to happen? Why did they allow it to happen?
And secondly, when they had Osama Bin Laden cornered why didn't they get him?
Had there been an independent congress, one that could ask questions these
questions would have been asked years ago."
9/11 Commissioner Bob Kerrey
said,
"By the way, there’s a credible case that the president’s own
negligence prior to 9/11 at least in part contributed to the disaster in the
first place. In the summer of 2001, the government ignored repeated warnings
by the CIA, ignored, and didn't do anything to harden our border security,
didn’t do anything to harden airport country, didn’t do anything to engage
local law enforcement, didn’t do anything to round up INS and consular
offices and say we have to shut this down, and didn’t warn the American
people.
The famous presidential daily briefing on August 6, we say in the
report that the briefing officers believed that there was a considerable
sense of urgency and it was current. So there was a case to be made that
wasn’t made. The president says, if I had only known that 19 Islamic men
would come into the United States of America and on the morning of 11
September hijack four American aircraft, fly two into the World Trade
Center, one into the Pentagon, and one into an unknown Pennsylvania that
crashed in Shanksville, I would have moved heaven and earth.
That’s what he
said. Mr. President, you don’t need to know that. This is an Islamic Jihadist movement that has been organized since the early 1990s, declared
war on the United States twice, in ‘96 and ‘98. You knew they were in the
United States. You were warned by the CIA. You knew in July they were
inside the United States. You were told again by briefing officers in
August that it was a dire threat. And what did you do? Nothing, so far
as we could see on the 9/11 Commission."
9/11 Family Member Kristen Breitweiser said,
"it is clear that [Zelikow] should never have been
permitted to be a member of the commission, since it is the mandate of the
commission to identify the source of failures. We can now see that trail
would lead directly to the staff director himself."
On 7/22/2005, at the
9/11 Congressional Briefing chaired by then Rep. Cynthia McKinney, 9/11
Family Members Monica Gabrielle, and Mindy Kleinberg accompanied 9/11 Family
Member Lorie Van Auken who said,
"the 9/11 Commission’s report is one year
old today. This report was supposed to provide the definitive account of
what had transpired on September eleven, 2001. We hoped that our thousands
of unanswered questions would be addressed and answered. Yet incredibly we
have found that the Commission’s definitive final report has actually
yielded more questions than answers."
9/11 Family Member Donna Marsh
O'Connor said at the National Press Club on 9/11/2006,
"This Government has
made me a victim of Conspiracy Theories, because they haven't answered
fully, or allowed anyone to ask the true questions of September 11th, and
that's what I'm asking from you today. For exposure. We are not crazy. We
have questions. We demand answers. [...] We're asking for a new
investigation into the events of September 11th, and this time, a truly
bipartisan, global, with families invested from the beginning, middle, and
throughout the end."
Fact #40
A
document
entitled, "Justification for U.S. Military Intervention in Cuba" from 1962
proves BEYOND THE SHADOW OF DOUBT that elements within our Government
are MORE THAN CAPABLE of devising a "9/11 Type" plan.
Fact #41
There are several indications that Osama Bin Laden has been protected, and
even allowed to escape after the 9/11 attacks. On 12/24/1998, at the request
of then CIA Director George Tenet, President Clinton
signs an order authorizing the CIA to assassinate Osama Bin Laden.
Philip Shenon
will write that Clinton's authorization is "written in stark language”
and it makes it very clear “that the president was telling the tribal
leaders they could kill bin Laden."
However, this order is "closely held
within the CIA, and the 9/11 Commission will comment,
“This intent [to
have bin Laden killed" was never well communicated or understood within the
agency."
Apparently, it is never even communicated to Michael Scheuer,
head of Alec Station, the CIA’s bin Laden unit. Scheuer will later
express his frustration at not being allowed to try to kill bin Laden, “We
always talked about how much easier it would have been to kill him." In
February 1999, Clinton
rewrites the order for the CIA and "deletes the wording authorizing an
operation to simply kill bin Laden."
In December 1999, Clinton issues a
wider memo that deals "with “a wider set of contingencies,” and they
authorize the use of force only within the context of a capture operation, not an assassination attempt.
