It is relatively easy to connect the historical dots knowing what actually happened on 9-11, but at the time no one could have put together what was going to happen. It is no different than the endless speculation about Pearl Harbor and whether Roosevelt, Churchill, military intelligence the code breakers etc. could have forewarned the Navy about December 7th.
Actually, the details as to what was planned were laid out on the Internet long before September 11, 2001. I read about it and talked to others about it. I was at work and was talking to a supplier on the telephone when my employer walked in to my tiny office and told me that something had struck one of the towers. I told him that suicide pilots were involved and that there would be more.
What I cannot understand is that I can find nothing in the internet archives on this now and while there was some discussion of it before the event and immediately afterward, nobody seems to remember anything about it now. I did not imagine all this, I read warnings before the event.
Yep. Hindsight is always 20/20.