Why 9/ 11 conspiracy theories are good for liberty

Cross-posted at the Australian Libertarian Society

I’ve been devoting some of my time lately to examining alternative explanations for the World Trade Center attacks on September 11, 2001, and considering the necessary implications of each narrative for political and cultural discourse, and indeed freedom itself. This is an important thought process that all advocates of limiting government should undertake, because we must realise that the entire edifice of contemporary history - indeed virtually every assumption underlying much of our everyday life - is essentially constructed on the events of 9/11. That is why our understanding of the foundations themselves is crucial to what choices we take in the immediate future.

Broadly speaking, there are three identifiable 9/11 narratives out there. I am not going to make a definitive statement on which is the most factually appropriate because in the process I would have to set myself up as the arbiter of the facts, which I am in no position to do at this stage. My purpose is therefore not to “uncover” anything, but to examine the basic divergence of narratives and their political implications. Before I continue, I will have to remind readers that every single explanation of 9/11 is necessarily a conspiracy theory, including the established wisdom.

The first narrative is essentially the government’s: that a conspiracy consisting of 19 fanatical Arabs, motivated only by blind hatred of the West and funded by the Taliban’s supporters and other sources, hijacked four aircraft and crashed them into strategic assets of the United States. One aircraft hit the Pentagon, another crashed in Pennsylvania, and two more aircraft were successfully used to destroy three major buildings in New York, including WTC buildings 1, 2 and 7. This narrative holds that, because of 9/11, the entire Middle East and Central Asia is therefore in need of the largest programme of government intervention in human history lest another 19 fanatical, irrational, Arabs (and what other kind can there possibly be?) repeat the 9/11 atrocities. In short, we must spend trillions of dollars to militarily lock down the Islamic world, and potentially the entire planet, to stop terrorism. That is to say - we must create a global government under effective martial law.

The second 9/11 narrative, which is generally believed in the media and academia, is based on the same objective facts as the first (a conspiracy of Arabs, funded from abroad, crashing planes into buildings), but carries a very different explanation. Rather than claiming that the Arabs are motivated by blind hatred of all things Western, it is instead suggested that they were stirred into action by a concern for the plight of the Palestinians, outrage at prior Western interventions in the Islamic world, and opposition to the maintenance of US military bases in the “Holy Land” of Saudi Arabia. In other words, the “root causes” of terrorism lie in feelings of desperation and injustice among Muslims. Therefore, concludes the narrator, we must fight injustice ourselves by siding with the Palestinians, halting all further punitive military interventions in the Middle East, and, just as importantly, forcibly transferring wealth from Westerners to Muslims in order to address the endemic poverty (which is held to be another cause of terrorism) of the latter.

This would further require the wholesale consolidation of the United Nations as an agency of aid redistribution, and the strengthening of all institutions of “global governance” (including the International Criminal Court, the Human Rights Commission, and UN peacekeeping forces) in order to create a semblance of “world justice”; all in the hope of fostering a more “balanced” global system. In short, to fight terrorism we must tear up national sovereignty and create a collectivist world government ... but this time we’ll do it nicely.

The third narrative, which is becoming very popular on the internet, spectacularly departs from the first two on both the facts and the interpretation. This theory holds that certain individuals in the United States government, in league with foreign allies, planned and carried out the 9/11 attacks themselves. It is argued that these criminal elements conspired to take direct remote control of the passenger planes, scrambled NORAD’s monitors to prevent any air-force interception, and guided the planes into their anticipated targets. It is held that the Twin Towers (WTC 1, 2) and WTC 7 were then brought down by pre-planted demolition charges; in the case of WTC 7, which was not hit by any plane, it is suggested that controlled demolition was required to cover up the planning and execution of 9/11, which allegedly took place there. People who subscribe to this theory attribute the motivations of the US government and its foreign allies to a desire for global domination - that is to say, a de-facto world government. Clearly, if this is true it would imply that the entire edifice of the 21st Century is built on quicksand, and that every single assumption or “fact” we might hold must be instantly revised.

