Pakistan's ISI and The Secret Cult of 9-11 -- Signs of the Times News

Pakistan's ISI and The Secret Cult of 9-11 -- Signs of the Times News: "http://www.sott.net/articles/show/212953-Pakistan-s-ISI-and-The-Secret-Cult-of-9-11"

House rejects bill to aid sick 9/11 responders

submitted by Mekt_Ranzz on fri, 07/30/2010 - 12:22am

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100730/ap_on_re_us/us_attacks_health

By ANDREW MIGA and DAVID B. CARUSO, Associated Press Writers Andrew Miga And David B. Caruso, Associated Press Writers

WASHINGTON – A bill that would have provided up to $7.4 billion in aid to people sickened by World Trade Center dust fell short in the House on Thursday, raising the possibility that the bulk of compensation for the ill will come from a legal settlement hammered out in the federal courts.

The bill would have provided free health care and compensation payments to 9/11 rescue and recovery workers who fell ill after working in the trade center ruins.

It failed to win the needed two-thirds majority, 255-159. The 

vote was largely along party lines, with 12 Republicans joining Democrats supporting the measure.

For weeks, a judge and teams of lawyers have been urging 10,000 former ground zero workers to sign on to a court-supervised settlement that would split $713 million among people who developed respiratory problems and other illnesses after inhaling trade center ash.

The court deal shares some similarities with the aid program that the federal legislation would have created, but it involves far less money. Only the most seriously ill of the thousands of police officers, firefighters and construction workers suing New York City over their exposure to the dust would be eligible for a hefty payout.

But supporters of the deal have been saying the court settlement is the only realistic option for the sick, because Congress will never act.

"Ladies and gentlemen, you can wait and wait and wait for that legislation ... it's not passing," Kenneth Feinberg, the former special master of the federal 9/11 victim compensation fund, told an audience of ground zero responders Monday in a meeting on Staten Island.

Democratic leaders opted to consider the House bill under a procedure that requires a two-thirds vote for approval rather than a simple majority. Such a move blocked potential GOP amendments to the measure.

A key backer of the bill, U.S. Rep. Peter King, a Long Island Republican, accused Democrats of staging a "charade."

King said Democrats were "petrified" about casting votes as the fall elections near on controversial amendments, possibly including one that could ban the bill from covering illegal immigrants who were sickened by trade center dust.

If Democrats brought it to the floor as a regular bill, King said, it would have passed with majority support.

GOP critics branded the bill as yet another big-government "massive new entitlement program" that would have increased taxes and possibly kill jobs.

To pay the bill's estimated $7.4 billion cost over 10 years, the legislation would have prevented foreign multinational corporations incorporated in tax haven countries from avoiding tax on income earned in the U.S.

Bill supporters said that would close a tax loophole. Republicans branded it a corporate tax increase.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg called the vote an "outrage." He said it was clearly a tactic designed to stall the bill.

"This is a way to avoid having to make a tough decision," Bloomberg said, adding that the nation owes more to "the people who worked down at 9/11 whose health has fallen apart because they did what America wanted them to do."

John Feal, a ground zero demolition worker who has lobbied extensively for the legislation, expressed disgust.

"They pulled the rug out from beneath our feet," Feal said. "Whatever member of Congress vote against this bill, whether Republican or Democrat, should go to jail for manslaughter."

The bill would have provided up to $3.2 billion to cover the medical treatment of people sickened by trade center dust and an additional $4.2 billion for a new fund that would have compensated them for their suffering and lost wages.

The potential promise of a substantial payout from the federal government had caused some ground zero workers to balk at participating in the proposed legal settlement, which would resolve as many as 10,000 lawsuits against the city.

Initially, the bill would have prohibited people from participating in the new federal compensation program if they had already been compensated for their injuries through a lawsuit, but a change was made in recent days eliminating that restriction.

