9-11/anomalies/collapse/debate

WTC1, WTC2, and WTC7 were destroyed by controlled demolition.

1 Controlled demolition goes from the bottom up, while the twin towers clearly collapsed from the top.

Standard protocols were probably not followed.

The demolition was not for legitimate purposes, so the demolition engineers were not necessarily constrained by convention, law, or ethics.

Top-down demolition is more in line with the goal of being frightening ("shock and awe"), since it is more dramatic.

Top-down demolition aids the goal of supporting the appearance of structural failure due to the impact, thus hiding the sabotage.

To accomplish such variation "with the skill that is brought to the standard method would require a tremendous amount of work to avoid error - which" further emphasizes the need for skill and organization (see below).

On the contrary, the demolitions of WTC1 and WTC2 were extremely clumsy -- nearby buildings were totalled, and there was no apparent attempt to shape the destruction so as to minimize loss of life. These seem more like the hallmarks of an unskilled operator misusing a skilled operator's tool than those of a skilled operator performing a hitherto-unknown variation on a known technique.

The pattern of attributes matches controlled demolition much better than any other previously-known cause of collapse.

WTC7 did collapse from the bottom.

2 It is extremely improbable that those planning such a complicated demolition would be able to predict the exact location the planes would impact the towers, and prepare the towers to begin falling precisely there.

2.1 They didn't have to know in advance; CD is usually radio-controlled. The demolition controllers presumably started the demolition near the impact points in order to support the appearance of structural failure due to the impact.

2.1.1 This implies that there are explosives near the point of impact. This implies - unless you think they knew the point of impact - there are explosives throughout the building. Besides immensely complicating the task of setting these explosives (see Counterpoint 4), this would either require that the explosives be left over at the crash site and need quiet disposal (see Counterpoint 4) or that they all be detonated during the collapse (which would be very loud - and the sound of these explosions are not reported by witnesses.

Yes, the demolition theory does require explosives throughout the building -- on every floor, in fact. This is highly consistent with observations -- required by them, even. If it could be conclusively shown that explosives were absent from many of the floors for which forcible outward expulsion is seen in the video recordings, that would be a serious blow to this hypothesis.

Counterpoint 2.1.1 breaks down into the following points:

2.1.1.1 Setting all those explosives is an immensely complicated task, making it highly incredible that it could be done in secrecy.

2.1.1.1.1 This is a duplicate of Counter #4.

2.1.1.2 This represents a sufficient quantity of explosives that one of the following two conditions must be true:

2.1.1.2a There would inevitably be some evidence of their presence left over [at the crash site] in the rubble, which would then need to be quietly disposed of (see Counterpoint 4).

2.1.1.2a.1 Much of the evidence was, indeed, quietly and quickly disposed of before it could be properly analyzed. (This fact is part of the case against the official story.

2.1.1.2a.2 Several photos of the clean-up show diagonal cuts in the vertical support elements; these are characteristic of controlled demolition, not of cuts made to reduce debris to smaller size for removal.

2.1.1.2a.3 Thermite particles were found in dust from the collapses.

2.1.1.2b The vast majority of these explosives would need to have been detonated during the collapse.

I should think that the demolition hypothesis rather requires them to be detonated... the building isn't going to come down if the explosives don't go off. ??

2.1.1.2b.1 This would be very loud - and the sound of these explosions are not reported by witnesses.

2.1.1.2b.1.1 Actually, there are many instances of witnesses reporting explosions, and at least one audio recording in which what sounds like timed explosions can be heard -- repeated bangs with a frequency of 2-4 times per second. This description is consistent with some of the witness reports; other witnesses in different parts of the building heard or experienced a smaller number of isolated explosions; these may have been more related to the initial impact.

If the NIST is claiming that witnesses did not report explosions, that is a flat-out lie -- and further reason to suspect the integrity of their conclusions.

2.1.1.2b.1.1 On top of that, there are video recordings in which firefighters said they saw what looked like explosives in the building.

3 WTC2 did not fall straight down, as the North Tower and buildings leveled by controlled demolitions typically fall, but rather began tilting from the point of impact.

There are a number of reasons why an otherwise-controlled demolition of WTC2 might have resulted in the observed tilt.

If structural elements were being severed by thermite shortly before collapse, this might have been enough to start the top of the building tipping over before the main demolition began.

There is strong evidence that structural elements were severed by thermite.

Diagonally-severed beams were found in the rubble.

Thermite particles were found in dust from the collapses.

There is significant evidence that steel was being melted by something other than the impact fire minutes before WTC2 collapsed.