We would realise at once that if our leaders are conspiring to sacrifice scores of “their” own people in order to destroy our sovereign independence and wreak global havoc, it follows that governments pose the greatest threat to our lives, our property, and indeed the entire human race. Indeed, people would come to despise the state with such great emotional intensity that they would be prompted to withhold their tax payments and perhaps even physically depose and imprison their criminal leaders. Governments across the planet would topple like dominoes, and therefore all notions of “global governance” would fall with them. The desire to severely restrict the operations of all future governments would be insatiable.

In sum, the “third narrative” of 9/11 as an inside job poses the greatest threat to the Establishment “Left” AND “Right” narratives of 9/11, and therefore the greatest threat to the global welfare-warfare paradigm itself. Although it is conceded that many on the far Left do subscribe to “9/11 as a government operation” they clearly have not realised how precarious the state’s position would become if such a narrative gained popularity; many libertarians have already anticipated this, and thus it is not surprising that many such “conspiracy theorists” are found on the Libertarian Right.

Regardless of the actual truth, I have shown that the 9/11 narrative most conducive to a libertarian programme is clearly the third narrative. It necessarily follows that libertarians have no cause to viscerally defend the Established Wisdom, and indeed have every incentive to undermine it at any opportunity.

Posted by Steve Edwards on Tuesday, March 14, 2006 at 02:14 AM in Libertarianism
Comments (18) | Tell a friend

Comments:

Posted by John Ray on March 14, 2006, 07:45 AM | #

“considering the necessary implications of each narrative for political and cultural discourse”

And I thought Derrida was dead!

Posted by Steve Edwards on March 14, 2006, 07:51 AM | #

Well, I wasn’t sure how else to word it!

Posted by Søren Renner on March 14, 2006, 12:15 PM | #

Assuming that the third theory is correct, why did the conspirators go to the trouble they did? Why not just have airplanes crashing into buildings? Why plant explosive charges? To ensure the collapse of the towers? Why?

I’ll tell you why. They understood perfectly what the outcome would be in the long run, when the truth was finally exposed. They knew that a vast, improbable conspiracy would in the end be “most conducive to a libertarian programme”. Where was Hoppe on 9-11? Where was JJR? How about you, Mr. Edwards? Do you have an alibi? If not, why not? If so—how very convenient.

Posted by Steve Edwards on March 14, 2006, 12:33 PM | #

Umm, I’m not really sure of your argument.

Anyhow, just to be clear on what is actually happening below the radar, I’d like to point out that at least two prominent Reagan and Bush II administration officials, Paul Craig Roberts and Morgan Reynolds, have joined the swelling ranks of the “conspiracy kooks” on the 9/11 issue.

They may, or may not, be correct - but until I get a straight answer on why WTC 7 was “pulled” (the words of owner Larry Silverstein) in the afternoon of 9/11 when it wasn’t even hit by a plane, I’m going to be increasingly skeptical of the “official version”.

Posted by ben tillman on March 14, 2006, 01:04 PM | #

Assuming that the third theory is correct, why did the conspirators go to the trouble they did? Why not just have airplanes crashing into buildings? Why plant explosive charges?

First, the author has posited a false choice between 1/2 and 3. The truth almost certainly lies in between. Genuine Islamic radicals were involved, but some or all of their activities were known to Israeli or US intelligence, which may or may not have put the idea in their heads or helped them along at times. I would suspect those with knowledge were fully aware of the utility of a “New Pearl Harbor” and engaged in continual bureaucratic debates about whether to stop the plan, aid the plan, or simply let it take its own course.

Posted by ben tillman on March 14, 2006, 01:17 PM | #

Why not just have airplanes crashing into buildings? Why plant explosive charges?

