Sources for Claims:

 

  1. 50% of US Marriages End In Divorce – National Center for Health Statistics
  2. Turn Your Back On Bush [Columbus Free Press, 7/01/02; The Progressive, 7/01/02, NY Times 6/25/02; Washington Post 6/23/02]
  3. High school student interrogated by the Secret Service. [Dayton Daily News, 12/09/02]
  4. Man interrogated by the Secret Service for bumper stickers. [AP, 9/09/01]
  5. 12 Students detained, interrogated and threatened with arrest by the

Secret Service for "threatening the life of the president." [North Texas Independent Media, 11/04/02]

  1. Attorney arrested for trespassing at a local mall for wearing Anti-War T-Shirt. [Times Union, 3/05/03]
  2. Man sentenced to 37 months in Federal Prison for "threatening the life of the President” by telling a joke in a bar. [AP, 12/06/02]

9/11 Source Information

  1. January 2001 - The Bush Administration orders the FBI and intelligence agencies to "back off" investigations involving the bin Laden family, including two of Osama bin Laden's relatives (Abdullah and Omar) who were living in Falls Church, Va. -- right next to CIA headquarters. This followed previous orders dating back to 1996 that frustrated efforts to investigate the bin Laden family. [Source: BBC Newsnight, Correspondent Gregg Palast, Nov. 7, 2001]
  2. May 2001 - Secretary of State Colin Powell gives $43 million in aid to the Taliban regime, purportedly to assist hungry farmers who are starving since the destruction of their opium crop in January on orders of the Taliban regime. [Source: Los Angeles Times, May 22, 2001]
  3. July 2001 - FBI agents in Arizona write a memorandum warning about suspicious activities involving a group of Middle Eastern men taking flight training lessons in Phoenix. The memorandum specifically mentions Osama bin Laden and warns of connections to terrorist activities. [Source: The New York Times, May 14, 2002]
  4. July 4-14, 2001 - Bin Laden meeting with CIA agent at US Hospital in Dubai.  [Le Figaro, 10/31/01, Agence France-Presse, 11/1/01, London Times, 11/01/01] During his stay, bin Laden is visited by "several members of his family and Saudi personalities," including Prince Turki al Faisal, then head of Saudi intelligence, as well as two CIA officers. [Guardian, 11/1/01] FTW The explosive story is widely reported in Europe, but barely at all in the US (possibly only by UPI [UPI, 11/1/01]).
  5. July 26, 2001 - CBS News reports that John Ashcroft has stopped flying commercial airlines due a threat assessment. Ashcroft told the press that he didn't know anything about what had caused it.
  6. August 2001 - Russian President Vladimir Putin orders Russian intelligence to warn the U.S. government "in the strongest possible terms" of imminent attacks on airports and government buildings. [Source: MSNBC interview with Putin, Sept. 15, 2001]
  7. August 2001 - President Bush receives classified intelligence briefings at his Crawford, Texas ranch indicating that Osama bin Laden might be planning to hijack commercial airliners. [CBS News; CNN, May 15, 2002]
  8. Sept. 6-7, 2001 - Put options (a speculation that the stock will go down) totaling 4,744 are purchased on United Air Lines stock, as opposed to only 396 call options (speculation that the stock will go up). This is a dramatic and abnormal increase in sales of put options. [Source: The Herzliyya International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism (ICT), http://www.ict.org.il/, Sept. 21, 2001;  The New York Times; The Wall Street Journal; The San Francisco Chronicle, Sept. 29, 2001]
  9. Sept. 10, 2001 - Put options totaling 4,516 are purchased on American Airlines as compared to 748 call options. . [Source: The Herzliyya International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism (ICT), http://www.ict.org.il/, Sept. 21, 2001]
  10. Sept. 6-11, 2001 - No other airlines show any similar trading patterns to those experienced by United and American. The put option purchases on both airlines were 600 percent above normal. This at a time when Reuters (Sept. 10) issues a business report stating, "Airline stocks may be poised to take off."
  11. Sept. 6-10, 2001 - Highly abnormal levels of put options are purchased in Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, AXA Re(insurance) which owns 25 percent of American Airlines, and Munich Re. All of these companies are directly impacted by the Sept. 11 attacks. [Source: ICT, above; FTW, Oct. 18, 2001, http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/oct152001.html]
  12. Sept. 10, 2001 - The Houston Chronicle reports the FBI was notified of a fifth grader from a Dallas suburb who told his teacher, "Tomorrow, World War III will begin. It will begin in the United States, and the United States will lose." The Chronicle was unclear on specifically when Garland, Texas school district officials told the FBI about the incident, but it was some time between Sept. 13, 2001 and the story's publication date of Sept. 19, 2001. [Source: Houston Chronicle, Sept. 19, 2001 http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/metropolitan/1055222] 
  13. Sept. 11, 2001
    1. “Within one minute, Air Traffic Control knows Flt 11 has been hijacked”:

