The New Pearl Harbor

September 11th was a New Pearl Harbor in the exact same way: the US Government was caught napping, taken by surprise that our enemies would do something so audacious.I want everyone to be clear on this. There is *NO*, repeat *NO* evidence that anyone in the US (or British, or Australian, etc.) decision-making process had the slightest inkling of an idea about a Japanese carrier attack on Pearl Harbor on 12/7/41. If you don't believe me, start a thread in the coffee house and we can discuss it in detail.It was in fact the result of excellent Japanese planning and execution, with a bit of luck and American incredulity.My expectation is that in a few decades, when a lot that is currently classified is declassified, it will turn out to be similar; excellent AQ work combined with a confused and disordered American intelligence effort.Chris

Could I have a source for this, CF? Because the 9/11 Commission Report contradicts you on this subject. (From Note 116 of Chapter 1, available at National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States)"116. On 9/11, NORAD was scheduled to conduct a military exercise,Vigilant Guardian, which postulated a bomber attack from the former Soviet Union. We investigated whether military preparations for the large-scale exercise compromised the military's response to the real-world terrorist attack on 9/11. According to General Eberhart, 'it took about 30 seconds' to make the adjustment to the real-world situation. Ralph Eberhart testimony, June 17, 2004.We found that the response was, if anything, expedited by the increased number of staff at the sectors and at NORAD because of the scheduled exercise. See Robert Marr interview (Jan. 23, 2004)." I think Ted Olsen would like to disagree with you on this point. From Chapter 1 of the Report: National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States"At 9:34, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport advised the Secret Service of an unknown aircraft heading in the direction of the White House. American 77 was then 5 miles west-southwest of the Pentagon and began a 330-degree turn. At the end of the turn, it was descending through 2,200 feet, pointed toward the Pentagon and downtown Washington. The hijacker pilot then advanced the throttles to maximum power and dove toward the Pentagon.60" Or they had a good plan, executed it well, and caught the US by surprise. It has happened before and will happen again. The US is not all-powerful and just as subject to surprise attacks as anyone else.This is probably not the appropriate thread for this discussion. Coffee House?Chris

Error (404) - The University of Sydneyhas a discussion (by a civil engineer at the University of Sydney, so proving that he is part of a US Government cover-up would be difficult) which explains the pictures of the collapse and discusses how the buildings went down.Now, of course, the disadvantage to having such a source is he has no physical access to the evidence. But we do have people who had physical access to the evidence, and they mostly agree with the conclusions of the unbiased observer looking at the television pictures.http://www.fema.gov/library/wtcstudy.shtmThat is the structural issues of the design. The failure of the American intelligence aparatus, the success of the AQ operation, and the actions of the first-response units is discussed in excellent detail (parts of it are better reads than any Clancy book) at National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United StatesYou can buy the report; much easier reading that way. The paperback cost me like 7 bucks when it came out and I found it fascinating.ChrisThis message has been edited by cmanteuf, 07-12-2005 11:40 AM

Well, FEMA does. The official report on the collapse is here:http://www.fema.gov/library/wtcstudy.shtmFor an easier to understand take on the problem, I like this articlehttp://www.tms.org/...ournals/JOM/0112/Eagar/Eagar-0112.htmlThe author of the article knows what he is talking about, the article is peer-reviewed, and it is not overly dry (unlike the FEMA official report).He says that what caused the collpase wasn't the heat from the fire, but that the heat from the fire was uneven; this caused buckling of the main support beams which caused a level to collapse.This might also have information; I saw the original program but have not checked out the web site.NOVA | Engineering Ground Zero | PBSChris Manteuffel

Crashfrog, if you read the link that Mr. Knight posted you would see it was not a government excercise. In the transcript, Mr. Power refers to it as "an exercise for a company of over a thousand people in London". No government. No wargame. No first responders. Simply a continuity management exercise for a company that was in a high-threat environment, using techniques similar to known AQ operations (e.g. Madrid). The company had its people ready to go, and was able to apply their continuity management program effectively because they were all keyed up, but there is no evidence of any government exercise on 7/7/05.I've been involved in a corprorate continuity management exercises before (and I've been working full-time for just over a year), and they must happen fairly regularly for a company like Visor to remain in business, so something like this is not that unlikely.ChrisThis message has been edited by cmanteuf, 07-12-2005 05:43 PM

