http://www.cooperativeresearch.org The Center for Grassroots Oversight aims to provide the public with a means to collaborate on investigations at the grassroots level. en-us http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-1023 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-1023 9/11 Timeline contributor Kevin Fenton has recently published an investigation into the intelligence failures before 9/11. is the most detailed examination of actions taken by the CIA, FBI and NSA in the run-up to the attacks yet published. The book shows that a small group of people centered on the CIA's bin Laden unit, Alec Station, withheld key information about two of the hijackers, Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi, from the FBI for over a year and a half. At the same time, the NSA was also failing to pass on similar information. Had the information been passed, it is highly likely that the FBI would have been able to stop the plot and prevent the attacks. Kevin Fenton 2011-07-12T09:31:17+02:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-984 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-984 Several miscellaneous new entries have been added to the 9/11 Timeline over the past few weeks. In the period before 9/11, we have a 1989 Rand Corporation paper that said the possibility of suicide plane hijackings was a military claims that the number of alert air bases was to protect against terrorism from around 1997, and preparation for a change to the FAA's policy in the summer of 2001. On the day of 9/11, an apparent gate agent checked to see whether lead hijacker Mohamed Atta's famous bags had been onto Flight 11, and a couple of days later the FAA investigated on the same flight. There is also more about Blackwater, including the of the CIA's assassination and capture program in 2004, and the in the press in August 2009. There are also two more CIA reports on Khalid Shaikh Mohammed's interrogations, in which the alleged 9/11 mastermind Zacarias Moussaoui was being considered solely for a second wave of attacks. Finally, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad recently said the 9/11 attacks were a Kevin Fenton 2010-04-11T07:03:59+02:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-983 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-983 The largest group of entries added to the 9/11 Timeline over the last couple of weeks concerns military exercises and the day of 9/11. FAA training exercises in December 2000 included scenarios and there was a Boeing 767 in the summer of 2001, as well as a simulated suicide terrorist attack against New York , and a mock the next day. Early on the day of the attacks, were participating in a training exercise, and controllers at Reagan National Airport of the approach of Flight 77. After the Pentagon was hit, a supervisor told DC Air National Guard pilots on training to and the Secret Service called the guard again after Flight 93 crashed to , but it launched his first planes with missiles . Another large group of new entries concerns the CIA/Blackwater assassination program that never killed anybody. The program was shortly after 9/11 and was not briefed to Congress . Blackwater, which had won a CIA contract to provide in 2002, became involved, but this involvement was later . CIA Director Leon Panetta was of the program in June 2009, cancelling it and immediately , which . Elsewhere in counterterrorism, CIA Director George Tenet significantly expanded the agency's in the late '90s. The agency also built a network of after 9/11, but later . There is also more about alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed (KSM), who, under interrogation, falsely claimed a key player in the Bojinka plot, Abdul Hakim Murad, only had a in the conspiracy, and whose secret tortured confessions were in March 2004. Last year, the administration famously announced that KSM and four other defendants would be tried in a (whereas five other detainees would remain in military commissions), and a lawyer for one of the five then said they would plead . Some other new entries concern the family of Osama bin Laden, who may or be alive. His son Saad around late 2008, had his early next year, and was then . Subsequently, bin Laden's daughter Iman also . Finally, some of the members of the Hamburg cell worked at a local , and a car rented by some of the other hijackers was repeatedly seen at in the days before 9/11. Kevin Fenton 2010-03-15T06:12:20+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-975 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-975 Several miscellaneous entries have been published in the 9/11 Timeline over the last couple of weeks. In the late 1990s, Air Force General Richard Myers thought NORAD's radar system and control software , whereas Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Advanced Technology Joseph Eash was concerned about the use of a over the same period. Shortly before the attacks, a self-proclaimed intelligence agent called Susan Lindauer warned relatives of an and a large number of shares were purchased in a . Further, a NORAD exercise had terrorists threatening to blow up an airliner and some tried to enter the control tower at Logan Airport in Boston two days later. Finally, after the attacks had ended, FAA officials were . Kevin Fenton 2010-03-01T12:14:20+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-974 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-974 Most of the entries published over the last couple of weeks are about video and audio messages released by al-Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri. We have a from January 2007, a from December of that year, and a for Israeli attacks in Gaza the following March. This was followed by his answers to the questions in , the last of which was a platform for him to claim the rumors Israel was behind 9/11 were planted by the nefarious mullahs of Tehran. There are also 2008 tapes , , and , as well as an audio recording from last year about a . In the field of air security, we have a 1991 to crash planes into buildings in Madrid, a 1992 FAA memo warning that , and a series of NEADS briefings about . There is also more about drone strikes in Pakistan in 2009. were killed on February 14, on April 29, and during a funeral on June 23. Miscellaneous entries cover Richard Myers' appointment as in 1998, the CIA's initial decision John Kiriakou, who underestimated the number of times Abu Zubaida was waterboarded by 118, and some analysis of the voice of a . Kevin Fenton 2010-02-14T12:27:00+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-973 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-973 After a hiatus of a couple of weeks, dozens of new entries have been published in the 9/11 Timeline over the last few days. The largest chunk of them covers events at the DC Air National Guard, based at Andrews Air Force Base, on the