| http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/Lynn052902/lynn052902.html Part 2 of a two-part series The complicity connection: What did the Bush administration know and when did it know it? By Joyce Lynn Online Journal Contributing Writer Strange Goings-On May 29, 2002—In May 2001, Secretary of State Colin Powell gave $43 million to the Taliban because under its regime poppy growing was drastically reduced. Despite its human rights abuses, the "gift," in addition to other aid, made the U.S. the "main sponsor of the Taliban" at the time, according to a column by Robert Scheer in the Los Angeles Times May 22. Last summer, then Pakistani ISI Chief General Mahmound Ahmad through an aide wired $100,000 to Mohammed Atta, according to a Times of India report. The FBI named Atta, who died in one of the hijacked planes, as the ringleader of the September 11 attacks. Last September 4, General Ahmad, the ISI chief, arrived in Washington for meetings with high-level State Department officials and presumably with his CIA counterparts, reports Michel Chossudovsky of the Centre for Research on Globalisation. Five days later, Ahmad Shah Masood, leader of the Northern Alliance, was attacked. He died September 13. The Northern Alliance blamed the Pakistani ISI. Last October 7, Pakistan's government dismissed Ahmad after the Indian government informed the U.S. about the wire transfer, and the U.S. requested his removal, according to the Times of India. It appears either Ahmad was acting as a rogue state of one or the Pakistani intelligence service was involved in the September 11 attacks. Key members of the U.S. State Department's Asia team made both clandestine and public trips to Pakistan and India last summer. These officials, including Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, were CIA operatives in the Reagan and Bush administrations. CIA Director George Tenet visited Pakistan and met with Pakistani president General Pervez Musharraf. In addition, last September, three members of the Senate Intelligence Subcommittee also visited Pakistan with an entourage of espionage operatives. "It is a mystery how bin Laden could have planned the U.S. attacks without the knowledge of the U.S. since the entire State Department team for South Asia visited or were stationed in the capitals of Pakistan and India during the past summer," maintains Yoichi Clark Shimatsu, former general editor of The Japan Times Weekly and now a journalism professor at the University of Hong Kong in a September 20 article. Airline Stock Trading Unusual trading in put options on American and United Airlines occurred in the week before September 11. According to investigative journalist Michael Ruppert, the CIA and other intelligence services monitor trading in real time using Promis software to "detect potential warnings of terrorist attacks and other economic moves contrary to U.S. interests." Ruppert's website, From the Wilderness, reports on the effects of illegal covert operations on society. The following is excerpted from his report. Ruppert relied on the Israeli Herzliyya International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism's September 21 article, "Black Tuesday: The World's Largest Insider Trading Scam," as well as business stories in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and San Francisco Chronicle for his information and data. September 6–7, 2001: 744 put options (a hedge that a stock will decline in value) are purchased on United Air Lines. Only 396 call options (a hedge that a stock will increase in value) are purchased. This is an unusual increase in put options. A large number of the UAL put options are purchased through Deutsche Bank/AB Brown. September 10, 2001: 4,516 put options are purchased on American Airlines compared to 748 call options. The put options on United and America airlines were 600 percent above normal. They were the only airlines with such trading patterns the week of September 6–11. On September 29, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that investors left more than $2.5 million in profits they made trading options in the stock of United Airlines before the September 11 terrorist attacks uncollected. "The uncollected money raises suspicions that the investors-whose identities and nationalities have not been made public-had advance knowledge of the strikes . . . " . . . The source familiar with the United trades identified Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, the American investment banking arm of German giant Deutsche Bank, as the investment bank used to purchase at least some of these options . . ." The current CIA Executive Director is A.B. "Buzzy" Krongard. He became CEO of A. B. Brown Inc. in 1991 and chairman in 1994. When