Question for those who served in 2001 prior to 9/11
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Osama was quickly accused as the lead. Then U.S. bombed Sudan pharmaceutical factory.
Then in late 2000, the USS Cole was bombed, again likely Osama.
Then in early 2001, the UN started sanctions against Taliban for not turning Osama over for trial (yes, the same Taliban that now run Afghanistan after Biden’s decision to abandon country).
Taliban continued erasing historical and cultural symbols along with mass killings in Afghanistan. Taliban timeline in 2001 was continued fighting, destroying Buddhist statues, requiring non Muslims to wear identification and kidnapping aid workers, some U.S. Busy year.
Yes, all that was going on. 5th Fleet, 9th Air Force, and CENTCOM were very busy dealing with all of that, in addition to the no fly zone operations going on over Iraq.
So there is no telling where some random US Army Sgt , stationed at an unknown base, was scheduled to deploy to. Normal OPSEC is that you don’t tell civilians what you are doing or where you are going. How many times have we all told people that we were going to “an undisclosed base in SW Asia” ?
But I think the OP’s real question was if the US military had some sort of an advanced warning about 9/11, or he might even be asking if the US military was in on the plot as many 9/11 conspiracists think.
My answer to that is that I know of no such a plot or knew of any type of warning. I’d be curious to know if someone else had a different answer than mine. But of course, if someone did say they were tipped off, I wouldn’t believe them unless intricate details were given and then I went and researched it and found corroboration.
The invasion of Iraq didn't occur until March of 2003, so unless "soon" to you meant 21 months later . . . you get my drift.
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If this guy was actually a soldier, I'd wager he was special forces.
I get the timeframe and I think we can reasonably assume that if the US was planning to attack Iraq that year, it was thwarted by the 9/11 attacks.
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Originally Posted by m1a1mg
We were constantly being told that we were going to Iraq, all through the late 90s into 2000. You met some guy who was trying to make himself seem important.
Maybe, but he didn't seem like the type.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WK91
If we are talking about Middle East in June of 2001, that most likely would’ve been Operation Southern Watch or Operation Northern Watch. If he was in the US Army, perhaps assigned to a Patriot Missile unit? Hard to know exactly. Especially if he was in SOF, there really is no telling what he was going to be doing out there.
But if you are trying to imply, or find out if some military people knew beforehand of 9/11, I have absolutely zero evidence of that. I was stationed at Osan Air Base, Korea during 9/11 and it happened completely out of the blue as far as I can tell. There was zero preparation going on, and nobody got an advanced warning that something was about to go down. We immediately went into Delta and 24 hour work centers.
I have also talked to a lot of people over the years, hundreds of people, mostly USAF, and I haven’t come across a single guy who had any type of advanced warning about 9/11. I’ve also talked to people who were physically inside the Pentagon on that day, too. They’ve all said to a man that a plane really hit the building.
Look, I fully understand that there have been nefarious things going on throughout our history as a country, and I’ll also readily admit that when you do a deep dive into 9/11, there are some strange anomalies that make you really wonder what the heck really happened.
But for me, since I was immersed in the USAF, knew people who were there at point blank range, it makes me trust the official account. I can fully understand civilians questioning some of that record, though.
Fair points.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AZ Desert Guy
It could have been a soldier (thankfully) practicing good OpSec. You just met the guy, right? The middle east has been an active deployment spot for U.S. military for a long time.
I was active duty and stationed in Bahrain in 1988-1989 to the ASU in Manama. It was a running, but sadly accurate joke, that the most accurate source of U.S. Navy ship scheduling info in and out of BASREC could be had from the Filipina hotel bar tenders in Manama. Sailors with a drink or two in them will tell pretty girls way too much.
He didn't make it seem like it was a normal deployment. He insisted that "something big" was going to happen.
Quote:
Originally Posted by WK91
Yes, all that was going on. 5th Fleet, 9th Air Force, and CENTCOM were very busy dealing with all of that, in addition to the no fly zone operations going on over Iraq.
So there is no telling where some random US Army Sgt , stationed at an unknown base, was scheduled to deploy to. Normal OPSEC is that you don’t tell civilians what you are doing or where you are going. How many times have we all told people that we were going to “an undisclosed base in SW Asia” ?
But I think the OP’s real question was if the US military had some sort of an advanced warning about 9/11, or he might even be asking if the US military was in on the plot as many 9/11 conspiracists think.
My answer to that is that I know of no such a plot or knew of any type of warning. I’d be curious to know if someone else had a different answer than mine. But of course, if someone did say they were tipped off, I wouldn’t believe them unless intricate details were given and then I went and researched it and found corroboration.
Whether it was advanced notice of the 9/11 attacks or possibly plans to attack Iraq before we knew 9/11 was going to happen.
I get the timeframe and I think we can reasonably assume that if the US was planning to attack Iraq that year, it was thwarted by the 9/11 attacks.
Whether it was advanced notice of the 9/11 attacks or possibly plans to attack Iraq before we knew 9/11 was going to happen.
I’m confused by your statement here. Are you trying to imply that an attack of Iraq was imminent in 2001, but because of 9/11, we changed our minds?
I guess it depends on what your definition of an attack actually is. The Iraqi’s would fire up their ground systems from time to time, trying to take some shots at aircraft, and we would paint them and hit them. This happened quite a bit. So we attacked the Iraqis quite a bit.
