EDITOR'S COMMENTARY: As can be seen, Mr Martin's original essay below generated a significant response from readers. While the author did engage in the debate, it is clear that both sides had little tolerance for the views of the other.

Mr Martin requested the opportunity to craft a formal response to his critics, and it is appended beneath the original article. Again, readers are encouraged to support his position or offer counter-argument.

-prh

This issue of the 9/11 attacks will not go away, as someone posts another variant of the standard conspiracy theory on the web or on Facebook every other day.

These people live in a world of profound DENAIL OF THE OBVIOUS, probably because of their distrust of government and authority, a general attitude which I also share, but not to the point of denying a conspicuous and obvious reality.

Their denials:

1)   They, in effect, deny that two jumbo jets loaded with jet fuel rammed into both buildings of the World Trade Center producing massive explosions and fireballs which any fool could see must certainly have instantly destroyed large sections of the building including several floors and imperiled the integrity of the entire buildings. This was an obvious and publically observable event and witnessed by thousands of New Yorkers, and minutes later, by tens of millions around the world. Yet the writing of these conspiratorial theorists are completely absent of any recognition  of the collisions and explosions  as if they never even occurred  while they talk about controlled demolitions, residues of explosive components found in the debris, and whatever else, while totally ignoring the massive explosions caused by the impact of the planes loaded with jet fuel.  They produce convoluted theories while ignoring the obvious. They never try to reconcile their theory of a controlled demolition with the airplane attacks, synchronizing the timing or whatever, because they ignore the collisions of the planes as if they never happened.

That jumbo jets loaded with jet fuel slammed in to the twin towers causing massive explosions is not at all a part of their calculus and is, in effect, ignored.

2)   They ignore and deny the implication of their theory that the President of the United States, or at least someone just underneath him, ordered the mass murder of 3000 American citizens living and working on American soil. (Initially it was believed that 6000 had died.) It boggles the mind that a US sitting President would order the mass murder of thousands of innocent American just to pull off a scam as an excuse to declare war on Al Qaeda. Bush might be stupid, but it is highly unlikely that he is an intentional mass murderer of American citizens. The mind-boggling, improbability of an American President being a mass murderer of thousands of Americans on American soil is simply ignored.

Even setting aside the mass murder of thousands of Americans, the World Trade Center Towers contains the offices of many of the major corporations in American and many of their top executives. It also contained the floor of the Commodities Exchange, which I once visited. Intentional damage to the American economy and to the people that run it would not be in the character of Bush or his administration.

If bush were caught for this conspiracy of mass murder, he would probably be executed or at least spend the rest of his life in jail.

That someone just beneath the president, Cheney maybe or someone else, ordered the mass murder leaves the question, ‘Did Bush know or not know of the scheme?’ But this question is never addressed because these shallow thinkers do not even think that far into the implications of their theories.

3)   They ignore and deny the engineering complexity of setting off a controlled demolition of such a large building as if it were as easy as snapping one’s fingers. In fact, controlled demolition of a large building (meaning at least as large as 8 stories) requires extensive planning over a period of at least months. Eventually a computer program to control the demolitions is produced after executing  many 3-D computer simulations before the actual demolition. And that requires an engineering firm, and for a very large building, one might envision a consortium of several engineering firms.

Aside from the timing of the sequenced series of detonations, decisions must be made with regard to the amount of the explosive material, the type of explosive material, different types of explosive material may be appropriate for different immediate targets, whether concrete or steel, e.g.,  and the size of the explosions, the placement of explosives, the composition of the columns or immediate targets of the explosions, not a trivial exercise for a building as large as the WTC towers. The architectural and structural designs and blueprints of the building must be studied and sites carefully selected by people who understand the concepts of structural engineering, and in particular, how the load is distributed in a particular building.  There are only a handful of engineering firms in the world with experience of controlled demolitions of very large buildings, and, of course, none as large as the WTC.  In fact, there has never been a controlled demolition of any building even approaching the size of the WTC towers.

So where are the engineering firms, and where are the many engineers that needed to be involved, and where are the computer programs and the many computer simulations? There should be a computer program trail. These questions are totally ignored because these theorists do not even think that far into their own ideas.

