US Releasing 9/11 Flight 77 Pentagon Crash Tape

Robotron23 writes "The BBC is reporting that the US government has decided to release the videotape depicting the crash of Flight 77 into the Pentagon building, nearly five years after the 9/11 attacks. The government had previously withheld the tape due to 'ongoing investigations' into al-Qaeda's Zacarias Moussaoui. A government representative commented that they 'hope that this video will put to rest the conspiracy theories.'"

Comments

Mad props for the National Security Archive

[Chris Burke]

Love that place, and love the Freedom of Information Act that allows it to exist -- one of the true strengths of our Democracy.

If you haven't read it, and if you are at all prone to dismissing "conspiracy theories" on the basis that our government wouldn't do that kind of thing, you have to read it. If you've ever wondered: Did the CIA really know and approve of the Contras funding their war by selling drugs in the States? Did the U.S. really know that Iraq was using chemical weapons against Iran and the Kurds at the same time Donald Rumsfeld was shaking Saddam's hand and providing cover stories for him? Read it.

Nothing that I know of that is relevent to the current situation, but it is still a fantastic archive and a great resource for putting to pasture any remaining naivete you may have about the nature of governments.

Re:Futile task

[Cl1mh4224rd]

1. Not that I doubt the Pentagon was hit by an aircraft, but it is documented fact that several security camera tapes were confiscated after the crash. Release them in their entirety.

The videos are property of the companies they were confiscated from. It's up to those companies to publically release the videos, not the government.

2. Explain to me why standard operating procedures for NORAD that would normally require specific orders to disregard, were disregarded that day.

What procedures were ignored?

3. Explain to me how WTC-7 came to be the only steel-framed structure in recorded history to suffer a complete collapse as a result of fire alone. (FEMA's own report offers an elaborate theory which they say has a "low probability of occurance")

The FEMA report was preliminary. Further investigation, not to mention some pictures and some interviews with firefighters on the scene, indicate that WTC7 also suffered severe structural damage, not just fire.

4. In light of the signifigance (particularly to insurers, architechts, engineers) of WTC-7's collapse-due-to-fire, why were the building remains sold to China for scrap before they could be fully analyzed?

This is just plain wrong. http://911myths.com/html/recycled_steel.html

The building had been evacuated hours before the collapse, it was not necessary for rescue crews. This is a major event in the building industry: if steel structures can collapse from fire alone, insurance rates would have to be adjusted, architects would have to reconsider the design of thousands of structures.

Well, if a building couldn't collapse due to fire alone, then what's the point of fireproofing the steel columns?

5. If Flight 93 was destroyed by being crashed (intentionally or accidentally) into a field in Shanksville, PA, why did it leave a debris field over 8+ miles?

It didn't. Indian Lake is not 6 miles from the impact site, as some people would like you to believe. Popular Mechanics has some bits about Flight 93 (continues on next page, too) in their "9/11: Debunking The Myths" article.

Re:Incredibility

[metamatic]

> What happens when the people who release the evidence have been shown to have been lying about everything else important during that time period? .... Like Iraq WMD

To say that Iraq never had WMD is pure non-sense.

That's why he didn't say it. You introduced the word "never", and yes, your straw man is nonsense.

He was referring to the claims that Iraq had WMD circa 2001-2003, which were used as justification for the illegal 2003 invasion of Iraq. Those claims were lies.

Yes, we know Iraq had WMD in the past. Of course we know that, we sold them the WMD. But Iraq had used or destroyed all its WMD prior to the illegal invasion.

> ... Like cheaper, more plentiful oil.

I'm guessing you are hiding in a cave somewhere. You obviously haven't bought gas recently.

Oh, do pay attention. He was saying that the claim that oil prices would be controlled was false. The current high prices are demonstration that he's right.

And as for bringing up Bill Clinton: Did anybody claim that the problems started in 2000? No, I don't think so, so once again you're erecting a straw man.

In fact, if you look at the people who complain about the lies used to justify the invasion of Iraq, you'll find that almost all of them were also deeply critical of the Clinton era sanctions that resulted in the lingering death of tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and their children.

The Origins Of al-Qaeda

[WombatControl]

And it still doesn't change the fact that an official conspiracy theory was put forward, and acted on, without a whole lot of evidence. (Not just "religious extremists", but the whole "Al Qaeda==Worldwide Terrorist Network", when the reality is that the conspiracy theory created Al Qaeda rather than visa-versa.)

That is completely untrue.

Al-Qaeda is Arabic for "the Base" or "the Foundation" - but it's actually a shortened form of the Arabic term "qaedat bayanat" - or database. Al-Qaeda started in the mid 1990s based on Osama bin Laden's personal database of Arab mujihadeen who had fought with him in Afghanistan against the Soviets. His number 2 man, Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri was recruited in order to merge al-Qaeda with the Egyptian Islamic Jihad.

As a side note, the CIA did not fund bin Laden, although they knew of him and knew that some fighters they did fund were also working with him. The CIA's main group in Afghanistan throughout the 1990s was led by a man named Ahmad Shah Masood. Masood was assassinated by bin Laden on September 9, 2001 as a symbol of al-Qaeda's commitment to protecting the Taliban. The group that Masood founded was the Northern Alliance - the same fighters who fought with the CIA in 2001 against the Taliban.

Al-Qaeda has existed as a terrorist organization since at least 1998, and probably earlier. It was 1998 when al-Qaeda launched the attacks against the US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, and bin Laden declared his fatwa against the presence of American troops on the Arabian peninsula.

So, no, you are not correct. Al-Qaeda has root well before 9/11, and to insinuate that it was invented afterwards is simply not correct.