With this mind-boggling sense of organization which reflects glory onto the USA, the FBI, during the day of 11 September, launched the vastest criminal investigation in human history: PENTTBOMB [[sic]] (a contraction of Pentagon/Twin Towers Bomb). It required one-fourth of its personnel, mobilizing 7000 employees, 4000 of them agents. It added detached personnel from other DOJ agencies to its own resources [[A ses moyens propres, il a ajouté ceux qui ont été détachés par d'autres agences du département de la Justice]]: the Criminal Division, attorneys' offices, the INS. Besides which, the FBI relied on the "US intelligence community," particularly the CIA, the NSA, and the DIA. Finally, the FBI was given international police cooperation from overseas, whether by Interpol, or directly, by bilateral cooperation with the police forces of allied states.
To gather evidence, the FBI called for [[witness]] testimony starting the evening of the attacks. Over the course of the first three days, they received 3800 phone calls, 30,000 emails, and 2400 notifications from its intelligence agents.
The day after the attacks, the FBI had already managed to establish the terrorists' modus operandi [Briefing by Atty General Ashcroft, 12 September 2001, http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/speeches/2001/0913pressconference.htm] . Agents of the bin Laden network had entered US territory legally. There they had taken accelerated flight-school lessons. Formed into four teams of five kamikazes each, they had hijacked passenger airplanes, their mission being to crash into major targets. On 14 September, the FBI published a list naming the 19 alleged hijackers [Press conference of Atty General Ashcroft and FBI Director Mueller, 14 September 2001, http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/agcrisisremarks9_14.htm].
Over the course of the following weeks, the international press pieced together the story of the kamikazes' lives. It came out that [[Elle a mis en évidence que]] nothing had allowed their friends and neighbors to suspect their intentions, nor had Western police been able to spot them. Lost in the crowds, carefully avoiding any unveiling of their convictions, these "sleeper agents" wouldn't be "awakened" until the day of their mission was at hand. Other "sleeper agents," cloaked in the shadows, would probably be waiting for their turn. An indetectable menace hovered above Western civilization…
By a methodological approach [[Sur le plan méthodologique]], here's a visibly botched-up investigation. In a criminal proceeding, and dealing with complex matters, police officers would have had to construct many hypotheses, and follow each trail to its end, without leaving any out. The hypothesis of internal terrorism was thrown out on general principles, without ever having been looked into. In its stead, Osama bin Laden had already been pointed out by "sources close to the investigation" a few hours after the attacks. Public opinion wanted some guilty parties, and they picked some out forthwith.
In each of the four hijacked airplanes, the terrorists had been organized into five-man teams, brought together at the last moment. However, there were only four terrorists on board Flight 93, which exploded [[sic]] above Pennsylvania: the fifth member of the commando team, Zacharias Moussaoui, had been apprehended a short time before for overstaying his visa. First off, the FBI asserted that all the hijackers had come together to sacrifice themselves. Second off, after a tape of Osama bin Laden was discovered, they claimed that only the pilot-hijackers were kamikazes, whereas their teammates hadn't been told until the last minute about the suicidal aspect of their mission. Be that as it may, the idea of kamikaze teams is a surprising one. Indeed, a suicide's psychology is eminently individual. During the Second World War, the Japanese kamikazes acted individually, even if their actions could be carried out in waves. More recently, members of the Japanese Red Army (Rengo segikun), who exported that technique to the Middle East in their attack on Lod [[Airport]] (Israel, May 1972), acting in a group of three, but after having had special training to bond together. And even so, one of the Lod terrorists, Kozo Okamoto, was captured alive. We don't know of any example of kamikaze teams formed at the last minute.
Besides, as Salman Rushdie [Fighting the Forces of Invisibility in the Washington Post, 2 October 2001, http://www.washingtonpost.com] was moved to point out, you can maintain that if the hijackers were indeed kamikazes, then they were not Islamic fanatics. Indeed, the Quran forbids suicide. Islamic zealots could be exposed to death, as martyrs, with no chance of escape, but they would not deal themselves the fatal stroke [[ils ne seraient pas eux-mêmes donné la mort]].