                                                               i.      8:13 a.m. The last routine communication between ground control and the pilots of Flight 11. The pilot responds when told to turn right. But almost immediately afterwards he fails to respond to a command to climb. [Boston Globe, 11/23/01, 8:13:31, New York Times, 10/16/01]

    1. “NORAD isn’t informed for another 27 minutes”:

                                                               i.      8:31 a.m. NORAD employee Lt. Colonel Dawne Deskins later says that Boston flight control notifies NORAD of Flight 77's hijacking at this time, not at 8:40 as has been widely reported, even by Deskins previously. [ABC News, 9/11/02] Another later report states, "Shortly after 8:30 a.m., behind the scenes, word of a possible hijacking [reaches] various stations of NORAD." [ABC News, 9/14/02] If Deskins' most recent account is right, Boston flight controllers wait about 10 minutes after they are sure Flight 11 was hijacked before notifying NORAD. Otherwise, Boston waits about 20 minutes.

                                                             ii.      8:40 a.m. Boston flight control supposedly notifies NORAD that Flight 11 has been hijacked (another account says it happens earlier (see 8:31 a.m.). [8:38, CNN, 9/17/01, 8:38, Washington Post, 9/12/01, 8:40, NORAD, 9/18/01, 8:40, AP, 8/19/02, 8:40, Newsday, 9/10/02] This is about 20 minutes after traffic control noticed the plane had its transponder beacon and radio turned off; 27 minutes after it failed to respond to the climb command. Such a delay in notification would be in strict violation of regulations.

    1. “It then took NORAD between 15 and 48 minutes to scramble aircraft despite their own procedure to do so immediately when radio contact with a plane is lost”:

                                                               i.      Sept. 11, 2001 - For 50 minutes, from 8:15 AM until 9:05 AM, with it widely known within the FAA and the military that four planes have been simultaneously hijacked and taken off course, no one notifies the President of the United States. It is not until 9:30 that any Air Force planes are scrambled to intercept, but by then it is too late. This means that the National Command Authority waited for 75 minutes before scrambling aircraft, even though it was known that four simultaneous hijackings had occurred. [Source: CNN; ABC; MSNBC; Los Angeles Times; The New York Times; www.tenc.net]

                                                             ii.      The scrambling (sending into the air) of fighter aircraft at the first sign of trouble is a routine phenomenon. During the year 2000, there are 425 "unknowns" - pilots who didn't file or diverted from flight plans or used the wrong frequency. Fighters are scrambled in response 129 times in cases where problems are not immediately resolved. After 9/11, such scrambles go from about twice a week to three or four times a day. [Calgary Herald, 10/13/01] Between September 2000 and June 2001, fighters are scrambled 67 times. [AP, 8/13/02]

                                                            iii.      "Consider that an aircraft emergency exists... when: ... There is unexpected loss of radar contact and radio communications with any... aircraft." [FAA regulations]

                                                           iv.      "If... you are in doubt that a situation constitutes an emergency or potential emergency, handle it as though it were an emergency." [FAA regulations]

                                                             v.      "Pilots are supposed to hit each fix with pinpoint accuracy. If a plane deviates by 15 degrees, or two miles from that course, the flight controllers will hit the panic button. They’ll call the plane, saying 'American 11, you’re deviating from course.' It’s considered a real emergency, like a police car screeching down a highway at 100 miles an hour. When golfer Payne Stewart’s incapacitated Learjet missed a turn at a fix, heading north instead of west to Texas, F-16 interceptors were quickly dispatched." [MSNBC, 9/12/01]

                                                           vi.      "A NORAD spokesman says its fighters routinely intercept aircraft. When planes are intercepted, they typically are handled with a graduated response. The approaching fighter may rock its wingtips to attract the pilot's attention, or make a pass in front of the aircraft. Eventually, it can fire tracer rounds in the airplane's path, or, under certain circumstances, down it with a missile." [Boston Globe, 9/15/01]

    1. “Bush knew about the first plane upon arrival at Booker Elementary.”

                                                               i.      8:35 a.m. Bush's motorcade leaves for Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida. [8:30, Washington Post, 1/27/02, 8:35, Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/01, 8:39, Washington Times, 10/7/02] He said farewell to the management at the Colony Beach and Tennis Resort at 8:20. [Telegraph, 12/16/01] Note that an early report that as Bush is leaving the resort, a reporter asks him, "Do you know what's going on in New York?" [ABC News, 9/11/01], appears to be mistaken. Perhaps it happens when Bush arrives at the school?

