- The FBI’s Intelligence Fumbles: How the feds knew about al Qaeda’s schemes years before 9/11 but dropped the ball.
- TWA Flight 800: Terrorism or Tall Tale?: Lance’s jaw-dropping claim that the 1996 crash was a terrorist hit, not a fluke.
- Mob Ties and FBI Lies: How the Bureau’s cozying up to organized crime muddied the 9/11 investigation.
- The 9/11 Commission’s Half-Truths: Why the official report feels more like a bedtime story than the full scoop.
- What Lance Brings New to the Table: Fresh evidence that’ll make you rethink everything.
As a former medical engineer turned stay-at-home dad, I’ve spent years fixing systems and raising kids—both teach you to spot when something’s off. Lance’s book hit me like a rogue lawnmower blade: it’s messy, sharp, and cuts through the government’s polished excuses.
The FBI’s Intelligence Fumbles: A Puzzle Left Unassembled
Lance kicks off with a gut punch: the FBI had inklings of the 9/11 plot as early as 1994 but couldn’t—or wouldn’t—connect the dots. In Chapter 2, he spotlights Ramzi Yousef, the “Mozart of Terror,” who hatched the scheme in the Philippines. Lance writes, “Ramzi Yousef was the al Qaeda link between both attacks on the Twin Towers” (p. 24). The FBI’s New York office had him in their sights, yet they let the trail go cold.
Take the Calverton shooters from Chapter 1—Middle Eastern men firing AK-47s on Long Island in 1989, snapped by the FBI’s own cameras. These guys weren’t weekend hobbyists; they included El Sayyid Nosair, who’d later kill Rabbi Meier Kahane, and others tied to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Lance notes, “Had they pressed further, the FBI might have discovered that the Alkifah Center was the New York outpost for… Osama bin Laden’s ‘Afghan Arabs’” (p. 25). It’s like handing a toddler a jigsaw puzzle and watching them eat the pieces instead of solving it. The feds had the intel—bomb receipts, Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman’s threats against “high world buildings”—but sat on it until after the towers fell.
This isn’t just hindsight grumbling. Lance’s evidence, like FBI 302 memos from Chapter 3, shows informants warning of plane hijackings years before 9/11. It’s infuriating—like knowing your smoke detector’s beeping but unplugging it because it’s annoying.
[TEXT holding space for image: FBI headquarters]
TWA Flight 800: Terrorism or Tall Tale?
Here’s where Lance throws a curveball that could knock you off your porch swing. Chapter 5 argues TWA Flight 800’s 1996 crash—230 lives lost—wasn’t a mechanical hiccup but an al Qaeda bombing tied to Yousef’s Bojinka plot. He quotes an informant’s sketch of a bomb trigger, saying, “Evidence uncovered for this book now shows persuasively that the FBI was warned, weeks in advance of the crash, that al Qaeda operatives tied to Ramzi Yousef would explode a bomb aboard a U.S. airliner” (p. 61).
Lance ties this to Yousef’s prison-cell scheming, detailed in Chapter 4, where he aimed to bomb a plane for a mistrial. An FBI informant—Gregory Scarpa Jr.—relayed, “Yousef told Scarpa that the bombing of a plane was to influence the trial and get a mistrial” (p. 49). The feds had this intel, yet Chapter 6 reveals they pushed a flimsy K-9 training mishap theory to explain explosive residue. Lance dismantles it: “The St. Louis K-9 test… was conducted five weeks earlier on a different aircraft” (p. 73). It’s like blaming a barn fire on a match you lit last month.
Why the dodge? Chapter 7 hints at protecting other cases: “The cover-up itself was the result of an ends/means decision made at the upper echelons of the Clinton Justice Department” (p. 83). This isn’t conspiracy kookery—it’s a government choosing convenience over truth, like a dad hiding a broken toy to avoid a tantrum.
[TEXT holding space for image: TWA Flight 800 crash site]
Mob Ties and FBI Lies: A Tangled Web
Things get murkier in Chapter 8 with the FBI’s dance with organized crime. Lance uncovers how Gregory Scarpa Sr., a Colombo family killer, doubled as an FBI informant since the ’60s. By Chapter 9, his son, Scarpa Jr., is feeding Yousef intel from prison—intel the feds later bury. Lance writes, “The FBI and Justice Department were alerted to the 9/11 plot… more than six years before September 11, 2001” (p. 5). Why ignore it? Chapter 10 reveals the Bureau feared unraveling mob convictions tied to Scarpa Sr.’s handler, Lin DeVecchio.