The CIA is therefore allowed to try to
kill bin Laden only using one specific group of assets—tribal leaders
tracking bin Laden in Afghanistan, still based on the earlier instructions.
But the CIA does not test “the limits of available legal authority,”
apparently because the CIA’s bin Laden unit is not told of the kill
authorization and due to confusion."
On 9/21/2001, it is
reported that President Putin "had warned the Clinton administration
about the dangers posed by Bin Laden.
"Washington's reaction at the time
really amazed me. They shrugged their shoulders and said matter-of-factly:
'We can't do anything because the Taliban does not want to turn him over'."
After 9/11, Bush
says about Bin Laden, "If he thinks he can hide and run from the United
States and our allies, he will be sorely mistaken.” Two days after that, he
says, "I want justice.
And there’s an old poster out West, I recall, that
says, ‘Wanted: Dead or Alive.'" In Afghanistan, veteran CIA agent
Gary Berntsen is in charge of the team responsible for capturing or
killing Osama Bin Laden called "Jawbreaker." "He will claim that at the
start of December 2001, one of his Arabic-speaking CIA agents finds a radio
on a dead al-Qaeda fighter during a battle in the Tora Bora region. This
agent hears bin Laden repeatedly attempt to rally his troops.
On the same
radio, that agent and another CIA agent who speaks Arabic hear bin Laden
apologizing to his troops for getting them trapped and killed by US aerial
bombing. Based on this information, Berntsen makes a formal request for 800
US troops to be deployed along the Pakistani border to prevent bin Laden’s
escape.
The request is not granted. Berntsen’s lawyer later claims,
“Gary coordinated most of the boots on the ground. We knew where bin Laden
was within a very circumscribed area. It was full of caves and tunnels but
we could have bombed them or searched them one by one. The Pentagon
failed to deploy sufficient troops to seal them off."
"A Knight Ridder
investigative report will later conclude,
“While more than 1,200 US Marines
[sit] at an abandoned air base in the desert 80 miles away, Franks and other
commanders [rely] on three Afghan warlords and a small number of American,
British, and Australian special forces to stop al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters
from escaping across the mountains into Pakistan.”
Military and intelligence
officials warn Franks that the two main Afghan commanders cannot be trusted.
This turns out to be correct, as the warlords accept bribes from al-Qaeda
leaders to let them escape." On 12/5/2001,
Brig. Gen. James N. Mattis "is convinced his forces can seal the Tora
Bora area to trap bin Laden there. Around this date, Mattis argues strongly
to his military superiors at Centcom that his troops should fight at Tora
Bora, but he is turned down."
Between December 8th - 14th, British
special forces
pursue Osama Bin Laden, and are reportedly "20 minutes behind" him but
are "pulled off to allow US troops to go in for the kill.” However, it takes
hours for the Americans to arrive, by which time bin Laden has escaped."
On
10/6/2008, it is
reported that "a team of elite Delta Force commandos was sent into
Afghanistan with an assignment to find and kill Osama bin Laden at Tora
Bora" but were stopped by U.S. officials. On 60 Minutes, the commando leader
is asked by Scott Pelley, "how often does Delta come up with a tactical plan
that's disapproved by higher headquarters?" His answer is "in my experience,
in my five years at Delta, never before."
Apparently, Cofer Black is
fired on 5/17/2002.
"Six anonymous US intelligence officials will claim
that, in fact, Black is removed by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
because Black publicly revealed details of the US military’s failure to
capture or kill bin Laden in Tora Bora, Afghanistan, in late 2001."
On
3/13/2002, Bush says,
"He’s a person who’s now been marginalized.… I just
don’t spend that much time on him.… I truly am not that concerned about
him.” Instead, Bush is "deeply concerned about Iraq.”
Fact #42
Over the years, there have been several reports indicating that Osama Bin
Laden is dead.
On 12/26/2001, Fox News
reported
that "Usama bin Laden has died a peaceful death due to an untreated lung
complication." On 1/18/2002, President Pervez Musharraf
says, "I think now, frankly, he is dead for the reason he is a ...
kidney patient."
