  |
 |
| |
|
|
|
 Troy Jollimore on Martin Amis’ ‘The Second Plane’Posted on Apr 24, 2008
The second plane, as no one needs to be told, was the one that hit the World Trade Center’s second tower. And it was the one which, as Martin Amis found himself writing within a few days of the event, utterly annihilated the hope that what was happening that September morning might have been nothing more than a terrible, tragic accident: “That was the defining moment. Until then, America thought she was witnessing nothing more serious than the worst aviation disaster in history; now she had a sense of the fantastic vehemence ranged against her. ... That second plane looked eagerly alive, and galvanized with malice, and wholly alien. For those thousands in the South Tower, the second plane meant the end of everything. For us, its glint was the worldflash of a coming future.”
The Second Plane: September 11: Terror and Boredom
By Martin Amis Knopf, 224 pages
Amis, of course, is best known as the author of such novels as “The Information,” “Money” and “London Fields.” His most frequent fictional mode is a species of carefully observed, somewhat brutal and frequently hilarious social satire. But his new book, “The Second Plane: September 11: Terror and Boredom,” is a pure product of the “coming future” he speaks of here, a book fully shaped by the single event that many take to have defined our era. “The Second Plane” collects 14 of Amis’ recent short works: essays, reviews, a pair of short stories. Granted its unifying theme, the book is still something of a hodgepodge; it was clearly not conceived as a cohesive work. But the pieces’ very lack of unity feels somehow appropriate to the subject. Here are 14 attempts, each one almost self-confessedly a failure, to respond in an adequate way to what cannot adequately be responded to. “The Second Plane” affords an interesting opportunity: to watch an intelligent person trying, over time, to think through the unthinkable turn his reality has taken. “I have cut nothing,” Amis remarks in his author’s note, “briefly tempting though it was, at times, to cover my tracks.” These tracks, and the evolution of the author’s desires to cover them, are perhaps the most interesting aspect of the book. Amis’ views on some matters remain fairly constant: He is reliably critical both of the Bush presidency and of the Iraq war, for example. But his thoughts on the book’s deepest question—what are the obligations that violence, and in particular mass slaughter, thrusts upon us as inhabitants of the world in which it occurs?—undergo a quite noticeable transformation over the six years the book’s writings represent. The opening piece, “The Second Plane,” was published a mere week after September 11. Here we find Amis shocked and bewildered, but interestingly open-minded and up to the challenge of thinking about the terrorist act in all its aspects and implications, up to and including a consideration of why the terrorists did it: “It will also be horribly difficult and painful for Americans to absorb the fact that they are hated, and hated intelligibly. How many of them know, for example, that their government has destroyed at least 5 percent of the Iraqi population? How many of them then transfer that figure to America (and come up with fourteen million)? Various national characteristics—self-reliance, a fiercer patriotism than any in Western Europe, an assiduous geographical incuriosity—have created a deficit of empathy for the sufferings of people far away. ... Unless Pakistan can actually deliver bin Laden, the American retaliation is almost sure to become elephantine. Then terror from above will replenish the source of all terror from below: unhealed wounds.” Of all the possible cuts that must have tempted Amis, the one that was most difficult to resist was surely that word intelligibly. For the idea that America was intelligibly hated—the idea that any aspect of the terrorists’ sentiments and actions could be considered even minimally intelligible or rational or comprehensible—is precisely what he would come to want to deny. This is nowhere more evident than in the author’s note: “The first piece—published on September 18, 2001—has a slightly hallucinatory quality (it is fevered by shock and by rumor), and also indulges in what Paul Berman, the author of Terror and Liberalism, has called ‘rationalist naïveté’—a reflexive search for the morally intelligible, which always leads to the chimera of ‘moral equivalence.’ ” By Sept. 18 many people, particularly in the United States, had decided that understanding the terrorists’ motives, not to mention the American foreign policy decisions that had helped form the background for the attacks, was precisely the last thing they wanted to do. (Amis, apparently, took somewhat longer to come around to this point of view, but eventually he did.) This refusal to reflect, to investigate, to learn, still seems regrettable, but the reaction is perhaps not impossible to understand. In the shadow of an atrocity of this magnitude, any attempt at explanation might be seen as amounting to the suggestion that the victims “had it coming.” One wants to retort that this worry is ungrounded: It is acknowledged by all reasonable parties that no one could possibly have had this coming, whatever damage American foreign policy might have done. Still, the worry persists, particularly in light of the knowledge that not all of the concerned parties are reasonable, that there are those who will take any proffered explanation of the terrorists’ actions as amounting to a justification. The temptation, in the light of this, is to insist on regarding the attacks as an incomprehensible event, something so alien to our sense of morality that any attempt to penetrate its baffling surface is doomed to failure, and indeed risks pulling us into the moral void that lies at its core. The perpetrators are not to be regarded as rational agents, and certainly not as political actors, but as the exact opposite, members of a “death cult” that rejects reason altogether: “Thanatism derives its real energy, its fever and its magic, from something far more radical. And here we approach a pathology that may in the end be unassimilable to the non-believing mind. I mean the rejection of reason—the rejection of the sequitur, of cause and effect, of two plus two. ... To transcend reason is of course to transcend the confines of moral law; it is to enter the illimitable world of insanity and death.”
1
2
3
NEXT PAGE >>>
Previous item: Snipes Slapped with 3-Year Prison Sentence Next item: Jeff Madrick on 'High Wire,' Peter Gosselin's Look at the Economic Meltdown Elsewhere: . Comments: 88 Published. Add Yours?Are you a Truthdig member yet? Login now, or register with Truthdig. |
The Defining Moment for Climate Change
Email
Print
Share
Del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Ma.gnolia
Newsvine
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo
Jump to Comments
By SteveL, May 9 at 1:48 pm #
(21 comments total)
Buildings
Right after 9-11 there were TV programs speculating on whether or not a plane could penetrate the containment wall on a nuke plant. The programs showed experiments in the desert where small and large planes were crashed into wall like those containing reactors. No penetration was possible. This blows up two lies. When Rice and Cheney said who would have thought about planes flying into buildings they lied (they were experimenting with this very thing). Also those heavy walls at the pentagon could not have been penetrated by an ordinary airplane.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 7 at 5:03 am #
(33 comments total)
Oh, I'm not upset...