                                                             ii.      Between 8:46 - 8:55 a.m. When Flight 11 hits the WTC at 8:46, Bush's motorcade is crossing the John Ringling Causeway on the way to Booker Elementary from the Colony Beach & Tennis Resort on Longboat Key. [Washington Times, 10/8/02] Sarasota Magazine claims that Bush is on Highway 301, just north of Main Street when he is told that a plane had crashed in New York City. [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/01] Around the same time, news photographer Eric Draper is riding in another car in the motorcade with Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, and overhears Fleischer say on a cell phone, "Oh, my God, I don't believe it. A plane just hit the World Trade Center." Fleischer is told he will be needed on arrival to discuss reports of the crash. [Christian Science Monitor, 9/17/01, Albuquerque Tribune, 9/10/02] Fleischer is told this "just minutes" after the first news reports. [MSNBC, 10/29/02] Congressman Dan Miller also says he is told about the crash just before meeting Bush at Booker at 8:55. [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/01] Some reporters waiting for him to arrive also learn of the crash just minutes after it happens. [CBS, 9/11/02 (B)] It would make sense that Bush is told about the crash immediately and at the same time that others hear about it. Yet Bush and others claim he isn't told until he arrives at the school.

                                                            iii.      8:55 a.m.  Bush's motorcade arrives at Booker Elementary School. [8:46, ABC News, 9/11/02, 8:55, Washington Times, 10/7/02, 8:55, Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/01, "just before 9:00," Telegraph, 12/16/01, "shortly before 9:00," Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/10/02, "just before 9:00," New York Times, 9/16/01 (B), 9:00, Albuquerque Tribune, 9/10/02] The trip is said to take 20 minutes, which confirms he arrives around 8:55, if it is true he left around 8:35. [New York Times, 9/16/01 (B), St. Petersburg Times, 9/8/02 (B), MSNBC, 10/29/02]

                                                           iv.      Between 8:55 - 9:00 a.m. Just after the WTC crash, the beepers of politicians' aides are going off with news of the first WTC crash as Bush arrives and enters Booker Elementary School. According to photographer Eric Draper, standing nearby, Bush advisor Karl Rove rushes up, takes Bush aside in a corridor, and tells him about the calamity. Rove says the cause of the crash was unclear. Bush replies, "What a horrible accident!" Bush also suggests the pilot may have had a heart attack. [Daily Mail, 9/8/02] Dan Bartlett, White House Communications Director, also says he is there when Bush is told: "[Bush] being a former pilot, had kind of the same reaction, going, was it bad weather? And I said no, apparently not." [ABC News, 9/11/02] One account explicitly says that Rove tells Bush the WTC has been hit by a large commercial airliner. [Telegraph, 12/16/01] However, Bush later remembers Rove saying it appeared to be an accident involving a small, twin-engine plane. [Washington Post, 1/27/02] In a later recollection, Bush recalls that it is chief of staff Andrew Card who first warns him and says, "'Here's what you're going to be doing; you're going to meet so-and-so, such-and-such.' And Andy Card says, 'By the way, an aircraft flew into the World Trade Center.'" [Washington Times, 10/7/02] Says a reporter who was standing nearby, "From the demeanor of the President, grinning at the children, it appeared that the enormity of what he had been told was taking a while to sink in." [Daily Mail, 9/8/02] ["Shortly before 9:00," Daily Mail, 9/8/02, "just before 9:00," Telegraph, 12/16/01] In fact, Bush has already been told about the crash twice before this (see (Between 8:46 - 8:55 a.m.) and (Before 8:55 a.m.)). He should also be aware that NORAD has known since 8:40, if not before, that Flight 11 has been hijacked, and since 8:43 that Flight 175 has been hijacked. The New York Times points out that flight controllers learn Flight 77 has been hijacked "within a few minutes" of 8:48. [New York Times, 9/15/01 (C)] Is Bush and his aides putting on a charade to pretend he doesn't know there is a national emergency? If so, why?

                                                             v.      Between 8:55 - 9:00 a.m. Just after Bush arrives at Booker Elementary School and is briefly told of the WTC crash, he is whisked into a holding room and updated on the situation via telephone by National Security Advisor Rice. [Christian Science Monitor, 9/17/01, Time, 9/12/01] Rice later claims, "He said, what a terrible, it sounds like a terrible accident. Keep me informed." [ABC News, 9/11/02] School principal Gwen Tose-Rigell is then summoned to a room to talk with the President: "He said a commercial plane has hit the World Trade Center, and we're going to go ahead and go on, we're going on to do the reading thing anyway." [AP, 8/19/02 (D)] One local reporter notes that at this point, "He could and arguably should have left Emma E. Booker Elementary School immediately, gotten onto Air Force One and left Sarasota without a moment's delay." [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/12/01 (B)] Why doesn't he? Note that CIA Director Tenet has already been told it was terrorism (see (After 8:46)) and Bush certainly should have been told by Rice of the three known hijackings at this time, if he hasn't been told already. How could Bush continue to think there is only a single-plane accident?