Nevertheless, with the House rejecting the bill and no vote scheduled on a similar Senate version, it appears almost guaranteed that there will be no new federal law by Sept. 8, the date by which ground zero workers involved in the lawsuits must decide whether to accept the settlement offer.

Under the terms of the deal, 95 percent of those workers must say yes for the court settlement to take effect.

The compensation system set up by the court would make payments ranging from $3,250 for people who aren't sick but worry they could fall ill in the future to as much as $1.5 million to the families of people who have died. Nonsmokers disabled by severe asthma might get between $800,000 and $1 million.

About 25 percent of the money would go to pay legal fees. Contested claims would be heard by Feinberg, who would act as an appeals officer.

Researchers have found that thousands of New Yorkers exposed to trade center dust are now suffering from breathing difficulties similar to asthma. Many have also complained of heartburn or acid reflux, and studies have shown that firefighters who worked on the debris pile suffer from elevated levels of sarcoidosis, an inflammatory disease.

Many of the workers also fear that the dust is giving people cancer, although scientific studies have failed to find evidence of such a link.

The exact number of sick is unclear. Nearly 15,900 people received treatment last year through medical programs set up to treat Sept. 11-related illnesses, but doctors say many of those people suffered from conditions that are common in the general public.

The House bill is named for James Zadroga, a police detective who died at age 34. His supporters say he died from respiratory disease contracted at ground zero, but New York City's medical examiner said Zadroga's lung condition was caused by prescription drug abuse.

Baby Say That Again

New Evidence Of WTC Thermite Presence On 9/11?

Contained within the 2008 History Channel documentary "102 Minutes That Changed America" is video depicting what appears to be molten material within World Trade Center tower 2 on September 11, 2001, similar to other molten material filmed nearby. Molten iron is a product of thermitic reactions.





Previously recorded molten material originating from within the northeast corner of the 80th floor of WTC 2 moments before its collapse:

Source of 23.7 Trillion Bailout Cost? SIGTARP Report Summary

Dylan Ratigan is one of the few, if not only, main stream news reporters that attempts to tell the whole story – in all their the ugly and painful details.  Here is an MSNBC clip of Ratigan going off on what he calls the $23.7 trillion bailout.  Dylan is absolutely right that the TARP program is a mere drop in the bucket compared to the overall bailout.  But unfortunately, he does not go into enough details or even provide sources for the $23.7 trillion figure.

So where does the $23.7 trillion figure come from? SIGTARP, an oversight commission created at the same time as TARP, produced quarterly reports that present a much more detailed view of the financial sector handouts bailout program.  The July 2009 Sigtarp report contains the $23.7 trillion figure, as shown in the graphic below.

It’s called “Total potential support” because not all of the money has actually been spent.  Much of the potential costs are associated to government guarantees for financial system transactions, which according to the financial institutions, are backed by a pile of worthless paper “assets”.

Two additional SIGTARP quarterly reports have been released since the July report with the $23.7 trillion reference.  True to government form, there is not much consistency in the look and feel of these average 250 page reports.  The section which contained the $23.7 trillion figure – “TARP in context with other programs”- has been removed from subsequent reports.  It’s likely still possible to extract the new figure with a painstaking comb through of the report.  My hunch is that this was intentional.  SIGTARP and the government agencies that created it do not want the true cost of the financial bailout known, or at least not easily known.

Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act, bill to help responders, may die

submitted by Orangutan. on wed, 07/28/2010 - 10:23pm via 911 blogger

• First Responders

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/07/28/2010-07-28_911_bill_...
BY Michael Mcauliff
DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU
Wednesday, July 28th 2010

 

WASHINGTON - The House votes Wednesday or Thursday for the first time ever on a bill to care for the heroes and victims of Sept. 11, 2001 - and it's likely to fail.

That's because Democratic House leaders decided Tuesday to push ahead with the Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act under a rule that requires two-thirds approval to pass.

Many Republicans are concerned about the $10.5 billion price tag, and many don't like the way it's paid for.

