Hijacker double identified?

[paulthompson]

John Doe II sent me an article (Book: Atta Applied at Airline, Newsday, January 24, 2002) mentioned in another thread here. I find this part very interesting:

The 33-year-old Egyptian national applied for a job with *Lufthansa* on Feb. 15, 2001, according to "Netzwerke des Terrors (Networks of
Terror)," a book published last month by Juergen Roth, one of Germany's top investigative reporters.



Atta did not know that Lufthansa's personnel division had access to law enforcement files that indicated he had once been under
investigation for petty drug crimes and falsifying phone cards while a
student at the Technical University at Hamburg-Harburg in 1995, the book reports, citing federal law enforcement sources.

Atta didn't get the job. Neither did an Iranian citizen who dropped
Atta's name while applying for the job three days later, not realizing an internal decision had already been made rejecting Atta. Nor did a third applicant who showed up on March 5, 2001, with Atta at his side. The three, according to the book, were members of an Islamic study group at the university in Hamburg. One of the two told Lufthansa's personnel division that he had been a pilot in the Pakistani air force, according to the book.

---

What's most interesting is the mention of a Pakistani air force pilot obviously in on the plot. It has long been a hunch of mine that if the Pakistani ISI was deeply involved with the 9/11 plot (as was the head of the Pakistani Air Force, Mushaf Ali Mir - see the book Why America Slept), that it would make sense they would entrust this most important of missions to real pilots and not to the likes of Hani Hanjour, who could barely even fly a Cessna. And what would be better than to use Pakistani fighter pilots? Bin Laden has more positive approval in Pakistan as percent of population (over 80% then and now) than any other country, and the ISI and military is filled with his extremist supporters, so no doubt many fighter pilots would have been eager to join in such a plot.

Now look at this except from the Los Angeles Times, 9/1/02:

Just after Al-Shehhi left, a Pakistani student named Atif bin Mansour arrived in Hamburg. Early the next year, Mansour, whose name has never been released by German authorities, was Atta's co-applicant for a room for a new Islamic study group at the technical university. Mansour was a pilot on leave from the Pakistani Air Force. This in itself is intriguing--a Pakistani pilot? Investigators acknowledge they haven't figured out Mansour's role in the plot, if any. The German Federal Bureau of Criminal Investigations said he remains "a very interesting figure."

Mansour's brother, also in the Pakistani armed forces, was killed in battle that spring of 1999. Mansour rushed home to be with his family and never came back. Not long after, Al-Shehhi returned to Hamburg. It is as if they replaced one another.

---

I have another article where the FBI later notes that Alshehhi arrives "almost as a replacement" for Mansour and says they wanted to interview him after 9/11 but couldn't find him.

I would bet this Pakistani Air Force pilot who applied for a job at Lufthansa with Atta was the same one who was his roommate and later mysteriously disappeared, never to be seen again. Note that he was supposed to have never come back to Germany according to visa records and so forth, yet there he is in Hamburg in 2001! (Either that, or the plotters consorted with more than one Pakistani fighter pilot.) He would have been keeping his fighter pilot background identity a secret except when applying for a job at Lufthansa, figuring that could greatly help him get the job. Obviously the plotters would have to lay down a false trail of evidence so investigators would suspect the likes of Al-Shehhi instead of Mansour, because if the evidence pointed to Pakistani fighter pilots, that would probably mean the US would be obliged to fight Pakistan, a nation with nukes. So everyone - the US, Pakistan, and al-Qaeda - has a motive to go with the false trail of evidence.

[spooked911]

1. Very interesting. But why did they want a job with Lufthansa exactly?

To have access to jets as part of the 9/11 plot or something else?

But that's the first I heard of Pakistani pilots being involved in this story-- very intriguing.

This reminds me a bit of a Wayne Madsen story from right after 9/11 where he talk about intelligence indicating Iraqi fighter pilots were involved in 9/11.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/issue/25/23/madsen2523.html

Obviously Madsen is a bit unreliable, and if there was an Iraqi pilot link, we certainly would have heard more about it. Nonetheless, someone seemed to be putting out that meme. I wonder if someone was also trying to plant a Pakistani pilot legend as well-- perhaps as a way of detracting from the idea that the planes were really controlled remotely?

[meppie-meppie not]

2. I don't believe for a minute that Iraqi fighter pilots were involved.

Saddam was surely sadistic but suicidal I don't think so. Supplying fighter pilots to the 9/11 plot would have been a suicidal maneuver on his part owing to the US retaliation which would result. It's no surprise that Pakistan's ISI has not been investigated for their part in 9/11, they have WMD and the US government is loath to stir that pot. Someone needs to look into a Korean timeline (both South and North) because the blowback is just beginning I'm afraid.

