Thursday, April 30, 2009

Pre-9/11 Upgraded GPS Service Provided 243 Foot Wide Aerial Navigation Corridors

Amended Version of Journal of 9/11 Studies Paper

Enhanced GPS service (WAAS) now in use by the U.S. commercial aviation industry and activated 13 months prior to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, provided virtual aerial navigation corridors only 243 wide and a 95% confidence that an aircraft's true position will fall within such a corridor . Such corridors can be navigated entirely by autopilot and flight management systems scheduled in 1996 and 1998 to be contained by United and American airlines Boeing 757 and 767 aircraft like those used during the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.


RNP .02 / Boeing 767-200 / World Trade Center Tower


WAAS also supports required navigation performance (RNP) operations, says Raytheon, providing a precision navigation capability down to RNP 0.02 (an accuracy of 0.02nm).

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2003/01/07/159964/ups-wins-faa-certification-for-wide-area-gps-receiver.html...


RNP is a required navigation performance level described by the specification of a numeric value indicating the required navigation accuracy for a specific operation, typically specified laterally in nautical miles - e.g., RNP 1 is a Required Navigation Performance of ± 1 nautical mile (95% Probability).

http://www.airweb.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgAdvisoryCircular.nsf/ACNumber/BBADA17DA0D0BBD1862569BA006F64D0?OpenDocument...


1 nautical mile = 6,076 feet

RNP 0.02 = RNP (0.02 nautical mile radius) x 2 = RNP (121.5 foot radius) x 2 = a 243 foot wide corridor.


Boeing Example


(Boeing)


http://clacsec.lima.icao.int/Reuniones/2008/CE73/NE/BoeingPresentacionFT.pdf...


AMENDED VERSION: Wide Area Augmentation System Signal Now Available

August 24, 2000

WASHINGTON, DC — After a successful 21-day stability test of the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) signal in space, the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) declared that it is now available.


http://www.faa.gov/news/press_releases/news_story.cfm?newsId=5249


According to Raytheon’s director-satellite navigation systems, the newly activated WAAS signal was used by rescuers at New York City's Ground Zero site following September 11, 2001 in order to precisely survey the site:

And, at the World Trade Center, rescue teams used WAAS to survey the site during the recovery program.

http://www.aviationtoday.com/av/categories/commercial/12571.html


By 1996 and 1998, United and American airlines Boeing 757 and 767 aircraft, like those used during the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, were scheduled to contain flight management systems and signal receivers capable of utilizing the new GPS service.

HONEYWELL ANNOUNCES ORDERS FOR NEW-GENERATION "PEGASUS" FLIGHT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

FARNBOROUGH, ENGLAND, SEPT. 7, 1998 - The Honeywell "Pegasus" flight management system earned its first FAA certifications March on the Boeing 757, 767 and MD-90 aircraft types ... Airlines get FANS-1/FANS-A capability ... FANS-1 ... allows operators to obtain more economical routings and to utilize satellite navigation.


http://www.aviationnow.com/shownews/farnday1/pressr15.htm


Key elements of Future Air Navigation System (FANS): RNP – Required Navigation Performance

http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/common/documents/Go_Direct_Downloads_for_Web/FANS_RNP_FMZ-2000_Software_Upgrade.pdf...


Using WAAS, a satellite-based system ... has allowed the FAA to move toward a performance-based NAS, exploiting the concept of “required navigation performance,” or RNP.

http://satjournal.tcom.ohiou.edu/issue9/aviation_navigation.html


Rockwell's Collins Landing System Picked for Both Airbus and Boeing Planes

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa, Sept. 6, 1996 /PRNewswire/ -- Rockwell's Collins Commercial Avionics, based in Cedar Rapids, has made major announcements of the selection of its Multi-Mode Receiver (MMR) landing system by two of the world's leading aircraft manufacturers, Airbus and Boeing ... Subsequent certifications are planned for Boeing's ... 757 and 767 ... The Multi-Mode Receiver ... expands capabilities required by the air transport industry as the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) is phased into operation.

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-18652301.html


GNSS-1 is the first generation system and is the combination of existing satellite navigation systems ... In the United States, the satellite based component is the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS).

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


October 1999:

Digital flight control systems on Boeing airplanes ... automatically fly the airplanes on pre-selected routes, headings, speed or altitude maneuvers.

