9/11 Truth vs Fiction

[Esther]

After the question was thrown to Medina about the possible 9/11 cover-up I decided to see what all this is about. To be honest, I just blew this off as being Bush haters trying to stir up something that was not there.

EXPERTS TALK ABOUT CONTROLLED DEMOLITION

Numerous experts have stated that three World Trade Center buildings were brought down on 9/11 by controlled demolition:

A prominent physicist with 33 years of service for the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC, said that the official theory for why the Twin Towers and world trade center building 7 collapsed "does not match the available facts" and supports the theory that the buildings were brought down by controlled demolition

A prominent physicist, former U.S. professor of physics from a top university, and a former principal investigator for the U.S. Department of Energy, Division of Advanced Energy Projects, stated that the world trade centers were brought down by controlled demolition

A U.S. physics professor who teaches at several universities believes that the World Trade Centers were brought down by controlled demolition
A professor emeritus of physics and former division chairman from a small community college said "My wife and I, transfixed in front of a TV as the horror of 9/11 unfolded, watched as the topmost, undamaged floors of the WTC South Tower started to gradually lean (rotate) in the direction of the damage due to impact. In an instant, the rotation stopped, and that which was rotating began to fall, as if only under the influence of gravity! The fulcrum was no longer there! I blurted out, "My god, they wired the building."


So far it appears that there was indeed a strong possiblity bombs were placed inside the buildings. However, to me the real question is WHO placed the bombs there?

Some of the below quotes kind of bother me since it seems they are putting together bits and pieces from a quote. I have not research the actual links to see if this is still in context to what was said. But if it is and there is a lot and I am only copy and pasting a portion of it.

A firefighter said “[T]here was just an explosion. It seemed like on television [when] they blow up these buildings. It seemed like it was going all the way around like a belt, all these explosions.”

Another firefighter stated "it almost sounded like bombs going off, like boom, boom, boom, like seven or eight" (page 4; original is .pdf; Google's webpage version is here)

Paramedic said "at first I thought it was -- do you ever see professional demolition where they set the charges on certain floors and then you hear pop pop pop pop pop -- thats exactly what because thought it was" (page 9)

Police officer noted "People were saying, 'There’s another one and another one.' I heard reports of secondary bomb explosions . . ." (page 61, which is page 3 of a hand-written memorandum)

Firefighter stated "there was an explosion in the south tower, which . . . just blew out in flames . . . One floor under another after another and when it hit about the fifth floor, I figured it was a bomb, because it looked like a synchronized deliberate kind of thing. I was there in '93" (referring to 1993 bombing of world trade center; pages 3 & 4)

A firefighter stated "it looked like sparkling around one specific layer of the building . . . Then the building started to come down. My initial reaction was that this was exactly the way it looks when they show you those implosions on TV."

Officer in the New Jersey Fire Police Department who was previously a sergeant in the U.S. Army, said about the south tower: “[I]t sounded like bombs going off. That's when the explosions happened. . . . I knew something was going to happen. . . . It started to get dark, then all of a sudden there was this massive explosion.” Then, discussing her experiences during the collapse of the north tower, she said: “[There was] another explosion. That sent me and the two firefighters down the stairs. . . . I can't tell you how many times I got banged around. Each one of those explosions picked me up and threw me. . . . There was another explosion, and I got thrown with two firefighters out onto the street.” (pages 65-66, 68)

These are the questions they say they want answered.

We want truthful answers to questions such as:

1.Why were standard operating procedures for dealing with hijacked airliners not followed that day?
2.Why were the extensive missile batteries and air defenses reportedly deployed around the Pentagon not activated during the attack?
3.Why did the Secret Service allow Bush to complete his elementary school visit, apparently unconcerned about his safety or that of the schoolchildren?
4.Why hasn't a single person been fired, penalized, or reprimanded for the gross incompetence we witnessed that day?
5.Why haven't authorities in the U.S. and abroad published the results of multiple investigations into trading that strongly suggested foreknowledge of specific details of the 9/11 attacks, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of traceable gains?
6.Why has Sibel Edmonds, a former FBI translator who claims to have knowledge of advance warnings, been publicly silenced with a gag order requested by Attorney General Ashcroft and granted by a Bush-appointed judge?
7.How could Flight 77, which reportedly hit the Pentagon, have flown back towards Washington D.C. for 40 minutes without being detected by the FAA's radar or the even superior radar possessed by the US military?
8.How were the FBI and CIA able to release the names and photos of the alleged hijackers within hours, as well as to visit houses, restaurants, and flight schools they were known to frequent?
9.What happened to the over 20 documented warnings given our government by 14 foreign intelligence agencies or heads of state?
10.Why did the Bush administration cover up the fact that the head of the Pakistani intelligence agency was in Washington the week of 9/11 and reportedly had $100,000 wired to Mohamed Atta, considered the ringleader of the hijackers?
11.Why did the 911 Commission fail to address most of the questions posed by the families of the victims, in addition to almost all of the questions posed here?
12.Why was Philip Zelikow chosen to be the Executive Director of the ostensibly independent 911 Commission although he had co-authored a book with Condoleezza Rice?

Those who are demanding deeper inquiry now number in the hundreds of thousands, including a former member of the first Bush administration, a retired Air Force colonel, a European parliamentarian, families of the victims, highly respected authors, investigative journalists, peace and justice leaders, former Pentagon staff, and the National Green Party.

There are some other issues that are rather troubling IF they are true. I don't have time right now to search much further. But here may be some here that have already done a search on this and has a better handle on it.

Like I said my first reaction was not possible. Now after reading so many giving testimonies confirming it appears there was inside explosives.

However, I am still trying to find any evidence that this was an inside job.

There is one that quotes Cheny in regards to the Pentegon attack that IF it is true is very distrubing.

Source: http://911proof.com/1.html

[Esther]

11) Deputy Fire Chief Nick Visconti: "Now, World Trade Center 7 was burning and I was thinking to myself, how come they're not trying to put this fire out? ... At some point, Frank Fellini said, now we've got hundreds of guys out there, hundreds and hundreds, and that's on the West Street side alone. He said to me, Nick, you've got to get those people out of there. I thought to myself, out of where? Frank, what do you want, Chief? He answered, 7 World Trade Center, imminent collapse, we've got to get those people out of there. ... There were a couple of chiefs out there who I knew and I called them individually. I said to them, listen, start backing those people out, we need them back up to the command post. While this was going on, I saw individual company officers. I was whistling, Captain, bring your guys this way. I was getting some resistance. The common thing was, hey, we've still got people here, we don't want to leave. I explained to them that we were worried about 7, that it was going to come down and we didn't want to get anybody trapped in the collapse. One comment was, oh, that building is never coming down, that didn't get hit by a plane, why isn't somebody in there putting the fire out? A lot of comments, a bit of resistance, understandable resistance." ("WTC: This Is Their Story," Firehouse, 8/2002)

I was trying to find the rest of this link. Another comment said debris hit the building and caught it on fire and that is probably why it came down. I am of course, just guessing. Don't know if any witnesses heard "bombs" going off in Tower 7. Will have to go back and read some of the witness account.

I guess I forgot about that building coming down.

I was going to post another link but there is some language in it from the witnessess.

[crakjak]

This stuff has all been debunked. You can find it all online, The "Truthers" are full of baloney, the totally ignore the facts to embrace their conspiracies.

[Esther]

1) The World Trade Center (WTC) twin towers were destroyed by controlled demolitions.

This is how the collapses may have appeared to non-experts, but demolition experts point out many differences:

• Demolition professionals always blow the bottom floors of a structure first, but the WTC tower collapses began at the upper levels, where the planes hit the buildings.

• Non-experts claim that debris seen blowing out of windows was evidence of explosive charges, but experts identify this as air and light office contents (paper, pulverized concrete, etc.) being forced out of windows as floors collapsed on each other.

• Demolition firms had very sensitive seismographs operating at other sites in Manhattan on September 11. None recorded signs of any explosions prior to the tower collapses. Instead, seismic spikes were noted when debris began hitting the ground.

• Cutting away walls, insulation, plumbing, and electrical conduits to place numerous charges on the towers’ structural columns in advance would not have gone unnoticed.