    1. “A public announcement is broadcast inside the South Tower, saying that the building is secure and people can return to their offices.

                                                               i.      8:55 a.m. A public announcement is broadcast inside the WTC South Tower, saying that the building is secure and people can return to their offices. [New York Times, 9/11/02, click on interactive popup] Such announcements continue until a few minutes before the building is hit, and "may [lead] to the deaths of hundreds of people." No one knows exactly what is said (though many later recall the phrase "the building is secure") or who gives the authority to say it. [USA Today, 9/3/02]

    1. “He knew at that point, and Bush sat there. He didn't show any emotion. For 25 minutes he sat there. The talk was ‘we don’t want to alarm the kids.’” (The 25 minutes is from when he heard about the 2nd plane hitting to when he finally gave his address to the nation.)

                                                               i.      9:03 - 9:06 a.m. Bush enters Sandra Kay Daniels' second-grade class for a photo-op to promote Bush's education policies. [Daily Mail, 9/8/02]

                                                             ii.      9:06 a.m.  Bush is in a Booker Elementary School second-grader classroom. His chief of staff, Andrew Card, enters the room and whispers into his ear, "A second plane hit the other tower, and America's under attack." [New York Times, 9/16/01 (B)] [9:05, New York Times, 9/16/01 (B), 9:05, Telegraph, 12/16/01, 9:05, Albuquerque Tribune, 9/10/02, 9:07, Washington Times, 10/8/02, ABC News reporter Ann Compton, who is in the room, says she is struck "So much so that I [write] it down in my reporter's notebook, by my watch, 9:07 a.m.," ABC News, 9/11/02] Intelligence expert James Bamford describes Bush's reaction: "Immediately [after Card speaks to Bush] an expression of befuddlement passe[s] across the President's face. Then, having just been told that the country was under attack, the Commander in Chief appear[s] uninterested in further details. He never ask[s] if there had been any additional threats, where the attacks were coming from, how to best protect the country from further attacks.... Instead, in the middle of a modern-day Pearl Harbor, he simply turn[s] back to the matter at hand: the day's photo op." [Body of Secrets, James Bamford, 4/02 edition, p. 633] Bush continues listening to the goat story. Then, in an event noticeable in its absence, as one newspaper put it, "For some reason, Secret Service agents [do] not bustle him away." [Globe and Mail, 9/12/01] Bush later says of the experience, "I am very aware of the cameras. I'm trying to absorb that knowledge. I have nobody to talk to. I'm sitting in the midst of a classroom with little kids, listening to a children's story and I realize I'm the Commander in Chief and the country has just come under attack." [Telegraph, 12/16/01] Bush continues to listen to the goat story for about ten more minutes (see 9:06 - 9:16 a.m.). The reason given is that, "Without all the facts at hand, George Bush ha[s] no intention of upsetting the schoolchildren who had come to read for him." [MSNBC, 10/29/02] Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport is only three and a half miles away, and in fact the elementary school was chosen as the location for a photo op partly because of its closeness to the airport. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/12/02] Why doesn't the Secret Service move Bush away from his known location?

                                                            iii.      9:16 a.m.  Bush leaves the Sarasota classroom where he has been since about 9:03. The children finish their lessons and put away their readers. [Sarasota Magazine, 9/19/01] Bush advises the children to stay in school and be good citizens. [Tampa Tribune, 9/1/02, St. Petersburg Times, 9/8/02 (B)] He also tells the children, "Thank you all so very much for showing me your reading skills." [ABC News, 9/11/02] One student also asks Bush a question, and Bush gives a quick response on his education policy. [New York Post, 9/12/02] A reporter asks, "Mr. President, are you aware of the reports of the plane crash in New York? Is there any..." This question is interrupted by an aide who has come into the room, saying, "All right. Thank you. If everyone could please step outside." Bush then says, "We'll talk about it later." [CBS, 9/11/02 (B)] Bush then tells school principal Gwen Tose-Rigell, who is in the room, about the terror attacks and why he has to leave. [Washington Times, 10/7/02] He then goes into an empty classroom next door and meets with his staff there. [ABC News, 9/11/02] Bush's program with the children was supposed to start at 9:00 and end 20 minutes later. [Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 9/16/01] So he leaves the classroom only a couple of minutes earlier than planned, if at all (as the goodbyes and questions on the way out may have taken another minute or two).

