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Enough Conspiracies! | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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Following the attacks of 9/11, a pervasive and rapid media, political and cultural phenomenon of “mockery” emerged. There are those who believe that people should stop using the term “conspiracy” especially in reference to the 9/11 attacks as this is like pointing the finger at “anonymous perpetrators” who used the youths of one religion and various nationalities as mindless tools in executing a plot that surpassed them; their intellect, their capability to plan, and their wretched vision of the impact and consequences [of the attacks].

This is the phenomenon that immediately followed 9/11 and this was the rhetoric at the time amongst leaders, masters and spectators. It was apparent that this phenomenon itself was “part” of the conspiracy, which aims to deny it by mocking it “comically” and through masking the “biggest conspiracy” in modern political history, as described by a number of intellectuals and researchers.

If nobody has enough evidence to prove or refute a conspiracy theory then the issue should be open to debate and discussion based on liberal thinking and supported by documented information, and according to the logic of the right to know the truth behind a major event, which had a huge impact on the lives of Americans and Muslims all over the world and an event which has affected world peace and security and continues to do so. Bold and open discussions must take place regarding the various narratives that surround this event; discussions, which nobody should restrain or suppress.

This article aims to contribute to what may be considered a requirement in liberalism and the right to know and what is required for the documentation of information.

So let us begin with the documentation of information.

Believing in the narrative of the neo-conservatives regarding the 9/11 attacks is based on “trust” in these people and the story that they constructed and relayed based on specific information.

Are they right to be trusted?

One of the books that discuss the “official version” of this unfortunate event is ‘9/11 and American Empire: Intellectuals Speak Out’ edited by David Ray Griffin and Peter Dale Scott, to which a number of American researchers, intellectuals, and academics have contributed, all of whom do not believe the official version of the 9/11 attacks. The editors of the book said that researchers, who do not belong to the mainstream, have found evidence that refutes the official version of who is ultimately responsible for the 9/11 attacks.

Morgan Reynolds is a professor at Texas A&M University, and a former member of the Bush administration. He believes that 9/11 was carried out by individuals with ties to the US administration in order to achieve world domination.

There is also Richard Falk, a professor of International Law and the chairman of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation who said that the Bush administration either allowed 9/11 to take place or conspired directly to facilitate the attack to help with its current international operations. What raises more suspicions is the fact that there is deep fear of discussing the truth of what happened that day so that dark and ugly secrets will not be discovered.

Karen Kwiatkowski, an academic who served in the US military for 20 years until 2003 says that she was at the US Department of Defense [the Pentagon] on September 11, 2001, and that none of the members of the 9/11 Commission, which was responsible for investigating the attacks, were capable of assessing the evidence from a technical point of view. She also states that she did not see the wreckage of the airplane that supposedly crashed into the Pentagon, nor did she see any evidence of the destruction that could be attributed to an aerial attack.

Steven E. Jones, a physics professor at the Brigham Young University added that the way that the Twin Towers and World Trade Center Seven collapsed was not explained by the official report. He argues that the buildings were not destroyed by airplanes; the closest interpretation using scientific logic concludes that the collapse was caused by controlled demolition using bombs that were planted beforehand.

David Griffin said that the behavior of the US army on September 11 was indicative of military involvement in the attacks, and that the collapse of World Trade Centre Seven is an example of a controlled demolition using explosives that were placed all over the building before the attacks.

The increased suspicion surrounding the narrative of the hawkish neo-conservatives regarding the 9/11 attack motivated American elites and groups to conduct “collective scientific research” into what really happened on September 11, 2001. An example of these collective scientific efforts is the establishment of the 9/11 Truth Movement, which is run by approximately 50 American academics and intellectuals, some of whom are ex-military experts.

In a testimony to the US Congress, Condoleezza Rice, who was the National Security Advisor at the time, said that US President George Bush had received a classified memo one month before September 11 detailing Bin Laden’s interest in launching an attack against the United States using hijacked planes. The memo was entitled, ‘Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US,’ however it did not state the exact date, place or method of the attack. She added that nobody could have imagined taking planes and slamming them into buildings.

Richard A. Clarke, the former Chief Counter-Terrorism Adviser on the US National Security Council, clearly stated that the American administration ignored the threat posed by Al Qaeda before the 9/11 attacks despite knowing of such threats. Clarke added that he and George Tenet, the former Director of Central Intelligence Agency, have always felt sorry that Al Qaeda and its threat were not dealt with seriously by the administration; even after the 9/11 attacks and the disappearance of Bin Laden in Afghanistan, the administration wanted to strike Iraq immediately, despite the lack of evidence of a link between Iraq and the attacks.

Michael Meacher, a senior member of British Parliament and the former minister of Environment (1997-2003) wrote in his article entitled, ‘This War on Terrorism is Bogus,’ published in The Guardian on September 6, 2003 that:

“It is known that at least 11 countries provided advance warning to the US of the 9/11 attacks … [There was information that] 200 terrorists were said to be preparing a big operation (Daily Telegraph, September 16, 2001). The list they provided included the names of four of the 9/11 hijackers, none of whom was arrested … The first hijacking was suspected at not later than 8.20am, and the last hijacked aircraft crashed in Pennsylvania at 10.06am. Not a single fighter plane was scrambled to investigate [from the US Andrews airforce base, just 10 miles from Washington DC] until after the third plane had hit the Pentagon at 9.38 am. Why not? There were standard FAA intercept procedures for hijacked aircraft before 9/11. Between September 2000 and June 2001 the US military launched fighter aircraft on 67 occasions to chase suspicious aircraft (AP, August 13, 2002)…Was this inaction simply the result of key people disregarding, or being ignorant of, the evidence? Or could US air security operations have been deliberately stood down on September 11? If so, why, and on whose authority?”

The aforementioned information from various sources prove that the official narrative of the event is invalid, that the high ranking officials were aware of what was going to happen, and that standard procedures were suspended at this instance. This is all evidence that proves the existence of a conspiracy of some sort; isn’t the crux of conspiracy the absolute denial and the terrorizing of whoever speaks of it whether it is called a “conspiracy” or a “miscalculation” or “foolish deception” or “a dark malicious plot” or the American strategy for hegemony in the 21st century instigated by powerful earthquake?