Anti-aircraft activity in Iraq no-fly zones immediately before the 9/11 attacks.
Since the no-fly zones in Iraq were established after the Gulf War of 1990–91 and until Operation Iraqi Freedom began in March 2003, US and British aircraft were shot at in peacetime by Iraq many times. A few drones were shot down. No manned aircraft were shot down.
On 10 August 2001, Iraqi forces used new technology to fire at a U-2 spyplane monitoring Saddam’s Iraq regime in the southern no-fly zone. CNN reported at the time that a U-2 was almost shot down. In retaliation, “a communications fiber-optic node was struck, a radar site was struck, a surface-to-air missile site was struck as well.” (*) Prior to to this incident, Iraq was not known to have the capability to shoot down a U-2.
Iraq claimed to have shot down a US drone plane the morning of 11 September 2001, before the attacks on the WTC and Pentagon occurred. (†) Iraq time is several hours ahead of US time.
It appears that the proximity in time of these incidents to the 9/11 attacks was a coincidence.