                                                           iv.      Between 9:16 - 9:29 a.m. Bush works with his staff to prepare a speech he will deliver at 9:29. He intermittently watches the television coverage in the room. [Albuquerque Tribune, 9/10/02] He also speaks on the phone to advisors, first calling National Security Advisor Rice, then Vice President Cheney, then New York Governor George Pataki. [Daily Mail, 9/8/02]

    1. Bush’s Lie: “Jordan, you’re never going to believe what state I was in when I heard about the terrorist attack. I was in Florida. And my Chief of Staff, Andy Card... Well actually I was in a classroom talking about a reading program that works! And uh -- it uh -- I was sitting outside the classroom waiting to go in and I saw an airplane hit the tower - of the -- the TV was obviously on. I used to fly myself and I said, well that’s one terrible pilot. And I said it must’ve been a horrible accident. But I was whisked off and I didn’t have much time to think about it. I was sitting in the classroom and Andy Card, my Chief of Staff, was sitting over here, walked in and said ‘A second plane has hit the towers, America is under attack.’”

                                                               i.      9:01 a.m. Bush later makes the following statement: "And I was sitting outside the classroom waiting to go in, and I saw an airplane hit the tower - the TV was obviously on, and I use to fly myself, and I said, 'There's one terrible pilot.' And I said, 'It must have been a horrible accident.' But I was whisked off there - I didn't have much time to think about it." [CNN, 12/4/01] He has repeated the story on other occasions. [White House, 1/5/02, CBS, 9/11/02] However, it has been noted that Bush doesn't have access to a television until 15 or so minutes later. [Washington Times, 10/7/02] A Boston Herald article later says, "Think about that. Bush's remark implies he saw the first plane hit the tower. But we all know that video of the first plane hitting did not surface until the next day. Could Bush have meant he saw the second plane hit - which many Americans witnessed? No, because he said that he was in the classroom when Card whispered in his ear that a second plane hit." The article points out that Bush had told the story more than once, and asks, " How could the commander-in-chief have seen the plane fly into the first building - as it happened?" [Boston Herald, 10/22/02] By 8:31 or 8:40, NORAD knew that Flight 11 was hijacked, and by 8:43, they knew Flight 175 was hijacked. Bush has just been briefed by his National Security Advisor on the situation. How he can only think, "There's one terrible pilot," based on an impossible television viewing?

    1. Jeff Seemann - “I wanna know why it took him why it took him 10 hours to get back to Washington DC that day. I wanna know why he flew to Louisiana on Air Force One and then flew to an Air Force Base in Nebraska.” (10 hours from when he hears about the 2nd plane crash at 9:06 a.m.)

                                                               i.      9:56 a.m. Bush departs from the Saratoga, Florida, airport on Air Force One. [9:54, Dallas Morning News, 8/28/02, 9:55, New York Times, 9/16/01 (B), 9:55, Daily Mail, 9/8/02,9:55, Washington Post, 1/27/02, 9:55, Washington Post, 9/12/01, 9:55, AP, 9/12/01, 9:55, ABC News, 9/11/02, 9:57, CBS, 9/11/02 (B), 9:57, New York Times, 9/12/01, 9:57, CNN, 9/12/01, 9:57, Telegraph, 12/16/01] Amazingly, his plane takes off without any fighters protecting it. "The object seemed to be simply to get the President airborne and out of the way," says an administration official. [Telegraph, 12/16/01] There are still 3,520 planes in the air over the US. [USA Today, 8/13/02 (B)] About half of the planes in the region of Florida where Bush is are still in the air. [St. Petersburg Times, 9/7/02] With so many reports of hijacked planes, how is being in the sky unescorted any safer than being on the ground?

                                                             ii.      10:32 a.m. Cheney calls Bush and tells him of a threat to Air Force One. He is told it would take between 40 minutes and 90 minutes to get a protective fighter escort up to Air Force One. His plane turns toward Louisiana soon after. [Washington Post, 1/27/02] Many doubt the existence of this threat. For instance, Representative Martin Meehan (D) says, "I don't buy the notion Air Force One was a target. That's just PR, that's just spin." [Washington Times, 10/8/02] A later account calls the threat "completely untrue," and says Cheney probably made the story up. A well-informed, anonymous Washington official says, "It did two things for [Cheney]. It reinforced his argument that the President should stay out of town, and it gave George W an excellent reason for doing so." [Telegraph, 12/16/01] Why wouldn't Air Force One already have a fighter escort, and why would it take so long for new planes to arrive? Does Cheney also delay a fighter escort? Why does he apparently lie to keep Bush away?

