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By Root 1786 0

dispatcher in charge of the airline’s transcontinental flights that day, and from Lynn Spencer’s book Touching History. Ballinger cited what he had been told by United’s chief pilot, and Spencer apparently interviewed Flight 23 crew members. There were other, less well documented reports of possible threats to planes on 9/11. Flight attendants told the Commission of Arab passengers having behaved in a way they thought suspicious aboard United Flight 962 from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C. A passenger who flew aboard yet another United plane, Flight 915 from Paris to Washington, D.C., told the Commission there had been a major security alert at Charles de Gaulle Airport before takeoff—and before the attacks began in the United States—and that guards removed a suspect from the terminal. In the States, the FBI reportedly searched for passengers who had been aboard another grounded airliner, American Flight 43. In Canada, authorities detained a Yemeni arrested aboard a U.S.-bound plane that had been diverted to Toronto. He was reportedly carrying several different passports, had papers with Arabic writing sewn into his clothing, and his baggage contained Lufthansa crew uniforms. A U.S. Justice Department spokesman said box cutters, similar to those used as weapons on the hijacked planes, were later found on other aircraft. Though the authors surmise that few if any of these accounts relate to real threats, the incident involving United 23 may indeed have been serious (Ballinger/Spencer: MFR 04020009, 4/14/04, Spencer, 102–; UA962: FBI 302, ints. Elizabeth Anderson & Elizabeth Henley, 9/20/01, “FBI 302s—ACARS,” B11, T7, CF, MFR 03007051, undated, 8/03; AA43: BBC News, 9/18/01; Yemeni: CBS News, 9/14/01, Hamilton Spectator [Canada], 9/26/01; box cutters: CNN, 9/24/01, & see MFR 04017172, 9/29/03, MFR 04019897, 7/29/03, FBI 302, 9/15/01, Chicago Tribune, 9/23/01, Guardian [U.K.], 10/13/01).

11 Mihdhar: Bamford, Shadow Factory, 64;

12 “We think we had”: Globe and Mail (Toronto), 6/13/02.

13 “Who do you think”: Ronald Kessler, The Terrorist Watch, NY: Crown, 2007, 8–;

14 some Arabs celebrate: Fox News, 9/12/01, “Bulls-Eye Say Egyptians as They Celebrate Anti-US Attacks,” AFP, 9/11/01, NYT, 9/13/01, 9/26/01, 10/27/01;

15 “should feel”: CNN, 9/18/01;

16 Palestinians/​rifles/​candy: Fox News, 9/12/01, New Yorker, 9/24/01, BBC News, 9/14/01, The Times (London), 9/11/01, Reuters, 9/12/01;

17 caller/DFLP: BBC News, 9/12/01, “Sept. 11 One Year On,” www.rte.ie, 9/11/02, CNN, 9/11/01;

18 Osama poster: AP, 9/14/01;

19 “Congratulations”: The dissident was Saad al-Fagih, of the Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia, transcript, Frontline: “Saudi Time Bomb,” 9/15/01, www.pbs.org, & see Corbin, 250;

20 “This action”: New Yorker, 6/2/08;

21 CRS report: Kenneth Katzman, “Terrorism: Near Eastern Groups and State Sponsors, 2001,” Washington, D.C.: Congressional Research Service, 9/10/01;

22 17th: an approximation. Osama’s father reportedly had some twenty-two wives over the years, and at least four other sons were born during the year of Osama’s birth. It is safe to say, though, that he fell between sons number seventeen and twenty-one (Steve Coll, The Bin Ladens, London: Allen Lane, 2008, 72–);

23 $300 million: For a more detailed analysis of bin Laden’s fortune, see Chapter 22;

24 “for some time”: CBS News, 9:12–9:54 A.M., 9/11/01, www.archive.org;

25 “We’ve hit”: Newsweek, 9/13/01, Bamford, Pretext, 54, notes of Stephen Cambone, 9/11/01, released under FOIA to Thad Anderson, www.outragedmoderates.com;

26 “Although in our”: Tenet, 167;

27 “beyond a doubt”: Tenet, xix.

28 “We could then”: 60 Minutes, CBS News, 9/11/02. The flight manifests were not released by any government source at the time. The airlines involved, however, quickly released lists of those they described as “victims” or passengers whose next of kin had been identified—but did not include the names of those believed to have been hijackers. That omission, especially, led to speculation that there had not really been any Arabs on the flights, that some hijackers