Conspiracy theorists love 9/11

2003-09-11 11:16

Hamburg - The smoke had still not cleared from the rubble of the World Trade Centre as the first conspiracy theory did its round.

Some people claimed the visage of the Devil was visible for a moment as the building collapsed. Then there were also claims that the French physician Nostradamus (1503-1566) prophesied the attacks.

Lies and half-truths have a way of working themselves into people's minds although there is not a shred of evidence that anyone but a group of young men bent on terror conducted the attacks.

Conspiracy books, especially those claiming the United States was the true author of 9/11, have been best-sellers, especially in Germany and France. There are dozens of Internet sites claiming to broadcast the supposed "truth" about September 11.

"Put out a badly written book claiming a worldwide conspiracy and everyone will buy it," said Hans Leyendecker, a journalist at the Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper of Munich, recently.

"How come we are all so stupid?"

The more idiotic the questions, the more the authors preen over their supposed insight, Leyendecker reckons.

Remote control

"Did George W Bush prompt the attacks on Washington and New York so he could seize maximum power? Were the jets that slammed into the Twin Towers flown by remote control from the White House? Did the president's brother, Jeb Bush, suppress evidence to help the family?"

After largely ignoring the theories, the German media has had a field day this week pointing up the absurdities of the allegations.

The cover of the news magazine Der Spiegel on Monday showed the burning World Trade Centre turned upside down, and the cover story was headed Panorama of the Absurd and listed all the ways the conspiracy theorists had ignored or misinterpreted facts.

"They treat every seemingly inconsistent detail as a form of proof for their bogus theories," the magazine said.

"Instead of going out and digging for the missing facts, conspiracy theorists interpret the gaps in their own knowledge as evidence in its own right, that allows them to insinuate manipulation by shadowy police and secret services."

The king of the German conspiracy theorists is Andreas von Buelow, 66, a lawyer who was Germany's minister of science more than 20 years ago.

World takeover

His prestige as a former state-secretary for defence and member of the parliamentary committee overseeing intelligence services has helped to sell his theory that the US secret services steered the jetliners into the World Trade Centre and fired a cruise missile at the Pentagon to create the grounds for a US takeover of the world.

The most remarkable sales success has been a book by a Berlin journalist, Mathias Broeckers, 49, who did most of his research on the Internet and claims the attacks were cooked up by the United States so it could invade Afghanistan and win an oil pipeline.

So far the book has reached its 31st printing and 130 000 copies have been sold. Zweitausendeins Verlag, the Berlin publisher, denies that the "research" is amateur. Pubisher Lutz Kroth declares, "We think the public should be allowed to discuss the facts."

German conspiracy theorists met on Sunday in Berlin to swap ideas about September 11.

19% believe it

The German weekly newspaper Die Zeit conducted a survey earlier this year that found 19% of Germans now believe the Bush administration was the author of the attacks. Among young people, the credulousness is even greater: nearly one third of those under 30 say it is "possible" the United States rained destruction on itself.

The leftist Berlin newspaper Taz, famous for blunt headlines, reported this with the heading, Germans have a screw loose. The result was a flood of letters to the editor from conspiracy-minded readers.

Taz suggests anti-American sentiment is on the rise in Germany, blinding better judgement.

In France, conspiracy theorists are led by Thierry Meyssan, whose book September 11, 2001: The Awful Confidence Trick appeared in March 2002. He claims the World Trade Centre could not have collapsed from plane strikes alone, and denies any jet hit the Pentagon.

A French book, The Awful Lies, ripped apart Meyssan's claims, but the theorist is still at it, with a new book entitled Pentagate.

Conspiracy theories have been widely reported in Middle East nations as well, but have made very little headway in the United States, where much of the population knew, at least indirectly, someone who died in the jets, the two towers or the Pentagon.

Americans have been more susceptible to far-fetched books claiming the intelligence services could have prevented the attacks but were too lax, or that Saudi leaders are posing as US allies while allegedly in cahoots with al-Qaeda.

Sapa-dpa

- SAPA