I admit I was running short on time and did not look more closely at the data points used to compute the trajectory. I will try to do that today. But I am not at all sure that will change my views on this.
As far as competing “internal contradictions:”
I have a person who was in charge of the department that did this type of analysis for a good part of the Cold War with the Soviets. A highly credible source. Not sure of the sources you call up as they are unnamed. And if current military sources are calling Stubblebine’s analysis into question, given the military leadership’s complicity with Bush’s highly controversial (in my view, criminal) policies, I would expect naysayers to be coming out by the hundreds. Douglas Feith’s new book reveals in part how complicit some of the current military leadership has been with the neo-con agenda, even throughout the Clinton administration.
As gruesome as it may sound, the body parts recovered… can you be absolutely certain they are from the pentagon? And, if so, what gives you that certainty?
The debris… there may be a pissing contest going on, but no large aircraft crashes that I am aware of were ever void of large pieces of debris… tail sections, wings, engines. No large aircraft crashes disintegrated into pieces that could not at least be partially reassembled to gather forensic information. I recall reading about a crash outside of Pittsburg some years ago where a large jet took a sudden dive into the ground. A failure in a mechanism that operates the tail flap. Even then there were parts that were recoverable, though much of the plane was shredded. I don’t recall how much was reassembled, if any, but large sections remained, and this plane accelerated into a ravine nose first.
It would be a simple matter for the government to disclose whether the video technology was standard or not. Such information would likely be revealed in a criminal investigation, had one been carried out.
Your last two points are not terribly conclusive either in proving my theory has internal contradictions. In the case of the eyewitness accounts, some of those seven that positively ID’d the plane as a 757 must be held with at least a certain amount of suspicion being military. That is not to say they are biased, just that a bias CAN exist because of their affiliation. Again, a plane painted to look like an AA aircraft suddenly appears, flying very fast, very low… the time it is in view is only a matter of seconds… making a judgment with absolute certainty, given those conditions, arguably difficult. In this case the eyewitness accounts certainly have some bearing on what happened, but must be analyzed very carefully and cannot be accepted as absolutely true at their face value.
Finally, you say,”it is not enough for me to decide the whole event was a lie...” Nor is it enough for me to decide the government’s conspiracy theory is not a lie. There is so much about the government’s explanation about the events of September 11 that is rife with internal contradictions for me not to question it. There needs to be a thorough criminal investigation, where the remaining videos, and FBI/FAA records are revealed.
Reply to this | Report thisBy niloroth, May 7 at 4:26 am #
(211 comments total)
Ah cyrena, the ignorance you bring to any thread on 9/11 you are in is always funny to see.
Lets see what you got wrong this time.
Emergency responders: So in other words you are saying that all the following people were in fact not there at all during the aftermath of the attack? Alexandria VA Fire & Rescue, American Airlines, American Red Cross, Arlington County Emergency Medical Services, Arlington County Fire Department, Arlington County Sheriff’s Department, Arlington VA Police Department, Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, DiLorenzo TRICARE Health Clinic staff, DeWitt Army Community Hospital staff, District of Columbia Fire & Rescue, DOD Honor Guard, Environmental Protection Agency Hazmat Teams, Fairfax County Fire & Rescue, FBI Evidence Recovery Teams, FBI Hazmat Teams, Federal Aviation Administration, Federal Disaster Medical Assistance Teams, FEMA 68-Person Urban Search and Rescue Teams Maryland Task Force 1, New Mexico Task Force 1, Tennessee Task Force 1, Virginia Task Force 1, Virginia Task Force 2, FEMA Emergency Response Team, Fort Myer Fire Department, Four U.S. Army Chaplains, Metropolitan Airport Authority Fire Unit, Military District of Washington Engineers Search & Rescue Team, Montgomery County Fire & Rescue, U.S. National Guard units, National Naval Medical Center CCRF, National Transportation Safety Board, Pentagon Defense Protective Service, Pentagon Helicopter Crash Response Team, Pentagon Medical Staff, Rader Army Health Clinic Staff, SACE Structural Safety Engineers and Debris Planning and Response Teams, Salvation Army Disaster Services, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, US Army Reserves of Virginia Beach Fairfax County and Montgomery County, Virginia Beach Fire Department, Virginia Department of Emergency Management, Virginia State Police
Body parts: You are really wanting to see pictures of the morgue? Wow, you are sick. So i guess all the emergency response people who pulled body parts out and the morgue workers who identified the victims are all lying right? Just in this post how many people are you going to accuse of covering up a murder of their own countrymen? I figure at this point you are up to at least about 1,000.
Airport: It would have taken you about one minute to hit google maps and discover that in fact Reagan National Airport is about 1 mile away from the pentagon. Your intellectual laziness never ceases to amaze me.
The hole: sure there are people who think the hole is to small. But keep in mind that there are also people who think that ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ are real. However, much like the ones who think the hole in the pentagon is to small, they are in the minority.
Reply to this | Report thisBy niloroth, May 6 at 6:34 pm #
(211 comments total)
Your getting all upset about my comments on the data points used to compute the trajectory of flight 77 all but proves you did not in fact even look at the information i liked you to. The data points i was talking about were the ones used by the people at pilots for truth, and the issues with them using the ones they chose. It was not an attack on you. You would have realized that had you read the link.
You say “The best theories are those that do not have internal contradictions.”
But yours contains just as many as you claim the official story does.
1) The size of the hole in the pentagon. Fine, you have one person who thinks it was to small, but there are hundreds who don’t think that.
2) The body parts recovered at the site. All but one child were identified. Did your smaller plane or missile carry the dead on it’s way to the pantagon?
3) The debris at the site. You claim it was to little, but many many others do not agree with you.
4) The video you claim is missing 17 frames with the plane in it. Right off the bat you jump to conclusions by stating “...if the recording camera at the parking lot was using standard video technology which records at 30 frames per second, and there is not much reason to think it wasn’t,...” Do you have any source for this, or is it just a theory you have?