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-55993162.html


An Air China Boeing 757, generally containing common flight systems with the Boeing 767, reportedly navigated a complex flight segment exclusively under GPS guided autopilot control via RNP operation:

Guided entirely by autopilot, an Air China Boeing 757 jet last month snaked along a narrow river valley between towering Himalayan peaks ... Pilots and passengers looked out to mountains left and right as the airplane automatically followed the twists of the valley, descending on a precisely plotted highway in the sky toward a runway still out of sight ... Using global-positioning satellites and on-board instruments, Naverus' navigation technology pinpoints the location of a fast-moving jet to within yards ... "You're watching the whole thing unfold. The airplane is turning, going where it's supposed to go ... it's all automatic."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003316294_naverus22.html...


The WAAS signal also made possible under autopilot control, the 370 degree decending right turn from an altitude of 7,000 feet, performed by American Airlines flight 77 prior to its reported impact with the Pentagon building in Arlington, VA on September 11, 2001.

Stanford University, 1998:

The Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) ... allows pilots to fly ... approaches that cannot necessarily be flown with current instrumentation ... Complex curved approaches, including approaches turning to a short (less than one mile) final ... Pathways were constructed from ... climbing, or descending constant radius arcs ... Autopilots could use WAAS position and velocity to fly curved trajectories.

http://waas.stanford.edu/~wwu/jennings/publications/ION98/iongps98.pdf




In October of 2001, Cubic Defense Systems applied for a U.S. patent for a system that utilizes GPS guided aircraft autopilot systems to implement a programmed or remotely transmitted flight plan, that overrides pilot control of an aircraft and navigates it to a given destination.

Responsive to the override input, the manager deactivates on-board control of selected aircraft flight systems and the autopilot system, and directs the autopilot to fly the aircraft ... In planning the flight routing ... the manager may utilize ... GPS direct routing.

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&RefSrch=yes&Query=PN%2F6641087=...


Plausibility Of 9/11 Aircraft Attacks Generated By GPS-Guided Aircraft Autopilot Systems

http://www.journalof911studies.com/volume/2008/AutopilotSystemsMonaghan.pdf....


Source

Editor in chief of Open Chemical Physics Journal resigns after controversial article on 9/11

(SnowCrash has updated this blog entry with some very interesting background information on Ms. Pileni... kicking it up to the front page for review. -rep.)

The editor in chief of the journal where recently the paper: "Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe" was published, resigned, claiming she wasn't informed of the publication. She proceeds to provide not a single solid scientific rebuttal, only administrative bickering and personal political bias against, well.. inconvenient science. One particularly notable comment attributed to Ms. Pileni is this one: "Marie-Paule Pileni points out that because the topic lies outside her field of expertise, she cannot judge whether the article in itself is good or bad.".

Strangely, her areas of research seem to contradict that. I'll quote you an excerpt of her resume:

OTHER ACTIVITIES
1990-1992: Chairperson on workshops related to the French Defense research.
1989-1992: Consultant at the Minister of Recherche concerning the National Defense 1989: Member of the “Institut des Hautes Etudes de Défense Européenne”.
1987-1988: Member of the ’“Institut des Hautes Etudes de Défense Nationale” (IHEDN)1984-1986: Member of National exam in Chemistry

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERSHIP
2006: Accounts of Chemical Research, American Chemical Society.
Journal of experimental nanosciences, Publisher Taylor&Francis.
2002: Journal of Physical Chemistry, Board member, American Chemical Society.

CONSULTING EXPERIENCE
1990-1994: Société Nationale des Poudres et Explosifs, SNPE, France (Literally translated: National Society of Powders and Explosives)

LABORATORY MANAGEMENT
2001: Laboratoire des matériaux mésoscopiques et nanomètriques, LM2N.
1992-2000: Structure et réactivité des systèmes interfaciaux, SRI. (Literally translated: Structure and reactivity of interfacial systems)

Interesting. Firm ties with the French/European military industrial complex. Experience with (powdered) explosives and nanotechnology. It's reasonable to assume Ms. Pileni is familiar with nano-explosives. So Ms. Pileni's contention that "the topic lies outside my field of expertise" is false. Why would a nanotechnology expert and former 'powdered explosives consultant' not want to comment on a paper discussing nano-thermitic explosives? A paper which caused her to resign? Puzzling.

