posted on November 5, 2001 10:01:06 AM new
"In the early months of 1962, General Lyman Lemnitzer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs
under President Kennedy, wanted a war. Part of a cabal of extreme right wing anti-communist Cold Warriors
within the Pentagon, General Lemnitzer believed Kennedy had gone soft on communism and Castro.
Kennedy had put any and all provocative action against Cuba on hold, and ordered only the gathering of
intelligence data. (Information regarding Operation Northwoods was provided by James Bamford's book,
"Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency," pp. 82–91)
For, General Lemnitzer, this was totally unacceptable. Further frustrated by the fact that Castro himself had
failed to do anything that would demand an invasion of Cuba, General Lemnitzer and his cabal planned an
action called Operation Northwoods. Bluntly, this operation called for acts of terrorism within the United
States perpetrated by agents of the United states loyal to Lemnitzer.
A plan, crafted in exquisite detail, was drafted describing the scope of Operation Northwoods, and was later
signed in approval by all of the Joint Chiefs. Citizens would be shot in the streets. Boats of Cuban refugees
would be sunk on the high seas. Bombings would be perpetrated within Washington, DC, and Miami. There
were even plans to fake the hijacking, and later the destruction, of a civilian aircraft.
Phony evidence would then be provided pointing a finger at Castro. The American people, in their outrage,
would demand a full invasion of Cuba. General Lemnitzer would have his war.
Needless to say, Operation Northwoods was never put into effect. When directly asked by Congress
whether plans were afoot for the invasion of Cuba, General Lemnitzer swore an oath and said no. Eventually,
he was removed from his position. Operation Northwoods became buried under subsequent events, a
forgotten idea for more than 40 years.
It is an appalling thing to know that such an idea could even be spoken aloud in the Pentagon. It is
comforting to believe General Lemnitzer was on the lunatic fringe, a man obsessed with Cuba to such a
degree that he would be willing to attack his fellow citizens to create the false pretext for war.
Yet, Operation Northwoods was signed off on by all the Joint Chiefs of Staff, leading to the inevitable
conclusion that this cavalier and bloodthirsty attitude towards the lives and safety of American citizens and
military personnel was not the exception, but the rule.
This is but one story of our government, of the men behind the curtain. It took 40 years for this story to be
told. The reason why such an insidious plot was hidden so completely and for so long from the eyes of the
American people lies within the trust we give to the agencies that are supposed to stand in defense of our
country. We give the Pentagon, the National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency, and to a
lesser extent the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the widest possible latitude with vital information, all in
the interest of national security.
Today, a war is being fought in Afghanistan and on our own soil. Before the snow flies, it may well expand
into a variety of other countries. The purpose of the war is as clear as the twisted rubble at the end of Lower
Manhattan, as clear as the smashed and gutted section of the Pentagon. Terrorism has arrived on American
shores, and those who perpetrated these acts must be brought to justice.
We have been told that this is a "new type of war," where secrecy is paramount. The news media has been
cut almost completely out of the information loop, relegated to reporting on grainy green videotapes of
nothing highlighted by almost nothing. Those who operate in this new theater do so under the cover of
complete darkness.
In light of Operation Northwoods, in light of the legacy of men like General Lemnitzer, and in light of
recently revealed information regarding warnings about the Sept. 11 attacks that were received and virtually
ignored by the CIA and FBI, the question of whether our government deserves that cloak of secrecy must be
voiced in the strongest possible terms.
According to CIA agents interviewed by the Los Angeles Times, who refused to give their names, a warning
about two "bin Laden related individuals" was transmitted to the FBI on Aug. 27, 2001. The information was
classified as "Immediate," one step below the "Flash" warning reserved for the outbreak of war.
Somewhere in the translation, according to the CIA, the veneer of urgency was dropped from the document.
The FBI failed to apprehend Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Alhazmi, two men named in the CIA warning who
later crashed an airliner into the Pentagon, killing 189 people.
What is disquieting is the simple fact that this warning did exist, and was bungled. The INS was not given the
information in a timely fashion, and was unable to block the entry of Almihdhar and Alhazmi, which it could
well have done.
The State Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs was likewise kept uninformed of the threat and warning.
This bureau is responsible for issuing visas to foreign visitors, and in fact gave one to suspected terrorist
Mohamed Atta, because the information was not shared. The head of the Consular Affairs Bureau, Mary
Ryan, commented angrily before Congress that she was "surprised how much we learned in the immediate
aftermath" of Sept. 11.
Likewise, the airline industry could have been warned to stop passengers with names matching those on the
alert from boarding any aircraft, had they been provided the information. None of this happened. The
terrorists managed to walk through a wide variety of governmental firewalls, up the ramps to those aircraft,
and into the cockpits unmolested.
At this point, the questions must turn to dark corners, places from whence monstrous plots like Operation
Northwoods have sprung.
