Man, I miss these boards. Wish I had more time to spend here like I did when I worked shift work... oh well.

As some one who worked at the Pentagon for six years right up to September of last year and experienced 9/11 first hand I'd like to interject a few thoughts.

1. I did not see the plane hit the building I was almost on the dead opposite side two level underground. In fact, I didn't feel or hear a thing. Not unusual if you are in a large steel-reinforced concrete building. That said, individuals who worked for me witnessed the explosion from the central courtyard of the building and could feel the heat from the fireball. Co-workers and friends significantly closer to the impact area were indeed thrown off their feet by the impact and explosion.

2. Over the next several days I did, personally, talk to about 4 individuals who personally saw the plane strike the building including two Pentagon shuttle bus drivers. These were just regular working people, with no reason to lie, no indication of any undue stress or coercion (other than what you might expect from witnessing an aircraft full of human beings being flown into a building full of human beings).

3. Why isn't there more video? Without telling too much of what I know of Pentagon security, you would be suprised how few cameras there are outside the building. Humans actively patrolling a building's perimeter are a tad more effective than dozens of monitors which may or may not be watched at any given moment. Given the limited number of entrances to the facility (all highly controlled areas), cameras are generally only needed in high traffic areas like vehicle control points (such as the one this video came from). What about the surrounding buildings. I've been to the AFFEES gas station on the hill more than a hundred times and can honestly tell you I never noticed a camera pointed towards the Pentagon... that doesn't mean there isn't one, but the filling stations don't seem to be arrainged in such a way as to provide camera coverage of the pumps and the Pentagon.

As for the hotels and shops over in Pentagon row or Crystal City Mall? Why should their cameras capture the Pentagon? Commion sense, and practical security experience, would dictate that any cameras they had would necessarily be pointed at their own properties. I do know for a fact that there is a traffic camera on I-395 right next to the Pentagon, we would check it regularly towards the end of shifts to see how bad traffic was. As I recall you can see part of one of the parking lots, but like most cameras it is focused towards it's own purpose... namele monitoring traffic in I-395 for the local television stations and commuter websites.

4. I can't speak to what happened with this specific tape and its alleged transition from VHS, to a digital format, and back again. I can say that standard operating procedure would be to put any video in a digital format. It is easier and less costly to store, much simpler to duplicate, takes up less space, and less likely to be lost or accidentally destroyed than a physical tape. Once you've got it digital on a server it's there to make as many copies as you need in whatever format; VHS, DVD, Beta (and a whole bunch of others) that your users or customers need. My last eight months at the Pentagon were spent in a facility that did exactly that with news feeds, surveillance video, gun-camera video, video taken from the internet, video from official events like dignitary visits and important ceremonies... you name it. Trust me when I say digital is better. So, it is possible (probable even) that the original security feed or tape was stored digitally after 9/11, then later released on VHS or Beta. This would not be unusual in my (admittedly limited) experience. Certainly, no one thinks that the original tape was the one released to dozens of news organizations simultaneously... do they? Besides the obvious physical impossibility of giving one tape to dozens of people at the same time... is there any way to distribute such a video without (a) making copies or (b) transfering it to a digital format and distributing it that way? Finally, if you are veiwing the video on the internet or on a television I can virtually gaurantee you are looking at a digital copy of the video. So, you've got another transcription right there.

All that said, if there is actual evidence that the data contained in the video was actually tampered with I sure would like to see it. That seems to be what is very loosely being implied here. Such manipulation would certainly leave very evident and particular artifacts in the images, if the guys who used to work for me actually knew what they were talking about.

5. Finally, I worked with a great many decent, honorable, and patriotic people at the Pentagon. For the purposes of full disclosure I was a commissioned officer in the United States Air Force with a very high security clearance and served in some pretty cool sensitive jobs about which I often can't say a whole heck of a lot. To many CBers these facts automatically makes me suspect or even a colluding member of whatever conspiracies they might dream up. Hence, I point to the first sentence of this paragraph again.

I'd like to think I'm a decent and honorable person, and that my sense of decency, honor, and even patriotism would compell me to speak out if I thought I had even a shred of evidence about any type of conspiracy such as the ones alluded to here. No amount of threats to my career, finances, freedom, life, or even the lives of my loved ones would persuade me from speaking out. If I had knowledge that the government I served was engaged in such activities I would scream as loud as I could from every hill, and then I would scream some more. My honor, patriotism, and hopes for the kind of nation and world I want to leave future generations would demand no less. And I am very proud to say that I personally served with hundreds of men and women who feel the same way. This doesn't even consider the many federal employees and contractors that I worked with over my 8 years of active duty service, the vast majority of which I can say with confidence would not just sit idly by, let alone actively participate in such crimes. I'd love to say that every member of the Armed Forces feels exactly the same, but I can only speak for those I with whom personally worked and served.

Military members, government employees, and defense contractors (from high faluting, high-tech gurus to the folks who mop the floors and clean the toilets) are generally pretty good and decent folks. They work hard, love their families, have hopes and dreams for a better future, and try to do the right thing. I try not to take these conspiracies personally, much as I don't take Apollo CBs personally, but it gets a little hard to deal with essentially being accussed en-masse. So, I do take it personally, because I served with every good intention, and I served with a great many good, decent people. And frankly, I resent to implication that we all actively or passively lent our hands to one of the greatest crimes and mass murders ever committed in our country.

Well, that's my piece on that aspect anyway.

Hope I gave a little helpful information.