Just for the record, here's my personal view of what happened on 9/11 and afterwards:

- 19 Saudi nationals trained to hijack and fly planes, with the intent of using the planes as weapons against the Pentagon, the WTC, and another US gov't building (Capitol, White House). This is nothing new - these lunatics keep trying and once in a while, manage to blow themselves up and damage US property (USS Cole, Lebanon Embassy, First bombing attempt at the WTC,....)

- the outgoing Clinton administration passed on all available intelligence to the incoming Bush administration. The Bush administration dismissed any such intelligence and warnings.

- the secret service and the CIA *had* become aware of suspicious behavior and chatter that indicated some operation was apparently being planned or underway. Any such suspicion was forwarded to Bush' Attorney General John Ashcroft who dismissed it - as he was more concerned about forced morning prayers that protecting the nation. (note: this wasn't intentional, it was merely stupid).

- the operation was able to be pulled off with a 75% success rate by the 19 Saudi nationals, mostly despite their being idiots. A credit to the mastermind behind their training (who turned out to be Khalid Sheik Mohammed), who knew that he had to execute a plan while relying on uneducated morons.

- the plane in Pennsylvania went down and was destroyed en-route when the passengers realized what was going on, and basically started over-powering the hijackers. Facing defeat, the crew that had locked themselves in the cockpit barreled the plane straight into the ground.

- the other three planes hit their targets.

- back then, as I was watching the twin towers burning, I recall turning to my friend in the living room, and mentioning "if they don't get these fires under control within the hour, those towers will collapse into themselves". I said so because I knew the upper steel skeleton section of the towers was not protected by flame retardant and heat reducing materials, due to changes in the 1968 building codes. Whatever thin veneer of spray on coating was probably compromised by having a 500,000 ton plane slam into it. As such, I knew that the heat and damage generated was enough to weaken not just the steel (making buckling easier) but that it would loosen the steel bolts securing the structure.

- understanding of structural factors involved made it clear to me, that once 2-3 floors gave way and collapsed the rest of the building would collapse into itself. Which is exactly what happened 45 minutes later. So, none of this came as any sort of surprise - subsequent collapses of surrounding buildings also came as no surprise, considering WTC 7 burned continuously for 6-7 hours, and underground foundation structures were seriously damaged by the collapse of the twin towers, causing subsequent damage and collapse of surrounding structures.

- I do believe systematic cover-ups followed the events of 9/11, but those were the typical cover-ups of those in charge (John Ashcroft, Rumsfeld, Cheney, et al) to protect their own asses as well as to protect The President from any implications of *incompetence* and willful *negligence* (notice the two words I used : *incompetence* and *negligence* - not complicity).

- I also believe that the official commission's findings, while largely accurate, greatly simplified the actual course of events in the interest of providing closure, protecting national security, and protecting other individuals from being implicated for negligence and incompetence. Thus, to me, the official story is something I do not pay much attention to.

At the end of the day, the confessions, boastings and admissions by Bin Laden, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, Zacarias Moussaoui, and others provide sufficient support for that portion of "the official story" (furthermore to be referred to as TOS).

That's about it - in a nutshell, my view on what happened can simply be summarized by:

"Complacency does not equal Complicity!" or, in short "Complacency, not Complicity!"