"Four in a Row and All Ascending"

"The game is up"

William Shakespeare

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As early as November 1995 strange objects were seen in the skies over Long Island.
By December 1996 there were four in a row and all ascending .......

November 17, 1995 22:20 (EST) - Lufthansa 405 and BA 226 Incident
Lufthansa 405 (747) departing JFK at 9:20pm bound for Frankfurt at 25,000 feet, south of Long Island, reported an object flying directly opposite its course about 2-3,000 feet above them. Confirmed by British Airways 226 (747). Directly north of W-105. Large bright light in front, no red or green beacons, long green light in rear and left a vapor trail. "It was looking strange". "Looked like a green trail on it, and a very bright light on the front of it". "It was looking very strange, with a long light, in the tail". "It did have a very strong trail to it...a vapor trail, which looked more like smoke. And the light on the front was very, very bright" "It didn't have any lights...((normal)) lights, beacon lights, or red or green lights. Only a white light in the front, and with a long green light. (The FAA transcript of the controller - pilot conversations on this incident may be found elsewhere at this website. See also The Tale of the Tapes.)

And we learned later that sophisticated mortar rocket systems were being smuggled into Europe for terrorist purposes some of which were discovered in Germany.

July 8, 1996    The Telegraph    (U.K. Electronic Edition)     Issue 422
Iran has developed an extensive network of training camps which are being used to train terrorists for operations around the world .....At least 11 camps have been established throughout the country ...... An estimated 5,000 volunteers pass through the camps each year, of whom about 500 are given extensive training in a wide range of terrorist skills......Although no direct link has yet been found to implicate Iran in the recent bomb attack against an American military complex at the Saudi Arabian eastern port of Dhahran, two Saudi dissident groups suspected of masterminding the attack ..... are based in Teheran. The Organisation of Islamic Revolution of Jezier al-Arab and the Hizbollah of the Hejaz, two groups that are outlawed in Saudi Arabia, are based in Teheran and work closely with Iran's intelligence ministry. A group calling itself "Hizbollah Gulf" claimed responsibility for the Dhahran bombing. Supporters of these Saudi groups are allowed to use the Imam Ali training camp in east Teheran. ... Intelligence experts believe many of Iran's overseas terrorist attacks are planned here. .. The Germans have been embarrassed by the discovery of a sophisticated mortar rocket system which was discovered on board an Iranian ship which had sailed from the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas to Hamburg.

And discovered in Belgium too !

January 12, 1997 Electronic Telegraph Issue 597
Iran is planning a fresh wave of terrorist attacks throughout Europe using purpose-built "super-mortars"..... developed specially by Iran's Organisation of Military Industry for terrorist operations. The 320mm mortar, which can be dismantled and transported in lorries and is considerably more powerful than the conventional weapon ..... ........ Reports received by Western intelligence agencies suggest that Iran has dispatched 15 similar weapons to terror cells throughout Europe..... "The Iranians are keen to deploy their super-mortars throughout Europe....Western intelligence agencies have been closely monitoring the activities of suspected Iranian terrorist cells in Europe after a prototype of the mortar weapon was discovered in an Iranian freighter ....... on docking in Antwerp last year. ... A team of international intelligence officials, including British and US technical experts, studied the mortar parts for several months and concluded they belonged to an exceptionally powerful weapon Iran has developed with terrorist operations in mind. ....... The Iranians were also embarrassed by the seizure of their prototype super-mortar by Belgian officials last year, especially as two senior Iranian intelligence officials were on board the freighter when it was searched in Antwerp.

The FBI Director admitted that the U.S. too was under terrorist attack and he offered as examples the World Trade Center, two Bombings in Saudi Arabia, and the Crash of TWA 800.

August 1, 1996      CNN
FBI chief (says) U.S. 'under attack' by terrorists. In testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, Freeh pointed to a series of arrests and convictions since four Islamic fundamentalists were found guilty in the February 1993 bombing that killed six people ...at New York's World Trade Center. He referred to two fatal bombings in Saudi Arabia ..... and the still unexplained crash of TWA Flight 800.

So let us look at what the FBI has been doing in the year since TWA 800.

July 13, 1997 The Associated Press
FBI Director Louis Freeh finds the nation's skies safer and its law enforcement authorities better prepared for terrorism a year after TWA Flight 800 exploded......Since 1993, when Freeh took over, the FBI has quietly been improving its relationships abroad. Taking a global view of terrorism and the need to share information with other countries, Freeh has ...... added agents in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan and other countries...

