Put yourselves in the shoes of a CIA operative given the job of covertly taking down a world trade centre.  Given that you would be a pretty pragmatic individual, you would identify the first challenge as being looking for a precedent on which there is plenty of data.  Your source would be a commercially available service (the demolition trade), given that such a task is something they do very well, whereas it’s not something that CIA operatives are asked to do quite as regularly.  Demolishing a building is much more technical than you might expect.  You need to place a large number of charges stragecially and fix them firmly to the items that you wish to fracture.  Having found where to place your incendiaries from the demolition trade professionals, you now have to go in and wander around fixing charges in place then securing and checking them… without being seen.  You then have to get some stunt pilots who specialise in passenger aircraft to just miss the tower, and you have to detonate your devices simultaneously.  You also have to get them to get out of New York unnoticed by a whole heap of people who are looking right up in their direction.  Does this not sound a little implausible?

Narwhol said:

Demolishing a building is much more technical than you might expect.  You need to place a large number of charges stragecially and fix them firmly to the items that you wish to fracture.  Having found where to place your incendiaries from the demolition trade professionals, you now have to go in and wander around fixing charges in place then securing and checking them… without being seen.

Narwhol, you’re endangering my life.  I was trying to get out of this thing, now you’re dragging me back in.  But, you are absolutely right.  There had to have been explosives and thermate (to melt the steel in the right places) planted in the buildings prior to the event.  And, it seems impossible to imagine how this could have been done, right?   

Well, Securacom, which later changed its name, was the company in charge of security for the towers.  Guess who headed it?  Guess what weird sorts of events in the towers immediately preceded 9/11?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qNouhEo4V0

Marvin P. Bush, the president’s younger brother, was a principal in a company called Securacom that provided security for the World Trade Center, United Airlines, and Dulles International Airport. The company was backed by KuwAm, a Kuwaiti-American investment firm on whose board Marvin Bush also served.

According to its present CEO, Barry McDaniel, the company had an ongoing contract to handle security at the World Trade Center “up to the day the buildings fell down.”

The World Trade Center was destroyed just days after a heightened security alert was lifted at the landmark 110-story towers, security personnel said yesterday [September 11]. Daria Coard, 37, a guard at Tower One, said the security detail had been working 12-hour shifts for the past two weeks because of numerous phone threats. But on Thursday [September 6], bomb-sniffing dogs were abruptly removed. [NY NewsDay]

On the weekend of 9/8, 9/9 there was a ‘power down’ condition in WTC tower 2, the south tower. This power down condition meant there was no electrical supply for approx 36 hrs from floor 50 up… “Of course without power there were no security cameras, no security locks on doors and many, many ‘engineers’ coming in and out of the tower.”

Marvin Bush was in New York on 9/11

You then have to get some stunt pilots who specialise in passenger aircraft to just miss the tower, and you have to detonate your devices simultaneously.  You also have to get them to get out of New York unnoticed by a whole heap of people who are looking right up in their direction.  Does this not sound a little implausible?

Yes, your straw man sounds implausible.  Look, no one is denying what is plain as day here: that commercial airliners crashed into those buildings (except for WTC 7, which also fell).  What is being questioned is whether those crashed airliners were the only cause of 110 story buildings falling straight down.  And, on that point I am saying, the jury is still out.  Why?  For one simple reason: there are a lot of strange coincidences and anomalies and no good story to explain them away.  See for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Odp1FO0Vmuw

I watched.  Much of it I had heard before.  The things that surprised me were the claims that firefighters wouldn’t speak out because they feared for the jobs and the fact that this happened 12 months after the think-tank document.

Firefighters are generally brave men and women.  I think if the claims were true, you’d fear more for your country.  You’d speak out.  And that lot getting something involving as many people as a plot like this would involve organised in only twelve months overestimates them somewhat.

I do think the war was a bid for power, and I think they vastly overestimated Europe’s fragility in thinking they could divide it for any length of time by demanding help with their war with menaces and trying to ostracise countries that sensibly told them to piss off.  Those same countries are still lookingto get the EC together, it will be the largest trading block in the world and this probably only makes them more determined not to fall out with the countries that caved in to the US (the one I’m in for one, and my native Ireland that actually ignored the constitution of the second Dail in order to join in.

However, I’m not buying the idea that they deliberately killed a whole lot of (mostly) American citizens in order to make it happen - although I wouldn’t put anything past them.  It’s just that I don’t think that they would find someone willing to crash a plane into a building and die for them.

