Secretary Mineta Confirms Dick Cheney Ordered Stand Down on 9/11

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Former Transportation Secretary Also Reveals Lynn Cheney Was in Presidential Emergency Bunker, and Contradicts 9/11 Commission Report’s Account of Dick Cheney’s Timetable

Here is the You Tube link for Mineta’s testimony:

http://www.bing.com

Aaron Dykes / JonesReport | June 26, 2007

Former Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta answered questions from members of 9/11 Truth Seattle.org about his testimony before the 9/11 Commission report.

Mineta says Vice President Cheney was “absolutely” already there when he arrived at approximately 9:25 a.m. in the PEOC (Presidential Emergency Operations Center) bunker on the morning of 9/11. Mineta seemed shocked to learn the 9/11 Commission Report claimed Cheney had not arrived there until 9:58– after the Pentagon had been hit, a report that Mineta definitively contradicted.

Norman Mineta revealed that Lynn Cheney was also in the PEOC bunker already at the time of his arrival, along with a number of other staff.
Mineta is on video testifying before the 9/11 Commission, though it was omitted from their final report. He told Lee Hamilton:

“During the time that the airplane was coming into the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say 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!?”
Mineta confirmed his statements with reporters, “When I overheard something about ‘the orders still stand’ and so, what I thought of was that they had already made the decision to shoot something down.”

Mineta was still in the PEOG bunker when the plane was reported down in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

“I remember later on when I heard about the Shanksville plane going down, the Vice President was right across from me, and I said, ‘Do you think that we shot it down ourselves?’ He said, ‘I don’t know.’ He said, ‘Let’s find out.’ So he had someone check with the Pentagon. That was about maybe, let’s say 10:30 or so, and we never heard back from DoD until probably about 12:30.
And they said, ‘No, we didn’t do it.’”

The two hour time delay is suspicious given the Vice President’s own account of the dedicated video communications available that morning, as he told it to Tim Russert of Meet the Press on September 16, 2001 .

“We had access, secured communications with Air Force One, with the secretary of Defense over in the Pentagon. We had also the secure video conference that ties together the White House, CIA, State, Justice, Defense–a very useful and valuable facility. We have the counter-terrorism task force up on that net. And so I was in a position to be able to see all the stuff coming in, receive reports and then make decisions in terms of acting with it.”

At a bare minimum, this confirmation by Norman Mineta constitutes a gross contradiction to the 9/11 Commission Report, and poses serious questions about the Vice President’s role in ordering NORAD to stand down on 9/11.

http://patriotsquestion911.com/#Mineta

Norm Mineta – U.S. Secretary of Transportation 2001 – 2006. U.S. Secretary of Commerce 2000 – 2001. Senior Vice President, Lockheed Martin 1995 – 2000. Former 12-term Congressman from California 1971 – 1995. Currently, Vice Chairman of the Board, Hill & Knowlton.

9/11 Commission testimony 5/23/03: 

Lee Hamilton: We thank you for that. I wanted to focus just a moment on the Presidential Emergency Operating Center [PEOC]. You were there for a good part of the day. I think you were there with the vice president. And when you had that order given, I think it was by the president, that authorized the shooting down of commercial aircraft that were suspected to be controlled by terrorists, were you there when that order was given?

Norm Mineta: “No, I was not. I was made aware of it 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?” Well, at the time I didn’t know what all that meant. And — “

Lee Hamilton: The flight you’re referring to is the–

Norm Mineta: The flight that came into the Pentagon. …http://www.youtube.com (Preview)

Norm Mineta: I didn’t know about the order to shoot down. I arrived at the PEOC at about 9:20 a.m. And the president was in Florida, and I believe he was on his way to Louisiana at that point when the conversation that went on between the vice president and the president and the staff that the president had with him.

Tim Roemer: So when you arrived at 9:20 [at the Presidential Emergency Operating Center in the White House], how much longer was it before you overheard the conversation between the young man and the vice president saying, “Does the order still stand?” 

Norm Mineta: Probably about five or six minutes.

Tim Roemer: So about 9:25 or 9:26. And your inference
was that the vice president snapped his head around and said, “Yes, the order still stands.” Why did you infer that that was a shoot-down?

http://www.youtube.com

Editor’s note: Secretary Mineta’s testimony directly contradicts the 9/11 Commission Report on two key points and it is entirely omitted from the 9/11 Commission Report.

1. Mr. Mineta testified he arrived at the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC) in the White House at 9:20 a.m. and observed Vice President Dick Cheney discussing with an aide that the incoming Flight 77 was 50 miles out at 9:25 or 9:26. The 9/11 Commission Report maintains Vice President Cheney did not arrive at the PEOC until 9:58, over 30 minutes later. Mr. Mineta’s testimony is further supported by the fact that Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37, which is the correct time it would have taken Flight 77 to arrive at the Pentagon, if it had been about 50 miles out at 9:26.

2. The Commission Report maintains the government did not know the whereabouts of Flight 77 prior to 9:32, when Dulles Tower air controllers “observed a primary radar target tracking eastbound at a high rate of speed”.

Mr. Mineta’s testimony reveals Vice President Cheney was being informed of the plane’s position for several minutes before that, and perhaps considerably longer. [Ask yourselves how did anyone on the ground know a random aircraft in flight on that morning intended to strike the Pentagon? There's no possible way anybody could know that-- So why was Dick Cheney so certain the plane should be shot down?]

Also of interest, is that the first approximately 15 minutes of Mr. Mineta’s testimony before the Commission during which he discusses the points mentioned above, have been edited out of the official 9/11 Commission video archives (Panel 1, Friday, May 23. 2003). However, his full testimony does appear in the written transcript.

Bio: http://www.nndb.com/people/649/000024577/