Moon of Alabama Brecht quote
September 11, 2021

Some Thoughts On 9/11

Twenty years ago I was chief technology officer for a major news website. It was after lunch and I was testing new productivity tools for the news room. Someone came into my office and said that a plane had hit the WTC in New York City. I walked into the news room where several TV screens were filled with pictures of a smoking tower. 

The news folks were busy writing their first takes. Some of it was speculation. I mentioned that this was not the first plane to hit a skyscraper in NYC and called it an accident. That made it into one of the first take stories.

Still - even as an accident it was spectacular news and the page views per minute on the website went towards our capacity limits. Then the second plane hit and it was immediately clear to everyone that these were no accidents. The web traffic went through the roof.

We had had ample capacity to cover news peaks but this was way too much traffic for our normal site to handle. I told the server administrator to take down all side processes on the web-server machines we were using. We then started to minimize the content of the site. Everything that was generated dynamically was switched off. We minimized the numbers of pictures. We stopped all advertisement delivery. Other major news sites I tested were already dead - overwhelmed from the enormous amount of traffic. We were still up - but even loading the much cleaned up front page took more than 30 seconds.

I phoned up a number of IT guys I knew who administered public web sites for other purposes. I asked them to mirror our site through a side channel we had opened for that purpose. We then fiddled with the domain name servers to reroute a part of our traffic to those mirror sites. With those finally up and running we barely made it through the evening traffic peak without crashing everything. 

The traffic stayed above our nominal capacity for over a week. I stopped my news room productivity project and set down to design a new content delivery system which allowed for a dynamic addition of capacity. The design was quite expensive but three month later we implemented it.

9/11 touched a bit on my job but I was lucky to avoid its other deadly consequences.

Before working for that news site I had long worked with Americans on a daily basis. I had been to the U.S. over a dozen times during the previous years. It was immediately clear to me that its people would want revenge. They would not care much against whom it would be waged. That private prediction turned out to be right.

Little has changed since. The catharsis that 9/11 should have brought never happened. Most people still don't care about the wars of terror and who gets killed in them. I blame the media for that.

Today the New York Times and the Washington Post both report on the recent 'righteous' drone strike in Kabul:

Times Investigation: In U.S. Drone Strike, Evidence Suggests No ISIS Bomb
U.S. officials said a Reaper drone followed a car for hours and then fired based on evidence it was carrying explosives. But in-depth video analysis and interviews at the site cast doubt on that account.
.
Examining a ‘righteous’ strike
Expert analysis of deadly U.S. drone strike’s aftermath in Kabul suggests no evidence of explosives in targeted vehicle

Ten innocent persons, including 7 children, were killed in that strike.

I applaud those reports. But there have been some 15,000 other drone strike since 2007. Most of those have hit innocent people but there was little reporting about them.

Three days before the drone strike happened a much bigger massacre took place.

A suicide bomber hit at the gate of Kabul airport. The bomb killed several dozen people including U.S. soldiers. But what happened immediately after the bomb went off made the incident much deadlier. Those who guarded the airport opened fire on the large crowd that had hoped to be let in to catch a flight to somewhere. In total more than 170 people died, some of them were British citizens, others were Taliban guards, most were Afghan civilians.

Local Afghan news, a BBC report on Twitter, Russian public TV (at about 3 min, German translation), China's major news agency and other reporters all spoke to eye witnesses who all confirmed the story: "Most of those dead were killed by bullets."

But 'western' media have buried that story. The sole mention of it I could find is deep down in a long NYT report about the evacuations from Kabul:

For the first time, Pentagon officials publicly acknowledged the possibility that some people killed outside the airport on Thursday might have been shot by American service members after the suicide bombing.

Investigators are looking into whether the gunfire came from Americans at the gate, or from the Islamic State.

'Officials publicly acknowledged the possibility ...'  Do they call THAT 'reporting'?

There were quite obviously no ISIS shooters at the gate.

Why ain't U.S. media all over a story during which the U.S. side killed more than 100 innocent people? Is it hyping the drone attack, which killed 10, to cover for the more embarrassing act during which troops under U.S. control massacred many more than that? Because those troops were the CIA's Afghan death squads who may soon be your neighbors?

Before 9/11 U.S. intelligence knew of Al-Qaeda sleeper cells and of plans for new attacks. Then came 9/11. I am by now one of those who thinks that they let it happen on purpose. That is because all the wars that followed had long been prepared for.

Following 9/11 the U.S. wars of terror displaced 37 million people and killed at least a million foreigners. The U.S. wars of terror are still going on today in Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Libya and elsewhere.

Shouldn't 20 years be long enough to end those wars? To find some closure? To suppress the urge for revenge? To change the rather aggressive general U.S. mentality?

Unfortunately the answer to all those questions seems to be "No".

Posted by b on September 11, 2021 at 17:52 UTC | Permalink

Comments
next page »

To mention just two, Daniel hale and Julián assange are sitting in jail.

Posted by: c | Sep 11 2021 18:05 utc | 1

The war on terror was a deadly aftermath of that horrible day,

The war on covid will be even deadlier.

And no, after 20 years we will still not have learned anything.

Posted by: DG | Sep 11 2021 18:05 utc | 2

“Let it happen on purpose” I can’t believe I’m reading this from you. Who wired the buildings to explode into dust clouds in 10 seconds? Who had access to the CIA building WTC 7? ‘Seven’ is a short very well made documentary about the only scientific study ever done on the collapse of WTC 7. This study took 5 years and is peer reviewed with its data open to the public. It proved that the governments official explanation for the collapse of the building is false, normal office fires could not have brought down the building. The government (NIST) has said this was a phenomenon they have never seen before but only provided a computer animation that looks nothing like the videos and refuses to provide any of the data they used in their simulation and study because of “national security”. Obviously when the data is secret and can’t be peer reviewed their explanation can not be considered considered science. Anyways this professor and his students proved the official explanation explanation is a lie. You’d think this study would have been on the front page of every newspaper when it was completed last year. You’d think B would have spent 15 minutes on A and E for 9/11 truth and understood the 4tj grade Newtonian physics involved. Or checked out Pilots for 9/11 truth when they made their first film over a decade ago which pointed out the planes could not have flown at the speeds or carried out the maneuvers under any circumstances ... etc etc. do you need me to link you to some info B? This is silly coming from you.


https://www.amazon.com/SEVEN-Ed-Asner/dp/B08NY2TMCW

Posted by: James | Sep 11 2021 18:14 utc | 3

I used to be anti conspiracy. But there's no way some amateur pilots hand flew planes with military accuracy

Posted by: Paulo | Sep 11 2021 18:14 utc | 4

it brings to question the role of the media in everything... the concept of ''just the facts'' is obviously bullshit... ''spin and misdirection'' seem a more appropriate description.. propaganda works... i don't want to hold a negative image of the ordinary usa person, but it is hard not to given the results of its drone campaign and all the rest of it... it is my view also that people in the usa ( i don't agree with the appropriation of the word ''americans'' fwiw ) are more focused on vengeance then compassion... perhaps this has to do with my impression that seem to follow the religious old testament 'an eye for an eye'' as opposed to the new.... i would really like to be wrong here...

i had the cbc news on in the car this morning at the top of the hour... i was wondering if i would get 'news' or 20th anniversary 9-11 spin... right when they said 'reporting from new york' i turned off the radio.. i knew i was going to get spin, not news... i have mostly given up on cbc and now refer to them as the coronavirus broadcasting corporation...

Posted by: james | Sep 11 2021 18:18 utc | 5

This tackles so called conspiracy theories:
Left-Leaning Despisers of the 9/11 Truth Movement: Do You Really Believe in Miracles? - Global Research


https://www.globalresearch.ca/left-leaning-despisers-of-the-9-11-truth-movement-do-you-really-believe-in-miracles/20039

Posted by: James c | Sep 11 2021 18:20 utc | 6

@ James | Sep 11 2021 18:14 utc | 3... i am confused by your comment to b.... do you think he just woke up this morning and only now believes 9-11 was an inside job??

Posted by: james | Sep 11 2021 18:22 utc | 7

WTF. How can you be so stuck in false narratives b?

Just some loose ends that failed to make it big time in the mass media and may have escaped your notice:

Hijack 'suspects' alive and well
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1559151.stm

Here's a more complete investigation of the issue:
https://911research.wtc7.net/mirrors/guardian2/september-eleven/hijackers-alive.htm

What about Mohammed Atta, the coke-snorting whiskey-binging whoremongering "fundamentalist"?
https://www.madcowprod.com/2006/02/21/the-secret-history-of-mohamed-atta/
(Do read Hopsicker's "welcome to terrorland" for more sordid facts.)

