Taliban; How Did They Do It?
I am pretty sure I went to the office at some point to do whatever I could do. More stories kept coming in that we where under attack, and rumors flowed like the Rio Grand. Some even came true as I learned more over the years. In this report I will try and provide you with a smuch as the details as I can find in some sort of logical sense. I may even interject my own personal beliefs on the intelligence or lack thereof that existed. I did not lose any family, friends or acquaintances in the attack. I have been to ground zero. I would like to hear from those of you who did. I will pull from many articles and give credit to the authors when I can. As I have never really put everything in some sort of chronological order in my head, so this will be revealing for me also. This read is long and detailed. Give yourself some time to finish or return.
On September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767 out of Boston for Los Angeles, crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York at 8:48 a.m. Eighteen minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175, a Boeing 767, headed from Boston to Los Angeles, crashed into the Southtower. American Airlines Flight 77, a Boeing 757 from Washington’s Dulles International Airport bound for Los Angeles, crashed into the western wall of the Pentagon at 9:40 a.m. United Airlines Flight 93, a Boeing 757 flying from Newark to San Francisco, crashed near Pittsburgh. (from Enver Masud).
From the 911 Commission Report. My previous articles are here, here, and here.
The commission found that the plot originally called for hijacking 10 planes and attacking targets on the eastern and western coasts of the United States. According to the commission: 
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the plot, planned to have nine of the planes crash into the FBI and CIA headquarters, the Pentagon and the White House, as well as nuclear plants and the tallest buildings in California and Washington state. The hijackers of the 10th plane, which Mohammed planned to pilot, would contact the media, kill all of the adult men on board and then make a statement denouncing the United States before freeing the women and children.
The plot also called for hijacking and blowing up 12 airliners in Southeast Asia, but al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden scrapped that part of the plan because it was too difficult to coordinate operations on two continents. Bin Laden scaled back the plot in the United States to the four planes that were eventually used in the attack. They narrowed down the list of targets to the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and either the White House or the Capitol. Bin Laden wanted to hit the White House, but Mohammed and Mohamed Atta, the leader of the 19 hijackers, favored the Capitol, because they felt it would be an easier target. Mohammed initially proposed the attacks in 1996, but planning did not begin until 1999. The plot cost an estimated $400,000 to $500,000, not including the hijackers’ training in Afghanistan. The hijackers spent about $270,000 in the United States, mainly on flight training, travel, housing, and vehicles.
I will skip some of the details and just focus on how they were able to get on a plane and fly it into the WTC. Again from the 911 Commission which is quite long and exhaustive in its details. As it is with all government reports I will reserve judgement on its conclusion as only the “Public Report” has been released. I also want to point out as you read this since you have had the benefit of hindsight, and alarms will be sounding that something was up, we Americans are a trusting bunch, trying not to be racist in our acceptance of other races and customs. It has been said that today a terrorist would be beaten to death on a US airplane if they tried to hijack it again. I am also skipping the money transfers from all the countries and Governments that supplied money to the terrorists. I believe the US Government has looked the other way in punishing a select few countries chiefly the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Let me guess… oil! I have also left out all the hints that when you look at them on the whole you could have surmised what was going on. A gas station attendant being warned that in a few days the place would be crawling with cops, and so forth.
Hazmi and Mihdar wanted asked to be trained on jumbo jets right away. Convinced that the two were either joking or dreaming, the pilot responded that no such school existed. Other instructors who worked with Hazmi and Mihdhar remember them as poor students who focused on learning to control the aircraft in flight but took no interest in takeoffs or landings.
A pilot they consulted at one school, the Sorbi Flying Club in San Diego, spoke Arabic. He explained to them that their flight instruction would begin with small planes. Hazmi and Mihdhar emphasized their interest in learning to fly jets, Boeing aircraft in particular, and asked where they might enroll to train.
In the early summer of 2000, the Hamburg group arrived in the United States to begin flight training. Marwan al Shehhi came on May 29, arriving in Newark on a flight from Brussels. He went to New York City and waited there for Mohamed Atta to join him. On June 2, Atta traveled to the Czech Republic by bus from Germany and then flew from Prague to Newark the next day. According to Ramzi Binalshibh, Attadid not meet with anyone in Prague; he simply believed it would contribute to operational security to fly out of Prague rather than Hamburg, the departure point for much of his previous international travel. Atta and Shehhi had not settled on where they would obtain their flight training. In contrast, Ziad Jarrahhad already arranged to attend the Florida Flight Training Center (FFTC) in Venice, Florida. Jarrah arrived in Newark on June 27 and then flew to Venice. He immediately began the private pilot program at FFTC, intending to get a multi-engine license. Jarrah moved in with some of the flight instructors affiliated with his school and bought a car.
