9/11 Conspiracy Theories

Author(s): Beáta Sáfrány

Source: Hungarian Journal of English and American Studies (HJEAS) , Spring, 2013, Vol.
19, No. 1 (Spring, 2013), pp. 11-30
Published by: Centre for Arts, Humanities and Sciences (CAHS), acting on behalf of the
University of Debrecen CAHS

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9/11 Conspiracy Theories

Beáta Šafrány

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attacks. To assess the truth of these theories one needs to test the facts used
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To start with, conspiracy advocates argue that Bin Laden had
nothing to do with the terrorist attacks and that al Qaeda as an organization
does not even exist. In a Saudi dissident's interview with the TV magazine
Frontline , for instance, al Qaeda becomes equated with a guestbook. In this
interview, Saas Al-Fagih said that a recruitment office had been opened in
Peshawar, Pakistan, in the 1980s for young Arabs who wanted to take part
in the Afghan war (Broeckers 128). At first, no record was kept of those
arriving at the office, but since more and more families were inquiring about
the whereabouts of their sons, Bin Laden created a record of names and
dates (Broeckers 128). Besides this interview, theorists believe the empty

Hungarian journal of English and American Studies 19.1. 2013. Copyright © 2013
by HJEAS. All rights to reproduction in any form are reserved.

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cave found in the mountains of Tora Bora near Pakistan in December 2001

also supports the assumption that al Qaeda is only a phantom enemy.

If there is no terrorist organization called al Qaeda, there is no need
for a leader. If Bin Laden is not the head of al Qaeda, then who is he? Is he
a terrorist at all? Those in favor of conspiracy theories believe they have
evidence that proves Bin Laden is not guilty of the 9/11 attacks. Since
September 11, 2001, Qatar's al-Jazeera satellite television channel has aired
many video tapes featuring Bin Laden, some of which lead conspiracy
theorists to question the official version of the attacks since Bin Laden's
appearance seems to them either un-Islamic or inconsistent with al-Jazeera's
videos. In the official video, Bin Laden wears a wrist watch and ring, but th
Islamic faith allegedly forbids wearing jewelry (Ripple Effect). Therefore, the
man on the video tape is either not Bin Laden or is a Bin Laden of very
little faith.

Moreover, Bin Laden first claimed responsibility for the attacks in

October 2004, just four days before the presidential election ÇLoose Change
9/11: American Coup), an act which raised the suspicions of many
Americans. That confession video is often compared to the video which
appeared on September 7, 2007. Theorists believe the difference in Bin
Laden's appearance between the two videos supports the argument that he
is not an enemy to be feared. Figure 1 displays the difference: Bin Laden
looks much younger in the tape released in 2007 than in the 2004 video.

Figure 1: Bin Laden in a 2004 and 2007 video

Apart from the Bin Laden video tapes, conspiracy theorists offer
two more pieces of evidence indicating that he is not more than a phantom

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enemy. They call attention to the possible connection that existed between
the CIA and Bin Laden. This link was supposedly established at the time of
the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The CIA is known to have funded and
trained the Mujahideen, and it is also said that it provided arms for Bin
Laden as well (Marrs 75-76). Theorists also allege that Bin Laden worked as
a CIA agent under the code name Tim Osman.
As convincing evidence of a conspiracy, theorists point to an article
published only one month after the attacks in the French newspaper he
Figaro which claimed that in July 2001 Bin Laden had received medical
attention for kidney failure at an American hospital in Dubai and was visited
by a local CIA agent there (Marrs 78). Theorists speculate that if Bin Laden
had posed a real threat to the United States, he would not have been
allowed to leave Dubai intact.