What about the USA PATRIOT act, that was enacted in record time. Do you seriously believe that they wrote that huge motherfucker in a few days time? What about the anthrax scare, that targeted precisely those lawmakers who were not playing along with the music? What about the strain of anthrax used, the Ames military strain?

I will not attempt to compile a full list of oddities, as that would probably span two entire comment pages' lengths. I am pretty sure many others will chime in anyway.

My guess is that even more barflies wildly disagree with you on this subject than on the pandemic.

On a personal note, when I saw the images of the second plane strike, I viscerally "knew" that they had done it themselves. The website that I watched in the aftermath was the one of the military base tasked with securing Washington DC airspace. It proudly proclaimed its purpose and allocated resources up until the moment when more and more of people on the net started talking about that. Then it went black. A few days later it reappeared, scrubbed. QED.

Posted by: Lurk | Sep 11 2021 18:23 utc | 8

The same guys who did 9/11 and anthrax are likely doing COVID. And b. is fully supporting them. Why? https://unlimitedhangout.com/2020/04/investigative-series/all-roads-lead-to-dark-winter/

Posted by: Elkan | Sep 11 2021 18:24 utc | 9

I remember two immediate reactions to the event:

1.) I was impressed with the organizing ability of whomever pulled it off, and
2.) I was impressed (on the theory it was some form of terrorism) that they picked the right targets: WTC, Pentagon, and Congress, they knew who the real enemy was.

I still have no opinion about how it came about. Interesting that "Biden" is calling for more declassifications, but I suspect he is just trying to intimidate the Saudis.

Posted by: Bemildred | Sep 11 2021 18:24 utc | 10

Shouldn't 20 years be long enough to end those wars? To find some closure? To suppress the urge for revenge? To change the rather aggressive general U.S. mentality?

The aim of the “new Pearl Harbor” was for America to launch a series of wars that would leave them dominating most of the energy resources of the world. They didn’t care how powerful China would grow as long as they controlled China’’s energy supply they would control China. Two thirds of the worlds oil and gas is found in the Middle East. Control the Middle East’s carbon resources and you practically control the world’s energy supply.

Also at that time the PNAC was written Russia had been fully subsumed through Yeltsin under American control. Russia had defaulted on its debt and no-one outside of Russia had even heard of Vladimir Putin.

They have not achieved this goal to put it mildly. They are in a worse position in the Middle East than when the GWOT started , their toehold in the “heartland” has been firmly shut. China has outmanoeuvred them with the BRI, Russia can destroy the US just with conventional military force (let alone nuclear) , Iran has weathered the worst and solidified the resistance axis from a loose alliance into a steel bridge.

Can they stop? The problem is every time they hold a losing hand they double down.

Posted by: Down South | Sep 11 2021 18:37 utc | 11

...
"I am by now one of those who thinks that they let it happen on purpose. That is because all the wars that followed had long been prepared for."

Yep. Otherwise known in 9/11-speak as LIHOP.
Considering the speed with which the Neocon-infested US Government named an Axis Of Evil and began finger-pointing in that direction and lobbying for retribution, I'm sympathetic to the people who believe the Neocon elements within the USG made it happen on purpose - MIHOP.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 11 2021 18:37 utc | 12

Russia had also warned the US something was brewing. They generally had good Intel on the CIA terrorist groups at that time as they were still cleaning them up in Chechnya and Dagestan. That intel would also have led back to, or come from the Gulf Arab world which were financing these groups not to mention the Saudi clerics that converted Sunni muslims into Wahhabi terrorists.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 18:39 utc | 13

I was directing for Newsworld at CBC Toronto and we had zero problems with traffic at our end.
I left the network right after that to work on the Red Green show.
Much more fun.

Posted by: ld | Sep 11 2021 18:41 utc | 14

James #7 apparently he hasn’t woken up at all because he’s talking about “letting it happen”, that’s complete BS, planning and carrying it out is what the US government did. The evidence is overwhelming.

Posted by: James c | Sep 11 2021 18:41 utc | 15

Bernard's piece is about his experience in a newsroom under service stress; the drone strike on an innocent family; and the 170+ killed at the Kabul airport; plus a rational comment about the likelihood that some segments of the U.S. 'security' apparatus may have known about the 9/11 plan and allowed it to happen. Somehow it becomes the target of folks who actually do not understand the metallurgy of steel and aluminum and the action of high impacts on brittle materials such as glass and concrete.

I don't know what happended in WTC 7, but the twin towers were right there in front of everybody's eyes. Obvious to the most obtuse observer.

Posted by: PAUL SPENCER | Sep 11 2021 18:42 utc | 16

Bemildred

The democrats had one of their favorite Saudis chopped up sometime back and they are still annoyed about that. A bit of a falling out amongst thieves.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 18:43 utc | 17

9/9 and 9/11, 20 Years Later (Pepe Escobar)

"Only a few days after 9/11, Osama bin Laden, never publicity-shy, released a statement to Al Jazeera: “I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons (…) I have been living in the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and following its leaders’ rules. The current leader does not allow me to exercise such operations.”

"On September 28, Osama bin Laden was interviewed by the Urdu newspaper Karachi Ummat. I remember it well, as I was commuting non-stop between Islamabad and Peshawar, and my colleague Saleem Shahzad, in Karachi, called it to my attention.

"Saudi-born alleged terror mastermind Osama bin Laden in a video taken ‘recently’ at a secret site in Afghanistan. This was aired by Al Jazeera on October 7, 2001, the day the US launched retaliatory bombing of terrorist camps, airbases and air defense installations in the first stage of its campaign against the Taliban regime for sheltering bin Laden.

"This is an approximate translation by the CIA-linked Foreign Broadcast Information Service: “I have already said that I am not involved in the 11 September attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid telling a lie. Neither I had any knowledge of these attacks nor I consider the killing of innocent women, children and other humans as an appreciable act. Islam strictly forbids causing harm to innocent women, children and other people.

“I have already said that we are against the American system, not against its people, whereas in these attacks, the common American people have been killed. The United States should try to trace the perpetrators of these attacks within itself; the people who are a part of the US system, but are dissenting against it.

“Or those who are working for some other system; persons who want to make the present century as a century of conflict between Islam and Christianity so that their own civilization, nation, country or ideology could survive. Then there are intelligence agencies in the US, which require billions of dollars worth of funds from the Congress and the government every year (…) They need an enemy.”

"This was the last time Osama bin Laden went public, substantially, about his alleged role in 9/11. Afterward, he vanished, and seemingly forever by early December 2001 in Tora Bora..."

Posted by: ADKC | Sep 11 2021 18:43 utc | 18

Why would you think American's have learned anything? In 1975 the trilateralist commission's Report on the Crisis in Democracy concluded, in part, that an over educated populace was a causal factor in the level of civil unrest experienced in the late 1960's. Starting from that year, trace the US education system's systemic dismantlement and centralization and I suspect you will be cured of innocence regarding the average American's capacity for synthesizing novel associations.

Posted by: New Guy | Sep 11 2021 18:46 utc | 19

James c 15 " The evidence is overwhelming."

Superstition, ideology, and suspicion are not evidence.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 18:50 utc | 20

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 18:43 utc | 17

Well, not just that, they have been talking to the Russians, Chinese, and Iran, making new friends.

But I do believe Biden has a grudge against anybody that got too close to Trump.

Posted by: Bemildred | Sep 11 2021 18:52 utc | 21

9-11

No one was punished for the unbelievable lapses of normal procedures that allowed civilian airliners to crash into 3 buildings over the span of a couple of hours - including the pentagon over which the airspace is restricted at all times.

The only people who were punished were those who raised questions about the official story.

The twin towers disintegrated and exploded into dust on live TV, yet it was later determined that office fires caused them to collapse under the stress of gravity (based on a incomplete [simulates only the initial failure, not the subsequent collapse of the entire structures] computer model created without the benefit of any investigation of debris for clues as to what had actually happened). Most of the dead were blown to bits, not crushed by falling debris, and no remains were recovered from over 1,000 despite painstaking search through the debris.

Despite the unprecedented nature of the building failures no on-site forensic investigation the collapses was undertaken and all of the steel, with a few minor exceptions, was quickly sequestered and recycled.