On 7/18/2002, the FBI's counter-terroism chief Dale Watson
says, "I am
not really sure of the answer... I personally think he is probably not with
us anymore but I have no evidence to support that." On 10/7/2002, President
Hamid Karzai
says that Bin Laden is probably dead.
On 10/16/2002, Israeli
intelligence sources
report that
Osama is dead. On 10/23/2005, a Multan newspaper
reports that Osama Bin
Laden, "died four months ago in a village near Kandahar of severe illness."
On 3/15/2006, the Philadelphia Inquirer
reports
about a claim by then Rep. Curt Weldon that Osama Bin Laden died in Iran.
On
9/23/2006, it is
reported that "a French regional newspaper quoted a French secret
service report on Saturday as saying that Saudi Arabia is convinced that al
Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden died of typhoid in Pakistan last month."
President Chirac
said
this was "in no way whatsoever confirmed." Recently, former CIA official
Robert Baer
said
that he thinks Osama is dead.
On 6/30/2008, Time released an
article entitled, "Is Osama bin Laden Dying ... Again?"
Fact #43
Several of the alleged hijackers should not have been given visas. Between
April 3-7, 2001, three hijackers
are given visas to the United States through the US Consulate in Jeddah,
Saudi Arabia.
They are Nawaf Alhazmi, Salem Alhazmi, and Khalid Almihdar.
"Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi are already "al-Qaeda veterans" and
battle-hardened killers."
"All three men have indicators in their
passports marking them as Islamist radicals. These indicators are used
to track them by the Saudi authorities, but are apparently not noticed by
US officials."
According to
Michael Springmann, someone who was the head US consular official in
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia from Sept. 87 to March of 89, said that he was
"repeatedly ordered… to issue [more than 100] visas to unqualified
applicants."
"He later learns that recruits from many countries fighting for
bin Laden against Russia in Afghanistan were funneled through the Jeddah
office to get visas to come to the US, where the recruits would travel to
train for the Afghan war.
According to Springmann, the Jeddah consulate was
run by the CIA and staffed almost entirely by intelligence agents. This
visa system may have continued at least through 9/11, and 11 of the 19 9/11
hijackers received their visas through Jeddah."
Fact #44
Footnote 44 of the 9/11 Report states, "CIA cable,“ Activities of Bin Ladin
Associate Khalid Revealed,” Jan. 4, 2000. His Saudi passport—which contained
a visa for travel to the United States—was photocopied and forwarded to CIA
headquarters. This information was not shared with FBI headquarters until
August 2001.
An FBI agent detailed to the Bin Ladin unit at CIA
attempted to share this information with colleagues at FBI headquarters. A
CIA desk officer instructed him not to send the cable with this
information. Several hours later, this same desk officer drafted a cable
distributed solely within CIA alleging that the visa documents had been
shared with the FBI.
She admitted she did not personally share the
information and cannot identify who told her they had been shared. We
were unable to locate anyone who claimed to have shared the information.
Contemporaneous documents contradict the claim that they were shared. DOJ
Inspector General interview of Doug M., Feb. 12, 2004; DOJ Inspector General
interview of Michael, Oct. 31, 2002; CIA cable, Jan. 5, 2000; DOJ Inspector
General report,“ A Review of the FBI’s Handling of Intelligence Information
Related to the 9/11 Attacks,” July 2, 2004, p. 282."
9/11 Family Member
Kristen Breitweiser referred to George Tenet as,
"I failed to tell
the FBI for 18 months that two known al Qaeda killers were living in San
Diego and planning the 9/11 attacks."
Fact #45
NIST released a report about the collapse of building 7 that is in dispute.
Recently, the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH)
published comments critiquing NIST's report on building 7. The September
Eleventh Advocates
released a
statement that cleverly mocked their report.
There is an organization
known as Architects and Engineers for
9/11 Truth that disputes this report. A physics professor formerly of
Brigham Young University named Steven E. Jones, a whistleblower from
Underwriters Laboratories named Kevin Ryan, and several others belong to a
group called Scholars For 9/11 Truth & Justice
that have written several critiques of NIST's reports from over the years
that have been published.