The opposite case

The official version of 9/11 pictures Bin Laden as an Islamic
terrorist who believes Americans had declared war against God and
attacked Islam {9/11 Commission Report 47). In 1988, after Soviet withdrawal
from Afganistan, Bin Laden established a base or foundation (al Qaeda) as
headquarters for future jihad (9/11 Commission Report 56). While the 9/11
Commission Report states that al Qaeda was a potential headquarters, Saas Al-
Fagih in his Frontline interview talks about al Qaeda as a guesthouse. This
difference led some conspiracy theorists to speculate that al Qaeda does not
exist. But saying that the name of the organization is not al Qaeda does not
mean that there is no organization at all. Bin Laden did have followers who
shared his hatred towards America. Even Saas Al-Fagih mentions the small
core of followers who looked to Bin Laden as their father and were eager to
receive his moral support and direction (Al-Fagih).
9/11 was, in fact, only one among a series of events performed by
terrorists with the intention of harming Americans, including, among
others, the truck bomb attack on the World Trade Center in 1993, the
bombings of US Embassy buildings in Kenya and Tanzania, the attempt by
Ahmed Ressam to attack Los Angeles international airport in late 1999, and
the suicide boat bombing against the U.S.S. Cok in 2000 (Mole). Bin
Laden's desire to attack America was fueled by Egyptian writer Sayyid
Qutb, who believed that American society had been corrupted by liberalism.
He thought that the belief in liberalism turned people into selfish creatures
who acted according to their own needs thus threatening to tear apart the
shared values that hold society together (Power of Nightmares , episode 1).

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Qutb had an "apocalyptic vision of a disease that was spreading from the
West throughout the world. He called it jahilliyah - a state of barbarous
ignorance" (Power of Nightmares, episode 1). This disease corrupted not only
the leaders but also the people of the Muslim world. The followers of Qutb
could not mobilize the masses to free their country from the liberal ideas of
the West; therefore, the decision was taken to attack the source of
corruption direcdy (Power of Nightmares, episode 2). The new jihad was to
target America as the "head of the snake" (9/11 Commission Report 59).
Bin Laden is not a fabricated enemy. The failure to capture Bin
Laden in the mountains of Tora Bora in December 2001 does not mean

that Bin Laden was not staying there. Both US soldiers and Afghan vill
confirmed his presence. He was not caught at Tora Bora because t
United States relied heavily on the Afghan militias to carry the fight forw
and on "Pakistan's paramilitary Frontier Corps to block any escape" (T
Bora Revisited 18). With the help of Afghans and Pakistanis, Bin Laden
his group made their way on foot and horseback into Pakistan (Tora B
Revisited 14). The theorists maintain that a man who wears jewelry cann
a true Islamist since Islam does not allow men to wear rings or w
watches. But Bin Laden was a radical Islamist and became a terrorist

capable of attacking countries which have allied with any of the enem
Islamists.

Neither was Bin Laden a CIA asset during the Soviet-Afghan war.
Pakistan agreed to help the Americans turn the war into the Soviets'
Vietnam on condition that American funding would be channeled through
the ISI, the Pakistani military agency. American funding went exclusively to
the Mujahideen and not to Arab volunteers, including those in Bin Laden's
group. Bin Laden did not trust the ISI, so he preferred to raise money
through charity. Moreover, he was outside of the CIA's surveillance during
the war ("Debunking the Conspiracy: The CIA/Bin Laden Myth"). As for
the possibility that he was treated and visited by a CIA agent in an
American hospital in Dubai two months before the attacks, according to an
Arab diplomat, Bin Laden would never have run the risk of "prolonged
medical treatment in Dubai, a free-wheeling gulf city-state with an
underworld of smugglers and mercenaries easily recruitable as assassins of
the man listed as US public enemy No. 1" ("Bin Laden met the CIA"). Bin
Laden had no link to the CIA.
Conspiracy theorists believe the events at the World Trade Center
reveal and provide evidence that proves 9/11 was an inside job. They argue
against the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) final