News of the scheme immediately alarmed 9/11 responders.

"Whoever votes 'No' tomorrow should go to jail for manslaughter," said John Feal, who lost half his foot at Ground Zero in the cleanup.

Feal thinks House leaders should have found a way to move the bill in the regular way, needing just a simple majority.

"They'll all go home and lick their wounds after the vote, but 9/11 responders are the ones who are going to suffer without health care after nine years," Feal said.

Sources told the Daily News that Democrats feared Republicans would attach toxic changes in a simple majority vote. No such tinkering is allowed under the two-thirds rule.

New York's legislators were still holding out hope they would prevail.

"Every time we had a vote on this, we did much better than people thought," said Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-Brooklyn/Queens).

And Republicans who oppose the bill can be cast in a politically poisonous light, Democrats said, noting the measure is paid for by closing tax loopholes on subsidiaries of foreign companies.

"Either they stand to protect foreign corporations who are avoiding U.S. taxes, or they are going to stand to protect those who stood in protection of us on 9/11," said Rep. Joe Crowley (D-Queens).

"Do they want to stand up for the heroes of 9/11 or do they want to vote for tax evasion?" asked Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-Manhattan).

In a painful irony, the decision to use an odd procedure came as Congress was voting to fund the war in Afghanistan, and add it to the debt.

"What I think is tragic is that we're funding wars that came out of 9/11, yet we're not taking care of the men and women who risked their lives," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan).

She and Nadler predicted if the measure fails, they will bring it back after the August recess. "We're playing to win, but if we don't we're building momentum," Maloney said.

mmcauliff@nydailynews.com

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/07/28/2010-07-28_911_bill_in_trouble.html#ixzz0v2PDYWFN

Fox legal analyst: Bush should have been indicted

By David Edwards
Monday, July 12th, 2010RawStory.com

Fox News' senior judicial analyst made some surprising remarks Saturday that may go against the grain at his conservative network.

In a interview with Ralph Nader on C-SPAN's Book TV to promote his book Lies the Government Told You, Judge Andrew Napolitano said that President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney should have been indicted for "torturing, for spying, for arresting without warrant."

The judge believes that it is a fallacy to say that the US treats suspects as innocent until proven guilty. "The government acts as if a defendant is guilty merely on the basis of an accusation," said Napolitano.

Nader was curious about how this applied to the Bush administration. "What about the more serious violations of habeas corpus," wondered Nader. "You know after 9/11 Bush rounded up thousands of them, Americans, many of them Muslim Americans or Arabic Americans and they were thrown in jail without charges. They didn't have lawyers. Some of them were pretty mistreated in New York City. You know they were all released eventually."

"Well that is so obviously a violation of the natural law, the natural right to be brought before a neutral arbiter within moments of the government taking your freedom away from you," answered Napolitano.

"So what President Bush did with the suspension of habeas corpus, with the whole concept of Guantanamo Bay, with the whole idea that he could avoid and evade federal laws, treaties, federal judges and the Constitution was blatantly unconstitutional and is some cases criminal," he continued.

"What should be the sanctions [for Bush and Cheney]?" asked Nader.

"They should have been indicted. They absolutely should have been indicted for torturing, for spying, for arresting without warrant," said Napolitano.

"I'd like to say they should be indicted for lying but believe it or not, unless you're under oath, lying is not a crime. At least not an indictable crime. It's a moral crime," he said.

This isn't the first time that Napolitano's comments have veered away from the standard talking points at Fox News. He has predicted that Arizona's controversial immigration law will be blocked by the court. Napolitano also said Arizona's governor would "bankrupt the Republican Party" fighting for the law.

The liberal blog Crooks and Liars has more details on the Nader/Napolitano interview.

This video is from C-SPAN's Book TV, broadcast July 10, 2010.

British Attorney General to investigate ex-KGB agent's claim that David Kelly was 'exterminated' by MI6

MI6 HQ in London

A former Russian spy's dossier which suggests that Government scientist David Kelly was 'exterminated' in a planned assassination is being studied by the Attorney General.

