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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | But most conspiracy theories state that the motives were much more general, not detailed. |
Both you cite are secondary motives: It is the reaction to the event that motivates the agent. All such theories can be safely ruled out, (except where every other plausible scenario fails to fit the facts). The event is always an end in itself for the agent, for it is the only outcome the agent can predict.
I assume you are not seriously suggesting we spend any time discussing these most unserious suggestions.
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Grant
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Rule #7.
There are no coincidences. |
Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbor...
-- from "Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century," September, 2000. |
You won't need me to remind you that many of the members of the Project for the New American Century were immediately promoted to high office in the Bush regime. They included Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld.
Then nine months after this new regime took over the new Pearl Harbour happened.
Now, I believe that there probably wasn't a conspiracy. I believe that the Towers fell because they were hit by planes. And Oswald shot Kennedy. But I hate the lazy assumption that you can dismiss conspiracy theories by simply labelling them as conspiracies.
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | Then nine months after this new regime took over the new Pearl Harbour happened. |
This is no coincidence.
Let me try to educate you.
You have made isolated reference to speculation concerning future terrorist attacks among those associated with the Republican party -- remarks made in the wake of the first WTC attack. But you have not sought out similar speculation made by those associated with the Democratic party. Should you have found any, it would not have fit your narrative. Therefore, any such speculation by Democrats has been carefully ignored.
Had Gore received a few more votes in Florida, those Democratic officials who speculated, perhaps concerning the need for beefed-up FEMA preparedness for catastrophic attack, would be cited by your equally crazy counterparts on the political right. Leftist statements, made in the wake of the first WTC bombing, would have been quoted by your nut-brothers in an effort to convince us all that Al Gore was ushering in Armageddon to secure an environmental police state and rob us of our SUVs.
Until you have demonstrated that speculation concerning future, catastrophic terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, and the possible effects thereof, was limited exclusively to those who would be associated with the U.S. government for the first six months of George Bush's first term, you don't even have an anomaly.
Let me be clear.
This is no coincidence.
This doesn't even count as anomaly.
You ought to be ashamed of this sort of sloppy thinking.
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | But I hate the lazy assumption that you can dismiss conspiracy theories by simply labelling them as conspiracies. |
And where was that done?
What I have said is that popular conspiracy theories argue backward from subsequent events to construct a mastermind playing the game several steps ahead, and that this line of reasoning violates the laws of probability.
The only event an actor can safely predict is the event the actor has himself engineered. Everything to follow is subject to chaos. Unintended consequences are astronomically more likely than any intended consequences.
Therefore, the one suspect that can always safely be ruled out of any conspiracy theory is the one who benefits exclusively. That suspect must be a creation of chance. To self-select, the suspect would need to have achieved a 100% predictive success rate in a roulette game of billions.
Not plausible.
At the same time, every agent knows that the event they have engineered is absolutely, 100% certain. The suspect is therefore likely to have an immediate interest in that one central event.
The farther removed (in the chain of cause and effect) is any potential benefit from the immediate event, the far less likely is the beneficiary to have anything to do with any alleged conspiracy. Those most likely to be involved are those with immediate interest.
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Ishmael, rather basing your argument on the grounds that International Relations is more like Ticky Tacky Toe (I have not the faintest idea what this is), than three dimensional chess, can you just keep it simple ......
Do you believe the story that shortly before 9/11....Omar Sheikh wired Mohammed Atta $100,000 dollars under the instruction of General Mahmoud Ahmed, head of the Pakistani ISI? If not how do you believe the attack was financed? If by one family which one?Why?
What do you think was the relationship between KSM and the ISI?
Do you believe KSM, Omar Sheikh, or someone else, murdered Daniel Pearl?
I would appreciate any evidence that you have on your claim that Bin Laden was never at Tora Bora (just the link will do).
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| nemesis8 wrote: | | ...International Relations is more like Ticky Tacky Toe (I have not the faintest idea what this is)... |
Tic Tac Toe. Draw a hash then fill it with Xs and Os. Three of either in a row makes the winner. The simplest game ever invented. Game can have no winner if both players make logical moves.
| Do you believe the story that shortly before 9/11....Omar Sheikh wired Mohammed Atta $100,000 dollars under the instruction of General Mahmoud Ahmed, head of the Pakistani ISI? |
This is new info to me.
Just reading now about Omar. The wire transfer appears to be reliable information. Where the money came from appears to be unknown. That General Mahmoud Ahmed was the ultimate source is an alegation of Indian intel. The FBI was, at one point, investigating this connection (according to Wikipedia) and Ahmed resigned a month after the attacks. His resignation, according to Indian newspapers, was due to American demands, after the FBI confirmed the transfer.