                                                            iii.      10:35 a.m. Air Force One turns toward Louisiana. It has been decided Bush cannot go directly to Washington. [About 10:30, CBS, 9/11/02 (B), about 10:42, Washington Post, 1/27/02]

                                                           iv.      11:45 a.m. Air Force One lands at Barksdale Air Force base near Shreveport, Louisiana. "The official reason for landing at Barksdale was that Bush felt it necessary to make a further statement, but it isn't unreasonable to assume that - as there was no agreement as to what the President's movements should be - it was felt he might as well be on the ground as in the air." [Salon, 9/12/01, New York Times, 9/16/01 (B), Telegraph, 12/16/01, CBS, 9/11/02] If this is true, then having him take off without any fighter escort makes even less sense.

                                                             v.      12:00 Noon Bush arrives at the Barksdale Air Force base headquarters in a Humvee escorted by armed outriders. Reporters and others are not allowed to say where they are. [Telegraph, 12/16/01] Compare this level of security to the complete lack of any security measures to protect Bush earlier in the day when it is learned that a second plane has hit the WTC.

                                                           vi.      12:58 p.m. Bush spends most of his time at Barksdale Air Force base arguing on the phone with Cheney and others over where he should go next. "A few minutes before 1 p.m.," he agrees to fly to Nebraska. As earlier (see 10:32 a.m.), there are rumors of a "credible terrorist threat" to Air Force One. [Telegraph, 12/16/01]

                                                          vii.      1:30 p.m.  President Bush leaves Barksdale Air Force Base for Nebraska's Offutt Air Force Base, home to the US Strategic Command. [1:15, Telegraph, 12/16/01, 1:31, Salon, 9/12/01, 1:44, MSNBC, 9/22/01, 1:48, CNN, 9/12/01] He travels with Chief of Staff Andrew Card, senior advisor Karl Rove, communications staffers Dan Bartlett, Ari Fleischer and Gordon Johndroe, and a reduced number of reporters. [Salon, 9/12/01]

                                                        viii.      2:50 p.m. Air Force One lands at Offutt Air Force Base near Omaha, Nebraska. Bush stays on the plane for about 10 minutes before entering United States Strategic Command at 3:06. [Salon, 9/12/01] Bush is taken into an underground bunker designed to withstand a nuclear blast. There, he uses an advanced strategic command and communications center to teleconference directly with Vice President Cheney, National Security Advisor Rice, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, and members of the National Security Council. The meeting ends at 4:15. [Telegraph, 12/16/01, Washington Times, 10/8/02] [2:50, Daily Mail, 9/8/02, 2:50, Telegraph, 12/16/01, 2:50, Salon, 9/12/01, 3:07, AP, 8/19/02] Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, CIA Director Tenet, and Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta also participate in the teleconference. [ABC News, 9/11/02]

                                                           ix.      4:33 p.m.  President Bush leaves Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska for Washington. [4:30, MSNBC, 9/22/01, 4:30, CNN, 9/12/01, 4:36, Telegraph, 12/16/01, 4:36, Washington Times, 10/8/02]

                                                             x.      6:54 p.m.  Bush arrives back at the White House, after exiting Air Force One at 6:42 and flying across Washington in a helicopter. [ABC News, 9/11/02] [6:34, Salon, 9/12/01, 6:54, Washington Times, 10/8/02, 6:54, CNN, 9/12/01, 6:54, Telegraph, 12/16/01, 7:00, AP, 8/19/02]

    1. “Why was Guiliani illegally storing 20,000 gallons of diesel fuel in WTC #7?” [WTC7: The Improbably Collapse.  Baltimore Chronicle, Sept. 16, 2003, ‘More Than Any of Us Can Bear.’ New York Daily News] At the time of its destruction, Building 7 housed documents relating to numerous SEC investigations. The files for approximately three to four thousand cases were destroyed. Among the destroyed documents were ones that may have demonstrated the relationship between Citigroup and the WorldCom bankruptcy. [National Law Journal, 9/17/01]
  1. September 13-19, 2001: Members of bin Laden's family and important Saudis are "driven or flown under FBI supervision to a secret assembly point in Texas and then to Washington from where they left the country on a private charter plane when airports reopened three days after the attacks." The flights to Texas and Washington occur before the national air ban is lifted. [New York Times, 9/30/01]
  2. Sept. 29, 2001 - The San Francisco Chronicle reports that $2.5 million in put options on American and United airlines are unclaimed. This is likely the result of the suspension in trading on the New York Stock Exchange after the attacks, which gave the Securities and Exchange Commission time to be waiting when the owners showed up to redeem their put options.
  3. May 16, 2002 - White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer states unequivocally that while President Bush had been warned of possible hijackings, "The president did not -- not -- receive information about the use of airplanes as missiles by suicide bombers." [Source: CBS News, May 15, 2002]
  4. May 31, 2002 - FBI Agent Robert Wright delivers a tearful press conference at the National Press Club describing his lawsuit against the FBI for deliberately curtailing investigations that might have prevented the 9-11 attacks. He uses words like "prevented," "thwarted," "obstructed," "threatened," "intimidated," and "retaliation" to describe the actions of his superiors in blocking his attempts to shut off money flows to Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. These are not words of negligence. They are words describing deliberate and malicious actions. [Source: C-SPAN website]