Do you have evidence of any confusion? The General in charge of NORAD has testified that it took less than 30 seconds to transition from the exercise that NORAD was actually running (that was for bombers from the fUSSR and not about plane crashes) to the real thing.Do you have any evidence that NORAD even knew of the NRO exercise? That the NORAD operators were aware of it? General Eberhart certainly didn't mention it in his testimony before the 9/11 panel. [1]The NRO exercise certainly didn't cover, say, the Pentagon, nor did it cover hijacking aircraft, nor did it cover New York City at all. It covered a plane crashing accidentally, as planes have been known to do from time to time. Evidence, Crashfrog, that is all I am asking for. Provide some, please. Why? Beyond personal incredulity, do you have any evidence? You know, I am strongly reminded of the people who come here and argue from personal incredulity about evolution.Chris[1]
From: National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United StatesMR. ROEMER: General Eberhart, a question about our training posture on the day of 9/11. On page five of our Staff Statement, the FAA says at 8:38 in the morning, "Hi, Boston Center, TMU, we have a problem here. We have a hijacked aircraft headed towards New York and we need you guys to -- we need someone to scramble some F-16s or something up there. Help us out." NEADS says, "Is this real world or an exercise?"My question is, you were postured for an exercise against the former Soviet Union. Did that help or hurt? Did that help in terms of were more people prepared? Did you have more people ready? Were more fighters fueled with more fuel? Or did this hurt in terms of people thinking, "No, there's no possibility that this is real world; we're engaged in an exercise," and delay things? Or did it have both impacts?GEN. EBERHART: Sir, my belief is that it helped because of the manning, because of the focus, because the crews -- they have to be airborne in 15 minutes. And that morning, because of the exercise, they were airborne in six or eight minutes. And so I believe that focus helped.The situation that you're referring to, I think, at most cost us 30 seconds -- 30 seconds.MR. ROEMER: That's what we have recorded. I just wondered if there was more of that down the line.GEN. EBERHART: No, it became painfully clear, Commissioner, that this was not an exercise.MR. ROEMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Crashfrog, please read the transcript. He never says any of this. He says that they picked the same *stations* (which is only three bombs, incidentally, the fourth was not at a station), but he mentions nothing about time. In fact, he is quite vague about time (just that they were holding an exercise at "half-past nine in the morning"). The bombs detonated at 0850 local, so you can't draw any conclusions from his statement.Now, what I would be very curious about, and what Mr. Power never discusses, is how many bombs he was playing with. Given that AQ has demonstrated the ability to do 10 bombs nearly simultaneously (10 bombs in 10 minutes on 3/11) I would have chosen far more than three targets were I running such an exercise. So he could have picked 15 stations, and AQ picked three, and his overlapped with AQ's. I have no evidence for this, but I would be curious about it.And you still have to explain why two private companies holding an exercise in London in some way implicates the US Government.Chris

Where did you propose this? And why? Do you have any evidence that the exercise did anything physical in these three tube stations?Let me explain my experience with a corporate continuity management exercise; this might clear up some misconceptions between us. Everyone in my company was told "we have a mercury spill on a major nearby road" and so we had to evacuate the building and then work from home.There was nothing done on Route 1 to simulate this: traffic flowed up and down the road quite normally, we simply declared it to be so, for the purposes of the exercise (actually we cheated a little bit, making sure everyone had their laptops with them, but that's a different story). Why do you think that a company of 1000 people with a consulting firm would actually do anything physical at a Tube station?It seems a much more parsimonious assumption to me to believe that the exercise was 'declaring a bomb in the Tube stop for the purposes of this company exercise' and involved no 'placing simulated bombs in tube stops'- this isn't an exercise for first responders, it isn't an exercise for the Transport for London employees, its a private company doing a company-wide exercise. It was not supposed to be a London-wide exercise. And that is what actually placing "fake" bombs would be- it would turn it from an exercise involving just the employees of that company into an exercise for the entire London first response and transit systems- and no one has claimed that any such thing happened, just that a single unnamed company "of more than a thousand employees" was doing an exercise.There is another reason to suggest that your interpretation of the event is not the most parsimonious one: you seem to believe that official cover for the bombs emplacement was provided to officials in TFL by officers of Visor Consultants. They told London Underground officials "Oh don't worry, we just need to put some fake bombs here" and under that cover installed *real* bombs. Why wouldn't some of those London Underground officials who were duped mention this to the press? I think that "Hey, some people were installing what they claimed were fake bombs here last night" might have come up from one of the many London Underground employees who would have known of the exercise as you portray it. Why hasn't anyone mentioned any physical emplacement of "fake" bomb materials yet?Unless you are arguing that people in TFL were complicit (in which case no excuse would be necessary, it would be trivial for TFL people to plant bombs in the system) or that the Men-in-Black mind-eraser was used (ditto) I would expect someone who works for the transit system to mention such a thing.And then you'd need to explain the detonation on the bus if the bombs were planted at the stations ahead of time. How did the bomb get on the bus?If you any evidence that there was indeed "fake bombs" put in place as part of this exercise I would *LOVE* to see it. But I need evidence to believe that government people were complicit in this. I know government employees. Hell, I work for a government contractor. And that might also be why I'm skeptical of a government conspiracy.(Sidenote: I find it is amusing that I, an Episcopalian who believes in God despite zero evidence, am asking Crashfrog for evidence to support his beliefs. Life can be kind of funny that way.)Chris