Could 9/11 Have Been Prevented?

Roughly 2,753 people were killed on September 11, 2001, by terrorists who overtook commercial airplanes (Jones). The cause of these thousands of deaths were a series of attacks in New York City by an Islamic terrorist group, Al-Qaeda. However, there are still many questions about what actually happened the morning of September 11, 2001. As there are many different conspiracy theories about what happened that day, 9/11 was an attack which began with Al- Qaeda hi-jacking airplanes, but ended with more questions than answers. Many questions still remain about the authenticity of cell phone calls from inside the planes, why air defense was told to “stand down,” and how three buildings imploded as the result of two buildings being struck by airplanes.

Various factors like the nature of bureaucratic organizations, unsuccessful diplomacy, lack of military actions, legislators, the uneven structure of the Federal government, advances in technology, backdrops of police surveillance, and policy formation promote organizational problem s in U.S intelligence communities. Intelligence officials and law enforcement experts have made conscious effort in handling terrorist threats before 9/11 attack. Unsuccessful diplomacy and the uneven structure of the Federal government accelerated organizational problems and absence of information sharing among the intelligence agencies. U.S Intelligence strategies have failed to recognize their new enemy and intelligence agencies lacked resources and manpower. U.S Intelligence agencies like CIA, FBI, and National Security Agency have faced organizational crisis from the side of Federal government and bureaucrats, and this organizational crisis contributed failure in their activities.

September 11, 2001 forever impacted America and gave a new challenge to our government that went far beyond any challenges that a natural disaster had presented in decades. The terrorist attacks were definitely a wake up call to being more prepared for natural disasters and reevaluating our intelligence agency jobs and communication levels. In chapter 2, one of the key points that Kettl discuss is connecting the dots. We can see that in the midst of 9/11, America focused on the nation’s intelligence services for answers. As the American people we wanted to know, who were the hijackers, where was security and most importantly, and who do we hold accountable? Furthermore, that the intelligence agencies failed to piece together information that already had about terrorism speculations. In chapter 1, Kettl talks about the warnings and signs that the government has before catastrophes (such as September 11, Hurricane

The attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001 were the direct result of the failure of US agencies, ranging from the White House to airport security, to recognize vulnerabilities present in the various symptoms. The reason why these vulnerabilities were not acknowledged and repaired is that these various agencies were trapped in a cognitive dissonance cycle of thinking. After the Cold War, terrorism was seen as a regional problem (9/11 Commission, 92). The majority of terrorist groups were either groups sponsored by governments or militants trying to create governments (i.e. Palestine Liberation Organization). As a result, the tactics used for fighting terrorism were centralized mostly in the Middle East and were restricted to

In the past, there were many attacks on Americans that were treated as extremist acts and indicators of continuing attacks against Americans and their targets of opportunity. One premonition of the 9-1-1 attacks occurred on the very site of the actual attack on 9-1-1. On February 26, 1993, the World Trade Center was attacked by terrorists (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2008). They place a truck loaded with 1,500 lbs of explosive in the basement structure of the North Tower. Their intention was to topple it into the South Tower killing thousands. The results were six killed and almost two-thousand injured when the devastation was completed. Closer to the 9-1-1 attack, men with Middle Eastern physical traits wanted to learn how to fly planes without learning to land them. This should have been an indicator of hidden agendas which should have raised more alarms.

On September 11, 2001 four passenger commercial jet airliners were hijacked and as a result approximately 3,000 human lives were lost. When asked about 9/11, many can recall exactly what they were doing when they heard the news that a plane crashed into one of the World Trade Center (WTC) buildings and many Americans can tell you how it all unfolded and the reason behind such a travesty. The “official story” provided by officials, and restated by Sofia Shafquat, producer of “9/11 Mysteries: Demolitions” say that “four passenger planes were hijacked and taken radically off course, within an hour, two of the planes had flown into the enormous steel towers of the World Trade Center, creating fires and eventually toppling them” (Shafquat).

