A disturbing testimony
Norman Mineta was the Secretary of Transport during the 9/11 attacks. His testimony before the 9/11 Commission contradicts the 9/11 Commission Report by revealing the fact that Vice President Dick Cheney knew about the aircraft approaching the Pentagon long before the 9/11 Commission Report declared.
According to Mineta, Cheney knew about an aircraft approaching the Pentagon at around 9:27 yet the 9/11 Commission Report claims that the US Military was only informed that the flight was missing at 9:34. This time discrepancy is significant because the Langley fighters could have intercepted the plane approaching the Pentagon if the US Military had been aware of the plane at 9:27 instead of 9:34 [1].
“… during the time that the airplane coming into the Pentagon. There was a young man who had come in and said to the vice president, "The plane is 50 miles out. The plane is 30 miles out." And when it got down to, "The plane is 10 miles out," the young man also said to the vice president, "Do the orders still stand?" And the vice president turned and whipped his neck around and said, "Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?"” [2]
Mineta assumed from his experience in the Military that the orders Cheney was refering to were shoot-down orders. This interpretation would imply that Cheney had given shoot-down authorization at some time before 9:27. But this order was not given before 10:25, according to the 9/11 Commission Report. [3]
Some critics of the official account have suggested, therefore, that the famous "orders still stand" weren't in fact orders to have the plane shot down, but orders NOT to shoot it down prior to it hitting the Pentagon, having 125 employees killed as a result. [see further reading]
9/11 Commission Coverup
Mineta’s account was released in the 9/11 Commission’s staff report in May 2003, but this account is not included, or even mentioned, in the Commission’s final report. The controversial part of Mineta's testimony has even been suppressed from the video archive of the 9/11 Commission. [4]
This omissions provide rather clear evidence that the Commission’s real mission was not to provide the fullest possible account of 9/11 but to defend the account provided by the Bush administration and the Pentagon.
Criticism of Mineta's testimony
Defenders of the official story have tried to discredit Mineta by saying that he got his times mixed up or that actually the conversation he overheard was not about flight 77 (the plane that crashed against the Pentagon at 9h37) but instead about flight 93 (the plane that crashed later in Pensilvania).
Concerning this last claim, Cheney and his assistant couldn't have been talking about United 93 since it crashed approximately 125 miles away from Washington D.C., and therefore, it was never “50 miles out” of the White House, Pentagon, or any other specific target.
Concerning the first claim, it is to point out that Richard Clarke (the chief counter-terrorism adviser) confirms Mineta’s timeline. He clearly states that Mineta joined Cheney in the PEOC (Presidential Emergency Operations Center) before 9:28. He also explains that Cheney would have definitely been in the PEOC well before 9:28. [5]
However, the 9/11 Commission Report places Cheney in the PEOC only at 9h37, coinciding with the Pentagon Strike. The only hard evidence of that entry time cannot be verified (according to the Secret Service, “this time was based on alarm data, which is no longer retrievable”). [6]
The changing official story of the Military’s response
Since September 18th, 2001 and for nearly two years, the US Military oficial version didn't contradict Mineta's timeline. The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) stated that they had been notified of flight 77 at 9:24, immediately scrambling their fighters afther the hijacked plane. [7]
When the 9/11 Commission revised the new Military’s timeline (according to which NORAD was only informed that the flight was missing at 9:34) it made no attempt to adequately explain how the earlier timelines were so inaccurate, and the Final Report completely omitted contradicting testimony, including Norman Mineta’s.
These two articles analyse thoroughly the implications of Mineta's testimony, concluding that the "orders still stand" were actually stand down orders.
John C. Ekonomou. "Mineta, Cheney and the orders still stand@ controversy". http://www.journalof911studies.com/letters/OrderRegardingAA77HittingPentagonOn911.pdf
Adam Letalik. "Norman Mineta and Richard Clarke Contradict the 9/11 Commission Report": http://www.journalof911studies.com/letters/AdamMinetaClarkePaper.pdf
References
[1]↑ David Ray Griffin. "Flights 11, 175, 77, and 93: The 9/11 Commission's Incredible Tales". http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20051205150219651 (search for the text "NORAD's explanation of its failure to protect the Pentagon")
[2]↑ Full transcript of Norman Mineta's testimony: http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/archive/hearing2/9-11Commission_Hearing_2003-05-23.htm (search for the text "do the orders still stand")
[3]↑ 9/11 Commission Report, chapter 1: http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/report/911Report_Ch1.htm (search for the text "authority to shoot down aircraft")
[4]↑ 9/11 Commission video archive of Norman Mineta's testimony, where the "orders still stand" part has been edited out: http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/archive/hearing2/index.htm (the video of "Day Two: Friday, May 23, 2003, Panel 1" starts after the polemic statements of Mineta: search for the text "MR. LEHMAN: Mr. Secretary" in the transcript)
[5]↑ Richard Clarke. "Against all enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror". 2004. pp 77. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743260244/centerforcoop-20 Extract available at: http://www.journalof911studies.com/letters/AdamMinetaClarkePaper.pdf (search for the text "Richard Clarke’s Book:")
[6]↑ 9/11 Comission Report Notes: http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report_Notes.htm (search for the text "Secret Service personnel told us")
[7]↑ Web archived version (August 8th, 2003) of NORAD official site: http://web.archive.org/web/20030809155434/http:/www.norad.mil/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.news_rel_09_18_01 (note that it is a cached version of a page that doesn't exist anymore in the original site. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_archive for more information about web archiving)
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