Defense Intelligence Agency Reservist Made it His ‘Mission in Life’ to Save New Yorkers from 9/11 Attack

Twenty-three years later, Gary Greco can still vividly picture Ron Bucca waving goodbye and passing through the Pentagon Metro Station turnstiles.

Greco didn’t know it would be the last time he saw his friend.

As operations chief for the 3413th Military Intelligence Detachment out of Fort Totten (Queens), New York, Bucca and his team of Army reservists reported to Greco, the chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency’s Terrorism Warning Division.

Bucca had nearly finished his two weeks of annual training at the Defense Intelligence Analysis Center (DIAC) in Washington, D.C, but before the New York City-native headed home in August of 2001, he was insistent on speaking with Greco in his Pentagon office about where a terrorist group called Al-Qa’ida could strike next.

“He was very adamant that they would come back to the World Trade Center,” said Greco, referring to Al-Qa’ida’s ties to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. “Our focus was totally overseas. We discussed how Al Qa’ida had attempted to blow up a U.S. Navy vessel in Aden Harbor (in Yemen) several times and failed, but then finally got the USS Cole there in 2000. Ron noted that they kept trying to come back to major targets.”