• Clean-up crews found none of the telltale signs of controlled demolitions that would have existed if explosive charges had been used.

• For more information, see ImplosionWorld’s article (PDF, 56 K) on the WTC collapses, the March 2005 Popular Mechanics, parts 4 and 5, “The Attack on the World Trade Center Towers,” and the video 9/11 Debunked: Controlled Demolition Not Possible.



Read more: http://www.america.gov/st/webchat-en...#ixzz0fmNcbuc5

That was my thoughts. How could that much explosive be placed without someone noticing???

[Esther]

8) Al Qaida is not responsible for the September 11 attacks.

• Al Qaida leaders, including Osama bin Laden, have repeatedly confirmed that they planned and carried out the September 11 attacks.

• In an audiotape released on May 23, 2006, bin Laden stated, “I was responsible for entrusting the 19 brothers … with those raids..”

• In a November 2001 tape, bin Laden said, “We calculated in advance the number of casualties … who would be killed. … I was the most optimistic of them all. … Due to my experience in this field, I was thinking that the fire from the gas in the plane would melt the iron structure of the building and collapse the area where the plane hit and all the floors above it only.”

• For more information, see “Al Qaida Confirms It Carried Out the September 11 Attacks.”



Read more: http://www.america.gov/st/webchat-en...#ixzz0fmPCV9cC

[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by crakjak

This stuff has all been debunked. You can find it all online, The "Truthers" are full of baloney, the totally ignore the facts to embrace their conspiracies.

Not to mention the fact that the so called "experts" have no names and there are no full quotes.

Also this is a polemic. It's circular. It assumes a lot of things, like the questions, don't need to be proven.

Example

1.Why were standard operating procedures for dealing with hijacked airliners not followed that day?

Me: Who says they weren't? What ARE standard operating procedures?

Why were the extensive missile batteries and air defenses reportedly deployed around the Pentagon not activated during the attack?

Me: Who says they weren't?

5.Why haven't authorities in the U.S. and abroad published the results of multiple investigations into trading that strongly suggested foreknowledge of specific details of the 9/11 attacks, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of traceable gains?

Me: This is like asking "why do you still beat your wife"...this assumes something is true without proving it, then asking a question based on an unproven assertion

This is how these 9/11 conspiracy theorists operate.

[Esther]

The Planes
The widely accepted account that hijackers commandeered and crashed the four 9/11 planes is supported by reams of evidence, from cockpit recordings to forensics to the fact that crews and passengers never returned home. Nonetheless, conspiracy theorists seize on a handful of "facts" to argue a very different scenario: The jets that struck New York and Washington, D.C., weren't commercial planes, they say, but something else, perhaps refueling tankers or guided missiles. And the lack of military intervention? Theorists claim it proves the U.S. government instigated the assault or allowed it to occur in order to advance oil interests or a war agenda.

Source: http://www.popularmechanics.com/tech...42.html?page=2

[Esther]

No Stand-Down Order
Claim: No fighter jets were scrambled from any of the 28 Air Force bases within close range of the four hijacked flights. "On 11 September Andrews had two squadrons of fighter jets with the job of protecting the skies over Washington D.C.," says the Web site emperors-clothes.com. "They failed to do their job." "There is only one explanation for this," writes Mark R. Elsis of StandDown.net. "Our Air Force was ordered to Stand Down on 9/11."
FACT: On 9/11 there were only 14 fighter jets on alert in the contiguous 48 states. No computer network or alarm automatically alerted the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD) of missing planes. "They [civilian Air Traffic Control, or ATC] had to pick up the phone and literally dial us," says Maj. Douglas Martin, public affairs officer for NORAD. Boston Center, one of 22 Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regional ATC facilities, called NORAD's Northeast Air Defense Sector (NEADS) three times: at 8:37 am EST to inform NEADS that Flight 11 was hijacked; at 9:21 am to inform the agency, mistakenly, that Flight 11 was headed for Washington (the plane had hit the North Tower 35 minutes earlier); and at 9:41 am to (erroneously) identify Delta Air Lines Flight 1989 from Boston as a possible hijacking. The New York ATC called NEADS at 9:03 am to report that United Flight 175 had been hijacked — the same time the plane slammed into the South Tower. Within minutes of that first call from Boston Center, NEADS scrambled two F-15s from Otis Air Force Base in Falmouth, Mass., and three F-16s from Langley Air National Guard Base in Hampton, Va. None of the fighters got anywhere near the pirated planes.