Unexplained phenomenon does not automatically prove conspiracy or nefarious doings.  As a skeptic, I say show us credible evidence to back up the government conspiracy claims.  While I remain open-minded about it and ready to consider new information, the conspiracy theorists have yet to prove their cases.

Who getsta decide what “credible evidence” is?
If you want “evidence”, you are not going to get it at a website. For “evidence” you need a *legal proceeding with sworn testimony*.

Fine. I await a legal proceeding. I have seen lotsa charges, and would appreciate a hearing with sworn witnesses whose testimony was recorded with high speed closeups of the faces so I can see their responses to cross examination.

Surf the work of Dr. Paul Ekman. He began with monkeys recording the many facial expressions they share with the hominids. But then, in recording hominid faces, realized that the initial response to a stimulus still held elements of primate expressions. However, monkeys dont have enough prefrontal lobe to lie.

Ekman shows how, if you block out the smile, or other hominid attempts to deceive, and just focus on those we share with the monkeys, you can tell when a witness is lying. Then… we will get “credible evidence”. It’d be nice as well to have EEG tabs placed appropriately on the skulls of witnesses. The brain wave patterns are different during attempts to decieve. (BTW: with these new technologies, which include FMRI brain scans, its a mystery why they wanted permission to use an obsolete tool like torture)

Until then, the failure of congress to respond to this issue with dismissiveness looks fishy.  The failure to use modern lie detection technologies in the name of national security is also fishy. There are also drugs which make these other methods even more effective. Why arent they using them in Iraq to identify terrorists?

The only reason I can think of, is that the power structure knows how corrupt it is, and knows that if these tools begin to be used on suspects, they will be used on current office holders. And the only reason they have gotten away with it so far, is that the electorate is too stupid and lazy to become informed on these new technologies.

If anyone else has any other method of getting “credible evidence” I would be grateful to be instructed.

Everyone has to decide for themselves which evidence is credible. Hopefully, if people are smart, informed, and not egomaniacal they will consider the comments on the evidence of various experts in like of those people’s expertise and credibility, but ultimately you have to decide for yourself what is credible. Legal standards of evidence are not by any means a reliable “gold standard” for credibility. And the work on fMRI and other tools daybrown refers to is not validated sufficiently in my opinion, intriguing as it is, to say it would be as reliable a “lie detector” as suggested.

Part of the problem with this thread is that what seems a credible piece of information that raises questions about the explanation most of the population accepts seems like just a strange but meaaningless bit of coincidence or innuendo to others. I haven’t yet heard what I consider to be a credible reason to suspect government or administration involvement in the disaster or to suspect that the buildings fell down for some reason other than that the airplanes that crashed into them. There’s a lot heated rhetoric, but each person has to decide for themselves if the arguments or information they hear is credible. I’m with bododio in not finding the unexplained bits or the “strange coincidences” particularly compelling. I think we dramatically underestimate the role of chance in events and we by our nature search for meaning where none necessarily exists. Sure, definitive experiments have not been done to disprove or explain every question or unexplained bit of information. But the same is true for many things in life, from the existence of god to alternative medical therapies. The question is what we should spend our limited time and resources on researching, and I don’t agree that the issues raised in this thread to support the idea of a conspiracy behind the disaster are sufficiently credible as to require definitive investigation. Those who do are, of course, welcome to conduct or push for such investigations themselves, but don’t assume everyone who is not interested in joining in is motivated by the sinister motives attributed to the “power structure”—some of us just don’t believe the questions raised are sufficiently credible to warrant trying to answer them.

I spent 3 months of my life responding to a seemingly endless trail of e-mails from my Brother on this subject.

My Brother is a self proclaimed Libertarian.  He has aligned himself with the likes of Alex Jones & Co.  A group of veteran conspiracy theorists, who are radical anti-government Libertarians that have consistently used fear of government, foreigners and even hate mongering to further their cause.

Here are some links I prepared along with one of many responses I drafted during that 3 months….

http://www.911myths.com

http://www.debunking911.com/

It is wise, however, to approach new utterances by a known loon with skepticism. That is merely common sense.

Do not underestimate a veteran skeptic’s ability to accurately and consistently detect bullshit on very little data. There are clearly many such veteran skeptics out there and if they fail to jump up and refute every claim presented, it lends zero credibility to said claims. The burden of proof is always upon the claimant.

