Latest revision as of 12:44, 28 June 2012
Background
General Ralph E Eberhart told the 9/11 Commission that "the threat of terrorists hijacking commercial airlines within the United States--and using them as guided missiles--was not recognised by NORAD before 9/11". However, there are 9/11 researchers who argue this is evidently untrue. Here's David Ray Griffin:
One interesting point here is his mention of the “proposed readiness test for NORAD based on the idea of ‘a hijacked airliner coming from overseas and crashing into the Pentagon’ (346)”. The way Dr Griffin tells it, this would appear to be the point of the exercise, however the 9/11 Commission stated it was a side issue that never actually happened:
One idea, intended to test command and control plans and NORAD's readiness, postulated a hijacked airliner coming from overseas and crashing into the Pentagon.The idea was put aside in the early planning of the exercise as too much of a distraction from the main focus (war in Korea), and as too unrealistic.
Page 346,
9/11 Commission Report
Griffin also appears to be implying that simply providing examples of the possible use of planes hijacked in the US, then being used as weapons, will contradict Eberhart’s “no recognition” claim. But is that true?
Here’s where the claim is used in the Commission Report:
NORAD perceived the dominant threat to be from cruise missiles. Other threats were identified during the late 1990s, including terrorists' use of aircraft as weapons. Exercises were conducted to counter this threat, but they were not based on actual intelligence. In most instances, the main concern was the use of such aircraft to deliver weapons of mass destruction.
Prior to 9/11, it was understood that an order to shoot down a commercial aircraft would have to be issued by the National Command Authority (a phrase used to describe the president and secretary of defense). Exercise planners also assumed that the aircraft would originate from outside the United States, allowing time to identify the target and scramble interceptors. The threat of terrorists hijacking commercial airliners within the United States -- and using them as guided missiles -- was not recognized by NORAD before 9/11.
Page 17, 9/11 Commission Report
They’re plainly conceding that there was knowledge of a potential threat from suicide hijacks. The Commission tell us that NORAD exercise planners assumed that hijacked aircraft would originate from outside the US, but they don’t say that no-one else ever suggested such a thing.
This is what General Myers said at the 9/11 Commission hearings:
MR. LEHMAN: But when you were NORAD commander, there had already been a private aircraft that crashed into the White House grounds. There were repeated and written worries about the potential for private aircraft to make suicide attacks, and there were 11 separate intelligence reports circulating broadly through the intelligence community that al Qaeda had planned to use aircraft as weapons, although the focus was overseas. Didn't anybody at NORAD try to connect the dots and say that this is something we've got to worry about, that it's a target in the Capitol area, that we'd better get ready for it? But, instead, when even NORAD's own planning staff proposed to include in exercises the dealing with hijacked suicide aircraft, it was rejected by NORAD as by the NORAD commander, I think it was after your time, as something to be exercised and planned for.
GEN. MYERS: I think it was rejected, and General Eberhart can be clearer on this, I don't think it was by the commander, I think it was by the planning group that was meeting because it did not fit the scenario at the time. But, the use of aircraft as a weapon, as a missile, other than World War II and the Kamikaze situation, I'm not aware, and I've tried to research this, and the best information I get, I am not aware that an aircraft has ever been used as a weapon. Now, there have been landings on the White House lawn, there was a landing in Red Square, there have been lots of stupid things. There was talk about crashing airplanes into the CIA. But, in most of that threat reporting leading up to 9/11, it was hijacking an airplane and in the normal hijack mode, not in the mode of a weapon.
Now, there were some talks about in post hijack situations where they talked to about people over the demands were made that they were going to crash, one instance, into the Eiffel Tower, but even the work that was done and the hijackings that were planned for the Philippines, which is a well-known plot, they planned to hijack the airplanes and blow them up primarily.
So, no, the threat perception, there was not -- the intelligence did not point to this kind of threat, and I think that explains our posture.
http://www.9-11commission.gov/archive/hearing12/9-11Commission_Hearing_2004-06-17.htm
Myers is also conceding that there were reports about using planes as weapons, and he was aware of these, but the intelligence didn’t indicate these were likely, and so NORADs primary focus was elsewhere.
If we’ve interpreted this correctly, then, to prove the Commission wrong will take far more than simply pointing to someone suggesting the possibility of suicide hijackings in the US. But then Dr Griffin has told us he’s got nine examples from the 9/11 Commission Report alone, so perhaps we should start by reviewing those.