Why couldn't ATC find the hijacked flights? When the hijackers turned off the planes' transponders, which broadcast identifying signals, ATC had to search 4500 identical radar blips crisscrossing some of the country's busiest air corridors. And NORAD's sophisticated radar? It ringed the continent, looking outward for threats, not inward. "It was like a doughnut," Martin says. "There was no coverage in the middle." Pre-9/11, flights originating in the States were not seen as threats and NORAD wasn't prepared to track them.

Flight 175's Windows
Claim: On Sept. 11, FOX News broadcast a live phone interview with FOX employee Marc Birnbach. 911inplanesite.com states that "Bernback" saw the plane "crash into the South Tower." "It definitely did not look like a commercial plane," Birnbach said on air. "I didn't see any windows on the sides."

Coupled with photographs and videos of Flight 175 that lack the resolution to show windows, Birnbach's statement has fueled one of the most widely referenced 9/11 conspiracy theories — specifically, that the South Tower was struck by a military cargo plane or a fuel tanker.

I don't think I posted the comment that Cheney supposedly ordered a stand down. I will have to find that.

[Esther]

Originally Posted by Praxeas

Not to mention the fact that the so called "experts" have no names and there are no full quotes.

Also this is a polemic. It's circular. It assumes a lot of things, like the questions, don't need to be proven.

Example

1.Why were standard operating procedures for dealing with hijacked airliners not followed that day?

Me: Who says they weren't? What ARE standard operating procedures?

Why were the extensive missile batteries and air defenses reportedly deployed around the Pentagon not activated during the attack?

Me: Who says they weren't?

5.Why haven't authorities in the U.S. and abroad published the results of multiple investigations into trading that strongly suggested foreknowledge of specific details of the 9/11 attacks, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of traceable gains?

Me: This is like asking "why do you still beat your wife"...this assumes something is true without proving it, then asking a question based on an unproven assertion

This is how these 9/11 conspiracy theorists operate.

Actually, there are quite a few names given. However, my concern is was it taken out of context? Seems to me there are a lot ... then a comment and ... and another comment. You can make anyone say what you want pretty much doing that.

[Esther]

Popular Mechanics cites their sources:

PM consulted more than 300 experts and organizations in its investigation into 9/11 conspiracy theories. The following were particularly helpful.

Air Crash Analysis
Cleveland Center regional air traffic control

Bill Crowley special agent, FBI

Ron Dokell president, Demolition Consultants

Richard Gazarik staff writer, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Yates Gladwell pilot, VF Corp.

Michael K. Hynes, Ed.D.,
ATP, CFI, A&P/IA president, Hynes Aviation Services; expert, aviation crashes

Ed Jacoby Jr. director,
New York State Emergency Management Office (Ret.); chairman, New York State Disaster Preparedness Commission (Ret.)

Johnstown-Cambria County Airport Authority

Cindi Lash staff writer, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Matthew McCormick manager, survival factors division, National Transportation Safety Board (Ret.)

Wallace Miller coroner, Somerset County, PA

Robert Nagan meteorological technician, Climate Services Branch, National Climatic Data Center

Dave Newell director, aviation and travel, VF Corp.

James O’Toole politics editor, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Pennsylvania State Police Public Information Office

Jeff Pillets senior writer,
The Record, Hackensack, NJ

Jeff Rienbold director, Flight 93 National Memorial, National Park Service

Dennis Roddy staff writer, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Master Sgt. David Somdahl public affairs officer,
119th Wing, North Dakota
Air National Guard

Mark Stahl photographer; eyewitness, United Airlines Flight 93 crash scene

Air Defense
Lt. Col. Skip Aldous (Ret.) squadron commander,
U.S. Air Force

Tech. Sgt. Laura Bosco public affairs officer,
Tyndall Air Force Base

Boston Center regional air traffic control

Laura Brown spokeswoman,
Federal Aviation Administration

Todd Curtis, Ph.D. founder, Airsafe.com; president, Airsafe.com Foundation

Keith Halloway public affairs officer, National Transportation Safety Board

Ted Lopatkiewicz director, public affairs, National Transportation Safety Board

Maj. Douglas Martin public affairs officer,
North American Aerospace Defense Command

Lt. Herbert McConnell public affairs officer,
Andrews AFB

Michael Perini public affairs officer, North American Aerospace Defense Command

John Pike director, GlobalSecurity.org

Hank Price spokesman, Federal
Aviation Administration

Warren Robak RAND Corp.