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2005 report which claimed that jet fuel fires and structural failure were
responsible for the collapse of the buildings. Conspiracy theorists believe,
on the contrary, that the collapse was the result of a controlled demolition.
The temperature of jet fuel fires (1000 °C/1800 °F) is well below the
melting point of steel (1500 °C/2700 °F), yet they point to the molten metal
found at Ground Zero concluding that explosives placed in the towers must
have melted the steel (Jones). Steven E. Jones, a physics professor from
Brigham Young University, claims that an explosive known as thermite
contributed to the collapse of the Twin Towers. When ignited, thermite
burns at 2500°C, much hotter than jet fuel ( Conspiracy Theory with Jesse
Ventura : 9/11). Jones concludes that the yellow- to-white hot molten metal
dripping from the South Tower (see Figure 2) indicates that thermite was
used to destroy the towers. He further reasons that these thermite reactions
were triggered via radio signal to sever the support columns of the towers.

Figure 2: The spout of orange molten metal falling from the South
Tower has the appearance of a thermite reaction

Other observations that advance the controlled demolition theory

include the observed squibs seen during collapse and the pyroclastic surge
generated by the collapse of the towers. Squibs were puffs of dust and
debris ejected from the sides of the buildings as they collapsed (see Figure
3). Such plumes of smoke are common when pre-positioned explosives are
used (Jones).

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 Figure 3: Puffs of concrete issuing from the sides of the building
above the demolition wave

A pyroclastic surge usually emerges after a volcanic eruption where

large amounts of material are exploded into the air and then turned into
small particles. Since the same thick dust clouds could be noticed after the
collapse of the towers (see Figure 4), this provides evidence that the towers
exploded internally rather than imploded.

Figure 4: Pyroclastic flow after a volcanic eruption (left) and after

the collapse of the Twin Towers (right)

For conspiracy theorists, besides the question of how the buildings

collapsed, the question of what exactly hit them is of crucial importance.

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They claim there is photographic evidence showing that the South Tower
was hit by a military aircraft and not by United Airlines 175. They say the
photographs taken before the crash reveal a pod attached to the plane (see
Figure 5). Conspiracy advocates state that in reality Flight 175 was a
remotely-controlled military aircraft with the pod carrying some kind of an
incendiary, bomb or missile, needed to intensify the damage caused by the
plane.

Figure 5: Flight 175 photo taken by Rob Howard

If there was no plane, there was no need for pilots. Articles about
the habits and the piloting skills of the hijackers led many to doubt the
possibility that such individuals as those portrayed in the Commission
Report could have flown the jets into the towers. It is said that the hijackers
were heavy drinkers, loved pork, and visited strip clubs the day before the
attack {9/11: Ijzťs Get Empirical). As if such suspicions were not enough, a
number of hijackers were trained at US military bases, where their trainers
characteri2ed them as horrible pilots. Finally, the failure of the intelligence
services to identify and prevent the hijackers from carrying out their plan
confirmed conspiracy theorists in their belief.
The various theories differ, however, in their identity and role of the
hijackers. If they loved alcohol, pork, and prostitutes, they could not have
been fanatical suicide hijackers and, therefore, Flight 11, similarly to Flight
175, could have been a military plane piloted into the North Tower by order

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of the US government. Similarly, if they were trained at US military bases
and were able to escape the attention of the intelligence services, it means
the government had knowledge of the coming attack but decided not to
intervene.

The collapse of the third tower fits the former theory which argues
for the possibility that the government not only had foreknowledge of the
attacks but carried them out. The third tower was not hit by a plane, which
means the temperatures reached in the building were far below the
temperatures reached by the jet fuel fires in the Twin Towers. If those fires
were not hot enough to melt steel, then the argument runs that it is absurd
to claim that fires which fed only on combustible materials could cause the
collapse of the third tower. Conspiracy theories hold the tower was
demolished on purpose. Squibs that were witnessed prior to collapse and
the pyroclastic clouds that were created after collapse serve as "irrefutable"
evidence for the controlled demolition theory.

