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TRIPOD II AND FEMA

Lack of NORAD Response on 9/11 Explained

by
Michael C. Ruppert

JUNE 5, 2004: 1900 PDT (FTW) -- The "Tripod II," joint New York City-Department of Justice biowarfare exercise, scheduled for Sept 12th 2001 at New York's Pier 29, and revealed in testimony by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani at the 9/11 Commission, may become one of the single most important disclosures of 9/11. I salute the work done by INN Global Free Press at http://inn.globalfreepress.com. But the "FEMA-Kennedy arrived in NY on Sept. 10th" myth is pure poison and absolutely incorrect. It originated from a CBS News interview conducted by Dan Rather shortly after the attacks. That interview, and the claim that it implies prior knowledge on the part of the Massachusetts FEMA Task Force, has been linked on multiple web sites and postings with Tripod and other 9/11 wargames. This erroneous story is dangerously useful for the cover-up, and it's time to give it the axe.

For six weeks I have been investigating a number of other 9/11 wargames that link directly to the work done by Global Free Press on Tripod II and other wargames. I am not exaggerating when I say that we may be close to the Holy Grail of 9/11.

I am certain that it will not be too long before these wargames receive serious coverage in the mainstream press. If they are reported on while still linked to the FEMA myth, the Bush administration will have a free shot to discredit the Tripod story (and all of the wargame stories) by disproving the FEMA part to the press and then asking, "Why should we even respond to the rest?"

The wargames will tie Bush and/or Cheney and Rumsfeld directly into a complete paralysis of fighter response on 9/11. I have gone directly to many NORAD, DoD, NRO, and other sources and questioned them. I have knocked on many doors and I have even obtained some documents. I have obtained an on-the-record statement from someone in NORAD, which confirmed that on the day of 9/11 The Joint Chiefs (Myers) and NORAD were conducting a joint, live-fly, hijack Field Training Exercise (FTX) which involved at least one (and almost certainly many more) aircraft under US control that was posing as a hijacked airliner. That is just the tip of what I have uncovered.

There never was a stand down order issued. That would have been way too incriminating and risky a piece of evidence. And it also might have been ignored by eager fighter pilots who had trained their whole lives to respond to a hostile aircraft killing Americans. There are several statements that the "new" NORAD procedures transferring scramble authority to Rumsfeld on June 1, 2001 were ignored by several NORAD commanders on 9/11 including General Larry Arnold. That's exactly what I would have expected.

I am still conducting this investigation and I will disclose everything in my book The Truth and Lies of 9/11, which we are now certain will be out this August (finally). I cannot say more while the investigation is in progress. However, anyone who saw my recent presentation at the Phase II Citizen's Inquiry in Toronto can verify quickly that I have nailed the fighter response question.

I investigated both the many wargames and FEMA by doing the routine things any investigator or journalist is required to do. I went to the sources and started asking direct questions.

FEMA

The basis for the FEMA rumor was a CBS News broadcast in which Dan Rather interviewed a Massachusetts fireman. The story's transcript said "A member of the Hyannis Fire Department, Tom Kennedy, was interviewed by Dan Rather after working for nearly 50 hours at Ground Zero. He said, "We arrived Monday night and started immediately…" 9/11 was a Tuesday. Try to remember your own phone number after 50 hours. Dan Rather also mispronounced Kenney's name as Kennedy, something many untrained 9/11 researchers thought suggestive of a conspiracy.

Researcher Barbara Honegger, who has aided in my war game research, wrote in an email to a 9/11 discussion list dated June 4, 2002:

Giuliani's revelation to the Kean Commission on May 19 of a planned
Sept. 12 New York City BIO-warfare emergency exercise drill, called
"Tripod" (Part II), which had PIER 92 AS ITS COMMAND CENTER,
validated Tom Kenney's early claim that FEMA emergency personnel
arrived in NY City THE DAY BEFORE the attack, on Sept. 10…

Because FEMA personnel came into NY City from out of state,
including Kenney who came in from Boston; because putting up large numbers of out-of-state personnel is extremely costly at a time of belt tightening; and because ALL THESE OTHER wargames/exercises/drills took place ON Sept. 11,it is highly likely that the BIO-warfare response exercise Tripod was ALSO scheduled to begin Sept. 11, NOT SEPT. 12; or, at the very least, that Sept. 11was to have been the first of a TWO-day, or multiple-day, drill.


This major leap to a conclusion about the FEMA myth was completely unjustified, nor was it backed up by fact checking. It is a lesson to us all about the care we must use in reaching conclusions.

Here are the steps I followed in establishing that the FEMA story is wrong - the same steps I follow with all 9/11 stories:

I got a copy of the tape and watched it. On the screen you could clearly see the man's name was Kenney over one breast pocket and the word Hyannis appeared over the other. This was a lead.

I called the Hyannis Fired Department in the summer of 2002 and spoke to the Chief. He said that Kenney was just exhausted and had misspoken. The Chief and all the families had been present when Kenney's crew left in trucks for New York on the night of 9/11.

The Chief offered to let me speak to other FD personnel. Two other members of the Hyannis Fire Department said exactly the same thing: The entire Hyannis FD emergency team, which was seconded to FEMA as a result of the attack, left late on Tuesday night, Sept, 11th, drove overnight to New York and went immediately to work.

There are also video tapes of the send-off with wives and children saying "God Bless America," "We Love NY" - all of which were clearly made after the attacks - and, they said, Kenney was in them. There are multiple witnesses. For Christ's sake! Kenney had been on a day off. He gets called up, drives many hours to New York and then works for fifty hours straight. For him 9/11 was the first day of his work week and he misspoke. That's it. When the Chief, really pissed off about the rumors, offered to send me a videotape of the sendoff, I just said, No Thanks. The Hyannis FD Chief was really grateful that someone had actually picked up the phone, called and asked.

Even if they are all lying, what kind of a story remains?

This is the way all 9/11 researchers must operate with every claim they make, every fact they put forth and every story they publish.

If anyone doubts what I am saying here, then I suggest that you do what I did: Call the Hyannis FD, ask the same questions I did, and have them send you a copy of the videotape.

A REQUEST FOR ASSISTANCE FROM ALL 9/11 RESEARCHERS

For the last six weeks I have called and emailed more than a dozen messages seeking to answer two questions. I have only partially answered them.

Question 1 - Prior to 9/11, when various military commands were conducting multiple simultaneous training exercises across various commands and services, what office or person at the Department of Defense was charged with coordinating all of them so that they did not overlap or interfere with each other, or occupy enough military assets at one time to jeopardize operational readiness?

Question 2 - Since the Tripod II biowarfare exercise was a joint New York-Department of Justice exercise we now must ask: Prior to 9/11, under US government Executive Branch procedure, what part of the government or official was responsible for and had the authority to coordinate and act as liaison between the military, federal agencies and state and local agencies and private corporations so that they did not overlap or interfere with each other, or occupy enough essential assets at one time to jeopardize operational readiness or impair the national security of the United States? Was it the White House? Was it the Office of National Preparedness? Was it the National Security Advisor? Was it the CIA?

Only official documents and records or on-the-record statements from qualified experts will suffice.

I ask everyone who reads this - every veteran, every former government official and all the remaining decent and honest military personnel and law enforcement officers - to help answer these questions. It is obvious how important they are.

Please submit any responses to media2@copvcia.com.