Streams of molten metal were seen pouring from one corner.

The impact fire never reached temperatures sufficient to melt steel.

The tilt might have been an extra bit of drama to add to the "shock and awe" effect.

Some elements of the controlled demolition rig might have been set off prematurely, either due to events within the building (metal beams falling and shorting something out, heat from the fire melting something and crossing wires or initiating some chemical process) or due to human error on the part of the remote control operator(s).

4 In order for controlled demolition to have taken place, hundreds of people would have to be involved. "Three may keep a Secret, if two of them are dead." ("point 0" on LessWrong)

"Everyone involved in setting up the controlled demolition (no easy task) has to plan, prepare, and execute the task."

? How many people does it take to set up a controlled demolition, if they have a weekend or two of unobserved time in which to do it?

Every witness has to be found and suppressed

This assumes that there were witnesses who were not part of the conspiracy and who knew enough to be damaging.

Many witnesses of suspicious events in which the charges might have been planted have, in fact, come forward.

Everyone in the chain of command to plan, order, and fund the project has to keep mum.

? How do we know who this would be, if we don't yet know who did it? (How do we know that not only haven't they been silenced, but that they have in fact been questioned?)

? If a rogue subordinate with access to the necessary materials were able to plant them, how would her/his superiors ever know that those materials had gone missing if they did not specifically check inventory?

? What companies had access to this sort of material, and did all of them check their inventories before and after 9/11?

? Was there, indeed, any investigation at all along these lines?

Everyone whose job it is to monitor activities like this has to be kept quiet.

? Who would that be, and were they ever asked about any suspicious activities?

? Was there, indeed, any investigation at all along these lines?

Just because you can't explain how something was accomplished does not negate the evidence.

The evidence for controlled demolition is considerably stronger than that for pyromechanical failure.

Rounding up a small crew to do the operation while ensuring their silence afterward does not seem that implausible.

Several public figures have declared openly that we need another 9/11 in order to unify the country behind President Bush and the Iraq war. It seems quite conceivable that a well-funded organization could have, though a careful selection process, found enough similarly-minded people before 9/11 to help with this project.

The "volunteers" might have been pumped full of patriotic fervor that they were going to be involved in some great and terrible event which would cost many lives but would unify the country as never before... then given specific instructions (you go into this building, and set these devices at the following locations) without explaining the expected results beforehand. With luck, you might convince them that what they did had nothing to do with demolition -- or, with the alternative being overwhelming guilt over a terrible crime, they might cling so fiercely to the rationale you've given them that they would never, ever betray you. There are less-extreme parallels which are better documented -- fraternity hazing, "first blooding" of gang members, etc.

5 It seems unlikely that such a well-coordinated event could have been accomplished without leakage by anyone in the Bush administration.

The "demolition" theory does not require direct involvement by members of the Bush administration. Evidence for or against their involvement does not of itself affect the evidence for or against demolition.

They didn't necessarily carry this out themselves. Although the overall strategy for dealing with Iraq was a huge mess, the initial invasion was reportedly done extremely well -- carried out by our well-trained and competent military.

Bushco clearly do have skills in the areas of manipulating public opinion and controlling information.

Bush's apparent incompetence may in fact be a sham; there is other evidence for this.

6 several groups have analyzed the collapses after the event and found them consistent with the mainstream narrative. Requiring that these analyses be false means either inducting them into the conspiracy (thus enlarging it -- see Counterpoint 1), designing the collapse so effectively that it appears to be due to the obvious factors (Counterpoint 2), or - probably - both.

Crossed-out text indicates already-refuted point.

There are other possible explanations for the analyses of these groups:

Selective bias, rationalization, and other cognitive errors

Manipulation via political means -- not necessarily complicity.

There is a substantial and growing case for effective ownership of the mainstream media by the government.

Merely stating that an argument has been refuted does not itself constitute a refutation. The refutation should be supplied, otherwise this is essentially argument from authority.

Engineering is done using numerical methods, and "every human being who has [analyzed this situation numerically] has confirmed the simple, obvious story of events.

This is utterly untrue.

Without immediately going off and doing an hour of research, what I do remember is the following numerical analysis (there were others, will add them as I find or remember them):

Free-fall collapse: all three buildings collapsed in about the time it would take for an unimpeded object to fall from the same height, starting at zero velocity. This disproves the "pancake" theory (to explain why the rest of the building collapsed downward from the point of impact) and the "spring-loaded ejection" theory (to explain why so much debris, some of it quite massive, was ejected so forcibly outward).