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This article is an overview of the 9/11 Commission’s conflicts and "failures", and some brief summaries of some of the many important facts left out of or distorted in their final report, with links for reference and additional research.
9/11 Commission Conflicts, Corruption & Failure to Investigate:
All Commission members and key staff members had professional, financial and/or political conflicts of interest. Chairman Thomas Kean’s conflicts included his having been a director of oil giant Amerada Hess, which had business dealings with Khalid Bin Mahfouz and Mohammed Hussein al Amoudi, two individuals suspected of financing Bin Laden, and named in a trillion dollar August 2002 lawsuit brought by 9/11 Families United to Bankrupt Terrorism, that’s still pending. Co-chair Lee Hamilton was a member of Bush’s Homeland Security Advisory Council, a member of the CFR and was instrumental in limiting the investigations into the 1980 “October Surprise†as well as Iran-Contra. As Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission, Philip Zelikow oversaw the work of the investigative team including what questions and evidence were considered, and controlled the information the Commission members based their report on. Zelikow was on the National Security Council in the Bush, Sr. Administration, co-authored a book with Condoleeza Rice during the Clinton years, was on the National Security Council transition team from the Clinton to the Bush Administration, and was then appointed to GW Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. The 9/11 Commission interviewed him as a witness due to his involvement on the transition team; he recused himself from that part of the investigation. March 21, 2004, the Family Steering Committee demanded Zelikow resign when the extent of his conflicts became apparent; he refused, the Commission supported him, and the corporate media made nothing of it. In addition, the 9/11 Commission ignored the substance of 70% of the families’ questions, including all evidence and testimony pointing to official negligence and/or complicity.
The 9/11 Commission Report’s version of events, as presented and uncritically accepted by the corporate media:
9/11 panel report: 'We must act': 'We do not have the luxury of time,' says Commission chairman – CNN.com
Summaries and statements concerning the conflicts of interest of the 9/11 Commission members and Zelikow:
The Kean Commission: The Official Commission Avoids the Core Issues - 911Research.WTC7.net
Who's Who on the 9/11 "Independent" Commission by Michel Chossudovsky
Who Is Philip Zelikow? - History News Network
Philip Zelikow Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
Philip Zelikow: The Bush Administration Investigates the Bush Administration - 911Truth.org
The Rice/Zelikow Connection: The Kean Commission and its Conflicts of Interest: 911Truth.org
QUESTIONS TO KEAN COMMISSION - 911CitizensWatch.org
March 21, 2004: Family Steering Committee calls for Phillip Zelikow’s resignation
April 20, 2004: Family Steering Committee Statement Regarding Conflicts of Interest and the 9/11 Commission
Family Steering Committee Review of the 9/11 Commission Report - hosted by 911Truth.org
Whitewash as Public Service: How The 9/11 Commission Report Defrauds the Nation by Benjamin DeMott in Harpers Magazine
THE 9/11 OMISSIONS HEARINGS: Convened by The 9/11 Citizens' Commission At Symphony Space, New York City – September 9, 2004. Chaired by Rep. Cynthia McKinney and Catherine Austin Fitts
The 9/11 Commission Report: One Year Later - A Citizens Response: Did The Commission Get It Right? – July 22, 2005. Chaired by Rep. Cynthia McKinney
Justice For 9/11: After the 9/11 Commission Report was released July 2004 and its inadequacies documented, a complaint and petition to open a criminal investigation into 9/11 was filed with Attorney General of New York Eliot Spitzer October 28, 2004. No investigation was opened, but this website remains a valuable resource for information and evidence.
http://justicefor911.org/Justicefor911Index_111904...
Statement of Kristin Breitweiser, Co-chairperson September 11th Advocates - Concerning the Joint 9/11 Inquiry: Senate Select Committee on Intelligence – House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence September 18, 2002 (The answers to some of her questions are likely in the 28 redacted pages of the declassified final report of the JICI; the 9/11 Commission ignored or distorted all these questions)
Unofficial transcript of 9/11 victim’s family member Laurie Van Auken’s statement at the July 22nd Congressional Briefing: The 9/11 Commission Report One Year Later: A Citizens’ Response – Did They Get It Right?