Ok, it appears that you did not follow the links I sent.  There are many sources that dispute almost every basis for the conspiracy theory.  I seem to be able to find them easily and the authors of a couple of the links I sent have spent the time to consolidate and present the point by point rebuttals to individual claims.

Here is one from popular mechanics

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/defense/1227842.html?page=4&c=y

And unlike much of the information quoted by the conspiracy theorists, all the sources are clearly identified.

Another thing that bothers me.  If you were to accept these claims as stated by the 9/11 truth organization at face value without attempting to debunk them, there are many things that just don’t make sense.

For example.  Assuming there were incindiary devices planted in the WTC and “building 7”, and they were cleverly designed to go off on command at times coinciding with the plane crashes, what evidence leads you to the government as the instigator?

From what I heard in the discussion, we are asked to not only believe the depictions of the events in accordance with the conspiracy theory, but we are also being asked to swallow the idea of a “shadow government”.

And from other Alex Jones & Co. broadcasts and writings I know that this ultimately leads to Illuminate and Reptilian Aliens from outer space!

And you want me to leap into that pool?!!!

And here is another interesting contradiction/observation:

“I currently work on boiler control systems.

I also worked in the steel industry for 5 years. Most of that was at a hot rolling mill. The steel slabs were heated for the rolling process to make the steel easier to process.

Before that I worked for a company that built industrial furnaces. Mostly for heat-treating engine and transmission parts. I also commissioned an aluminum-melting furnace.

I do have a background in military demolitions. I was a combat engineer. Not quite the same thing as the folks that bring down buildings, but I understand the concept well enough.

But I am not a structural engineer. I have a BS in electrical engineering technology. (Not an EE. Less math in my degree.)

During basic training, we “watched” a demonstration where a thermite grenade was used to destroy some old radio equipment. I put watched in quotes because we had to turn our heads away from the flash. The Flash went on for over a minute. The stands we were in were only about 20 yards from where the grenade was set off. Thermite is NOT and explosive. It is an incendiary chemical combination that produces great amounts of heat. But it takes a short time to heat up and does not act instantaneously. Real explosives are consumed in a fraction of a second.

The whole idea behind controlled demolition is to use limited amounts of fast acting explosives with precise timing on already weakened structures. Thermite is not what they use. IIRC, the explosives used for such things are the same ones NASA used in explosive bolts on spacecraft. Very fast acting. Much faster than traditional military explosives. Arguments claiming that the WTC were brought down by a controlled demolition and involved the use of thermite are contradictory right from the start. “

Guy Noir - on skepticforum.com

——

Bottom line, it seems that the techniques being used by these organizations is to develop theories that are complex and woven together using many mis-conceptions, mis-quotes and factually incorrect depictions of events.  So many that it would take real dedication to dispute them all.

Not to mention that once refuted, they simply invent new theories that implicate the “devils” they are after and ask that you spend more time debunking those.

However, in my mind enough has already been refuted to disway me from the task.

Not to mention the credibility of the people at the forefront of these theories have already made statements that damage their credibility.

Each of the panelists in the discussion is either trying to sell movies, books or pursue political ambitions that would benefit greatly from leagues of followers.

Most of the people in the audience that had “questions” were selling something themselves.  Sounds a lot like the peddlers you find selling UFO and Big Foot stuff.

There was a 22 year old kid that got a terrific round of applause during the question and answer period.  He was a high school student when 9/11 happened and by his own admission, knew little of what the government did or how it worked at the time.  But now, I guess he is an expert, and renowned among his peers at this conference.  I think this says a lot.

One guy got up and listed more than 40 liberal/left wing “Gate Keepers” (news sources) that need to be shut down or turned around to thier way of thinking.  Is this the kind of “research” technique that was used to come up with these theories?  Sounds all too familiar, ignore the contradictions, kill the messenger, full speed ahead.

There was no one at the conference with a contrary opinion ready to refute anything they said.  This is no surpirise, I suspect if there was one they would have been swiftly lead away, just like a protester at a Bush speach.  Perhaps those with contrary opinions had a forum 15 miles away in a protest area?

I honestly think you would be better off looking for truth elsewhere.

I dont see the point in following links. Anyone can put up anything and claim it is a truthful source.
I am content to await *evidence*, sworn testimony under oath by people who present their documentation to prove they are who they say they are. There are way too many people on all sides of the 911 controversy with hidden agendas for any reasonable skeptic to think he can figure out what went on.