Nevertheless, the kamikaze theory is confirmed by manuscript documents written in Arabic which the FBI [Briefing of Atty General Ashcroft and FBI Director Mueller, 28 September 2001, http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/agcrisisremarks9_28.htm] published, translated into English, and which were reprinted in the international press. Three copies had been found: one in a lost suitcase which missed a connecting flight, belonging to Mohammed Atta; the second in a car left behind at Dulles Airport by Nawaf Alhamzi; and the third in the wreckage of Flight 93 which exploded [[sic]] above Stony Creek Township, Pa. [Several European newspapers erroneously reported that the FBI had found this document in the ruins of the Pentagon.]
It's a matter of four pages of pious advice:
"1. Take the vow of death and renew your intention. Shave your body and use some eau de cologne. Take a shower.
Etc.
Couched in a classic theological style, frequently tinged with medieval references, these documents contributed greatly to sustaining the image of fanatics which American authorities had exposed to public condemnation. However, there are crude errors, the incongruity of which any person familiar with Islam would remark. Indeed, the documents begin with the exhortation "In the name of God, myself, and my family [sic]," whereas Muslims—unlike many American puritan sects—never pray in the own name, nor in that of their family [Oddly, the celebrity journalist Bob Woodward pointed out this anomaly that very day, but he drew no conclusions from it. See In Hijacker's Bags, A Call to Planning, Prayer and Death, in the Washington Post, 28 September 2001 http://www.washingtonpost.com]. Likewise, the text includes {in a roundabout way} a Yankee language tic which is out of place in this Quranic vocabulary: "You have to confront it and understand it at 100% [sic]."
The FBI presents Mohammed Atta as the leader of the operation. In ten years, this 33-year-old Egyptian had traveled to Salu (Spain), then to Zurich (Switzerland)—where, according to investigators, he had of course paid with a credit card for some Swiss knives that were destined to hijack some planes—and finally to Hamburg (Germany). With two other terrorists, he had taken a course in electronics there, without attracting attention or revealing his extremist convictions. After he arrived in the United States, he had rejoined his accomplices in Florida, taking flight lessons in Venice, and he'd even paid for a few hours in a flight simulator in Miami. Careful to mask his fundamentalism, Mohammed Atta had even taken care to frequent the "Olympic Garden" in Las Vegas, the world's biggest topless cabaret. This peerless agent had gone back to Boston on 11 September on a domestic flight. Taking into account the short time between the two flights, his baggage got lost during the connection. Searching the bags, the FBI found Boeing pilot training videos, a Muslim prayerbook, and an old letter in which he stated his intention to die as a martyr. Atta was identified as the leader of the terrorist team by a flight attendant, who made a call with his cellphone during the hijacking; he gave out Atta's seat number: 8D.
Should we take information like this seriously? We'd have to suppose that Mohammed Atta had been at pains for ten years to disguise his intentions, and that he had been communicating with his accomplices by means of strict procedures so as not to tip off the intelligence services. Nevertheless, at the very last minute, he left behind a trail of evidence. Although he was the leader of the operation, he took the risk of missing his connecting flight on 11 September, and finally managed to catch American Airlines Flight 11, but without keeping his luggage. Anyways, why would you load yourself down with luggage on your way to kill yourself?
Still more ridiculous, the FBI asserts that they found Mohammed Atta's passport intact in the smoldering ruins of the World Trade Center! That's a genuine miracle; you even wonder how that document survived such an ordeal…
Evidently, the FBI produces proof of its fabrications. Maybe all we should see there is the panic-stricken reaction of a police force who proved their inability to prevent the catastrophe and who are trying by any means necessary to polish up their badges.