But if you are talking about an invasion, no, there was no ground invasion imminent in 2001. Back in 1990, we built up for months and knew it was coming. Some assumed the Iraqis would retreat out of Kuwait and the invasion wouldn’t be necessary, but when it was apparent they weren’t going to do that, we went in, and it surprised nobody in uniform.
In 2003, again, a lot of preparations, and then we went in. Not surprising at all.
Now I might be able to buy that George W, angry about Hussein’s attempt on G HW Bush’s life, plus Cheney and the defense contractors wanting war, that we were going to build up and then oust Saddam in 2002, I might be able to buy that. But I haven’t seen a lot of proof of that, though.
I also want to add that many people were tired of Saddam thumbing his nose at everyone. I thought it was ridiculous that we were running no fly zones in perpetuity. I wanted Saddam taken out just for that reason alone.
Now I will also readily admit that we broke Iraq, and with hindsight being 20/20, I would not support removing Saddam after all I know about today. But at the time, I thought it was worth the try to make Iraq a better place. Many people were naive, didn’t understand that Iraq wasn’t really a united country. They were 3 countries being controlled by Baathists. However, Bush and his “experts” should’ve known what would happen. Either they were incompetent, or they wanted a war so bad in order to make a lot of money that they didn’t care.
Anyway, getting back to your original question. I believe your Army Sgt acquaintance was going on a normal deployment, there were no imminent plans for invasion of Iraq in the summer of 2001, and 9/11 was a terrorist attack that came out of the blue.
Now I will say that I’ve read some new material where a couple of the Saudi nationals who were part of the hijackers were allegedly recruited by the CIA. Supposedly, this info was suppressed, because it makes the US intelligence agencies look bad. But people are recruited all the time, and it’s not clear if these guys were ever activated, or contacted to do anything. But some people are stating that because they were CIA assets, the FBI wasn’t tipped off when they arrived in San Diego to begin their flight training.
Bottom line, this is not even close to enough damning information to prove 9/11 was a CIA plot as some believe.
I get the timeframe and I think we can reasonably assume that if the US was planning to attack Iraq that year, it was thwarted by the 9/11 attacks.
Maybe, but he didn't seem like the type.
Fair points.
He didn't make it seem like it was a normal deployment. He insisted that "something big" was going to happen.
Whether it was advanced notice of the 9/11 attacks or possibly plans to attack Iraq before we knew 9/11 was going to happen.
Attack in what way? Bill Clinton ordered air strikes against Iraq throughout his presidency. Attacking Iraq was nothing "new" in that sense. That said, I've seen nothing to support (definitely not a reasonable assumption . . . that's getting into the conspiracy theorist lane, IMO) some imminent major ground operation in Iraq that was thwarted by 9/11.
It could have been a soldier (thankfully) practicing good OpSec. You just met the guy, right? The middle east has been an active deployment spot for U.S. military for a long time.
Good OPSEC would have been to say no more than, "I'll be out of the country."
Now I will also readily admit that we broke Iraq, and with hindsight being 20/20, I would not support removing Saddam after all I know about today. But at the time, I thought it was worth the try to make Iraq a better place. Many people were naive, didn’t understand that Iraq wasn’t really a united country. They were 3 countries being controlled by Baathists. However, Bush and his “experts” should’ve known what would happen. Either they were incompetent, or they wanted a war so bad in order to make a lot of money that they didn’t care.
They had been told.
I saw at least three mid-to-late 90s "Iraq after Saddam" analyses out of DIA predicting that Iraq would go the way of Yugoslavia if Saddam were removed.
The dissolution of Yugoslavia had actually been a surprise...most analysts believed Tito had sufficiently united the country. But after Yugoslavia spun apart, Iraq analysts looked more closely at Iraq and saw the same kinds of fissures under Saddam.
I've never been in the military, but there's something that's been sticking with me for years and I wanted to ask if anyone knew anything about it. Here's the story.
Around June 2001, I took a road trip with my roommate (I'm going to purposely leave out where I was living and where we were going). When we were out hiking, we met a soldier, and if I remember correctly, he was in the army and I think he was a sergeant. We chatted for a while and we all hit it off, and agreed to come visit us in our city when he came down the following week.
We went out to eat and he told us that he was going to be shipped off the Middle East soon. We asked why, and he wouldn't tell us, but he said something big was going to happen soon. No matter how hard we tried, he wouldn't/couldn't give us any details.
I suspect, but I'm not sure, that he was alluding to an invasion of Iraq, but I don't know. I knew there were some plans to invade prior to 9/11, but it's hard to get concrete evidence.
When 9/11 happened, I sort of forgot about the conversation we had had with the guy, but over the last few years it's made me think. I'm not a 9/11 conspiracy theorist or anything, but I have to wonder what "big" event he was talking about.
Would any of you know?
If there had been a conspiracy to permit 9/11 to happen, no Army sergeant who would be in a unit that would deploy overseas in response would know about it in advance. He would have no need to know anything until he suddenly got orders to deploy.
If there had been such a conspiracy, I doubt anyone in uniform would have been taken into confidence about it. Soldiers are too likely to take their oaths seriously.
I once flew back from Frankfurt to the states on a flight primarily filled with military. The guy behind me was selling the biggest bunch of BS for the first two hours of the flight. I finally had enough and told him he needed to **** as the tings he was saying were all BS.
I meet posers all the time. Guys who actually served but have made up the most ridiculous stories that civilians will believe, hook, line, and sinker.
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