NIST's questionable report on building 7 caused
people that were once
on the
fence regarding the collapse of those buildings on 9/11, to think that
those advocating something different than NIST's conclusions, responsibly, might be right.
Fact #46
After the 9/11 attacks, George Bush's popularity ratings soared to
record numbers. On 9/18/2001, the Washington Post
reported
that,
"the country has rallied to the president's side. Even those who
wished for a little more eloquence from him did not want to hear a word
against him."
Ask any journalist who raised questions about his initial
handling of the crisis: They have been inundated with furious calls
calling them a disgrace to their profession and even traitors. Congress
is well aware that George Bush has become a colossus, surpassing his
father's 90 percent approval rating after the Persian Gulf War.
Congress
has been more than satisfied with a supporting role in the wake of
the horror. On Tuesday night members convened and sang "God Bless America"
and pledged allegiance to Bush. Democratic consternation and
misgivings have been expressed behind the scenes.
When Bush requested
blanket authority for retaliation, some remembered the Gulf of Tonkin
resolution, which they unwarily gave to Lyndon Johnson during Vietnam and
came to regret. They said the president's current powers give him all the
authority he needed to punish the authors of the obscene attacks.
But, as
one Democrat said disconsolately, "No one wants to say no to Bush now."
Fact #47
The Moussaoui Trial had a lot of problems, and revealed a lot of
information.
On 3/7/2006, the Associated Press
reported that,
"a defense lawyer got FBI agent Michael Anticev to admit
that the FBI was aware years before Nine-Eleven that al Qaida planned to
slam planes into prominent buildings."
On 3/13/2006, AP
reports that,
"an angry federal judge unexpectedly recessed the death
penalty trial of al Qaeda conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui to consider whether
government violations of her rules against coaching witnesses should
remove the death penalty as an option."
Another AP
report cites that a,
"government lawyer who has jeopardized the
prosecution of al-Qaida conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui used a transcript of
the first day of the trial to try to shape future testimony to meet or
deflect possible defense attacks, court documents indicate." [...]
"Arguing
that Martin's e-mails tainted three government and four defense witnesses
beyond repair, the defense has asked the judge to dismiss the
government's bid to execute Moussaoui, the only person charged in this
country in connection with al-Qaida's Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World
Trade Center and the Pentagon."
This "outraged"
the families.
"I was really horrified and very outraged to hear that this
type of mistake was made," Regenhard said.
"This is probably one of
the most important trials in the history of this country — how someone could
put that at risk. She betrayed the families of the victims who certainly
have been waiting nearly five long years to get some kind of scintilla of
justice."
On 3/15/2006, the Washington Post
reports that,
"U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema decided yesterday to exclude all aviation security evidence after Martin violated a court
order by e-mailing trial transcripts to seven witnesses and coaching them
about their upcoming testimony." [...]
"I am furious," said
Rosemary Dillard, whose husband, Eddie, was killed on the plane that was
hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon.
"Aviation is a big part of this
case. Aviation is what killed our loved ones. It was planes. You take
aviation out . . . where do they go from here?" [...] "How are we
supposed to get any new information now?" said Fiona Havlish, formerly
of Buck County, Pa., whose husband was killed at the World Trade Center.
"I
think what all of us are looking for is the truth, and the truth has not
been forthcoming out of Washington. I mean, I can only speak for myself, but
I do not feel that the truth has come out no matter how hard we as family
members have tried. And this was just one more avenue to find a particle of
truth, and that is being thwarted." [...]
"Some wondered whether she was
being used as a scapegoat for other government officials who did not want
the aviation security evidence to be made public." [...]
"I don't think she
is alone," Dillard said in a telephone interview last night.
"I just don't
think she could have gotten away with that. Somebody helped her or prompted
her. It just makes me wonder whether this is one more thing where no one is
going to be held accountable. . . . It's almost too clean. I wonder if there
is more to the story than we know." [...]