[spooked911]

3. I don't believe Iraqi pilots were involved either, but I find it hard to

believe Pakistani pilots were involved as well-- how often do trained professionals do something like that?

I was just saying maybe the pilot story was something they were passing around as intelligence lore.

[paulthompson]

4. Why?

Why on Earth would fighter pilots be somehow inelligible to be suicide pilots? Suicide attackers come from all kinds of backgrounds, and there's no shortage if the conditions are right - look at how many there are in Iraq each month (many of whom, by the way, are believed to be military veterans, including the celebrated first one, who has become something of a patron saint for Iraqi suicide attackers). Throughout history there has been no shortage of military people willing to conduct suicide missions. Just look at the kamakazi pilots in WW2 Japan for one particularly apt example. They had no shortage of volunteers, only a shortage of aircraft for them to use.

Then look at the supposed real 9/11 pilots, types like Mohammed Atta who had just gotten his doctorate in urban planning. Saeed Sheikh, another al-Qaeda operative who personally kidnapped Western tourists deep in India, was a stellar graduate of the London School of Economics. Somehow PhD's and the like can be suicide pilots, but fighter pilots can't? Again, I'd ask for the reasoning behind that.

[meppie-meppie not]

5. suicide fighter pilots I have no problem believing, what I meant

is that I don't believe Iraqi's were involved in 9/11. I don't believe Saddam had anything to do with 9/11 whatsoever.

[paulthompson]

6. yep

I don't see any Iraqi involvement either. But I was actually replying to spook's post. He has trouble imagining fighter pilots as suicide pilots for some reason.

[spooked911]

7. You're right. I didn't think that deeply about it.

I guess it all depends how fanatical they are.

[spooked911]

8. But are you saying that you really think Pakistani pilots were flying

the planes on 9/11?

I guess one reason I discounted this idea is that I have tended to prefer the remote control theory to real suicide pilots-- mostly because I didn't think the hijackers could fly well enough.

So the key question becomes-- what is the likelihood that Pakistani pilots were flying the planes on 9/11?

Is there any evidence for it besides this story?

[paulthompson]

9. Evidence?

It's just a hunch, not a belief. One thing I do believe is that the hijackers were laying down a false trail of evidence while in the US. Note the investigator quoted by Seymour Hersh who said, "Everything that was found, they wanted to be found." They laying of evidence was almost comical at times, from frequently paying for the delivery of pizzas with credit cards to going to a strip club and leaving a Koran behind.

Then you have the fact that the four supposed pilots were so poorly trained for such an important mission, and the involvement of the ISI in the plot. The ISI is very capable and wouldn't have left such a vital mission to the likes of Hanjour, especially when they had access to much better people. Fighter pilots are just one possibility. There are others. Note this entry in my timeline:

October 1, 2001 (C)
It is reported that “a worldwide hunt is under way for 14 young Muslims said to have been trained in secret to fly Boeing airliners at an air base in Afghanistan. A senior pilot for the Afghan state-owned airline Ariana has told how he and four colleagues were forced by the Taliban regime to train the men who are now thought to be hiding in Europe and the United States. The 14 men, seven of whom are said to speak fluent English, are described as ‘dedicated Muslim fanatics’ who spoke of being involved in a holy war. They are thought to have left Afghanistan a year ago. All had close links with the Taliban and some had fought for the regime.”

Also note the case of Niaz Khan, the guy who almost joined the plot, but dropped out and went to the FBI. He says he was trained in hijacking techniques in a special camp in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, and that many others were training there. His story has been basically vindicated.

So if there was a false trail and a switch, there are many possibilities as to whom the replacements were, and Pakistani fighter pilots are just one possibility.

Or what about this guy, Abdulsalam Ali Abdulrahman, from another timeline entry:

August 12, 2000: Italian intelligence successfully wiretap the al-Qaeda terrorist cell in Milan, Italy from late 1999 until summer 2001. In a wiretapped conversation from this day, suspected Yemeni terrorist Abdulsalam Ali Abdulrahman tells wanted Egyptian terrorist Es Sayed about a massive strike against the enemies of Islam involving aircraft and the sky, a blow that "will be written about in all the newspapers of the world. This will be one of those strikes that will never be forgotten.... This is a terrifying thing. This is a thing that will spread from south to north, from east to west: The person who came up with this program is a madman from a madhouse, a madman but a genius." In another conversation, Abdulrahman tells Es Sayed: "I'm studying airplanes. I hope, God willing, that I can bring you a window or a piece of an airplane the next time we see each other." The comment is followed by laughter. Beginning in October 2000, FBI experts helped Italian police analyze the intercepts and warnings. Neither Italy nor the FBI understands their meaning until after 9/11, but apparently Italians understand enough to give the US an attack warning in March 2001 (see March 2001 (B)). The Milan cell "is believed to have created a cottage industry in supplying false passports and other bogus documents."