Boris Karpichkov, who fled to Britain after 15 years as a KGB agent, claims a London intelligence contractor linked to MI5 told him Dr Kelly's death was not suicide.

Mr Karpichkov has emailed his evidence to Attorney General Dominic Grieve - who has already said he is 'concerned' by questions raised by doctors who dispute the official suicide ruling over the Iraq expert's death.

Last night a spokesman for Mr Grieve confirmed that the dossier had been received, and that it was being 'considered'.

Dr Kelly's body was discovered in woods close to his Oxfordshire home in July 2003.

Tony Blair's Labour Government had controversially unmasked him as the source of a hotly-disputed BBC news story that claimed a dossier used to justify the war on Iraq had been 'sexed up'.

Lord Hutton's public inquiry ruled that Dr Kelly killed himself, but since the ousting of Labour in May there has been growing pressure from within the coalition Government for a new independent inquiry.

© Unknown
KGB claim: Boris Karpichkov had worked as a Russian spy for 15 years before fleeing to Britain 

A group of doctors have claimed Dr Kelly could not have died as a result of cutting his left wrist with a blunt garden pruning knife, and it has emerged that his death certificate was left incomplete.

There is also outrage at the fact that full details of his postmortem examination are to be kept secret for 70 years, and that no inquest took place.

Campaigners also note that on the morning of his death Dr Kelly sent an email warning of 'many dark actors playing games'.

The new allegations from Mr Karpichkov suggest directly that the 'dark actors' could have been British secret agents determined to silence Dr Kelly before he could embarrass the Government.

The former Russian spy, who defected from Latvia to Britain in 1998, says the source of his dossier is 'agent' Peter Everett, who lives in Dulwich, South-East London, and until 2006 ran a shadowy firm, Group Global Intelligence Services.

The firm is understood to have employed former MI5 operatives to carry out detective work for corporations.

© Unknown
Claims: Karpichkov identified this man as MI5 agent Peter Everett

Mr Karpichkov, who now holds a British passport, claims in his dossier that he worked for Mr Everett too, and that one of their dozens of meetings took place two days after Dr Kelly's body was found.

Mr Everett told him, the former KGB man claims, that Dr Kelly had been ' exterminated' for his ' reckless behaviour'.

Mr Karpichkov says Mr Everett suggested he was himself an 'active field operative' for MI5, and continues: 'He told me that it was extremely uncomfortable, inconsistent and unusual for Dr Kelly to slash his arm in the way he did. He would have lost some blood, but it would not have been fatal.

'He also claimed that it was not a coincidence that Special Branch officers were the ones who first appeared on the scene. They moved Dr Kelly's body to another location, changed the original position of his corpse and took away incriminating evidence.

'He added that the scene where Dr Kelly's body was found was carefully arranged and completely "washed out", including the destruction of all fingerprints.
'When I asked who was behind his death, he [Mr Everett] answered indirectly, saying the "competing firm", which I took to mean MI6.'

At the weekend, Mr Everett confirmed that he had met Mr Karpichkov, and that he had discussed Dr Kelly's death. But he denied being party to any secrets about the incident. 

© Unknown

He refused to comment on whether he had ever worked for MI5, but agreed he had 'spent a number of years working in the world of intelligence'.

Mr Karpichkov's dossier comes on top of a claim by Dr Kelly's colleague Mai Pedersen that the chemical warfare expert had been too weak to slash his own wrist.

Blix: U.S. was 'high on military' over Iraq

By Melissa Gray, CNN

July 27, 2010 -- Updated 1550 GMT (2350 HKT)

Hans Blix said the U.S. "thought it could get away with" invading Iraq.

The United States had discounted Blix's reports that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and insisted those programs were simply being concealed. After the invasion, Iraq was found to have dismantled its weapons programs years before.London, England (CNN) -- Hans Blix, the former chief United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq, was testifying Tuesday before Britain's inquiry into the Iraq war.

