patrick.net

Many questions remain about what happened on 9/11. I thought a Substack post might bring together some of the things I’ve noticed and wondered about on Twitter over the years. I don’t have the answers. - RH

Sometime between 1991 and 2001, a regional sector of the North American Aerospace Defense Command simulated a foreign hijacked airliner crashing into a building in the United States as part of training exercise scenario, a NORAD spokesman said Monday.

- CNN, April 19, 2004

On August 6, 2001, the president's intelligence briefing included a response to questions that he had earlier raised about any al Qaeda intentions to strike our homeland.

The briefing item reviewed past intelligence reporting, mostly dating from the 1990s, regarding possible al Qaeda plans to attack inside the United States. It referred to uncorroborated reporting that from 1998 that terrorists might attempt to hijack a U.S. aircraft in an attempt to blackmail the government into releasing U.S.-held terrorists who had participated in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. This briefing item was not prompted by any specific threat information. And it did not raise the possibility that terrorists might use airplanes as missiles.

- Transcript of Condoleeza Rice's 9/11 commission statement

“Any letting the Saudis off the hook came from the White House,” former Agent Mark Rossini said. “I can still see that photo of Bandar and Bush enjoying cigars on the balcony of the White House two days after 9/11.”

- Robert Mueller helped Saudi Arabia cover up its role in 9/11 attacks: suit

CHENEY, BANDAR, RICE & BUSH, 9/13/01
In Washington, former FBI Agent John Guandolo, who worked terror cases out of the bureau’s DC office, said then-Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar “should have been treated as a terrorist suspect” for giving money to a woman who funded two of the 9/11 hijackers. But he was never questioned either, Guandolo said.

To put it bluntly the oil spigot is more important than American lives. The facts are all there, but conscious avoidance has been the practice. We protect the Royal House of Al-Saud, who made a deal with puritanical Wahhabi zealots, in order to ensure the flow of oil. Right or wrong, these are the facts which causes everybody to look down at the floor when you mention them, and hope you'll go away and not interfere with their cheap tank of gas.

- Former FBI Agent Mark Rossini

Washington, D.C., Nov. 3, 2000 — The fire and smoke from the downed passenger aircraft billows from the Pentagon courtyard.
At least five months before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, air defense planners proposed a war-game situation in which a terrorist group hijacked an airliner and flew it into the Pentagon…

New York Times April 14,2004

DTHC participation in an Arlington County EMS tabletop exercise with Arlington County EMS in May 2001 helped response preparation for the Pentagon attack. The scenario in that tabletop exercise featured a commuter airplane crashing into the Pentagon. Additionally, Major Brown and other DTHC staff had recently conducted a detailed disaster plan review. The familiarity with its content helped adapt the DTHC disaster plan to this situation.

- Arlington County After-Action Report On the Response to the September 11 Terrorist Attack on the Pentagon

Oral Histories From 9/11
It was weird how it started to come down. It looked like it was a timed explosion, but I guess it was just the floors starting to pancake one on top of the other.

- BATTALION CHIEF DOMINICK DeRUBBIO October 12, 2001

As my officer and I were looking at the south tower, it just gave. It actually gave at a lower floor, not the floor where the plane hit, because we originally had thought there was like an internal detonation explosives because it went in succession, boom, boom, boom, boom, and then the tower came down.

- Firefighter Edward Cachia, FDNY 12/6/2001

Paramedic Daniel Rivera, October 10, 2001
Floor after floor after floor. One floor under another after another and when it hit about the fifth floor, I figured it was a bomb, because it looked like a synchronized deliberate kind of thing. I was there in '93.

- Firefighter Kenneth Rogers, FDNY 12/10/2001

I just remember we were -- initially we were out by the street and they started having jumpers, so they all kind of moved back towards the parking garage, towards the building, so nothing would come down on us. We were there I don't know, maybe 10, 15 minutes and then I just remember there was just an explosion. It seemed like on television they blow up these buildings. It seemed like it was going all the way around like a belt, all these explosions. Everybody just said run and we all turned around and we ran into the parking garage because that's basically where we were. Running forward would be running towards it. Not thinking that this building is coming down. We just thought there was going to be a big explosion, stuff was going to come down.

- Firefighter Richard Banaciski, FDNY 12/6/2001

I know I was with an officer from Ladder 146, a Lieutenant Evangelista, who ultimately called me up a couple of days later just to find out how I was. We both for whatever reason -- again, I don't know how valid this is with everything that was going on at that particular point in time, but for some reason I thought that when I looked in the direction of the Trade Center before it came down, before No. 2 came down, that I saw low-level flashes. In my conversation with Lieutenant Evangelista, never mentioning this to him, he questioned me and asked me if I saw low-level flashes in front of the building, and I agreed with him because I thought -- at that time I didn't know what it was. I mean, it could have been as a result of the building collapsing, things exploding, but I saw a flash flash flash and then it looked like the building came down.

Q. Was that on the lower level of the building or up where the fire was?

A. No, the lower level of the building. You know like when they demolish a building, how when they blow up a building, when it falls down? That's what I thought I saw. And I didn't broach the topic to him, but he asked me. He said I don't know if I'm crazy, but I just wanted to ask you because you were standing right next to me. He said did you see anything by the building? And I said what do you mean by see anything? He said did you see any flashes? I said, yes, well, I thought it was just me. He said no, I saw them, too. I don't know if that means anything. I mean, I equate it to the building coming down and pushing things down, it could have been electrical explosions, it could have been whatever. But it's just strange that two people sort of say the same thing and neither one of us talked to each other about it. I mean, I don't know this guy from a hole in the wall. I was just standing next to him. I never met the man before in my life. He knew who I was I guess by my name on my coat and he called me up, you know, how are you doing? How's everything? And, oh, by the way did you… It was just a little strange.

- Stephen Gregory, Assistant Commissioner, FDNY 10/3/2001

“...remember 7 World Trade had not yet come down, so when I went down to the exchange that Wednesday morning, I was staying with some military and police officers, and we were looking over in that direction, and if it had come down in the way in which it was tilting, it would’ve wiped out everything…there were still fears that if that building had fallen sideways, you’re going to wipeout a good part of lower Manhattan. So they did manage for one to take that down in a controlled implosion later on.”

- Ron Insana, Bernie and Sid in the Morning, 9/11/2019

The White Van “Our purpose was to document the event.”