5) The angle of the plane as far as the FDR shows. The only way the plane would have missed the light poles and the pentagon was if it was not accelerating in the last few seconds, however, the data before the last few seconds shows it was being accelerated, and that matches up with eyewitness testimony.
6) The eyewitness testimony itself. If you read over the link i provided, you will see that 26 mentioned it was an AA plane, 7 said it was a 757, 104 saw it hit, and 8 witnesses were in fact pilots. (Not that strange since there is an airport about a mile away.)
In the end, the only thing i have to give you is the fact that the government will not release info on the identification process with regards to the aircraft debris. I am still rather puzzled by it, but in the face of all the rest of the evidence for the fact that flight 77 hit the pentagon, it is not enough for me to decide the whole event was a lie.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 6 at 12:42 pm #
(33 comments total)
It is your certainty that is suspect...
There has not been a positive identification of the aircraft that hit the pentagon. What has been given publicly by the government is innuendo. And the fact that they vigorously refuse to provide positive identification is highly suspect. I will look through the list of witnesses when I have more time later today, but at first glance I fail to see anything that is definitive, and can be said with complete certainty as to the identity of the aircraft. The speed of approach, the suddenness of such a highly unusual phenomenon makes extremely plausible a cleverly camouflaged paint job on a smaller aircraft a very real possibility.
The damage to the building was not extensive enough to have been from a 757 traveling at 400 mph. The photographs from immediately after the strike, as Major General Stubblebine said, show something hit the pentagon but not something the size of a 757.
And competent analysis of the Judicial Watch clip leaves some very big questions unanswered. As I said below, if the recording camera at the parking lot was using standard video technology which records at 30 frames per second, and there is not much reason to think it wasn’t, the aircraft in that clip, if a 757 flying at roughly 400 mph, should have been recorded in about 17 more frames, given the time and distance it had to travel from the time it first appears until the time it strikes the building. As it does not appear, either the clip was editted, or else a much faster aircraft struck the building. Your certainty is suspect because you leave a lot of questions unanswered.
The best theories are those that do not have internal contradictions.
Your theory has a BIG problem. Your theory is AA 77 crashed into the pentagon. You have NOTHING to back up that theory, no positive ID of the aircraft or aircraft parts, eyewitnesses that saw something hit the pentagon, but which have no way to verify with certainty exactly what.
My theory is something hit the pentagon, but given the damage initially recorded, not extensive enough to have been due to a 757. The damage recorded in photographs is more consistent with a smaller aircraft. The last known data point from the FDR places the speed and direction of Flight 77 too high to strike the pentagon where it was struck. The FDR has no serial number associated with it and so cannot be positively identified as belonging to Flight 77. It may be, but without the serial numbersof parts of the rest of the fusilage collected from the wreckage it can not be matched as having come from within the pentagon. The damage inside the building is not consistent with a large aircraft strike, but with a much smaller aircraft. The lack of large pieces of aircraft outside the pentagon is not consistent with a 757, but with a much smaller aircraft. The damage to the C-ring is not consistent with the known structure of a 757, or of the trajectory.
I could enumerate more points, but the main point is, without positive identification of the aircraft, the certainty with which you talk about what struck the building is based on pure HEARSAY.
My theory is incomplete, but lacks the internal contradictions that cripples yours.
It is entirely consistent for me to not say with certainty what hit the pentagon, because the evidence is not complete enough to make that determination. But the evidence does favor something different from a 757, because there are too many contradictions to that theory. Your rather insulting remark that I am simply trying to make only certain data points fit my theory is unwarranted and adds nothing to this discussion. In fact, it appears, niloroth, that what you accuse me of is exactly what you are doing yourself. You are trying to make only your selective data fit your theory. Bad form. And completely inconclusive.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report thisBy cyrena, May 6 at 7:56 pm #
(4071 comments total)
Re: It is your certainty that is suspect...
Some other equally obvious things that are NOT consistent with a 757 PASSENGER aircraft striking the Pentagon..
There was NO EMERGENCY RESPONSE!
There should have been dozens upon dozens upon dozens of emergency response personnel and vehicles on the site IMMEDIATELY! Why don’t we see a single solitary news clip or photo of ANY?
Niloroth speaks of body parts that were identified. BY WHOM? We’re just taking the Coverup’s word on ALL of that. Where were the bodies taken? Supposedly to a makeshift morgue in the area. Did anybody see that?
WHICH airport is supposedly within a mile of the Pentagon? NOT one that handles passeger traffic, because the Pentagon is surrounded by it’s own restricted airspace, just as the White House and other areas are off limits to commercial air traffic.
Niloroth conveniently fails to appreciate the obvious in his tortured logic to explain what cannot be explained away. For instance, FAR MORE than ‘one’ person or expert can see, and has noted from moment one, that the ‘hole’ in the Pentagon allegedly created by a 757 is far too small. Only Houdini could perform such a feat.
Reply to this | Report thisBy niloroth, May 6 at 4:38 am #
(211 comments total)
Thank you for the links, it will of course take me a while to work through them, but it is at least somewhat refreshing to have new material rather than the outdated drivel than most of the 9/11 deniers seem to post on this site.
“ The eyewitnesses saw many things. How you fail to see the importance of eyewitnesses seeing a commuter size plane, a C-130 military plane following a 757, or an F-16 or A3 Skywarrior just prior to the explosion is your problem. Your claim that the eyewitnesses clinches it is completely inconclusive. The eyewitnesses saw many things”
Yes, the eyewitness saw many things that day, i know because i have read about every interview that was printed or taped about the crash at the pentagon. The funny thing is, that while the c-130 is mentioned as being in the area of the pentagon, no one actually says it was the one that crashed into the building. And no one mentions the same issue with any A3 or F-16. However, at least 104 people actually witnessed the plane hitting the building, and amazingly enough, none of them mention a c-130 or an a3, or anything else. Even more people saw the plane heading towards the building but didn’t see the actual collision. And none have made a credible statement that the plane pulled up at the last second. Or that a military jet or missile hit the pentagon.
Witness list, fully linked and sourced.