Blix, the Swedish diplomat who led the effort to find Iraq's suspected nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons programs before the 2003 invasion, has criticized the United States and Britain for launching the war in the absence of evidence.

"I think the U.S. at the time was high on military," Blix told the inquiry. "They felt that they could get away with it (an invasion), and therefore it was decided they would do so."

Blix said he was personally suspicious of Iraq in the build-up to the war, noting, for example, that the country imported uranium. He said he did not mention those suspicions in his official role.

Blix told CNN in 2004 that he began having doubts about the quality of intelligence information from the United States and other countries in January 2003 -- two months before the war -- after his inspectors failed to find any weapons at sites that had been searched based on that information.

Blix said he believed the United States relied too much on Iraqi defectors to provide intelligence on Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. The defectors were only interested in the liberation of Iraq, he said.

Since the war, Blix has written two books on Iraq and most recently chaired the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, which examined how international cooperation could reduce the threat from WMDs.

The Iraq Inquiry, which started last year, is headed by an independent panel led by longtime civil servant John Chilcot.

Its goal is to establish what happened before and during the war and identify any lessons that can be learned from the conflict.

The inquiry is examining the period starting from the summer of 2001 until the launch of the military operation in 2003, and up to the present day.

Mainstream Media Implodes on 9/11 along with WTC 7

Written by Dwain Deets

TV Coverage of Remarkable Building Collapse Analyzed The shocking collapse of the 47-story World Trade Center Building 7 on 9/11 causedgreat alarm, not only in the architectural and engineering community (among those who have become aware of it) but with mainstream media – right from day one.  While Dan Rather’s commentary on the remarkable collapse (that it looked  like it was knocked down by well placed dynamite) is more often quoted, Peter Jennings also had similar thoughts as he reflected on the shocking 47-story collapse shortly after the event. Jennings showed the building coming down in slow motion. As he reflected on the enormity of it he said, “Well, there’s Building 7 coming down. When you think that part of the component of news coverage around the country every year is the excitement, the fun, that people get watching an old building being demolished, and they wire it very carefully for days. It’s a very careful operation in order to make sure a building comes down safely. I think the last one we saw was when they brought down one of the old casinos in Las Vegas. It’s just stunning to see these buildings come down...and now, number seven World Trade Center which is 47 stories tall.” A valuable resource on the web is a collection of network TV broadcasts archived from the day of September 11, 2001, plus the two following days. Drawing from those records of the first evening, those time periods when the collapse of Building 7 is discussed can be categorized by the time they were aired, the length of time for the commentary, and the degree to which the commentary contains some reflection suggesting some extraordinary magnitude of force involved in the event. When viewed across all of the major networks, there appears to be a rather quick transition to the point where it isn’t mentioned at all. Some would say that this probably was because of the enormity of the other events of the day – and that a collapse of a building such as WTC 7, even as enormous as it was, did not command the news interest.  Also, apparently, no lives were lost. The following analysis suggests more reason to be suspicious.  As an aid in comparing the various commentaries from the different networks, the following timeline shows three stages of transition between reflective commentary, and no commentary at all.1 Mainstream media transitioned through three stages of information quality in record time. 1: More time taken, plus some reflection other than just saying no one was in the building. 2: Short, less than 20 seconds, or with no reflective comments. 3: No mention of collapse at all. Stage 1 DR: Dan Rather -- "For the third time today, it's reminiscent of those pictures we've all seen too much... when a building was deliberately destroyed by well-placed dynamite to knock it down." Dan Rather coverage of Building 7 collapse is here. PJ: Peter Jennings – (see commentary earlier in this article.) AB2 & MM: Aaron Brown & Maureen Madden -- "The whole south side of the building was engulfed in flames, at one time. They had been waiting for it to come down for the past half hour or so. At least they had some warning." Stage 2 DS: Diane Sawyer – "As you know, within the hour, another building came down, a 47-story building." AB1: Ashleigh Banfield – "Those people [tenants in Building 7] had all been cleared out of those buildings as soon as the first plane hit the WTC this morning. They were just waiting for that building to go down." PH: Philip Hayton -- Shows collapse video. "Supposedly has been weakened because it was so close to the other buildings. Presumably, they were able to evacuate everyone." ML & TN: Mike Landess & Tracey Neale – Shows Video of collapse. Landess says, "The information we have - this building was probably incredibly structurally damaged by the goings on right next door." Neale follows, "It is another building at the World Trade Center itself, number seven, World Trade Center. It had been evacuated this morning. So, structural damage probably led to this building coming down." SP: Scott Pelley – "Thru the day, an inferno raged in Building 7, another massive office tower. Fire fighters feared it would collapse. And, a little more than 8 hours after the attack, the abandoned building fell." DS-Int.: Diane Sawyer interviewed a volunteer from California (J.D. Halperim) reporting from near the WTC 7 collapse. "Well, at Building Seven, there was no fire there, whatsoever. There was one truck putting water on the building. But then, it collapsed completely CG: Charlie Gipson -- One wrap-up sentence - "And then, at 5:20 PM, still another building collapses -- Seven World Trade Center." In reflection on these widely divergent and short-lived commentaries, it is probably not unreasonable that the collapse of Building 7 quickly became a minor part of the overall day’s events. What is troubling though occurred over the months and years following, when significant findings by architects, engineers, and others, that should have raised serious and troubling questions about this event, did not break into the news. Yet, the “Stage 3” phenomena of silence on the subject of the collapse, in the face of overwhelming and explosive evidence that was amply provided to every mainstream media outlet, continued on indefinitely.  The mainstream media silence is deafening. 1 http://7problemswithbuilding7.info/detail-mainstrea.html

