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This article was nominated for deletion on 11 August 2006. The result of the discussion was Speedily kept (nomination withdrawn).

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Request for sources

After reading the media and ciriticism sections, one could be forgiven for concluding that the US government is the greatest beneficiary of the popularity of 9/11 conspiracy theories. The willingness to entertain fanciful notions and to question anything, no matter how trivial, serve to distract from the more sober questions of incompetence and responsibility that might otherwise be levelled at the administration. Does anyone know of any sources that make such claims? Sheffield Steel_stalk 19:59, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Considering the content, I doubt few reliable sources could be found for such claims. --clpo13_(talk) 20:12, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I believe Michael Albert of Z Magazine has been outspoken in making this point, and has given other notable commentators a platform to do the same. I will go looking for some sources. (Yeah, I know Z isn't at the pinnacle of our reliable source pyramid, but WP:PARITY has to apply when we're dealing with an article about the 9/11 Truthers.) <eleland/talkedits> 01:32, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Dancing Mossad agents

There's various sites that claim five Mossad agents were seen dancing in after the collapse, before leaving in a white van. The van was stopped, and found to contain explosives. They were then deported in minor visa charges. The most reliable source I could find is this: http://www.todayscatholicworld.com/mossad-agents-911.htm. A quick look shows that it isn't reliable at all. Has this come up before, and is there any proof that this is bunk (other than a lack of proof) —Preceding unsigned comment added by GeneralStan (talk • contribs) 23:59, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

This incident definitely did happen. There used to be quite a bit of material on it in this article, however it has all been moved to the article "9/11 advance-knowledge debate". A number of reliable sources are referenced. The whole thing is very suspicious, and unfortunately many people dismiss it as a bogus story. Logicman1966 (talk) 00:45, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

• Related question: do we have the "Dancing Palestinian children hoax" in any of our articles? It appears that cameramen were handing out sweets to Palestinian children in order to obtain footage of "Palestinians who were extatic about the attacks".  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 20:54, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Passports

The article fails to mention the conspiracies fuelled by the passports of the hijackers and the fact that some were found in the rubble by firefighters. We need some facts: who found them? when? where are they now? were any other passports recovered? what are the sources of this passport story? 70.165.168.225 (talk) 08:24, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Do you have reliable sources discussing these? --Haemo (talk) 04:36, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

That could be seen as a bit unfair, Haemo, we have had a three month discussion on Talk:9/11 about this, which is now in archives 37-39 I reckon...  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 20:51, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

I was referring to some connection to conspiracy theories, which has never been produced. --Haemo (talk) 21:30, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

" 'Conspiracy sites' are ... reliable sources for what 'conspiracists' think," which is that the passports were planted. That should be obvious. Not that it proves that they were planted, but it is hard to believe that they got to where they were 'found,' in pristine condition, by any other means. Wowest (talk) 08:41, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Foreknowledge

It seems during a speech on Thursday, Attorney General Michael Mukasey admitted that the Echelon spy network had provided warnings of the 911 attack 6 months before it happened. Another RS reported that the CIA was tracking the hijackers and were fully aware of their movements right up to 911. As a result of this information Keith Olbermann stated on MSNBC yesterday that the U.S. government was responsible for "malfeasant complicity in the 9/11 attacks." Feel free to track down reliable sources we can use for the article as I suspect we'll need a lot to get this added. Wayne (talk) 07:07, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

San Francisco Chronicle: Someone from Afghanistan called the USA; we don't really know who from where called whom and said what. Maybe something like 9/11 could be prevented if we could follow calls like that. Please give more money for wiretapping. (Unvoiced hint hint nudge nudge: the call we don't know about could have been related to 9/11! Think of the children!).

How conspiracy theorists read that: Hey, someone knew someone made a telephone call! They did it on purpose! Admission! Smoking gun!.