So quite frankly, i am curious how you have decided that something else must have hit the pentagon, other than for the simple fact that it doesn’t jive with your theory. Obviously you can’t have eyewitness testimony you believe, since if you put stock in that, then you have to also value the other eyewitnesses, or at the least, debunk them all. And since as we have already shown, none of the video from that day show anything useful for identifying what hit the pentagon. So in the end, you really have no evidence that supports your theory, other than the fact that you want it to be something other than flight 77.
I will look over the links you supplied.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 6 at 4:33 am #
(33 comments total)
In a nut shell....
The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 are collectively one of the most significant events in world history. And because of the absence of complete information regarding various aspects of this event, many scenarios contrary to the U.S. government’s account of events, have evolved within a large percentage the collective public’s imagination.
Release of requested defendant agency records than can better clarify events of that day, are thus in the greater public interest.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 5 at 6:26 pm #
(33 comments total)
more on the lawsuit
http://www.911blogger.com/node/15029
F.B.I. Counsel Apparently Disputes N.T.S.B. Information Regarding 9/11 Aircraft Wreckage Recovery
This posting is long and has lots of information. In the comments section, Monahan lists two possibilities:
1). NTSB/FBI investigators did undertake a collection and identification operation for 9/11 aircraft wreckage and did not generate any related records.
2). NTSB/FBI investigators did undertake a collection and identification operation for 9/11 aircraft wreckage and did generate related records that were later eliminated.
It is difficult to imagine that the recovery and identification of the murder weapons used to take 3,000 lives on 9/11 was not documented.
http://www.911blogger.com/node/14447
The Court orders the FBI to respond by April 14, 2008:
Civil Action For Release Of 9/11 Aircraft Records
The following is a March 17, 2008 court order pertaining to Federal defendant’s motion and also plaintiffs response. (See attached PDF court order)
Background:
http://www.infowars.com/?p=886
Court order reads in part:
This matter is before the Court on Defendants’ Motion for Enlargement of Time to Respond to Amended Complaint (#20), filed on March 14, 2008. On February 1, 2008, Plaintiff filed his Amended Complaint (#15). Defendants request an enlargement of time pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 6(b)(1) and LR 6-1. For good cause shown, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Defendants’ Motion for Enlargement of Time to Respond to Amended Complaint (#20) is granted. Defendants shall serve and file their answer or responsive pleading to Plaintiff’s amended complaint in this case on or before April 14, 2008.
So what exactly are they hiding?
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 5 at 6:12 pm #
(33 comments total)
77
http://www.911blogger.com/node/14081
In Part:
Aidan Monaghan
Of all major U.S. airline crashes within the U.S. investigated and published by the National Transportation Safety Board during the past 20 years, the 9/11 ‘black boxes’ are virtually the only ones without listed serial numbers.
NTSB American Airlines flight 77 flight data recorder report, not noting a device serial number:
http://www.911myths.com/AAL77_fdr.pdf
NTSB United Airlines flight 93 flight data recorder report, not noting a device serial number:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB196/doc04.pdf
The United States government alleges that 4 registered Boeing commercial passenger aircraft were used in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, yet has failed to produce any physical evidence collected from the 3 9/11 crash scenes positively tied to these federally registered United and American airlines aircraft. Despite the release of abundant information regarding the 9/11 flights and the aircraft reportedly used, specific information that would confirm official allegations regarding the identity of these aircraft has been mysteriously withheld or denied upon request.
The federally registered aircraft reportedly used during the 9/11 attacks:
- American Airlines flight 11 (N334AA), United Airlines flight 175 (N612UA), American Airlines flight 77 (N644AA) and United Airlines flight 93 (N591UA).
With flight data recorder serial number data that is virtually always provided within NTSB reports of major U.S. commercial airline crashes that occur within U.S. territory, one can trace an installed device to a particular registered aircraft through manufacturer or Federal Aviation Administration records.
The following e-mail was provided by a Susan Stevenson of the NTSB on 12/26/2007, in response to a 12/16/2007 public correspondence e-mail inquiry:
“Yes. NTSB investigators rarely encounter a scenario when the identification of an accident aircraft is not apparent. But during those occasions, investigators will record serial numbers of major components, and then contact the manufacturer of those components in an attempt to determine what aircraft the component was installed upon.”
A 11/26/2007 Freedom of Information Act request of the Federal Aviation Administration for the last known serial numbers of the flight data recorders and other components contained by the aircraft said to have been used during the 9/11 attacks, was unlawfully denied.
Background:
http://www.911blogger.com/node/13149
A 1/3/2008 e-mail reply from a Loren Cochran, a FOIA specialist with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, regarding the FAA FOIA denial reads as follows:
“It is unusual and unlawful for them to not cite an exemption. “[W]e are not in a position to release the said records at this time,” certainly isn’t an exemption any where in the Freedom of Information Act, and I can’t think of any case law that supports that answer either.”
http://www.911blogger.com/node/12735
Aidan Monaghan
In an effort to end speculation surrounding the events at the Pentagon building on September 11, 2001, a Freedom of Information Act request was made of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, seeking confirmation of the process by which recovered debris belonging to the 4 aircraft used in the 9/11 terrorist attacks was identified. This request was denied. An appeal of that decision has also been denied. Court action is pending.
There is much more at the link.
The eyewitnesses saw many things. How you fail to see the importance of eyewitnesses seeing a commuter size plane, a C-130 military plane following a 757, or an F-16 or A3 Skywarrior just prior to the explosion is your problem. Your claim that the eyewitnesses clinches it is completely inconclusive. The eyewitnesses saw many things.
Reply to this | Report thisBy niloroth, May 5 at 5:42 pm #
(211 comments total)
“The last data point puts flight way too high to meet the building where something did meet the building. This is perfectly in line with eyewitnesses who saw more than one aircraft in the vicinity.”
As far as the data points go, i find the work done by pilots for 9/11 truth to be very open to dispute. While they can bend the flight angles to miss the lightpoles and the building, it is at the expense of the data leading up to the seconds before the crash, as well as at the expense of the eyewitnesses.
A good write up of the FDR info.