While Jarrah quickly settled into training in Florida, Atta and Shehhi kept searching for a flight school. After visiting the Airman Flight School in Norman, Oklahoma (where Zacarias Moussaoui would enroll several months later and where another al Qaeda operative, Ihab Ali, had taken lessons in the mid-1990s), Atta started flight instruction at Huffman Aviation in Venice, Florida, and both Atta and Shehhi subsequently enrolled in the Accelerated Pilot Program at that school. By the end of July, both of them took solo flights, and by mid-August they passed the private pilot airman test. They trained through the summer at Huffman, while Jarrah continued his training at FFTC. In mid-September, Atta and Shehhi applied to change their immigration status from tourist to student, stating their intention to study at Huffman until September 1, 2001. In late September, they decided to enroll at Jones Aviation in Sarasota, Florida, about 20 miles north of Venice. According to the instructor at Jones, the two were aggressive, rude, and sometimes even fought with him to take over the controls during their training flights. In early October, they took the Stage I exam for instruments rating at Jones Aviation and failed. Very upset, they said they were in a hurry because jobs awaited them at home. Atta and Shehhi then returned to Huffman. In the meantime, Jarrah obtained a single-engine private pilot certificate in early August.
Hani Hanjour, from Ta’if, Saudi Arabia, first came to the United States in 1991 to study at the Center for English as a Second Language at the University of Arizona. In 1996, Hanjour returned to the United States to pursue flight training, after being rejected by a Saudi flight school. He checked out flight schools in Florida, California, and Arizona; and he briefly started at a couple of them before returning to Saudi Arabia. In 1997, he returned to Florida and then, along with two friends, went back to Arizona and began his flight training there in earnest. After about three months, Hanjour was able to obtain his private pilot’s license. Several more months of training yielded him a commercial pilot certificate, issued by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in April 1999.
The three pilots in Florida continued with their training. Atta and Shehhi finished up at Huffman andearned their instrument certificates from the FAA in November. In mid-December 2000, they passed their commercial pilot tests and received their licenses. They then began training to fly large jets on a flight simulator. At about the same time, Jarrah began simulator training, also in Florida but at a different center. By the end of 2000, less than six months after their arrival, the three pilots on the East Coast were simulating flights on large jets.
During the summer and early autumn of 2000, Bin Ladin and senior al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan started selecting the muscle hijackers—the operatives who would storm the cockpits and control the passengers. Despite the phrase widely used to describe them, the so-called muscle hijackers were not at all physically imposing; most were between 5′ 5″ and 5′ 7″ in height.
The three Hamburg pilots—Atta, Shehhi, and Jarrah—took the first of their cross-country surveillance flights early in the summer. Shehhi flew from New York to Las Vegas via San Francisco in late May. Jarrah flew from Baltimore to Las Vegas via Los Angeles in early June. Atta flew from Boston to Las Vegas via San Francisco at the end of June. Each traveled in first class, on United Airlines. For the east-west transcontinental leg, each operative flew on the same type of aircraft he would pilot on September 11 (Atta and Shehhi, a Boeing 767; Jarrah, a Boeing 757). Jarrah and Hanjour also received additional training and practice flights in the early summer. A few days before departing on his cross-country test flight, Jarrah flew from Fort Lauderdale to Philadelphia, where he trained at Hortman Aviation and asked to fly the Hudson Corridor, a low-altitude “hallway” along the Hudson River that passes New York landmarks like the World Trade Center. Heavy traffic in the area can make the corridor a dangerous route for an inexperienced pilot. Because Hortman deemed Jarrahunfit to fly solo, he could fly this route only with an instructor. Hanjour and Hazmi, as noted below, took similar cross-country Hanjour too requested to fly the Hudson Corridor about this same time at Air Fleet Training Systems in Teterboro, New Jersey, where he started receiving ground instruction soon after settling in the area with Hazmi. the Hudson Corridor, but his instructor declined a second request because of what he considered Hanjour’s poor piloting skills.
