Listening to msnbc 9/11 coverage, something really bothering me

[madaboutharry]

Listening to Jim Miklaszewski reporting on the morning of 9/11 that pentagon officials stating that there was no indication or warning that anything like this would happen and that military jets not called up yet.

First of all, four airplanes simultaneously hijacked, one already crashed into the World Trade Center, and they hadn't put military jets in the air. Miklaszewski saying some pentagon bullshit about not wanting to make a mistake with an "innocent" airliner. Secondly, immediate claims of being taken by surprise by such an attack.

From the first moment, the Bush White House had all their lies all lined up.

[DontTreadOnMe]

1. It was over 30 min. until the 2nd plane hit the WTC

Even on TV, they were saying terrorist attack... then HOW MANY MINUTES AFTER THAT until the plane hit the Pentagon?

Think about it... we can scramble the U.S. Air Force in less than 10 minutes to anywhere in the US.

So the air traffic controllers didn't KNOW we were under attack?

[abelenkpe]

41. Always thought that was out of character

My brother called me when the first plane hit the WTC. Told me to turn on the TV. As we watched both my hubby and I kept wondering why no jets were scrambled.

[Politicalboi]

51. 35 minutes

And the Pentagon, our DEFENSE building couldn't defend itself with 35 minutes of warning. LOL! Oh but DON"T say it was an inside job. Because we all know those people are just plain crazy.

We only spend billions at the Pentagon on the lawn up keep.

[snappyturtle]

2. I'm with you madaboutharry. NO one will ever convince me that TPTB didn't

know about 9/11. ....in advance.

[uponit7771]

3. ...and we STILL haven't seen the unedited TAPES (like more than 10) of the pentagon hit....

...that the FBI confiscated soon after the events happened.

The FBI released an edited tape time stamped the day after with frames missing, they admitted to that soon after an claimed it shouldn't make a difference

[Happyhippychick]

4. I never understood why those damn "emergency alert" tests we suffered through for years

werent used. Wasn't that the point???

[riverbendviewgal]

5. Michael Moore did a movie on that

more movies and books on this...which people call the conspiracy theorys.

I like Richard A. Clarke's accounting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_A._Clarke

Clarke argues that he made numerous urgent requests for a meeting about dealing with terrorism, had CIA Director George Tenet include numerous details about Al-Qaeda in daily briefings, found an unprecedented level of terrorist "chatter" before September 11.

Soon after 9/11, he says that defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld wanted to bomb Iraq, even though there was no evidence of their involvement, because they had more "good targets" than Afghanistan, which was actually involved.

Clarke also says that on September 12, 2001, President Bush asked him to try to find evidence that Saddam Hussein was connected to the terrorist attacks. In response he wrote a report stating there was absolutely no evidence of Iraqi involvement and got it signed by all relevant agencies (the FBI, the CIA, etc.). The paper was quickly returned by a deputy with a note saying "Please update and resubmit," apparently unshown to the President.

[Bluenorthwest]

54. Clarke's book is excellent...

nt

[Pirate Smile]

6. Remember that when they finally got the planes scrambled, they were NOT armed. They were

fake training bombs. They would have had to try to ram a hijacked plane - no missiles.

[hack89]

15. No - they were armed

there were 14 armed fighters on what it called strip alert. The closest bases with such fighters were Langley VA and Otis AFB on Cape Cod.

[BumRushDaShow]

25. Here in Philly

There were 4 (if I remember correctly) Blackhawks with ordinance on them that flew low over our building downtown while some of us were outside. This was before 10:00. Had never seen an armed helicopter with stuff on it before, let alone flying that low. After seeing that, we were like - we're outta here and they did tell everyone to go home before the mass crowds coming out of of the big towers were released to clog the streets.

[Blue State Bandit]

48. They were from JRB Willow Grove.

I remember that.

[Politicalboi]

58. The "terrorist" made it easy to shoot them down

Instead of taking off from a NY airport, they flew over a shit load of military bases, and still didn't get shot down. But talk like that is leading into "conspiracy"

[IggleDoer]

65. There were two closer bases that somehow didn't respond with F 16s.

Atlantic City and DC ANG bases.

Otis and Langley were too far to respond to the action.

[hack89]

67. Those bases did not have strip alert interceptors

there were only 7 bases in America with armed fighters ready to take off in 5 minutes. With the fall of the Soviet Union, the US cut back on the number of ready alert fighters as the Soviet Air Force stopped routine flights around our borders.