As for other planes in the area, i fail to see how that is an issue.
“ And as the FOIA request being handled by a court in Illinois makes very clear, the FBI is hedging on the positive identification of the aircraft that DID strike the pentagon.”
I am actually not to familiar with this one. Have any links you could set me up with? It is at times hard to keep up with all the things that the 9/11 deniers come up with in their search for something that will actually stand up to investigation.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 5 at 12:04 pm #
(33 comments total)
What about the black box...?
The last data point puts flight way too high to meet the building where something did meet the building. This is perfectly in line with eyewitnesses who saw more than one aircraft in the vicinity.
And as the FOIA request being handled by a court in Illinois makes very clear, the FBI is hedging on the positive identification of the aircraft that DID strike the pentagon.
A real criminal investigation should answer these questions.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 5 at 11:37 am #
(33 comments total)
77
Except eyewitnesses saw at least three different aircraft, not simply one. Some described it as a commuter jet, others like a 757. And what some eyewitnesses saw was not one plane but three in the vicinity.
And furthermore, as pointed out below, if the surveillance camera which recorded the Judicial Watch clip used the standard format of 30 frames per sec. there should have been at least 17 more frames showing the aircraft that struck the pentagon. If the camera WAS using the standard format, the aircraft recorded had to be travelling much, much faster than what has been reported to avoid being recorded at 30 per sec, or else the clip was doctored.
And furthermore, the FOIA requests that is now making its way through the courts, with appeals from the FBI to dismiss, what the FBI has claimed in a US court is that they have no records of the wreckage of what we are given to assume was 77 being positively identified by the serial numbers of parts as that of a 757. The NTSB is on record as having assisted with the identification, but it is the FBI that is responsible for the records in this case. And in this case, they are saying they have no records positively ID’ing the aircraft that crashed into the building. That is the case with each of the planes. Now isn’t that curious.
One thing is quite clear, it was not likely to be a 757, eyewitnesses seeing SOMETHING notwithstanding.
Reply to this | Report thisBy niloroth, May 5 at 9:50 am #
(211 comments total)
wow.
manni, you amaze me. But first, i am glad you now admit the existence of more than one video of the penatagon attack. Welcome to 2007, most us us were there last year. but i guess better late than never.
“Are you aware who Scott Bingham (the founder of Flight77.info) is? He is ex-military, connected with the Pentagon, and a long-time Bush supporter. As well, if you go to the site, it is clear that he is no longer running it,”
Source for that? Well, other than the fact that he is no longer in charge of the site, because it says that right on the front page of the site. But how about a source for the bush supporter and pentagon bit? I probably shouldn’t hold my breath i guess.
“ and has simply given it over to government sources to run, since every link provided is a government source.”
Uh, what? Of all the links off that front page, 37 of them, only 2 go to government sites. Thats what, roughly 5%?
“ As well, you might be surprised to find that the government has removed the two videos that Judicial Watch had obtained; you can no longer view them on the site.”
Yes, you can, in fact, i just did. They are right there on the front page. In fact you can download them right from the site.
Serious question, are you trying to set a record by most lies in a single post? You can’t really be this dense.
“ Finally, the Citgo, Doubletree and Sheraton videos are not simply inconclusive; they are useless.”
Yep, thats true. They prove nothing. I have no idea why the government held them for so long, but whatever, they did. However, if they were monkeying with them, don’t you think they would have made sure they did in fact show a plane hitting the building, just to support that version of events, why would they alter them to be inconclusive? The fact is they are not needed in any way to prove the fact that flight 77 fit the pentagon. The physical evidence and the eyewitness testimony of the people there are more than enough.
“ Your lack of any critical thinking or open-minded discernment is what makes your position impossible to accept.”
Wow, that is really funny coming from you.
Reply to this | Report thisBy cyrena, May 5 at 2:23 am #
(4071 comments total)
Ah, so I’m joining this conversation late…which is good. I get to read all of your comments. And…NOT to my surprise, I see that some of you have discovered Niloroth…Ah yes. Niloroth can be expected to show up in VERY FULL FORCE, anytime the truth might stand to be revealed about the events of 9/11. He’s committed to making sure that never happens…a true warrior in protecting the lies and the whitewash cover up of those events. I do believe he’s devoted his life to it. And Patrick Henry has noted the same thing that I’ve noted long ago...it’s the ONLY time that Niloroth comments on anything here at truthdig..to protect the cover-up of 9/11.
Meantime, as I read the first several comments, (albeit in reverse order, since I was reading from the top) I thought to myself that I may have stumbled upon something that I’ve been searching for, for over 5 years now…some proof via video or any other photos, that an American Airlines 757 had actually hit the Pentagon. Believe me, I’ve searched, and searched. And, I’ve seen many videos and photos. Not a single one shows that a 757 passenger aircraft hit that building. Not a single news clipping gives any indication that an air disaster involving a commercial passenger jet liner, actually occurred there, on that day.
I have witnessed such disasters and their aftermaths, and the emergency responses involved. NOTHING is available from that alleged incident. So as I read, (at least at first) I thought..WOW, so there IS one, at least ONE something, that actually shows it. And then I continued on, and discovered that it was just more of Niloroth making claims with absolutely no proof, (as usual for him) and that’s because of course we all surely know by now, (and some of us knew from day one), that AA flight 77 DID NOT crash into the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.
I don’t know what actually DID happen to that flight. I don’t know what actually DID crash into the pentagon. I only know that it was NOT AA flight 77.
Patrick Henry, thanks so much for the very excellent link. It’s got some new stuff as well as some old stuff that I’d lost when my computer crashed.
Nilo…get a life.
Reply to this | Hide 2 replies | Report thisBy Maani, May 5 at 6:45 am #
(1254 comments total)
Re:
Cyrena:
I’d like to offer a theory as to what happened to Flight 77 - an admittedly ugly theory, but, given the other events of the day, perhaps no more ugly than anything else that happened. (It will also be fun to send niloroth into paroxysms of raving and denial! LOL).