July 25, 1997 ERRI        Daily Intelligence Report        Vol. 3 - 206
Exiled Saudi millionaire Osama bin Laden ... has ... sworn to bring an end of U.S. influence in his native Saudi Arabia and the Islamic world. Counterterrorism analysts say that bin Laden is working with terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and its patron Iran. Kenneth Katzman, the terrorism analyst for the U.S. Congress, said, "I think you have an 'atomic bomb' brewing between bin Laden, Hezbollah and the Iranians. ..... In speaking to an Arabic newspaper, bin Laden said, "We had thought that the Riyadh and al-Khobar blasts were a sufficient signal to sensible U.S. decision-makers to avert a real battle between the Islamic nation and U.S. forces, but it seems that they did not understand the signal." .... .There is also evidence that bin Laden may had been connected to the February 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center .... Ramzi Yousef, who is currently on trial for being involved in the World Trade Center bombing, is said to have received money from bin Laden's brother-in-law. According to a top State Department official, "Bin Laden's activities were run through Islamic charities that we think extended as far as the Philippines and that is where Yousef planned out his attacks on U.S. planes."

We can understand the CIA adding agents abroad - but the FBI?   Why, one might wonder, is the FBI (which will depart the TWA investigation if it can not find a "criminal" element) looking for "criminals" in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Pakistan?  

Let's follow Ramsey Yousef who planned attacks on U.S. airliners before turning up in Pakistan.

February, 1995
Ramsey Yousef arrested by U.S. agents in Pakistan for plotting attack on U.S. airliners in the Pacific.

May 13, 1996   The Telegraph     (U.K. Electronic Edition)     Issue 382
Ramsey Yousef is .... accused of having designed ... the bomb that blew up in the World Trade Centre in 1993....His idea was to topple one of the twin towers onto the other..... perhaps 50,000 people would have perished. ...Yousef placed a bomb on a Philippines Airlines jet. Yousef .. was .. testing a method he intended using to destroy three US passenger planes at a later date. That plan, had it worked, would have killed about 700 civilians, dwarfing all previous terrorist outrages against air passengers. A fire at the flat where he lodged in Manila - possibly caused by nitroglycerine - led to a search by the Philippines police ....Yousef managed to escape, fleeing to Pakistan...... America should expect further attacks.

America did indeed suffer "a further attack". It was over Long Island where something was again "ascending".

July 17, 1996, 22:30 EDT   TWA 800 Downing
James Kallstrom: "We do have information that there was something in the sky. A number of people have seen it. A number of people have described it similarly. It was ascending."

But back to Yousef, Sheikh Rahman and the Saudi dissident Omar bin Laden.

August 2, 1997 Electronic Telegraph Issue 799
A leading associate of a sworn enemy of the West is now in custody in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he is providing information about his former boss's Islamic fundamentalist activities. Details have been passed to MI6 and to the CIA at Langley, Virginia. United States intelligence sources yesterday named the informant as Abu Fadel, the terrorist alias for Sidi Tayyib. He handled the distribution of Osama bin Laden's vast wealth as the "godfather" of anti-American terror groups. Just how he ended up in Riyadh is uncertain. US officials, who have found the Saudis difficult to deal with in the matter of terrorism, will not say if he was captured or was working as a double agent for the desert kingdom. All they will disclose is that he has been in Saudi hands since the middle of May. There is also a report that a second aide to bin Laden, said to go by the name of Jallud, is helping the Saudis after being arrested. Exiled from Saudi Arabia, bin Laden, 44, who has an inherited fortune estimated at £154 million, is zealously committed to striking at American interests. He is a towering figure in Islamic circles, where he gained heroic status in the Eighties, fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan. Reporters who have interviewed him say he is a tall and elegant figure in a gold-trimmed white robe and red-and-white keffiyeh. He lives with his three wives at Hadda in Afghanistan, beyond the reach of the West and under the protection of the Taliban, who captured Kabul almost a year ago. He is especially feared because of his ability to fund many diverse operations. Britain has a special interest in him because he has been linked to the transfer of funds two years ago to a London-based Algerian group suspected of seven bombings in France. He has also been connected to the London-based Saudi opposition group, the Committee for the Defence of Legitimate Rights. Egypt wants to question him for allegedly funding a plot to assassinate President Mubarak in December 1995. Cairo believes that in association with the blind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, he was behind some of the murders of Western tourists in Egypt. America believes that bin Laden was the patron of Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, the 28 year-old Pakistani on trial in Manhattan for allegedly masterminding the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing for which the sheikh is serving a prison term. A State Department report labels him as "one of the most significant financial sponsors of Islamic extremist activities in the world today". It is thought to be no coincidence that two alleged suicide bombers, Abu Mezer, 23, and Lafi Khalil, 22, carrying Jordanian passports, were captured two days ago making pipe bombs in a flat in Brooklyn, New York. They were apparently plotting to blow up a subway train. American sources say the information being given in Riyadh by Tayyib relates to the distribution of money to Arab communities in Brooklyn, Jersey City in New Jersey, and Detroit. Tayyib has apparently given details of bin Laden's bank accounts in Pakistan and Afghanistan from which money has been sent to London and Detroit for passing on to individuals. His information is thought to have been the reason a federal grand jury has been secretly convened in New York to examine the financing of terrorism in America. The CIA believes that bin Laden had advance knowledge of two Saudi bombings that killed 24 US servicemen. He is thought to have provided the money, with Iran supplying the muscle through Hizbollah.

