I think it was Norad that basically over ruled his plans. he wanted to put chaff in the chutes.....that included the planes coming in close..

It sounds like the military decided it was a civilian matter, and helped out, but didn't want any part of what was to be done to stop Cooper, or be involved other than radar, and aircraft surveillance..

The military is normally limited in what it is permitted to do to help enforce civilian laws.  It is something covered by "posse comitatus" in the laws of the land.

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I think it was Norad that basically over ruled his plans. he wanted to put chaff in the chutes.....that included the planes coming in close..

It sounds like the military decided it was a civilian matter, and helped out, but didn't want any part of what was to be done to stop Cooper, or be involved other than radar, and aircraft surveillance..

According to Kaye:

1. FBI Transcript: "The aircraft was tracked by the U.S. Air Force at McChord Air Force Base, as it proceeded south on Vector (sic) 23, and precise tracing of that route has been provided by the Air Force and became a basis for a search in the Southwestern part of the State of Washington."

2. FBI transcript: "Will maintain contact with Beale Air Force Base concerning the flight of the Air Force SR-71 and advise the results of the flight and when the pictures might be available."

Providing law enforcement with information and "technical assistance" is permitted, but there are not going to be any military weapons involved.  Remember that the involvement in the Waco stand-off a few years ago was widely discussed as to its legality.  If I remember correctly, the Army loaned the FBI an unarmed tank (all weapons removed) so that agents could get close to the Branch Davidson's building mainly because those people had longer range and more powerful weapons than the law enforcement people.

What about escape by boat, James Bond stuff. anyone every bring that idea up?

Granted the Columbia has the force to 'move' something. I dont see random bundles floating anywhere. Once soaked they would sink. The whole bag of money could have been pushed a long way while still buoyant or even bounced along the bottom if not buoyant ... then snagged until the dredging sucked the bundles apart?

I am struck by the gulf between 'natural means' and 'plant'. Tom makes it sounds like it's either one or the other, with no other options?! Cooper could have survived his jump up north then walked to Vancouver trying to get to Portland, and lost some or all of his money, or been separated of it in a struggle, or lost the whole bag or bundles while trying to jump a train .... point is, there are a million possibilities and shades of gray between 'natural means' and 'a plant'! But Tom is an all-or-nothing kind of guy. Black or white and nothing in between. Since he can't prove a natural means, well then it has to be a plant, and asparagus only!     

My feelings are the money bundles remained inside the bank bag until they were "unsheathed" by the dredging process, or/and the bank bag decayed away at some point.  The dredge is meant to move high volumes of sand, mud, sediment, etc., and it's conceivable that the money bundles were were sucked up with surrounding sand and encased within that sand inside the dredge pipe.  Once the bundles were deposited in the dredge piles, the sand which encased them held them together, eliminating the effect of the rubber bands once they failed due to eventual decay.  The bundles remained there, slowly decaying, until they were found in 1980.

Let's do a quick timeline of the money discovery:
1971-The skyjacking incident
About 3 years pass
1974-The Columbia River is dredged and dredge spoils are formed at Tina bar
About 6 years pass
1980-The money is found and Dr. Palmer investigates and creates his report
About 19 years pass
2009-The Citizen Sleuths re-analyze Tina Bar and come up with their own conclusions

I've already explained my opinion that Tom Kaye is a very bright guy who sometimes lacks the common sense to interpret information in a practical way.  The "Cooper's body  snagged on a freighter propeller and moved upstream" scenario is one example of that which comes to mind, which leads us to the theory of a "plant".  This theory is used to explain the discrepancy in the timeline of when the money was deposited in the bar and the results of the rubber-band test.  The problem is when we open ourselves the theories like this, based on possible misinterpretation of evidence, then we open ourselves to all kinds of wacko ideas.  Next thing we know, we are looking for a suspect wearing platform shoes, contacts and a strap-on, digging holes and burying money in a river bank in 1979.  Possible?  Maybe.  Probable?  Highly unlikely.

So much of the dredge theory sounds good, but it throws a wrench into things just as other theories.