A.B. Brown merged with Bankers Trust Corp. in September 1997, Krongard became vice chairman of Bankers Trust until he became counselor to the CIA Director in March 1998. Deutsche Bank acquired Bankers Trust in 1999, making it the largest bank in Europe. David Doherty, Vice President for Enforcement of the New York Stock, was formerly general counsel of the CIA. War Games The United States and an unusual number of countries in Europe and Central Asia were preparing for war with the magic commencement date on or around October 7, the date the U.S. began bombing Afghanistan. A June 26 story on Indiareacts.com reported that the U.S. and Russia were planning "limited military action" against the Taliban if economic sanctions failed. According to the article, the Taliban were advancing near the Tajik-Afghan border to attack the Northern Alliance and take the 10 percent of the country outside the Taliban's control. By July, according to a source, a U.S. plan was in place for war in Afghanistan; the former Soviet Republic of Georgia gave the U.S. the OK to use its territory. Military war games—all planned before September 11—brought more than 60,000 U.S., British, and NATO troops to the Middle East. Most were in place by September 10, the rest by October 7. Operation Bright Star, a joint training exercise in Egypt between the Egyptian military and the U.S. Army. Military forces from France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Jordan, Kuwait, Spain, and the United Kingdom also participated. The 11th in a series, Operation Bright Star was scheduled to take place October 8 through November 1. Operation Swift Sword, six-week exercises involving the armed forces of Oman and 25,000 British Army, Navy and Air Force personnel. The operation was intended to demonstrate the British forces' ability to deploy over long distances. One press release called Swift Sword 2 war games the "biggest deployment of British troops since the Falklands war in the South Atlantic 20 years ago." Oman in the Gulf of Arabia is close to Pakistan. Swift Sword was scheduled for September 15 to October 2001. U.S. Evidence The week of September 4, bin Laden indicated he was "about to launch a major attack on America. Associates of bin Laden named the action date 'on or around 11 September.' Others were warned to return to Afghanistan before their plot unfolded," according to an October 7 New York Times story. The Times based its account on a document the British government released and posted on its website. This 18-page document apparently is the "evidence" of bin Laden's guilt that Bush said was too sensitive to release to the American people. According to the story, some of the statements came from intercepted telephone conversations and others from interrogation sessions in Europe since September 11. Therefore, it is difficult to know which accusations were known when. The Line-up at the State Department Colin Powell may be Secretary of State, but at least a half dozen top CIA operatives from the Reagan-Bush and Bush I administrations hold key State Department posts for Central Asia in the current Bush administration. Bush's team in the State Department are "the very same individuals who indoctrinated Osama bin Laden under the administration of his father," according to journalist Yoichi Clark Shimatsu. He reported this training included using planes as bombs/missiles. The line-up: Richard Armitage, Deputy Secretary of State and point man on South Asia. Armitage had a long CIA career: He had four tours of duty in covert operations in Vietnam. He was Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security in the Reagan-Bush administration. As an advisor on the Afghan war, he organized the covert flow of weapons to the Afghan guerrillas—the mujaheddin—and the militant Islamic base during the 1980s. Then, with Oliver North, he was involved in Iran-Contra arms smuggling. His nomination for a position in the Bush 1 administration was withdrawn before the hearings because of his role in Iran-Contra. Shimatsu calls bin Laden "an Armitage protégé." Christina Rocco, Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia. As such, she handles U.S. foreign policy with Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. A CIA career officer since 1982, Rocco is a former CIA Directorate of Operations official. The directorate deals with clandestine operations including assassinations. After the Afghan-Soviet war, Rocco was responsible for buying back U.S. supplied anti-aircraft Stinger missiles that were given to the Afghan Mujaheddin through the Pakistani ISI. Wendy Chamberlain, Ambassador to Pakistan. A former CIA operative, Chamberlain was Ambassador to Laos. Critics have condemned her human rights record there. Robert D. Blackwell, ambassador