Nine Commission Report Examples
The Eiffel Tower
1. [A]n Algerian group hijacked an airliner in 1994, ... possibly to crash it into the Eiffel tower” (345). The airplane was hijacked in Algiers. But since the distance from Algiers to Paris is less than the distance across the United States, there might have been less time to intercept it than is available to intercept a plane hijacked within this country. It would, therefore, not take much imagination to transfer the scenario to the United States.
Page 264, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
Dr Griffin's first example is described here, but unfortunately he's left out a key detail. Here's the part of the first sentence that Dr Griffin cut out (in bold, our emphasis), and a footnote relating to the report:
And here’s more about how the hijack started:
This situation began as a hijack on the ground, then, which is where the plane remained for more than a day. When the plane did take off, it was under the control of the regular crew. The hijackers were fooled into permitting a landing in Marseilles, under the guise of a refuelling stop, where the plane was stormed and the hostages freed.
This is clearly a very different situation to 9/11. The hijack was of the conventional type; the terrorists were never going to fly the plane; interception or shooting down the plane wasn’t an issue at any time; and there’s no certainty that the flight was to be used as a missile, either.
You might still say that it should have bought attention to the possibilities of hijacking, but even that isn’t necessarily true, as this article from 1995 suggests:
Here poor airline security in Algeria is held responsible for the hijacking, while in comparison the US is applauded (although please go read the rest of the above article, because there’s also criticism and interesting suggestions later). And if this could be blamed on Algeria, then the US may have been less likely to see it as a story relevant to them.
In any event, we’d suggest this falls a long way short of establishing a clear or credible precedent for 9/11-type attacks.
Bojinka
2. In early 1995, Abdul Hakim Murad--Ramzi Yousef’s accomplice in the Manila airlines bombing plot--told Philippine authorities that he and Yousef had discussed flying a plane into CIA headquarters” (345). It was, we saw, this plan that provided the basis for Wolfowitz’s “failure of imagination” comment.
Page 264, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This is occasionally quoted as though it invalidates NORAD all on its own, however, as we've seen, Myers told the 9/11 Commission he was aware of the plot:
In addition, this story doesn’t fully satisfy Dr Griffin’s requirement for contradicting NORAD. It certainly included suicide pilots, but how the second phase might have unfolded isn't entirely clear. The possibility of hijacking commercial airliners was reported later:
However, this second phase may also not have involved hijacking, or commercial jets, at all:
As such, this cannot be a clear contradiction of NORAD's "no recognition" claim.
World Trade Centre
3: In August of [1998], the intelligence community had received information that a group of Libyans hoped to crash a plane into the World Trade Center. (344-345). The Commission does not explicitly say that the plane would be hijacked from within the United States, but it also does not explicitly say otherwise.
Page 264-265,
The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This isn’t exactly a complete view of the claim. The full sentence in the report, for instance, simply says "[i]n August of the same year, the intelligence community had received information that a group of Libyans hoped to crash a plane into the World Trade Center". No mention of hijacking here. A footnote from the 9/11 Commission report tells us more:
For the August report, see Intelligence report,"Terrorism: Alleged Threat by Arab Terrorists to Attack the World Trade Center in New York," Aug. 12, 1998. An FAA civil aviation security official believed the plan was improbable because Libyan planes were required to operate within airspace limitations and the Libyans did not possess aircraft with the necessary range to make good on the threat. Jack S. interview (June 13, 2004). On September 30, 1999, the FAA closed the file on the August report after investigation could not corroborate the report, and the source's credibility was deemed suspect. FAA report,Transportation Security Intelligence ICF Report 980162, undated; but see FAA/TSA rebuttal to the Joint Inquiry's Sept. 18, 2002, staff statement, undated, p. 1 (stating that the FAA did not formally analyze this threat).
Footnote #14 to Chapter 1, 9/11 Commission Report
Dr Griffin ignores the finding that this claim could not be corroborated, and the source wasn’t deemed to be credible.
His statement that the Commission does not “explicitly” say that the “plane would be hijacked from within the United States” is correct, but misleading. The footnote makes no mention of hijacking at all. And the comment that “the Libyans did not possess aircraft with the necessary range to make good on the threat” plainly indicates that they were expecting the attack to come from overseas.