A former Los Angeles Police Department field officer and narcotics agent named Michael C. Ruppert, who
twice turned down recruitment overtures from the CIA before being forced out of the department for
questioning CIA involvement in civil police affairs, has leveled some disturbing accusations.
Some very strange transactions regarding United and American Airlines took place in the days before the
Sept. 11 attacks. Similarly odd transactions took place regarding Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, and a
variety of other prominent companies who made their homes in the World Trade Center towers. These
transactions, made in astoundingly large volume, were essentially betting that certain stocks would lose an
enormous amount of value.
On Sept. 11, planes from United Airlines and American Airlines crashed into the World Trade Center and
those stocks immediately sank. Whoever made the transactions reaped an enormous profit: $16 million
alone for trades on the airline stocks.
Mr. Ruppert was interviewed recently by Kellia Ramares and Bonnie Faulkner on "Guns and Butter" that
aired on KPFA in Berkeley, on the subject of the CIA's involvement with Wall Street. He provided the
following information:
"One of the primary functions of the Central Intelligence Agency by virtue of its long and very close history
of relationships with Wall Street, I mean to the point where the current executive vice president of the New
York Stock Exchange is a retired CIA general counsel, has had a mandate to track, monitor, all financial
markets worldwide, to look for anomalous trades, indicative of either economic warfare, or insider currency
trading or speculation which might affect the US Treasury, or, as in the case of the Sept. 11 attacks, to look
for trades which indicated foreknowledge of attacks like we saw.
"One of the vehicles that they use to do this is a software called Promis software, which was developed in
1979 . . . and Promis is very unique for two reasons: first of all, it had the ability to integrate a wide range of
databases using different computer languages and to make them all into one readable format. And secondly,
in the years since, Promis has been mated with artificial intelligence to even predict moves in markets and to
detect trades that are anomalous, as a result of those projections."
Mr. Ruppert said that the CIA, with all of its abilities and with its careful observation of financial
transactions, should have seen the Sept. 11 attacks coming a mile away. He further asserted that the CIA let
the attacks happen to further the economic and military agenda of the current administration.
The first assertion, that the CIA should have been able to detect a pattern in the financial trades and been
able to act in the defense of the country, connects nicely with the botched warning of Aug. 27. The terrible
scenario that develops is that the CIA, with its budget declared a state secret and with all of the trust given
in the name of national security, failed in spectacular fashion to do its job.
The second assertion, that the CIA knew of the attacks and allowed them to happen in order to provide
inertia for a variety of governmental agendas, is almost blasphemous in its implications. Only the existence
of plans like those delineated in Operation Northwoods makes the accusation even worth consideration.
The first assertion gives birth to the second. How could such a powerful and far-seeing agency like the CIA
have so thoroughly failed to perceive and thwart such a monstrous threat, unless that ignorance was
deliberate?
One thing is certain. Every agency tasked with the care and protection of this nation failed in its duty on
Sept. 11, and thousands of Americans died as a result. The justification for the billions of dollars in
budgetary allocations these agencies receive from our tax dollars has disappeared in a ball of flaming dust.
Unless and until this catastrophe is set right, these agencies will no longer deserve our trust or our money.
As for the assertions above raised, assertions that use words like "complicity" and "foreknowledge," they
will not go away. Operation Northwoods makes anything and everything possible. Until this matter is settled
appropriately, the CIA stands in taint of high treason and murder. It's time to pay attention to the man
behind the curtain."
posted on November 5, 2001 10:30:06 AM newNeedless to say, Operation Northwoods was never put into effect.
Are we sure about that? I wonder. There's been talk for years here in South Florida that undercover activities by ex-Cubans similar to ones described in the above article were not only encouraged by the PTB in Washington, but actually attempted or carried out.
posted on November 5, 2001 10:53:39 AM new
Tight knit group of harcore fanatics, that crowd. Some of their planning was implemented or attempted. There was/is involvement to the highest levels of our government--that guy was the chairman of the joint chiefs, after all, and little was allowed to stand in their way for years.
Very interesting and blatant coverup done friday by dumbya, wasn't it? The records of the Reagan administration were overdue, since Jan. 8th, for release under the freedom of information laws and presidential papers treaty of 1978 and now won't be. The bush administration has been stalling the release for months, and now when they've run out of reasons to stall he does this, Those records contain the names and activities of many of the players of today's administration as well as all of the records of daddy bush's doings as VP for reagan. Pitt has done another piece about that monkey business.
posted on November 5, 2001 05:10:10 PM new
Not bad as far as conspiracy theories go, but what evidence is presented other than a reference to ten pages from someone's book? Terrorism exists, independent of the U.S. For example, the Palestinian gunman who opened fire on a busload of civilians yesterday. The NSA again? Not likely.
posted on November 5, 2001 06:38:16 PM new
Wow did the country go down hill in a year or what? 4 years ago bill clinton was re-elected president. Too bad we must wait 3 more to elect another. We dont have one now.