Credit goes to DHS for pointing this news out in a comment on 911blogger. It's being discussed at Randi** as well.

Source


**Related** [Translated using Google Translator]

An article about the explosives in the World Trade Center was brought in a scientific journal without the editors were aware of it. Now she draws, she tells the videnskab.dk.

It caused great sensation, surprise and suspicion, as the journal The Open Chemical Physics Journal in April published a scientific article on the remnants of nanotermit, which had to be found in large quantities of dust from the World Trade Center.

One of the most surprised is apparently chief editor of the magazine. Professor Marie-Paule Pileni hear the first article as videnskab.dk write to her to ask for her professional assessment of the content of the article. This email will get her right away to slam the door to the magazine.

"I resign as the editor in chief, says the short answer in an email to videnskab.dk.

Printed without permission
A phone call reveals that chief Marie-Paule Pileni never been informed that the article would be put at The Open Chemical Physics Journal, being published by the journal juggernaut Bentham Science Publishers.

"They have printed the article without my authorization else, so when you wrote to me, I did not mean that the article was published. I can not accept, and I have written to Bentham, that I withdraw myself from all activities with them, "says Marie-Paule Pileni, which daily is a professor specializing in nanomaterials at the prestigious Université Pierre et Marie Curie in France .

She feels not only snigløbet but wonder also that the article on dust tests after the terrorist attack on U.S. 11 September 2001 have actually found their way to The Open Chemical Physics Journal.

"I can not accept that the issue is put in my journal. The article is not about physical chemistry or chemical physics, and I could well believe that there is a political point of view behind the publication. If anyone had asked me, I would say that the article should never have been published in this journal. Sentence, "notes the former chief.

Dumpekarakter the journal
Chief Editor's dramatic departure gives critics an extra reason to doubt the article's conclusions, but Marie-Paule Pilini points out that because the issue is outside her expertise, she can not judge whether the article itself is good or bad.

In return get her publication to The Open Chemical Physics Journal dumpekarakter.

"I was really unsure about them in advance because I had repeatedly asked for information about the magazine without hearing from them. It does not appear in the list of international journals and is a bad sign. Now I see that it is because it is a bad magazine, "says Marie-Paule Pileni and continues:

"There are no references to The Open Chemical Physics Journal of other articles. I have two colleagues who agreed to publish an article that never has been quoted anywhere. If nobody reads it, it is bad magazine, and there is no need for it, "reads the harsh verdict.

The professor says that she a few years ago were invited to be editor of the journal, which would open new opportunities for new researchers, and because she supports the idea of open journals in which articles are accessible to all, she said yes.

"It is important to let people try to succeed, but we must not be allowed to all, and this is something decidedly rubbish. I try to be a serious researcher, and I do not want my name associated with this kind, "ends Marie-Paule Pileni.

Does not alter the study
Chief Editor's decision annoyed the Danish chemist Niels Harrit, which is one of the authors of the controversial article on nanotermit in the dust from the World Trade Center.

"It surprised me, and it is unfortunate if it discredits our work. But her departure will not alter our conclusions, because it is a purely human thing, she is sur over. I still believe that we have made chemical physics, and if there is something wrong with our investigation, she must love to criticize us for it, "said Niels Harrit, Associate Professor of Chemistry Institute of the University of Copenhagen.

The Niels Harrit co Steve Jones who has been in charge of contacts with Bentham, and so is the Danish researcher not offhand know what the editor responsible under the group have communicated with.

He knows to turn the names of two researchers - called referees - who have rated the article, but he would not disclose their names because they are 'in principle anonymous.

Dane withdrew from the magazine
Niels Harrit overall at the University of Copenhagen Nils O. Andersen itself has been in the pool of researchers who could be designated as under editor - 'editor' - in an article that was published in The Open Chemical Physics Journal. He has recently decided to withdraw from the journal 'Editorial Advisory Board.

He said to videnskab.dk that the decision has nothing to do with Niels Harrit article and that he in fact did not have time to make any experience with the magazine so that he can not throw further light on how the magazine works.

'Open access is an exciting development and principle should test the idea, because there is no reason why commercial publishers make money on our work. But professional journal was the edge of my expertise, and since I had no thanks for being editor of two articles, I decided that I would rather spend my time on something else, "says physicist Nils O. Andersen, dean of Faculty of Science and editor at The European Physical Journal D.