---

The al-Qaeda Milan cell specialized in creating forged documents. It sure sounds to me like he was getting his false identity made up, and was on his way to the US to take part in the 9/11 plot. He could even be one of the 14 young Muslims mentioned in the other entry, for all we know.

I believe US investigators must know these kinds of things, but don't want the US to know, because A) they try to keep everything about 9/11 classified as it's a very nasty can of worms and B) if people knew these additional facts, the failure of the US government would be magnified for failing to catch all these other people.

Another example of what the government knows and doesn't want the populace to know: the probable fifth hijacked plane.

After 9:00 A.M.*: United Flight 23 Hijacking Averted?

Shortly after 9:00 A.M., United Airlines Flight 23 receives a warning message from flight dispatcher Ed Ballinger. Flight 23 is still on a Newark, New Jersey, runway, about to take off for Los Angeles. Apparently in response to Ballinger’s message, the crew tells the passengers there has been a mechanical problem and returns to the departure gate. A number of Middle Eastern men (one account says three, others say six) argue with the flight crew and refuse to get off the plane. Security is called, but they flee before it arrives. (CBS NEWS, 9/14/01 (B); CHICAGO DAILY HERALD, 04/14/04) Later, authorities check their luggage and find copies of the Koran and al-Qaeda instruction sheets. Ballinger suspects they got away. “When all we have is a photo from a fake ID, the chances of finding in Afghanistan or Pakistan are rather slim.” (CHICAGO DAILY HERALD, 04/14/04) A NORAD deputy commander later says, “From our perception, we think our reaction on that day was sufficiently quick that we may well have precluded at least one other hijacking. We may not have. We don’t know for sure.” (GLOBE AND MAIL, 6/13/02)

I probably should have clarified that the NORAD commander speaking a year after 9/11 was specifically referring to Flight 23. I do mention that elsewhere in the book.

And here's a bit more from one of my chapter intros:

While one might think that the information was not included because the 9/11 Commission did not have access to the necessary information, we know that is not the case. We know, based on media reports, that some information was given to the commission — but was not included in their report. For instance, United Airlines flight dispatcher Ed Ballinger told a reporter what he was going to tell the commission a few days before he went to testify. He explained how officials told him the hijacking of Flight 23 was narrowly averted that morning. Korans and al-Qaeda instructions were found in the baggage of some passengers who fled when the flight failed to take off and returned to its gate. (CHICAGO DAILY HERALD, 4/14/04) The commission quoted Ballinger about ten times on other topics, but failed to mention Flight 23 at all. (9/11 COMMISSION REPORT, 7/24/04)

The five men appear to have been carefully written out of the official account, and of course the 9/11 Commission happily participates in the coverup (if they were at all honest they would have at least mentioned Flight 23 as a possibility). It's highly likely that these extra guys wouldn't have just shown up at the airport that day - they would have had ties to all the other hijackers, as all the hijacking teams mixed with each other. If you go back and look at all the accounts of witnesses who saw the hijackers in the months before 9/11, there are many accounts that mention other, unidentified Arab men who were sharing hotel rooms with the hijackers, living with them, doing things with them. But no doubt these witnesses were told not to mention the names because it was part of an ongoing investigation. (Note to self: I really should compile all those accounts of the extra mystery men.)

Oh, and I should mention there are various advance warnings that mentioned five planes were going to be hijacked, not four. For instance, John Walker Lindh was told several months beforehand by his al-Qaeda instructor in Afghanistan that it was a five pronged attack.

I think there have to be some government investigators who know these things, because they can't all be so stupid to fall for the al-Qaeda cover story and false trail of evidence hook, line, and sinker.

We also have considerable evidence pointing to many accomplices (for instance the Germans intercepted a message on 9/11 from an al-Qaeda source talking about the 30 people travelling for the operation) and the Congressional Inquiry did a reasonable job looking into this, pointing out for instance that 14 people the hijackers associated with in the US were already under investigation before 9/11. But the 9/11 Commission whitewashed this out too, because again it makes the US look bad that those guys haven't been caught either, and because many of those accomplices like Omar al-Bayoumi or Osama Basnan had disturbing ties to Saudi Arabia or Pakistan. But that's a whole other story.