Evidence against such conspiracy theories

Jet fuel fires do not have to burn for a long period of time and the
steel does not need to melt to "compromise the buildings' structural
integrity" (The 9/11 Conspirades) because jet fuel fires do reach 1000 °C,
which is far above 600 °C, the temperature at which steel loses 50 percent
of its strength (Dunbar and Reagan 39). Once the steel columns in the
impact zone, including both the interior and the exterior columns, started to
sag, they could no longer bear the weight of the structure above, causing the
building to collapse (Zero).
Experts say it is not impossible that Professor Steven E. Jones
found thermite residue on a dust sample since there was a lot of aluminum
in the towers both in the windows and the airplanes), which could have
caused a thermite reaction and produced a small amount of molten iron
(Dunbar and Reagan 42). The molten metal dripping from the South Tower
was, however, most probably molten aluminum, and not steel, coming from
the plane.
Squibs, or puffs of dust, are also possible from mere collapse. They
do not occur only from explosions. There was an enormous amount of
energy being released by the collapse of the buildings, and that energy
compressed the air and caused the dust to be blown out of the side of the
buildings (The 9/11 Conspirades). Nor was there any pyroclastic flow during
collapse. The temperature of pyroclastic flows is 100 °C. "Not one person,

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even the ones trapped inside complained of dusty air burning their skin"
(Debunkinģ).
As a result of Flight 175's banking when it hit the South Tower,
images taken from below the tower show a distortion of the right wing
(Dunbar and Reagan 8-9). After having studied the picture of Flight 175
taken by Rob Howard, Ronald Greeley, director of the Space Photography
Laboratory at Arizona State University, dismissed the notion that the photo
shows a pod, saying it reveals "only the Boeing's right fairing, a pronounced
bulge that contains the landing gear" (9-10).
Newspaper articles claiming that the hijackers were hard drinkers
and visited strip clubs differ in their description about what Mohamed Atta
was actually doing in those clubs. He is a hard drinker in one story, and he
plays video games in the second. Such claims appear to be based on
guesswork rather than facts. Nor were the hijackers controlled by the US
government, although they were indeed trained in the United States. Some
of them, including Atta, had obtained a pilot's license and took simulator
training for large jets (5). It is true that they were not professional pilots, but
they did not need to be since their task was to steer and crash the aircraft:
into their targets. Taking off and landing, which are among the most
difficult aspects of flying, were not included in their plan. All the planes
were hijacked after the pilots had lifted off.
Building 7 did collapse due to fire and damage from debris falling
from the North Tower. Fires were burning on several floors supplied by the
fuel tanks that were located all throughout the building. There were two
6,000-gallon tanks in the basement which fed most of the generators in the
buildings. They presumably contributed to the building's collapse (56).
As we know, the hijackers did not focus only on the World Trade
Center. Neither do conspiracy theorists. Theorists maintain that the attack
on the Pentagon and the hijacking of Flight 93 were also included in the
9/11 plan prepared by some high-ranking U.S. officials with the purpose of
advancing future wars in the Middle East.
Theorists believe there is plenty of evidence suggesting that the
Pentagon could not have been hit by American Airlines Flight 77, since the
damage caused to the Pentagon appears to be inconsistent with aircraft
impact damage. Conspiracy theorists argue that the holes created by the
impact were far too small to have been made by a commercial jetliner ("16
Facts about 9/11").
The Boeing 757, which was reported to have hit the Pentagon, is
known to have a 124 feet wide wingspan (9/11 Ripple Effect ). The 75 feet

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wide hole in the exterior suggests that no damage was created by the wings
of the plane (see Figure 6). According to conspiracy theorists, the reason
there was no visible damage indicating where the wings hit the building is
that a missile and not a Boeing 757 caused the damage.

