2 New Reports Counter 9/11 Conspiracy Theories

NEW YORK TIMES
September 2, 2006

2 U.S. Reports Seek to Counter Conspiracy Theories About 9/11

By JIM DWYER

Faced with an angry minority of people who believe the Sept. 11 attacks were part of a shadowy and sprawling plot run by Americans, separate reports were published this week by the State Department and a federal science agency insisting that the catastrophes were caused by hijackers who used commercial airliners as weapons.

The official narrative of the attacks has been attacked as little more than a cover story by an assortment of radio hosts, academics, amateur filmmakers and others who have spread their arguments on the Internet and cable television in America and abroad. As a motive, they suggest that the Bush administration wanted to use the attacks to justify military action in the Middle East.

Most elaborately, they propose that the collapse of the World Trade Center was actually caused by explosive charges secretly planted in the buildings, rather than by the destructive force of the airliners that thundered into the towers and set them ablaze.

The government reports and officials say the demolition argument is utterly implausible on a number of grounds. Indeed, few proponents of the explosives theory are willing to venture explanations of how daunting logistical problems would be overcome, such as planting thousands of pounds of explosives in busy office towers.

Nevertheless, federal officials say they moved to affirm the conventional history of the day because of the persistence of what they call â??alternative theories.â?� On Wednesday, the National Institute of Standards and Technology issued a seven-page study based on its earlier 10,000-page report on how and why the trade center collapsed. The full report, released a year ago, and the new study, in a question and answer format, are available online at http://wtc.nist.gov.

About a dozen researchers produced the new study over the last two months by assembling material from the longer report that addressed the conspiracy claims.

â??With the fifth anniversary coming up, there seemed to be more play for the alternative viewpoints,â?� said Michael E. Newman, a spokesman for the institute. â??We have received e-mails and phone calls asking us to respond to these theories, and we felt that this fact sheet was the best means of doing so.â?�

A nationwide poll taken earlier this summer by the Scripps Survey Research Center at Ohio University found that more than a third of those surveyed said the federal government either took part in the attacks or allowed them to happen. And 16 percent said the destruction of the trade center was aided by explosives hidden in the buildings. The survey questioned 1,010 adults by telephone and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points. Details are available at http://newspolls.org.

The demolition theory has managed to endure what would seem to be enormous obstacles to its practicality. Controlled demolition is done from the bottom of buildings, not the top, to take advantage of gravity, and there is little dispute that the collapse of the two towers began high in the towers, in the areas where the airplanes struck.

Moreover, a demolition project would have required the tower walls to be opened on dozens of floors, followed by the insertion of thousands of pounds of explosives, fuses and ignition mechanisms, all sneaked past the security stations, inside hundreds of feet of walls on all four faces of both buildings. Then the walls presumably would have been closed up.

All this would have had to take place without attracting the notice of any of the thousands of tenants and workers in either building; no witness has ever reported such activity. Then on the morning of Sept. 11, the demolition explosives would have had to withstand the impacts of the airplanes, since the collapse did not begin for 57 minutes in one tower, and 102 minutes in the other.

Those who believe in the demolition theory remain unpersuaded by government statements new or old, and the officials who issued the would-be rejoinders say they are not surprised. â??We realize that this fact sheet wonâ??t convince those who hold to the alternative theories that our findings are sound,â?� Mr. Newman said. â??In fact, the fact sheet was never intended for them. It is for the masses who have seen or heard the alternative theory claims and want balance.â?�

Mr. Newman was correct that the instituteâ??s reports would not convert those who favor the demolition theories, said Kevin Ryan, who is the coeditor of an online publication, www.journalof911studies.com, that has published much of the material arguing that the governmentâ??s accounts are false.

â??The list of answers NIST has provided is generating more questions, and more skepticism, than ever before,â?� Mr. Ryan said.