More disturbing, a controversy has arisen about the kamikazes' identity. The international press has discussed at length the FBI profile of the 19 alleged terrorists. All of them are males, between 25 and 35 years of age. They are Arab Muslims, mostly Saudis. They're well-educated. They're fighting for a cause, not out of desperation. The only shadow in the picture, this robotic portrait is based on a list which is subject to discussion. The Saudi Embassy in Washington confirmed that Abdulaziz Alomari, Mohand Alshehri, Salem Alhazmi, and Saeed Alghamdi are in the very best of health, alive and well in their country. Waleed M. Alshehri, who currently lives in Morocco and is employed as a pilot for Royal Air Maroc, gave an interview to the London Arabic-language daily Al-Quds al-Arabi. Prince Saud al-Faisal, Saudi Foreign Minister, told the press: "It has been proven that five of the people listed by the FBI have nothing at all to do with what has happened." Meanwhile, Prince Nayef, Saudi Interior Minister, told an official American delegation, "Up till now, there exists no proof whatsoever that [the 15 Saudi nationals accused by the FBI] have any connection to 11 September. We have received nothing from the US on this subject." [Saudi Minister Asserts that Bin Laden is a "Tool" of Al Qaeda, Not a Mastermind by Douglas Jehl, in the Washington Post of 10 December 2001 http://www.washingtonpost.com]
So how were these terrorists identified? If you refer to the lists of victims, which the airlines published on 13 September, you'll be surprised not to see the names of the hijackers on them. It all looks as though the criminals were taken off the lists so as to keep only the names of the "innocent victims" and the crew members. If you count the passengers, you'll come up with 78 innocent victims on AA Flight 11 (which crashed into the North Tower of the WTC); 46 on United Flight 175 (which crashed into the South Tower); 51 on AA Flight 77 (allegedly crashed into the Pentagon); and 36 on United Flight 93 (which exploded [[sic]] above Pennsylvania). These lists are incomplete; several passengers were unidentified.
If you refer to the airlines' communiques [These communiques were broadcast by the AP] of 11 September, you'll note that Flight 11 was carrying 81 passengers, Flight 175 had 56 passengers, Flight 77 was carrying 58 passengers, and Flight 93, 38 passengers.
It is thus materially impossible for Flight 11 to have carried more than three terrorists, and for Flight 93 more than two. The lack of hijackers' names on the passenger manifests thus doesn't mean that they were taken off the list for "politically correct" reasons, but quite simply that they weren't there among the passengers. Bye-bye, attendant's identification of Mohammed Atta by his seat number (8D).
To sum it up, the FBI made up a list of hijackers out of which a robotic portrait of enemies of the West was drawn up. We are asked to believe that these hijackers were Arab Muslim zealots and that they acted as kamikazes. Exit the domestic American trails. In reality, we know nothing, neither the identity of the "terrorists" nor their M.O. All hypotheses are still open. As in any criminal affair, the first question to ask is Who would benefit from the crime?
It was stated precisely, the day after the attacks, that some financial transactions characteristic of "insider trading" took place during the six days before the attack [Black Tuesday: The World's Biggest Insider Trading Scam? by Don Radlauer, Int'l Policy Institute for Counterterrorism, Israel, 9 September 2001 [[sic]]. http://www.ict.org.il/articles/articledet.cfm?articleid=386]. United Airlines (private company whose airplanes crashed into the South Tower and at Pittsburgh) stock artifically dropped by 42%. American Airlines (private company whose airplane crashed into the North Tower of the WTC, and whose airplane would have crashed into the Pentagon) stock dropped by 39%. No other airline in the world was the subject of anything like this, except for KLM (Royal Dutch Airlines). So that we can deduce that one of the Dutch company's airplanes was maybe chosen to be the target of a fifth hijacking.
Identical activities happened with securities options of Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, which grew twelvefold during the week leading up to the attacks. Now, this company occupied 22 floors of the WTC. Likewise with the world's biggest stock trader, Merrill Lynch, whose registered office is located in a neighboring building in danger of collapsing, whose stock options grew by a factor of 25. And most of all, the stock of the implicated insurance firms: Munich Re, Swiss Re, and Axa.
The SEC in Chicago was the first to sound the alarm. They stated that in the Chicago stock market, investors made $5 million in capital gains on United Airlines stock, $4 million on American Airlines, $1.2 million on Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, and $5.5 million on Merrill Lynch.
Faced with an investigation, the investors prudently decided not to cash in $2.5 million worth of American Airlines stock that they hadn't gotten a chance to cash in before the alarm was sounded.
Authorities at each major stock market took inventory of investors' capital gains. These investigations were coordinated by IOSCO, the International Organization of Securities Commissions [official website at http://www.iosco.org/iosco.html]. On 15 October, they held a video conference in which the national authorities presented the results to date of their investigations. It appeared that illicit capital gains went into hundreds of millions of dollars, consituting the "most important insider trading ever committed."