[Atman]

7. The other thing Mick said...

He said that no one saw any plane at the Pentagon. They all thought it was a bomb. It was several minutes before they started reporting that it was a plane.

Now remember, a FOURTH hijacked plane is still in the air an hour after the first hit.

[Whiskeytide]

8. Its not all as simple as it seems...

... due to a number of random circumstances, we were NOT able to put jets in the air, and recognition of the attack was delayed. For example, air traffic controllers hand planes off to one another as they move into different areas of the country. New York has them for a while, then someone in Cleveland (or somewhere) takes them for a while, and so on. A lot of signs where there, but they were going to different people in different offices in different cities, and no one put the pieces together fast enough to react. As for fighters, there were some in the air, but they were on training missions over the Atlantic, and were not armed. Air Traffic Controllers - the first to realize what was going on - also don't have the authority to scramble jets.

You may want to read "Touching History" by Lynn Spencer.

http://cleartheskies.com/

Before I read that book, I also felt it was simply unbelievable that we could not scramble jets to down the planes. After I read it (and its been a few years), I came away really understanding that we were completely caught with our pants down, and that sheer luck seemed to favor the hijackers that morning. It is NOT political at all, more like a documentary - but it was very eye opening for me.

[Patiod]

11. ooo...logical

Come on now - you know conspiracy theories are SO much more interesting than logic.

[madaboutharry]

18. I don't subscribe to conspiracy theories.

I was only commenting on the real time reporting.

One thing is certain, the Bush White House was in full spin mode from the first moment.

[rwsanders]

30. If it is all "conspiracy theory" than why did the PNAC have their plans all written up already?

And why was Bin Laden's family all safely whisked out of the country?

[Politicalboi]

60. Shhhhhh!

Don't let facts get in the way. We need to hear about how it was impossible for fighter jets to scramble even though the "planes" were hijacked over an hour before hitting the WTC's. And we need a feel good story of flight 93. LOL! 9/11 has something for everybody. Everything except the truth.

[RepublicansRZombies]

69. And right out of their playbook "The Pearl Harbor of the 21st century took place today"

11:30: Before sleeping, President Bush enters into his journal: "The Pearl Harbor of the 21st century took place today...We think it's Osama bin Laden."


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_for_the_day_of_the_September_11_attacks

[progressivebydesign]

26. but when a small plane breached the airspace near the Pres. O in Seattle, the fighters were there

in minutes. I know this because they had no chance to mitigate the sonic booms, and it felt like the house would explode.

[RepublicansRZombies]

71. interesting

I don't get how people explain the official story to themselves. How can they possibly believe it?

Every time the fighter jets fly over NASCAR and other stupid ass sporting events...this would occur to me.

Where were the fighter jets on 9/11?

They have plenty of time and money to waste on stupid ass air displays for sports but they can't do their fucking jobs!!!

[hack89]

84. Do you think that things are done differently after 9/11? nt

[Atman]

27. Air traffic controllers have "the authority" to recognize planes in the wrong airspace.

They don't have to "scramble jets." But they shouldn't just be looking at their screens scratching their balls, wondering why this flight from Boston to LA is flying down the Hudson River. I think I'd pick up the phone and call my supervisor...at least.


.

[valerief]

31. Random. You're funny. PNAC even stated in their docs they wanted another Pearl Harbor.

They got what they wanted once they stole the presidency.

[Politicalboi]

62. So true

I wonder if Obama had a PNAC involvement if they would just poo poo it away.

[JDPriestly]

36. I translate your post, Whiskeytide: Our military leadership was incompetent and lacked the

imagination and foresight to prepare for an actual terrorist attack ALTHOUGH BUSH WAS WARNED WEEKS AND MONTHS BEFOREHAND THAT SUCH AN ATTACK MIGHT BE IMMINENT.

It was incompetence on the part of the Bush administration and reluctance on the part of the military to risk getting Bin Laden during the Clinton administration. Either way, the US was not well served by our security bureaucracy.

The members of our security bureaucracy are just human, so we can't expect perfection. But they need to admit to the errors they made and concede that, like the rest of us and the rest of our government, they are just human and prone to error.

Unfortunately, the security bureaucracy likes to collect a lot of information on us little folk but do not want to focus on the really essential things.

The 9/11 fiasco may have been partly due to the fact that our security bureaucracy collects too much information and cannot discern quickly enough what is important and what is not.

[Whiskeytide]

72. I agree with pretty much all of what you say...

...The admin was certainly incompetent, and deserves to be vilified for it. But the story of what happened on the ground and in the offices of air traffic controllers is a different story - and that's what I was referring to. As I said - been a few years since I read the book - but from memory consider the following:

The terrorists turned off transponders on most of the planes. That means the planes were erratic radar blips, and not transmitting identification numbers, etc... They were easily lost in the screen clutter.