This example fails Dr Griffin’s test, then, as it isn’t necessarily about hijacking, or commercial airliners, or flights that originated within the United States. It does contain the threat of using planes as weapons, but this is lessened by the fact that it could not be corroborated. And if the source wasn’t deemed credible then it’s hard to see why NORAD (or anyone else) should have taken this particularly seriously.
A Hijacked Lear Jet
4. [Richard] Clarke had been concerned about the danger posed by aircraft since at least the 1996 Atlanta Olympics... In 1998, Clarke chaired an exercise [that] involved a scenario in which a group of terrorists commandeered a Learjet on the ground in Atlanta, loaded it with explosives, and flew it towards a target in Washington, D.C.” (345) The Commission elsewhere concluded the description of this exercise by saying that the terrorist group “took off for a suicide mission to Washington” (457-58 n98).
Page 265, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This gets close to Dr Griffin’s target, in that we’re talking about an attack originating in the US. It’s not a commercial airliner, though, and isn’t a clear hijacking (though this depends on the meaning of “commandeered” here).
The example also falls short as far as we’re concerned, in that it relates only to Clarke’s exercises, rather than direct intelligence on what terrorists were doing. This is important because, for instance, we have no idea of how many other exercises Clarke might have done. We also don’t know how credible his speculations might have been to the military, although we can get some clues. This, for example, is the full Commission Report paragraph from which the Dr Griffin quote is taken (our emphasis):
Clarke had been concerned about the danger posed by aircraft since at least the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.There he had tried to create an air defense plan using assets from the Treasury Department, after the Defense Department declined to contribute resources. The Secret Service continued to work on the problem of airborne threats to the Washington region. In 1998, Clarke chaired an exercise designed to highlight the inadequacy of the solution. This paper exercise involved a scenario in which a group of terrorists commandeered a Learjet on the ground in Atlanta, loaded it with explosives, and flew it toward a target in Washington,D.C. Clarke asked officials from the Pentagon, Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and Secret Service what they could do about the situation. Officials from the Pentagon said they could scramble aircraft from Langley Air Force Base, but they would need to go to the President for rules of engagement, and there was no mechanism to do so.There was no clear resolution of the problem at the exercise.
Page 345, 9/11 Commission Report
The Defense Department didn’t want to contribute resources to his air defense plan? This surely confirms that they didn’t take the threat seriously, at least in 1996: precisely what the 9/11 Commission Report were saying.
Clarke’s book offers further confirmation of this (our emphasis):
The Secret Service and Customs had teamed up in Atlanta to provide some rudimentary air defense against an aircraft flying into the Olympic Stadium. They did so again during the subsequent National Security Special Events and they agreed to create a permanent air defense unit to protect Washington. Unfortunately, those two federal law enforcement agencies were housed in the Treasury Department and its leadership did not want to pay for such a mission or run the liability risks of shooting down the wrong aircraft. Treasury nixed the air defense unit, and my attempts within the White House to overrule them came to naught. The idea of aircraft attacking in Washington seemed remote to many people and the risks of shooting down aircraft in a city were thought to be far too high. Moreover, the opponents of our plan argued, the Air Force could always scramble fighter aircraft to protect Washington if there were a problem. On occasions when aircraft were hijacked (and in one case when we erroneously believed a Northwest flight had been seized), the Air Force did intercept the airliners with fighter jets. We succeeded only in getting Secret Service the permission to continue to examine air defense options, including the possibility of placing missile units near the White House. Most people who heard about our efforts to create some air defense system in case terrorists tried to fly aircraft into the Capitol, the White House, or the Pentagon simply thought we were nuts.
Page 131,
Against all Enemies, Richard A Clarke
In Clarke’s Commission testimony he didn’t seem surprised at the lack of recognition of the threat, even in 2001.:
The mention of “probably hundreds of thousands” of intelligence reports helps to put Dr Griffin’s 15 examples (these 9 plus 6 more later) into context. (Although note that he did go on to say that he’d like to think he could have put the pieces together, if he’d known about Moussaoui.)
This particular example does cover suicide attacks that originated in the US, then. But on the other hand, it doesn’t come directly from intelligence, or relate to passenger jets, or necessarily to hijacking, and it doesn’t appear Clarke’s efforts were taken seriously at the time (by the military, at least). And as such it seems to support the official NORAD position, more than hurt it.