So when Sheikh Rahman turns up as the reason for an explosion in Islamabad...

November 20, 1995 World News The Electronic Telegraph
A huge car bomb destroyed the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad yesterday, killing at least 15 people, including an Egyptian diplomat. More than 60 people were seriously injured. Three Islamic militant groups said they carried out the attack. The International Justice Group made its claim in a fax to an international news agency, demanding the release of the militant leader Sheikh Omar Rahman from an American jail and of an Islamic leader missing after being held in Croatia. The Jamaa Islamiyya and Al-Jihad, the two main groups behind militant violence against the government of President Mubarak, claimed the blast in separate telephone calls to international news agencies in Cairo. It was apparently in retaliation for the extradition from Pakistan of  Islamic terrorists wanted in Egypt .......In recent months Pakistan has extradited to Egypt at least five Islamic fundamentalists wanted in Cairo for trying to topple the regime of President Mubarak. An Arab ambassador in Islamabad said the Egyptian embassy had received several threatening telephone calls. Thousands of Arab fundamentalists trained and fought for the Afghan Mujahideen during the Eighties war against Soviet troops occupying Afghanistan. The Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, has frequently promised to extradite Arab fundamentalists, but hundreds are known to be still hiding out along the lawless Pakistani-Afghan border. The latest and most dangerous threat to the government Ms Bhutto faces a rising tide of fundamentalism..... tens of thousands of people, many of them teenagers, raised clenched fists in unison as Qazi Hussain Ahmed, the Jamaat leader, promised to topple the Bhutto government and bring about an Islamic revolution. This is the latest and most dangerous threat to the government, shaken in recent months by a series of political and economic crises and an attempted coup by fundamentalist army officers in September.

We see why the FBI wants to be in Pakistan and Egypt. And the FBI seems to have got deeply involved.......

November 27, 1995       World News The Electronic Telegraph
Islamic fundamentalists protested at the weekend against the arrest of 12 Arabs and government action against local militants after the bombing of the Egyptian embassy in Islamabad. An FBI team arrived from America at the weekend to join Egyptian and Pakistani intelligence teams investigating the car bomb, which killed 16 people. The 12 Arabs, including Egyptians and Jordanians, are being interrogated. More than 200 Pakistani militants have been held.

To the extent that a lot of Pakistani militants were upset with their government and its relationship with the U.S.

January 1, 1996       The Electronic Telegraph      World News
Pakistan's Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, urged mullahs to leave politics to the politicians after Islamic parties staged a countrywide shutdown on Saturday as part of their campaign to topple her government. The strike, called by the Milli Yakjheti Council (MYC), an alliance of 15 Islamic fundamentalist parties, closed many shops and offices in major cities, although it had little effect in smaller towns. But there was violence in Lahore, where police surrounded the headquarters of the fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami to prevent militants going on to the streets. The police used tear-gas and made baton charges several times as the militants tried to cross police lines. Nearly 100 people were arrested across Punjab Province. The strike paralysed Karachi, which saw 26 strikes in 1995 due to ethnic and sectarian violence in which more than 1,800 people were killed. Ms Bhutto said: "Politics are for the politicians. The Ullema [religious leaders] should work for the character-building of the people and the rights of elders and orphans. "The government is not affected by such tactics. In fact, it helps strengthen our claim that today there is democracy and everybody has a free choice."  There is growing concern about the growth of fundamentalism in Pakistan. Maulana Shah Ahmad Noorani, the MYC chairman, claimed that the strike was totally successful. "People have lodged their protest against the government's failure to check rising prices, lawlessness, indifference to religious institutions and the screening of obscene scenes on television," he said. The MYC also accuses the government of leaning too much to the United States and the West. Although the MYC poses no immediate threat to the government it is the first time so many Islamic parties, who are usually at each other's throats over theological issues, have united against the government. Workers of the main opposition party, the Muslim League, led by Nawaz Sharif, also joined in the strike. The mullahs are promising to intensify their campaign through January, which is also the holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset. There is growing concern about the growth of fundamentalism in Pakistan, even in such once-secular institutions as the army. Court martial proceedings began yesterday against four Islamic fundamentalist officers, allegedly the ringleaders of a coup attempt in September that aimed to wipe out the country's leadership and impose an Islamic system. The trial of the four officers - a major-general, a brigadier and two colonels - and one civilian opened in secret at the Attock Fort in northern Pakistan.