WTC building 7 was destroyed by controlled demolition hours after the twin towers went down as was reported live at the time by multiple first responders who warned people to leave the area because the building was about to 'collapse', and the bbc reported the collapse prior to it actually occurring.

The official explanation for what had occurred was put out on national media the same day as the event - prior to any investigation having occurred to determine the facts of the matter. [If the correct narrative was able to be determined so quickly then a great deal must have been known before hand, yet this horrendous, simple-minded scheme was pulled off with no glitches except for a plane crash in Pennsylvania. Truly amazing!]

Despite these facts and circumstances (and many more 'curious facts' surrounding the event) the official narrative still dominates all media coverage and the bulk of the general public has bought it, and believes those who might question the official story are wingnut yahoos with a screw or two loose.

Posted by: the pessimist | Sep 11 2021 18:54 utc | 22

Paul Spencer: 15 floors cannot freefall through where 90 intact floors used to be, and cannot under any circumstances smash down 90 floors without losing speed or at any speed at all. Plus theres plenty of video of the top of the building blowing up and we can see that it never strikes the bottom portion. There was giant steel columns thrown with such force that they lodged in buildings across the street. No need to “understand the metallurgy of steel and aluminum and the action of high impacts on brittle materials such as glass and concrete.” This is 4th grade physics, 15 floors can never smash down 90, and that’s not what happened anyway as you can see on the video. Therea a couple thousand architects and engineers who are folks who understand metallurgy who have proven that this defies physics. The NIST story on WTC 7 imploding in uniform fashion from normal office fires has now been shown to be a lie, hence the movie Seven which is about the Alaskan study that proved that with open peer reviewed science... I could go on the next 1000 facts about this but maybe start with my link above to the David Ray Griffin article.

Posted by: James c | Sep 11 2021 18:56 utc | 23

I don't see the need to berate Bernhard over the 911 'inside job' issue. It's enough to state your information here and not DEMAND that the writer conform to your own judgements and beliefs.

That said, I find the entire hijacking narrative highly problematic. I say that as a professional pilot and engineer. It should also be recalled that the US deep state has planned such false flag events in the past, for instance Operation Northwoods:

Operation Northwoods was a proposed false flag operation against American citizens that originated within the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) of the United States government in 1962.

The proposals called for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or other U.S. government operatives to both stage and actually commit acts of terrorism against American military and civilian targets,[2] blaming them on the Cuban government, and using it to justify a war against Cuba.

The possibilities detailed in the document included the possible assassination of Cuban immigrants, sinking boats of Cuban refugees on the high seas,[2] hijacking planes to be shot down or given the appearance of being shot down,[2] blowing up a U.S. ship, and orchestrating violent terrorism in U.S. cities.[3] The proposals were rejected by President John F. Kennedy.

We know at this point, due to the peer-reviewed University of Alaska, Fairbanks study that Building 7 was brought down intentionally. We know that increasingly few people believe the official narrative.

We also know that the Taliban had nothing to do with it, and Osama bin Laden denied any involvement. It has been a huge lie from start to finish.

The Strategic Culture website has a good editorial on the subject:

Several professional groups representing the expertise of thousands of aviation analysts, airline pilots, architects and engineers have also questioned the official narrative.

In particular, it is doubted that commercial jetliners could have been flown with such precision under the physical conditions described.

The footprint collapse of three towers at the World Trade Center (the third one was not even hit by a plane) also beggars belief that the buildings and their internal steel structures simply fell from the heat generated by exploding aviation fuel. There is plausible evidence from the expert analyses that the buildings were taken down by controlled demolition.

I think a lot of people would agree with this, and it is good to see this in print from what many consider a credible outlet.

Whatever the particulars may be, and I doubt ANYONE commentating on this from a distance actually knows those details, the main thing we all agree on is that the story is a lie. B has said as much. There is no need to speculate further.

The problem is the lie, not the actual details. It doesn't much matter if the US govt let it happen, or if they took an active part. Either one is just as criminal. And both are lies of equal magnitude.

I will also say that there is definitely a lot of nuttiness associated with the 'truther' movement. This includes things like nukes in the basement, holograms rather than real airplanes and things like that. These kinds of things do nothing but DISCREDIT those who doubt the official narrative in a more reasonable and circumspect way.

Also not helpful is those who insist on identifying some particular perp...like the Mossad, or even the CIA etc. There is no point to speculate on these kinds of unknowable and unprovable things.

It is enough to know that the official story is a LIE.

Posted by: Gordog | Sep 11 2021 18:59 utc | 24

How many historians are parked on this site?

It was always thus.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Sep 11 2021 19:01 utc | 25

Why would you think American's have learned anything? In 1975 the trilateralist commission's Report on the Crisis in Democracy concluded, in part, that an over educated populace was a causal factor in the level of civil unrest experienced in the late 1960's. Starting from that year, trace the US education system's systemic dismantlement and centralization and I suspect you will be cured of innocence regarding the average American's capacity for synthesizing novel associations.

Posted by: New Guy | Sep 11 2021 18:46 utc | 20

Yes, that is the way I remember that too. Our "elites" chose their own survival in control, over our future development. And we can see what they have become in the process. Sad.

Posted by: Bemildred | Sep 11 2021 19:01 utc | 26

i long ago gave up discussing "what 'really' happened" on 9/11. what we learn about the US actors from their response to 9/11 and the consequences of that response are more important. at a minimum, certain agents in the US allowed the 9/11 attacks to occur. maybe they planned it. maybe they put explosives in buildings, etc., etc.

but the white house and congress did certain things that there is no mystery about, using 9/11 as the pretext, the excuse. nothing but lies were told about Iraq. why wouldn't they lie about 9/11?

it's also possible some assets went off the reservation, went off script and surprise, surprise, it's not just a hijacking anymore.

it doesn't matter. the known knowns are more important. the "mystery" of how the magic act was pulled off is a distraction, a Jedi trick for the simple-minded.

Posted by: rjb1.5 | Sep 11 2021 19:02 utc | 27

james @ 5 whatever you might say in criticism of polls they paint a very dark bleak picture of the US and many places.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Sep 11 2021 19:06 utc | 28

Gordog 25

I have considered something like the Honeywell system that can take over an aircraft controls in the event of a highjacking,
But I have also, not having flown anything like that, wondered how difficult it would be to hit the buildings. My thought is that little more skill than the ability to set up final and touch down on the center of the runway would be all that's required.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 19:17 utc | 29

@Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 18:50 utc | 21

Superstition, ideology, and suspicion are not evidence.

Neither are fairy tales, miracles and blatant lies.

The official version of events surrounding 9/11 is less credible than some "conspiracy theories" - yeah yeah, not all conspiracies are credible or even make sense. Mind you, if a huge event such as 9/11 were preplanned by state actors, I'd fully expect to see pre-seeded false leads pop up like mushrooms.

There is a fundamental asymmetry in the battle of narratives. Pointing out one bad conspiracy does not invalidate other theories and questions. Pointing out falsities in the official version does make that entire edifice collapse.

You'd think that the collapse of the official story would also take down along with it the credibility and authority of the state and media, but alas that appears not to be the reality. Case in point being the invasion of Iraq and its destruction, that have since been admitted to have been based entirely on fabricated falsities (aka "lies".) The public just can't be arsed it seems. I have long ago stopped trying to argue about the intricacies of 9/11 and now merely suffice to point out that the Iraq war is a war crime proper. Nobody actually denies that when I mention it. They just want to zone out, not hear it. But nobody dares to deny it or even argue about it. They just don't want to know about it, silently, and hope that it goes away when I stop talking about it.

Posted by: Lurk | Sep 11 2021 19:20 utc | 30

because of the principal of segregation of knowledge, keeping things on a "need to know" basis, these 3 possibilities are not mutually exclusive:
1) USG elements caused it to happen
2) USG elements allowed it to happen
3) USG assets/trainees did not follow the plan of their handlers

some % of the hijackers may not have even known the plan, because they didn't need to know.

all this ignorance is very useful.

Posted by: rjb1.5 | Sep 11 2021 19:24 utc | 31

I sympathize with the intention of this post to be a personal reflection and springboard to 20 years of post-911 clusterfuck discussion, and not the who, what, how, and why of WTF happened on 911, not just in NYC, but DC and the Pennsylvania countryside.

On the other hand, once one rejects the 'official story', it becomes hard not to discuss, and indeed becomes critical to discuss - much like the 'topic whose name shall not be spoken' is today.

As for the 'how' of 911 I leave to others, but as for the who - Cui bono? Happy 911 Day!