The jumped was either later than thought, or the path is possibly wrong. I doubt the money crawled up from the bottom all by itself.

Then it still doesn't prove he lived, or died. could of lost the money, or went into the river with the money, and finally, he landed somewhere near the money location....all 3 work, but which one 

Well, living suspects have been heavily investigated for the past 40 years, with little tangible results.  There are few missing persons out there that are similar to the the description of the Cooper suspect, and they haven't been investigated very well, though I don't know what one would look for if investigating a "no pull".  The key to a final solution would be the FBI locating the cigarette butts, then running a DNA test and making the results public, thereby allowing us to compare it against the couple of missing persons that match the suspects description.  eventually something would come out of the woodwork and lead to a solution of the case,, and the FBI would save a ton of money not dealing with this fiasco.   

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Granted the Columbia has the force to 'move' something. I dont see random bundles floating anywhere. Once soaked they would sink. The whole bag of money could have been pushed a long way while still buoyant or even bounced along the bottom if not buoyant ... then snagged until the dredging sucked the bundles apart?

I am struck by the gulf between 'natural means' and 'plant'. Tom makes it sounds like it's either one or the other, with no other options?! Cooper could have survived his jump up north then walked to Vancouver trying to get to Portland, and lost some or all of his money, or been separated of it in a struggle, or lost the whole bag or bundles while trying to jump a train .... point is, there are a million possibilities and shades of gray between 'natural means' and 'a plant'! But Tom is an all-or-nothing kind of guy. Black or white and nothing in between. Since he can't prove a natural means, well then it has to be a plant, and asparagus only!     

My feelings are the money bundles remained inside the bank bag until they were "unsheathed" by the dredging process, or/and the bank bag decayed away at some point.  The dredge is meant to move high volumes of sand, mud, sediment, etc., and it's conceivable that the money bundles were were sucked up with surrounding sand and encased within that sand inside the dredge pipe.  Once the bundles were deposited in the dredge piles, the sand which encased them held them together, eliminating the effect of the rubber bands once they failed due to eventual decay.  The bundles remained there, slowly decaying, until they were found in 1980.

Let's do a quick timeline of the money discovery:
1971-The skyjacking incident
About 3 years pass
1974-The Columbia River is dredged and dredge spoils are formed at Tina bar
About 6 years pass
1980-The money is found and Dr. Palmer investigates and creates his report
About 19 years pass
2009-The Citizen Sleuths re-analyze Tina Bar and come up with their own conclusions

I've already explained my opinion that Tom Kaye is a very bright guy who sometimes lacks the common sense to interpret information in a practical way.  The "Cooper's body  snagged on a freighter propeller and moved upstream" scenario is one example of that which comes to mind, which leads us to the theory of a "plant".  This theory is used to explain the discrepancy in the timeline of when the money was deposited in the bar and the results of the rubber-band test.  The problem is when we open ourselves the theories like this, based on possible misinterpretation of evidence, then we open ourselves to all kinds of wacko ideas.  Next thing we know, we are looking for a suspect wearing platform shoes, contacts and a strap-on, digging holes and burying money in a river bank in 1979.  Possible?  Maybe.  Probable?  Highly unlikely.

People have cited hard objects passing through a dredge pipe _ not soft wet money! The idea that the high velocity sand is somehow 'encasing-protecting' the money may be total fiction. Normally high velocity sand is one helluva
abrasive.

We keep hearing stories about hard metal objects, but they seem to over look that currency isn't a cannonball, or a welding tank.

The only thing I can think of is contacting a pump company, and see if there R & D department would be willing to toss a bundle in the pump 

It works on suction, so I don't know how it will react to the impeller. it might go right past it, I don't know?

Just a bundle of hard packed magazines etc should tell something ... keep in mind the bands would not have been viable and holding anything together by 1974. The bundles would constitute nothing but a bunch of 2.6" x 6" sheets of paper maybe encases in some silk ? but nothing of any real substance that can deal with the forces of the suction auger and pipe which incidently is working at a high enough pressure to pump tons of sand through very long pumps from the center of the Columbia all the way to Tena Bar! Those are some strong forces involved.