Top Ten Conspiracy Theories

[stringvest]

Did you ever watch Krypton factor in the 1990's?

 

"now here's Our Gordon with a list of injuries..."

[VladimirIlyich]

Well, my entire involvement in this thread came about by you posting something about 9/11; a comment about how we're supposed to believe that a 'handful of Arabs' outsmarted all the intelligence agencies, etc. So my question to you is, does that also apply to the 7/7 bombings?

I would have thought loading backpacks with explosives and getting on public transport in London is much easier than hijacking 3 airliners and crashing them into buildings in the USA.

Not too difficult for those who want to do it,I wouldnt have thought.

Seems a common tactic in the Middle East to under funded groups and individuals.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I would have thought loading backpacks with explosives and getting on public transport in London is much easier than hijacking 3 airliners and crashing them into buildings in the USA.

I don't think the location is important. The year is probably more important. Still, it's not difficulty of the act that I was questioning. Flying a plane is more difficult that sitting somewhere, that's for sure. Then again, building a bomb post 9/11 must be more difficult than walking onto a plane pre-9/11. Anyway, the point I was making is that a couple of members on here found it an interesting point made by the guy quoted by RP; just a handful of Arabs outsmarting intelligence agencies, etc. The same principle is true of 7/7. Actually, it's probably even more relevant because it's post-9/11 and less people and it was planned in the UK.

[VladimirIlyich]

I don't think the location is important. The year is probably more important. Still, it's not difficulty of the act that I was questioning. Flying a plane is more difficult that sitting somewhere, that's for sure. Then again, building a bomb post 9/11 must be more difficult than walking onto a plane pre-9/11. Anyway, the point I was making is that a couple of members on here found it an interesting point made by the guy quoted by RP; just a handful of Arabs outsmarting intelligence agencies, etc. The same principle is true of 7/7. Actually, it's probably even more relevant because it's post-9/11 and less people and it was planned in the UK.

While I am not,at this moment at least,saying it was an inside job or a conspiracy or whatever title you want to foist upon it,the fact that the 11/9 stuff bypassed so many security agencies definitely gives fuel to the fire.

At the very least you could argue that there is a distinct possibility that one or two people or agencies deliberately or accidentally looked the other way.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

While I am not,at this moment at least,saying it was an inside job or a conspiracy or whatever title you want to foist upon it,the fact that the 11/9 stuff bypassed so many security agencies definitely gives fuel to the fire.

At the very least you could argue that there is a distinct possibility that one or two people or agencies deliberately or accidentally looked the other way.

You could argue it, but it would have absolutely no evidence other than the 'handful of arabs' argument. So my point remains about 7/7. McVeigh. Unabomber.

[Anubis]

While I am not,at this moment at least,saying it was an inside job or a conspiracy or whatever title you want to foist upon it,the fact that the 11/9 stuff bypassed so many security agencies definitely gives fuel to the fire.

At the very least you could argue that there is a distinct possibility that one or two people or agencies deliberately or accidentally looked the other way.

 

Not really. The Saudi's were in the US on legitimate passports and student visas. As I recall the FBI did actually take notice that they were taking flying lessons, and a single agent was tasked to look into it.  But their legitimate entry, coupled with no known ties to terrorism, and a seemingly genuine interest in studying to be pilots meant that there was nothing to flag any potential threat.

 

As for boarding airlines, flying on internal flights in the US was a piece of piss with poor security checks. It was a security weak point and it was exploited.  The idea this was some sort of astoundingly detailed plot couldn't be further than the truth.  They saw a weakness in the sytem and went for it, and probably had a bit of luck - if you can call it that.

[KMD7]

Not really. The Saudi's were in the US on legitimate passports and student visas. As I recall the FBI did actually take notice that they were taking flying lessons, and a single agent was tasked to look into it.  But their legitimate entry, coupled with no known ties to terrorism, and a seemingly genuine interest in studying to be pilots meant that there was nothing to flag any potential threat.

 

As for boarding airlines, flying on internal flights in the US was a piece of piss with poor security checks. It was a security weak point and it was exploited.  The idea this was some sort of astoundingly detailed plot couldn't be further than the truth.  They saw a weakness in the sytem and went for it, and probably had a bit of luck - if you can call it that.

 

Good post and good point.  I remember reading how much security on internal flights was tightened as a result in the aftermath. 

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Good post and good point.  I remember reading how much security on internal flights was tightened as a result in the aftermath.

Yep. Pre-9/11 was a totally different thing to post 9/11.