Osama bin Laden, whose financial assets have been frozen since 1998, doesn't have at his disposal the kind of money it would take for this kind of speculation. The Taliban government of the Islamic emirate of Afghanistan no longer has the financial means. Indeed, President Bill Clinton ordered that all financial holdings of bin Laden, his associates, and their associations and corporations be frozen, by Executive Order 13099, signed on the symbolic date of 7 August 1998 (the day of the reprisal for the Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam attacks). [[This is incorrect. Executive Order 13099 was signed on 20 August 1998. See http://www.nara.gov/fedreg/eo1998.html.]] This decision was made international based on UN Security Council Resolution 1193 of 13 August 1998. Bill Clinton extended the measure to include the Taliban's bank accounts, and those of the Taliban's associates, with Executive Order 13129 of 4 July 1999. The worldwide freezing of assets of people and organizations connected with financing "international terrorism" was definitively pronounced by UN Security Council Resolution 1269, 19 October 1999. From that date forth, it became pretty silly to keep talking about "billionare Osama bin Laden," seeing as how he no longer had any possible access to his personal fortune. The means which he still has at his disposal can no longer be the result of anything but secret assistance (whether it be state funds or no), which can no longer be assistance from the Islamic emirate of Afghanistan.
It was possible to establish that the majority of the transactions was "carried" by Deutsche Bank and its American investment partner Alex. Brown [Suspicious Profits Sit Uncollected, Airline Investors Seem to be Laying Low, by Christian Berthelsen and Scott Winokur, San Francisco Chronicle, 29 September 2001 http://www.sfgate.com]. That company was directed up until 1998 by a colorful personality, A.B. Krongard. A Marine captain, with a keen interest in guns and martial arts, this banker became Counselor to the Director of Central Intelligence, and then, since 26 March [[2001]], number three in the American intelligence service. Taking into account the importance of the investigation, and the influence of A.B. Krongard, you'd have thought that Alex. Brown would have willingly cooperated with authorites to help identify the investors. It wasn't that way at all.
Very strangely, the FBI stopped following this trail and IOSCO closed it investigation without resolving the matter. It's nevertheless easy to "trace" the movements of capital, as all interbank transactions are logged by two clearing houses [Révélation$, by Denis Robert and Ernest Backes, Les Arènes ed., 2001, http://www.arenes.fr/livres/page-livre1.php?numero_livre=4&num_page=1]. You might suppose that, given the high stakes, it would have been possible to force out the bank secrets and determine who were the lucky beneficiaries of the 11 September attacks. It wasn't that way at all.
[The FBI is no longer interested in the owner of premonitory Internet domain names: according to domain-name registrar VeriSign, an unidentified computer user bought, for one year, 17 domain names which expired on 14 September 2001 and were never used. These names include: attackamerica.com, attackonamerica.com, attackontwintowers.com, august11horror.com, august11terror.com, horrorinamerica.com, horrorinnewyork.com, nycterroriststrike.com, pearlharborinmanhattan.com, terrorattack2001.com, towerofhorror.com, tradetowerstrike.com, worldtradecenter929.com, worldtradecenterbombs.com, worldtradetowerattack.com, worldtradetowerstrike.com, wterroristattack.com. See Internet Domain Names May Have Warned of Attacks and Investigators Can Access Internet Domain Data by Jeff Johnson in CNS-News.com, 19 and 20 September 2001.]
Having at its disposal an unprecedented array of investigative resources, the FBI was duty-bound to elucidate every one of the contradictions we have pointed out. They should have first of all studied the message the assailants sent to the Secret Service in order to identify them. They should have figured out what really happened at the Pentagon. They should have tracked down the financial investors. They should have traced, down to their source, the warning messages sent to Odigo to tip off the WTC occupants two hours before the attack. Etc.
Now, as we have just shown, far from conducting a criminal investigation, the FBI has applied itself to making clues disappear and muzzling testimony. It supported the external-attack version of events and tried to bolster it by divulging an improvised list of hijackers and by making up fake pieces of damning evidence (Atta's passport, kamikaze instructions, etc.).
This manipulatory operation was orchestrated by the Director, Robert Mueller III. This indispensable man was nominated by George W. Bush and precisely fulfilled his duties the week leading up to 11 September.
Was this pseudo-investigation conducted in order to assure a fair trail, or to overshadow the Americano-American [[sic… I have no idea what this means]] responsibilities, and to justify the military operations to come?
[[END OF CHAPTER FOUR]]
[[END OF PART ONE]]