Figure 6: A Boeing 757 and the Pentagon - no damage to the

building occurred where the wings and the tail would have struck the
building

Conspiracy advocates also say that had Flight 77 crashed into the
Pentagon, it would have left substantial wreckage on the outside (Loose
Change 9/11 : American Couß). The small pieces of debris found outside the
building, they insist, cannot be identified as parts coming from an American
Airlines plane (see Figure 7).

Figure 7: Pentagon workers collecting debris after the attack

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Several windows above and near the impact zone remained intact. Theorists
believe that such "intact windows" support the claim that the Pentagon was
hit either by a plane smaller than a Boeing 757 or by a missile.
Conspiracy theorists allege that the flying skills of the leading
hijacker of Flight 77, Hani Hanjour, indicates that the Pentagon was not
struck by a US airliner. Hanjour, similarly to the other hijackers, took some
flight lessons in the United States. His teachers described him as a horrible
pilot who was not able to fly even a single-engine Cessna 172 ("Hani
Hanjour"). Nor did he complete a single course.
In addition, the way Hanjour hit the building and where he chose to
hit made conspiracy theorists conclude that Flight 77 could not have been
the sort of plane described in the official report. If Hanjour had wanted to
"inflict maximum damage, all he had to do was to . . . nose down into the
roof of the Pentagon" ( Loose Change 9/11 : Final Cut ). But instead, he
supposedly changed his trajectory and "executed a maneuver described by
experienced pilots as nearly impossible requiring professional expertise"
( Loose Change 9/11 : Final Cut). Conspiracy advocates think it is impossible
that an amateur pilot who could not control and land a small plane, could
have piloted a Boeing 757 into the Pentagon - only a missile could have
been so accurate.

As for Flight 93, conspiracy advocates think the plane was shot
down in order to mute the 9/11 conspiracy witnesses. Some theorists
presume that the three passenger jets landed at an airport and substitute
remote-control aircraft then attacked the World Trade Center and the
Pentagon (Dunbar and Reagan 2). The passengers from Flight 11, 175, as
well as from Flight 77 were probably herded to United Airlines Flight 93
and then killed so that none of them could testify against the government.
To shake the public's belief in the official story, theorists often point
to the phone calls made from Flight 93. Theorists say that given the
technology in 2001, it was impossible for passengers to make cell-phone
calls from airplanes. David Ray Griffin, a professor at Claremont School of
Theology, believes it was possible to make cell-phone calls from low-flying
small planes but impossible from larger jets flying above 2,000 feet (Let's Get
Empirical ).
Theorists also say the wreckage found in Shanksville, Pennsylvania,
confirms the hypothesis that Flight 93 was shot down as part of a
government conspiracy. First responders should have found human remains
and large pieces of debris from the plane, had it crashed as reported.

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Instead, they encountered a small crater but no human bodies or pieces of
debris to remind them of Flight 93 (see Figure 8).

Figure 8: A small crater created by the crash of Flight 93

Almost all eyewitnesses remarked how litde of the plane and its
passengers remained at the actual crash site. Somerset Country Coroner
Wallace Miller was among the first to arrive at the scene. He noticed how
small the crater was and said it looked "like someone took a scrap truck,
dug a 10- foot ditch and dumped trash into it" ( Loose Change 9/11 : Second
Hìditiorì). He added: "I stopped being a coroner after about twenty minutes,
because there were no bodies there" (. Loose Change 9/11 : Final Cut).

What appears to be the truth

First and foremost, at the time of the crash, "thousands of
commuters were crowded in rush-hour traffic along the highways"
surrounding the Pentagon (Dunbar and Reagan 59); therefore, there are
thousands of witnesses who did see a Boeing 757 hit the building. The outer
hole at the Pentagon was not as wide as the 757's wingspan because the
wings were damaged before striking the façade. However, it is also possible
that "portions of the wings closer to the fuselage were sheared off upon
striking the building" (Dunbar and Reagan 68). The wings and the tail were
not heavy enough to damage the reinforced outer walls of the Pentagon.
The hole in the interior was not made by a missile but by the jet's landing
gear (Dunbar and Reagan 70).

