Dr. Steven Jones at UC Davis-May1, 2009

2 06 2009

Dr. Steven Jones presents important features from the paper, “Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe”
This talk is powerful and challenges the un-peer reviewed science of NIST, as that agency of the government tries to explain the collapse of building 7 during the 9/11 event.



Richard Gage on KMPH Fox 26 in Fresno, CA

28 05 2009



Column Resistance - Some thoughts on Chandler, Szamboti and Bazant

2 07 2009

RichardAJohns.blogspot.com

There has been some recent discussion on 911Blogger about one of David Chandler’s videos on his YouTube channel.

I have some points to make here.

1. Chandler’s argument, while correct as far as it goes, establishes only an upper bound on the column resistance. A better empirical estimate is roughly 0 - 0.1mg. This can be seen as follows.

The video measures the downward acceleration of the roofline of WTC1, during the first few seconds of collapse, and measures a downward acceleration of around 0.64g. Chandler argues, correctly, that this implies that the block is resisted by an upward force of (1-0.64)mg = 0.36mg, where m is the mass of the block. Yet this is puzzling, since the columns were (just a moment before) supporting the full weight (mg) of this block. (Moreover, assuming a safety factor of 3, they the columns were capable of supporting at least 3mg, almost 10 times their measured resistance.)

Chandler’s video is, in my opinion, a useful device to attract attention to this important puzzle. However, while the reasoning is correct as far as it goes, the true situation is actually far more disturbing than even his argument suggests. (I assume that he is aware of this, but wants to keep the argument as simple as possible.) Let me explain why.
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Banksters Love Cap-and-Trade

2 07 2009

 James Corbett | TheCorbettReport.com

The sweeping new bill which just passed the House last Friday, the Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, is ostensibly about climate change, but it is in fact a bill of staggering economic ramifications that is going to accelerate the takeover of the economy by the well-placed financiers who have already plundered the Treasury and the Fed of $12+ trillion and counting. It was rushed through the House in the tradition of such nightmarish legislation as the Patriot Act and the banker bailout of last October: hundreds of pages were added to it at the last minute and it was humanly impossible for anyone to have read it before they voted on it. This, of course, is exactly what Obama promised his administration would never allow to happen, and for good reason; bills passed in this manner are always the result of fear and panic and inevitably results in legislation that would never be passed upon sober second thought.

In this case, the rush to pass this new bill was an attempt to stop any scrutiny of a plan that is going to utterly transform the American economy, further centralize control of citizens’ lives in the hands of unaccountable federal bureaucrats and complete the transfer of the American economy from Main Street to Wall Street. And all of this in the name of fighting a threat which itself is a demonstrable fraud. In short, the banksters and bureaucrats are sharpening their knives, preparing to butcher what’s left of the carcass of the United States, and a good portion of the public are not only willing to allow it but are actually clamoring for it.

The first thing that needs to be understood about the brand new trillion dollar carbon-trading commodities market that will be brought into existence if this bill passes the Senate is that it is a ripoff designed by and for the very corporate interests the environmentalists claim to be fighting. For an historical precedent of what is being proposed under this cap-and-trade scam one can look to Enron, which immediately found ways to plunder billions of dollars from  new energy market legislation passed by the Clinton Administration in 2000.

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Helen Thomas: Not Even Nixon Tried to Control the Media Like Obama

2 07 2009

Penny Starr & Fred Lucas | CNSNews.com

 Following a testy exchange during Wednesday’s briefing with White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas told CNSNews.com that not even Richard Nixon tried to control the press the way President Obama is trying to control the press.

“Nixon didn’t try to do that,” Thomas said. “They couldn’t control (the media). They didn’t try.

“What the hell do they think we are, puppets?” Thomas said. “They’re supposed to stay out of our business. They are our public servants. We pay them.”

Thomas said she was especially concerned about the arrangement between the Obama Administration and a writer from the liberal Huffington Post Web site. The writer was invited by the White House to President Obama’s press conference last week on the understanding that he would ask Obama a question about Iran from among questions that had been sent to him by people in Iran.