I base my theory on three facts:
1. Flight 77 did NOT hit the Pentagon, nor has it nor any of its passengers been heard from since 9/11.
2. Flight 77 was lost to radar contact for over half an hour before it “reappeared” over DC.
3. Two fighter jets were scrambled from Langley AFB in Virginia, but rather than intercepting Flight 77, they were sent out over the Atlantic, where they “hold” for about 20 minutes.
Facts #2 and #3 are included in the 9/11 Commission Report.
Given these three facts, it is conceivable that what actually happened is that the jets DID intercept Flight 77, but then escorted it out over the Atlantic, where it was shot down. (Keep in mind that this would have been done at high altitude, which would explain why there are no eyewitnesses to it). And since this would have been planned in advance (as were all aspects of 9/11), it is equally conceivable that there was already a “clean-up” team in place to deal with the detritus of the crash, and “sweep” the crash site so that nothing was left to wash up on shore.
A truly ugly scenario, to be sure. But as likely as anything else, given the facts above and the other aspects of the “attack.”
Peace.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report thisBy cyrena, May 5 at 3:55 pm #
(4071 comments total)
Re: Re:
Maani,
I have to agree with you that as ugly as your scenario is, it is JUST AS LIKELY AS ANYTHING ELSE, which of course is what has given me a permanent case of PTSD in reference to the attack perpetrated against us that day, and by our own government.
I spent over 25 years in the commercial airline industry, and that’s why I know that none of those airplanes did what the US claims they did, ON THEIR OWN, or under the ‘guidance’ of any amateur Arab terrorist pilots. Period. Dot. End of THAT story.
So yes, it’s highly likely that they were instead escorted out over the Atlantic,(via pre-loaded flight plan or other remote means) and while it MAY have been at higher altitudes, it wouldn’t necessarily even have NEEDED to be. In fact, pushing this just a little bit further, it only needed to be within an area that is already highly secured by the feds anyway. In other words, where no other airplanes or ocean-going vessels were likely to witness such a ‘downing’ of a commercial aircraft.
You find the same ‘convenient’ location for the alleged crashing of UA flt 93. What, a hole in the ground in a deserted area of Pennsylvania? Nope…I’m not buying that either. So, as I’ve said before, I’ll have to say again…ANY aircraft that comes to disastrous ends, LEAVES WRECKAGE. The thugs want us to believe that 4 airplanes managed to disappear in the course of an hour, with all of their passengers, crew, and cargo, without leaving a single identifiable trace. What, a single black box that showed up ages later? Come on.
Anyway, as much as it pains me, I have to consider yours as much a possible explanation as anything else. I should also remind that my own belief is that the original crews of all 4 of those aircraft lost control of their ships as soon as they reached a cruising altitude and were on track of the programmed flight plans. In other words, after the initial take-off and ascent to cruise, the control was removed (from the pilots) and at that point, they were remotely piloted to follow whatever plan had been devised and preloaded. Note they were all Boeing aircraft, and that is something easily accomplished from the ground, even PRIOR to departure, as well as once the airplanes are airborne. In short, all of those aircraft could easily be turned into the equivalent of drones, to follow a pre-loaded flight plan, and WITHOUT the knowledge of the crew.
THAT is far, far, far more reasonable than an assumption that 19 amateurs (and I don’t care if they DID take a few flying lessons) could actually pilot those craft without help and ‘guidance’ from some other source.
Meantime, good luck with Niloroth. I don’t know what to suggest on that, since we’ve heard from the likes of him on this before, and he doesn’t give up or give in to facts logic, or any connection of the dots on this subject…not an inch.
Report thisBy Conservative Yankee, May 4 at 8:01 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Funny money
Maani says:
“Yes, the Reichstag fire is probably the first true “false flag” operation that we know about”
If you do not count the sinking of the battleship Maine (as justification for the Spanish American war) The endless mis-reported “Indian attacks” as an excuse for Genocide, The murder of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914,
In point of fact, most wars are started with a “false-flag” incident.. I believe this is due to people’s reluctance to give their lives for what is often the real reason.... money.... and someone elses money at that!
Reply to this | Hide 2 replies | Report thisBy Maani, May 4 at 8:22 pm #
(1254 comments total)
Re: Funny money
CY:
Thank you (sincerely) for reminding me of history I should have remembered. You add a sobering reminder for all of us.
Peace.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report thisBy Conservative Yankee, May 5 at 4:28 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Re: Re: Funny money
“the first casualty when war comes, is truth”,
Senator Hiram Warren Johnson (R) California
Report thisBy sdemetri, May 4 at 6:28 am #
(33 comments total)
An interesting point
An interesting point about the released video footage from the Pentagon attack: the standard format for most video recording creates a record of events at 30 frames per second. Given the reported speed of the aircraft that crashed into the Pentagon, and the distance from the building of the aircraft when it first appears as indicated by the surveillance camera in the parking lot entrance, the aircraft should have been recorded in at least 17 more frames before striking the building. It is not. Either the format used by that recording device was unusual, and not 30 frames per second, or the speed of the aircraft was much, much higher than what has been recorded, indicating something other than a 757, or the clip released was doctored. Another question in need of further investigation.
Reply to this | Report thisBy sdemetri, May 4 at 6:24 am #
(33 comments total)
An enormous fallacy
An enormous fallacy in the government’s conspiracy about the September 11 attacks is that the attacks were a surprise. Hardly.
The statement by then National Security Advisor Rice: “I don’t think anyone could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center” is naked disinformation.