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 Figure 9: American Airlines plane and debris found outside the
Pentagon that have pieces of the Airline logo on them

Damage outside the Pentagon is appropriate for a high speed crash

(9/11: Science and Conspiracy ). Pieces of debris found outside the Pentagon
can be identified as parts coming from an American Airlines plane (see
Figure 9), while those windows near the impact area that remained intact
did so because they were blast-resistant (Dunbar and Reagan 71). Like the
other hijackers, Hani Hanjour pursued flight training in the United States.
Although the 9/11 Commission Report mentions that his instructors "found
his work well below standard and discouraged him from continuing" (226),
it also says what conspiracy theorists like to ignore: that Hanjour completed
the simulator training in March 2001 (227). Also, the 9/11 Commission
reports that the hijackers bought Global Positioning System (GPS) units
(249). Hanjour, similarly to the other hijackers, had only to "punch the
destination coordinates into the flight management system and steer the
planes while looking at the navigation screen," which he had done several
times in training (Dunbar and Reagan 6).
Flight 93 was not shot down and its passengers did not include all
the passengers from the four doomed planes. A Boeing 757 can carry 200
people but the four planes had a total of 265 passengers, a lot more than the
carrying capacity of a Flight 93 aircraft (Dunbar and Reagan 2). Flight 93
could not have been shot down since President Bush authorked the

shooting down of any aircraft only after Flight 93 had crashed

Commission Report 37).

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 Cell-phone calls were possible in 2001 even from high altitudes.
Paul Guckian, vice president of engineering for cell-phone maker
Qualcomm, told Popular Mechanics that phones could get a signal at an
altitude around 30,000 or 35,000 feet but would lose that signal in the
50,000- foot ranee (Dunbar and Reagan 84), "Flight 93 never flew higher
than 40,700 feet" (84).
There were pieces of debris at the main crash site that could be
identified as parts coming from Flight 93 (see Figure 10). Distrust towards
the official version might originate from the idea we usually have of plane
crashes. "We tend to think that when planes crash, they crack in half. This
is, in fact, what happens when planes crash at very low speed. However,
United Flight 93 was flying straight down and penetrated into soft ground
with incredible velocity" (The 9/11 Conspiracy Files : Fact or Fiction).

Figure 10: Flight 93 debris: windows frame and a jet engine

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 The testimony of Lieutenant Patrick Madigan, a first responder,
refutes the claim that no human bodies were found at the crash site: "I was

at the site . . . , there was what was determined to be many parts of human
remains that were located, recovered and identified as being passengers that
were on Flight 93 on that morning" (The 9/11 Conspiracy Files : Fact or
Fiction ). Somerset County Coroner Wallace Miller did say that he stopped
being a coroner after twenty minutes because the cause of death was clear.
Although what he said was technically correct that there were no complete
bodies at the crash site, many body parts and DNA were found and used to
identify the passengers and crew on board ("Conspiracy Files - Q&A").
Conspiracy advocates also tend to promote the hypothesis that if
the government did not carry out the 9/11 attacks, it did have
foreknowledge about them, but the Bush administration decided not to
intervene so that it could have a pretext for a war in Afghanistan.
The war games conducted in the years before 2001 also serve as a
basis for speculation that there was US involvement in the 9/11 attacks.
NORAD, for instance, simulated attacks in which hijacked airliners were
used as weapons to crash into buildings like the Twin Towers and cause
mass casualties (Komarow and Squitieri). Furthermore, in October 2000 the
Pentagon also conducted an exercise called Mascai to simulate a Boeing 757
crashing into the building ( Loose Change 9/11: Second Edition). Theorists are
convinced that either the war game or a stand-down order issued by the
government hindered the response to the deadly attacks. They claim there
are a number of reasons to believe that President Bush himself was

