PART 2
The Pentagon and the Death of the Two Unknowns*
Tony Kimery, working in intel for decades has things he can't disclose. Oftentimes they are routine details on routinely secret data gathering missions that don't approach any special, personal territory. Other times he may have "skin in the game" with strong feelings about the content and particulars because he was involved in decisions that were hotly argued over concerning operations and methods but those settle down into garden variety secrets that are buried away without much trouble once strong feelings cool down. But sometimes the calendar intrudes with it's relentless persistence year after year as newscasts shove personal memories to that part of the brain where reprocessing and re-warehousing of intel projects becomes necessary as does revisiting certain events that are a matter of public record, although the facts surrounding them and the players involved may remain and do remain secret yet it becomes inescapable to re-hash and re-file away if not re shove away into ones memory. Friends and family wonder why one would suddenly leave the room, excuse oneself or change the subject or just be gone sometimes for some sudden, baffling reason.
This is a beef with the late summer calendar that Tony Kimery has had for some twenty years. It's just easier to keep the drill well practiced and the remembrances hustled away in the usual manner. But it actually doesn't feel any better to replay the well practiced drill but just seems to bother him more. The annual hash and re-hash ritual becomes draining like too many apps or too much data stored away that slows you down on your phone or your laptop. But some things you don't want to delete even if you could. Take old pictures that you go back to once in a while except when you're with company and afraid of them getting lost, damaged, or worried about spilling coffee, beer or ketchup on them. Or other precipitation.
On 9/11, 1941 breaking ground on the Pentagon commenced. It's 60th anniversary saw two friends, one from the Northeast and one from the South get together at the "Puzzle Palace" to be involved in conversations about off limits topics that were of vital importance to national security if not national survival. The "Yankee" and the "Reb", or call them Ted and Fred, Tom and Jerry or Pete and Repete, in any case, they were two great friends that Tony was going to get together with afterwards to talk real beefs, possibly decry bums, bona fide bastards or just bitch with bonhomie over beer, bourbon and some nice chow that decades in government service enabled. Their real names don't make it into this real story. Their work was and remains too sensitive with stakes that remain 21 years later too high to disclose. The plan to meet up at a watering hole in Virginia evaporated at 9:37:46.
AM Eastern Time that morning as Tony's two friends were at the Western section of the Pentagon that a Boeing 757 flying at 530 MPH slammed into.
In a never before heard interview, Tony Kimery talks about his two friends who loved America quietly and courageously and who dedicated their lives to defend her through a profession that can't openly recognize it's heroes and whose names remain a secret to this day. They gave their lives for freedom on 9/11.
*(With permission from the Near East Center for Strategic Engagement where it was published on Sept. 11th, 2022)