An air traffic controller might notice something odd about a course change - but he/she is also responsible for and watching a screen full of planes. There was no one - at least initially - to take over handling an anomaly in real time.

Losing communication with a plane, losing transponder info, and planes turning back - while odd - are not necessarily red flares in and of themselves. They happen sometimes. It was a while before the ATCs realized they couldn't get the pilots on the radio - signaling a real problem. One ATC did actually hear the terrorists over the radio - and he realized something was really going on - but his warnings had to make their way up the chain and out over the system - and none of these people knew what was unfolding well enough to connect the dots until time had run out.

The hijack playbook for pilots and ATCs didn't yet have a chapter on terrorists flying planes into buildings. Hijackers usually wanted money or transport out of the country, and didn't usually want to die themselves. The first reaction to the recognition that there was a hijacking taking place wasn't "we gotta shoot them down". They were not trained for this scenario.

ATCs don't have a TV in their office playing CNN - for obvious reasons. Most of those watching the hijacked planes on their screens didn't know the first plane had hit the WTC until it was too late.

Fighters went up - but were not armed. One pilot received orders to collide. Initially some of the fighters were sent in the wrong direction due to a mis-communication. Some were not fully fueled and had to land too quickly. Also, there was no way for the military controllers to communicate directly with the civilian ATCs who by then knew what was happening.

A pilot is sent toward DC with orders to shoot down a commercial airliner. And when he gets there, there are 37 blips on his radar (civilian airliners, UPS, Fed-Ex, private commuter planes, etc...). He's not picking up transponder signals - so who does he shoot? And, assuming he gets on the tail of a civilian airliner he "thinks" is the rouge plane - does he shoot? What does he have to do to confirm the target before he incinerates 80+ Americans?

It was a clusterfuck, for sure - but there was never any evidence that the real time guys were letting it happen. They were simply not ready for it. I wish there was more to it (actually, maybe I don't since that would be beyond comprehension), but I don't believe there is. Just my HO.

[JDPriestly]

105. Thanks. I hope that planes have now been equipped so that this kind of even cannot occur.

[Atman]

9. Another amazing live comment...

"It just collapsed into its own footprint. Buildings just don't collapse that way!"

This was a reporter on the scene talking to Tom Brokaw.


Meanwhile, at 10:13, they are STILL not able to confirm that it was a plane that hit the Pentagon.

[MadHound]

10. It was being reported on national news, Katy Couric among others,

That the four planes had been hijacked. This was forty five minutes to an hour before the first plane hit the twin towers. I saw it on the nationwide broadcast.

Now then, standard operating procedure for a hijacked plane is that NORAD has planes ready to go at a moments notice, kick the tires and light the fires. They go up at the least sign of aviation trouble, a plane off course, hijacked, unknown, etc. A few years before 911 the golfer Payne Stewart went up in a smaller jet. The seal in the plane failed and everybody inside died. However the plane was on auto pilot, and as soon as it deviated from the flight plan, within less than five minutes, it had two Air Force jets from NORAD escorting it across the country, and they did so until it finally crashed.

So the question becomes why didn't the NORAD planes go up on 911? They had plenty of time, plenty of warning, but basic, standard operation procedure was not followed. Somebody, somewhere, told them to stand down.

[PearliePoo2]

12. Good question.

It's my understanding that there are armed fighters on alert 24/7 waiting for the orders to scramble. They train for this, it's what they do.
There used to be what they call an alert shack with rotating pilots. Has this changed?
I don't get it, this has always bothered me.

[hack89]

14. There were 14 planes on alert at 7 sites on 9/11

the closest ones were based at Langley VA and Cape Cod MA. They were scrambled but no one knew where the highjacked planes were so it was impossible to intercept them before impact.

[MadHound]

22. Yes, they knew where the hijacked planes were,

There were tracking them, hell, as I stated above, it was on the national news. The problem is that Cheney had given the order to stand down, and the Norad planes didn't take off until after the hijacked planes had hit.
http://www.jonesreport.com/articles/260607_mineta.html

[louis-t]

29. All planes had turned off the transponders

and they all deviated from flight plan. Probably very hard to track. If chee-nee really told them to stand down, that would be suspicious.

[MadHound]

32. Umm, radar?

Not, radar can't track planes

And yes, apparently Cheney did tell them to stand down. But let's not believe reputable eyewitness sources who were there.