involved in the 9/11 attacks. First, Bush became president as a result

conspiracy, since he stole the election with the help of his relatives and
Supreme Court justices, and anyone capable of stealing an election wo
also be able to betray his people and let a horrible attack, like 9/11, hap
The Presidential Briefing which he received from the CIA on 6 Au
2001, which said that Bin Laden was planning to attack America
hijacking airplanes ( Fahrenheit 9/11), is seen as evidence that Bush kne
the attacks in advance but decided not to prevent them. He let 9/11 hap
because he knew how much his country and the members of
administration would gain from such an attack. The major motive
allowing 9/11 to happen, according to such theorists, was to make wa
Afghanistan and to ensure the building of the trans-Afghanistan pipelin
US oil company Unocal. With the construction of die pipeline, the
could enjoy total military and economic control of the region which is o
described as the center of world power (Chin).

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 Conspiracy theorists are convinced the elite used 9/11 to
consolidate and expand their power. The 9/11 attacks created an
atmosphere of crisis and fear which made it easy for them to persuade
people that they needed to give up their liberty so that they could get
security ( Masters of Temor). Theorists claim the USA Patriot Act was designed
to destroy the civil liberties of Americans since it gives government power
to access people's tax records or information about books they buy or
borrow and it also empowers high ranking officials to search people's
homes and conduct unconstitutional seizures (Webster). Once people lose
their basic rights, such as the right to be free from unreasonable searches of
their home, they become vulnerable to government control. Absolute
control can be achieved by declaring martial law and establishing a police
state. Theorists believe this is exactly what has been happening in the
United States since 9/11.
Conspiracy advocates think the report "Project for a New American
Century," released by a neo-conservative think tank in September 2000,
hints at this kind of transformation. In "Rebuilding America's Defenses,"
the members of the think tank including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld,
Paul Wolfowitz, and Jeb Bush declare: "the process of transformation, even
if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some
catastrophic and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor" (Loose Change
9/11 : American Coup). Conspiracy theorists assert that steps toward this
transformation have already been taken. The presence of police surveillance
blimps, the presence of policemen in black ski masks and with automatic
weapons on the streets, and the body scan at airports are all considered a
result of this transformation ( Martial L aw). The microchip identification
device which can be implanted in the body is looked upon as part of a larger
plan prepared by the New World Order. In the future people will not be
able to get food, water, or jobs without the microchips (9/11: The Road to
Tyranny). This New World Order implies the emergence of a one-world
government. Theorists say the North American Union; which was
established in 2005 by the merging of the USA, Canada and Mexico, the
European Union, the African Union, and the soon-to-emerge Asian Union;
will form a one- world government when time is ripe ( Zeitgeist ). 9/11 is
viewed as a step in the on-going plot of the New World Order to achieve
world domination ("New World Order").
The government knew an attack was immanent, but 9/11 happened
because the government was not prepared for it and not because they
decided not to prepare for it. Multiple hijackings had never been carried out

