TOPOFF 4: A Teachable Moment for Portland and America
The Dismissals of October
A few weeks ago, our local paper The Oregonian printed an editorial to marginalize and shrug off those of us with concerns about the largest ever terrorism drills, TOPOFF 4 and VIGILANT SHIELD 08, to be staged in our city of Portland, Oregon starting Monday. You can read it here, but for those on a time budget I'll get right to the O's debate-avoiding, but predictable, slight of our concerns:
It's hard to know what's scarier: the idea of responding to a terrorist attack in Portland or the idea that the government is using a drill as a pretext to seize power, declare martial law and, possibly, attack Iran. The average Portlander doesn't give much thought to either notion, but a feverish fringe sees a disaster drill as evidence of a future police state.
This is the standard, obligatory dismissal we've come to expect from The Oregonian toward the large activist community in Portland. We are a diverse array of ordinary citizens that tends to take issue when, say, an unelected, criminal regime runs roughshod over our Constitution for almost seven years without any discernible opposition from Congress, the Judiciary or the Press. In fact we don't see the drills as "evidence" of a future police state, but just another episode in the ongoing series "American Idle: Watch Your Own Country Go Fascist." Wouldn't it be fair, though, to expect a line or two -- even just one sentence -- stating the historical foundation for citizens' concerns, before they are dismissed wholesale as "lathered" "feverish" and "fringe," as has become The Oregonian's custom?
We've tried in earnest to share with The Oregonian and all Oregon citizens the historical, factual basis for our concerns here at the Oregon Truth Alliance first with our press release on NOBLE RESOLVE in August and then our piece "Here's the Drill" concerning TOPOFF 4. Some of us spoke with and met Joseph Rose, an Oregonian staff writer, and shared historical background articles and DVD's with him, including the informative video posted at http://blip.tv/file/426817.
But none of this information ever made it through. It's as if there is shield surrounding the O to block out uncomfortable facts that might disturb the official storyline. Our role, according to the O, is to be "lathered," to stay on the "fringe" -- in other words we must be depicted as irrational, not as ordinary, average citizens who examine history, motives and facts and have reasons for the concerns we raise. But, because the facts we raise don't jibe with the official 9/11 conspiracy theory (that nineteen Arabs with boxcutters and a guy on dialysis in a cave -- all on their own -- broke through the world's most powerful and sophisticated air defenses) therefore they can't be discussed. To question the 9/11 story might upset reader sensibilities. After all, there is nothing that pisses off Americans more than finding out they've been "had."
But we hoped to at least spark a debate on the merits -- a look at the sordid history of military drills and their connection with false flag terrorism in the Bush era. I even prepared a commentary piece, printed below, and sent it in to the Oregonian a week ago on October 8th. It hasn't been printed yet, but it is possible I've already had my quota of newsprint for the year. The O printed a piece of mine about secret election software in May. If that is why they didn't print it, that is understandable. But it just seems that this issue, the fact of another round of huge linked terrorism drills and wargame exercises, just like those held on 9/11, is really an important teachable moment for Americans, isn't it? Shouldn't we examine these exercises in depth to find out what they are really all about and also look at their history?
I don't know about any of you, but the disaster I fear most is already here, and that is the willful, institutional, mass media fostered ignorance of the documented facts and history surrounding the events of 9/11. The most dangerous aspect of that ignorance is the failure to recognize that the large-scale military training drills underway during 9/11, overseen by Richard Cheney, are what made the catastrophic events of 9/11 possible. By handy coincidence or by design, they served as the "New Pearl Harbor" the neocons openly hoped for in writing and that paved the way for the Bush regime's endless "War on Terror."
Now, despite our dismissal by the O, here is the opinion piece that I hoped would be printed to kick start a public debate on the uncomfortable truths about the 9//11 military drills and wargames and their parallels with TOPOFF 4.
I hope the Oregonian will see its way clear to printing this piece. The truth about 9/11 is a matter all Americans must face sooner or later.
Terror Drills Past and Present: Various Shades of Improbable
In finding us "feverish" about the upcoming terrorism drills in Oregon, the Oregonian got our symptoms wrong ("Different shades of unthinkable" 10/2/07). It's not fevers we suffer over TOPOFF and VIGILANT SHIELD, but a bad case of flashbacks. Our worries that drills can turn "live" stem from historical facts. During the September 11, 2001 attacks and the July 7, 2005 London bombings, parts of exercise scripts did, in fact, become real events. Now that drills involving nuclear explosions and martial law are coming to Oregon, we think a frank look at this history is in order.
In May of 2001, Bush placed Cheney in charge of nuclear terrorism response training. On the morning of 9/11, multiple military wargames and terrorism drills were underway. Vigilant Warrior, Vigilant Guardian, Northern Guardian and Northern Vigilance, to name a few, all served to either divert attention from, or paralyze, US responses to the attacks.
Northern Vigilance diverted many jets to the North Pole on an outdated Cold War scenario. When northeast sector air traffic controllers saw commercial jets off course, they immediately notified the FAA, which alerted NORAD. Due to the drill, NORAD had very few jets to scramble, and none turned a wheel for over 80 minutes. That is 70 minutes slower than normal.
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