to New Delhi, India. An intelligence veteran, he was an assistant in the National Security Agency from 1989–90 in the Bush I administration. In a September 20 article, Shimatsu, wrote, "Bush's current State Department officials were CIA experts who funded and trained bin Laden under the Reagan-and Bush administrations." The CIA has determined the power structure in Afghanistan since 1979 by funding and supporting the chosen regime via the ISI. Saudi Arabia has been the U.S. companion in this operation. The Reagan and Bush administrations funneled more than $3 billion to the Mujaheddin to fight the Soviets. Bin Laden emerged from these factions along the mountainous camps in Afghanistan. In 1994, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia buoyed by the U.S. supported the Taliban because they would protect the U.S.-led pipeline slated to go through Afghanistan to Pakistan. The Events of September 11, 2001 (All times are EDT; departure times vary depending on the media source; all sources are consistent on the crash times) American Airlines Flight #11 leaves Boston for Los Angeles at 7:45 a.m. United Airlines Flight #175 leaves Boston for Los Angeles at 7:58 a.m. United Airlines Flight #93 leaves Newark, NJ, for San Francisco at 8:01 a.m. American Airlines Flight #77 departs Washington, DC's Dulles International Airport in suburban Virginia for Los Angeles at 8:10 a.m. Around 8:30 a.m., a flight attendant onboard Flight #11 calls the reservations desk at Boston's Logan International airport and reports a hijacking is in process. The pilot turns on the microphone so ground controllers can hear the cabin noise. Flight #11 slams into the World Trade Center North tower at 8:45 a.m. Air traffic controllers lose contact with Flight #77 at 8:55 a.m. Flight #175 crashes into the World Trade Center South tower at 9:05 a.m., 20 minutes after Flight #11 hits the first WTC tower. At 9:06 a.m. the New York police broadcast, "This is a terrorist attack. Notify the Pentagon," the New York Daily News reported on September 12, 2001. At the same time, Bush, who is at an elementary school in Sarasota, Florida, reading to second graders is told by chief of staff, "America is at war." Bush continues to talk to the school children. At 9:30 a.m., Bush goes on television and calls the WTC hits an "apparent terrorist attack." (Bush was notified after the first WTC was hit and later said he thought that was "one bad pilot." He continued with this classroom event.) Then, at 9:40 a.m., Flight #77, hits the Pentagon. At 10 a.m., a passenger aboard United Airlines Flight #93 places a 911 call. That plane had been hijacked over Cleveland and reversed direction heading back toward the east coast. Minutes later at 10:10 a.m., the plane goes down in a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania—one and a half hours after the first plane hit the World Trade Center. This timeline, based on published accounts of the September 11 attacks, shows that nearly one hour elapsed between the first World Trade Center crash and the Pentagon crash. Once the FAA requests help, prior to September 11, planes could be in the air in 10 minutes to scramble, intercept, or guide another plane; since September 11 that time has been reduced to 6 minutes, Nora O'Donnell reported on MS-NBC December 23. By 8:30 a.m., officials knew a hijacking was in progress. At 8:45, it was clear to these officials the first World Trade Center crash was a hijacking, not an accident. Only after Flight #77 slammed into the Pentagon—55 minutes after the first tower is hit and nearly 80 minutes from the initial hijacking—are fighter planes from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, 10 minutes from Washington, DC, sent to fly over the nation's capital, according to a September 12 story in the San Diego Tribune. Reports put the departure time of American Flight #77 from Dulles at 8:10 or 8:21 a.m. At 9:25 a.m., Barbara Olson allegedly calls her husband Solicitor General Ted Olson from Flight #77 to say the plane has been hijacked. He tells her of the other hijackings. It crashes at 9:45. Dulles is in suburban Maryland outside DC. Where was this plane for one hour? Air Force and others officials have tried to explain the failure to respond by blaming the lack of available planes or faulting air safety/defense systems. In doing so, they have changed their public explanations. The Emperor's New Clothes in a November 14 article contradicts these contentions. "The FAA, NORAD, and the military have cooperative procedures by which fighter jets automatically intercept commercial aircraft under emergency conditions. These procedures were not followed on September 11. "Andrews Air Force Base is a huge military installation just 10 minutes from the