Ex-Malaysian premier still says 9/11 inside job

Press Tv


Sat, 23 Jan 2010 12:56:06 GMT
Malaysia's Mahathir Mohamad has once again stated that the September 11 attacks were a staged event, rejecting claims that his comments are a publicity stunt.




“What do I gain from a publicity stunt? I am merely going by a public statement. I am not going to be a Prime Minister anymore unless you (pointing to a journalist) want me to ...” the former Malaysian prime minister told reporters on Friday.

After watching a three-hour video of the attack on the World Trade Center buildings, Mohamad, had suggested earlier in his blog that the twin towers had collapsed “demolition style.”

Later on Friday, Mahathir also called on local television stations to show the three-hour video.

"It sounds logical to me. Until today, you cannot even find scraps of the plane that crashed into the World Trade Centre and there is no picture of the other plane, which was supposed to crash.”

"The way the tower came crashing down was also funny. People who saw it were also not ordinary people. They were professional engineers and what they say is quite credible.”

"I wish some television stations would consent to show the video as it is not long and only three hours. You can then see what I saw."

Mahathir also said some people were afraid of saying anything critical about the governments of powerful countries or accusing them of doing something wrong.

"But the government of powerful countries said lies to go to war,” he added

"I have great respect for the Arabs but for them to hijack four planes is not very Arab. Just imagine the amount of planning that would be involved."

Rejecting claims that he was being insensitive to the victims, Mahathir stressed that he was "being more sensitive to the victims" as he was saying the attacks were carried out "deliberately.”

The former Malaysian prime minister also said that his views about how 9/11/2001 attacks were carried out would not affect Malaysia's chances of attracting foreign investment.

"I have said this many times even when I was the prime minister. But we still have the foreign direct investment. However, we cannot rely on foreign direct investments alone. We must build on our own system," he said.

Mahathir made the comments at a debut held for a book titledCivilizations, Nomadic Migrations, Empires and The Trail of Islam, at the Islamic Arts Museum in Kuala Lumpur.