Richard Clarke and the CSG
5. After the 1999-2000 millennium alert, ... Clarke held a meeting of his Counterterrorism Security Group devoted largely to the possibility of a possible airplane hijacking by al Qaeda... [T]he possibility was imaginable, and imagined”.
Page 265, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This is a little vague. What type of aircraft? Hijacked where? To do what? Here’s the context of this as it appears in the original text:
In late 1999, a great deal of discussion took place in the media about the crash off the coast of Massachusetts of EgyptAir Flight 990, a Boeing 767. The most plausible explanation that emerged was that one of the pilots had gone berserk, seized the controls, and flown the aircraft into the sea. After the 1999 -- 2000 millennium alerts, when the nation had relaxed, Clarke held a meeting of his Counterterrorism Security Group devoted largely to the possibility of a possible airplane hijacking by al Qaeda.
In his testimony,Clarke commented that he thought that warning about the possibility of a suicide hijacking would have been just one more speculative theory among many...
Page 345, 9/11 Commission Report
The context here suggests a suicide hijacking, however we don’t know of what type of plan, or where, or what form the attack might take. In addition, we have the issues itemised in example 4: we don’t know how many other issues Clarke considered, for instance, and we’ve no reason to believe his ideas were considered any more likely now, than earlier. Certainly a Clarke exercise in itself cannot invalidate Myers view that "the intelligence did not point to this kind of threat", and so we don't believe this example contradicts the NORAD position.
FAA Intelligence Report
6. In early August 1999, the FAA’s Civil Aviation Security intelligence office summarised the Bin Ladin hijacking threat... [T]he paper identified a few principal scenarios, one of which was a ‘suicide hijacking operation’” (345).
Page 265, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This is non-specific as to the location of the threat, and the form the attack might take. And if you read the full version, then you’ll find this passage is followed by an important qualification:
In early August 1999, the FAA's Civil Aviation Security intelligence office summarized the Bin Ladin hijacking threat. After a solid recitation of all the information available on this topic, the paper identified a few principal scenarios, one of which was a "suicide hijacking operation."The FAA analysts judged such an operation unlikely, because "it does not offer an opportunity for dialogue to achieve the key goal of obtaining Rahman and other key captive extremists. . . . A suicide hijacking is assessed to be an option of last resort."
Page 345,
9/11 Commission Report
Once again, this supports the NORAD position, that intelligence wasn’t pointing to suicide hijackings as a likelihood: it’s in no sense evidence against them.
CIA Memo on KSM
7. A CIA report on June 12, 2001, said that KSM “was recruiting people to travel to the United States to meet with colleagues already there so that they might conduct terrorist attacks on Bin Ladin’s behalf. On June 22, the CIA notified all its station chiefs about intelligence suggesting a possible al Quaeda suicide attack on a US target over the next few days” (256).
Page 265, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This is particularly poor evidence. It doesn’t mention hijacking at all, or even planes, and the worries about an attack in June weren’t restricted to the US, as the full text makes clear:
Threat reports surged in June and July, reaching an even higher peak of urgency. The summer threats seemed to be focused on Saudi Arabia, Israel, Bahrain, Kuwait, Yemen, and possibly Rome, but the danger could be anywhere--including a possible attack on the G-8 summit in Genoa. A June 12 CIA report passing along biographical background information on several terrorists mentioned, in commenting on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, that he was recruiting people to travel to the United States to meet with colleagues already there so that they might conduct terrorist attacks on Bin Ladin's behalf. On June 22, the CIA notified all its station chiefs about intelligence suggesting a possible al Qaeda suicide attack on a U.S. target over the next few days. DCI Tenet asked that all U.S. ambassadors be briefed.
That same day, the State Department notified all embassies of the terroristthreat and updated its worldwide public warning. In June, the State Department initiated the Visa Express program in Saudi Arabia as a security measure, in order to keep long lines of foreigners away from vulnerable embassy spaces. The program permitted visa applications to be made through travel agencies, instead of directly at the embassy or consulate.
Page 256-257, 9/11 Commission Report
The idea that this report (even in conjunction with others) might persuade NORAD that “the threat of terrorists hijacking commercial airliners within the United States -- and using them as guided missiles” was more realistic than they’d previously assumed, is simply bizarre.