War on Terrorism & Operation Iraqi Freedom

  1. “Why was the war in Afghanistan planned for years before 9-11?”
    1. 1997: It is later claimed that the special CIA paramilitary teams start entering Afghanistan in this year. [Washington Post, 11/18/01]
    2. 1998: It is later revealed by Uzbekistan that Uzbekistan and the US have been conducting joint covert operations against Afghanistan's Taliban regime and bin Laden since at least before this year. [Times of India, 10/14/01, Washington Post, 10/14/01]
    3. September 2000 (D): US General Tommy Franks, who will later lead the Afghanistan war, tours Central Asia in an attempt to build military aid relationships with nations there, but finds no takers. Russia's power in the region appears to be on the upswing instead. Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev writes, "The actions of Islamic extremists in Central Asia give Russia the chance to strengthen its position in the region." But shortly after 9/11, Russia and China agree to allow the US to establish temporary US military bases in Central Asia to prosecute the Afghanistan war. The bases become permanent, and the Guardian will write in early 2002, "Both countries increasingly have good reasons to regret their accommodating stand. Having pushed, cajoled and bribed its way into their Central Asian backyard, the US clearly has no intention of leaving any time soon." [Guardian, 1/10/02]
    4. December 19, 2000: The Washington Post reports that "the United States has quietly begun to align itself with those in the Russian government calling for military action against Afghanistan and has toyed with the idea of a new raid to wipe out Osama bin Laden. Until it backed off under local pressure, it went so far as to explore whether a Central Asian country would permit the use of its territory for such a purpose." Russia and the US are discussing "what kind of government should replace the Taliban. Thus, while claiming to oppose a military solution to the Afghan problem, the United States is now talking about the overthrow of a regime that controls nearly the entire country, in the hope it can be replaced with a hypothetical government that does not exist even on paper." [Washington Post, 12/19/00] It appears that all pre-9/11 plans to invade Afghanistan involve attacking from the north with Russia (see March 15, 2001, June 26, 2001 and July 21, 2001), but 9/11 allows the US to do it without Russian help.
    5. Spring 2001: The Sydney Morning Herald later reports, "The months preceding September 11 [see] a shifting of the US military's focus ... Over several months beginning in April [2001] a series of military and governmental policy documents [are] released that [seek] to legitimize the use of US military force in the pursuit of oil and gas." Michael Klare, an international security expert and author of Resource Wars, says the military has increasingly come to "define resource security as their primary mission." An article in the Army War College's journal by Jeffrey Record, a former staff member of the Senate armed services committee, argues for the legitimacy of "shooting in the Persian Gulf on behalf of lower gas prices." He also "advocate[s] the acceptability of presidential subterfuge in the promotion of a conflict" and "explicitly urge[s] painting over the US's actual reasons for warfare with a nobly high-minded veneer, seeing such as a necessity for mobilizing public support for a conflict." In April, Tommy Franks, the commander of US forces in the Persian Gulf/South Asia area, testifies to Congress in April that his command's key mission is "access to [the region's] energy resources." The next month US Central Command begins planning for war with Afghanistan, plans that are later used in the real war (see May 2001 (F)). [Sydney Morning Herald, 12/26/02] Other little noticed but influential documents reflect similar thinking (see September 2000 and April 2001)
    6. May 2001 (F): General William Kernan, commander in chief of the Joint Forces Command, later mentions: "The details of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan which fought the Taliban and al-Qaeda after the September 11 attacks, were largely taken from a scenario examined by Central Command in May 2001." [AFP, 7/23/02].
    7. US 'planned attack on Taleban'  [BBC, 9/18/01]
  2. Iraq war planned before 9/11
    1. January 26, 1998: The Project for the New American Century (PNAC), an influential neoconservative think tank, publishes a letter to President Clinton, urging war against Iraq and the removal of Saddam Hussein because he is a "hazard" to "a significant portion of the world's supply of oil." In a foretaste of what eventually actually happens, the letter calls for the US to go to war alone, attacks the United Nations, and says the US should not be "crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity in the UN Security Council." The letter is signed by many who will later lead the 2003 Iraq war. 10 of the 18 signatories later join the Bush Administration, including (future) Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, Assistant Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, Assistant Secretary of State Richard Armitage, Undersecretaries of State John Bolton and Paula Dobriansky, presidential adviser for the Middle East Elliott Abrams, and Bush's special Iraq envoy Zalmay Khalilzad (see also June 3, 1997, and September 2000). [Sunday Herald, 3/16/03, PNAC Letter, 1/26/98] Clinton does heavily bomb Iraq in late 1998, but the bombing doesn't last long and its long-term effect is the break off of United Nations weapons inspections. [New York Times, 3/22/03]