“When you call the reporter the night before you know damn well what they are going to ask to control you,” Thomas said.

“I’m not saying there has never been managed news before, but this is carried to fare-thee-well–for the town halls, for the press conferences,” she said. “It’s blatant. They don’t give a damn if you know it or not. They ought to be hanging their heads in shame.”

During today’s briefing, Thomas interrupted a back-and-forth between Gibbs and Chip Reid, the White House correspondent for CBS News, when Reid was questioning Gibbs about who was going to decide what questions would be asked of President Obama in a townhall meeting that was scheduled to take place in Annandale, Va., today.

Gibbs then had an exchange involving Reid and Thomas that went as follows:

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Attack Helicopter “Flyover” On Fourth of July

1 07 2009

Infowars.com

Just before Memorial Day this year, Marines invaded Staten Island’s Clove Lakes Park in what was billed as a “simulated raid as part of Fleet Week festivities.” The demo had absolutely no military training objective other than to get New Yorkers accustomed to armed soldiers landing in public parks.

Now folks in California will get a similar demonstration.

“Four Super Cobra AH-1W attack helicopters are set to perform a July 4 flyover for people gathered to watch evening fireworks at Orange County beaches,” reports the Orange County Register.

The helicopters are from Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 369, Camp Pendleton, and were in Iraq a mere 3 weeks ago, according to Wayne Eggleston, a San Clemente City Council member.

In May, Infowars reported on armed soldiers arresting an over-zealous fan at the Kentucky Derby, an incident completely ignored by the corporate media with the exception of a Reuters photograph showing the arrest.

In April, we reported on the presence of National Guard soldiers at the Boston Marathon.



FEMA, Israeli Defense Forces Home Front Command Partner for Martial Law

1 07 2009

Kurt Nimmo | InfoWars.com 

A press release buried on the FEMA website, dated June 30, 2009, announces a meeting between FEMA administrator Craig Fugate and Maj. Gen. Yair Golan of the Israeli Defense Forces Home Front Command. “I look forward to working with my Israeli counterpart as co-chair of an emergency management work group to improve emergency management practices in both countries,” said Fugate. “These partnerships are critical in ensuring that we are incorporating best practices and also working towards greater public preparedness.”

The Israeli National Emergency Management Authority and FEMA partnership was established under “an emergency management work stream workgroup established under a 2007 Memorandum of Understanding with DHS,” according to the press release. FEMA representatives attended the national preparedness exercise Turning Point 3 in Israel on June 1, 2009, and Israel sent observers to the TOPOFF 4 national exercise in the United States, as well as personnel to participate in FEMA emergency management training.

TOPOFF, or Top Officials, is billed as “the nation’s premier terrorism preparedness exercise” by the Department of Homeland Security. “Thousands of federal, state, territorial, and local officials engage in various activities as part of a robust, full-scale simulated response to a multi-faceted threat,” the DHS website explains.

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Fox News : The only chance we have as a country right now is” for bin Laden to “detonate a major weapon” in U S

1 07 2009



Murdoch CEO Labels Bloggers “Political Extremists”

1 07 2009

 

A stinging attack by John Hartigan, the CEO of Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited, labels bloggers and alternative media outlets as “political extremists”. Hartigan implies that bloggers should be jailed as they are in oppressive police states like China and Burma.

In a speech to the National Press Club, Hartigan savagely dismissed blogs as, “Something of such little intellectual value as to be barely discernible from massive ignorance.”

Bloggers don’t go to jail for their work. They simply aren’t held accountable like real reporters….It could be said the blogosphere is all eyeballs and no insights,” barked Hartigan.

“In the blogosphere, of course, the mainstream media is always found wanting. It really is time this myth was blown apart.”

“Blogs, and a large number of comment sites, specialise in political extremism and personal vilification. Radical sweeping statements without evidence are common.”

Hartigan doesn’t seem to grasp the fact that the mainstream media is always found wanting because they habitually lie about news events and spin stories to suit the demands of their corporate owners. This is the very reason why blogs and alternative media outlets have become so popular and have eaten into the mainstream media’s audience share, because people are sick of being treated like idiots, sick of being lied to, and are desperately in search of the truth.