From Gustav Le Bon’s “The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind”, published in 1895:

Things must be laid before the crowd as a whole, and their genesis must never be indicated. A hundred petty crimes or petty accidents will not strike the imagination of crowds in the least, whereas a single great crime or a single great accident will profundly impress them…. The epidemic of influenza, which caused the death but a few years ago of five thousand persons in Paris alone, made very little impression on the popular imagination. The reason was that this veritable hecatomb was not embodied in any visible image, but was only learnt from statistical information furnished weekly. An accident which caused the death of only five hundred instead of five thousand persons, but in a single day and in public, as the outcome of an accident appealing strongly to the eye, by the fall, for instance, of the Eiffel Tower, would have produced, on the contrary, an immense impression on the imagination of the crowd.

Posted by ben tillman on March 14, 2006, 01:35 PM | #

But even if you accept the official story, the blood of 9/11 is on the government’s hands because of its foreign policy and immigration policy.

Posted by Steve Edwards on March 14, 2006, 01:45 PM | #

I admit that I tried to simplify the choices to a large extent.

Perhaps there was another possibility - involving the US government giving al-Qaeda plenty of target practice in Afghanistan and the Balkans, before allowing the monster to turn on its creator.

The real problem is still with WTC 7. We have never had a satisfactory explanation why that building collapsed from a couple of fires on the top floors, and how the fires started in the first place when it was smothered in a clowd of dust from WTC’s 1 and 2.

Posted by ben tillman on March 14, 2006, 02:25 PM | #

In January, Silverstein finaly attempted to explain what his remark meant, but it doesn’t seem plausible:

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/january2006/050106silversteinanswers.htm

We know that the term ‘pull it’ means to bring the building down by means of explosives because in the same [PBS] documentary a cleanup worker (in December 2001) refers to the demolition of WTC Building 6 when he says, “...we’re getting ready to pull the building six.”

But, one may ask, how did they manage to rig explosives in a matter of hours that would successfully and safely take down a 47 story building in a built-up and already chaotic area? Obviously, the explosives would have had to be rigged in advance. Why? Perhaps to conceal evidence of a homing device that helped guide the planes to their target? I don’t know—I am not an expert on this stuff.

Posted by Svyatoslav Igorevich on March 14, 2006, 02:48 PM | #

But even if you accept the official story, the blood of 9/11 is on the government’s hands because of its foreign policy and immigration policy.

I do, even if only for the purposes of argument (and sanity - fact-checking becomes impossible with stuff like this), and I agree.

The government knew PERFECTLY WELL the threat of hijacking airliners and using them as weapons. Hollywood warned them about it for God’s sake.

It is the nature of government to ignore its ostensible duty and morph into a legal mafia; that’s precisely what ours did long ago.

Posted by Steve Edwards on March 14, 2006, 02:52 PM | #

Need I drag up the Northwoods Document at this point?

http://www.thenewamerican.com/birchblog/index.php?entry=entry060205-190800

Here are some excerpts from the declassified 1962 Joint Chiefs of Staff plan to stage terror attacks against the US and blame Fidel Castro…as a pretext for war with Cuba:

“We could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington. The terror campaign could be pointed at Cuban refugees seeking haven in the United States. We could sink a boatload of Cubans enroute to Florida (real or simulated). We could foster attempts on lives of Cuban refugees in the United States even to the extent of wounding in instances to be widely publicized. Exploding a few plastic bombs in carefully chosen spots, the arrest of Cuban agents and the release of prepared documents substantiating Cuban involvement also would be helpful….”

“Use of MIG type aircraft by US pilots could provide additional provocation. Harassment of civil air, attacks on surface shipping and destruction of US military drone aircraft by MIG type planes would be useful as complementary actions. An F-86 properly painted would convince air passengers that they saw a Cuban MIG, especially if the pilot of the transport were to announce such a fact.”

“We could blow up a US ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba…. We could blow up a drone (unmanned) vessel anywhere in the Cuban waters…. “

Posted by Steve Edwards on March 14, 2006, 02:54 PM | #

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