Posted by: gottlieb | Sep 11 2021 19:34 utc | 32

Pepe Escobar allowed The Saker to repost his Twitter thread, "9/11: A U.S. Deep State Insider Speaks …" which I'm copy/pasting below:

9/11: A U.S. DEEP STATE INSIDER SPEAKS Old school. Top clearance. Extremely discreet. Attended secret Deep State meetings on 9-11. Tired of all the lies. The following is what’s fit to print without being redacted.

Part 1 THE PHONE CALL. Up next.

“An emergency phone conference was held in the early afternoon of 9/11 based on the fact that WTC Building Number Seven was still standing. Demolitions were engineered to cause the building, as well as the others, to fall into its own footprint. I attended this call.”

Part 2 On WTC7: “No plane hit Building Number Seven.” “The CIA was brought to cover it up. The CIA set up failed asset bin Laden to blame as misdirection, then pulled the plug on Building Number Seven.” “The CIA doctored boarding tapes to show Arabs entering the planes.”

Part 3 On Mullah Omar: “Our CIA Arabists knew that if we blamed Osama, who was innocent of 9-11, Mullah Omar would not give him up in violation of the laws of Islamic hospitality. Mullah Omar requested evidence: then he would turn Osama over. Of course, we did not want that.”

Part 4 On heroin: “The Afghanistan heroin war was justified by 9-11. No one in Afghanistan was involved in 9/11. No member of Islam was involved. We invaded Afghanistan for only one purpose, which was to restart heroin production shut down by a righteous act of Mullah Omar.”

Part 5 On CIA and heroin: “CIA heroin plantations in Afghanistan funded external, clandestine operations and lined some important people’s pockets. That was common practice when the CIA ran the heroin operation in the Golden Triangle.”

Part 6 On MOTIVE: “It was never in the U.S. strategic interest to lay a curse on Islam in the West.” “9-11 was a kind of Gulf of Tonkin false flag operation justifying a war on Islam and the invasion of Iraq, followed by other invasions of Islamic nations.”

Part 7 Afghanistan-Iraq: “The Taliban loved us as they did not know that we lured Russia into Afghanistan. It was idiotic to think that they wanted to hurt their ally on 9-11.” “With Iraq invaded over a new falsity, the neocons created a war of hatred against Islam.”

Part 8 Who’s in charge: “The apex of the U.S. command structure is not the presidency. It’s the Deep State. I use that term even though we did not as it is commonly used.”

I've written my analysis of 911 many times and won't bore anyone repeating it. Thanks for sharing your 911 experience, b. Perhaps Gordog can inform the bar about remote fly-by-wire capability 20 years ago.

Posted by: karlof1 | Sep 11 2021 19:37 utc | 33

@Gordog | Sep 11 2021 18:59 utc | 25

I don't see the need to berate Bernhard over the 911 'inside job' issue. It's enough to state your information here and not DEMAND that the writer conform to your own judgements and beliefs.

I had considered praising b's courage for posting an opinion that he could have expected his readership to wildly disagree upon. To be fair, hardly anyone (so far) has demanded their opinion to prevail anymore than b did in the first place.

The problem is the lie, not the actual details. It doesn't much matter if the US govt let it happen, or if they took an active part. Either one is just as criminal. And both are lies of equal magnitude.

I strongly disagree. MIHOP is substantially more evil than LIHOP. One paints a principled criminal as the sole initiator and executor, the other merely an opportunistic and exploitative accomplice

It is enough to know that the official story is a LIE.

No. There must be consequences. All attempts must be made to let truth prevail. The guilty must be punished and the victims (untold millions) must be compensated.

This is not some semantic folly in purely academic context.

Posted by: Lurk | Sep 11 2021 19:37 utc | 34

Most people get stuck on the fact of the act. Three towers fell and a finance department was annihilated. There were more than three thousand victims.

What I think is being carefully hidden are the actions taken by certain people after the act itself.

Cheney taking command over the War room while Bush was flying about "for his own good". Anti-war Senators sent "for their own safety" to Bunkers with no outside connections. Who were later replaced by Cheney's group when they had got their hands on all the means of communication. Mueller (FBI, anti-Trumpist) as a "clean up artist" and the ONLY one who could present evidence that he chose to the Commission "for it's own good" etc. etc.

The Follow up was planned as well. It left the US in the hands of a full regime change, and they had insider status, but it was the "outsiders" who were "credited" with the act.

******

Of course b is au courant with the various theories, and I for one, appreciate his more personal viewpoint than I had from the UK. It shows that the reaction of the world was total, immediate and sympathetic.

So why was what happened afterwards allowed to become another tragedy?

Posted by: Stonebird | Sep 11 2021 19:40 utc | 35

"I mentioned that this was not the first plane to hit a skyscraper in NYC and called it an accident."
Like Bush said at the time "That's a very bad pilot".

There've been plenty of people who would've loved to hit back at the US. Terror attacks inside the US shouldn't come as a massive surprise. The scope of the attack is the only surprising bit. Bin Laden took credit for it, but also stated he didn't expect the WTC part to be that successful, he didn't think both towers would entirely collapse. On the other hand, the Pentagon hit was just a basic attack, the target being the shocking part, not the scope of the damages, and the last plane didn't even hit its target.
A bit like B, when I look over all this, what tends to make the most sense to me is some high-ups around Bush knowing something was going on and hoping to rile up Americans by letting it happening; I would actually be fine believing they didn't know how big the attack was and what was actually planned, since after all no attack of such a scope had been carried on before, I assume they were expecting stuff closer to typical 1980/1990s terror attacks across Europe, possibly on a slightly bigger scale. In this way, the WTC was better than what they hoped for. Involvement and plotting might have gone further, that's still possible. That the entire thing was purely US-planned and US-done still seems silly for me; back in 2000, it wasn't hard to find 25 Islamists that would love to destroy US symbols of power - sure, it's even easier nowadays, but that's not something new.

Posted by: Clueless Joe | Sep 11 2021 19:49 utc | 36

Thank you all for your detail. I mention the issue of flight plans. These two planes, as well as the third one which was crashed by passengers, were seriously off course. Flight plans are required for all planes. NYC is a protected airspace. I believe that air traffic control personnel also could have prevented this.Or at the very least, managed to alert the area.

Posted by: HelenB | Sep 11 2021 19:52 utc | 37

Stonebird "So why was what happened afterwards allowed to become another tragedy?"

Mostly I suspect because the US was the sole superpower.
On the who-dunnit, many are mesmerized by the piles of smoking rubble. I have always thought 'follow the money' is the way to go, though that should also include 'follow the actions'.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 19:52 utc | 38

@HelenB

DC is also a highly watched, protected airspace. I would have expected an alert and evacuation or even an attack on any errant plane.

Posted by: ,HelenB | Sep 11 2021 19:54 utc | 39

Me, I ran home to hide that day. My colleague telephoned to warn me, and I ran.

I was certain the US could well retaliate massively, without thinking who they were retaliating against, and that could include nuclear. My feeling about the lack of discrimination proved right in the end, though slower than I expected, and not nuclear.

The poor Iraqis were slaughtered in their thousands, although they had nothing to do with 911, 100 times the number of US dead that day. And the Afghans, they've suffered military occupation for 20 years, and thousands of dead, because they weren't fast enough to hand over Bin Ladin.

Posted by: Laguerre | Sep 11 2021 19:55 utc | 40

In the lobby of the DPSST (Oregon's training center for the state police) there is a large chunk of twisted steel on display, said to have come from the WTC collapses.

Perhaps there are still some residues on that steel that could help answer the many legitimate questions that have so far gone unanswered.

Posted by: AntiSpin | Sep 11 2021 20:00 utc | 41

It is obvious to me that 9-11 was a well-planned mission that could only have been executed and covered-up by those in power in the USA.
Troops were already in place to attack Afghanistan, the Patriot Act was also ready to go, and the scripts were written and spoken by all media.
As for Americans and their never-ending gullibility and malleability, three plot twists in the last 20 years make it sadly obvious. Most Americans never even noticed the plot change.
The first is when they took the blood revenge of vicious Americans and turned it onto Iraq. Say what? How do you take anger at Afghanistan (already quite a stretch) and turn it onto a country that had nothing to do with the plot, even in the Official Story?
The next was when they switched out masterminds, going from Osama BinLaden to Khalid Sheik Mohammad without a blink from the same Americans who screamed with disbelief when "Bewitched" switched out Darrens.
Then there were Libya and Syria, where the US allied with al Qaeda to destroy the governments, lives and well-being of the citizens of those countries, while using the Authorization To Use Force against al Qaeda to ally with al Qaeda. This was also swallowed without question by the American public, who, frankly, seem to be dumb as rocks.
(You can see this today as the covid narrative shifts and backtracks, and all twists and turns are accepted by that same public without a blip of dissonance).

