Almost half of the Pentagon has to be evacuated because of a small but smoky fire there. [CNN, 8/2/2001] The three-alarm fire apparently starts early in the afternoon, in electrical wires near the loading dock behind a food service area, between two main corridors. [United Press International, 8/2/2001] It starts on the building’s first floor but extends up to the second floor. [CNN, 8/2/2001] It spreads into the return air duct system, causing smoke to disperse through a fifth of the building. Seventeen vehicles respond to it, and it is put out with extinguishers and a minimal amount of water. About 8,000 Pentagon workers are forced to evacuate from the building, but no one suffers any injury. [United Press International, 8/2/2001] Reportedly, the fire provides “the Pentagon’s most relevant experience in dealing with the Flight 77 attack” on 9/11. It is one of the first real tests for the Pentagon’s new Building Operations Command Center (BOCC), which opened two months earlier, on June 4. [Microsoft Executive Circle, 2006] Steve Carter, the assistant building manager, will later recall that due to this fire, when the Pentagon is hit on 9/11 the emergency drill is “fresh in everybody’s mind.” Consequently his building maintenance and operations workers are able to “immediately [start] those same steps again.” [Washington Post, 9/11/2006] And in response to this fire, Paul Haselbush, the director of real estate and facilities at the Pentagon, will direct his staff to update their emergency plans. As a result, his continuity of operations plan will be fresh in his mind when the attack occurs on 9/11. [Goldberg et al., 2007, pp. 143]
August 2-3, 2001: Taliban Official Predicts US Will Invade Afghanistan by Mid-October, Possibly in Response to Major Attack Inside US
A senior official in the Taliban’s defense ministry tells journalist Hamid Mir that the US will soon invade Afghanistan. Mir will later recall that he is told, “[W]e believe Americans are going to invade Afghanistan and they will do this before October 15, 2001, and justification for this would be either one of two options: Taliban got control of Afghanistan or a big major attack against American interests either inside America or elsewhere in the world.” Mir reports this information before 9/11, presumably in the newspaper in Pakistan that he works for. [Bergen, 2006, pp. 287] Interestingly, Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar made a similar prediction to Mir several months before (see April 2001). Also, several weeks earlier, US officials reportedly passed word to Taliban officials in a back channel meeting that the US may soon attack Afghanistan if the Taliban do not cooperate on building an oil and gas pipeline running through the country. According to one participant in the meeting, the US attack would take place “by the middle of October at the latest” (see July 21, 2001).
August 3, 2001: Florida Police Fail to Notice Arrest Warrant for 9/11 Hijacker Atta
9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta’s rental car is queried by police in Broward County, Florida. This incident is added to the NCIC, a widely used nationwide police database. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 10/2001, pp. 204 
] On June 4, a Florida warrant was issued for Atta’s arrest, as he skipped court following a previous traffic offense (see June 4, 2001). It is not clear why the existing arrest warrant does not raise a red flag, since he rented the car in his own name.
August 4, 2001: Air Defense Exercise Involves the Scenario of Bin Laden Using a Drone Aircraft to Attack Washington
NORAD’s Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) runs a training exercise called Fertile Rice, based on the scenario of Osama bin Laden attacking a prominent target in the Washington, DC, area, using an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) armed with a fuel-air explosive. An information sheet for the exercise will describe the scenario. “According to reliable sources,” it will state, “operatives of Osama bin Laden will attack a highly visible US government target within the next 24-36 hours. Specifically, the terrorist will utilize an unmanned aerial vehicle, believed to be the Russian-developed Colibri, modified to be launched off a ship.” Bin Laden has acquired at least one, and perhaps two, Colibri UAVs. The plans for the Colibri may have been illegally purchased by his agents posing as Iranian Air Force representatives. The terrorists’ exact target is unknown, but “unconfirmed reports” suggest it is in the Washington area.
Drone Has Electronic Jamming Equipment – The Colibri is a propeller-driven remotely piloted vehicle that is designed to perform a wide variety of military and civilian missions. It is 4.25 meters long, has a wingspan of 5.9 meters, and its maximum speed is 155 miles per hour. The aircraft bin Laden has obtained in the scenario is reportedly fitted with sophisticated electronic jamming equipment, as well as equipment for monitoring electronic communications and radar.
Ship Carrying the Drone Left from a Port in the Middle East – The ship carrying the Colibri left a port in the Middle East about two weeks ago in the scenario and is set to rendezvous with an unspecified person off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia, on August 4. This person will provide the final targeting information that will be programmed into the Colibri. The ship is reportedly also carrying a dozen shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles, rocket-propelled grenades, automatic weapons, and unspecified types of plastic explosives.