The book which entails the history of mankind, origin and commonality of major religions, is authored by Syed Salem Albukhary.

MJ/HGH/MMN

RT Analyst: 'WikiLeaks story soft, coverage a 9/11-like lie'

NORAD Exercise a Year Before 9/11 Simulated a Pilot Trying to Crash a Plane into a New York Skyscraper--The UN Headquarters

submitted by Shoestring on tue, 07/27/2010 - 9:40am

• military exercises
 
• NORAD

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) held a major training exercise in October 2000 that included the scenario of a person stealing a large jet plane, which they planned to crash into the United Nations headquarters building--a 39-story high-rise in New York, just a few miles away from the World Trade Center. Furthermore, a NORAD exercise in June that year included one scenario in which a plane was hijacked with the intention of crashing it into the White House, and another in which a transcontinental flight was hijacked with the intention of crashing the plane into the Statue of Liberty, only a short distance from where the WTC stood.

The existence of these exercise scenarios was revealed in August 2004 by General Richard Myers, at that time the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, during a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Senator Mark Dayton (D-MN) asked, "Did NORAD"-- the military organization responsible for defending U.S. airspace--"conduct exercises or develop scenarios, prior to September 11, 2001, to test a military reaction to an aircraft hijacking which appeared destined to result in a suicide crash into a high-value target?" In response, Myers outlined "five exercise hijack events" that NORAD had practiced for between November 1999 and October 2000, which all "included a suicide crash into a high-value target." [1] Yet the details of these chilling scenarios, which were like premonitions of the attacks on New York and Washington that lay ahead, failed to receive the public attention they deserved.

OCTOBER 2000 SCENARIO: STOLEN PLANE TARGETS UN BUILDING
The scenario that included an attempt to crash a plane into the UN headquarters was practiced for twice--on October 16 and October 23, 2000--as part of an exercise called Vigilant Guardian. This annual exercise was conducted by NORAD, and all of the organization, including its headquarters and its three air defense sectors in the continental United States, participated. [2]

The scenario practiced for on October 16 was that, "Due to recent arrests involving illegal drug trafficking in Maine, an individual steals a Federal Express plane and plans a suicide attack into the United Nations building in New York City." The October 23 scenario, according to Myers's summary, was almost identical. It was based around "weapons of mass destruction directed at the United Nations," and in it, "an individual steals a Federal Express aircraft and plans a suicide attack on the United Nations building in New York City." [3] (At the time of this exercise, Federal Express was flying mostly the MD-11 and the DC-10, both large jet aircraft. Presumably one of those planes was the type considered in the scenarios. [4])

The next Vigilant Guardian--for the year 2001--was actually being conducted at the time the 9/11 attacks occurred. [5] One can only imagine what NORAD personnel must have thought when the real-world events of September 11 so closely resembled a scenario they had encountered in the previous instance of that day's exercise--a suicide pilot trying to crash a large jet plane into a New York skyscraper.

JUNE 2000 SCENARIOS: HIJACKERS PLAN TO CRASH PLANES INTO WHITE HOUSE AND STATUE OF LIBERTY
On June 5, 2000, the Continental United States NORAD Region (CONR) was conducting an exercise called Falcon Indian, in which its three air defense sectors in the continental U.S. took part. [6] Two scenarios were practiced for that day in which hijackers planned to crash an aircraft into a well-known, "high-value" target in New York or Washington.