Posted by: wagelaborer | Sep 11 2021 20:00 utc | 42

There were quite obviously no ISIS shooters at the gate.

Eh, I wouldn't be so sure.

Posted by: Skiffer | Sep 11 2021 20:02 utc | 43

@wagelaborer | Sep 11 2021 20:00 utc | 43

Stop insulting the innocent rocks!!

Posted by: Lurk | Sep 11 2021 20:09 utc | 44

@ Gordog | Sep 11 2021 18:59 utc | 25

Personally I believe that the "nuttiness associated with the 'truther' movement" was at least partially contrived and fostered by saboteurs with the explicit intent of discrediting the movement. Any person with a reasonable amount of insight and intelligence would understand that '9/11 was an inside job' is quite enough by itself to strain the credulity of the average citizen. Adding science fantastical garbage such as Judy Wood's 'dustification beams from space' to the mix was obviously not calculated to make it seem more credible. James Fetzer in particular, divided the 9/11 movement against itself and promoted all sorts of rubbish (he is still doing it, apparently oblivious to the damage he has caused)

I particularly agree with your last point, it is enough to know the official story is untrue. By proposing a specific alternative hypothesis one is voluntarily shouldering the burden of proof, unless one really has got cast iron evidence to back up ones claims, that is obviously self defeating.

Posted by: MarkU | Sep 11 2021 20:12 utc | 45

Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 19:52 utc | 39

Follow the money is also very correct as there were movements seen in the stock market before the acts. (Never really followed up by the commission, of course. because it was said to include several VERY well placed "players") Plus the pentagon greenbacks, plus insurances.

Posted by: Stonebird | Sep 11 2021 20:14 utc | 46

AntiSpin 42 "Perhaps there are still some residues on that steel that could help answer the many legitimate questions that have so far gone unanswered."

It matters not a bit either way. The believers will continue believing no matter what. Once something becomes a religion, evidence has little meaning.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 20:15 utc | 47

...
The footprint collapse of three towers at the World Trade Center (the third one was not even hit by a plane) also beggars belief that the buildings and their internal steel structures simply fell from the heat generated by exploding aviation fuel. There is plausible evidence from the expert analyses that the buildings were taken down by controlled demolition.
...
...
It is enough to know that the official story is a LIE.
Posted by: Gordog | Sep 11 2021 18:59 utc | 25

Yes, it is enough to know the Official Story is a Lie, so why borrow eduphobic claptrap about WTC 7, and nonsense about controlled demolition?

Wikipedia has comprehensive articles on World Trade Centre
and
The Collapse of World Trade Centre - informed by the NIST Report.

Both are based on FACTS, not made-up stuff, bullshit, or wishful thinking.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 11 2021 20:17 utc | 48

Laguerre

I just happened to hear it on the radio because my mother in law was visiting and always has a radio going in the kitchen. (we didn't have radio, newspaper or television then. Each day the sun come up and the sun went down and that was good enough for me but when I heard that I just said the yanks are going to bomb someone.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 20:21 utc | 49

re: Why ain't U.S. media all over a story during which the U.S. side killed more than 100 innocent people?

Because any reporter who had the temerity to put the USA! in a bad light would become an ex-reporter.
Dan Rather, an iconic US journalist: "Look I'm an American. I never tried to kid anybody that I'm some internationalist or something. And when my country is at war, I want my country to win, whatever the definition of 'win' might be. Now, I can't and don't argue that that is coverage without prejudice. About that I am prejudiced." So Dan brought us through the criminal war against Vietnam and the Nixon presidency. -- from Norman Solomon's "War Made Easy" -- How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Sep 11 2021 20:35 utc | 50

@Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 11 2021 20:17 utc | 49

Quite right. Like all of wikipedia is only FACTS, no censorship, misrepresentation or politically motivated slander EVER.

Jimmy Wales is a saint, who singlehandedly conceived and initiated wikipedia on his own, all for the public good. Jimmy was never concerned about money - or hookers for that matter.

And Philip Cross is just one lonely guy with nothing better on his hands.

Posted by: Lurk | Sep 11 2021 20:41 utc | 51

Peter @ 30 says:

My thought is that little more skill than the ability to set up final and touch down on the center of the runway would be all that's required.

No, I think that is not realistic at all.

Let's briefly review how passenger jets land. Most of the time the weather is clear and you can do a visual approach. But you still use the instruments that tell you when you are on the correct glidepath. This involves both vertical and horizontal guidance.

Perhaps only 10 percent of the time will you do a purely visual landing where the controller has you fly a 'pattern' type approach like you would in a small airplane at an uncontrolled field. The rest of the time you still have to follow the approach procedure, which is a very exacting flight path that is depicted on an approach chart for each particular airport and runway.

In those fully visual 'pattern' type of approaches you are relying on your sight picture of the airplane's nose in relation to the horizon and runway. This is of course a developed skill, but this does not translate to hitting an UPRIGHT target like a building. This is in fact a very different sight picture, and most pilots [including myself] who have tried this in a full-flight sim have MISSED.

Look, those twin towers buildings are a square planform of 208 feet on each side. That is about the width of an international airport runway [typically about 60 m or ~200 ft]. It is going to look like a postage stamp to the pilot from even a few miles out.

Here is the radar track info on UA Flight 175. The altitutde is displayed on top, and the speed at bottom.

Notice the steep dive of the airplane in the final seconds. It drops 4,000 ft in 30 seconds, which is a rate of descent of 8,000 feet per minute, far higher than any passenger jet will descend under normal circumstances.

Again some illustrative numbers: from a typical cruise of 30,000 ft or so, the pilot will pull back power and start descending about 100 miles from the airport. From cruise altitude to 10,000 ft the descent rate is going to be about 3,000 fpm. Once at 10,000 ft, speed must be reduced to 250 knots indicated and descent the rest of the way is at about 1,500 fpm.

The final approach to landing is a glideslope of 3 degrees, so that final six miles or so is going to descend at an even lower rate of about 500 fpm or slightly higher, depending on your airplane approach speed.

Now look again at that Flight 175 radar track. The airplane descended 17,000 ft in 2.5 minutes! That is insane. This has nothing to do with the way you fly the aircraft in actual practice.

Look at the far left where the graph starts. At the airplane's speed, that is more than 23 miles out from the WTC. You will not even be able to make out even a large CLUSTER of buildings from that distance.

Yet in just 2.5 minutes this superhuman pilot has crashed squarely into this 200 foot wide building, after diving 17,000 feet!

And look at the speed. Those speeds are indeed possible as I have discussed previously. But you are 20 to 40 knots over the redline DIVE SPEED! The airplane is going to be shaking like it wants to come apart. The buffeting and vibrations are going to be HUGE! There may even be small parts departing the airplane, like engine nacelles!

The interesting thing for me is the descent profile, which is remarkably LINEAR. It is only in the last 30 seconds that the airplane only slightly pitches down and increases its rate of descent by a tiny bit.

What kind of pilot does it take to know to start an 8,000 fpm descent 25 miles out, and with the target nowhere in sight?

Sorry, but that is just craziness!

Posted by: Gordog | Sep 11 2021 20:50 utc | 52

LIHOP is just another cover story.

Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 21:00 utc | 53

Thanks Gordog, I spent a few weeks a year or two back going over various reports and claims but had not looked at the flight track from radar.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 21:15 utc | 54

And they give Hitler a bad name!

Posted by: Ali | Sep 11 2021 21:17 utc | 55

... I had long worked with Americans on a daily basis. I had been to the U.S. over a dozen times during the previous years. It was immediately clear to me that its people would want revenge. They would not care much against whom it would be waged.

This is very wrong. Yeah, they wanted revenge, but:

  • they were lied to about the 9-11 attack what led to it.
  • Americans didn't issue a blank check to attack the world and "remake the Middle East" - that was driven by power-elites who hijacked the American government to pursue their own agenda. The same sort of asshats that had called for a 'new Pearl Harbor' in a PNAC report.

=
Little has changed since... Most people still don't care about the wars of terror and who gets killed in them. I blame the media for that.

This is disheartening and inaccurate.