There were numerous specific warnings detailing a significant attack, and in some cases that very type of attack. The Aug 6, 2001 Presidential Daily Brief, entitled, “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US” mentions a 1998 report by the FBI that Bin Laden was seeking to hijack US aircraft, and that also mentions the FBI had evidence of suspicious activity “consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks…” The Sunday Times in London in 1999 reported that al-Qeada had plans to use commercial aircraft in “unconventional ways,””possibly as flying bombs…” In 2000, Italian intelligence from wiretaps started in 1999 revealed a plan to use aircraft in a massive strike. In June of 2001, rumors are spreading around Afghanistan of an attack on skyscrapers. German intelligence in June 2001 warns the CIA, MI6, and Mossad of hijacking plans involving commercial aircraft for an attack on “American and Israeli symbols.” In July 2001 even the Taliban warns that there is a major attack planned on the US by Bin Laden. In July 2001 Egypt supplies intelligence from informants having infiltrated al Qeada warning the CIA of attack plans. Jordan in the summer of 2001 warns of aircraft related terror attack. Jordan communicates this directly from King Abdullah’s men to Washington, and through an intermediary to German Intelligence. An Ex-CIA agent is given information about a “spectacular terrorist operation” by a military associate of a Saudi prince, which is then ignored by senior CIA officials. In 1995, plans are discovered by Philippine investigators the commercial airliners are part of plans for an attack on buildings, including the Pentagon and World Trade Center. In 1999 the National Intelligence Council reports of possible plans to crash an aircraft laden with explosives into the Pentagon, CIA headquarters, or the White House. In July 2001 Richard Clarke, national security advisor to Condileesa Rice warns that agencies should prepare for a response to the likelihood 3 to 5 simultaneous attacks.
This doesn’t take into account the war games taking place on September 11 in the NEADS region with the scenario of planes flying into buildings, of which there is much speculation, but relates the news accounts, in the public sphere, showing foreknowledge of the attacks.
So, not only was the type of attack well known having been previously contemplated, but specific potential targets were known, and planning for such attacks using aircraft was contemplated and actions taken previous to September 11 were put into place. During the Gulf War a battery of surface to air missiles was permanently installed on the roof of the White House for just such an eventuality. The September 11 attacks were by no means a complete surprise, either in method or specificity. Furthermore, given the visit by Pakistani ISI chief, Mahmoud Ahmad, from whom at least $100,000 was wired to Mohammed Atta before the attacks, was in country meeting with US officials on September 11, the pre-placement of FEMA officials in NYC on September 10, and the very large, and very specific financial transactions that took place in the days prior to September 11 involving United and American Airlines, there is strong reason to believe the very day of the attacks was known as well.
Given this, two explanations are left. Some in the Bush administration let it happen on purpose. Or they made it happen on purpose. There are significant reasons to believe the latter, but at the very least the available evidence strongly supports the former notion. What is quite clear is that the official conspiracy theory is by no means true.
Reply to this | Report thisBy Maani, May 2 at 8:02 am #
(1254 comments total)
JS/CY:
Thank you for your additions. Yes, the Reichstag fire is probably the first true “false flag” operation that we know about, followed, of course by Pearl Harbor (FDR knew a U.S. military target was going to be hit, but probably didn’t know which one, yet he allowed it to happen (LIHOP) in order to have an excuse to fight Hitler), then the Gulf of Tonkin incident (which never occurred), and now 9/11.
Niloroth:
I am surprised by your gullibility. Are you aware who Scott Bingham (the founder of Flight77.info) is? He is ex-military, connected with the Pentagon, and a long-time Bush supporter. As well, if you go to the site, it is clear that he is no longer running it, and has simply given it over to government sources to run, since every link provided is a government source.
As well, you might be surprised to find that the government has removed the two videos that Judicial Watch had obtained; you can no longer view them on the site.
Finally, the Citgo, Doubletree and Sheraton videos are not simply inconclusive; they are useless. Given this, why would the FBI not simply have released them right away? In this regard, it stretches credibility to the breaking point that the FBI would have held them for over FIVE YEARS if they were not “monkeying” with them in order to make sure they did not show whatever they ORIGINALLY DID show.
You are FAR too trusting of your own government (just as JS notes that many were far too trusting of the Russian government, and CY notes that far too many were trusting of the National Socialists).
Your lack of any critical thinking or open-minded discernment is what makes your position impossible to accept.
Peace.
Reply to this | Report thisBy Ed, May 2 at 5:58 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Couldn't Get Any Worse
TruthDig has featured some excellent reviews in the past. Chalmers Johnson’s review of the book on Korean War comes immediately to mind. This one, however, doesn’t just not live up to TruthDig standards, it would stick out for its obtuseness even in a student paper. The reviewer is too intellectually insecure for irreverence, and instead ends up couching his word of two of criticsm in racist assumptions about Muslims and the causes of their resentment. I do expect better from TruthDig editors.
Reply to this | Report thisBy Conservative Yankee, May 2 at 4:45 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
My mother was visiting Germany on the week of February 27, 1933. She was in Berlin meeting family members whom my grandmother was advising to leave Germany. Turns out it was a great week to make that case.
The German lower house, The Reichstag was burned. Officials claimed it was the Communists. Most Germans kept their doubts to themselves. Officials captured a man with communist ties, Marinus van der Lubbe leaving the scene of the fire. They tortured a confession out of him and executed him the next year.
Most historians believe that although van der Lubbe was no doubt involved, he did not set the fire which destroyed the building. S.A. Troopers entering through Herman Goering’s presidential apartments are suspected to be the true arsonists. They were subsequently murdered on the Night of the long knives, the ultimate “silencer”.
Although I am a doubter about the alternate theories concerning the poorly built towers in NYC, my mother is not. Like Jackpine above, she saw the incident in NY as the replay of a bad movie.
Reply to this | Report thisBy jackpine savage, May 2 at 3:51 am #
(667 comments total)
Maani’s heard this story before, but i’ll relate it again…
I was living in Russia in the fall of 1999. Times were exceedingly bad; Yeltsin was far out of favor, grandmothers were selling the meager contents of their kitchen cabinets on street corners, and an unknown man named V.V. Putin had just been given the Prime Minister position.
Apartment buildings in Moscow started blowing up. The world paid attention for a few minutes and many were shocked. Several Western governments offered to provide forensic teams to analyze the wreckage of the buildings, but Mr. Putin declined the offer. Instead, he had the buildings bulldozed immediately and the scarp carted off.
After 70 years of Soviet rule, the Russian people gained a serious mistrust of their own government. That the FSB was the real perpetrator was commonly spoken by Russians within days of the first attack. Because Putin quashed any investigation, several Western governments and pundits also wondered aloud about FSB involvement.