[louis-t]

40. Gee, if radar can track every plane in the sky, why even have transponders?

You had thousands of planes in the sky, they had turned up to 180 deg. off course.
Yeah, 'radar'.

[Atman]

42. Radar can see the planes.

Hell, you can spot fish under your boat. And if those fish had TRANSPONDERS saying "I am a 10 lb bluefish swimming NW" it would be cool. That is all the transponder does...the plane would show up on radar either way. And, I'm sorry, but if you saw something that big on radar, flying down the Hudson, or across New England, totally unmarked on your control screen, wouldn't it raise a red flag to you?

[Whiskeytide]

76. Sure it would...

... but do you realize how little time was left before that happened? The ATCs had figured it out finally - but it was too late.

[Atman]

85. There was a lot of time.

I watched it "live" on tape again today. Hell, I had time to shower and shave between the time the first plane hit and the Pentagon was hit by something. Who the hell was monitoring our airspace?

[Whiskeytide]

92. 20 different guys..

..in 4 different cities. None of whom had the authority to do anything except yell.

[Atman]

94. To whom did they yell?

And if they have no authority to do ANYTHING, why are they there?

Pick up the phone, DO SOMETHING. Call someone. I cannot believe for one moment that a panicked air-traffic controller calling his supervisor -- or a government official -- would just be put on hold. I don't believe it. I'm not sure why your so eager to apologize for the fact that our multi-billion-dollar defense and air-traffic network allowed a hijacked plane to fly off-course from Boston to NYC without ANYONE saying "hey, this doesn't look right."

WTF?

[Whiskeytide]

104. I'm not apologizing for anyone. But I'm also not blaming people...

... who had very little ability to stop this. Sure, in a movie, the ATC would be suspicious, and would call his supervisor, who happened to know an Air Force Colonel, who in turn calls the closest air base and a pilot just happened to be sitting in a fully armed and fueled fighter, and he then takes off and finds the right target out of the 300 on the screen - you know, because the terrorists had spray painted "Death to America" on the side - and at the last second he sends a sidewinder up the exhaust - but only after all the innocent passengers had parachuted to safety.

Come on. The logistics of this are unimaginable, and no one knew what was really going on until the first plane hit. And then it still wasn't clear it was intentional until the second plane hit. Even the ATCs who knew planes were hijacked couldn't comprehend what was happening at first. They weren't watching CNN - they were watching their screens.

We are re-writing the history as Monday morning quarterbacks, when those guys were living it in real time, with no reason to suspect that this was a potential threat. They SHOULD have been on alert for it - for that I blame the Bush Admin - but they weren't. And I don't fault them.

And, to answer your question, they were yelling at their bosses, who in turn started yelling at their bosses, who started making calls to military, who started calling for jets to scramble, as soon as they were fueled and armed, and a pilot was in the cockpit. That doesn't all happen in 6 minutes. Its going to take 30 to 45 minutes. And then the jets have to fly to the right location and identify the right target and than make the right call on what to do.

Please read the book "Touching History". I think you're sincere in your criticism of the system - you sound like me before I read it. But I think you'll see it from a different perspective after reading that account. I know I did.

[ladjf]

37. Radar can see aircraft with transponders off. Mainly, the transponders are for exact indentificatio

[hack89]

45. The air traffic control system is a cooperative system

that assumes that every plane has a transponder. The controllers do not see actual radar returns - the planes are tracked via transponder signal.

[ladjf]

68. I believe that your statement that "controllers do not see actual radar return" is not true.

The four digit transponder code is received along with the primary radar picture. Perhaps in
recent times, the controllers may filter out the primary signal and use only the transponder code for identification.

There are numerous articles on the INTERNET discussing the fact that on 9-11, the controllers were able to "paint" the hijacked planes even with their transponders turned off.

[RepublicansRZombies]

73. So nice during a time of war the enemy is honorable enough to leave their transponder on

n/t

[hack89]

75. The air traffic control system is not a military system, is it?

the military uses different radars and different procedures. There is not a huge system of military radars covering America and tracking every aircraft flying - there are a handful of radars on the borders looking outwards for aircraft and missiles approaching American soil.

[RepublicansRZombies]

79. The FAA notifies the military when a plane veers off course or shut off a transponder

the military can take it from there.

There is a standard procedure for scrambling jets this way in the event of an emergency.

This is what the Air Force does!

When a plane veered off course near an Obama event, the jets were there within minutes.

I am pretty sure that RADAR can work both inside the country and 'looking outward' as in the excuse Rumsfeld made up.