"I felt the government wasn't
telling us all that it knew, and I do know that feeling is shared in the
Massachusetts circle of families within which I travel," said Blake Allison,
of Hanover, N.H., whose wife, Anna Allison, was killed on American Airlines
Flight 11.
"We talked about this the first day of the trial, the hope that
the trial would bring some clarity to some of the circumstances leading up
to 9/11."
On 3/15/2006, the Sunday Times
reports more about 9/11 Family Member Rosemary Dillard's anger about
what happened.
"I felt like my heart had been ripped out," said
Rosemary Dillard, whose husband Eddie was killed aboard the plane that
crashed into the Pentagon. "I felt like my husband had been killed again.
I felt like the Government had let me down again." [...]
"I don't
think in the annals of criminal law there has ever been a case with this
many significant problems," said Judge Brinkema, who considered
abandoning the trial altogether but eventually decided to adjourn it until
Monday." [...]
"The missing testimony was expected to deal with how much
the Federal Aviation Administration already knew about possible terror
threats to airlines prior to 9/11, and what security measures were in place."
On 3/16/2006, MSNBC
reports that,
"the lawyer whose coaching of witnesses in the death
penalty case of Zacarias Moussaoui caused his trial to be halted was placed
on administrative leave from her job, the Transportation Security
Administration said Thursday."
On 3/17/2006, AP
reports that,
"the judge has issued a written order that says prosecutors
can present exhibits and a witness or witnesses if they are untainted by
contact with Transportation Security Administration lawyer Carla Martin."
On 3/20/2006, Reuters
reports that "an FBI agent testified in the sentencing trial of
September 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui on Monday that agency
superiors repeatedly blocked his efforts to warn of a possible terror attack.
Harry Samit, the FBI agent who arrested Moussaoui three weeks before the
deadly airliner hijackings that killed 3,000 people, said he tried to
tell his superiors that he thought a hijacking plan might be in the works.
"You tried to move heaven and earth to get a search warrant to search this
man's belongings. You were obstructed," defense attorney Edward
MacMahon said as the trial resumed after a week's delay over improper
witness coaching. "From a particular individual in the (FBI's) Radical
Fundamentalist Unit, yes sir, I was obstructed," Samit said."
Forbes
reports that "MacMahon (Moussaoui defense attorney) introduced an Aug.
31 letter Samit drafted "to advise the FAA of a potential threat to
security of commercial aircraft" from whomever Moussaoui was conspiring
with. But Maltbie barred him from sending it to FAA headquarters, saying he
would handle that, Samit testified. The agent added that he did tell FAA
officials in Minneapolis of his suspicions."
On 3/25/2006, the Washington
Post reports that the families hope for answers at the Moussaoui Trial is "unfulfilled."
Fact #48
On 9/25/2006, former 9/11 Commission
Richard Ben Veniste
makes public knowledge a deal within the 9/11 Commission to keep Bush,
Cheney, and Clinton's testimony classified until 2009.
"BLITZER: Now, I read
this report, the 9/11 Commission report. This is a big, thick book. I don't
see anything and I don't remember seeing anything about this exchange that
you had with the president in this report.
BEN-VENISTE: Well, I had hoped
that we had -- we would have made both the Clinton interview and the Bush
interview a part of our report, but that was not to be. I was outvoted on
that question.
BLITZER: Why?
BEN-VENISTE: I didn't have the votes.
BLITZER: Well, was - were the Republican members trying to protect the
president and the vice president? Is that what your suspicion is?
BEN-VENISTE: I think the question was that there was a degree of
confidentiality associated with that and that we would take from that the
output that is reflected in the report, but go no further. And that until
some five years' time after our work, we would keep that confidential. I
thought we would be better to make all of the information that we had
available to the public and make our report as transparent as possible so
that the American public could have that."
Fact #49
In the fall of 2003, former National Security Advisor to President Clinton,
Sandy Berger,
"removed classified documents from the National
Archives, hid them under a construction trailer and later tried to find the
trash collector to retrieve them, the agency’s internal watchdog said
Wednesday.” [...]