“A
thorough and definitive investigation by the Commission would have
addressed all of [Sibel Edmonds] concerns, and spoken to all of the whistleblowers.
It would have subpoenaed for the information it required and examined
the plethora of information that other citizens and groups responsible
provided. And finally, without compromising our national
security, it would have reported all of its findings, with its
redactions blacked out and submitted to the American people. In
essence, the Commission could have produced a final product where the
resulting conclusions and recommendations could be trusted. Instead, at
the end of the day, what we got were some statements that truly
insulted the intelligence of the American people. Violated our loved
ones’ memories, and might end up hurting us, one day soon. One
such statement is that 9/11 was a ‘failure of imagination’. A failure
of whose imagination? What exactly does that mean? When you have a CIA
director with his hair on fire, a system blinking red, 52 FAA warnings,
an August 6th, 2001, PDB entitled ‘Bin Laden Determined to Strike in
the United States’, leads on several 9/11 hijackers including Alhazmi,
Almihdhar and Marwan Al-Shehi, warnings from many foreign governments,
a Phoenix memo warning of Islamic extremists taking flying lessons, the
arrest of would-be terrorist Zacarias Moussauoui, facts imparted to one
agent, Agent Frasca at the RFU at the FBI, 9/11 was truly a failure
alright.â€
Credible or Not? By George Washington (prominent people who question the 9/11 Commission Report; including the 9/11 Commissioners)
BUT THE 9/11 COMMISSION SHOWED THAT SEPTEMBER 11TH WAS A REAL TERRORIST ATTACK, RIGHT? - Summary at 911Proof.com
Criticism of US Government and 9/11: Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
Following are examples of the kind of reports from the US government, as well as mainstream media and orgs, that were ignored or distorted by the 9/11 Commission Report. Links to more than 5000 can be found at CooperativeResearch.org, aka HistoryCommons.org, host of the Timelines referenced in this article/series, and many other timelines documenting suppressed information:
Presidential Level Warnings – including the infamous August 6, 2001 PDB, titled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in USâ€, which warned of “patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New Yorkâ€. This was just one of at leasdt 40 Al Qaeda-related warnings Bush received since taking office.
Senator Bob Graham, Chairman of the Congressional Joint Intelligence Committee Inquiry into the 9/11 attacks says, “I think there is very compelling evidence that at least some of the terrorists were assisted not just in financing -- although that was part of it -- by a sovereign foreign government and that we have been derelict in our duty to track that down, make the further case, or find the evidence that would indicate that that is not true and we can look for other reasons why the terrorists were able to function so effectively in the United States.†Graham made these comments to Gwen Ifill in interview on PBS, December 11, 2002, following the release of the JICI report. TheMemoryHole.org has preserved some of the most relevant parts, and has a link to the original transcript. The report, with its 28 redacted pages detailing evidence of Saudi (and other nations??) assistance to the alleged hijackers, can be reviewed here: Final Report of the Congressional Joint Inquiry Into September 11
9/11 Report Cites Many Warnings About Hijackings: New York Times - This article refers to a monograph of the Commission’s work not included in the Report, its release was obstructed by the Bush Administration until February 2005. “Among other things, the report says that leaders of the F.A.A. received 52 intelligence reports from their security branch that mentioned Mr. bin Laden or Al Qaeda from April to Sept. 10, 2001. That represented half of all the intelligence summaries in that time. Five of the intelligence reports specifically mentioned Al Qaeda's training or capability to conduct hijackings, the report said. Two mentioned suicide operations, although not connected to aviation, the report said.†These reports were received from April to September 10, 2001.