[Red Phoenix]

Well, my entire involvement in this thread came about by you posting something about 9/11; a comment about how we're supposed to believe that a 'handful of Arabs' outsmarted all the intelligence agencies, etc. So my question to you is, does that also apply to the 7/7 bombings?

 

Hey again,

 

I'm not going to be brought back into this thread if possible, so hopefully this is a good enough reply for you for the time being :

 

I've not even looked into 7/7 properly, it's basically as simple as that. I've seen something highly strange connected to it, (note: I'm not implying anything, this has just always stuck in my head.) but this is about as far as I've ever gone with it :

 

Peter Power, Managing Director of Visor Consultants, a private firm on contract to the London Metropolitan Police, described in a BBC interview how he had organized and conducted the anti-terror drill, on behalf of an unnamed business client.

 

The fictional scenario was based on simultaneous bombs going off at exactly the same time at the underground stations where the real attacks were occurring:

 

POWER: At half past nine this morning we were actually running an exercise for a company of over a thousand people in London based on simultaneous bombs going off precisely at the railway stations where it happened this morning, so I still have the hairs on the back of my neck standing up right now.

 

HOST: To get this quite straight, you were running an exercise to see how you would cope with this and it happened while you were running the exercise?

 

POWER: Precisely, and it was about half past nine this morning, we planned this for a company and for obvious reasons I don’t want to reveal their name but they’re listening and they’ll know it. And we had a room full of crisis managers for the first time they’d met and so within five minutes we made a pretty rapid decision that this is the real one and so we went through the correct drills of activating crisis management procedures to jump from slow time to quick time thinking and so on.

(BBC Radio Interview, 7 July 2005)

http://www.globalresearch.ca/7-7-mock-terror-drill-what-relationship-to-the-real-time-terror-attacks/821

 

(I'm just linking that source because it has that text, I've not read the rest of that article.)

 

Anyway, I'm not trying to distance myself from "conspiracy theories". I'll still read up on some of them from time to time, just like I have done since I was a kid. It's just something I've been into from a young age, and something that I'll probably carry on being interested in until I'm 6 foot under, or whatever.

 

But I can't be doing with getting into 7/7, or any other of the recent tragedies involving shootings, bombings, etc, that have become what you could call "mainstream" conspiracy theory material. If I thought most of us could talk without descending into insulting each other and arguing so often, maybe I'd have slightly more time, but it's too much of a headache for now.

 

(and it's about time someone passed me as the person with the highest number of posts in this thread, which should happen soon if I piss off for a while.)

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I'm asking if the same logic applies to 7/7, RP. Regarding a handful of Arabs.

[Red Phoenix]

I'm asking if the same logic applies to 7/7, RP. Regarding a handful of Arabs.

I wouldn't have any idea about handfuls of Arabs and 7/7, haven't looked into it enough.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I wouldn't have any idea about handfuls of Arabs and 7/7, haven't looked into it enough.

It was for British Muslims, but the logic used in your quoted comment was about a handful of Arabs. If it's an interesting post in that sense, isn't it interesting in 7/7?

[Spy Bee]

I find 7/7 more agreeable generally, because whichever way you prefer to list your dates it's always the 7th of July. 9/11 is just so confusing, I mean it happened on 11th Sept, but they call it 9th of November!

[Red Phoenix]

It was for British Muslims, but the logic used in your quoted comment was about a handful of Arabs. If it's an interesting post in that sense, isn't it interesting in 7/7?

What interested me mainly about the 9/11 quote was the amount of security failures, the main aspect for me isn't and hasn't been about Arabs or Muslims.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

What interested me mainly about the 9/11 quote was the amount of security failures, the main aspect for me isn't and hasn't been about Arabs or Muslims.

That's what I'm talking about RP. In a post 9/11 world dudes made bombs and blew them up without the intelligence agencies stopping it. How can them outsmarting the met, the MI5 and 6 spooks, and GCHQ? If that's an interesting point about 9/11, why not 7/7?

[Stu Monty]

I think it might have been Greg Palast that reported that post 9-11 one of the law enforcement agencies (can't remember if it was the CIA or FBI) wanted to follow the money on it and were very much informed by their superiors that it was not something they wanted to happen.

 

On an unrelated note...anyone got the latest political donation numbers from the Saudis to the US parties?

[Red Phoenix]

That's what I'm talking about RP. In a post 9/11 world dudes made bombs and blew them up without the intelligence agencies stopping it. How can them outsmarting the met, the MI5 and 6 spooks, and GCHQ? If that's an interesting point about 9/11, why not 7/7?