When we were all sure it was an attack, they might have turned the RADAR inward temporarily....

[hack89]

82. Where to start.

1. The Obama event is post 9/11 - things have changed.

2. Military radars are on the coast. They do not have 360 coverage and do not cover the land. They cannot be temporarily turned around - pictures here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAVE_PAWS

3. A simple challenge - show me a pre-9/11 example (besides the Payne Stewart incident) where fighters intercepted an airliner over American soil. I have been asking for years with no success.

[Atman]

86. What do you mean "beside the Payne Stewart incident"?????

There it is, right there!

That "incident" PROVES they have the capability to do it! You can't just say "don't consider when it actually happened, show me when it happened but didn't really happen." Or something. The Payne Stewart incident proves the military is at the ready to intercept errant aircraft. Period.

[hack89]

88. The Payne Stewart intercept was an ad hoc affair that took nearly 90 minutes

before a fighter intercepted Stewart's plane.

It was not done by armed interceptors - they asked a unarmed plane airborne on a training flight to take a look.

If Payne Stewart is your model then the response on 9/11 was perfect.

Now do you have a real example?

[Atman]

87. You're right.

But there IS a huge system of military radars scanning our coastlines. Last I checked, NYC was an island, and the Atlantic Ocean was nearby. Boston's Logan Airport sits on the ocean. But yeah...why would the military be bothered with scanning the skies around places like Boston and New York City? Gotcha.

[hack89]

89. No - there is not a huge system

unless you can show some evidence of one.

And lets not forget how far inland those planes flew before turning around.

[Atman]

90. "Inland?"

Have you seen NYC? It is an ISLAND off the coast of Southern New England. And the flew from BOSTON, whose airport is on the Atlantic Ocean. WTF?

[hack89]

91. Let me explain

those aircraft flew hundreds of miles inland before turning around to their targets - putting them outside the range of any coastal radars.

You now have four planes flying in the most crowded air space in the world. With no IFF. So the notion that someone sitting on a radar scope can pick those four needles out of the haystack in time is pretty far fetched. That radar scope would have shown thousands of radar contacts.

[Atman]

95. Meanwhile, ATC in Boston would have noted that they lost a plane.

Still calling bullshit.

How does a plane go missing off the ATC system and NO ONE does ANYTHING about it?

[hack89]

96. No - the plane was not under Boston control anymore

I think it was under Cleveland control at the time.

People did things - they knew the plane was highjacked. Doesn't mean they knew where the plane was.

[knitter4democracy]

99. Not true.

One of my cousins was an Air Force radar air traffic controller, and yes, they cover everything and are part of the hand-off procedure with non-military controllers.

[hack89]

100. You misunderstood my post

air traffic control systems or ATC systems, whether civilian or military, are fundamentally different from military systems used in combat situations. The military ATC system is fully integrated into the FAA system - the vast majority of the radars are FAA operated. But we are not talking about military ATC systems here.

Air traffic control systems are cooperative systems where aircraft are tracked using IFF transponders. Military radar systems are designed to detect and track planes that don't want to be tracked. There is no large network of such military radars in America in place to detect and track aircraft if they turn off their transponders.

[Atman]

101. I still don't see how that makes much difference...

So, either way, a big plane flew down the Hudson River, a no-fly zone for big planes, and no one did anything or said anything? Military, ATC, whatever...there was a LOT of time after that first plane hit for someone to notice these errant planes. Especially since the military was doing exercises in the area that day. How could NO ONE have seen anything suspicious?

[hack89]

103. Because radar is not a magic lantern that illuminates everything

the ATC radar would not have seen the plane because the transponders were off. I doubt there was a military radar in the region - there are no military bases close to NYC.

Secondly, even if there was a radar that saw them, how do you pick out those aircraft out of the thousands that were in the air that day? It is not easy tracking aircraft on radar - it takes 5-10 minutes to determine a course and speed per plane. Any radar operator would have been over whelmed.

And if it was detected over the Hudson, there would not have been enough time to intercept them. The fighters were coming from either Cape Cod or Virginia - that is hundreds of miles to travel in a very short time.

And the military was not conducting exercises in that area that day - that is a 9/11 myth that refuses to die.

[hack89]

43. They turned off the IFF transponders

the air traffic control system is a cooperative system that depends on planes having their transponders on. The air traffic controllers are not looking at actual radar returns. Without a transponder the plane is not seen by the ATC.