It has not yet been possible to get a comment from Bentham Science Publishers.

Source

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Feds knew Air Force One photo-op flyover might spark panic in the city - but didn’t give a hoot

Federal officials knew a flyover in lower Manhattan could spark chaos and panic in the streets below - but they did it anyway.

View more news videos at: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/video.


A memo clearly marked “FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY,” shows the Federal Aviation Administration was aware that sending a Boeing 747 and F-16 fighter jet over New York City at a low altitude raised “the possibility of public concern.”

Yet, the agency demanded the information be shared on a “need to know” basis and the public and media be kept in the dark.

It was a move branded “sheer stupidity” by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) yesterday.

“To say that it should not be made public knowing that it might scare people, it’s just confounding,” he said.

“It’s what gives Washington and government a bad name.”

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told WCBS-TV it showed “insensitivity to the psychic wounds” the city has suffered since 9/11.

Full article here

Source
Photobucket

Newly Released Memo: Government ‘Minders’ at 9/11 Commission Interviews ‘Intimidated’ Witnesses

A recently released 9/11 Commission memo highlights the role of government “minders” who accompanied witnesses interviewed by the commission. It was added to the National Archives’ files at the start of the year and discovered there by History Commons contributor paxvector.


The memo, entitled “Executive Branch Minders’ Intimidation of Witnesses,” complains that:

  • Minders “answer[ed] questions directed at witnesses;”

  • Minders acted as “monitors, reporting to their respective agencies on Commission staffs lines of inquiry and witnesses’ verbatim responses.” The staff thought this “conveys to witnesses that their superiors will review their statements and may engage in retribution;” and

  • Minders “positioned themselves physically and have conducted themselves in a manner that we believe intimidates witnesses from giving full and candid responses to our questions.”
The memo was drafted by three staffers on the commission’s Team 2, which reviewed the overall structure of the US intelligence community. One of the drafters was Kevin Scheid, a senior staffer who led the team. His co-writers were Lorry Fenner, an air force intelligence officer, and lawyer Gordon Lederman. The complaint was sent to the commission’s counsels, Daniel Marcus and Steve Dunne, in October 2003, about halfway through the commission’s 19-month life.

The memo makes clear that the problems were not occurring only with witnesses talking to Team 2, but also in “other teams’ interviews.” A hand-written note on a draft of the memo says, “not one agency or minder – also where we’ve sat in on other Teams’ interviews.”

According to the memo, some minders merely policed prior agreements between the commission and their parent agency about what the commission could ask witnesses, and others were simply there to make a list of documents the commission might want based on a witness’ testimony. However, some minders saw their role differently.

Intimidation through Physical Positioning

The three staffers argued minders should not answer questions for witnesses because they needed to understand not how the intelligence community was supposed to function, but “how the Intelligence Community functions in actuality.” However: “When we have asked witnesses about certain roles and responsibilities within the Intelligence Community, minders have preempted witnesses’ responses by referencing formal polices and procedures. As a result, witnesses have not responded to our questions and have deprived us from understanding the Intelligence Community’s actual functioning and witnesses’ view of their roles and responsibilities.”

The memo also describes the minders’ conduct in detail: “… [M]inders have positioned themselves physically and have conducted themselves in a manner that we believe intimidates witnesses from giving full and candid responses to our questions. Minders generally have sat next to witnesses at the table and across from Commission staff, conveying to witnesses that minders are participants in interviews and are of equal status to witnesses.”

The staffers also worried about minders taking “verbatim notes of witnesses’ statements,” as they thought this “conveys to witnesses that their superiors will review their statements and may engage in retribution.” They believed that “the net effect of minders’ conduct, whether intentionally or not, is to intimidate witnesses and to interfere with witnesses providing full and candid responses.”

Another problem with the verbatim notetaking was that it “facilitates agencies in alerting future witnesses to the Commission’s lines of inquiry and permits agencies to prepare future witnesses either explicitly or implicitly.”

Proposals

In response to this, the three staffers proposed not that minders be banned from interviews, but a set of rules governing minders’ conduct. For example, minders were to keep a “low profile,” sit out of witnesses’ sight, not take verbatim notes and not answer any questions directed at the witnesses.

Perhaps the most remarkable proposal is that the number of minders be limited to one per witness. The memo indicates that where an interviewee had served in multiple agencies, more than one minder would accompany the witness. The memo therefore requests, “Only one minder may attend an interview even if the witness served in multiple agencies,” meaning a witness would at least not be outnumbered by his minders.