The Genoa G8 Threat
8: In late June [2001], because of threats, Italy closed the airspace over Genoa and mounted antiaircraft batteries at the Genoa airport during the G-8 summit which President Bush attended” (258). We learn elsewhere that the Italians kept fighters in the air over the city, and that the threat was taken so seriously that Bush stayed overnight offshore, on an aircraft carrier. Although this example, like the first one, is about a threat in Europe, not the United States, it obviously counts against the thesis that there was a “failure of imagination” with regard to the possibility that terrorists might try to use airplanes to attack President Bush. (Another puzzling thing about this example is that the Commission, in mentioning that “antiaircraft batteries” had to be mounted at the Genoa airport, failed to point out that the White House and the Pentagon already have their own antiaircraft batteries, which would shoot down any aircraft except one with a transponder signal indicating that it belongs to the US military.)
Page 265-266, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
As Dr Griffin points out, this isn’t about a threat in the US, nor is it necessarily about hijacking, or commercial jets:
As such the example fails the tests he applied previously, although you’ll note he now changes this to a more general “thesis that there was a “failure of imagination” with regard to the possibility that terrorists might try to use airplanes to attack President Bush”. It’s an easier straw man to knock over, although this doesn’t help his case much. And it’s not the only problem here.
First, we don’t know that threats from the air were the specific reason that Bush stayed on a carrier. It was certainly reported that he did this to reduce his exposure to terrorist attack, but even if true, such attacks can come from many directions. And it’s worth noting that other leaders stayed offshore, too.
Certainly not everyone seemed to be taking all reports of the aerial threat seriously. Here’s a Time comment from June 2001:
Presumably this was a different threat, as you wouldn’t put up antiaircraft batteries against “remote-controlled model aircraft”. Would you? However, it illustrates the difficulties in picking out what’s real. And if we don’t know how seriously the US took these threats at the time, then we cannot say what impact they may (or should) have had elsewhere.
The August 6th PDB
9. On August 6, 2001, the Presidential Daily Brief included an intelligence memo stating, amongst other things, that “[one threat report said] that bin Ladin wanted to hijack a US aircraft... FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks... CIA and the FBI are investigating a call to our Embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group of Bin Ladin supporters was in the US planning attacks with explosives” (262).Page 266, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions, David Ray Griffin
This is something else that looks rather less impressive once you consider the text that Dr Griffin has left out:
We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting, such as that from a [REDACTED] service in 1998 saying that bin Laden wanted to hijack a U.S. aircraft to gain the release of “Blind Shaykh” Umar 'Abd al-Rahman and other U.S.-held extremists.
Page 262, 9/11 Commission Report
This hijacking concern was an old one, from 1998. It was described as “sensational”, and could not be corroborated. And it appears to be a conventional hijacking (you need hostages if you’re hoping to gain the release of someone).
There is the general concern about preparations for hijackings, of course:
Nevertheless, FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.
Page 262, 9/11 Commission Report
However there’s nothing here to say that these were suicide hijackings. And in fact a warning about “preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks” is particularly useless, as it could obviously be about anything.
As there’s also nothing here about using planes as weapons, this example fails Dr Griffin’s test, and ours.
Six Further Examples
The 9/11 Commission told us that “the threat of terrorists hijacking commercial airliners within the United States -- and using them as guided missiles -- was not recognized by NORAD before 9/11”.
In “The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions”, though, David Ray Griffin tells us the Commission Report itself provides nine examples “that either clearly do, or at least may” contradict this claim. We’ve discussed these above.
In addition, though, Dr Griffin tells us that “the claim is even further undermined if we look outside this document”. He then delivers six further examples, which we’ll examine here.
Terror 2000
In 1993, a panel of experts commissioned by the Pentagon suggested that airplanes could be used as missiles to bomb national landmarks. In 1994, one of these experts wrote in the Futurist magazine:
Targets such as the World Trade Center not only provide the requisite casualties but, because of their symbolic nature, provide more bang for the buck. In order to maximise their odds for success, terrorist groups will likely consider mounting multiple, simultaneous operations.
Page 266, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions
This example sounds very impressive, however take a closer look and issues begin to emerge.