If Ahmed transferred money to Omar Sheikh, it does not necessarily link Ahmed to Sept. 11th. Sheikh was a known agent of the ISI and may have been receiving funds for his pro-Taliban work in Afghanistan (he was running training camps there). Once the funds were in his possession, Ahmed had power to redirect those funds. Ahmed is actually a known double-agent: He also was paid by British intel in the past. We are dealing here with a nefarious individual who appears to work for the highest bidder.
Keep in mind also that, somehow, money from some Saudi princesses (if I recall correctly) also ended up in the hands of Atta.
Is the CIA/FBI covering for the Saudi Royal family and for General Mahmoud Ahmed, or are they genuinely satisfied (rightly or wrongly) that the funds in question were never intended for Atta? I'm perfectly satisified that the latter is the case.
However, we are free to reach a different conclusion, if the facts lead us there. But there are other explanations that should not be ignored.
Was a highly-visible money trail created to make it appear that the Saudis and Pakistanis were behind Sept. 11th?
| If not how do you believe the attack was financed? If by one family which one? Why? |
We will get there. Eventually. I do not want to rush. I want to assemble the evidence, with your assistance. After all, I may yet change my mind if new facts emerge.
| What do you think was the relationship between KSM and the ISI? |
I don't know. However, I don't think KSM could survive inside Pakistan without the protection of someone in ISI. Ultimately, they did give him up, however. His protection can't have been uniform or complete.
| Do you believe KSM, Omar Sheikh, or someone else, murdered Daniel Pearl? |
At this point, I'm going with KSM. According to the same Wiki article I've relied on for most of this post, the late Benazir Bhutto appears to have attributed the murder to Omar Sheikh (she slipped up and said the name "bin Ladin" instead, which has been seized upon by the conspiratorialists). Why could not both be involved? Wasn't that the conclusion of the famous book on the subject, Who Killed Daniel Pearl -- a book I own but never did read: I think my wife read it though so I'll ask her about it.
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Grant
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Ishmael said
| Leftist statements, made in the wake of the first WTC bombing, would have been quoted by your nut-brothers in an effort to convince us all that Al Gore was ushering in Armageddon to secure an environmental police state and rob us of our SUVs. |
I'm surprised that Ishmael as an applied epistemologist is so keen to use terms like "left-wing" and "right-wing." If you judge politicians in the US and UK by what they do, rather than what they say, he would notice that there is only a wafer's thickness between the major parties.
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Grant
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Ishmael said
| until you have demonstrated that speculation concerning future, catastrophic terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, and the possible effects thereof, was limited exclusively to those who would be associated with the U.S. government for the first six months of George Bush's first term, you don't even have an anomaly. |
Are you being deliberately obtuse? Surely you must have heard of the Neoconservative movement, which prior to 9/11 had made hardly any inroads with the Democrats but was gradually taking over the Republicans. The Project for the New American Century is a Neocon organisation.
To quote Gerard Baker in the Times:
| It took, improbably, the arrival of George Bush in the White House and September 11, 2001, to catapult [neoconservatism] into the public consciousness. When Mr Bush cited its most simplified tenet – that the US should seek to promote liberal democracy around the world – as a key case for invading Iraq, neoconservatism was suddenly everywhere. It was, to its many critics, a unified ideology that justified military adventurism, sanctioned torture and promoted aggressive Zionism. | |
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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I repeat.
| until you have demonstrated that speculation concerning future, catastrophic terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, and the possible effects thereof, was limited exclusively to those who would be associated with the U.S. government for the first six months of George Bush's first term, you don't even have an anomaly. | |
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | If you judge politicians in the US and UK by what they do, rather than what they say, he would notice that there is only a wafer's thickness between the major parties. |
This sort of statement is always made by those who find neither party sufficiently extreme.
Conspiracy theories are certain. Political divides determine who plays the parts: Conspirators and accusers.
Had Gore been president, his most extreme opponents would have accused him of having brought down the Twin Towers. They would have experienced no difficulty finding statements made by Gore's political alies to support their "case".
In the wake of the first WTC bombing, there were many on all sides who speculated concerning the likelihood of future terrorist attacks and the proper role of government in the wake of such. Hollywood (with Bill Clinton still in power) even made a Denzel Washington movie in which the mass arrest of Muslims in New York city was portrayed as reasonable policy! My how things changed once a Republican was president.
| Surely you must have heard of the Neoconservative movement |
Heard of it? I'm a subscriber to Commentary Magazine, the Bible of neoconservatism.
We hear so much of this "pearl harbor" statement because it fits the present conspiracist narrative. But to establish the statement as an anomoly, you must demonstrate that similar statements are alien to the political left. They are not.
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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This conversation bores me.
I have introduced new thinking on the subject of 9/11 but you prefer to rehash the tired narratives of weaker minds -- conspiracy theories that have been around for years.
New Rule: If your "argument" has been made somewhere before, do not post it to this thread.
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| nemesis8 wrote: | | I would appreciate any evidence that you have on your claim that Bin Laden was never at Tora Bora (just the link will do). |
Haven't forgotten this request. Answer requires more than a link but it's an angle worth pursuing.