Mr. Newman said, â??NIST respects the opinions of others who do not agree with the findings in its report on the collapses of WTC1 and WTC2.â?�

The State Department report, which officials said was written independently of the new institute study, is titled, â??The Top Sept. 11 Conspiracy Theoriesâ?� and says, â??Numerous unfounded conspiracy theories about the Sept. 11 attacks continue to circulate, especially on the Internet.â?� Produced by an arm of the State Department known as a â??counter-misinformation team,â?� the report is dated Aug. 28 and appears as a special feature on the departmentâ??s Web site, at http://usinfo.state.gov/media/misinformation.html.

The report brought to light one little-known detail about the morning: a private demolition monitoring firm, Protec Documentation Services, had seismographs at several construction sites in Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn.
Those machines documented the tremors of the falling towers, but captured no ground vibrations before the collapses from demolition charges or bombs, according to a separate report by Brent Blanchard, the director of field operations for Protec. It is available online at www.implosionworld.com.

Asked for comment, Mr. Ryan said that his online 9/11 journal would soon publish an article on those seismic recordings. He also maintained that the Protec paper did not adequately address why puffs of smoke were seen being expelled from some of the floors. However, the federal investigators said that about 70 percent of a buildingâ??s volume consists of air, and what looked like puffs of smoke were jets of air â?? and dust â?? that were pushed ahead of the collapse.

Among those now propelling the argument that explosives took down the trade center is Steven E. Jones, a physics professor at Brigham Young University, coeditor with Mr. Ryan of www.journalof911studies.com, which published his paper, â??Why Indeed Did the World Trade Center Buildings Completely Collapse on 9-11-2001?â?�

In an e-mail message yesterday, Professor Jones did not explain how so much explosive could have been positioned in the two buildings without drawing attention. â??Others are researching the maintenance activity in the buildings in the weeks prior to 9/11/2001,â?� he wrote.

He said his investigation was finding fluorine and zinc in metal debris and dust gathered from near the trade center site, and argued that those elements should not have been found in the building compounds. â??We are investigating the possibility of thermite-based arson and demolition,â?� he wrote, referring to compounds that, under controlled circumstances, can cut through steel.
The federal investigators at the National Institute of Standards and Technology state that enormous quantities of thermite would have to be applied to the structural columns to damage them. Not so, said Professor Jones; he said he and others were investigating â??superthermite.â?�

Professor Jones also argues that the molten steel found in the rubble was evidence of demolition explosives because an ordinary airplane fire would not generate enough heat. He cited photographs of construction equipment removing debris that appeared to be red.

In rebuttal, Mr. Blanchard of Protec said that if there had been any molten steel in the rubble, it would have permanently damaged any excavation equipment encountering it. â??As a fundamental point, if an excavator or grapple ever dug into a pile of molten steel heated to excess of 2000 degrees Fahrenheit, it would completely lose its ability to function,â?� Mr. Blanchard wrote. â??At a minimum, the hydraulics would immediately fail and its moving parts would bond together or seize up.â?�

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/02/ny...onspiracy.html

those clinging onto the official conspiracy theory are becoming the minority.

9/11 the official story is the biggest conspiracy
by Barry Zwicker

Mark Twain said, â??If you donâ??t read the newspaper, youâ??re uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, youâ??re misinformed.â?� According to Toronto writer Barrie Zwicker, this is the sorry truth about the officially accepted version of September 11, 2001, which he dissects in his new book Towers of Deception: The Media Cover-Up of 9/11.

As a media critic, Zwickerâ??s credentials are impeccable: in addition to his commentaries on CBC Radio and Vision TV, he has worked for the Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail, and taught journalism at Ryerson University for seven years. Common Ground: According to a few polls taken in the US and Canada, there is a notable lack of faith in the official story on 9/11.

Why do you think this disbelief persists, in spite of the lack of media interest in an alternative take on 9/11?

Barrie Zwicker: The disbelief persists because despite the drumbeat of the official story, and despite the nearly utter failure of the mainstream media to raise questions about the absurdities and impossibilities of the official story, ordinary, decent people, using their own senses and adding two and two, smell something fishy. Especially because the people promoting the official story, namely the White House and the big media, also promoted the lie of WMDs in Iraq, and have lied and covered up on other large issues. What I call the apologist community has more and more to answer for.