Much has changed. There is more distrust of the US government and the establishment after the lies of the Iraq War; CIA rendition and torture; the Bank bailouts of the global financial crisis; etc. And Russia and China now stand against USA-led bullying.

The media is controlled. I blame the Deep State Empire managers that control the media.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 11 2021 21:19 utc | 56

@wagelaborer | Sep 11 2021 20:00 utc | 43

Agreed.

Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 21:21 utc | 57

Norwegian @Sep11 21:00 #54: LIHOP is just another cover story.

The more we learn, the more this appears to be true.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 11 2021 21:21 utc | 58

Two planes,three buildings. Not even Hollywood can beat that one. HHHHHA.

Posted by: Viktor k | Sep 11 2021 21:23 utc | 59

@MarkU | Sep 11 2021 20:12 utc | 46

Adding science fantastical garbage such as Judy Wood's 'dustification beams from space' to the mix was obviously not calculated to make it seem more credible.

You are increase credibility by misrepresenting what she has said? That quote is not a quote.

Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 21:24 utc | 60

Why ain't U.S. media all over a story during which the U.S. side killed more than 100 innocent people?

That would detract from the propaganda of US troops selflessly putting themselves at risk to evacuate refugees.

I also think there may be more to the story. It was reported that Taliban were among those killed. I think that the Taliban may have responded to the bombing and got into a firefight with US troops.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 11 2021 21:26 utc | 61

wagelaborer @Sep11 20:00 #43

Excellent points.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 11 2021 21:29 utc | 62

@Jackrabbit | Sep 11 2021 21:21 utc | 59

Norwegian @Sep11 21:00 #54: LIHOP is just another cover story.

The more we learn, the more this appears to be true.


I am a structural engineer with many years of working with Finite Element software. I knew right away the official story was impossible. It took me a few more years to realize that LIHOP was one of the many layers of deception built in to this plan. The purpose is to distract attention from those who actually wanted it to happen, took part in its execution and benefited from it. Ref. the wars that followed.

Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 21:35 utc | 63

Karlof @ 34 says: 'Perhaps Gordog can inform the bar about remote fly-by-wire capability 20 years ago.'

Remotely controlling a full-size aircraft would have been easily possible 20 years ago. The General Atomics MQ1 Predator UAV has been in service since 1995, and first saw action in Bosnia during that mid-1990s conflict.

This aircraft is controlled by satellite link from half a world away...from Creech AFB in Nevada. It doesn't matter that it's relatively small. Size really has no bearing. Any aircraft, even a hobby model still has the exact same controls and flies according to the same laws of physics.

There are today much bigger UAVs that are remotely controlled the same way, like the jet-powered RQ4 Global Hawk, which has an all-up weight of 33,000 pounds---about the size of a midsize bizjet. Its wingspan is actually about 30 percent bigger than a 737!

Every passenger jet is already equipped with an autopilot, which can actually fly the aircraft right to an approach and automatic landing! It would not be a daunting technical challenge to make any airplane into a remotely piloted vehicle.

Here is what hobbyists are building in their basements: This scale model of a 747 has four small jet engines! It will have all the flight controls of a real 747, like rudder, ailerons, elevator etc. all simply scaled down in size.

Conceptually there is no difference. This is not rocket science, lol!

Posted by: Gordog | Sep 11 2021 21:38 utc | 64

A post that was banned by the Saudi owned Independent

Difficult to say but a lot of Islamic extremism is due to Saudi princes, not the state. In the 20s and 30s, the conquest of what is today Saudi was made by jihadists, with the ideology of ibn abd al-Wahhab. The conquest achieved, the jihadists were slaughtered in the later 30s. But the interest survived.
There's a long tradition, going back to the 9th century, of wealthy private individuals supporting fighters for the faith. This is what we see here.
Then suddenly in the 1970s, the Saudis became wealthy. They put their money into propagandising wahhabism, paying the construction of mosques, and salaries of imams. Not surprisingly, there's a lot of extremism.
The Saudi government now wants to deny it ever happened, but there are still a lot of Saudi princes (5000, they say), with access to state funds , who are free to do as they wish.

Posted by: Laguerre | Sep 11 2021 21:39 utc | 65

Trust destroyed in the U.S. government? A lot of people seem to believe what it is saying about covid and vaccines.

Posted by: Lysias | Sep 11 2021 21:43 utc | 66

I was a 30 yr old visiting professor at a university in Pennsylvania on a three month fellowship in September 2001. On 9/11 in my apartment building people began hanging the stars and stripes outside their windows. I hung an Australian flag outside my window in an attempt at some kind of initial naive solidarity since Australia is a close ally of the US. The building superintendent came by 10 minutes later saying there had been quite a few complaints and told me to to take it down. I tried to explain and began arguing when he refused to understand the sincerity of my gesture. It was a light in my young and naive eye on the road to Damascus. I ended up that evening more enraged by that peasant stupidity than the WTC event. The USA is a parochial, insular, bigoted and petty-minded nation of protestant castaways who thrive on a cocktail of ignorance, violence and undeserved privilege. It didn't come as a surprise either that 9/11 was a fabricated casus belli because their oligarchs knew the dumbasses at Bovine University would swallow the whole "da-towelheads-hate-us-cuz-our-freedums!" schtick. When asked if they deserve everything that's coming I think of the immortals words of Ozzy Osborne: "Oh lord yeah!"

Posted by: Patroklos | Sep 11 2021 21:45 utc | 67

@Viktor k | Sep 11 2021 21:23 utc | 60

Two planes,three buildings. Not even Hollywood can beat that one. HHHHHA.

True, but the main thing you are supposed to believe is that planes had anything to do with the buildings turning into pyroclastic flows and disappearing in the breeze. The planes are just another deception, they did not cause the buildings to disappear. You are supposed to argue about 2 planes and 3 buildings or some such, because it distracts from the reality that the destruction of the towers had nothing to do with planes.

Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 21:45 utc | 68

Addendum to 68: from 'War Pigs' by Black Sabbath (1970 opening track off Paranoid. They could have written that song about anything the US has done. A masterpiece. Tony Iommi's treble booster is a treasured guitar pedal of mine...

Posted by: Patroklos | Sep 11 2021 21:49 utc | 69

Andreas von Buelow, former State Secretary in the German Defense Ministry and Minister of Technology in the German government had a book published a year or two after 9/11 arguing that controls over the 9/11 planes had been remotely commandeered. Die CIA und der 11. September.

Posted by: Lysias | Sep 11 2021 21:54 utc | 70

FYI

Prior to b's 9-11 post, we had a discussion about 9-11 in the Open Thread. Anyone interested in 9-11 might want to peruse that discussion.

Here are links to my comments from that discussion:

  • @Sep9 20:37 #11

    Lists "disturbing facts" about 9-11 and a snippet fromm 2012 news report about Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld's conviction for war crimes in Malaysia.

  • Sep 10 2021 1:13 utc | 48

    I discuss a little about my personal experience on 9-11

  • @Sep11 14:33 #181

    The tragedy of 9-11 is not that nearly 3,000 Americans died on that day, it is that it was preventable and the wars and human rights abuses that happened afterward were unjustifiable.

    [snip]

    The worst lies are the lies we tell ourselves. No one should fall for feel-good narratives from Empire Media. War is not only profitable for MIC and the Security-Intelligence Complex (SIC) but is also used as a lever for social control.

  • @Sep11 16:53 #197
  • Victoria Nuland slip-of-the-tongue reveals the truth?

    "the primary reason we went in there [Afghanistan] was to address the threats emanating from our homeland".

    "FROM our homeland"? This suggests threats made by US MIC and/or Israel (Nuland is Jewish so Israel is also her "homeland") that pressured USA into war.


!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 11 2021 21:58 utc | 71

@Patroklos | Sep 11 2021 21:45 utc | 68, 70

Interesting story you had about the blind submission to the US this kind of event is demanded of everybody, even people on other countries. Where I worked in Norway, we were made to stand next to our desks in solidarity with the US. You can imagine how I look at that now, given what we know. And yes, I knew immediately the "Oh lord yeah!" reference :-)

Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 22:03 utc | 72

Out in Montreal this afternoon, I came across some celebrations (not sure if that’s the correct word, but I can’t think of a better one) for Chile, Salvador Allende, in remembrance of the coup on Sept. 11, 1973. I was drawn in by the Latin music; I’ll admit it, I thought the flag was for Cuba at a distance. They had huge posters of a head shot of Allende, with “Allende Vive!” written below his photo. “Non à impunité au Chili” another banner read. The event was organized by the Comité Chilien pour Droits Humains, I think that was it. Some of the display materials promoted freeing political prisoners in Chile. Very very sad - the coverage on display of the coup. But the local Latin diaspora came across as lively, inspired and hopeful.

