In the first half, veteran airline captain Philip Marshall revealed the connections between the 9/11 hijackers and the Saudi Arabian intelligence community. Lead investigator of the Congressional Joint Inquiry, Senator Bob Graham, uncovered such a relationship and has filed a lawsuit against Saudi Arabia for their role in the attack, Marshall said. The hijackers were in contact with Saudi Arabian aviation experts, he continued, adding that "none of the official evidence mentions any kind of role by bin Laden and al-Qaeda." Marshall dismissed theories that the Pentagon was struck by a missile, though he acknowledged that the incredible speed at which the plane was traveling (480 knots) would have made it sound and even appear like a missile attack. Photographic evidence shows Boeing engine turbines inside the Pentagon, as well as wing fairings and other metallic wreckage with American Airline's paint job, he noted. There is no doubt that American Flight 77 hit the Pentagon, Marshall stated.
He spoke about the extraordinary skill required to pilot a Boeing 757 at high speeds at low altitude, and to navigate the aircraft to a single building from 270 miles away (distance when hijackers took over the plane). Marshall said he attempted the Washington DC attack himself in a simulator and, despite his 20 years of experience flying Boeing airliners and 15,000 hours of flight time, it took him four tries to hit the Pentagon. "To suggest that this was the first time that guy had ever flown a 757 is absolutely impossible," he stressed. According to Marshall, the 9/11 hijackers were tailed by the FBI from the moment they landed in Los Angeles on January 12, 2000. They learned to fly on small aircraft and simulators then, after George W. Bush became president, started disappearing into the Arizona desert for days at a time, he disclosed. Marshall believes the hijackers were trained at a CIA-operated airport, Pinal Air Park, by a Saudi group from an aviation charter that operated Boeing aircraft. He connected the people in charge of Pinal to Wall Street and ultimately to Dick Cheney, and suggested that President Bush knew enough not to scramble fighters to intercept the hijackers.
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Next, author and nuclear terrorism expert Robert Gleason joined John B. Wells to discuss how for the past ten years the United States has been relatively free from major terrorism events but the threat now is higher than ever. Gleason outlined a plausible and frightening nuclear scenario that he identified as 'catalytic war.' If a small vengeful power could get cruise missiles and submarines, they could create the illusion that the great powers were nuking each other until they actually started doing so, he said, noting how easy subs and missiles can be acquired on the open market. Security exercises at various facilities across the U.S. show how terrorists would likely succeed 50% of the time in stealing nuclear fuel, he added. "Once you get the nuclear bomb fuel it's shockingly easy to cobble together a crude terrorist nuke," Gleason continued. Spheres about the size of a large grapefruit filled with weapons-grade enriched uranium can produce a Hiroshima-level yield, he explained. Perhaps even scarier, Gleason disclosed that a device exists which would allow terrorists to easily set off a blast or meltdown from within a nuclear facility, and he fully expects them to attempt to do this sometime in the future.