The early August Scripps Howard/Ohio University nationwide poll shows 36 percent of the US public â??â?¦ suspects that federal officials assisted in the 9/11 terrorist attacks or took no action to stop them, so the United States could go to war in the Middle East.â?� The same poll shows â??â?¦ anger against the federal government is at record levels.â?� The most common thing that Americans tell me is that the Bush regime is capable of anything and that it will stop at nothing. I agree.

CG: You were skeptical early on about the official story on 9/11. What was it that gave you your initial doubts?

BZ: My initial doubts arose before noon on the day of 9/11, based on the absence of any USAF response to the multiple hijackings, over a drama in the skies that lasted almost two hours. As a person always very interested in aviation, I knew that this quite simply was impossible. It turned out I was the first journalist in the world to go on national TV to question the official story.

CG: If 9/11 were a conspiracy against the American people, it would presumably require the involvement of hundreds, if not thousands of people, to play their respective roles and maintain silence afterwards.

What do you say to critics who say people canâ??t keep secrets, and that something this big is bound to get out?

BZ: For one thing, I point to the Manhattan Project, in which the US developed and then exploded the first atomic bomb. Conceived in 1939, the Project, by its completion, involved 43,000 people at 37 facilities in 19 states and in Canada. It was kept entirely secret. Who knew about the stealth bomber until the military chose to reveal it? Who knew about the U-2 spy plane until one was shot down over the USSR, thereby wrecking the Paris peace talks? Large secrets canâ??t be kept? Gimme a break!

CG: Many will be willing to go with you as far as the idea that the White House had forewarning of the attacks but allowed them to go through for political gain. But they will reject the idea of direct government involvement. What do you say to them?

BZ: In any crime, you have to search out all the evidence you can and then find out which suspect the evidence points to more than any other suspect. In the case of 9/11, the smoking guns are all pointed at the White House. Some people shrink from this observation out of a sheer established trust in government, or the belief that government would be incapable of such a heinous crime. Such a belief is unjustified by the evidence of what previous governments throughout history have done.

Keep in mind what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote in The Sign of Four: â??Whenever you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.â?�

CG: In your book and DVD, you cite the declassified Operation Northwoods, a planned â??false flagâ?� operation that nearly came to be 30 years ago. Can you tell us more about this plan for a staged domestic terror attack?

BZ: The frightening thing about Operation Northwoods was that the whole of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff unanimously signed off on it. It involved American citizens being killed, to make more real the lie that the Cubans were carrying out â??terrorist attacksâ?� against the US. Furthermore, most of the advisors around then President John F. Kennedy were in favour of the horrible ruse, which would have led to the invasion of Cuba back in 1962. The rot of criminal, immoral, death-dealing deception was already that deeply rooted in the US White House then. Is todayâ??s White House more pure?

CG: In your book, you state that it is the cumulative weight of evidence, rather than any one incident that leads you to believe 9/11 was an inside job. If you were to name the closest thing to a smoking gun, what would that be?

BZ: Smoking guns include the near freefall collapse â?? controlled demolition, for example â?? of WTC7. The non-appearance of the USAF for almost two hours on 9/11, and Bush saying he saw on ordinary TV the first plane hit, when footage of the hit was not aired on ordinary TV until the next day, come second and third in my lineup of smoking guns.

CG: Can you tell us more about World Trade Centre building number seven?

BZ: As mentioned, it was a matter of controlled demolition, which Larry Silverstein, the buildingâ??s owner, later admitted in the PBS documentary Rebuilding America. The question is could Osama bin Laden have been able to infiltrate his al Qaeda agents into WTC-7 weeks in advance and plant the required explosives? If he did have that power, how come the administration, and of course, the mass media in general, pay so little attention to this amazing power of Osamaâ??s as to make WTC-7 a â??non-buildingâ?� to this day? Why does the 9/11 commissionâ??s report not mention its collapse whatsoever?

CG: In your opinion, which techniques are being used to cover up the real story?