Pentagon. On September 11, there were two entire squadron of combat-ready fighter jets at Andrews. Their job was to protect the skies over Washington, D.C." It is possible that the U.S. could have prevented the crash of Flight #77 into the Pentagon and could have saved Flight #93 if normal procedures had been instituted? Why did 60 minutes pass after a hijacked plane destroyed a symbol of U.S. financial power and another hijacked plane ripped a gapping hole in the symbol of U.S. military power without the U.S. taking defensive, protective action? The Emperor's New Clothes contends, "U.S. air safety and air defense emergency systems are activated in response to problems every day. On September 11, they failed despite, not because of, the extreme nature of the emergency." Black Gold The administration says its war on terrorism is intended to root out the perpetrators of the September 11 attacks on the United States. Some experts believe finding those responsible for the attacks and hastening the demise of the Taliban could have been accomplished without turning Afghanistan to rubble, killing thousands of Afghanis, enhancing bin Laden's image, and provoking future violence. What does the Bush administration gain by the war in the Caspian Sea arena? For starters—the opportunity to extend the U.S. military presence in Central Asia to achieve political and economic goals. The Gulf War in 1990 gave the U.S. a military presence in the oil rich Gulf States. Ten years later, the U.S. war in Afghanistan is laying the foundation for a U.S. military presence in the Caspian Sea arena and its estimated $3 trillion in oil reserves. Last September 3, only a week before the attacks, Pakistan launched the independent Interstate Gas Company Limited to secure regional pipeline options for gas imports, according to a report on Dawn. One of the pipelines in the works, the Centgas Consortium pipeline from the oil-rich fields of Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Pakistani ports and then possibly onto the huge markets of India and China, has been on hold since November, 1998, when UNOCAL pulled out saying the civil war in Afghanistan precluded financing. Lobbying the U.S. State Department in the mid-1990s, UNOCAL fostered the Taliban's emergence because the company considered the Taliban the most likely of the rival Afghanistan factions to guard the pipeline and keep it secure. Then, when the Taliban lost favor, UNOCAL pulled out of the consortium. John J. Maresca, UNOCAL's vice president of international relations, told Congress on February 12, 1998: "Construction of a pipeline across Afghanistan cannot begin until a recognized government is in place that has the confidence of governments, lenders, and our company." At the time only three countries recognized the Taliban, which controlled 80 percent of Afghanistan. Banks such as J.P. Morgan refused to finance the project. UNOCAL insisted a stable U.S./U.N.-approved government must be in place in Afghanistan to proceed with the project. Suddenly, last October, only three weeks after the attacks on the United States, and as the U.S. was beginning the air assault on Afghanistan, U.S. Ambassador Wendy Chamberlain met with the Pakistani oil minister. Afterwards, according to an October 10 story in the Pakistani newspaper The Frontier Post, the UNOCAL pipeline was now "back in play in view of recent geo-political developments." Oil is at the heart of the Bush administration's so-called war on terrorism. If one were wondering what the U.S. could offer Pakistan to abandon its six-year support of the Taliban—in addition to the billions in aid and weapons it has promised—a secure pipeline might seal the deal. In its June 26 story on what it calls a "U.S.-Russian plan" for an October attack on the Taliban, Indiareacts.com explained what is at stake: "Such Central Asian countries as Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan are threatened by the Taliban that is aiming to control their vast oil, gas and other resources by bringing Islamic fundamentalism into power." The article in the public affairs magazine reports that India and Iran will "facilitate" the planned U.S.