[paulthompson]

10. speaking of which...

Speaking of creating a false trail of evidence, this is by far my favorite incident.

Late April–Mid-May 2000: Atta Leaves Numerous Clues While Seeking Crop-Dusting Airplane Loan

Mohamed Atta reportedly has a very strange meeting with Johnelle Bryant of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (incidentally, one month before the official story claims he arrived in the U.S. for the first time). According to Bryant, in the meeting Atta does all of the following:
· He initially refuses to speak with one who is “but a female.”
· He asks her for a loan of $650,000 to buy and modify a crop-dusting plane.
· He mentions that he wants to “build a chemical tank that would fit inside the aircraft and take up every available square inch of the aircraft except for where the pilot would be sitting.”
· He uses his real name even as she takes notes, and makes sure she spells it correctly.
· He says he has just arrived from Afghanistan.
· He tells about his travel plans to Spain and Germany.
· He expresses an interest in visiting New York.
· He asks her about security at the WTC and other U.S. landmarks.
· He discusses al-Qaeda and its need for American membership.
· He tells her bin Laden “would someday be known as the world’s greatest leader.”
· He asks to buy the aerial photograph of Washington hanging on her Florida office wall, throwing increasingly large “wads of cash” at her when she refuses to sell it.
· After Bryant points out one of the buildings in the Washington photograph as her former place of employment, he asks her, “How would you like it if somebody flew an airplane into your friends’ building?”
· He asks her, “What would prevent from going behind desk and cutting throat and making off with the millions of dollars” in the safe behind her.
· He asks, “How would America like it if another country destroyed and some of the monuments in it like the cities in country had been destroyed?”
· He gets “very agitated” when he isn’t given the money in cash on the spot.
· Atta later tries to get the loan again from the same woman, this time “slightly disguised” by wearing glasses.
Three other terrorists also attempt to get the same loan from Bryant, but all of them fail. Bryant turns them down because they do not meet the loan requirements, and fails to notify anyone about these strange encounters until after 9/11. Government officials not only confirm the account and say that Bryant passed a lie detector test, but also elaborate that the account is consistent with other information they have received from interrogating prisoners. Supposedly, failing to get the loan, the terrorists switched plans from using crop dusters to hijacking aircraft. (ABC NEWS 6/6/02; LONDON TIMES 6/8/02) Compare Atta’s meeting with FBI Director Mueller’s later testimony about the hijackers: “There were no slip-ups. Discipline never broke down. They gave no hint to those around them what they were about.” (CNN, 9/28/02)

Whenever I think of this incident, I think of this as a scene out of Monty Python, esp. the part about Atta coming back and doing it all over again, except "disguised" with a pair of glasses. I imagine him coming back wearing Groucho Marx glasses, complete with bushy eyebrows and fake nose. :)

Note especially how this happens one month before Atta even officially arrives in the US, another piece of evidence that there were two people running around with the Atta identity.

[spooked911]

11. Flight 23 is a strange story. It sounds like another hijacking all right

But when they ground the plane, the weird part is how five Arab men won't get off the plane.

Does this make sense? I suppose, maybe the men thought they were going to die, and then when the plane was grounded, the men didn't know what to do. Maybe they thought they would make a last stand on the plane.

But here's the kicker:
When they finally got the men off the plane, the men disappeared into the crowd.

How LAME is that? The authorities just LET these guys get away? Potential accomplices to the 9/11 attacks?

You have to wonder how much the authorities really wanted them.

There were also those two Indian men on a flight that was grounded in St. Louis-- they had the MO of hijackers-- but only TWO on the plane? Weird.

The bottom line is that there are just so many mysteries about that day that have been covered up.

[medienanalyse]

14. Dear Paul - are you okay? Fever? Any problems ?

You write:
"I do believe is that the hijackers were laying down a false trail of evidence while in the US."

This explains a lot.

You BELIEVE. No logic, no facts, but belief.

Since we know one another I ask you and the community "where is the evidence that hijackers existed at all?"

I get
- washed fotos
- muffled voices on the radios
- bodies on ice not identified

and hundreds of trails and tracks into the nowhere.

WHO THE HELL LAYS FALSE TRAILS? Have you ANY PROOF that it is a so-called hijacker?

I Have proof enough that the heads of the U.S. government are liars concerning Iraq, concerning Afghanistan and concerning 9/11.

No belief. Evidence.