[Atman]

23. Bullshit that no one knew where they were!

That is absurd! With all the radar, military radar, air traffic control, EVERYTHING we have in this country, it is just ridiculous to assume that no one knew where the planes were. What is the point of all the technology if a giant plane can just disappear? And if one DID just disappear off of an ATC screen, it would be reported immediately as a possible crash or something. There is just no validity in the "no one knew where they were" statement.

[hack89]

47. First off, the ATC system is built around IFF transponders

that is what the system uses to track the planes. The controllers don't even see actual radar returns - it is call processed video.

Secondly, with thousands of planes in some of the most crowded air space in the world, finding a plane without a transponder is hard as hell. The ATC depends on transponders. Military radars are located on the coasts looking out to sea - there is not a network of military radars spread out over America.

When the high jackers turned off the transponders is when highjacking was suspected. Read all the reports - show me a single one that says we know where the planes were all the time.

[louis-t]

53. Thank you!

You explained it much better than I did. It seems that some here who scream the loudest know the least.

[RepublicansRZombies]

74. I believe that our military is used for Defense

During a time of war, it is possible that the enemy might not cooperate.

The military might just have a way of finding planes in the sky even if they do not notify us of where they are?

[hack89]

78. There is not a huge system of military radars covering America

There is not a huge system of military radars covering America and tracking every aircraft flying - there are a handful of radars on the borders looking outwards for aircraft and missiles approaching American soil.

[RepublicansRZombies]

80. the military has no RADAR capable of watching the skies within the country?

So in the event of an emergency, they have to redesign the RADAR system to 'look inward'

Are you calling our military stupid?

[hack89]

83. Look for yourself

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAVE_PAWS

[sufrommich]

13. Katie Couric never reported that 4 planes

had been hijacked before the first plane hit. God, truthers are as ridiculous as birthers.

[MadHound]

20. Yes, she did.

I switched on the Today show at seven am CDT that day. Lead off story was four planes hijacked, and yes, they were being tracked. I'm sure you could go through the NBC archives of that day and find the broadcast.

Please stop calling me a liar, I'm truthfully reporting what I saw.

[sufrommich]

33. No, she didn't and you saying you saw it

doesn't make it true. There was no lead off story of her reporting on planes being hijacked,I think it would be pretty big news and known to this day if she had. Show me some proof,because Couric reporting that would surely be known by now.

[SansACause]

50. watch it again

At 7:15 am CDT, Katie was talking about Macy Gray. The first plane had not yet hit the WTC.

[cpwm17]

93. You have a false memory

That's different than lying. Memories aren't reliable.

[grasswire]

52. there was an exercise that day, run out of the situation room by Cheney

Don't you remember this?

The agencies were involved. They didn't know if this was part of the exercise or real attack.

Why was a VP running an exercise out of the situation room?

[sufrommich]

16. So a reporter repeated a rumor during an attack on the US.

They also reported that a car bomb went off near the State Department, but there was no car bomb. Reporters were reporting unverified information, not exactly "proof" of anything other then that.

[Auntie Bush]

17. What I noticed was the broadcaster's total lack of showing empathy toward the horror

the victims were going through. They just discussed what was happening to the buildings and didn't seem to be caring or worrying about those poor souls trapped in the building.

[Berlum]

19. With over an hour of warning, the Republican Pentagon could not muster even a pop gun

to protect itself. Pathetic? Or LIHOP?

Sad ass state of affairs for the Republican-infested Pentagon of 2011, that's for sure....

[RepublicansRZombies]

77. we are expected to believe Rumsfeld had no idea of the attacks until a plane hit the pentagon 1 hour

later.

Rumsfeld was kept out of the loop during an attack on the nation, however Bush was supposed to make the call on the fighter jets?

People will make up a strange set of beliefs to justify the unjustifiable.

[SoapBox]

21. I never ever understood WHY box cutters and BIG knives were ever allowed in the cabin anyway.

And I work the industry.

I was always thinking...someday, something really bad is gonna happen.

p.s....AND, over the years, there have been attempts to lessen the regulations on the size
of a knife / blade, that can be brought on board. WTF? ...thus far, those attempts have failed. Duh.

[Atman]

24. How come when I mentioned this broadcast, my thread got locked?

I never mentioned conspiracies or anything. I was just commenting on some of the actual comments being made.

RIGHT NOW, on the live re-run, they are reporting about secondary explosions within the buildings, and saying how they believe they were PLANTED, possibly by the terrorists, and how they lost many first responders during those "secondary explosions." I am not making this stuff up...it is in the reporting being aired on MSNBC. But we can't talk about news reporting on DU. Some might consider news to be "conspiracy theory."