4)   Also Ignored are the many people involved in the imagined conspiracy and the fact that the conspiracy was so perfectly executed that not one word of it has escaped from the source of any of the conspirators. The greatest investigative journalists of our time, Seymour Hirsh, Bob Woodward, and there are others, have not uncovered one word of a conspiracy of 9/11. Of course, they believe, correctly, that these are crackpot theories and would not waste their time. The success of this imagined conspiracy would require a competence on a level that far exceeds that of George Bush who did not have enough foresight to even consider what to do with Iraq the day after the initial invasion.

Those who constantly propound these conspiracy theories are generally so shallow that these questions are not even considered. That people can ignore such obvious and conspicuous phenomena means that their motivations are totally emotional and not intersecting in any ways with any rational process that emulates the painstaking and careful process of discovery within the various fields of science.

[For  an excellent discussion of the collapse of the towers by a panel by the most highly competent structural and civil engineers in the world, see here. Also see here for a general discussion of controlled demolitions. 

William James Martin

wjm20@caa.columbia.edu

On the 9/11 Conspiracy Theories: Reply to my critics

I note first that no one, unless I missed it, replied to my point about the engineering complexity of a controlled demolition and the many engineers needed and the engineering expertise required. This is an important part of my paper. The complexity and the magnitude of the engineering expertise of creating a controlled demolition was totally ignored by commentors.

Nor did anyone reply to the absence of any competent scientific body, such as the American Federation of Scientists, or the American Federation of Engineers, or the American Society of Structural Engineers, or the American Society of Civil Engineers producing any report skeptical of the theory that the heat generated from the explosion of 90,000 litres of aviation fuel compromised the steel structure of the buildings and was the ultimate cause of the collapse. Indeed, these respected organizations have produced studies analyzing the collapse of the towers without resorting to conspiracies theories.

There are, of course, papers produced by engineers arguing for the conspiracy theories, of however many variations, just as there are PhDs in biology that will deny Darwinian evolution. Hitler even came up with PhDs in physics who tried to discredit Einstein’s relativity theory. But in all these cases, these are so-called scholars are on the fringe of scientific thinking, and all have ideological axes to grind.

Nor did anyone reply to my point about the absence of this nation’s best investigative journalists, such as a Seymour Hersh who uncovered the My Lai massacre and the abuse at Abu Ghraib, or Bob Wordward who uncovered Watergate and brought down a government, producing one hint of a conspiracy. These investigative reporters have many contacts within the government who are willing to provide confidential information.

Most of my critics referred to the collapse of Building 7. A more complete article would have addressed this, and I should have. But it was beside my essential point, which was not to articulate what I believe is the correct explanation of events occurring on 9/11, but to highlight the large and important quantity of information ignored by the conspiracy theorists.

There seems to be a shocking lack of knowledge of the basic and publicly observable facts by the so-called ‘Truthers”, whom I seriously doubt could pass a test about the basic facts occurring on that day.

True enough, Building 7 collapsed. But so did Building 3, while Buildings 4, 5 and 6 suffered partial collapses and ultimately had to be razed. About 20 surrounding buildings suffered major, but reparable, damage. The conspiracy theorists seem to be totally unaware of this fact.

There is absolutely no awareness expressed that Building 3 also collapsed, and no explanation given. Similarly, for the partial collapses of Buildings 4,5, and 6.

That building 7 burned for several hours before collapsing is also a fact seemingly unknown to the conspiracy theorists.

Building 7 as well as Building 3, which also collapsed, as well as others, certainly caught fire for the same reason that your house would catch on fire if it were situated between two houses burning out of control. The airborne burning cinders and debris would be expected to ignite other structures within some radius of the two burning houses. This is the most reasonable explanation as to the damage of nearby buildings. It is also inconsistent with a controlled demolition which is a sudden event rather than the evolution of a progressively destructive fire.

Also, apparently unknown to these conspiracy theorists, is that the fire in Building 7 was magnified in part by diesel fuel stored in that building - it housed the emergency command center for NYC.

Building 7 might well have been saved and the fire extinguished had it not been for the destruction and severe loss of life in the two towers, which diverted all of the city’s available resources.

There is so much of the events of that day which are publicly observable and should not cause controversy of which the conspiracy theorists seem to be totally unaware.