Bill Shumann spokesman,
Federal Aviation Administration

Louis Walsh public affairs officer, Eglin AFB

Chris Yates aviation security editor, analyst, Jane’s Transport

Aviation
Fred E.C. Culick, Ph.D., S.B., S.M. professor of aeronautics, California Institute of Technology

Clint Oster professor of public and environmental affairs, Indiana University; aviation safety expert

Capt. Bill Scott (Ret. USAF) Rocky Mountain bureau chief, Aviation Week
Bill Uher News Media Office, NASA Langley Research Center

Col. Ed Walby (Ret. USAF)
director, business development, HALE Systems Enterprise, Unmanned Systems, Northrop Grumman

Image Analysis
William F. Baker member, FEMA Probe Team; partner, Skidmore, Owings, Merrill

W. Gene Corley, Ph.D., P.E., S.E. senior vice president, CTL Group; director,
FEMA Probe Team

Bill Daly senior vice president, Control Risks Group

Steve Douglass image analysis consultant, Aviation Week

Thomas R. Edwards, Ph.D. founder, TREC; video forensics expert.

Ronald Greeley, Ph.D. professor of geology, Arizona State University

Rob Howard freelance photographer; WTC eyewitness

Robert L. Parker, Ph.D. professor of geophysics,
University of California, San Diego

Structural Engineering / Building Collapse
Farid Alfawakhiri, Ph.D. senior engineer, American Institute of Steel Construction

David Biggs, P.E. structural engineer, Ryan-Biggs Associates; member, ASCE team for FEMA report

Robert Clarke structural engineer, Controlled Demolitions Group Ltd.

Glenn Corbett technical editor, Fire Engineering; member, NIST advisory committee

Vincent Dunn deputy fire chief (Ret.), FDNY; author, The Collapse Of Burning Buildings: A Guide To Fireground Safety

John Fisher, Ph.D. professor of civil engineering, Lehigh University; professor emeritus, Center for Advanced Technology; member, FEMA Probe Team

Ken Hays executive vice president, Masonry Arts

Christoph Hoffmann, Ph.D. professor of computer science, Purdue University; project director, September 11 Pentagon Attack Simulations Using LS-Dyna, Purdue University

Allyn E. Kilsheimer, P.E.
CEO, KCE Structural Engineers PC; chief structural engineer, Phoenix project; expert in blast recovery, concrete structures, emergency response

Won-Young Kim, Ph.D. seismologist, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University

William Koplitz photo desk manager, FEMA

John Labriola freelance photographer, WTC survivor

Arthur Lerner-Lam, Ph.D. seismologist; director,
Earth Institute, Center for Hazards and Risk Research, Columbia University

James Quintiere, Ph.D. professor of engineering, University of Maryland member, NIST advisory committee

Steve Riskus freelance photographer; eyewitness, Pentagon crash

Van Romero, Ph.D. vice president, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology

Christine Shaffer spokesperson, Viracon

Mete Sozen, Ph.D., S.E. Kettelhut Distinguished Professor of Structural Engineering, Purdue University; member, Pentagon Building Performance Report; project conception, September 11 Pentagon Attack Simulations Using LS-Dyna, Purdue University

Shyam Sunder, Sc.D.
acting deputy director, lead investigator, Building and Fire Research Laboratory, National Institute of Standards and Technology

Mary Tobin science writer, media relations, Earth Institute, Columbia University

Forman Williams, Ph.D. professor of engineering, physics, combustion, University of California,
San Diego; member, advisory committee, National Institute of Standards and Technology