Drone Is Carrying a Highly Destructive Explosive – The Colibri’s “weapon payload” in the scenario is reportedly a type of fuel-air explosive. [Northeast Air Defense Sector, 8/4/2001; Northeast Air Defense Sector, 8/5/2001] Fuel-air explosives are highly destructive. They “disperse an aerosol cloud of fuel, which is ignited by an embedded detonator to produce an explosion,” according to the Federation of American Scientists. The “rapidly expanding wavefront” that results from the explosion “flattens all objects within close proximity of the epicenter of the aerosol fuel cloud and produces debilitating damage well beyond the flattened area.” [Federation of American Scientists, 2/5/1998]
Weekly Exercise Includes Simulated Hijackings – Fertile Rice is a NEADS command post exercise (CPX). [North American Aerospace Defense Command, 8/25/1989] (A CPX is defined by the Department of Defense as a type of exercise “in which the forces are simulated, involving the commander, the staff, and communications within and between headquarters.” [US Department of Defense, 11/8/2010 ] ) Fertile Rice exercises are held weekly at NEADS prior to 9/11, according to Master Sergeant Joe McCain, the NEADS mission crew commander technician. They routinely involve simulated aircraft hijackings, although multiple hijack scenarios are never included. Occasionally the aircraft that is hijacked has taken off from within the United States. Sometimes the scenario takes place over land and at other times it takes place over water. These large-scale exercises include at least seven “targets,” according to McCain, although what the targets might be is unstated. [9/11 Commission, 10/28/2003; 9/11 Commission, 10/28/2003 ] NEADS, based in Rome, New York, is responsible for protecting the airspace in which the hijackings take place on September 11 and will therefore be responsible for coordinating the US military’s response to the hijackings. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 17; Vanity Fair, 8/1/2006; Shenon, 2008, pp. 203]
August 4, 2001: Nothing New in Letter from President Bush to Pakistani President Musharraf
President Bush sends a letter to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, warning him about supporting the Taliban. However, the tone is similar to past requests dating to the Clinton administration. There had been some discussion that US policy toward Pakistan should change. For instance, at the end of June, counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke “urged that the United States [should] think about what it would do after the next attack, and then take that position with Pakistan now, before the attack.” [9/11 Commission, 3/24/2004] Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage later acknowledges that a new approach to Pakistan is not yet implemented by 9/11 (see January-September 10, 2001 and Early June 2001). [9/11 Commission, 3/24/2004 Sources: Richard Armitage]
August 4, 2001: Possible 20th Hijacker Al-Khatani Is Denied Entry to US
A Saudi named Mohamed al-Khatani is stopped at the Orlando, Florida, airport and denied entry to the US. Jose Melendez-Perez, the customs official who stops him, later says he was suspicious of al-Khatani because he had arrived with no return ticket, no hotel reservations, spoke little English, behaved menacingly, and offered conflicting information on the purpose of his travel. At one point, al-Khatani said that someone was waiting for him elsewhere at the airport. After 9/11, surveillance cameras show that Mohamed Atta was at the Orlando airport that day. 9/11 Commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste says: “It is extremely possible and perhaps probable that [al-Khatani] was to be the 20th hijacker.” Al-Khatani boards a return flight to Saudi Arabia. He is later captured in Afghanistan and sent to a US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (see December 2001). Melendez-Perez says that before 9/11, customs officials were discouraged by their superiors from hassling Saudi travelers, who were seen as big spenders. [Los Angeles Times, 1/27/2004; Time, 6/12/2005] Al-Khatani will later confess to being sent to the US by 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed (KSM) (see July 2002), and in June 2001 US intelligence was warned that KSM was sending operatives to the US to meet up with those already there (see June 12, 2001).