As to targets, Atta understood Bin Ladin’s interest in striking the White House. Atta said he thought this target too difficult, but had tasked Hazmi and Hanjour to evaluate its feasibility and was awaiting their answer. Atta said that those two operatives had rented small aircraft and flown reconnaissance flights near the Pentagon.Atta explained that Hanjour was assigned to attack the Pentagon, Jarrah the Capitol, and that both Atta and Shehhi would hit the World Trade Center. If any pilot could not reach his intended target, he was to crash the plane. If Atta could not strike the World Trade Center, he planned to crash his aircraft directly into the streets of New York.Atta told Binalshibh that each pilot had volunteered for his assigned target, and that the assignments were subject to change. In chapter 8 of the report it is pretty clear the pieces that something immanent was going to happen. It is painful to read knowing that the evidence was staring the experts right in the face. I will skip my comments on this section except this:
“The September 11 attacks fell into the void between the foreign and domestic threats. The foreign intelligence agencies were watching overseas, alert to foreign threats to U.S. interests there. The domestic agencies were waiting for evidence of a domestic threat from sleeper cells within the United States. No one was looking for a foreign threat to domestic targets. The threat that was coming was not from sleeper cells. It was foreign—but from foreigners who had infiltrated into the United States.”
And you wonder why we laugh at the term “Military Intelligence.” Didn’t anyone ever read a spy novel? The preceding is a low key way of saying “We ^%$#ed up!”
Here is a report on the “Phoenix Memo.” If you lost anyone on 911 this will hurt.
The Phoenix memo was investigated thoroughly by the Joint Inquiry and the Department of Justice Inspector General. We will recap it briefly here. In July 2001, an FBI agent in the Phoenix field office sent a memo to FBI headquarters and to two agents on international terrorism squads in the New York Field Office, advising of the “possibility of a coordinated effort by Usama Bin Ladin to send students to the United States to attend civil aviation schools. The agent based his theory on the “inordinate number of individuals of investigative interest” attending such schools in Arizona. The agent made four recommendations to FBI headquarters: to compile a list of civil aviation schools, establish liaison with those schools, discuss his theories about Bin Ladin with the intelligence community, and seek authority to obtain visa information on persons applying to flight schools. His recommendations were not acted on. His memo was forwarded to one field office. Managers of the Osama Bin Ladin unit and the Radical Fundamentalist unit at FBI headquarters were addressees, but they did not even see the memo until after September 11. No managers at headquarters saw the memo before September 11, and the New York Field Office took no action.
Chapter 8 will piss off even the most loyal citizen to the Government. A kindergartner could have put this together and here people that are trained intelligence experts couldn’t find their head from a hole in the ground! I hope you will read chapter 8 and recognize just how poorly our Government was prepared to protect its citizens.
As we turn to the events of September 11, we are mindful of the unfair perspective afforded by hindsight. Nevertheless, I will try to describe what happened in the following 102 minutes:
From 8:46 until 9:03 am
At 8:46:40, the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 flew into the upper portion of the North Tower, cutting through floors 93 to 99. Evidence suggests that all three of the building’s stairwells became impassable from the 92nd floor up. Hundreds of civilians were killed instantly by the impact. Hundreds more remained alive but trapped.
Civilians, Fire Safety Personnel, and 911 Calls North Tower. A jet fuel fireball erupted upon impact and shot down at least one bank of elevators. The fireball exploded onto numerous lower floors, including the 77th and 22nd; the West Street lobby level; and the B4 level, four stories below ground.The burning jet fuel immediately created thick, black smoke that enveloped the upper floors and roof of the North Tower. The roof of the South Tower was also engulfed in smoke because of prevailing light winds from the northwest. Within minutes, New York City’s 911 system was flooded with eyewitness accounts of the event. Most callers correctly identified the target of the attack. Some identified the plane as a commercial airliner.
• the 17 minutes from the crash of the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 into 1 World Trade Center (the North Tower) at 8:46 until the South Tower was hit
* 56 minutes from the crash of the hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 into 2 World Trade Center (the South Tower) at 9:03 until the collapse of the South Tower
• 29 minutes from the collapse of the South Tower at 9:59 until the collapse of the North Tower at 10:28
The first response came from private firms and individuals—the people and companies in the building. Everything that would happen to them during the next few minutes would turn on their circumstances and their preparedness, assisted by building personnel on-site. Hundreds of civilians trapped on or above the 92nd floor gathered in large and small groups, primarily between the 103rd and 106th floors. A large group was reported on the 92nd floor, technically below the impact but unable to descend. Civilians were also trapped in elevators. Other civilians below the impact zone—mostly on floors in the 70s and 80s, but also on at least the 47th and 22nd floors—were either trapped or waiting for assistance.
Chapter 9 is heartbreaking to read. Many died due to mis-information, wrong information, error in judgements, and no information. Rule of thumb. Get out no matter what if you are ever caught in a buidling and its attacked. What else I have been able to glean is the turf war all the agency’s had (have) and the utter lack of coordination and basic radio contact. I had to stop reading in parts due the futility of their efforts as I became inscensed.Paul Smith. Republican Candidate for the 5th Congressional District (Sacramento)
Thank you for sharing this. I have not as yet read the report, after this I am going to find a copy…we should never forget