Well duh. Weregerbil (talk) 08:00, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

You got it wrong.. you should have said "how conspiracy debunkers spin it"....an American newspaper selectively reported it.... What are the chances? Mukasey said the call was from an Al Qaeda safe house in Afghanistan to the US. "Maybe something like 9/11 could be prevented if we could follow calls like that". The government did not need a warrant as FISA laws already allowed interception of such calls. In fact the government admitted in 1999 that such calls were routinely intercepted and copied under FISA and in September 2001 German Intelligence stated that calls intercepted by (what they believe was) Echelon were given to them in June 2001 indicating "Middle Eastern terrorists were planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack important symbols of American and Israeli culture" (it was unknown what symbols or where) and that they acted on them by increasing surveilance of terrorist suspects. The key is "multiple sources" not the one that best fits. Wayne (talk) 07:01, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Except that Echelon doesn't really exist. It's a myth purpetrated by the CIA in an attempt to demonstrate they're doing something. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 07:14, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Echelon may not exist (which is why it said "believed") but something similar does exist. The national newspaper here had an article on it as Australia does the interceptions for the US. According to Aussie officials "we" have the ability to intercept and record every phone call on the planet and do interecept all from suspected terrorists that use "key" words. Is that not similar to Echelon? Wayne (talk) 07:32, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

So do you know any reliable sources that discuss Mukasey's "admission"? So far we have him asking for money (not warrants) to make a closer investigation of suspected terrorist chatter.

In a newspaper here a Muslim gentleman of 15 years of age was quoted discussing Fitna: do they want a terrorist attack in Amsterdam or something?. Probably just talking out of his arse, but if something happens you heard it here first: I had foreknowledge! I am teh 1337 Illuminati!

It is not practical to direct unlimited manpower to follow up on every phone call with non-specific threats from half a world away. So we would need a WP:RS which carefully considers foreknowledge vs. vague hints of something that might or might not happen somewhere at some time. Weregerbil (talk) 08:48, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

The difference is that there is a RS (unfortunately citing anon sources within German Intelligence) that claims the call was passed on to them months before 911 as a serious threat. Wayne (talk) 16:47, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I can give you guys some reliable sources if you want — but they discuss it like this:

Either Mukasey is lying about the 9/11 attacks in order to manipulate Americans into believing that FISA's warrant requirements are what prevented discovery of the 9/11 attacks and caused 3,000 American deaths -- a completely disgusting act by the Attorney General which obviously cannot be ignored. Or, Mukasey has just revealed the most damning fact yet about the Bush's administration's ability and failure to have prevented the attacks -- facts that, until now, were apparently concealed from the 9/11 Commission and the public.

The article then continues, citing the apparent falsity of the comment given replies to it from other governmental source:

That's polite Beltway talk for saying that nothing like what Mukasey described actually happened. Does anyone on TV other than Keith Olbermann care that the Attorney General of the United States just invented a critical episode about 9/11 that never actually happened -- tearing up as he did it -- in order to scare Americans into supporting the administration's desired elimination of spying restrictions and blame FISA supporters for the 9/11 attacks?

Scandalous, yes. Connected to 9/11 conspiracy theories? Well, we'll have to wait and see. Right now, it looks like this is just an opportunistic fear-mongering lie from the Attorney General to try and rally support for a failing initiative. --Haemo (talk) 18:07, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Edit Comment

I reverted an edit Haemo made and in the comment i said he had made a dishonest edit. The reasons for my assumption were that he changed "mathematician" to "biologist", the source to the study was replaced with one giving Dewdney's conspiracy beliefs which are irrelevant considering the study is not disputed and a quote from the report by Dewdney was replaced with another from a magazine that made him sound like a crackpot. These changes appeared to me to be an attempt to discredit his study. The edit comment I made is out of character for me and has bothered me all day. I apologise for not assuming good faith and having had time to think I now assume he was not thinking clearly for some reason or was mistaken. Thx Wayne (talk) 16:40, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