False Statement by Chairman Kean

Commission Chairman Tom Kean, a Republican, first raised the issue of minders in a press briefing in early July 2003 . He said, “I think the commission feels unanimously that it’s some intimidation to have somebody sitting behind you all the time who you either work for or works for your agency. You might get less testimony than you would.”

He was asked about the minders again on September 23 at another press briefing. Instead of saying the minders represented “intimidation,” he commented: “Talking to staff, what they have told me is that as they’ve done these interviews, that the interviewees are encouragingly frank; that they by and large have not seemed to be intimidated in any way in their answers. … I’m glad to hear that it’s — from the staff that they don’t feel it’s inhibiting the process of the interviews.”

The commission’s Vice Chairman Lee Hamilton, a Democrat, commented, “it is our feeling that thus far, the minders have not been an impediment, in almost all cases.” He added that there were “one or two instances where the question has arisen,” but, “neither are we aware at this point that the presence of a minder has substantially impeded our inquiry. And nor have we run into a situation where we think a witness has refrained from speaking their minds.”

However, the Team 2 memo, sent a mere nine days after Kean and Hamilton’s remarks, shows Kean’s statements to have been untrue. The memo even referenced “Minders’ Intimidation of Witnesses” in the title, contained unusually strong language and was co-drafted by a leader of one of the commission’s teams.

Nevertheless, it is unclear whether Kean and Hamilton made the false statements knowingly. One of the criticisms at the commission was that the ten commissioners were cut off from the body of the staff, and all information that flowed from the staff to the commissioners went through the commission’s executive director, Philip Zelikow.

Author Philip Shenon, who wrote a history of the commission, found that at the start of the commission’s work Zelikow drafted a welcome memo containing ground rules for staffers, such as not talking to journalists. One of the rules was that the staff should not talk freely to the commissioners. If a staffer were contacted by a commissioner, he should not deal with the commissioner himself, but contact Zelikow or his deputy, who would then “be sure that the appropriate members of the commission’s staff are responsive.”

This rule was rescinded after complaints from some of the commissioners, including former Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick. Nevertheless, Zelikow’s control of information continued. When the commission’s counterterrorism team found a draft of the final report to be overly deferential to the FBI, they did not launch a formal objection to the draft’s language though the commission’s bureaucracy, but a female staffer cornered Gorelick “where Zelikow would not see it”–in the ladies room.

Source
Photobucket

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Former 9/11 Commission Vice Chairman Makes Bizarre Comments about Intelligence Failures before Attacks

Former 9/11 Commission Vice Chairman Lee Hamilton recently made some bizarre comments about the Zacarias Moussaoui case in an interview for Vanity Fair. The interview was used for a wide-ranging and very interesting oral history of the Bush White House. Hamilton’s comments appear to show complete ignorance of a key aspect of the investigation of which he was vice chair.

Moussaoui was arrested on an immigration violation due to suspicious he was planning to hijack an aircraft by the Minneapolis FBI on 16 August 2001, nearly four weeks before 9/11. His personal effects contained evidence linking him to eleven of the nineteen alleged hijackers and the local FBI suspected that he was part of a wider plot. It correctly assumed a search of the effects would uncover his links to the other conspirators. However, due to obstruction by FBI headquarters, no warrant was ever granted to search Moussaoui’s belongings. Middle managers at headquarters also failed to properly inform their superiors of the case.

Here are Hamilton’s comments on the Moussaoui case:

    We knew, for example—when I say we, I mean the F.B.I. in Minneapolis knew—that those guys in flight-training school were more interested in flying the airplane than they were in taking off and landing. They knew that. Who didn’t know it? The director of the F.B.I. didn’t know it. The director of the C.I.A. did know it. His response was that it was none of his business. Technically correct, because his business is foreign intelligence.

Errors

Anyone familiar with the Moussaoui case can see that this is pretty much garbage from start to finish. Let’s go through it one point at a time.

Error No. 1: “Those guys in flight training.” Minneapolis did not know of any “guys [plural] in flight training.” It knew of one [singular] guy, Moussaoui. Moussaoui had an associate, Hussein al-Attas, but he was not in flight training. Minneapolis suspected Moussaoui had associates (who turned out to be the actual alleged hijackers), but did not know of them.