Nearly all information we obtained about 911 except the very first reports in independent newspapers were spread by FBI and CIA officials. Whenever a newspaper showed fotos of the "hijackers - they got them by - whom? By the "hijackers" ?

Paul - excuse me - but better go for a week for fishing or whatever and rethink if you are trying since years to prove a belief instead of sober and logical evaluation of your OWN findings.

[John Doe II]

12. Here the entry from the book

Here the entry from "Netzwerke des Terrors" (networks of terror) by German journalist Jürgen Roth, p. 9f.

First the German text and then my humble translation. It sounds so much like the Atta we know from Hopsicker's research ....


Das folgende sind keine Erkenntnisse eines Nachrichtensenders, sondern die des Bundeskriminalamtes, BKA. Es war am Donnerstag, dem 15. Februar 2001, als bei der Lufthansa in Frankfurt ein Mann vorstellig wurde. Sein Name: Mohammed Atta, Ägypter, 33 Jahre, ehemaliger Studentan der Technischen Universität Hamburg-Harburg. 1995 liefen einmal gegen ihn Ermittlungen wegen kleinerer Drogendelikte und Fälschungen von Telefonkarten, krimineller Kleinkram. Er bewarb sich an diesem 15. Februar 2001 um eine Sicherheitsstelle der deutschen Airline. Der Personalabteilung überprüfte jedoch, was Atta nicht wissen konnte, insbesondere Arbeitssuchende, die sich für den Sicherheitsbereich bewerben. Und zwar in Frankfurt und Wiesbaden bei den zuständigen Behörden, die im polizeilichen Informationssystem HEPOLIS nachschauen lassen, ob dort Informationen gespeichert sind. „Aufgrund der polizeilichen Erkenntnisse von 1995“, bestätigt mir ein BKA-Beamter, wurde Mohammed Attas Bewerbung abgelehnt.

Drei Tage nach seiner Bewerbung folgte die nächste. Diesmal war es ein iranischer Staatsbürger, der sich auf seinen Freund Atta bezog, nicht wissend, daß er bereits intern abgelehnt war. Am 5. März 2001 bewarb sich eine weitere Person persönlich bei der Lufthansa und zwar in Begleitung von Mohammed Atta. Beide Bewerber wollten die Lufthansa ebenfalls nicht anstellen. Einer von ihnen erklärte übrigens gegenüber der Personalabteilung der Lufthansa, er sei Pilot der pakistanischen Luftwaffe gewesen. Aber auch das nutzte ihm nicht viel.

Zu diesem Zeitpunkt mußten amerikanische Sicherheitsbehörden bereits ein Auge zumindest auf Mohammed Atta geworfen haben. Denn als sich Atta Frankfurt als Arbeitsplatz auswählen wollte, haben ihn CIA-Agenten in Frankfurt observiert. Er habe in Dorgerien und Apotheken große Mengen Chemikalien eingekauft, mit denen sich Sprengstoff herstellen ließ, bestätigten Ermitteler des BKA entsprechende Zeitungsberichte.




The following are not findings of a news channel but the findings of the „Bundeskriminalamt“, BKA (something like Federal Office for criminal investigations).

It was Thursday, February 15, 2001, when a man went to Lufthansa in Frankfurt. His name: Mohammed Atta, agyptian, 33 years old, former student of the Technische Universität Hamburg-Harbug. In 1995 there had been an investigation against him due to small drug offenses and forgeries of telephone cards, criminal trifles. On February 15, 2001 he applied for a security post at the German airline. The personnel departement verified (this atta couldn’t know) especially people seeking work in the security area.

They asked in Frankfurt and Wiesbaden the responsible authorities to check the information system of the police called HEPOLIS, if there had been information saved.

“Based on the findings of the police in 1995” confirmed an official of the BKA to me the application of Mohammed Atta was refused.

Three days after his application followed the next one. This time an Iranian citizen who referred to his friend Atta not knowing that internally Atta was already refused. On March 5, 2001 another person applied to Lufthansa being in company of Atta. Both applicants weren’t accepted by Lufthansa. One of the applicants by the way told the personnel departement that he was a pilot of the Pakistanian Air Force. But that didn’t help him.

At this point the American security agencies must have had an eye at least on Atta. Because when Atta was seeking work in Frankfurt he was observed by CIA agents. He had bought big amounts of chemicals in pharmacies and drug stores. It was possible to build bombs with theses chemicals investigators of the BKA confirmed corresponding newspaper accounts.

[spooked911]

13. So which Atta is this? The mean looking guy in the FBI picture or

the more mild-looking guy seen in some of the Portland photos?

I am fairly confident there were two Attas simply from various chronologies of his movements.