911 - was it self inflicted?

[Bob Singleton]

Who is to say that the "snopes" website isn't owned and operated by the CIA or similar to help refute anti-government "conspiracy" theories. (After all, the US government and military were happy to allow UFO stories as these were good cover for the testing of secret military weapons, such as the stealth fighter bomber and cruise missiles)

For example, in this page debunking the "it wasn't a 757 that hit the Pentagon" theories the snopes website says that when the first tower was hit, people at first thought it was a light aircraft because the size of the hole was so "small".

That is utter bollocks.

Look at photos of the Twin Towers after the attack and the "outline" of a plane is clear for all to see... fuselage AND wings.

People thought it was a light aircraft at first for various reasons, not least because the very idea of a commercial airliner hitting the tower was preposterous, and secondly because there were dozens of helicopter and light aircraft flights (many for tourist purposes) around Manhattan at the time, so the "obvious" thought was that one of them had crashed.

The simple fact is that the damage done to the Pentagon bears no resemblance to the sort of damage done to the Twin Towers, and two large commercial airliners (flights 77 and 93) supposedly left little or no debris at their crash sites.

Why were no bodies, or even parts of bodies, ever recovered from Flight 93? Even the Air India crash into the mid-Atlantic from a much higher altitude left greater wreckage and more bodies/body parts than Flights 77 and 93 put together!

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, and am more inclined towards "cock-up" theory. I too have flown extensively in the US and seen how lax security was on internal flights prior to 9/11.

HOWEVER... I personally wouldn't discount the theory that some people very high up in the US administration knew something was going to happen and CHOSE to allow it to happen knowing the power it would ultimately give them to do whatever they wanted.

[mrmcfister]

The buildings were hit by planes.They fell down.Many died.Theres no god,no ghosts,astrology is for idiots.Most readers of this will be dead by the time they are 83.They will be cremated or buried.They will be missed by their immediate families.In 100 years time you will be photographs in albums.People will say 'Wow Great Grandad Dibble has my nose etc etc' .This is only a visit.Live your life.IMHO Most Yanks are decent people avoid zealots they are the real twats.......

[Fred]

Snopes a disinformation site? Sure. Why stop there? Who's to say that much of the "9/11 Truth Movement" isn't a front and that many of these oh-so popular theories aren't dreamed up in the first place by spooks in Langley?

Personally I think it's far too neat and tidy that 9/11 was organised by the US govt or that they knew that the WTC was going to happen. What is far more likely is that they knew that something like this could happen and planned various strategies accordingly - the fruits of which we've seen in the ensuing years. Combine the neocon's avowed project for the "New American Century" with Bush/Rumsfeld/Cheney's incompetence and you have the Iraq quagmire three years on. Not as exciting as the rock soundtrack on the conspiracy DVD's and Flash presentations, but far more likely.

What the hell, if it all gets too much, you could always slash your wrists with Occam's razor.

[strictlybroadband]

If you're looking for conspiracies, think about the anthrax "attacks" after 9/11 - remember those envelopes of white powder?

It was all over the news, the American public were crapping themselves, then they announced that grade of anthrax is only produced in US government labs (strange, isn't that illegal?) and then - silence. No more scare, no more information, no arrests.

That one needs explaining.

[perihelion]

there is a site is used to go on which is full of 9/11 theories from the reasonable to the fucking insane, if you want the link ill post it, otherwise ill leave it off as i can just see me getting canned and criticised for it.

I think more of al qaeda as a belief - a way of life as opposed to some big bad organisation headed up by the ever elusive bin laden. Its for this reason that we fight such a difficult battle against modern terrorism.


Is bin laden still alive? How do we know those videos we see from time to time is not just old footage, doctored, chopped up, re hashed? being played every now and then so the masses stay in fear and end up backing our governments agendas.

I dont believe the whole thing was self inflicted - that is a bit too extreme in my opinion, but certain aspects of 9/11 stink to high heaven - bushes ties with the bin laden family and the fact that the first commercial flights out of the US after 9/11 contained close family members of bin laden.....

The Beeb aired a good tv programme not so long ago called the ower of nightmares, did anyone see it?

[mart]

And apparently it overflew the Pentagon and returned, crashing into a section of the building which had recently been strengthened and was the least occupied part.

Mart

[strictlybroadband]

"The Beeb aired a good tv programme not so long ago called the Power of nightmares, did anyone see it?"

Yes - it was a series of 3 programmes: basically said that Al Qaida is an imaginary construct invented by the FBI so they could put a case together against bin Laden using organised crime legislation. And that the entire "war on terror" is constructed against an imaginary enemy that can never be beaten (since it doesn't exist), in order to keep dumb people scared and America in a perpetual state of war (truth being the first casualty of war).

They revealed some quite entertaining facts, like bin Laden used to pay local Afghans to appear in his propaganda videos, as he didn't have enough real "soldiers" of his own. The Americans turned him from minor gang leader into a global terrorist leader using smoke & mirrors.

[Chemical Robbie]

Dude, you make the most sense on this issue - I'm with you on this.

[Fred]

Power of Nightmares was a fine series, although not quite as black and white as StrictlyB suggests

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/3755686.stm

http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares

[Jonone]

The prescience of Orwell's '1984' is astonishing. 'War is peace', internet technologies and surveillance ... it's all in there.