Whenever the truth about 9/11 is discussed, I always post a link to a CBC documentary 911: One Year Later, something like that. I can’t find the link, but that brief documentary is very revealing. It includes mention of Russia flying jets in the Arctic the night before; Canada’s Finance Minister, Paul Martin having just arrived from China; and Canada’s Foreign Minister, John Manley arriving in Newfoundland on the very last plane to arrive in North America that day. He was flying from Frankfurt. … Obviously the event was a completely unexpected event that caught everyone by surprise.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Sep 11 2021 22:10 utc | 73

I, for one, believe it matters whether the truth of 9-11 becomes accepted public knowledge. Most of the last vestiges of an independent press regarding matters of state and foreign policy disappeared following 9-11. Without an informed, critical press there can be no informed discussion about these subjects that reaches the majority of citizens.

Regarding the plane impacts and subsequent collapse of the twin towers - they were designed to theoretically withstand the impact of a Boeing 707 traveling at 600mph. The planes that did impact the towers had approximately 20% more mass, but were traveling more slowly and delivered somewhat less kinetic energy than the aforementioned 707. There have been a number of attempts to model the damage caused by the planes and they all suffer from lack of critical evidence: "Because there is no observational information on the state of core structure after the aircraft impact, computer simulations are used to estimate the damage sustained by the structural elements in WTC-I core." The various simulations differ widely and are sensitive to input parameters. [from "An Engineering Perspective on the Collapse of WTC-1" Irfanoglu and Hoffmann, 2007)

Why is this, or any other forensic evidence (other than that obtained from widely available videos of the event) lacking? Two 110 story steel frame towers collapse - an unprecedented event - and there is no effort made to understand the mechanism(s) that led to such a catastrophe other than some belated computer modeling? Why is Gordog citing the radar tracking for indications of airspeed and altitude? As in - where is the 'black box' data from these flights?

The 1993 bombing of the towers underground parking structure caused essentially no structural damage and killed only 6 people. The idea that two airplanes, impacting the towers at different heights, different speeds, different angles, and different positions could cause identical complete failures of structures designed to tolerate such injuries and survive is... beyond belief, magical thinking.

It matters how this event occurred, why it occurred, and who was involved in enabling it and for what purpose(s).

https://newspunch.com/1993-twin-towers-engineer-says-it-can-survive-jumbo-jet-hit/

Posted by: the pessimist | Sep 11 2021 22:14 utc | 74

"Before 9/11 U.S. intelligence knew of Al-Qaeda sleeper cells and of plans for new attacks. Then came 9/11. I am by now one of those who thinks that they let it happen on purpose. That is because all the wars that followed had long been prepared for."

This is the first thing I thought back then. Literally dozens of foreign agents acting for weeks in the Usa, and the intelligence knew nothing? This is so utterly incredible that in order to "explain" this, "conspiracy theories" saying the sky skrapers were intentionally mined from within arose.

I am convinced that neither the terrorists nor the Intelligence espected the skyscrapers to crumble, though. As B. reported, similar accidents had happened already, with scores (not, thousands) of deaths. One happened here in Milan a few days after 9/11, killing about ten people (it was a small airplane), and leaving the skyscraper standing and undamaged, except for the area that was directly hit. My opinion is that the intelligence espected a few scores, perhaps one hundred, victims, but no more than this.

And a few scores victims was all what was needed to unleash the war being prepared for a long time (against nations that had nothing to do with the attack, BTW, which demonstrates it was no "response" to anything).

What made me suspicious was the 4th airplane, headed towards the White House. It fell. Oops. Thanks to the heroics rebellion of the passengers, and blah blah blah.
Now, we espect the defence apparatus protecting the skies of the mightiest military power in the world, would down any hijacked airplane heading towards the White House, don't we? But no, it failed. It was a riot within the airplane that by a lucky coincidence downed it, we were told. How believable is it that no rocket was available to protect the White House from any air attack?
In fact, this one airplane was not allowed to reach the target.
Then the intentional downing was covered up with the moving episode of the heroes (which might well have happened for real, BTW), and forgotten thereafter.

Sometimes simpler explanations work better than very complicate plots involving the secret mining from within, with "Jews dancing on the nearby roofs" as a bonus.
"It" happened because it was allowed to happen (not especting the buildings to fall, though), because an incident was needed to go to war. The same thing has already happened in Pearl Harbour, after all.
Occam's Razor, you know.

Posted by: Giovanni Dall'Orto | Sep 11 2021 22:16 utc | 75

How about that? John Manley, as in Foreign-Affairs-minister-on-the-last-flight-to-land-in-North-America-on-9/11, that John Manley, just gave an interview on 9/11 and the invasion of Afghanistan.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/mobile/video?playlistId=1.5581065

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Sep 11 2021 22:21 utc | 76

Thanks b, a true account in unaccountable times. I'm with you, 98\11 was allowed to happen because it filled the need, as written by PNAC, of a necessary " Pearl Harbor" event, to get the public aroused for war.

Posted by: vetinLA | Sep 11 2021 22:26 utc | 77

Giovanni Dall'Orto 76

That is pretty close to my take on the event. The majority of doubters staring at smoking rubble is no danger to the perps. A very red red herring.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 11 2021 22:29 utc | 78

Whitney Webb on impact of 9/11 on rights if citizens. Nice contrast also provided with covid and the domestic war on terrorism.
https://www.mintpressnews.com/9-11-and-the-politics-of-self-preservation-and-fear/278455/

Posted by: Joe | Sep 11 2021 22:31 utc | 79

Gordog @65--

Thanks for that info. I already was aware of all that, but the story at the time was NO airliner could be flown remotely in that manner. Such a capability explains the very unusual flight maneuvers we all observed. Then there's the lack of any disturbance to the grass outside the Pentagon that was supposedly hit by an airliner on the ground floor. I worked with a team of citizen investigators, and within a week we knew the official story was a BigLie, which is #4 after JFK, RFK, MLK, or #5 if you include the Gulf of Tonkin BigLie. As a reward for my investigating, I was placed on the No Fly list with a double red star status that was printed onto my boarding passes and subjected all my baggage and myself to a complete search. I discovered earlier this year that I'm no longer subjected to that anymore.

I contemplated self-exile, but my duties/responsibilities didn't allow me to make that move. I decided to continue my historical investigations and share what I discover. Yes, the criminals are running the Outlaw US Empire, but I discovered they were running it when I was born in 1955; so, I've been able to create a logical rationalization for my continuing to live within the Empire yet seek its demise, as I've explained on several occasions. I even smile because I take solace in the fact that the criminals won't make it out alive and are doomed to death just like everyone.

Posted by: karlof1 | Sep 11 2021 22:53 utc | 80

Fucking neocons! Burn bastards burn! Death be upon them!

Now what about the plane that supposedly had a novice fly it in a 1000ft (m?) descending helix from which he came out horizontally to make direct hit on the offices in the pentagon that were looking into very sensitive matters (billions of dollars unaccounted for in defence budget?)?

This all wasn't allowed to happen, it was planned to happen! PNAC

Fucking neocons! Burn bastards burn! Death be upon them!


Posted by: tucenz | Sep 11 2021 22:57 utc | 81

What's perhaps most interesting as I read today's headlines are the myriad lies that the initial BigLie spawned, and they're everywhere. Such is our world today. Perhaps that will change once the Eurasian Bloc becomes the dominant Moral force and 80 years from now 911 will be known as the Outlaw US Empire's last and biggest BigLie that eventually undermined its authority and political-economy, bankrupting it in every way possible.

Posted by: karlof1 | Sep 11 2021 23:12 utc | 82

re: remote-control aircraft
. . .by mother aircraft, in this case
Aug 7, 1946
Drone Bombers Make Flight From Hawaii To California Field . .here

Posted by: Don Bacon | Sep 11 2021 23:22 utc | 83

I, for one, cannot wait for September 12. Hopefully, the unrelenting media revivification of 9/11 will abate, though I am certain that it will not stop--ever. The goal, of course, is to trigger all the emotions that Americans felt on that day and, in so doing, rekindle enthusiasm for the cursed War on Terror, which has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced many more--all for the benefit of MIC. As for conspiracy theories regarding who was responsible for the attack, I am agnostic, but nothing can surprise me at this point.