First, Dr Griffin presents the panel of experts views and the Futurist magazine quote together, which might persuade you that the second quote was about the use of airplanes to fly into the WTC. But you’d be wrong. The Futurist article discussed chemical, biological and nuclear attacks, economic attacks on the Internet, banking system and more, but nothing at all to do with using planes as missiles.
So why mention the WTC? Hardly surprising, as it had been attacked the previous year, but the author suggested plenty of other potential targets, too:
It could be argued that if you’d read the report produced by these experts, then come across the Futurist article, you should have been able to figure out that a 9/11-type attack could occur. But there’s a problem with this: the idea about using planes as missiles didn’t make it into the final report:
As far as we’re aware, it only became public knowledge after 9/11, when the study participants recalled what had happened:
...the assignment for the Pentagon panel charged with writing a report called "Terror 2000" was to think broadly about international terrorism's evolution in a world that suddenly had a single superpower. The group of military officials, terrorism experts and "futurists" met at Virginia's Langley Air Force Base in 1993 to kick around a variety of scenarios, some of which seemed far-fetched, in the days before the Oklahoma City bombing.
"The main interest was to get people to think outside the box," said "Terror 2000" co-author Peter S. Probst, a Fairfax terrorism expert. "You begin with a blank sheet of paper and start to think about the United States through the eyes of a terrorist."
Several participants remembered discussing the possibility of a commercial airliner being deliberately flown into a public building in the nation's capital. The idea may have been inspired by disclosures about an alleged plot by hijackers to destroy France's Eiffel Tower using an aircraft, Probst said.
"Coming down the Potomac, you could make a left turn at the Washington Monument and take out the White House, or you could make a right turn and take out the Pentagon," Marvin J. Cetron, a Falls Church author and a leader of the exercise, recalled telling the group.
A version of the report marked "interim draft" correctly predicts several aspects of the Sept. 11 attack. "In the future, horrified civilians will get to watch every step in a terrorist plot," it says. "CNN and other networks will certainly air the footage."
Presaging a break from the state-sponsored terrorism familiar to most Americans at the time, the report said tomorrow's "most dangerous" terrorists would be "motivated not by political ideology but by fierce ethnic and religious hatreds."
"Their goal will not be political control but utter destruction of their chosen enemies," it said.
In a 1994 article commenting on the panel's findings and the broader discussions that inspired them, Cetron wrote that future terrorists motivated by ethnic and religious hatreds would pick "soft" targets -- sports arenas or shopping malls, for example -- because of their high visibility and greater opportunities for mass casualties.
"Targets such as the World Trade Center not only provide the requisite casualties but, because of their symbolic nature, provide more bang for the buck," he wrote in the Futurist magazine. "In order to maximize their odds for success, terrorist groups will likely consider mounting multiple, simultaneous operations with the aim of overtaxing a government's ability to respond, as well as demonstrating their professionalism and reach."
The decision not to publish detailed scenarios was made partly out of a fear that it could give terrorists ideas, participants said. A draft was circulated through the Pentagon, the Justice Department and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, but senior agency officials ultimately decided against a public release.
"That was a mistake," Probst said.
Still, panel participants said even they were stunned by the scale of the Sept. 11 attacks, never imagining how hijackings could cause such devastation and push the nation to the brink of war.
Menarchik, the Terror 2000 organizer, said future war-gamers now have to consider a broader range of disasters -- and they always run the risk of getting it wrong.
"You can plan your brains out for something that never occurs," said Menarchik, who now directs the presidential library and museum of former president George Bush. "No one will ever be able to completely predict the future."
Before Attack, U.S. Expected Different Hit (Washington Post)
Did the “planes as missiles” scenario even make the interim draft of the report? That’s not clear from these stories, however if it didn’t then obviously there was no chance of the idea influencing policy.
And even if the concept had been included the finished report, there’s no guarantee it would have made the slightest difference. What you’re not seeing from Dr Griffin’s snipped few words is that Terror 2000 was a substantial document, totalling more than four hundred pages. It considered many world trends, and proposed four different future scenarios: “Economics dominate”, “Violence dominates”, “Status Quo” and “Environment dominates”. Each scenario was then followed by all kinds of predictions, with “Economic dominates”, for instance, being covered as follows:
This was apparently regarded as the most likely future, and you can see that specifying hijacking as more likely after 2000 seems impressive. But on the other hand, they specify many other threats before then that haven’t materialised at all. Why should that particular element be taken above all others, including those in the other futures?