[panader0]

28. The events on that day are arguably the greatest watershed moment in our history.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan came from those events. Why should it be considered wrong to discuss this earth shattering event?

[FreeJoe]

63. Pearl Harbor?

You think 9/11 and the subsequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were a greater "watershed moment" than the attack on Pearl Harbor and the subsequent wars with Japan, Germany, and Italy? Really?

And for anyone taking the bait and arguing with the 9/11 conspiracy crowd, remember that there are still lots of people convinced that FDR new about Pearl in advance and let it happen. If that one hasn't been settled yet, do you really think you have a chance of getting the truthers to see things your way?

[mwb970]

34. I will forever believe that cheney had something to do with it. /nt

[pasto76]

35. lots of wild speculation, gross armchair quarterbacking in this thread.

Given the new NYT article that goes more in depth about how much and how often the Bush admin had been warned, absolutely, there should have been preventative actions against something.

But our culture is rife with the "it wont happen to me" mentality. Safety professionals talk about that all the time. "I dont have to use this PPE, it wont happen to me". Think it's bullshit? do you talk or text while driving? you're living proof.

I do have experience with emergency management on the county level. The thought of traffic controllers putting all these pieces together, independently, and seperated by hundreds of miles, is mind boggling.

couple people submitting that there are armed fighters on "standby" somewhere...I dont know of any. If you espouse that there are these capabilities, you should be able to present specifics.

Technology technology technology. None of it stopped motivated foot soldiers, armed with blades. It's about as low tech as it gets.

[Gabi Hayes]

38. Bush kept us SAFE! always remember that

except for 9/11, that one little bump in the road of spotless natsec

[Atman]

39. I would agree with you but for one important point...

These events didn't happen in unison. There was a LOT of time between each hit. That is what struck me as I watched the re-runs...I was glued to the tv, even today, as I watched this unfold, almost in slow motion there was so much time between strikes. All I could think of was "what the fuck were those guys in the control tower DOING?" Seriously...just standing around watching CNN? Scratching their heads saying "Gawrsh, I ain't never seen no plane flyin' down the Hudson before!"? I'm not kidding...I don't buy your argument. We spend BILLIONS of dollars on "defense" in this country, and no one could put together four errant flights, even as planes were crashing into buildings in the biggest city in America? I'm just not buying it.

[Old and In the Way]

49. It's a real stretch to think our $600BB/year Pentagon couldn't protect itself.

Almost 55 minutes elapsed between 11 going into the WTC and 77 crashing into the Pentagon. Almost 2 hours between 11's crash and 93's crash in Penn.

Flight 11 crashed at 8:45 a.m. Flight 175 crashed at 9:03 a.m., 18 minutes later. Flight 77 hit the Pentagon at 9:40, 37 minutes after Flight 175 crashed. Then Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania at 10:37 a.m., 57 minutes after Flight 77 crashed.

Those intervals are:

18 minutes between first and second crash (Flight 11 and Flight 175),
37 minutes between second and third crashes (Flight 175 and Flight 77), and
57 minutes between the third and fourth crashes (Flight 77 and Flight 93).

I especially find 77's flightpath to be particularly interesting.....what's that hump all about, anyways?



Remember, too....93 and 77 were both delayed. From: http://s3.amazonaws.com/911timeline/main/flight93.html

8:01 a.m. Flight 93 is delayed for 41 minutes on the runway in Newark, finally taking off at 8:42. The Boston Globe credits this delay as a major reason why this was the only one of the four flights not to succeed in its mission. [Boston Globe, 11/23/01] [Newsweek, 9/22/01, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 10/28/01] Apparently Flight 93 has to wait in a line of about a dozen planes before it can take off. [USA Today, 8/12/02]

(8:20 a.m.) Flight 77 departs Dulles International Airport near Washington, ten minutes after the scheduled departure time. [8:20, CNN, 9/17/01, 8:20, Washington Post, 9/12/01, 8:20, Guardian, 10/17/01, 8:21, AP, 8/19/02]

I'm thinking that strange hump on 77's flightpath starts about 20 minutes into the flight...almost like it's in a holding pattern awaiting for 93 to catch up. Maybe the hijackers were talking to each other? Or, maybe not.

[RepublicansRZombies]

81. they expect us to believe that the RADAR was looking outward,military has no RADAR within country

what will they come up with next?

[Myrina]

44. August 5, 2001 Presidential Daily Briefing:

"Bin Laden Determined to Strike In US".

Not sure how much more clear of an indication they'd need.