    2. Bush Sought ‘Way’ To Invade Iraq? [CBS News, Jan. 11,2004]
  3. Women had best quality of life in the Middle East
  4. “Over 91 million kilograms (200 million pounds) of explosives used in the first two weeks of Operation Iraqi Freedom.” [Toronto Star – 4/6/03]
  5. “Half a million Iraqi children have died since 1991 as a result of UN imposed sanctions”
    1. "if the substantial reduction in child mortality throughout Iraq during the 1980s had continued through the 1990s, there would have been half a million fewer deaths of children under-five in the country as a whole during the eight year period 1991 to 1998" [Unicef, 12 August 1999]
    2. Annual mortality rates and excess deaths of children under five in Iraq, 1991-98. (by M. Ali, J. Blacker and G. Jones). Paper to be printed in Population Studies, July 2003. Based on UNICEF 1999 mortality survey, estimates that 400-500,000 excess deaths occurred as a result of the Gulf War and its aftermath.
    3. Were Sanctions Right? [NY Times Magazine, 7/29/02003]
    4. P-I is Wrong on Iraqi Sanctions [Seattle Post Intelligencer, 6-21-01]
  6. “Only two countries in the world have refused to ratify the UN's treaty that protects children's rights: Somalia & USA.”  The Convention of the Rights of the Child [Amnesty International, Unicef]
  7. “Malformed babies occur in Iraq at the alarming rate of 1 or 2 every day due to the US use of depleted uranium during both Gulf Wars.”
    1. Dr. Siegwart Horst-Gunther, President of the International Yellow Cross. Most appeared in his 1996 book  "URANIUM PROJECTILES - SEVERELY MAIMED SOLDIERS, DEFORMED BABIES, DYING CHILDREN" (Published by AHRIMAN - Verlag, ISBN: 3-89484-805-7). The book is a documentary record of DU ammunition after-effects, and they were taken between 1993 and 1995.
    2. "Unborn children of the region [are] being asked to pay the highest price, the integrity of their DNA." Ross B. Mirkarimi, The Arms Control Research Centre, from his report: ‘The Environmental and Human Health Impacts of the Gulf Region with Special Reference to Iraq.’ May 1992
  8. US making claims against Syria one week after overthrowing Saddam’s Regime [Washington Post, 4/13/03]
  9. “299 Executed Human Beings – 1982-2002 Huntsville, TX” [CNN, 3/12/03]
  10. “George W. Bush 152 Executed Prisoners in 6 years.” [Reuters 05/01, Austin Chronicle 11/7/03, Amnesty International 6/01]
  11. Countries the US has bombed since WWII – List compiled by Historian William Blum.
  12. “Over 10,000 Gulf War Veterans have died since the first Gulf War ended in 1991 Probably due to depleted uranium poisoning.”
    1. "Aerosol DU (Depleted Uranium) exposures to soldiers on the battlefield could be significant with potential radiological and toxicological effects. [...] Under combat conditions, the most exposed individuals are probably ground troops that re-enter a battlefield following the exchange of armour-piercing munitions. [...] We are simply highlighting the potential for levels of DU exposure to military personnel during combat that would be unacceptable during peacetime operations. [...DU is..]... a low level alpha radiation emitter which is linked to cancer when exposures are internal, [and] chemical toxicity causing kidney damage. [...] Short term effects of high doses can result in death, while long term effects of low doses have been linked to cancer. [...] Our conclusion regarding the health and environmental acceptability of DU penetrators assume both controlled use and the presence of excellent health physics management practices. Combat conditions will lead to the uncontrolled release of DU. [...] The conditions of the battlefield, and the long term health risks to natives and combat veterans may become issues in the acceptability of the continued use of DU kinetic penetrators for military applications." [Excerpts from the July 1990 Science and Applications International Corporation report: ' Kinetic Energy Penetrator Environment and Health Considerations', as included in Appenix D - US Army Armaments, Munitions and Chemical Command report: 'Kinetic Energy Penetrator Long Term Strategy Study, July 1990']
    2. Our Servicemen’s Health in Danger [Miami Herald, 3/31/03]
  13.  “The Bush Administration's current federal budget has cut $844 Million from Veteran's Health Care.  Plus an additional $15 Billion over the next 10 years ($1.5 Billion per year) from the Veteran's Department.” [Seattle Weekly, 4/9-15/03]
  14. Project for a New American Century stating it needs a Pearl Harbor Type Event from its paper entitled Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century: A Report of the Project for the New American Century,September 2000 - available from its website http://www.newamericancentury.org/

 

*More extensive sources for 9/11 claims and timelines can be found at: