Yet Another 9/11 Coincidence/Oddity

Members of New York's Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) were predicting, almost two years before 9/11, that terrorists would fly planes into the World Trade Center. JTTF members described their prediction to best-selling thriller writer Nelson DeMille while he was interviewing them as part of the research for his novel The Lion's Game.

The Lion's Game, written in 1999 and published in January 2000, is about a ruthless Libyan terrorist, known as "The Lion," who comes to the United States and goes on a killing spree. In an introduction to the paperback reissue of the book in 2010, DeMille explained that when he interviewed members of the New York JTTF during his research for the book, he kept hearing about "the next attack." Nearly two years before 9/11, the JTTF members told him that the "World Trade Center would again be targeted, and the attack would be carried out by suicide pilots, flying small private jets loaded with fuel and explosives, which would be flown into the North and South Towers of the Trade Center." [2] (snip)

The New York JTTF was established in 1980, to improve coordination between the FBI and the New York Police Department in the fight against terrorism. [3] The task force, which had exclusive jurisdiction over local terrorism investigations, began with 11 FBI investigators and 11 members of the NYPD. But by 1999 it had grown to more than 140 members and included personnel from numerous other agencies, including the Port Authority Police Department, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the Secret Service. [4] It also included more than a dozen CIA officers. [5] The New York JTTF was, according to the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, "on the forefront of the war against terrorism." [6]

DeMille told talk radio host Glenn Beck that while conducting research for The Lion's Game, he had been at 26 Federal Plaza, where the New York JTTF was located, and, he recalled, "Just in passing we were talking about the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center." DeMille had asked the JTTF members: "What do you think the next attack would be? Will there be another attack?" They replied that the target of the next terrorist attack in the United States would be the World Trade Center again. They said, "Look, they missed and they're gonna do it next time." [7] (snip)

DeMille pointed out to the JTTF members, "Well, you know, this car bomb in the basement [used in the 1993 attack] really didn't do much." They replied: "No, no, no. It's gonna be Learjets." [9] (Learjets are small private aircraft.) They said there would be "two or three or four Learjets" used in the attack. [10] These planes, they said, would be "full of explosives and full of gasoline." The JTTF members, according to DeMille, were "positive" that that next terrorist attack in the U.S. "was gonna be Learjets full of explosives." The Learjets would be flown by "suicide pilots" into "both towers" of the World Trade Center. [11] And the pilots would be "guys who know how to fly and not [how] to land." [12]

TASK FORCE MEMBERS 'KNEW' THE WORLD TRADE CENTER WOULD BE THE TARGET OF THE NEXT ATTACK

The JTTF members also said they "knew" the target of the attack "was gonna be the World Trade Center. They were pretty definite about that." DeMille asked: "Why not any other iconic landmark? Why not the Empire State Building?" The JTTF members replied that the terrorists would be "looking for maximum death." DeMille pointed out to talk radio host John Gambling, "The Empire State Building doesn't have as many people, obviously, as the Twin Towers." DeMille then asked the JTTF members, "How about something like the Statue of Liberty?" but they told him that the terrorists were "not after symbols or icons. They're after maximum death." [13]

DeMille told the New York Times that the members of the JTTF "were all obsessed with the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, and they were convinced we'd be attacked again." [14] He similarly told the Egyptian newspaper Al-Masry Al-Youm that he "interviewed many people in the FBI, the Joint Terrorism Task Force, and a few people in the CIA," and they "all knew the World Trade Center would be attacked again." [15] Furthermore, DeMille said, the JTTF members "knew that Arabs were training in the United States to fly small planes." [16] (snip)

NOVEL INCLUDES TERRORIST ATTACK ON 'FLIGHT 175' BOUND FOR NEW YORK

Despite what he was told by the members of the JTTF, DeMille did not include the scenario of terrorists crashing planes into the WTC in The Lion's Game. Curiously, though, the novel begins with The Lion carrying out a terrorist attack on a "Flight 175" that is bound for New York.

Very interesting about the small planes, since there were several witnesses who claimed to see a small plane crash into the WTC on 9/11... Obviously, overall this is a limited hangout type disclosure, but indicates the JTTF intel agents were likely planning the 9/11 attacks at this point.

The use of the name flight 175 has got to be significant, perhaps the JTTF agents read the book and used that name as an homage to DeMille? Who knows...