One scenario involved a Learjet being hijacked, and "maintaining tight formation with [a] Canadair airliner, loaded with explosives," according to Myers's summary. (It is unclear from that summary whether it was the Learjet or the Canadair plane that had explosives on board.) The hijackers "planned to crash" the Learjet "into the White House." In the other scenario, a "Communist Party faction" hijacked an aircraft bound from the western to the eastern United States. The hijackers had "high explosives on board," and intended "to crash into the Statue of Liberty." [7]

NOVEMBER 1999 SCENARIO: TERRORISTS PLAN TO CRASH HIJACKED PLANE INTO UN BUILDING
The fifth scenario Myers described was from an earlier Falcon Indian, held in November 1999. Again, NORAD's three air defense sectors in the continental U.S. took part in the CONR exercise. And, again, the exercise included a scenario based around the hijacking of a transcontinental aircraft flying from the western to the eastern United States. In the simulation, a China Airlines plane bound from Los Angeles to JFK International Airport in New York was "hijacked east of Colorado Springs by five terrorists." If the plane was not intercepted by the U.S. military, the hijackers intended "to crash into [the] United Nations building." [8]

OTHER PRE-9/11 PLANE-INTO-BUILDING SCENARIOS

Just a few months before Richard Myers revealed the existence of these five exercise scenarios, USA Today and CNN reported that NORAD had conducted exercises in the years before 9/11 that simulated hijackers crashing aircraft into buildings in the United States. Some of the scenarios that had been practiced for were described. It is unclear whether any of them correspond with the five later outlined by Myers, although, from what has been reported, it appears they were separate scenarios, additional to those in Myers's list.

USA Today reported that "in the two years before the September 11 attacks," NORAD conducted exercises simulating "hijacked airliners used as weapons to crash into targets and cause mass casualties." In one exercise, "One of the imagined targets was the World Trade Center." Another exercise involved fighter jets performing "a mock shootdown over the Atlantic Ocean of a jet supposedly laden with chemical poisons headed toward a target in the United States." These two scenarios were included in "regional drills, not regularly scheduled continent-wide exercises," according to NORAD, and the planes in the simulations were coming from a foreign country, rather than from within the U.S. [9]

CNN reported, "Sometime between 1991 and 2001, a regional sector of the North American Aerospace Defense Command simulated a foreign hijacked airliner crashing into a building in the United States as part of [a] training exercise scenario." That scenario involved the airliner "being hijacked as it flew into U.S. airspace from abroad." The exercise "was conducted at one regional sector, and was not conducted at the [NORAD] headquarters." The identity of the building hit by the aircraft was classified, but military officials said that it "would be recognizable if identified, but was not the World Trade Center or the Pentagon." [10]

How could it have happened that the organization responsible for defending U.S. airspace repeatedly practiced scenarios that so closely resembled the 9/11 attacks in the years leading up to those attacks? And considering that the existence of these plane-into-building training scenarios has largely gone unreported, might there have been other, similar scenarios practiced for by NORAD--or other U.S. military organizations--that we do not yet know of? A new investigation into 9/11 is clearly urgently required. And the role of these training scenarios is one of many aspects of the attacks that must be thoroughly examined.

NOTES
[1] Senate Committee on Armed Services, Implications for the Department of Defense and Military Operations of Proposals to Reorganize the United States Intelligence Community. 108th Cong., 2nd sess., August 17, 2004.
[2] Ibid.; William M. Arkin, Code Names: Deciphering U.S. Military Plans, Programs, and Operations in the 9/11 World. Hanover, NH: Steerforth Press, 2005, p. 545.
[3] Senate Committee on Armed Services, Implications for the Department of Defense and Military Operations of Proposals to Reorganize the United States Intelligence Community.
[4] Greg Schneider, "FedEx to Buy 10 Airbus Super-Jumbo Jets." Washington Post, January 17, 2001.
[5] William M. Arkin, Code Names, p. 545.
[6] Senate Committee on Armed Services, Implications for the Department of Defense and Military Operations of Proposals to Reorganize the United States Intelligence Community; William M. Arkin, Code Names, p. 362.
[7] Senate Committee on Armed Services, Implications for the Department of Defense and Military Operations of Proposals to Reorganize the United States Intelligence Community.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Steven Komarow and Tom Squitieri, "NORAD Had Drills of Jets as Weapons." USA Today, April 18, 2004.
[10] Barbara Starr, "NORAD Exercise Had Jet Crashing into Building." CNN, April 19, 2004.