[Gabi Hayes]

56. I'll never forget the look on Condi's face as she was forced to recite

the title of that PDB

and I'll ALWAYS remember how the media allowed that moment to disappear from public consciousness, which, in turn, allowed Bush to steal his ''re-election'':

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2004/04/condi_lousy.html

Condi Lousy--
Why Rice is a bad national security adviser.

By Fred Kaplan|Posted Thursday, April 8, 2004, at 6:17 PM ET



A poor adviser

One clear inference can be drawn from Condoleezza Rice's testimony before the 9/11 commission this morning: She has been a bad national security adviser—passive, sluggish, and either unable or unwilling to tie the loose strands of the bureaucracy into a sensible vision or policy. In short, she has not done what national security advisers are supposed to do.

The key moment came an hour into the hearing, when former Watergate prosecutor Richard Ben-Veniste took his turn at asking questions. Up to this point, Rice had argued that the Bush administration could not have done much to stop the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Yes, the CIA's sirens were sounding all summer of an impending strike by al-Qaida, but the warnings were of an attack overseas.


Ben-Veniste brought up the much-discussed PDB—the president's daily briefing by CIA Director George Tenet—of Aug. 6, 2001. For the first time, he revealed the title of that briefing: "Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US."*

Rice insisted this title meant nothing. The document consisted of merely "historical information" about al-Qaida—various plans and attacks of the past. "This was not a 'threat report,' " she said. It "did not warn of any coming attack inside the United States." Later in the hearing, she restated the point: "The PDB does not say the United States is going to be attacked. It says Bin Laden would like to attack the United States."

To call this distinction "academic" would be an insult to academia.

Rice acknowledged that throughout the summer of 2001 the CIA was intercepting unusually high volumes of "chatter" about an impending terrorist strike. She quoted from some of this chatter: "attack in near future," "unbelievable news coming in weeks," "a very, very, very big uproar." She said some "specific" intelligence indicated the attack would take place overseas. However, she noted that very little of this intelligence was specific; most of it was "frustratingly vague." In other words (though she doesn't say so), most of the chatter might have been about a foreign or a domestic attack—it wasn't clear....

[RoccoR5955]

46. It was CHENEY who ordered the military to stand down

Or they would have shot down the planes!
Geeze. These people like to remake history, don't they?

[patrice]

61. And it was Rumsfeld who ordered a change in NORAD & FAA radar management...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021319006

[librechik]

55. yes--standing orders are to scramble instantly on a threat, someone high up must tell them

to stop, if they stop.

The testimony of the FAA and NORAD on why no scramble is contradictory and unsatisfying.

[AntiFascist]

97. Here's someone who would have had some answers...

and keep in mind the Wall Street Journal is not a conspiracy site:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124581129913745441.html

He previously served as the commander of the 113th Fighter Wing at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington. Local press reports indicated that it was Gen. Wherley who gave the order to scramble fighter jets over the nation's capital on the morning of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

[librechik]

98. RIP on its face the whole event stinks to high heaven

don't have to be a CT to wonder WTH happened

[patrice]

57. If we're capable of asking these questions, why didn't Congress? Are they stupid, or what????

http://www.9-11commission.gov/

[librechik]

102. they were underfunded, given a vicious deadline and get this NO subpoena power

Several members of the commission had severe conflicts of interest, and the testimony linking Al Qaeda and Bin Laden to the attack was famously obtained by torture. The torture session tapes, where evidence was obtained, were destroyed.

The interview tapes of the FAA and other eyewitnesses were destroyed by an FAA official.

Oh Congress asked questions--and were stonewalled, redacted., and overruled.Cheney and Bush refused to speak on the record.

The legal overseer to the project refused to sign off on the 9/11 Commission report and wrote an article denouncing it.

Now do you want a new investigation?

[arcane1]

59. Four hijacked airliners are a lower priority than one golfer in a tiny plane n/t

[just1voice]

64. MSNBC is propaganda, it's full of lies, constant steady lies and coverups.

People point out much of the MSMedia propaganda everyday and the propaganda never stops. The only way it'll stop is for the sales and ratings such propagandists to drop to almost nothing.

[Whisp]

66. listening to the old msnbc tapes, I have something else that bothers me

I am not watching the tv screen, just have it on low volume while I work at my comp.

The tone of the reporters, the tone just doesn't fit. It's just weird. What I heard was calm. Like they were talking about an ordinary event - hardly any emotion.

I remember CNNs account of that fake Balloon Boy story and the excitement and emotion were there right up front in your ears for the whole afternoon.