Indeed, Hartigan’s boss Rupert Murdoch confessed to the fact that his media empire tried to shape public opinion to support the war in Iraq In other words, Murdoch’s many prominent news outlets wantonly put out propaganda supporting the manufactured case for invasion. Murdoch admitted to this while lamenting the corporate media’s “loss of power” to alternative media and Internet blogs, seemingly unaware of the fact that the two are directly connected.

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Air Force tests missile in launch from Calif coast

30 06 2009

AP | MercuryNews.com

The Air Force successfully launched an unarmed Minuteman 3 intercontinental ballistic missile Monday from the California coast to an area in the Pacific Ocean some 4,200 miles away.

The ICBM was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base near Santa Barbara at 3:01 a.m. and carried three unarmed re-entry vehicles to their targets near the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands, said Lt. Raymond Geoffroy.

The missile, configured with a National Nuclear Security Administration Test Assembly, was launched under the direction of the 576th Flight Test Squadron, whose members installed tracking and command destruct systems on it to collect data and meet safety requirements.

“It’s really something when you see a truly outstanding team come together,” Col. David Buck, 30th Space Wing commander, said in a written statement. “I couldn’t think of a better team to demonstrate the awesome capability of our ICBM fleet.”

On clear mornings the missiles in such tests can be seen as far away as Los Angeles 140 miles away, but a foggy coast Monday made the missile difficult to see even in the immediate area, Geoffroy said.

The Air Force says the launch was an operational test to check the weapon system’s reliability and accuracy, and the data will be used by United States Strategic Command planners and Department of Energy laboratories.

“These are dangerous times we’re living in right now,” Lt. Col. Lesa K. Toler, commander of the 576th, said in a statement. “It’s extremely important our combatant commander has the capabilities he needs to perform the mission of fighting and winning our nation’s wars.”



Naval “National Center for Energetics” Records Of Pre-9/11 Nano-Energetic Materials Development, Nonexistent Or Destroyed

30 06 2009

Aidan Monaghan | 911blogger.org 

The Indian Head Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center, (a branch of the Naval Sea Systems Command or NAVSEA), described in 1999 as the “national center for energetics”[1], “the only reliable source of aluminum nanopowders in the United States”[2] and in 2008 as “probably the most prominent US center for nano-thermite technology”[3], alleges via Freedom of Information Act replies that records “regarding research and development of nano-sized or Ultra Fine Grained (UFG) aluminum powders, nano-sized or Ultra Fine Grained (UFG) iron oxide powders or other metal oxide powders and Metastable Intermolecular Composites prior to 2002″ do not exist. According to Indian Head, “research may have been conducted by Indian Head Division personnel but not submitted.”

Records prior to 2002 of Indian Head’s private sector partnerships regarding nano-sized energetic materials development and production, were reportedly destroyed per policy after seven years (or all such records prior to 2002).

Explosive, unreacted thermitic material containing nano-meter sized grains of intimately mixed aluminum and iron oxide, has recently been discovered in dust created by the collapses of the World Trade Center buildings on September 11, 2001.[4]

Evidence prior to 2002 of Indian Head’s private sector partnerships regarding nano-sized energetic materials development and production exists.

December 2002:

“FY01 Technology Transfer Business Plan: IHDIV is considered the Navy’s Center of Excellence for Energetics development and has extensive expertise, capabilities, and information in energetics synthesis, formulation, and processing as well as in testing of energetic systems. IHDIV will transfer their knowledge of development and manufacturing energetics with respect to the use of TECHNANOGY produced nanoaluminum and supply TECHNANOGY with test data associated with the testing of TECHNANOGY nanoaluminum. TECHNANOGY is a leader in the production of nanoaluminum for use in energetic systems utilized for DoD purposes. To our knowledge, TECHNANOGY is the sole supplier of nanoaluminum for use in pilot scale processing. TECHNANOGY will share their material and knowledge of nanoaluminum processing subject to the terms and conditions of this CRADA. (cooperative research and development agreement).”

