September 11, 2001 Research & Archives

con·spir·a·cy
kənˈspirəsē/

noun: conspiracy; plural noun: conspiracies

    a secret plan by a group to do something unlawful or harmful.
    "a conspiracy to destroy the government"
    synonyms:   plot, scheme, plan, machination, ploy, trick, ruse, subterfuge; informal racket

    "a conspiracy to manipulate the results"
     the action of plotting or conspiring.
    "they were cleared of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice"

     Synonyms:   plotting, collusion, intrigue, connivance, machination, collaboration; treason
     "conspiracy to commit murder"



The best explanation of conspiracy theory that I have come across was given by Talk Radio Host Dave vonKleist from the DVD "9/11 in Plane Site" which can be found at http://www.911inplanesite.com/

Dave vonKleist is a host on The Power Hour http://www.PowerHour.com

No conspiracy can possibly be true now can they? After all they are just theories; right?
In the phrase "Conspiracy Theory" There are two words, the first word "Conspiracy", the second word is the active word "Theory". By definition, a theory is a supposition, an idea, a concept, an hypothesis. Let me give you an example, in theory if I purchase a raffle ticket; I could win a prize. Now as long as I don't purchase a raffle ticket, my win is theoretical. But once you purchase a raffle ticket; the win is no longer a theory it becomes a possibility. And the more raffle tickets you purchase; the more possible and eventually probable the win becomes. Such as the case with a "Conspiracy Theory". As long as there is no evidence, it is a conspiracy theory. But once you have a piece of evidence; no matter how flimsy or circumstantial it may be, it becomes a possibility. And the more evidence that is gathered; the more possible and eventually probable the conspiracy is.

Excerpts From Wikipedia:

The 9/11 Commission Report, formally named Final Report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, is the official report of the events leading up to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. It was prepared by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (informally sometimes known as the "9/11 Commission" or the "Kean/Hamilton Commission") at the request of United States president George W. Bush and Congress, and is available to the public for sale or free download.

The commission was established on November 27, 2002 (442 days after the attack) and their final report was issued on July 22, 2004. The report was originally scheduled for release on May 27, 2004, but a compromise agreed to by Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert allowed a sixty-day extension through July 26.

In a 2004 article titled, "Whitewash as Public Service: How The 9/11 Commission Report defrauds the nation", Harper's Magazine writer Benjamin DeMott stated that:

    The plain, sad reality — I report this following four full days studying the work — is that The 9/11 Commission Report, despite the vast quantity of labor behind it, is a cheat and a fraud. It stands as a series of evasive maneuvers that infantilize the audience, transform candor into iniquity, and conceal realities that demand immediate inspection and confrontation. Because it is continuously engaged in scotching all attempts to distinguish better from worse leadership responses, the Commission can't discharge its duty to educate the audience about the habits of mind and temperament essential in those chosen to discharge command responsibility during crises.[16]

Other sources have criticized the commission for not digging deep enough to get to the core of the issues. In a 2004 interview with Bernard Gwertzman, of the Council on Foreign Relations, Anthony H. Cordesman (of the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, the Center for International and Strategic Studies in Washington) stated of the report:

    Again, one of the great problems in the commission report is that it looked at exactly one issue — counterterrorism — and none of the others. But [U.S.] intelligence users consist of more than one million people, many of them in uniform, and when you talk about budgeting and programming authority, you have to consider that. . . . Many of these conclusions are probably very valuable. But this is a 13-chapter report. Eleven chapters are a masterful description of what happened and what went wrong that led to the 9/11 attack. There is no chapter that explains what people did after 9/11. There is no chapter that qualifies that this is only one of many problems in intelligence and intelligence reform."[17]

FAA counter-terrorism expert Bogdan Dzakovic believes that the security failures at airports that allowed the hijackers to board the planes were not due to the failures in the system that the report identified. Furthermore, he stated that "Many of the FAA bureaucrats that actively thwarted improvements in security prior to 9/11 have been promoted by FAA or the Transportation Security Administration."[18] The report did not mention his name, despite Dzakovic giving the following testimony to the commission regarding his undercover checks on airport security prior to 9/11:

    We breached security up to 90 percent of the time. The FAA suppressed these warnings. Instead, we were ordered not to write up our reports and not to retest airports where we found particularly egregious vulnerabilities, to see if the problems had been fixed. Finally, the agency started providing advance notification of when we would be conducting our 'undercover' tests and what we would be 'checking.' . . . What happened on 9/11 was not a failure in the system. Our airports are not safer now than before 9/11. The main difference between then and now is that life is now more miserable for passengers.[18]

The report has been accused of not giving the whole story about the warnings the U.S. received prior to the attacks.[19] While the report did describe that "the system was blinking red" and that an al Qaeda attack was imminent, it did not include the testimony of former CIA director George Tenet to the commission in January 2004, in which he claimed to have given a specific warning to the Administration in a July 2001 meeting with Condoleezza Rice. Commission members Thomas Kean and Lee Hamilton stated that they had not been told about the meeting. But the Boston Globe reported that "it turns out that the panel was, in fact, told about the meeting, according to the interview transcript and Democratic commission member Richard Ben-Veniste, who sat in on the interview with Tenet."[20]