That the system has gone on this long without a legal proceeding to delve into all this proves to me that it is corrupt and/or incompetent. I checked at the NIST website, where last year it said the report on WTC 7 would be posted in the spring of 2007. I did not see the report. If anyone has, I’d be grateful of the opinion of the bureacrats, but still await their testimony in a legal proceeding about the method they used to reach their conclusions, and what those conclusions were.

All the rest, til then, is pissing in the wind.

I have watched Loose Change but I prefer 9/11 Mysteries:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6708190071483512003

I think the TV commercial style opening is silly and annoying though.

Looking thru this thread I see conspiracy, moon landing, CIA and Republicans but I don’t see the word TONS.

I have downloaded the NIST reports and burned them to DVD and searched them for lots of different things.  But I cannot find the quantity of concrete in the WTC in that report.  They say roughly 200,000 tons of steel total in both towers but not how much concrete.  Other non-official websites that also say 200,000 tons of steel specify 425,000 cubic feet of concrete.  Assuming 100 pounds per cubic foot that comes to 100,000 tons of steel and 280,000 tons of concrete in each tower.

Now I don’t care if the planes was flown by Arab terrorists.  I don’t care if they were flown by CIA agents with remote controls.  And I don’t care if they were flown by drunken Hell’s Angels.  But somebody has to work real hard to convince me that a 166 ton airliner containing 34 tons of kerosene, alias jet fuel, flying 500 mph can knock down a 500,000 ton building with that much steel and concrete in FIFTY-SIX MINUTES.  And this doesn’t even bring up the question of why it collapsed so fast once the collapse started.

Now the NIST site claims that they are “world renowned scientists and engineers”.  But have you heard how many tons of steel were on the floors where the planes hit in FIVE AND A HALF YEARS?  These buildings were designed in the 60’s.  Didn’t they have to figure out how many tons of steel and how many tons of concrete were going on every floor before they even started digging the hole for the foundation in 1968?  So why can’t the NIST produce a table with those 234 numbers in 3 years and using up TWENTY MILLION TAXPAYER DOLLARS?

The believers in the Osama Conspiracy are just as much conspiracy theorists as everybody else, but they have to prove an airliner can knock down a skyscraper 2,500 times its mass in 56 minutes.  So why aren’t they asking the NIST about the quantity and distribution of steel and concrete or do they believe Allah gave Muslims power over the laws of physics?

http://911research.wtc7.net/materials/contrib/911_physics_v9a.htm

psikey

psikeyhackr - 06 July 2007 01:30 AM

I have watched Loose Change but I prefer 9/11 Mysteries:

Now I don’t care if the planes was flown by Arab terrorists.  I don’t care if they were flown by CIA agents with remote controls.  And I don’t care if they were flown by drunken Hell’s Angels.  But somebody has to work real hard to convince me that a 166 ton airliner containing 34 tons of kerosene, alias jet fuel, flying 500 mph can knock down a 500,000 ton building with that much steel and concrete in FIFTY-SIX MINUTES.  And this doesn’t even bring up the question of why it collapsed so fast once the collapse started.

Now the NIST site claims that they are “world renowned scientists and engineers”.  But have you heard how many tons of steel were on the floors where the planes hit in FIVE AND A HALF YEARS?  These buildings were designed in the 60’s.  Didn’t they have to figure out how many tons of steel and how many tons of concrete were going on every floor before they even started digging the hole for the foundation in 1968?  So why can’t the NIST produce a table with those 234 numbers in 3 years and using up TWENTY MILLION TAXPAYER DOLLARS?

The believers in the Osama Conspiracy are just as much conspiracy theorists as everybody else, but they have to prove an airliner can knock down a skyscraper 2,500 times its mass in 56 minutes.  So why aren’t they asking the NIST about the quantity and distribution of steel and concrete or do they believe Allah gave Muslims power over the laws of physics?

http://911research.wtc7.net/materials/contrib/911_physics_v9a.htm

psikey

I’m not an Engineer.  But when this happened I worked with 100’s of Engineers in one of the worlds largest Architectural/Engineering and Construction firms.

I heard the news of the planes hitting the world trade center buildings on the radio as I commuted to work.  When I entered work there were a group of around 10 Engineers from various disciplines (Mechanical, Civil even a couple of Nuclear) watching the news on a monitor in the lobby.  They were assessing the damage from the planes and discussing various things that an impact like that would do to the structure.  I confess I wasn’t really listening to all the details.  However, I began to hear some of them rumbling about the collapse of the buildings and that they should get everyone out right away.  They were completely unsurprised when it happened.  Shocked, like we all were, but not surprised.

