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Tallgeese wrote:

user wrote:

Given the "suck it up, smurfs!" attitude of this administration, it seems more reasonable that they wouldn't feel the need to cover up a shoot-down.

Maybe the bombs they planted in the plane went off too early....

Given the administration-friendly hero manufacturing attitude, I think that if they thought they could get more mileage out of "let's roll" then they'd cover up a shoot-down.
Pat Tillman?
Jessica Lynch?

I think Tillman, and the others like him, are quite admirable.

Tillman was just doing his job, and didn't do much to merit medals. Lynch mearly survived and didn't participate in the firefight.

Not much heroic there. Though it's all in what you do, when you do it, and who sees it.

Maj. James Howard was a hero.

There is a definate line you must cross to win that appelation.

When discussing timelines - one needs to carefully convert all times to GMT first.

D'Eyncourt wrote:

resedit wrote:

When discussing timelines - one needs to carefully convert all times to GMT first.

It might make a difference if all the relevant places weren't in a single (Eastern) time zone.

Even then - the problem can still exist because so and so may not have been in a specific time zone when certain decisions were made, etc. - if you look at each point on the time line - look at the source of the point - and put it into GMT, you then have a standardized time - regardless of whether or not things happened in the same time zone. It should be standard practice when looking at time lines.

StaticAge wrote:

D'Eyncourt wrote:

StaticAge wrote:

Interestingly, the Telegraph out of Nashua, New Hampshire quoted an air-traffic controller from Boston claiming that an F-16 was in "hot pursuit" of United Airlines Flight 93.
[snip]

A problem with such a report is that an air traffic controller in Boston wouldn't have been observing western Pennsylvania or points west--one may as well cite a quote from Hawaii air traffic control.

Unfortunately the article that had the timeline with the relevant air traffic controller dialog is no longer online. It's conceivable that any report about pursuit may have been referring to those military jets I noted above, but those jets got to DC after Flight 93 crashed.

Andrews and then Langley are responsible for protecting DC, and they sent up three F-16's. They would have had to go north to get to PA, so obviously they'd arrive after the crash. Unless your saying its the fighters that were circling NYC that morning, but I dont know why the 2 F-15's from NJ would come down to DC instead of continuing to patrol NY when they had 3 there already.

One of the points of the article was to describe how on 9/11 the US was totally unready to meet such a threat. My recollection of the article was that jets from Andrews (I don't think Langley was mentioned) were not available until well after Flight 93 crashed, so the only armed military jets in the air at the time came south from NYC (leaving others flying air cover there) and had flown along the coast. When Flight 93 crashed, these jets were inbound from the coast to DC.

The main point of all of this is that there were no military jets in the area of Flight 93--and certainly none within the range of air-to-air missiles--in spite of any witnesses saying things to the contrary. Suggesting otherwise implies that those civilian air traffic controllers who witnessed this were and are part of some conspiracy to cover-up the supposed shoot-down of Flight 93.

Or perhaps, in summary: "never ascribe to evil when incompetence will do."

D'Eyncourt wrote:

One of the points of the article was to describe how on 9/11 the US was totally unready to meet such a threat. My recollection of the article was that jets from Andrews (I don't think Langley was mentioned) were not available until well after Flight 93 crashed, so the only armed military jets in the air at the time came south from NYC (leaving others flying air cover there) and had flown along the coast. When Flight 93 crashed, these jets were inbound from the coast to DC.

The main point of all of this is that there were no military jets in the area of Flight 93--and certainly none within the range of air-to-air missiles--in spite of any witnesses saying things to the contrary. Suggesting otherwise implies that those civilian air traffic controllers who witnessed this were and are part of some conspiracy to cover-up the supposed shoot-down of Flight 93.

Or perhaps, in summary: "never ascribe to evil when incompetence will do."

That is entirely bunk even by the official record. The jets from either Langley or Andrews were above the DC metro area by 9:40, thats just a fact.

And further, you really think on 9/11 that air traffic contrlloers would balk at being quiet about matters of national security? After what had already happened?

I dont believe the many conspiracy theories out there. I just think that 93 was shot down as a matter of national security. As ugly as it may sound, the reasons that lead me to believe that arent the bunches of random "eyewitnesses" who saw anything from an A-10 to F-18's, but just the way this thing unfolded that morning as I watched it on tv, how the stories developed in the WaPost, and what the official story said years later. I live in the DC/Metro area, I lived much closer to DC when this happened, and because I have family and friends in the military and grew up around the military, I know somewhat the basic protocol for how our skies are protected.

Even if you buy the official story, there is a huge mystery why the plane went down then- because the flight recorder proves that no one got into the cockpit. That's in the official story too. Think about that, think about why the Commission kept asking about what time Cheney claimed to have gotten the President's order, and why the 10:10/10:18 time was important to them. If fighters were sent up at 9:30-9:40 (depending on which record you believe), what were they sent up for? They already knew the attacks were being made by passenger jets. Do you suppose it was just to watch stuff happen? Guards have weapons for a reason- when you launch a military patrol up when under attack, thats for a reason too: protection. Everything I am saying right now is ion the official record if you dont believe me. They had over half an hour to make a 12-15 minute flight to the vicinity of Flight 93.

I am not saying I have proof it really happened that way, but it does not seem as implausible as you make it out to be, just going by the evidence that's there.

Last edited by StaticAge (2007-10-26 8:38 am)

The real question is why the tapes are locked up.
1) if the passengers made it into the cockpit, and crashed the plane - why not release the tapes? It would prove the "Hero" story.
2) if the passengers did NOT make it into the cockpit, why did the pilots crash? Sure, it's possible that they pilots were trying to slow down the attack by rolling the plane, but 757's can do barrel rolls just fine. If the pilots did crash the plane with incompetence, why not release the tapes? It still boosts the "Heroes", and makes the terrorists look bad. If the pilots just went kamikaze, and ditched on their own, the tapes shouldn't be a problem either.

The biggest obstacle to believing the official story is the fact that all the evidence is being kept secret. I can't believe there was anything on those tapes that should have been classified - unless it was proof that the plane was shot down. I think one of those F-16 pilots got the word, and did his duty - he planted that airplane in the PA hillside to keep it out of the White House or Capitol building - and the Bushies are afraid of how that will play out.

I dunno, but the official story smells like yesterdays fish.

Panic will cause people to do strange things. Doing something without a good chance of it succeeding while opening up another target isn't high on a commanders to-do list. It's more likely that they would hold airborne resources over suspected targets until they had a good contact for flight 93. If I recall, ATC lost contact with Flight 93, and didn't know where it was.

Vectoring to a target flying at a few hundred miles an hour that you can't receive updated vectors to isn't a good use of resources. It would be better to keep them on CAP over known good targets and attempt to intercept closer to the target.

I think the real quesiton is why Cheney has different times et. al.

It doesn't make a lot of sense that they'd send fighters hunting all over the sky for a target that wasn't pinpointed and they could be vectored in on.

StaticAge wrote:

D'Eyncourt wrote:

One of the points of the article was to describe how on 9/11 the US was totally unready to meet such a threat.
[snip]

[snip]
I know somewhat the basic protocol for how our skies are supposedly protected.
[snip]

Fixed that phrase for you.

I thought there were tapes from NORAD that show they didn't even know about the 4th plane until after it had crashed.

sturner wrote:

Did those fighters ever make contact with Flight 93? Radar?

According to the commission they got the okay too late (like the okay was made as the thing crashed or something, but supposedly the planes were on their way too, I guess they didnt know or no one told them it crashed).