OK then. Just the facts. 9-11

[William Seger]

74. Nonsense

Approaching from the west, the plane did not "pass up" either the White House or the Capital in D.C.; the Pentagon is west of D.C. in Virginia. Hanjour approached at about 7000 feet until he had visual identification of the Pentagon, then did a slow, wobbly spiral to lose altitude without gaining too much speed, then plowed into the Pentagon from the south-west. Rumsfield's office was on the east side.

> So back to Nr. 1 - Don't gloss over the main point - do you believe the terrorists just happened to pick the same day as the exercises-that that was just a coincidence?

Lots of issues with this one. First, the primary exercise that the others were coordinated with, Global Guardian, was a two-week exercise into its second week, so the attack wasn't "the same day" as the exercises. Second, the military has exercises throughout the year, so it's not nearly as much coincidence as you seem to think. Third, the exercises are NOT secret -- e.g. Air National Guard participants need to schedule time off from work -- so it's possible that it wasn't a coincidence; that the terrorists knew about the exercises and independently decided to schedule the attack at that time. But fourth, that would be a rather stupid thing to do, simply hoping that the exercises interfered with a response rather than aided a response, since lots of people were already on-station and active. In fact, the 9/11 Commission found that if anything, the military response was faster because the exercise were underway. So, the fundamental premise behind this "reason" is seriously flawed.

But there's another problem when both of your points are considered together: They don't tell a consistent story on their own, and you haven't offered one. The point about the exercises would seem to imply LIHOP while the point about where the plane hit the Pentagon would seem to imply MIHOP. (I admit to guessing what you meant to imply, since you didn't really say.) If both of these points are so convincing to you, which is it -- LIHOP or MIHOP? Or can you fit both of your points into a plausible narrative?