-Russia hostilities and gives this broader context: "Iran is also worried over the unending war effort of the Taliban to get supremacy in Afghanistan that is harming Iran's economic interests. India, Iran, and Russia, for example, are working on a broad plan to supply oil and gas to south Asia and Southeast Asian nations through India but instability in Afghanistan is posing a great threat to this effort." Le Figaro's headline October 31 tagged bin Laden as "gravely ill." He had treatment at the American Hospital in Dubai several times between 1996 and 1998. According to Le Figaro, a March 2000 story in Asia Week said bin Laden had a serious physical problem and "his days were in danger" because a kidney infection was spreading to his liver. He reportedly had a mobile dialysis machine sent to him in Kandahar during the first half of 2000. These reports, if true, may influence bin Laden's activities. History Lessons Is it outrageous to consider that the CIA might have had a role in the September 11 tragedy? U.S. history in the 20th century is replete with instances of the U.S. government allowing, provoking, creating, or lying so the U.S. could retaliate or expand its war effort, often to serve the needs of those in power. Several examples: 1. Operations Northwoods - In 1962, the U.S. military wanted to provoke a war with Cuba. The Pentagon and CIA planned Operation Northwoods. The Chiefs of Staff-approved plan would have terrorized U.S. cities to provoke war with Cuba. The civilian leadership eventually rejected it. Author James Bamford tells about the plan in his book, "Body of Secrets," and in an ABC News interview on May 1. 2. Vietnam War - The U.S. both provoked an attack on a U.S. ship in the Gulf of Tonkin and then lied that another attack occurred. As a result, Congress passed the Tonkin Gulf resolution that gave President Lyndon Johnson war powers leading to full-fledged war in Vietnam. "Working Class War" by Christian Appy, which is used in a history class at Georgetown University, put it this way: "Though most of the fighting on the ground took place within South Vietnam, U.S. and South Vietnamese forces conducted hundreds of small clandestine, across the border operations in Cambodia, Laos, and North Vietnam. "Indeed, raids against the North were the provocation that led North Vietnamese patrol boats to fire at an American destroyer on 2 August 1964. "President Johnson claimed this attack and another on August 4 (which did not, in fact, take place) were unprovoked acts of aggression, and he ordered air strikes on North Vietnam in response. More importantly, he used the incident to win congressional approval of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, a resolution drafted months earlier giving (LBJ) the power to 'take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression.'" Johnson used the resolution as congressional authorization to escalate the war in 1965. More than 50,000 Americans and two million Vietnamese and Laotians lost their lives in the Vietnam War. The U.S. ostensibly waged the Vietnam War to stop the spread of communism. Johnson kept the fighting going even when it was clear the U.S. could not win because he did not want to be the first U.S. president to lose a war. 3. Gulf War–George H.W. Bush instituted a war plan that encouraged Saddam Hussein to invade Kuwait so the U.S. would have grounds to retaliate. The U.S. ambassador to Iraq gave the green light, leading Saddam Hussein to believe the U.S. would overlook his invasion of Kuwait. The New York Times on September 22, 1990, published a transcript of a conversation between U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie and Saddam Hussein that took place on July 25, eight days before fighting broke out in the Gulf. In the conversation, she suggests the Bush (I) administration's neutrality in the Arab dispute: " . . . we have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait . . . we see the Iraqi point of view that the measures taken by the United Arab Emeritus and Kuwait is, in the final analysis, parallel to military aggression against Iraq." More than 100,000 Iraqi soldiers were killed in the Gulf War. Two hundred U.S. military personnel lost their lives in the Gulf War. UNICEF estimates 500,000 Iraqi children have died since 1981 as a result of U.S. sanctions against Iraq. What Now? We must find the truth so that we can hold accountable and bring to justice any one, including those in the U.S. government, who might have covertly or overtly participated in the tragedy now known as September 11. The corporate media have abrogated their responsibility to the public's right to know. Congressional investigations are in disarray It is likely these investigations will focus on how the intelligence agencies dropped the ball. The agencies have already promulgated this line of defense in the media. For example, unidentified sources quoted in a New York Times story published a month after the attacks: "Clearly, the officials agree, the United States failed to grasp the organization's transformation from an obscure group of Islamic extremists into the world's most dangerous terrorists." A truly independent commission should be established to determine what the CIA/U.S. knew and when it knew it. Joyce Lynn is a journalist. She spent eight years as a political reporter in Washington, DC. |