Error No. 2: “…more interested in flying the airplane than they were in taking off and landing.” This is an urban myth, which was reported shortly after 9/11. However, the flight school officials who alerted the FBI, Clancy Prevost, High Sims and Tim Nelson, have been interviewed numerous times about why they alerted the FBI to Moussaoui, and none of them have ever mentioned this. Neither was it mentioned at Moussaoui’s trial, in the Justice Department inspector general’s investigation of the case, the 9/11 Congressional Inquiry report or the 9/11 Commission report.

The flight school and the FBI were suspicious for other reasons, such as Moussaoui paid cash, he was too badly dressed to be an “affluent joyrider,” and he did not have a pilot’s licence at all, but wanted to train on a 747 simulator. Indeed, Moussaoui never trained on the simulator, he was arrested before the practical part of his course started.

Error No. 3: “The director of the C.I.A. did know it.” CIA Director George Tenet certainly did know of the case, as he was briefed on it on 23 August. However, he did not know Moussaoui was “more interested in flying the airplane than they were in taking off and landing” because this is not true. You can find the first information Tenet received about Moussaoui here. Here’s an update from a week later. See, no mention of Moussaoui being more interested in flying a plane than in taking off and landing, but both of them mention the cash payment.

Here’s the 9/11 Commission’s version of what Tenet was told (p. 275):

    Tenet was also told that Moussaoui wanted to learn to fly a 747, paid for his training in cash, was interested to learn the doors do not open in flight, and wanted to fly a simulated flight from London to New York. He was told that the FBI had arrested Moussaoui because of a visa overstay and that the CIA was working the case with the FBI.


See, no mention of Moussaoui being “more interested in flying the airplane than they were in taking off and landing” here either. Perhaps if Hamilton could actually remember what the commission of which he had been vice chair had written, it might aid him in his public pronouncements.

Error No. 4: “His response was that it was none of his business.” Tenet may legitimately be criticised for many things, such as the missing WMD in Iraq affair and the torture of who knows how many people. He may even be criticised for his pre-9/11 actions and the mountain of BS he tried to sell investigators after the attacks. However, he demonstrably did not respond that the Moussaoui case was none of his business.

The briefings for him both point out “We are working the case with the FBI.” The commission itself points out that the CIA continued to work on the case after Tenet was briefed:

    On August 24, the CIA also sent a cable to London and Paris regarding ‘subjects involved in suspicious 747 flight training’ that described Moussaoui as a possible ’suicide hijacker.’ On August 28, the CIA sent a request for information to a different service of the British government; this communication warned that Moussaoui might be expelled to Britain by the end of August.


Indeed, the mere fact of the second briefing a week later is evidence that he had not told his subordinates it was none of his business. If he had, they would not have troubled him with a second briefing.

Tenet has been criticised for failing to inform Acting FBI Director Thomas Pickard and others, such as counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke, of the case. Tenet’s response is that it was the FBI’s case, so he didn’t think it was his responsibility to brief people on it. You might find that response reasonable or, in the high threat environment in the summer of 2001, you might find it unreasonable. Whatever the case, Hamilton is some way off base with his comments.

Who Is Responsible?

While the failure to obtain the warrant to search Moussaoui’s belongings has garnered most of the media attention, the FBI’s failure to inform its own director of the case is, in some ways, more interesting. Although “systemic errors” and suchlike were blamed for the intelligence failures after the attacks, the bureau’s failure to inform its own director was a failure by specific officials to pass notification up the chain of command.

So who was responsible for this? Notification was passed from the field office in Minneapolis to the Radical Fundamental Unit (RFU) at headquarters. However, the RFU then failed to properly communicate the information to the next official up the chain of command, the assistant director in charge of the bureau’s International Terrorism Operations Section (ITOS), Michael Rolince. RFU chief Dave Frasca did briefly mention the case to Rolince in late August, but only in what the commission calls “two passing hallway conversations.” Rolince didn’t appreciate the significance of the investigation and didn’t become more involved in the case until September. By then, the decision had already been taken not to apply for a warrant, but to attempt to deport Moussaoui.