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in the United States (9/11 Commission Report 10), thus there was no dossier
to turn to which would contain any suggestion of how to prevent such an
event. Second, no information sharing occurred between the CIA and the
FBI due to the widespread belief that information sharing was a career
stopper (79). Third, FBI field offices are known to be in charge of an entire
investigation (74). I believe that 9/11 could have been prevented, had more
than one office been assigned to work on the Bin Laden case.
The failure to respond to the hijackings can be accounted for not by
a stand-down order but for the tendency of the North American Aerospace
Defense (NORAD) to look outward for threats instead of inward (Dunbar
and Reagan 20). NORAD was created in 1958 as a binational command
center between the United States and Canada. Since its major mission was
to counter the Soviet threat, NORAD "came to define its job as defending
against external attacks" (9/11 Commission Report 16).
As for the war games, the idea of using aircraft as weapons was not
foreign to NORAD. To counter such a threat, NORAD even developed
exercises (9/11 Commission Report 346). However, these exercises "differed
from the September 1 1 attacks in one important respect: The planes in the
simulation were coming from a foreign country" (Komarow and Squitieri).
If an aircraft were coming from overseas, the military "would have time to
identify the target and scramble interceptors" (346). On 9/11 NORAD
encountered a different scenario. Yet, they expected there would be time to
address the problem and presumed that "the hijacked aircraft would be
readily identifiable and would not attempt to disappear" (18). But the
hijackers turned off the transponder of the planes making it impossible to
identify and track them
The Pentagon exercises included simulations focused on an
accidental plane crash and not a hijacking. There was a need for such drill
since the Pentagon is "located less than one mile from Reagan National
Airport, and one of the flight paths takes planes direcdy over the Pentagon.
Being located so close to a major airport, it would have been irresponsible
for officials not to drill for an accidental plane . . . crash" ("9/11
Debunked").
President Bush did not let the attacks happen on purpose. He knew
that Bin Laden was planning an attack against America, but he had no
specific data about the attack. The President told the 9/11 Commission that
the August 6 Presidential Briefing was historical in nature, and that it
"contained few specifics regarding time, place, method, or target" (9/11
Commission Report 260).

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 Moreover, 9/11 was not allowed to happen in order to build a
pipeline and gain control over the Middle East. The trans-Afghanistan
pipeline project was prepared years before 9/11. In the late 1990s the
United States contributed to the suspension of activities related to the
construction of the pipeline by refusing to recognize the Taliban
Government. This, in combination with the fact that no trans-Afghan
pipeline has been built in the ten plus years after the attacks, "suggests it is
not a plausible motive for carrying out 9/11" ("9/11 and the Afghan
pipeline").
Nor was a desire to gain control over the American population the
reason why 9/11 happened. The report released by the neo-conservative
think tank, the "Project for a New American Century," has nothing to do
with 9/11. Conspiracy theorists tend to quote one sentence, but the total
report makes it clear that transformation "refers to the process introducing
more information technologies into the military" ("New Pearl Harbor").
To sum up, 9/11 conspiracy theories, though constructed logically,
are delusional. If the preceding pages have demonstrated anything, it must
be that the 9/11 conspiracy theories are not bolstered by real evidence.
What theorists call evidence is nothing more than quotations taken out of
context and tiny anomalies they claim to have found in mainstream
accounts. In fact, 9/11 conspiracy theorists focus their attention not on the
whole story but only on certain elements. Sometimes the elements are
mixed, which results in the theories contradicting each other. Thus, the
conspiracy narrative cannot function as a line that would connect the
elements. Despite the shortcomings of the theories, there are still a lot of
people who side with conspiracy theorists. I think the theories which
appeared right after the attacks were attractive because they interpreted the
events in a way that made them fit the apocalypse scenario.
Theorists warn that if Americans take the official story at face value
they become un-American. They emphasize that the task of a true
American, a true patriot, is to ask questions (The 9/11 Chronicles: Truth
Rising). Such theorists use conspiracy theories to express their distrust in the
government. While some of the issues are truly problematical, such as the
2000 election, the fate of Flight 93, and the Patriot Act, such people
presuppose that the whole story about 9/11 is problematical. Other
conspiracy theorists attract people's attention by denying that they are
conspiracy theorists. Richard Gage, the founder of Architects and
Engineers for 9/11 Truth, claims that the members of his organization are
not conspiracy theorists - they just examine the "science-based, forensic

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evidence" {9/11: Blueprint for Truth). This denial makes the resulting theories
sound innocent and convinces people that there is nothing sinister about
paying attention to them. But conspiracy theories are anything but innocent.
They lead to the creation and preservation of "voodoo" histories, which
distort our view of the past, the present, and could well have a deleterious
effect on future decision-making (Aaronovitch 15).

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