All the alleged 9/11 hijackers reportedly check in at the airports from where they board Flights 11, 175, 77, and 93. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 1-4; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 27, 89, 93]

Since 1998, the FAA has required air carriers to implement a program called the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-screening System (CAPPS). This identifies those passengers who might be a security risk, based upon suspicious behavior such as buying one-way tickets or paying with cash. CAPPS also randomly assigns some passengers to receive additional security scrutiny. If a particular passenger has been designated as a "selectee," this information is transmitted to the airport's check-in counter, where a code is printed on their boarding pass. At the airport's security checkpoints, selectees are subjected to additional security measures. [US News and World Report, 4/1/2002; 9/11 Commission, 1/27/2004; US Congress, 3/17/2004; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 2, 85]

Their baggage is to be screened for explosives or held off the plane until they have boarded. Supposedly, the thinking behind this is that someone smuggling a bomb onto a plane won't get onto that same flight. According to the 9/11 Commission, nine of the 19 hijackers are flagged by the CAPPS system before boarding Flights 11, 175, 77, and 93. [Washington Post, 1/28/2004; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 84; United States of America v. Zacarias Moussaoui, a/k/a Shaqil, a/k/a Abu Khalid al Sahrawi, Defendant, 3/6/2006]

In addition, Mohamed Atta was selected when he checked in at the airport in Portland, for his earlier connecting flight to Boston. All of the hijackers subsequently pass through security checkpoints before boarding their flights. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 1-4]

9/11 hijackers Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz Alomari's flight from Portland to Boston takes off. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 10/4/2001]

Their plane, Colgan Air Flight 5930, is a 19-seat Beechcraft 1900. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2001; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 3]

Fellow passengers Vincent Meisner and Roger Quirion will later say Atta and Alomari board separately, keep quiet, and do not draw attention to themselves. [Chicago Sun-Times, 9/16/2001; Washington Post, 9/16/2001]

Quirion, says: "They struck me as business travelers. They were sitting down, talking, seems like they were going over some paperwork." [CBS News, 10/12/2001]

Michael Tuohey [Source: CNN]

9/11 hijackers Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz Alomari check in at the US Airways counter at Portland International Jetport. [Portland Press Herald, 10/5/2001; Federal Bureau of Investigation, 10/5/2001] They are wearing ties and jackets. Atta checks in two bags, Alomari none. Atta is randomly selected for additional security scrutiny by the FAA's Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-screening System (CAPPS).  However, the only consequence is that his checked bags will be held off the plane until it is confirmed that he has boarded. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 1; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 2; CNN, 3/3/2006] Noting that their flight is soon due to leave, the ticket agent who checks them in, Michael Tuohey, says, "You're cutting it close."  [Portland Press Herald, 3/6/2005] Tuohey thinks the pair seems unusual. He notices they both have $2,500 first-class, one-way tickets. He later comments, "You don't see many of those." Atta looks "like a walking corpse. He looked so angry." In contrast, Tuohey will say, Alomari can barely speak English and has "a goofy smile, I can't believe he knew he was going to die that day." Tuohey will later recount, "I thought they looked like two Arab terrorists but then I berated myself for the stereotype and did nothing." [Philadelphia Daily News, 2/24/2005; Mirror, 9/11/2005; CNN, 3/3/2006]

Atta becomes angry when Tuohey informs him he will have to check in again in Boston. He complains that he was assured he would have a "one-step check-in." [9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 2; Associated Press, 3/7/2005] Tuohey will be recalled to work later in the day to speak to an FBI agent about his encounter with Atta and Alomari. He is shown video footage of them passing through the airport's security checkpoint upstairs. Although recognizing the two men, he notices that in the video they are no longer wearing the jackets and ties they'd had on when checking in just minutes before. He assumes they must have taken these off and tucked them into their carry-on baggage. He is also informed that the security camera behind his own desk, which should have captured the two hijackers, has in fact been out of order for some time. [Portland Press Herald, 3/6/2005; CNN, 3/3/2006]

Abdulaziz Alomari (a passport stamp overlaps part of his face). [Source: FBI]

Having spent the previous night at the Comfort Inn in Portland, Maine, hijackers Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz Alomari check out at 5:33 a.m. and drive their rented Nissan to the nearby Portland International Jetport Airport, entering its parking lot at 5:40 a.m. The FBI will later seize their car there. [Observer, 9/16/2001; Portland Press Herald, 10/5/2001; Federal Bureau of Investigation, 10/5/2001; Newsday, 4/17/2006] Their flight is due to take off for Boston at 6:00 a.m.  The Boston Globe points out, "Any significant delay would foil [Atta's] big plans for the day." [Boston Globe, 9/16/2001] The 9/11 Commission later concludes: "The Portland detour almost prevented Atta and Omari from making Flight 11 out of Boston." [9/11 Commission, 6/16/2004]