Scarpa Sr.’s rap sheet is a horror show—murders, loan-sharking, all under FBI protection. Lance notes, “Between 1962… until he stopped working for the Bureau thirty years later, Gregory Scarpa was paid upwards of $158,000 by the Feds” (p. 20). It’s like hiring a fox to guard the henhouse, then wondering why feathers are everywhere. Chapter 11 ties this to the TWA cover-up: “The Justice Department suddenly ruled the crash an accident… throwing away its best chance to penetrate the cell that was already planning 9/11” (p. 133). The FBI’s mob mess didn’t just stink—it stank up national security.
[TEXT holding space for image: Gregory Scarpa Sr.]
The 9/11 Commission’s Half-Truths: A Whitewashed Report
Lance’s beef with the 9/11 Commission hits hard in Chapter 12. He calls it “the Warren Commission of its era—an official body that purposely limited the scope of its investigation, cherry-picked evidence” (p. 3). Chapter 13 exposes their timeline dodge: “The vast preponderance of our work… focuses on the period of 1998 forward” (p. 3). Why skip the ’90s when Yousef’s plot was brewing?
Chapter 14 details ignored warnings—like a 1998 briefing about al Qaeda hijacking a plane to free the blind Sheikh (p. 7). Lance contrasts this with the Commission’s claim in Chapter 15 that the plot crystallized later: “The 9/11 plan was conceived in 1996” (p. 209). Bull. Chapter 16 shows the feds knew of Yousef’s flight-school schemes by ’94. It’s like a teacher grading your essay without reading the first half.
Chapter 17’s minute-by-minute breakdown of 9/11—fighters not scrambled for nearly an hour, Bush out of touch—screams negligence. Lance asks, “Why wasn’t NORAD alerted… until eighteen minutes after air traffic controllers realized a hijacking was in progress?” (p. 229). Chapter 18 hammers the Commission’s soft-pedaling: “The Commission ignored vast areas of culpability” (p. 3). It’s a report less about truth and more about saving face—like a kid swearing the dog ate his homework when the paper’s still in his backpack.
[TEXT holding space for image: 9/11 Commission report]
What Lance Brings New to the Table: Evidence That Bites
Lance isn’t just rehashing old gripes; he’s got fresh meat. Chapter 19 introduces Scarpa Jr.’s “kites”—notes from Yousef predicting TWA 800 and more: “The informant reports… offer an extraordinary glimpse inside the mind of Ramzi Yousef” (p. 6). These were dismissed by prosecutors, but Lance’s appendices (p. 299-312) show they’re legit—raw, unfiltered warnings the FBI trashed.
Chapter 20 unveils a 1996 FBI 302 memo echoing the ’98 hijack threat, proving earlier awareness (p. 7). His Afterword adds sting: the Justice Department stonewalled his Scarpa Jr. interview request in 2004 (p. 257). Lance’s digging—FBI memos, informant sketches, timelines from Paul Thompson—builds a case that’s hard to shrug off. It’s like finding a rusted wrench in your garage and realizing it fits every bolt you’ve been missing.
[TEXT holding space for image: Symbolic image of transparency]
Final Thoughts: A Call to Keep Digging
Cover Up isn’t a cozy read—it’s a kick in the shins. Lance argues the government’s still hiding the full 9/11 story, and his evidence backs it up: “This is the story of an extraordinary act of negligence in one presidential administration that was compounded in the next, then ignored by the 9/11 Commission” (p. 7). As a guy who’s wrestled with broken medical devices and teenage rebellion, I get it—systems fail when no one’s accountable.This book’s a plow through the muck of government screw-ups and cover-ups. It’s not perfect—Lance can get preachy—but it’s real. The declassified Saudi link only sharpens his point: we’re still in the dark. So, grab Cover Up, chew on it, and let me know what you think below. The truth’s a stubborn weed—it keeps growing if we don’t yank it out.