These guys predicted it before it happened.  No one can convince me that these guys don’t know what they are talking about.  I worked closely with these guys for years, I know the value of their opinions on such things in design and construction of not only office buildings, but facilities such as Nuclear Power plants, for which the standards are much higher.

You can’t learn physics from 9/11 conspiracy sites.

Charles - 06 July 2007 11:41 AM

You can’t learn physics from 9/11 conspiracy sites.

Great statement. I like it, really.

The WTC is not the only case in the world where one floor collapse makes the whole building collapse.

<You can’t learn physics from 9/11 conspiracy sites.>
I dont think anyone posting on this thread here claimed you can.

It’d also be useful to read up on group think. I’d be frankly surprised to hear engineers offer an opinion on what they thot was going on based on just the video. But not surprised if a senior neurotic engineer jumped to a conclusion to show leadership, and then you heard all the others fall into place behind him. That’s the way group think works.

The media likewise does not like ambiguity, perhaps wanting to prevent panic in a dense urban area, so it accesses whatever authority figures it can to provide the public with quick easy answers. And at a slower pace, given all the questions which have risen since the 911 hearings, there was a rush to judgment, again to reassure the public that they had a handle on things.

And once those in the media and government made up their minds, there was no going back deal with apparent inconsistencies in their position. Again, neurotics cannot tolerate ambiguity. An answer, any answer will do, and then when arrived at, will be defended no matter how illogical it seems based on the facts that emerge later. They call that ‘denial’.

It is, as Dr. Freud noted, a very intractable condition. Only a severe trauma will snap a neurotic out of it. Which I have warned the conspiracy theorists about. Cause if they do indeed wake up the public to their point of view, the public will be pissed. They may very likely start dragging the bastards out to be shot.

No, this whole issue is going to have to rest simmering on the back burner until Bush moves to his ranch in Paraguay. The next president will have to decide whether disempowering the CIA is useful. When one traces their activities, from the assassination of JFK (who I personally disliked), thru the cocaine shipments from Central America thru Mena, to the opium they are now bringing in from Afghanistan, one would havta wonder why they didnt also have a hand in 911.

Anyone who doubts this hasnt read Gibbon’s reports on the activities of the Praetorians. If it walks like a duck, its a duck. Time was, when Americans made snide remarks about the USSR’s line of leaders who all came out of the KGB. But then the praetorian effect became obvious with Bush I, then the governor- who was, at the very least, able to turn a blind eye to the cocaine shipments thru Mena- then the son of the praetorian, and apparently the wife of the former governor who is also obviously smart enuf not to look into things she is not spozed to know about- will be in the Oval office in 2008.

If you doubt her friendly relations with the CIA, just ask Vince Foster.

Daybrown,

Your response betrays your linkage to the Alex Jones & Co group think.

You yourself are a victim of group think.  I have listened to many of Alex Jones broadcasts.  Neurosis and demagoguery are rampant among those that have joined their ranks.  They routinely congratulate one another on their fake credentials and accomplishments, to the point that they actually believe it themselves.

Do you seriously believe that the Engineering firm I used to work for is full of neurotic Engineers?

You also have used tactics that are common among conspiracy theorists.  Compound the conspiracy with links to other conspiracy theories, add despicable activities such as drug smuggling, an already despised President and in order to invoke a sufficient level of fear, add accusations associating the CIA with that of ancient Roman Praetorian Guard.

Since I know this all eventually leads to morphing reptilian beings, world domination and embedded microchips that track our every move, my skeptics antennae are at full attention.

The WTC is not the only case in the world where one floor collapse makes the whole building collapse.

Name one in a steel frame building.

psik

psikeyhackr - 06 July 2007 04:16 PM

Name one in a steel frame building.
psik

I don’t know about construction techniques, so I don’t know if the samples I have in mind (one in Korea, two in Argentina, another in Israel) got the same design as the WTC. I am pretty sure that none of them had the same design as the WTC, but anyway, the weren’t hitted by an airplane.

Intuitively, I’d say that the weight of one floor over another would make building to collapse, particulary if the tensors are hitted. There is any mathematical calculus which shows clearly that this could or couldnt happen?. I am serious… knowing one of this studies formal enough to contradict the strong evidence of this films showing a plane entering the building and then the building collapse I’d change my mind.

I havent been able to get any calculation from the 9/11 conspiracy sites. I’d like to see one of them