August 4, 2001: 9/11 Hijacker Jarrah Again Phones Islamic Jihad Leader Wanted for Murder in Egypt
Future 9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah telephones Ayub Usama Saddiq Ali, an imam and an Islamic Jihad leader wanted for murder in Egypt. No details about the call are known except that it lasts 13 minutes. Jarrah also called Ali in November 1999 (see November 7, 1999). Ali was convicted of murder in Egypt in 1996, but he fled to Muenster, Germany, and received political asylum there in October 1999. Also in October 1999, Ali was on a published list of the Egyptian government’s most wanted terrorists (see October 2, 1999), and he is said to be a close associate of al-Qaeda second in command Ayman al-Zawahiri. Jarrah’s two phone calls to Ali will be mentioned in a classified 2002 FBI report about the 9/11 hijackers, but it is unclear how or when the FBI learns about the calls. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1/11/2002; Vidino, 2006, pp. 230; Bild, 3/10/2011]
Ali Attended a Monitored Terror Summit in Italy – On August 12, 2000, Ali attended a terrorist summit in Bologna, Italy, that lasted for several days and was monitored by the Italian government (see August 12, 2000 and Shortly After). Also attending the summit were Mahmoud Es Sayed, another close associate of al-Zawahiri (see Before Spring 2000) and Yemeni government official Abdulsalam Ali Abdulrahman. On their way to the summit, Es Sayed and Abdulrahman were overheard discussing an attack using aircraft, indicating they have some level of foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks (see August 12, 2000). Also attending the summit was Mohammed Fazazi, the imam of the Al-Quds mosque in Hamburg, Germany, that Jarrah and other members of the al-Qaeda Hamburg cell regularly attend (see Early 1996 and (April 1, 1999)). Fazazi will be convicted of a role in a bombing in Casablanca, Morocco, in 2003 (see May 16, 2003). The summit was organized by the Islamic Cultural Institute, which is the epicenter of an al-Qaeda cell in Milan, Italy, that was heavily monitored by the Italian government at the time (see 2000). [Vidino, 2006, pp. 230] It is not known if the Italian government warned the German government of Ali’s presence at this summit, or if Ali was monitored by anyone in Germany after it.
Asylum Status Later Stripped – Beginning in 2007, the German government will attempt to strip Ali of his asylum status because of his link to Islamic Jihad. He will lose that status in 2011, but is not subsequently deported from Germany. [Deutsche Presse-Agentur (Hamburg), 3/9/2011; Bild, 3/10/2011]
August 4-30, 2001: Bush Nearly Sets Record for Longest Presidential Vacation
President Bush spends most of August 2001 at his Crawford, Texas, ranch, nearly setting a record for the longest presidential vacation. While it is billed a “working vacation,” news organizations report that Bush is doing “nothing much” aside from his regular daily intelligence briefings. [ABC News, 8/3/2001; Washington Post, 8/7/2001; Salon, 8/29/2001] One such unusually long briefing at the start of his trip is a warning that bin Laden is planning to attack in the US (see August 6, 2001), but Bush spends the rest of that day fishing. By the end of his trip, Bush has spent 42 percent of his presidency at vacation spots or en route. [Washington Post, 8/7/2001] At the time, a poll shows that 55 percent of Americans say Bush is taking too much time off. [USA Today, 8/7/2001] Vice President Cheney also spends the entire month in a remote location in Wyoming. [Jackson Hole News and Guide, 8/15/2001]
August 4-5, 2001: Phoenix Memo Agent Vets Bush PDB, Fails to Add Relevant Information, Does Not Contact Phoenix Office
The CIA officers who draft a presidential daily briefing (PDB) item given to George Bush on August 6 (see August 6, 2001) ask an FBI agent for additional information and also to review a draft of the memo, but she does not provide all the additional information she could. The 9/11 Commission will refer to the FBI agent as “Jen M,” so she is presumably Jennifer Maitner, an agent with the Osama bin Laden unit at FBI headquarters. The purpose of the memo is to communicate to the president the intelligence community’s view that the threat of attacks by bin Laden is both current and serious. But Maitner fails to add some important information that she has: around the end of July, she was informed of the Phoenix memo, which suggests that an inordinate number of bin Laden-related Arabs are taking flying lessons in the US (see July 10, 2001). She does not link this to the portion of the memo discussing aircraft hijackings. Responsibility for dealing with the Phoenix memo is formally transferred to her on August 7, when she reads the full text. The finished PDB item discusses the possibility bin Laden operatives may hijack an airliner and says that there are “patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings.” It is unclear whether the draft PDB item Maitner reviews contains this information. However, if it does, it apparently does not inspire her to take any significant action on the memo before 9/11, such as contacting the agents in Phoenix to notify them of the preparations for hijackings (see July 27, 2001 and after). The PDB will contain an error, saying that the FBI was conducting 70 full field investigations of bin Laden-related individuals (see August 6, 2001), but this error is added after Maitner reviews the draft, so she does not have the opportunity to remove it. [9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 260-2, 535; US Department of Justice, 11/2004, pp. 69-77 ]
August 6, 2001: Perle’s Concern About Iraq, North Korea, and Iran Before 9/11 Becomes Axis of Evil Afterward
Richard Perle, head of the Defense Policy Board and foreign policy adviser to Bush, is asked about new challenges now that the Cold War is over. He cites three: “We’re concerned about Saddam Hussein, We’re concerned about the North Koreans, about some future Iranian government that may have the weapon they’re now trying so hard to acquire…” [Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 8/6/2001] Note that these three nations are the same three named in Bush’s famous January 2002 “axis of evil” speech (see January 29, 2002). [US President, 2/4/2002]