Al Qaeda had been planning to invade the United States for quite a long time. They started strategizing for the attacks in 2000. Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda, wanted a strike on America that would impact everyone. He approved a plan that stated Al Qaeda would use hijacked airplanes to attack multiple targets in the United States. Their proposal to have multiple hijackings was in case one failed, they wanted to make sure they still

Prior to 9/11 the security of the United States was “across more than 40 federal agencies and an estimated 2,000 separate Congressional appropriations accounts”. (DHS History Office ,2017, p.4). This was a huge issue when it came to sharing intelligence. This was perhaps one of the many reasons that the terrorist of 9/11 were so successful. Shortly after 9/11, the United States found its self in need of an all-encompassing organization that shared information under one roof that enabled better protection of its infrastructure and its people at home, not just abroad. Shortly over a year later, in November 2002, Congress passed the “Homeland Security Act” (DHS.gov, 2017, para.2). With the creation of homeland security came conflict

On September 11, 2001, the nation suffered a traumatic event in which impacted the world’s perspective on terrorism and violence that will last for generations to come. In the early hours of a calm Tuesday morning business was flowing as usual. The World Trade Center symbolized power and wealth of America, leading it to be the most prominent target to hit in order to cause deadly destruction. An eyewitness of the event, Ed Hashey described the first explosion that took place. He states, “Before you knew it, it was 8:40 a.m. and I was at the World Trade Center station at Cortland Street. I got off the train, walked up to the street exit, and right as I saw daylight, I heard a huge explosion and then many pieces of metal debris, some the size of car hoods, were falling all around me and a very large crowd of people” (Source 9). No one at the time understood what was happening, the nation was in a state of shock. This passenger airplane turned out to be American Airlines, Flight 11 which came out of Boston, Massachusetts from Logan International Airport (Source 1). The original route was heading to upstate New York when suddenly it was hijacked by terrorists which then controlled the plane to come down towards the city, specifically Manhattan in an aim to hit the World Trade Center. Everyone believed that it was a true accident and a tragedy, but to Ed Hashey he stated, “At that point the police ordered a mass evacuation, and I remember thinking this was a terrorist act. It was just too coincidental to be anything else” (Source 9). The worse was only yet to come.

When the US was warned about the possibility of a terrorist attack on US soil, why was the threat not taken seriously? Some of the lower grade official (CIA), took the threat to be very seriously, but were told to dismiss the warnings, by top their superiors. September 10, 2001, a number of the Pentagon’s top brass suddenly cancel travel plans for the next morning, apparently because of security concerns. The airlines security system was not up graded to possible terrorists attack alert.

The report identified that the procedure on home security was not employed to analyse an enemy that, as the twentieth century closed, was most likely to launch a surprise attack on the United States. The report went on to say how the County Terrorism Centre (CTC) did not examine how an aircraft, hijacked or explosive-ridden may be used as a weapon (The 9/11 Commission Report, p347). Also, the procedure used by the CTC did not develop a set of warnings to notify them of possible airborne attacks (ibid). For example, one sign may be the discovery of potential terrorists pursuing flight training to fly large jets, but because the CTC did not set requirements to monitor such warnings they looking for information such as in July 2001 when the FBI drafted a report of potential terrorist interest in various aircraft activities in

Mr. Bin Laden said, “Praise be to Allah who created the creation for and worship and commanded them to be just and permitted the wronged one to retaliate against the oppressor in kind.” He said that Bush claims that they hate freedom. No one except a dumb thief plays with the security of others and then makes himself believe he will be secure. He said, “I am amazed at you, even though we are in the fourth year after the events of September 11th, Bush is still engaged in distortion, deception hiding from you the real causes. And, thus the the reasons are still there for a repeat of what

The “need to know” vice “need to share” is critical for putting all the pieces together. There was information that different agencies had prior to 9/11 where if the information had been shard throughout the intelligence umbrella, it is

CNN (2015) reports, in regards to the 9/11 attacks, catastrophe killed nearly 3,000 people in Lower Manhattan, at the Pentagon, and southwestern Pennsylvania. Many suggested that the leaders should have taken Osama Bin Laden threats more seriously. It has even been reported that the Business Intelligence Unit and FBI that there was an indication of plans to hijack the U.S. and attack but had little or no intellection that they would use planes as bombs. According to Fukuyama (2007), the bias against optimism in the governmental intelligence world was nowhere more evident than in the estimates made of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Further, I am sure details of these plans have been reported, however, as a low-level government employee (civilians) we are not privy to that type of high-classified type of

September 11, 2001 marked the most horrific day in history for United States of America. The events of this day changed the lives of those residing in America forever. United States was considered somewhat safe, in regards to terrorists’ attacks. However, this all came to a screeching halt when 19 militants known to be a part of the Al-Qaeda terrorist group hijacked four planes for the purpose of destroying targeted areas in the United States. As a result of the deadly attack on the United States, security measures drastically changed. Although, security measures throughout the United States have been in place, extreme caution came into effect. All departments looked at different measures to improve preventing terrorists’ attacks.