So Frasca was the line manager whose job it really was to tell Rolince and push awareness of the case up the chain of command, but things are more complicated than that. The other managerial-level employee involved in the case at FBI headquarters was Tom Wilshire, a CIA officer on loan to the bureau. His role in the case was ignored by the 9/11 Congressional Inquiry, the DoJ inspector general, and the 9/11 Commission, but an e-mail dated August 24 attached to his substitution for testimony at Moussaoui’s trial proves his involvement. In the e-mail, he asks for an update on the case, indicating it was not his only communication with the RFU about Moussaoui. He also makes light of the situation’s seriousness.

According to the substitution for testimony, Wilshire was “the CIA’s chief intelligence representative to ITOS Section Chief Michael Rolince,” and his “primary role at the FBI was to assist the FBI in exploiting information for intelligence purposes.” So should Wilshire shoulder some of the blame for Rolince not being informed in full and in a timely manner? In this context, I can’t help but note that Wilshire was involved in, at least, most of the other intelligence failures before 9/11 as well.

What happened to Wilshire and Frasca after 9/11? Nothing, they stayed in their positions. All the people who had failed stayed, some were even promoted. The entire US intelligence system was reconfigured to fit in a director of national intelligence, but the same people were still inside the system. And the lessons that should be drawn from this are what?

Source

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

9/11 Commission Counsel: Government Agreed to Lie About 9/11

New book from man tasked by government to help investigate attacks unveils how “official story is almost entirely untrue”

The senior counsel to the 9/11 Commission - John Farmer - says that the government agreed not to tell the truth about 9/11, echoing the assertions of fellow 9/11 Commission members who concluded that the Pentagon were engaged in deliberate deception about their response to the attack.

Farmer served as Senior Counsel to the 9/11 Commission (officially known as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States), and is also a former New Jersey Attorney General.

Farmer’s book about his experiences working for the Commission is entitled The Ground Truth: The Story Behind America’s Defense on 9/11, and is set to be released in September.

The book unveils how “the public had been seriously misled about what occurred during the morning of the attacks,” and Farmer himself states that “at some level of the government, at some point in time…there was an agreement not to tell the truth about what happened.”


Only the very naive would dispute that an agreement not to tell the truth is an agreement to lie. Farmer’s contention is that the government agreed to create a phony official version of events to cover-up the real story behind 9/11.

The publisher of the book, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, states that, “Farmer builds the inescapably convincing case that the official version not only is almost entirely untrue but serves to create a false impression of order and security.”

In August 2006, the Washington Post reported, “Some staff members and commissioners of the Sept. 11 panel concluded 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 rather than a reflection of the fog of events on that day, according to sources involved in the debate.”

The report revealed how the 10-member commission deeply suspected deception to the point where they considered referring the matter to the Justice Department for criminal investigation.

“We to this day don’t know why NORAD [the North American Aerospace Command] told us what they told us,” said Thomas H. Kean, the former New Jersey Republican governor who led the commission. “It was just so far from the truth. . . . It’s one of those loose ends that never got tied.”

Farmer himself is quoted in the Post article, stating, “I was shocked at how different the truth was from the way it was described …. The [Norad air defense] tapes told a radically different story from what had been told to us and the public for two years…. This is not spin. This is not true.”

As we also reported in August 2006, released portions of NORAD tapes from 9/11, which were featured in a Vanity Fair article, do little to answer skeptic’s questions about the impotence of U.S. air defenses on 9/11 and if anything only increase focus on the incompatibility of the official version of events with what is actually known to have taken place on that day.

Make no mistake, Farmer is not saying that 9/11 was an inside job, however, Farmer’s testimony, along with that of his fellow 9/11 Commission members, conclusively demonstrates that, whatever really happened on 9/11, the official story as told to the public on the day and that which remains the authorities’ version of events today, is a lie - according to the very people who were tasked by the government to investigate it. This is a fact that no debunker or government apologist can ever legitimately deny.

Source

Thursday, April 9, 2009

NYC Ballot Initiative relaunched as NYCCAN - The New York City Coalition for Accountability Now

(The NYC Ballot Initiative has been reorganized, placing the further gathering of signatures for the petition in the hands of Ted Walter, one of the lead petition workers involved with the first phase of this project. He is joined by Frank Morales, who will safeguard funds for NYCCAN.org - Behind Walter and Morales are some familiar names; Donna Marsh O’Connor, Bob McIlvaine, Bill Doyle, Janette MacKinlay and William Rodriguez, who have formed an interim Executive Council for the coalition. This reorganization is the result of feedback that has effected change in the handling of the petition. NYCCAN also offers a new email address for further feedback, that will be accessible by the Executive Council. This could include opinions on the current membership of the commission, which can be changed once the commission has been established. Please feel free to distribute the Press Release below far and wide, and donate if you can. - rep.)