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Comic Artist Detained For Script Containing 9/11 Type Scenarios

30 06 2009

Slashdot.org 

 

Comics writer Mark Sable was detained by security at Los Angeles International Airport because he was carrying a script for a new issue of his comic miniseries, UnthinkableUnthinkable follows members of a government think tank that was tasked with coming up with 9/11-type “unthinkable” terrorist scenarios that now are coming true.

Sable wrote about his experience saying, “…I was flagged at the gate for ‘extra screening.’ I was subjected to not one, but two invasive searches of my person and belongings. TSA agents then ‘discovered’ the script for Unthinkable #3. They sat and read the script while I stood there, without any personal items, identification or ticket, which had all been confiscated.

The minute I saw the faces of the agents, I knew I was in trouble.

The first page of the Unthinkable script mentioned 9/11, terror plots, and the fact that the (fictional) world had become a police state. The TSA agents then proceeded to interrogate me, having a hard time understanding that a comic book could be about anything other than superheroes, let alone that anyone actually wrote scripts for comics.

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Israeli navy commandeers Gaza aid boat

30 06 2009

Google | AP

The Israeli navy intercepted a ship carrying foreign peace activists trying to break a blockade of Gaza on Tuesday and forced it to sail to an Israeli port, the military said.

A statement said the Greek-registered freighter Arion ignored a radio message from the Israeli military saying it would not be allowed to enter Gaza waters and ordering it to turn back.

The statement said naval personnel boarded the small vessel without any shots being fired.

The military said those on board would be handed over to immigration authorities on arrival in the southern port of Ashdod, and humanitarian cargo would be trucked into the Gaza Strip after a security check. The ship arrived at Ashdod port after nightfall.

An earlier statement by the voyage’s organizers, the Free Gaza Movement, said the vessel, renamed the Spirit of Humanity, left the Cypriot port of Larnaca on Monday bound for Gaza with three tons of medical supplies.

The 20 passengers include former U.S. Representative Cynthia McKinney, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire and other activists from Britain, Ireland, Bahrain and Jamaica.

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Pelosi Won’t Give Public a Week to Review Text of Health-Care Bill Before House Votes on It

29 06 2009

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) will not give the public a week to review the final text of a health-care reform bill before it is voted on later this year.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.) has also declined to commit to giving the public a week to read and consider the final health-care bill.

At her press briefing on Thursday, Pelosi was asked whether the health-care bill would be handled differently than the stimulus bill, which came up in February. The 1,071-page final text of that bill was posted on the House Appropriations Committee’s Web site late on a Thursday night and then voted on the next day.

“When the stimulus bill came out earlier this year, members and citizens had less than two days to review the final version that came out of the conference committee before it was voted on,” CNSNews.com asked Pelosi on Thursday. “Will you commit to giving Americans at least a week to review the full conference version of the health care bill before it is voted on? And also will you commit to submitting the final version to the CBO [Congressional Budget Office] so that they can report the cost to the public?”

Pelosi would not commit to giving the public a week to review the bill, and did not respond to the question of having the CBO report on the cost of the final bill.
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Iran overtakes Saudi as China’s No.1 crude supplier

29 06 2009

Chen Aizhu | Guardian.co.uk 

Iran overtook Saudi Arabia in May as China’s top crude supplier, Chinese customs data showed on Monday, but traders said it was partly due to a supply cut from the Saudis.

Beijing-based trading officials cautioned against reading too much into one month’s figures, which they said may have been skewed due to technical problems such as port congestion that pushed back or forth imported cargoes for customs clearance.

Iran, the world’s fifth-largest crude exporter, shipped into China 3.088 million tonnes of crude, or 727,000 barrels per day last month, a rise of 88 percent from a year ago.

Exports from the world’s top exporter, Saudi Arabia, however, slipped 15.5 percent on year to 2.76 million tonnes, or 650,000 bpd, official data from the General Administration of Customs showed.

“Saudis can’t supply the amount of heavy grades Chinese refineries asked for, as most of the OPEC-agreed cuts are on these heavy grades,” said one trader close to state-run Saudi Aramco.

“Chinese may have sorted it out by taking more such grades from Iran.”