Posted by: Rob | Sep 11 2021 23:28 utc | 84

They let it happen: that was my take before and after looking at "MIHOP" theories. Some further evidence was compiled here http://they-let-it-happen.blogspot.com/

Posted by: Adam Larson | Sep 11 2021 23:33 utc | 85

Karlof @ 81:

The Pentagon crash was an even more unlikely piece of flying. I don't know of any pilot who has successfully accomplished that 'impossible turn' in the sim...before that 'flight vehicle' circled round and came back in to strike the building.

Not to mention how low it came in. Any airplane that is low to the ground [by even half the wingspan] is going to have a LOT of additional lift due to ground effect. That is a quantifiable aerodynamic value that would take extraordinary pilot skill to overcome and practically skim the ground without hitting.

As for remote control, well consider that the Buran space shuttle launched into space without a crew, successfully reentered the atmosphere at over 18,000 mph and autolanded on its intended runway! That was in 1988.

Posted by: Gordog | Sep 11 2021 23:36 utc | 86

Don Bacon @ 84: Thanks for that! 👍

Yes, a mother ship with the remote pilots on board could easily control any aircraft by simple line-of-sight radio control...just like the model aircraft flyers!

So it could be done in 1946, but not in 2000, lol!

Posted by: Gordog | Sep 11 2021 23:42 utc | 87

An Egyptian airliner, filled with military officers, crashed into the Atlantic off the US eastern seaboard in the autumn of 1999. The official cause was said to be a suicide crash initiated by a fundamentalist Islamist pilot, a finding vehemently disputed by the man’s family. Wondered, in wake of 9/11, if that was a test run of remote control tech.

Very suspicious that on the day the entire US national security apparatus effectively froze in place for an hour or so, until the Pentagon was hit. This included senior military and Congressional leaders allegedly in scheduled meetings, who later claimed they did not know anything re: hijackings or the WtC strikes. Also the anthrax inside job. And the deliberate protection of the future hijackers by well-placed CIA officers. etc

Posted by: jayc | Sep 11 2021 23:46 utc | 88

@ Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 11 2021 22:03 utc | 73

It was indeed one of the most humiliating, pathetic moments of Western European History. I remember random Western Europeans citizens immediately flew to NYC to mourn alongside the Americans. I remember there was even a French woman in full funeral attire (sunglasses, black clothes, covered hair) who was interviewed by some TV channel in NYC.

9/11 was one of those moments all Westerners thought would be glorious but turned out to be one of the most cringe. I bet there are a lot of Westerners who would prefer to erase many things they did and said in the aftermath of the attacks.

Posted by: vk | Sep 11 2021 23:50 utc | 89

The disappearance fo Malaysia Flight 370 was also likely caused by remote control. Some very important Chinese scientists on that plane and a mysterious cargo possibly having to do with high-end micro-chip production.

As far as the burning jet fuel causing the building to collapse as they did, yes that is a possibility and the most likely scenario. Folks want to throw out a variety of fairly crazy theories, the craziest being mini-nukes, less crazy would be a controlled demolition, but the amount of prep work that would take would leave a big fingerprint.

As a physics guy I have done the math, that amount of hot burning jet fuel piled up against the inner supports of the towers would cause them to collapse in such a manner. The trick would be a very precise strike, or the mass of the fuel would cut through the building and detonate on the opposite side of the strike, instead up piling up against the supports.

Remote control would explain how the jets hit so precisely.

Posted by: Haasaan | Sep 11 2021 23:56 utc | 90

re: drone aircraft
Crewless Flight Points Way to Push-Button War
Here's another news article on the 1946 drone aircraft flight from Hawaii to California, with a quote: Brig Gen William L Richardson, chief of the army air force guided missiles division, said the unprecedented radio-piloted flight proved the air force could have struck a target at 2500 or more miles range with any conventional bomber--unmanned.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Sep 12 2021 0:02 utc | 91

Gordog #53

The interesting thing for me is the descent profile, which is remarkably LINEAR. It is only in the last 30 seconds that the airplane only slightly pitches down and increases its rate of descent by a tiny bit.

What kind of pilot does it take to know to start an 8,000 fpm descent 25 miles out, and with the target nowhere in sight?

Thank you for that analysis. So likely there was laser beacon fitted to each building at the impact point to enable the flying object to contact right on target.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 12 2021 0:02 utc | 92

NORAD's no-show on 9/11 was a big surprise for me. It was created to counter threats to the continental USA. Until Rumsfeld became DefSec/ SecDef there had been a hotline between Air Traffic Control and NORAD. 9/11 Mythology has it that Rumsfeld had the hotline diverted to a phone in a locked empty office in the Pentagon.
NORAD's no-show on the only occasion it could have fulfilled its SOLE FUNCTION adds considerable weight to the Myth.

Some time before 9/11 NORAD was asked to investigate a private LearJet which had departed from its flight plan and wasn't responding to Air Traffic Control requests for an explanation. When NORAD aircraft intercepted it they observed that its windows were fogged - a sign that it had suffered a loss of cabin pressure and all on board were either unconscious or dead. They escorted it with the intention of waiting for it to run out of fuel and ensuring that it didn't endanger anyone on the ground. It eventually ran out of fuel and crashed in a field.

That's a pretty minor incident compared with 4 scheduled jetliners departing from their flight plan within minutes of take-off, from major commercial airports, on the same morning.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 12 2021 0:09 utc | 93

Gordog

Earlier on and also looking at your comments, I wonder about a target beacon. Even when I was was wondering how much more difficult it was than lining up for a landing, I also had in mind that one of the planes hit the building virtual dead center while banking. The more I look at what you have been posting, the more likely I think the probability of a target beacon.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 12 2021 0:09 utc | 94

Patroklos #68

+++ Oh Lord Yeah.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 12 2021 0:09 utc | 95

A target beacon was used for the attack on Serbian television during the Kosovo War.

Posted by: Lysias | Sep 12 2021 0:13 utc | 96

I know nothing about explosives, architecture, aeronautics or metallurgy, but I did grow up on military bases and lost a classmate in the Pentagon attack and I have always wondered where the photos/security footage from the perimeter cameras of the Pentagon went. The feds only ever released a few still photo frames of a distant fuzzy fireball behind which is a flash of white that may or may not be a plane. Either the Pentagon had no perimeter cameras (a travesty if true, but unlikely) OR a plane did not hit the Pentagon. I understand video was pulled from surrounding businesses' security cameras to "assist in the investigation." That has also never been released or returned. There should be footage of the plane approaching and crashing from multiple viewpoints from hundreds of cameras, but I've never seen any. So countless people witnessed and filmed the planes hitting the Twin Towers (replayed ad nauseum today)... But no one and nothing documented the attack on the Pentagon?

Posted by: Valerie | Sep 12 2021 0:14 utc | 97

uncle tungsten 93

Read your comment after posting mine. My thought was and narrow beam electronic beacon in the buildings.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Sep 12 2021 0:18 utc | 98

Some interesting eye witness observations from Edward Snowden:

https://edwardsnowden.substack.com/p/9-12

His free emails are good too.

Posted by: Paul | Sep 12 2021 0:26 utc | 99

@ Haasan:

I don't know what kind of physics you used, but as an engineer with advanced working knowledge of thermodynamics and heat transfer, I can tell you the NIST so-called 'heat model' is complete BUNK.

What they have produced has absolutely NOTHING to do with a formal heat transfer analysis. I know, I have done many. I have extensive background in designing heat exchangers.

Most of the jet fuel energy was consumed in those huge fireballs at point of impact. Those were OUTSIDE the building. In order for jet fuel to combust it must be PRECISELY balanced by an air to fuel ratio. That only happened at the precise moment of impact when the mass of fuel was VAPORIZED.

The fire inside the building was from office furniture, which is like a house fire in terms of temperature, low temperature and lots of black smoke. That's called a diffuse flame. A high temperature fire makes almost no smoke.

Then there is the issue of heat transfer into very thick steel. That is impossible under those low fire temps and without FORCED CONVECTION.

I will dig up later photos of a Spanish steel frame highrise that was utterly consumed in a huge ORANGE FIREBALL that literally dwarfed the building. It burned like that at high temp for 24 hours. Naturally it remained standing.

Anyone with even a basic knowledge of thermodynamics, looking at that mickey mouse black smoke coming from a few floors, knows the score instantly.

Posted by: Gordog | Sep 12 2021 0:26 utc | 100

next page »

The comments to this entry are closed.