They gave you a plausible-enough reason and you took their word for it. That's completely fine, you are well within your rights to decide for yourself whether you believe them or not.

I don't, and since neither of us can know for sure given the info we've been given, it's useless for us to argue about our opinions.

I am curious, what explanation would justify a full closure of the airspace over a major us city for 10 days, in your opinion? That is the real screwup here. Whatever justification they are giving is entirely beside the point. Closing the airspace, even to emergency medevac flights, is negligence.