But the trader said cuts on heavier grades to China — Arab Medium and Arab Heavy

– started at the beginning of the year, suggesting the sudden fall in May could be just a blip.

An official with the National Iranian Oil Co said he was not aware of any additional sales that Iran had made above its contractual volumes.

Chinese refiner Sinopec Corp and PetroChina, with many of their plants upgraded in recent years to process more heavy, sour and thus cheaper crude, have become increasingly picky in crude slates, motivated by a new fuel pricing mechanism since January 2009 that more or less guarantees a fixed margin.

Iran’s oil output and exports were not affected by protests after the June 12 presidential election, Iran’s OPEC governor said last week.



U.S. grants support Iranian dissidents

29 06 2009

 Ken Dilanian | GlobalResearch.ca

Global Research Editor’s Note

This report published in USA Today confirms unequivocally that Washington has directly financed dissident groups in Iran. 


WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is moving forward with plans to fund groups that support Iranian dissidents, records and interviews show, continuing a program that became controversial when it was expanded by President Bush.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which reports to the secretary of state, has for the last year been soliciting applications for $20 million in grants to “promote democracy, human rights, and the rule of law in Iran,” according to documents on the agency’s website. The final deadline for grant applications is June 30.

 

MORE: USAID report on support to Iranian dissidents

U.S. efforts to support Iranian opposition groups have been criticized in recent years as veiled attempts to promote “regime change,” said Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, the largest Iranian-American advocacy group. The grants enable Iran’s rulers to paint opponents as tools of the United States, he said.

Although the Obama administration has not sought to continue the Iran-specific grants in its 2010 budget, it wants a $15 million boost for the Near Eastern Regional Democracy Initiative, which has similar aims but does not specify the nations involved. Some of that money will be targeted at Iran, said David Carle, a spokesman for the appropriations subcommittee that oversees foreign affairs.

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The Truth Alone Will Not Set You Free

29 06 2009

Chris Hedges | TruthDig.com

The ability of the corporate state to pacify the country by extending credit and providing cheap manufactured goods to the masses is gone. The pernicious idea that democracy lies in the choice between competing brands and the freedom to accumulate vast sums of personal wealth at the expense of others has collapsed. The conflation of freedom with the free market has been exposed as a sham. The travails of the poor are rapidly becoming the travails of the middle class, especially as unemployment insurance runs out and people get a taste of Bill Clinton’s draconian welfare reform. And class warfare, once buried under the happy illusion that we were all going to enter an age of prosperity with unfettered capitalism, is returning with a vengeance.

Our economic crisis—despite the corporate media circus around the death of Michael Jackson or Gov. Mark Sanford’s marital infidelity or the outfits of Sacha Baron Cohen’s latest incarnation, Brüno—barrels forward. And this crisis will lead to a period of profound political turmoil and change. Those who care about the plight of the working class and the poor must begin to mobilize quickly or we will lose our last opportunity to save our embattled democracy. The most important struggle will be to wrest the organs of communication from corporations that use mass media to demonize movements of social change and empower proto-fascist movements such as the Christian right.

American culture—or cultures, for we once had distinct regional cultures—was systematically destroyed in the 20th century by corporations. These corporations used mass communication, as well as an understanding of the human subconscious, to turn consumption into an inner compulsion. Old values of thrift, regional identity that had its own iconography, aesthetic expression and history, diverse immigrant traditions, self-sufficiency, a press that was decentralized to provide citizens with a voice in their communities were all destroyed to create mass, corporate culture.

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Rachel Maddow: President Obama,Prolonged Preventive Detention, Indefinite Detention

27 06 2009



Obama contemplates Executive Order for detention without charges

27 06 2009

When Obama first unveiled his “preventive detention” policy, many defenders praised him (and claimed he was different than Bush) because of his vow that — as he put it – “my Administration will work with Congress to develop an appropriate legal regime.”  But now, relying exclusively on three Obama officials speaking behind a veil of anonymity, Peter Finn and Dafner Linza of The Washington Post and ProPublicareport that the White House is “crafting language for an executive order that would reassert presidential authority to incarcerate terrorism suspects indefinitely.”  TPM calls this ”the latest installment in the Obama administration’s tendency to mimic the Bushies on war on terror tactics.”  And the article itself points out the obvious:  ”Such an order would embrace claims by former president George W. Bush that certain people can be detained without trial for long periods under the laws of war.”  Revealingly, the article quotes two Bush national security officials justifying the need for detention without charges.