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Grant
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Ishmael wrote:
| New Rule: If your "argument" has been made somewhere before, do not post it to this thread. |
OK, but then please explain to us why your idea isn't just another conspiracy theory. You seem to be alleging that KSM and the other Balochis used the religious mania of OBL's supporters for their benefit, because otherwise no one would give a shit about them.
Isn't that what my right-wing/left-wing nut-brothers say about the neo-cons?
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | OK, but then please explain to us why your idea isn't just another conspiracy theory. You seem to be alleging that KSM and the other Balochis used the religious mania of OBL's supporters for their benefit, because otherwise no one would give a shit about them. |
Because those are the acknowledged "facts" as we have them for the first World Trade center bombing: KSM and his nephew used the religious mania of Sheik Rachman's supporters for their benefit.
No one presently argues that Sheik Rachman was the mastermind behind the first WTC attack. Investigators acknowledge that Ramsi Youssef organized the plot from start to finish and Rachman merely supplied the man-power. That is the actual, official story.
Now there's nothing "conspiratorial" in this. Investigators have merely identified the one Jihadi, from the large number involved, who organized and planned the operation. It just so happens that this fellow was from Barochistan. Nothing especially significant in that. He could have been from any Jihadi-producing part of the world - as there are many such places (Germany, for instance).
But things get interesting once we recognize that the second attack was proposed and organized by the supposed uncle of Youssef, Kalid Sheik Mohammod (KSM). KSM was Youssef's former terror partner in Indonesia, which means the two had an established terrorist operation before either had any involvement with an organization known as Al Quida. Moreover, only KSM would ever come to be associated with an organization of that name.
None of this is controversial. None of it.
If we chart things out, however, this is what it looks like:
Two terror organizations, (1) KSM-Youssef (KSM-Y) and (2) Al Quida (AQ), plus (3) some loose associates of the radical, Sheik Rachman.
First Attack: Inspired, funded and organizaed by KSM-Y. Staffed by some loose associates of the radical, Sheik Rachman.
Second Attack: Inspired and organized by KSM-Y. Staffed and funded by AQ.
Now the truth is that only the details of the first attack are known. The details of the second are conjecture. conjecture that leaves certain anomalies. Not the least of which has been the allegation by conspiracy theorists (backed up by much of the military experience in Afghanistan) that Al Quida never existed as a terrorist organization. This problem goes away, however, if we simply accept the allegation as true.
Here is an excerpt from a BBC documentary on the problem.
In this film, the BBC documents the difficulties experienced by American and British soldiers locating any sign of the AQ terror organization. This film also contains the allegation that Bin Ladin was never in Tora Bora (an allegation that makes perfect sense, as it is the simplest way to explain his not having been killed or captured there, and is consistent with the lack of supplies, equipment and shelter subsequently discovered).
Incidentally, the film further documents the total incompetence of the CIA. This is clearly an organization generating "theory-laden" facts. One sequence, designed to make Rumsfeld look like a fool or a liar, shows the Sec. of Defence discussing a diagram I remember all too well: A Newsweek inset illustrating an AQ mountain headquarters (straight out of James Bond). What the film maker neglects is that Rumsfeld and the Press were both getting their facts from the same place: The Central Intelligence Agency.
The facts fed the press and the Defence department by the CIA appear ridiculous in retrospect. How could they be so far off the mark? The CIA was heavily invested in the notion that AQ was an independently-operated, privately-funded terror organization and intel consistent with this paradigm was greeted credulously and characterized as "reliable". Intel that ran contrary to this paradigm was described as unreliable and never made it to the press (for more on this, I recommend War and Decision by Douglas J. Feith).
So let's drop the CIA's assessment and instead, use that of the conspiracy theorists and the BBC. AQ was not an independent, privately funded terror organization at all. AQ was a loose association of former Jihadis and Jihadi wannabes, networked to bin Ladin and Afghanistan. What does our chart look like now?
First Attack: Inspired, funded and organized by KSM-Y. Staffed by some loose associates of the radical, Sheik Rachman.
Second Attack: Inspired and organized by KSM-Y. Staffed by some loose associates of the radical, Ossama bin Ladin.
Of course, we have to ask, where does the funding come from? To answer that, we rely on the established pattern. Our final chart looks like this:
First Attack: Inspired, funded and organized by KSM-Y. Staffed by some loose associates of the radical, Sheik Rachman.
Second Attack: Inspired, funded and organized by KSM-Y. Staffed by some loose associates of the radical, Ossama bin Ladin.
To understand the Sept. 11th attacks, we need to understand the motives and origins of KSM-Y.
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Is there any evidence other than a BBC "documentary" which one reviewer compared to a combination of Chomsky and Monty Python.
The BBC has a reputable news reporter called Jane Corbin who actually produced a serious programme on the "Hunt for Bin Laden"
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