BZ: Theyâ??re more than techniques. As I have written about extensively in my book, there are deep and widespread realities of the media that create a de facto censorship regime as powerful as Pravda and Izvestia ever were in the old Soviet Union. You have to start with the owners of the corporate media, who are closely supportive of the Bush White House. The Fox News network is, in effect, a privatized, propaganda network at the disposal of Bush and company.

Add to this the traditions of journalism â?? he said, she said journalism, for instance â?? that treats lies and truth equally. And that journalists live in the same fiction-ridden society as everyone else, and are not, despite their pretensions, immune from â??Big Picture BS.â?� As well, many, if not most, journalists are careerists and learn which stories or actions will get them raises and promotions, and which will get them into hot water. Put all these factors and many more, including peer group pressure, together and you get a situation akin to a school of fish; they all learn in which direction to swim and they all swim in that direction together.
CG: Of the independent researchers and/or writers digging into this matter, whom do you follow and respect?

BZ: There are many. And many, if not most of them, are ordinary, unsung people I meet in various cities who are doggedly pursuing 9/11 truth and trying to share it with their families, neighbours and colleagues. Of the better-known 9/11 truth activists, I think my greatest respect and admiration must go to Dr. David Ray Griffin, now the author of four books about the truth of 9/11. I devote a chapter to him in my new book.

Michael C. Ruppert, although he has, unfortunately, made some negative and unnecessary remarks about the 9/11 truth movement, remains a giant of the movement in my eyes nevertheless. He was about the earliest out of the gate, and when he spoke in Toronto in January of 2002, he pried my eyes open much wider than they were at that time. He connected the dots between the CIA, Wall Street, the illegal drug trade, corruption in the US government and 9/11. I believe his video, Truth and Lies of 9/11, was the first of its kind, based on a talk he gave in Portland, Oregon, in November 2001. He now focuses almost exclusively on Peak Oil and again, not only was he early on that, but he has also helped boost the visibility of the coming end of the age of oil, which will be civilization-shaking.
CG: Given your conclusions about 9/11, do you have suspicions about the attacks in Bali, Madrid and London?

BZ: More than suspicions. In my book, I list 18 false flag operations, including Madrid and London. I also believe Bali 1 and Bali 2 were false flag ops. More recently, the trans-Atlantic exploding shampoo terror fraud was obvious from the beginning, as was the roundup of 17 â??terrorist suspectsâ?� in Toronto in June of 2006.

CG: In the past, mainstream media has shown its readiness to give nominal coverage to activists and their campaigns, only to dismiss them, or reduce the concerns to just one more scare story in a barrage of manufactured news. Are you concerned this could happen with your message?

BZ: There are signs that, spurred by the inescapable imperative of news organizations to play up anniversaries in a big way, that even the mainstream is having to recognize there are a lot of people who are not on board with the official story. But after the fifth anniversary passes, there will be a tendency to once again relegate all 9/11 truth activity to the memory hole. Of course, other developments, especially one or more other horrendous false flag ops, could change the whole picture, probably much for the worse.

CG: Many people would prefer to ignore or reject your conclusions. For to take any of it seriously means more than a co-opted or complicit media; it means we are governed by monsters and there is no social contract. What do you say to the people who reject your thesis, for fear of looking into the abyss?

BZ: I sympathize with people who do not want, as you so well phrase it, to look into the abyss. It takes courage and a dedication to follow the truth wherever it may lead, however discomfiting or even threatening to the well- being of oneself and oneâ??s family.

At the same time, I think our best chance to get out of our multiple messes is to face them squarely, take the bull by the horns and join the struggle for a safer, saner world. In a way, I agree with Bush, and with Jesus, in their stating, â??Youâ??re either with me or against me.â?� One of the most dispiriting things is to encounter people who say, â??I know what you say is true, but I donâ??t intend to do anything about it.â?� Would they say that if their doctor diagnosed them with cancer?

CG: Do you see any chance in the near future of reversing a trend toward reduced civil rights, military expansion and global atmospheric breakdown?