day of the attacks. Initially, officers assumed that the first crash into the WTC was . However, after the second crash, Andrews learned the Secret Service . Although the Secret Service then said it on the phone, pilots started overwriting on their flight disks. The base's intelligence officer was on the crisis, but fighters on a training mission learned of the attacks around 9:30 a.m., when the Secret Service called and said that . Missiles at the base , but the commanding officer, Brigadier General David Wherley, wanted orders from a before he would launch and called the again. The first of the fighters returning from training landed at 10:14 a.m., but . Wherley discussed the and apparently then wanted to launch planes in response to . One of the returning fighters was , but, finding nothing, . Other entries about the day of 9/11 take in an , the arrival of the air force's liaison at FAA headquarters , and the over Washington after 11:00 a.m. There are also several new entries about Osama bin Laden, for whom al-Qaeda offered to in October 2001. After the interview had been done, western intelligence naturally managed to before it was broadcast by Al Jazeera. We also have some more about bin Laden's health. He died of in December 2001, was in 2005, and in 2006, all of which makes his in 2007 remarkable. Despite his repeated deaths and the near certainty that, if he has survived them, he is in Pakistan, late last year Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani claimed that bin Laden was , at which point the ISI helpfully unrolled a with the BBC's kind assistance to back him up. There are also two more entries about al-Qaeda media releases, of which there were and which included a second from al-Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri last July. Returning to the topic of psyops, there are three new entries about CIA disinfo peddler John Kiriakou, who went dangerously off-message when he , leading to a referral of his leaking to be for a coat of whitewash. When it came to light Abu Zubaida had been waterboarded 82 more times than Kiriakou claimed, at least a couple of journalists proved they had . Finally, there are also new entries about Sibel Edmonds' offer to and the of one 9/11 hijacker. Kevin Fenton 2010-02-02T12:56:01+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-963 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-963 The vast majority of entries published by the 9/11 Timeline over the past couple of weeks concern the elusive Osama bin Laden. First, there are entries about audio recordings he has reportedly released over the last couple of years, about , , , , , the , , and . In addition, there are new entries about an interview of him by al-Quds al-Arabi editor in 1996, a look behind the scenes at , and a 2003 claim by an MIT professor that the tapes may be . We have also collected some of the rumors of his death. The following have claimed he was dead: a (2001), (2002), (2002), (2002), and a (2009). The two most interesting claims he was dead came in 2006, both a man thought to be bin Laden again released an audio recording; the claims had the effect of increasing interest in the recordings. Finally regarding bin Laden, as US Defense Secretary Robert Gates recently commented, there has been on him for years. Elsewhere, there are more entries about alleged liquid bomb plot mastermind Rashid Rauf, who has been wanted in Britain for a since the summer of 2002. Rauf later allegedly became head of , but, during a joint British-US operation to thwart the liquid bomb plot, CIA official Jose Rodriguez traveled to Pakistan on Vice President Dick Cheney's orders to have Rauf arrested, . Terror charges against Rauf were later in Pakistan. Concerning the World Trade Center on the day of the attacks, a demolition engineer shortly after the second plane hit and there were at Ground Zero after the second tower fell. Finally, the inquiry into the destruction of CIA torture tapes was in May. Kevin Fenton 2010-01-03T23:37:38+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-956 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-956 Three entries recently published in the 9/11 Timeline cover films with 9/11-style themes made before the attacks. 1977's Black Sunday had terrorists crashing an into the Superbowl stadium, 1996's Executive Decision featured a planned , and a late 2001 Chuck Norris vehicle originally entitled The President's Man: was too close to real events for comfort and CBS refused to air it. Elsewhere, al-Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri was with Barrack Obama, two of the 9/11 hijackers shortly before the attacks, and some of the 2006 "liquid bomb" plotters were convicted in Britain in September, although others were . Their alleged leader Rashid Rauf was hit by a last year, although doubts about his death persist. Finally, some Democrats after the famous August 6 Presidential Daily Brief item was made public in 2002, former CIA agent Larry Kolb thought the US was in 2007, and alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four associates expressed a desire to in military commissions late last year. Kevin Fenton 2009-12-14T03:03:14+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-955 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-955 There has been a minor reorganization of the 9/11 Timeline, which is explained at the contributors' blog, . Kevin Fenton 2009-12-11T12:00:59+01:00 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-953 http://www.cooperativeresearch.org//news.jsp?oid=140393703-953 The entries recently published in the 9/11 Timeline are something of a grab bag. For example, they cover the and of Mounir El Motassadeq, an associate of some of the hijackers, in Germany in 2007, as well as a pair of events around noon on the day of the attacks: a statement by the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency that , and an accurate prediction by an engineer at Ground Zero that . There is also more information about some of the key figures in the timeline: former Alec Station chief Richard Blee was in 2004, whereas his one-time subordinate Mark Rossini, who acquiesced in the withholding of information from FBI investigators, became a key briefer at an . Robert Fuller, the rookie FBI agent who failed to find Pentagon hijackers Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi shortly before 9/11, recruited a shortly afterwards. The informer lured the financiers to Germany, where they were , before being arrested and . Finally, Karl Rove first suggested politicizing the GWOT in , the "redhead" involved in the waterboarding of alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and the torture of an innocent German was considered for the position of deputy station chief in Baghdad in 2007, but , and a 1999 novel by CIA spokesman Bill Harlow featured a terror plot. Kevin Fenton 2009-11-29T23:39:36+01:00