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Press Release from NYCCAN.org:



April 9, 2009

Dear Friends around the World,

THE TIME TO ACT IS NOW

To place a public referendum for an impartial, independent and subpoena powered investigation of 9/11 on the New York City Ballot for the November General Election.

The 9/11 Commission was set up in 2002 to “provide the fullest possible account of the events surrounding 9/11”. What we got instead, in the words of Commission Chairs Governor Thomas Kean and Representative Lee Hamilton, was a Commission “Set up to fail”. A joint statement from both sides of the aisle is a rarity. This one speaks volumes.

AMERICA DESERVES BETTER

Today, over 66% of New York City residents support a new 9/11 investigation. Millions now know that critical questions were left unaddressed. Only an objective, independent, subpoena powered investigation can ask the right people the relevant questions the 9/11 Commission certainly did not. Only an impartial investigation, free from intervention and powered by subpoena, can deliver the answers that every American deserves.

Thanks to your hard work and dedication in keeping 9/11 front and center all along, the NYC 9/11 Ballot Initiative has succeeded in collecting over 30,000 signatures, leading us to the final phase of our mission; to place a referendum for an independent subpoena powered 9/11 investigation on the NYC Ballot for the November General Election.

Those 30,000 signatures are needed to present the petition to the New York City Council for its approval. Our goal, however, is 75,000 signatures by the end of June, making it a virtual certainty that the referendum will be on the ballot, placing the decision to approve the pursuit of evidence and fact wherever it may lead exactly where it belongs - in the hands of New York City voters.

The NYC 9/11 Ballot Initiative has evolved into the NYC Coalition for Accountability Now, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization comprised of 9/11 Family Members, First Responders and concerned citizens like you, determined to bring about an impartial, an independent investigation into the events of September 11, 2001. Along with its new name, NYC CAN has brought new leadership and a renewed commitment to transparency and accountability.

Ted Walter, the key coordinator of the Initiative’s 2008 petitioning effort, has taken on the role of Executive Director, along with First Responder Reverend Frank Morales, who will serve as Treasurer. The organization’s Board of Directors will be comprised of 9/11 Family Members, First Responders and others committed to this effort. In the interim, the organization has created an Executive Council consisting of individuals most directly affected by September 11, including 9/11 family members Donna Marsh O’Connor, Bob McIlvaine, Jean Canavan and Bill Doyle, former downtown resident Janette MacKinlay and 9/11 Survivor William Rodriguez.

This initiative is the tangible result of all your efforts to keep 9/11 alive in the hearts and minds of the American public. At the height of our petitioning effort, we collected over 1,000 signatures per day. With 90 days and 45,000 signatures to go, our goal of 75,000 is well within reach.

THE TIME TO DONATE IS NOW

If every person who reads this letter acts now to become a Member of NYC CAN by donating just $25, we will move that much closer to our goal of 1 Million Members worldwide and quickly surpass the $100,000 required to fund the final phase of the petitioning effort. With minimal overhead, your contribution will provide well-trained, professional petitioners along with all the marketing, advertising and collateral materials necessary to help New Yorkers realize their wish for an independent and impartial investigation into the events of 9/11.

Please join our commitment to answers, accountability and action by standing together and donating what you can - $25, $50 or $500 - today. If we stand as Americans, united as one, we do not simply succeed - we make history.

Our success together depends on the efforts and participation of all, which includes an active and ongoing dialogue with you. We encourage you to email us at info@nyccan.org with any questions, comments or suggestions you may have. We’re listening. And we guarantee you’ll hear back from us. After all, we’re in this together.

And remember, while thinkers think and talkers talk, patriots act.

The time to act is now.

DONATE NOW

BECOME A MEMBER NOW

TELL ALL YOUR FRIENDS NOW


http://nyccan.org/

Sincerely,

The New York City Coalition for Accountability Now

Donna Marsh O’Connor
Bob McIlvaine
Jean Canavan
Bill Doyle
Janette MacKinlay
William Rodriguez
Ted Walter
Frank Morales

Source

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