BZ: If by near future you mean five years, yes. I also think that if we the people have not seriously undermined the ruling hyper-militaristic, super-deceitful, power-mad oiligarchy of ruthless greedsters, they will have declared martial law and moved to full-fledged fascism. I do not say this lightly. I mean the kind of genocidal fascism that Hitler practised. Todayâ??s oligarchy was spawned by the same forces â?? runaway corporatism and ideology â?? that fueled Hitlerâ??s Third Reich. We either stop them, or we, and our children â?? those who survive â?? will be living in the Fourth Reich, which may be the ultimate fate of humankind, which is not wired for survival.

As the resources run out, Earth will be a pathetic place, where a few ultra-wealthy live in fortified places, while the vast majority either die or barely survive. A successful revolution might be as unlikely as bringing the oil back. I think we have to imagine how good life on Earth could be if we smarten up and learn to live together, and how bad it could be if the present trends continue.

Remember, the present trends, or at least most of them, are toward dystopia. To overlook this is to engage in fatal denial. Denial is probably the main Achillesâ?? heel of the species known as Homo sapiens.

There are too many great websites to list; here are a few to get you started:
www.911truth.org
www.oldamericancentury.org
www.mujca.com
www.truthout.org
www.citizenscourt.com
www.911blogger.com
www.podcasts.com
Events:
September 8-11, New York City- Be part of history. Come to NYC for the 5th anniversary of 9/11. [email protected]
September 11-17, 2006, Washington, D.C. People will convene and move through the legal recourse needed to redress the government. The â??War of Liesâ?� has passed the $500 billion debt mark and 3,000 Americans are dead, along with hundreds of thousands in the nation we â??saved.â?� Freedom and liberty have been sold out to a federal police force. All Americans have been affected by corporate and limited liability governments and municipal codes. The time has come for a change. See http://www.911citizenscourt.com/index.php
Magazines: Global Outlook (www.globaloutlook.ca). Books by David Ray Griffin: The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions;
9/11 and American Empire: Intellectuals Speak Out; Christian Faith and the Truth Behind 9/11: A Call to Reflection and Action
Videos:
9/11 Press for Truth
Everybodyâ??s Got to Know Sometime
The Truth & Lies of 9/11

Pissy, you need to commission a survey so you can get your facts straight. People who believe the official story are still very much the majority.

AB, shame on you. You and those Bush loving b@#$%^ds at the NYT's are part of that great Government conspiracy. :D

Yeah people dont like being lied too so they cling on to that Official theory of 19 cavemen cause it sounds soo real... And hell our government wouldnt lie to us.....aint nothing like a bunch of criminals posting their thoughts on a cannabis.com website, wait i may be the only one who smokes pot in this thread, beside PH...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by birdgirl73

Pissy, you need to commission a survey so you can get your facts straight. People who believe the official story are still very much the majority.

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Hmm...that's a good idea. No, wait. CNN already did one in 2004, but it's mysteriously disappeared off their site. Other references exist on the web. Search for it if you care.

ANOTHER CNN Poll that is quite interesting is the one asking, "is America safer after 9/11?" 1 in 4 Americans say NO, it's more dangerous.

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/US/08/23/terror.poll/

It is generally the majority that has NO time to read beyond the surface, and so the governments and media have a field day, moulding public opinion as they require.

I remember a period in the 80s where butter went from being really really bad for you to being really really good for you and then really really bad and then... get my drift? If you use the media to repeat a message enough times, people will believe it.

Oh, and not to mention the fact that 5 of the 19 alleged suicide hijackers have been found alive and well in the middle east. Maybe they died and went to heaven and decided to come back for a laugh?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/mid...st/1559151.stm

Finally, what happened to America's defences on the morning of the attacks? In the one year prior to the "attack" NORAD was scrambled over 20 times when a plane went even slightly off it's course.

I don't claim to know who did it, but I can smell a lie when I see one, and just because they are the oh so divine government doesn't mean they are righteous or honest. QUITE the opposite in fact!

Lol...its not surprising that BA would post something like this.

Hey BA..those freedom hating Muslims are out to get you!! Better have the fascist Amerikans invade every Muslim country in the name of security!!