“Berger took the documents in the fall of 2003 while
working to prepare himself and Clinton administration witnesses for
testimony to the Sept. 11 commission. Berger was authorized as the Clinton
administration’s representative to make sure the commission got the correct
classified materials.”
On 4/1/2005, it was
reported that Berger “pleaded guilty yesterday to pilfering
classified documents from the National Archives, saying he showed “very
poor judgment” and that his actions were “wrong.”
On 1/9/2007, Fox News
reports that,
“some classified documents that were unlawfully removed
from the National Archives three years ago may never have reached their
intended destination — the Sept. 11 commission, a House Republican
report concluded Tuesday.” [...]
“Released by Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., the
report said Berger could have taken White House staff working papers that
never were inventoried by the archives. In that case, nobody would know they
were gone, the report said.”
Fact #50
Several companies friendly to the Bush Administration as well as others, and
several partners in the "War On Terror" have
benefitted from the
9/11 attacks. A long time ago at the
2004 9/11 People's Commission, I asked ex-CIA Analyst Ray McGovern what
he thought could be the
possible motives (Quicktime
required) for doing something as horrible as 9/11.
He mentioned an acronym
for "O.I.L." that he created. “O for oil, I for Israel, and L for the
logistical bases necessary to exert (inaudible) military capability in that
part of the world.” Before he answered my question, he spoke of the PNAC’s
dream of invading Iraq.
He spoke of eliminating any possible threat to the
state of Israel. He spoke of what were considered then to be 14 permanent
military bases in Iraq, and so on. Since 9/11, oil companies like
Exxon,
Shell, and
Chevron have made massive fortunes.
On 6/20/2008, the Guardian
reported that,
"Iraq is preparing to allow four of the biggest western
oil companies to renew exploitation of the country's vast reserves for
the first time in almost four decades. Iraq's oil ministry stepped up
talks with BP, Exxon Mobil, Shell and Total after the US vice-president,
Dick Cheney, visited Iraq in March, where he also pressed the government
to revive efforts to pass the hydrocarbon law that nationalist MPs were
blocking. The first contracts are expected to be signed this month. Some 90%
of Iraq's budget comes from oil revenues."
Companies like
Bechtel and
Halliburton have made fortunes because of the "War On Terror." Granted,
like most companies, they have lost some of those fortunes within the last
two months. Since 9/11, the Bush Administration have made repeated claims
that they will protect Israel.
On 1/26/2006, the Mail & Guardian
reports that Bush has committed to the "defense of Israel."
On 2/1/2006,
Reuters
reports that Bush says the U.S. would defend Israel against Iran.
On
5/23/2006, CNN
reports that Bush promises to protect Israel if attacked by Iran. On
1/7/2008, AFP
reports that Bush promises again to protect Israel if attacked by Iran.
Haaretz reported about a
possible pipeline of oil going from Iraq to Israel.
On 5/24/2007, the
Daily India
reports that "a new study released by the Centre for Public Integrity, a
non-profit organisation based in Washington, has said that Pakistan has
been the largest recipient of anti-terror funds in the four years after 9/11."
On 5/30/2007, publicintegrity.org reported that most of the money Pakistan
received "came through a Defense Department program subject to virtually
no congressional oversight." According to
Spencer Ackerman, a lot of the money came in the form of "untraceable
cash transfers." Both Pakistan and Israel are considered partners in the
"War On Terror."
If we're not staying in Iraq, we sure have a
massive U.S. embassy, "the largest of its kind in the world, the size of
Vatican City, with the population of a small town, its own defense force,
self-contained power and water, and a precarious perch at the heart of
Iraq's turbulent future."
According to
Wiki, Ray
McGovern,
"was a mid-level officer in the CIA in the 1960s where his focus
was analysis of Soviet policy toward Vietnam. McGovern was one of President
Ronald Reagan's intelligence briefers from 1981-85; he was in charge of
preparing daily security briefs for Reagan, Vice President George H.W. Bush,
the National Security Advisor, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Cabinet.
Later, McGovern was one of several senior CIA analysts who prepared the
President's Daily Brief (PDB) during the first Bush administration."
It
seems to me that he knows what he's talking about.