October 27, 1996    Electronic Telegraph       Issue 522
Tens of thousands of supporters of Islamic fundamentalist parties will attempt to storm Pakistan's parliament in Islamabad today to demand the resignation of the prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, and her government. As hundreds of mullahs were arrested across the country before the rally, paramilitary troops and police have been deployed across the capital to prevent the protesters from even reaching Islamabad's outskirts....... Last week, when the prime minister rose in the National Assembly to defend herself, her face was drawn and exhausted. But her words were defiant. "I will not resign under any pressure. I pledge with the people of Pakistan that their sister along with her colleagues will confront the conspiracies," she said ...... Ms Bhutto has been saved only by the opposition's inability to unite, even though all parties demand her resignation. Saturday's strike was led by the 14-party secular opposition alliance led by the former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif. Today's rally has been organised by the Jamaat-e-Islami and other Islamic parties.

So was it surprising that once again over Long Island something was seen "ascending"?

November 16, 1996 22:00 (EST)    PIA Flight 712 Incident
Pakistan International Airlines Flight 712 Leaving Kennedy at 9:25pm, bound for Frankfurt. The pilot, W. Shah, said his co-pilot saw an orange light coming from the left hand side to the right hand side of the airplane. (See The Tale of the Tapes)  The object was 3 - 4 miles in front of the aircraft and above it. Shah was told by Boston controllers that there were no military exercises in the area. Boston apparently confirmed two unidentified blips' on radar. The tapes have been turned over to the FBI and NTSB. The object(s) rose directly out of Long Island Sound and ascended almost vertically. The Pakistani crew just saw a flash, and apparently a TWA crew, which was behind the Pakistani, saw the whole thing. The TWA crew was so alarmed by what they had just seen that they considered returning to JFK. Later, they requested clearance to skirt the area where the light had been seen. Radio 5 in the U.K. reported that the object which crossed the Pakistani aircraft had exploded. (On a subsequent McNeill - Lehrer newshour when asked about the direction of the object Mr. Kallstrom replied, "ascending".)

Another report on this incident stated: This evening I flew flight 1504 FLL to BOS. It was an extremely clear night over the Eastern Seaboard. You could see the Connecticut shoreline from Cape May, NJ. We were at FL 330 just east of JFK proceeding direct to PVD. It was about 10:15 PM when an aircraft asked center the following question: were there any fireworks going off in the area. Center replied in the negative, to the best of their best knowledge. The aircraft then reported they had something streak up towards them from the left and pass in front of them and through their altitude. There was silence on the frequency. I asked center the position of the aircraft reporting the event. Center replied 20nm south of HTO. It was a foreign carrier, but judging by the accent of the pilot, I would say it was Air India or Pakistan Intl. I didn't get a call sign, and to my surprise, center did not ask any more questions. It was a crystal clear night, and we could see the Hamptons from our position. There were no fireworks taking place anywhere. Unless the controller was working both frequencies, the aircraft was at least climbing to or in the high sector. I did a little bit of checking, and found out Air India leaves at 7:30. PM, and Pakistan Intl. leaves at 9:45 PM from Kennedy. It doesn't really matter who it was. Fact is someone reported a streak that came from the ground and to the left of them and passed in front and through their altitude. It was 10:17 when center replied to me that the aircraft was 20nm south of Hampton. Is it merely a coincidence this is close to where TWA 800 blew up, or is something else going on? I don't believe the aircraft was flying inverted and that was a meteor that streaked by their windshield. Again I was amazed at the silence of the controller after the report. This event certainly got our attention.