And while we can point at the “planes as missiles” idea now, and say how prescient it was, we don’t know how many other detailed scenarios were discussed (and left out) that weren’t accurate at all. Picking this out with hindsight is easy; deciding what was valuable in this report at the time would be rather more difficult.
Sam Nunn
In 1995, Senator Sam Nunn, in Time magazine’s cover story, described a scenario in which terrorists crash a remote-controlled airplane into the US Capitol Building.
Page 266, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions
The mention of “remote-controlled airplane” should be enough to make you wonder what Nunn was describing. Here’s the relevant paragraph from the original Time story:
This was about a method of delivering chemical or biological weapons, then, not hijacking or suicide attacks. It could be argued that the cumulative effect of examples like this should have persuaded NORAD to do more, but we’ll deal more with that later.
National Intelligence Council
In 1999, the National Intelligence Council, which advises the President and US intelligence agencies on emerging threats, said in a special report on terrorism: “A-Qaeda’s expected retaliation for the US cruise missile attack [of 1998]... could take several forms of suicide attack in the nation’s capitol. Suicide bombers belonging to al Qaeda’s Martyrdom Battalion could crash-land an aircraft packed with high explosives... into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), or the White House.”
Page 266-267, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions
This sounds impressively specific, until you read the full paragraph and discover everything else the author said:
This was not necessarily about hijackings, then, or commercial jets (the idea of a plane “packed with high explosives” suggests it’s one they’ve prepared themselves). Also, the suicide attack by plane scenario was only one of many discussed here, and the most likely response was judged to be a more conventional bombing of planes.
Pentagon Drill
In October 2000, Pentagon officials carried out an emergency drill to prepare for the possibility that a hijacked airliner might be crashed into the Pentagon.
Page 267, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions
Dr Griffin references two stories for this claim, one a Military District of Washington account, the other from the UK’s Daily Mirror. Neither provides any evidence that the drill was specifically about a hijacking, however, and an article Dr Griffin doesn’t mention points out that it was not:
This article also does its best to use the incident to cast blame, but points out that it was only about a crash. So why plan for this scenario at all? The same article later provides a reason:
It was sensible to plan for a potential accidental crash into the Pentagon because the building is very close to an airport: it’s as simple as that. Just another accident scenario, like the construction accident mentioned above.
This incident wasn’t about terrorists, then, or hijacking, or using planes as missiles. As such it fails to counter the NORAD case. Perhaps the fifth example will do better.
Drills of Jets as Weapons
In July 2001, according to an article headed “NORAD Had Drills of Jets as Weapons”, the military planned a drill in which hijacked airliners, originating in the United States, were used as weapons to crash into targets, including the World Trade Center.
Page 267, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions
Here Dr Griffin misrepresents his source by telling us that the hijacked airliners in these cases were “originating in the United States”. The story is quite clear on this:
It does say there were exceptions, however the only specific example provided seems to have been a conventional, not a suicide hijacking:
Then we get comments that might allude to further exercises of planes being used as weapons, although this is unclear, but nothing definitive on flights originating in the US:
It’s worth noting that the exercises were also mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Report:
The North American Aerospace Defense Command imagined the possible use of aircraft as weapons, too, and developed exercises to counter such a threat -- from planes coming to the United States from overseas, perhaps carrying a weapon of mass destruction. None of this speculation was based on actual intelligence of such a threat. One idea, intended to test command and control plans and NORAD's readiness, postulated a hijacked airliner coming from overseas and crashing into the Pentagon.The idea was put aside in the early planning of the exercise as too much of a distraction from the main focus (war in Korea), and as too unrealistic.As we pointed out in chapter 1, the military planners assumed that since such aircraft would be coming from overseas; they would have time to identify the target and scramble interceptors.
Page 345, 9/11 Commission Report
This example does not in itself counter the NORAD and 9/11 Commission position, then. Let’s move on to the sixth and final offering.
NRO Drill
At 9.00 on the morning of 9/11, the National Reconnaissance Office, which operates spy satellites and draws its personnel from the military and the CIA, had planned to simulate the accidental crashing of an airplane into its headquarters, four miles from Dulles Airport in Washington. The simulation was evidently to be run by “John Fulton and his team at the CIA”.