I didn't say it wasn't interesting I don't think, and sorry if I did. 9/11 had much bigger consequences, which is maybe why most people focus more on that than 7/7 when it comes to possible conspiracies.

[Spy Bee]

There is absolutely no comparison between 9/11 and 7/7. Logical fallacy. Nitrazepam etc.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I didn't say it wasn't interesting I don't think, and sorry if I did. 9/11 had much bigger consequences, which is maybe why most people focus more on that than 7/7 when it comes to possible conspiracies.

It's hard to answer, isn't it? I'm not concerned with the consequences, the difficulty of flying planes or whatever. I was asking specifically about the quote you posted. My objective here is to demonstrate why I said it was ridiculous. Hopefully by showing how his 'handful of Arabs' comment doesn't indicate it was more likely to be an inside job rather than less likely in the case of the 7/7 attack, a light might go off (or on?) as to why it's so stupid in the case of 9/11. Or, for that matter, any of the other examples I gave of obscurity being used to pull off terror attacks.

[Red Phoenix]

It's hard to answer, isn't it? I'm not concerned with the consequences, the difficulty of flying planes or whatever. I was asking specifically about the quote you posted. My objective here is to demonstrate why I said it was ridiculous. Hopefully by showing how his 'handful of Arabs' comment doesn't indicate it was more likely to be an inside job rather than less likely in the case of the 7/7 attack, a light might go off (or on?) as to why it's so stupid in the case of 9/11. Or, for that matter, any of the other examples I gave of obscurity being used to pull off terror attacks.

I don't think it's that hard to answer, that's why I suggested that the consequences of 9/11 being much bigger are maybe why more people focus on 9/11 than 7/7. I don't think that simply isolating the "handful of arabs" part of that quote and then not being concerned about anything else is really going to solve anything either. Just my own opinion anyway.

[Stu Monty]

I have just got off the phone with my mother who has informed me that my usually quite sane uncle was telling her that he thinks that 9/11 may well have been a government job deliberately targeted at the firefighters because they were always suspected to be sending funds over to the IRA.

 

I'm not sure where to go on that. 

 

He's genuinely not that crazy...honest.

[Dr Nowt]

I have just got off the phone with my mother who has informed me that my usually quite sane uncle was telling her that he thinks that 9/11 may well have been a government job deliberately targeted at the firefighters because they were always suspected to be sending funds over to the IRA.

 

I'm not sure where to go on that. 

 

He's genuinely not that crazy...honest.

 

Fucking shocking that mate.

 

Never knew NV was your uncle.

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

I don't think it's that hard to answer, that's why I suggested that the consequences of 9/11 being much bigger are maybe why more people focus on 9/11 than 7/7. I don't think that simply isolating the "handful of arabs" part of that quote and then not being concerned about anything else is really going to solve anything either. Just my own opinion anyway.

If it's not hard to answer, could you give it a shot. The entire first paragraph is about a small number of people outsmarting intelligence agencies, with the implication that it's hard to believe so it points to an inside job. Why doesn't that translate to a small amount of people outsmarting intelligence agencies on 7/7?

 

I know why people aren't as desperate to pain 7/7 as an inside job. The consequences, etc, isn't the point. None of that is relevant to the question I'm asking. Those things happen after the event. The question of a small number of people outsmarting intelligence agencies is before the event.

[Red Phoenix]

If it's not hard to answer, could you give it a shot. The entire first paragraph is about a small number of people outsmarting intelligence agencies, with the implication that it's hard to believe so it points to an inside job. Why doesn't that translate to a small amount of people outsmarting intelligence agencies on 7/7?

Maybe because 9/11 was slightly more difficult than 7/7 to pull off? The entire first paragraph wasn't about a small number of people either, it was also about how many parts of the US security apparatus failed at or around the same time.

[SlugTrail]

If it's not hard to answer, could you give it a shot. The entire first paragraph is about a small number of people outsmarting intelligence agencies, with the implication that it's hard to believe so it points to an inside job. Why doesn't that translate to a small amount of people outsmarting intelligence agencies on 7/7?

 

I know why people aren't as desperate to pain 7/7 as an inside job. The consequences, etc, isn't the point. None of that is relevant to the question I'm asking. Those things happen after the event. The question of a small number of people outsmarting intelligence agencies is before the event.

maybe he is saying it is easier to get on a bus with a rucksack on than to get through customs with a concealed weapon. for my 2pence worth, i don't believe it was a conspiricy at all, Americans knew they were up to something but thought hang on we're america, the most powerfull nation in the world, no one would dare attack us. at wich point they gave each other high fives and a few wooh hoo's. in summary they fucked up!