Putin brushed these “conspiracy theories” aside rapidly. He blamed the Chechen “terrorists” and almost immediately launched the Second Chechen War. If you think Bush was wrong to use the word “crusade”, he didn’t go nearly as far as Putin. V.V. Putin used an old Russian saying in public that translates roughly to, “We will exterminate them sitting on their toilets.”
The West (mostly) hung it on Putin’s neck that he had started a war based on an uninvestigated terrorist attack. And of course, after the attacks there was a preponderance of military men patrolling Russian cities with assault rifles to keep us safe.
I happened to be back in the States, temporarily, on 9/11/01. For me, the whole thing was like watching a Hollywood remake of a movie that i had already seen. I knew the storyline and the ending; consequently, it wasn’t very “exciting”.
Family and friends had tried to get me to leave Russia after those attacks, saying that it wasn’t “safe”. I laughed at that, but few saw the humor in me suggesting that they should leave the States after 9/11 because it wasn’t “safe”.
The moral of the story is that terrorist attacks that lead to starting wars without being seriously investigated tend to raise questions about the attacks themselves...especially when they also provide the impetus for a leader to grab broad new powers. And even more so when they look almost exactly like attacks that occurred elsewhere just two years earlier.
Reply to this | Report thisBy niloroth, May 2 at 3:19 am #
(211 comments total)
My god you are living in your own little world aren’t you? I wonder about both your memory and your reading comprehension. Here, let me quote myself, FROM A FEW POSTS AGO! In fact, it was in post #152738.
“ Again, source please? I would like to know what the half dozen videos are, since as far as i know, all videos from that day have been released. Notice that i said Videos? Well, you probebly didn’t, you seem to miss a lot. You said “only released a single graint on-site c/c video which does NOTHING to support their case.” But in fact there are multiple videos. So you are either lying or misinformed. Here, go read up kid.”
Oh, and then what did i do, oh yeah, i provided a link to my source. Here, i will give it to you again.
Source
So, um, yeah. Once again you are wrong, and once again you are fully ignorant, not only of the events surrounding 9/11, but also of the events of the past few days surrounding the events on Truthdig.
You never cease to amaze.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report thisBy PatrickHenry, May 3 at 6:28 am #
(1074 comments total)
So much for Govt. Investigation
Once again it is you Nilroth who are ignorant.
http://libertyforlife.com/eye-openers/911/wtc7demoliti on.htm
Reply to this | Report thisBy Maani, May 1 at 7:15 pm #
(1254 comments total)
niloroth:
“But in those 4 years you have missed the fact that more videos than the one from the pentagon have in fact been released. In fact, they have been released for over a year.”
Interesting that you do not provide links to support this statement.
The only video released by the government re the Pentagon crash is the c/c video from one camera in the parking lot of the Pentagon. Yet within an hour of the crash, the FBI confiscated videotapes from a gas station, a hotel, and at least one other establishment - all of which were pointed directly at the Pentagon - and none of these tapes has been released.
As noted, if these tapes show, without question, that a Boeing 757 struck the Pentagon - and this would put to rest ALL of the conspiracy theories (at least re the Pentagon) - then why would they not release them?
You have yet to answer that question.
Peace.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report thisBy Michael Gass, May 1 at 10:08 pm #
(30 comments total)
"They" will never answer that...
You are correct. Only ONE video, from numerous sources available, was ever released. It was a snippit of video from ONE camera that showed NOTHING. NO other videos were released.
If the videos clearly repudiated the “conspiracy theories”, you’d think they would have been released. They haven’t.
Yet, die hard “bushies” still insist all is right in the world.
Reply to this | Report thisBy Maani, May 1 at 5:02 pm #
(1254 comments total)
niloroth:
Your blindness to your method and your arrogance is scary. All you do in responding to others who disagree with you on this issue - other than call them names and insult them - is to provide alternative links and info that YOU consider to be “correct.” Having done that, you strut away believing that you are right and everyone else is wrong. Thus, your approach is: “I’m right, you’re wrong; my information is unimpeachable and your information is ‘lies.’”
Why on God’s great earth would anyone WANT to discuss this issue with you when you approach it with such an attitude?
Peace.
Reply to this | Hide 2 replies | Report thisBy niloroth, May 1 at 6:19 pm #
(211 comments total)
Re:
Okay, you are still kinda not getting it are you?
Lets just pick on thing you brought up. Like the video of the pentagon attack that you claimed was the only video released by the government. And you claimed in another post to have done 4 years of research on the events of 9/11. But in those 4 years you have missed the fact that more videos than the one from the pentagon have in fact been released. In fact, they have been released for over a year. But you either didn’t know that, or you lied about it.
So yes, in this case, i am right and you are wrong. Please stop spreading your ignorance, you are making those of us on the left who are sane look really really bad.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report thisBy Michael Gass, May 1 at 10:21 pm #
(30 comments total)
Please provide ALL links to ALL videos
You say that, “in fact”, “they have been released for over a year”.
Here’s a clue.
First… this would mean that the videos you say “were released”, were released in 2006 at best, a good 5 years AFTER the fact, IF, they were in fact released.
Second… IF there were “numerous” videos released 5 years later, what enhancements/changes were done to them?
Third… please provide links to these videos so I can see them.
and last… why weren’t these videos released in MONTHS instead of YEARS? Hmmmmmmm?
Do you think I’m and going to trust a video released 5 YEARS after an event to be ACCURATE by an administration that has lied about EVERYTHING it has ever done?????
Here is a test… YOU name the things that Bush has claimed that has been right… I will name things they have lied about… let’s see who has more…
Report thisBy niloroth, May 1 at 3:43 pm #
(211 comments total)
Manni:
Cherry picked? If by that you mean that i actually back up what i say, then yes. You just rehash the same old lies and then slink away from any request for proof.
PatrickHenry,
No, you will find my comments in most any topic that has to do with religion as well, especially if Hedges is making a fool of himself again.
And no, i have many many reservations about the events leading up to and after 9/11. However, i have this silly tendency to challenge people who post lies and BS without the facts to back them up. Prove what you say, and be honest, and i will have no issues with you. Lie and hide from questions like manni, and i will prove you wrong.
Reply to this | Hide 1 reply | Report this