November 17, 1996     WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV reports that last night Pakistani International Airlines flight 712 radioed Logan International (Boston) that a missile had just flown by their plane (the story implied 'just missing them') ...Boston confirmed 'two unidentified blips' on radar at the same time as the PIA report.  (For a transcript and audio file of this incident see A Tale of Two Tapes)

A message was being sent to both the Pakistani government and its American ally! The message got through! The FBI went to Frankfurt to interview the crew.

November 17, 1996       Associated Press
FBI spokesman Joseph Valiquette said Sunday, "At this point we don't know what, if anything, was seen." Shah (pilot of PIA 712) said they were told by Boston air traffic controllers that there were no military exercises in the area. He also said the pilots were interviewed by officials with the U.S. Embassy in Frankfurt... A TWA plane flying immediately behind the Pakistanis jet Saturday made a similar sighting and asked to turn around .... The TWA plane was rerouted and the air corridor used by the Pakistan Airlines flight was closed.

The American people were led to believe that what the crew saw was ....... a meteorite. We have all heard the expression "meteoric rise" but ......they don't! And the message was not been heeded! Agents are "sneaking" ... and the U.S. Government is "inducing" .....

June 19, 1997 NY Times
Five FBI agents sneaked into a hostel in Afghanistan, where Afghan informants had told them they would find Mir Amal Kansi, one of the world's most wanted men, the suspect in a deadly 1993 rampage outside CIA headquarters. Kansi .... The breakthrough in the hunt for Kansi came about through the CIA's Near East division via the intelligence agency's station in Pakistan... cooperation followed some pressure brought to bear on Pakistan under a June 1995 presidential decision directive, a secret order in which the United States resolved to "induce cooperation" from foreign nations where suspected terrorists and criminals reside.

June 25, 1997 MSANEWS
Agence France Presse quoting ABC reported from Islamabad that American government paid a sum of $3.5m and used Pakistan military and intelligence as intermediaries while abducting Mir Aimal Kansi, a Pakistani citizen from Pakistani soil and flew him to America. So far it is known Kansi has not committed any crime in Pakistani soil. There is no case pending against him in any Pakistani court nor the Pakistani authorities issued any arrest warrant for him. Moreover, there exists no extradition treaty between Pakistan and America. It is not known who is/are the recipient(s) of $3.5m which the American government paid for Kansi's abduction. ...... As an elected Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan did Mr Sharif know anything beforehand the abduction of this Pakistani national? ..... Stage is now set for the Mossad and its lackeys in the CIA to use Pakistani military intelligence and their "expertise" and the intermediaries to abduct Sheikh Osama bin Laden whom the Zionist entity and American State Department have declared 'world's number one terrorist'! .....Pakistanis who are accusing Mr Sharif of compromising national sovereignty and abandoning Islamic honour are not "Islamic terrorists" as claimed by the Zionist terrorists and their puppets in the White House.

Mr. bin Laden, a highly intelligent man, continued to make the message clear.  The U.S. knew what to expect.....

November 10, 1996   The Telegraph    (U.K. Electronic Edition)      Issue 536
US base placed on alert over Islamic bomb threat. American troops and diplomats based in Saudi Arabia have this weekend been placed on high security alert following intelligence reports that Islamic militants are planning a fresh wave of bomb attacks. The report, which coincides with the anniversary of the bombing of an American military complex in Riyadh last year, follows a massive security clampdown by the Saudi authorities that has resulted in the arrest of 40 Islamic dissidents. All the estimated 10,000 American personnel in Saudi Arabia have been ordered not to leave their residential compounds except in extreme emergencies. .... According to American intelligence reports, Islamic militants are planning a new round of bomb attacks against US targets to show that their terrorist capability has not been affected by the Saudi crackdown. The militants also want to put pressure on Washington to abandon its long-standing support for the Saudi royal family. .... The Saudis now believe that they have detained the ringleaders of the Dhahran attack, including the man who drove the explosive-laden vehicle that was detonated just outside the military complex. Despite mounting speculation that the group responsible for the bombing had been trained and equipped by Iran, the Saudis are refusing to provide any details of the evidence they have acquired from confessions and other sources.

But it looked in the wrong place.  It had forgotten Long Island where once again things were "ascending".

December 12, 1996    Saudi Arabian Airlines Incident
A Saudi Arabian Airlines crew reported sighting a bright greenish object streaking by their plane as it approached Kennedy Airport Thursday morning. It was approaching Kennedy airport, 15 miles south west of East Hampton, at about 12,000 feet when the object appeared on radar. At least one crew member saw the object from the cockpit window.