ep,
Re: One thing I have heard is there were some hijacking practice drills scheduled for around 9/11 - so some of the first questions were is this part of exercise or real ?
Yes, the 9/11 war gaming is a very contentious issue that the Pentagon has been bending over backwards to avoid discussing. Here's what we know so far:
oilempire.us
War Game |Attribution | Description
CIA / National Reconnaissance Office "plane into building" exercise |Associated Press, August 21, 2002 | simulation of a plane crash into the NRO headquarters (near Dulles Airport, Virginia) - this was not a "terrorism" exercise but it did result in the evacuation of most NRO employees just as the "real" 9/11 was taking place, making it more difficult for the nation's spy satellites to be used to track the hijacked planes
Vigilant Guardian Aviation Week & Space Technology, June 3, 2002, Newhouse News, others (these articles are reproduced below) The publicly available mass media articles about these exercises state that they were similar enough to the actual events that top NORAD personnel were confused, not sure if 9/11 was "part of the drill" or a real world event.
Vigilant Warrior | Richard Clark, "Against All Enemies" (March 2004) referenced by Richard Clark. Were Vigilant Guardian and Vigilant Warrior related exercises (defender and attacker)?.
Northern Vigilance | Toronto Star, December 9, 2001 "Operation Northern Vigilance, planned months in advance, involves deploying fighter jets to locations in Alaska and northern Canada." This ensured that there would be fewer fighter planes available to protect the East Coast on 9/11. Simulated information was fed into radar screens - is this what confused the air defenses that morning?
Northern Guardian | Toronto Star, December 9, 2001 only mention was in the early edition of this article, no details publicly available (probably related to Northern Vigilance)
Tripod II | US Department of Justice and City of New York Rudolph Giuliani's testimony to the 9/11 Commission, May 2004 biowar exercise in New York City scheduled for September 12, 2001
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War Games were only mentioned once at the Kean-Zelikow Commission. Here's a transcript and comment from Nicholas Levis:
<COPY>
The one time the "war games" were mentioned during the official 9/11 Commission hearings (on the final day of the hearings)
Nicholas Levis posts:
Ha, I finally got into the Official Record
KEAN: Three questions, then I know the general has to leave.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Ask about the war games that were planned for 9/11.
KEAN: Commissioner Gorelick?
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Tell us about the 9/11 war games.
GORELICK: Could you please be quiet? We have only a few minutes with General Myers, and I'd like to ask a question. General Myers, the -- I'm sorry.
KEAN: I would ask please people in the audience to be quiet if you want to stay here.
Wimpy of me, but I stayed quiet. The cops that came up to "calm me down" were a bit too beefy. So I "calmed down." Apparently, this was also sent out on CNN and audible over TV. The transcript doesn't include the walk-out by another guy...
They introduced The Emperor's New Timeline, in which all the times are now consistent and the blame is laid on the FAA. It's completely ridiculous and we can dismantle it, but I suspect the straightforward way to do is to concentrate on UA93. The new timeline shifts FAA notification to NORAD of the UA93 diversion from 9:16 to 10:07 (after the crash), the crash time from 10:06 (according to the Army's seismic study) to 10:03 and the Cheney shootdown order for UA 93 from 9:55 (according to Wash. Post) to somewhere between 10:10 and 10:20. If we can convincingly promote the evidence we already have of the UA93 shootdown, all this falls completely apart. And it's an emotionally compelling and easy-to-understand matter.
Best from DC, still,
Nicholas |