NORAD had Drills of Jets as Weapons: USA Today – “In the two years before the Sept. 11 attacks, the North American Aerospace Defense Command conducted exercises simulating what the White House says was unimaginable at the time: hijacked airliners used as weapons to crash into targets and cause mass casualties.â€
'Able Danger' Stopped From Informing FBI: Associated Press - “An Army intelligence officer said Wednesday he told staff members from the Sept. 11 commission that a secret military unit had identified two of the three cells involved in the 2001 terrorist strikes more than a year before the attacks. Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, who said he was associated with the "Able Danger" unit, said that during a 2003 meeting in Afghanistan, he mentioned that the unit had identified Sept. 11 ringleader Mohamed Atta along with three other hijackers as terrorist suspects. Three months later, in January 2004, Shaffer said he was back in the United States and offered to follow up with the commission, but his offer was declined.â€
Visas that Should Have Been Denied: A look at 9/11 terrorists’ visa applications: The National Review – “The cover story in National Review's October 28th issue (out Friday) details how at least 15 of the 19 September 11 hijackers should have been denied visas — an assessment based on expert analyses of 15 of the terrorists' visa-application forms, obtained exclusively by NR. In the year after 9/11, the hand-wringing mostly centered on the FBI and CIA's failure to "connect the dots." But that would not have been a fatal blow if the "dots" had not been here in the first place. If the U.S. State Department had followed the law, at least 15 of the 19 "dots" should have been denied visas — and they likely wouldn't have been in the United States on September 11, 2001.â€
FBI AGENT ROBERT WRIGHT SAYS FBI AGENTS ASSIGNED TO INTELLIGENCE OPERATIONS CONTINUE TO PROTECT TERRORISTS FROM CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS AND PROSECUTIONS - Agents Lied To Federal Court for Wiretap Authority and Compromised Criminal Investigations of Terrorists: FBI Headquarters’ International Terrorism Unit Acted as a “Spectator†While Americans Died at the Hands of Terrorists: JudicialWatch.org
FBI Documents Contradict 9/11 Commission Report: RawStory.com – “Newly-released records obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request contradict the 9/11 Commission’s report on the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and raise fresh questions about the role of Saudi government officials in connection to the hijackers.â€
Hijackers Lived With FBI Informant: CBS News – “Two of the Sept. 11 hijackers who lived in San Diego in 2000 rented a room from a man who reportedly worked as an undercover FBI informant, highlighting the lack of cooperation by the nation's law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Newsweek magazine reports that Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi lived with a "tested" undercover "asset" who had been working closely with the FBI office in San Diego.â€
9/11 "black box" cover-up at Ground Zero? –Philadelphia Daily News – “Two men who worked extensively in the wreckage of the World Trade Center claim they helped federal agents find three of the four “black boxes†from the jetliners that struck the towers on 9/11 - contradicting the official account. Both the independent 9/11 Commission and federal authorities continue to insist that none of the four devices - a cockpit voice recorder (CVR) and flight data recorder (FDR) from the two planes - were ever found in the wreckage. But New York City firefighter Nicholas DeMasi has written in a recent book -- self-published by several Ground Zero workers -- that he escorted federal agents on an all-terrain vehicle in October 2001 and helped them locate three of the four. His account is supported by a volunteer, Mike Bellone, whose efforts at Ground Zero have been chronicled in the New York Times and elsewhere. Bellone said assisted DeMasi and the agents and that saw a device that resembling a “black box†in the back of the firefighter’s ATV.â€
Official 9/11 Investigations:
Final Report of the Congressional Joint Inquiry Into September 11 (The 9/11 Commission was to pick up where the JICI left off; instead, the Commission Report does not even go as far as the JICI in their examination of the evidence of foreign state assistance to the 9/11 hijackers.
Joint Intelligence Committee Inquiry into the 9/11 attacks (JICI) Timeline
FBI 9/11 Investigations Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States
9/11 Commission Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
NIST and the World Trade Center
World Trade Center Building Performance Study
WTC Investigations Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
Destruction of the CIA tapes Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
Related to 9/11 Investigations Timeline - HistoryCommons.org
Inspirational article by George Washington: Hope In a Time of Hopelessness
Click here for the other articles in the:
9/11 Truth Overview Series