Anonymous trial balloon articles like this one are difficult to comment on because it’s obviously designed to announce that a certain policy is being considered before it’s actually written, and so none of the key details is known.  Would Obama’s new detention powers apply only to current “War on Terror” prisoners at places like Guantanamo and Bagram, or would they also apply to future, not-yet-abducted detainees as well?  Would these powers apply to detainees picked up anywhere in the world, far away from “war zones”?  Would there be any judicial review or other meaningful oversight provisions so that — even in theory — this was something other than the unilateral, unchecked presidential power to detain indefinitely without charges?  None of these important details is known (though the article notes that, under one White House proposal, “ongoing detention would be subject to annual presidential review“; the Emperor, sitting alone, will decree once a year whether they must remain in a cage).

This specific article is even worse than the usual one of its type, since it’s particularly uncritical in passing along administration claims without any skepticism (I addressed each of the “justifications” for Obama’s preventive detention proposal – Obama has to do this because of what Bush did; we can’t get convictions because of Bush’s torture; it’s common in War to do things like this, etc. etc. – here).  Worse, the article does not provide any information about the Obama officials whose mission the reporters are dutifully carrying out, so there’s no way to assess their motives.

Those journalistic practices produce egregious sentences like this:  ”‘Civil liberties groups have encouraged the administration, that if a prolonged detention system were to be sought, to do it through executive order’, the official said.”  I’d love to know which so-called “civil liberties groups” are pushing the White House for an Executive Order establishing the power of indefinite detention.  It’s certainly not the ACLU or Center for Constitutional Rights, both of which issued statements vehemently condemning the proposal (ACLU’s Anthony Romero:  ”If President Obama issues an executive order authorizing indefinite detention, he’ll be repeating the same mistakes of George Bush”).

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National Level Exercise 2009 (NLE 09)

25 06 2009

FEMA.gov

National Level Exercise 2009 (NLE 09) is scheduled for July 27 through July 31, 2009. NLE 09 will be the first major exercise conducted by the United States government that will focus exclusively on terrorism prevention and protection, as opposed to incident response and recovery.

NLE 09 is designated as a Tier I National Level Exercise. Tier I exercises (formerly known as the Top Officials exercise series or TOPOFF) are conducted annually in accordance with the National Exercise Program (NEP), which serves as the nation’s overarching exercise program for planning, organizing, conducting and evaluating national level exercises. The NEP was established to provide the U.S. government, at all levels, exercise opportunities to prepare for catastrophic crises ranging from terrorism to natural disasters.

NLE 09 is a White House directed, Congressionally- mandated exercise that includes the participation of all appropriate federal department and agency senior officials, their deputies, staff and key operational elements.  In addition, broad regional participation of state, tribal, local, and private sector is anticipated.  This year the United States welcomes the participation of Australia, Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom in NLE 09.

EXERCISE FOCUS

NLE 09 will focus on intelligence and information sharing among intelligence and law enforcement communities, and between international, federal, regional, state, tribal, local and private sector participants.

The NLE 09 scenario will begin in the aftermath of a notional terrorist event outside of the United States, and exercise play will center on preventing subsequent efforts by the terrorists to enter the United States and carry out additional attacks. This scenario enables participating senior officials to focus on issues related to preventing terrorist events domestically and protecting U.S. critical infrastructure.

NLE 09 will allow terrorism prevention efforts to proceed to a logical end (successful or not), with no requirement for response or recovery activities.

NLE 09 will be an operations-based exercise to include: activities taking place at command posts, emergency operation centers, intelligence centers and potential field locations to include federal headquarters facilities in the Washington D.C. area, and in federal, regional, state, tribal, local and private sector facilities in FEMA Region VI, which includes the states of Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

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