Page 267, The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions
Remember, these examples are supposed to be countering the claim that “the threat of terrorists hijacking commercial airliners within the United States -- and using them as guided missiles -- was not recognized by NORAD before 9/11”.
This particular incident did not involved terrorists, or hijackings. From Mike Ruppert’s account, it didn’t involve commercial airliners:
...the NRO’s drill was “based on the idea of a Lear Jet or a FedEx plane having a flame-out on takeoff from nearby Dulles airport and crashing into the building.” The NRO is close to the end of one of Dulles’ runways. However, Oborn said, since there was no flying involved, there was no need to coordinate with the military or the FAA.
Page 381, "Crossing the Rubicon"
As it didn’t have anything to do with using planes as missiles, either, this example clearly does nothing whatsoever to counter the NORAD “no recognition” claims.
Conclusion
David Ray Griffin suggests that General Eberhart’s “no recognition” claim, regarding the threat of 9/11-type attacks, can be undermined if reports can be unearthed that both (1) involved the hijacking of commercial airliners within the United States, and (2) then used those airliners as guided missiles. He then told us that his examples “either clearly do, or at least may, contradict the endorsement of Eberhart’s claim”. To measure Griffin’s success, then, we should examine how well each of his examples support these points.
First, let’s itemise four elements that should be a part of each report according to the NORAD statement :
(a) they should involve hijacking
(b) this should be of a commercial airliner
(c) the flight should originate within the United States
(d) the hijacking should be planned to end by using the plane as a guided missile
Now let’s see how all fifteen examples fare in each case. In the following table, green means an element is covered, yellow means it could be, red means it is not. (Note that red doesn’t mean an element is ruled out, just not explicitly specified, so for instance a message “bin Ladin will attack tomorrow” scores a red for hijacking, element A, as it doesn’t mention it, even though in theory that could be one form of attack.)
(Please note that simplifying reports in this way involves a degree of interpretation, and your view on this may not agree with ours. Don’t accept this as a summary of the examples, unless you’ve read each one, and our response, and decided that the chart is accurate.)
What’s immediately interesting here is how few of the examples score full marks, or even 3 out of 4. And this is without introducing highly relevant factors like “credibility”.
The “crashing into the Eiffel Tower” report, for instance, scores 3 here, but it’s also not clear that the Algerian hijackers ever intended to do this. Nor does the score reflect the fact that this was a conventional hijacking, where the plane’s own pilots were the only ones flying it, a significant difference to 9/11. Example a6, “FAA on bin Ladin and suicide hijacking”, mentioned suicide hijacking as a possible form of attack, but thought thought it was unlikely. And b3, the National Intelligence Council report, again mentioned using planes as missiles as one option, but decided others were more plausible.
Other high-scoring reports (Terror 2000, Clarke's CSG meeting on airplane hijacking) came from exercises or think tanks. The military run regular drills on all kinds of scenarios, though, and an exercise will never be as compelling as solid intelligence about terrorist plans.
It’s apparent, then, that the number of credible reports about using hijacked US planes as weapons is actually very small, especially as these 15 are taken from a period of over 7 years. The official position remains that this was an error, a “failure of imagination”, the military and intelligence community should have figured it out, and we wouldn’t disagree with that conclusion. But is it really true that these 15 reports prove anything more, that NORAD must have known, and therefore a charge of complicity is more appropriate than incompetence? We would say no: look at the details here, and most of these reports aren’t compelling at all.
We can hear the rebuttals already, of course. “No, you don’t understand. The individual reports may not be up to much, but if you look at all of them, see the big picture, then everything becomes clear.” That’s an argument we hear a great deal, and it doesn’t become any more impressive with repetition. You can’t build a strong overall case from weak individual points, no matter how many of them you bring together.
What’s more, the reality is that Dr Griffin’s list doesn’t represent “the big picture” in the slightest. That would show you exactly what the analysts were seeing, and as Richard Clarke pointed out, this involved far more than these 15 examples:
Probably “hundreds of thousands” of intelligence reports over five or six years, on al Qaeda and other terrorist threats is the real “big picture”. What Dr Griffin offers instead is the small picture, driven by hindsight and an ”inside job” agenda, picking the individual reports that suits his needs, and leaving out relevant information where it might hurt his case. This may lead you to many things, but the truth isn’t one of them.