But it looks like a mistake. The source that was previously used never states that he was a mathematician — whereas the source I added in this revision is a reliable source which states he is a "biology professor". Also, the quote I added as the same, but continued to give context for his beliefs — previously, it stated that the chance of successful connections "can only be described as infinitesimal". My revision put it in the correct context, which is "cellphone calls made by passengers were highly unlikely to impossible. Flight UA93 was not in the air when most of the alleged calls were made. The calls themselves were all faked." This section is directly about "claims relating to the cell phone calls" and Dewdney's argument is not just that it would have been impossible to make the calls — he further argues that this indicates that the calls were faked. If you think his views make him a "crackpot", then so be it, but that's no reason to remove them from the article — if his opinion about the possibility of calls is important enough to mention, that surely his conclusion drawn from opinion is just as important. You can't have it both ways here. --Haemo (talk) 18:05, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

PS thanks for the apology :) --Haemo (talk) 18:08, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

OooH. We just had TWO edit conflicts.

I meant to comment on that. Haemo could have been honestly reporting a dishonest article while assuming that only reporters who agree with his POV are honest. On the other hand, supporters of the Official Conspiracy Theory seem to have a morbid fear of any other possible explanations. The footage of the Twin Towers in the aftermath of the attacks was traumatizing, regardless of the exact chain of events, and a lot of people did a lot of things to vent their anger, such as clipping American flags (made in China) to their bumpers and speeding up and down various main drags. That could give rise to a lot of cognitive dissonance. I picked up a few flags that had been run over and saved them for a formal flag retirement event at the American Legion.Wowest (talk) 18:14, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Haemo is, of course correct that having a "reliable source" is more important than getting the fact right, according to wikipolicy. Still, BLP rules should apply, if we can find a reliable source that says that A.K. Dewdney is whatever he actually is. Wowest (talk) 18:14, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, AD is (or was) a mathematics columnist for Scientific American. If he's a biology professor, that may explain the (to me) obvious errors in some of his columns. Again, although I think his views are nonsense, we must include them if reported by a WP:RS in the conspiracy movement. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:56, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

So, is he a mathematician or not? He's definitely a biology professor. Also, what of including more complete views of his? It seems contrary to policy to selectively quote what someone believes about the phone calls because we think it "makes him sound like a crackpot". If no one objects, I'm going to restore that revision, leaving in mathematician with a "fact" tag. --Haemo (talk) 19:44, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Upon some study, he shows up in the Mathematics Genealogy Database. I think we can include both then? --Haemo (talk) 19:47, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

"Biology professor and writer on mathematics" seems to sum him up, based on the info presented. Sheffield Steel_stalk 20:02, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Er, no. He seems to be a professor of computer science at the University of Western Ontario. -- But he has other interests. Look here:

http://www.csd.uwo.ca/faculty/akd/akd.html

Wowest (talk) 23:29, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

I am so confused. Is he a biology professor or not? Maybe he once was, and now isn't? Let's just say "professor and mathematician" and be done with it? --Haemo (talk) 00:08, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Did anyone look at his WP entry which is wikilinked in the paragraph? "Alexander Keewatin Dewdney (born August 5, 1941 in London, Ontario) is a Canadian mathematician, computer scientist and philosopher who has written a number of books on the future and implications of modern computing."
As for having it "both ways" the paragraph should concentrate on the study not on his own irrelevant views as the study stands by itself. The source for the cell phone calls origin is the 911 commision report and the only part that had no reference was flight 77 having no airphones which I checked and found that not only do the airlines literature of the day state they had none, but they were asked and confirmed the fact.
The new sentences that have been added are misleading as a.) the source predates the study and b.) no one (not even Dewdney) disputes that there is a chance (1.8% above 6000 feet and "physically impossible" above 8000 feet) but the source implies ALL cell calls have a HIGH chance of connecting which is incorrect in light of actual studies and this implication makes the addition POV and it needs to be deleted. Wayne (talk) 13:13, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

The assertion that cell phone connection is unlikely is not in or quoted by the 911 Commission report. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 14:26, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

The sources don't say they have a high chance, they say they can work or they have varying degrees of success, neither of which implies a high success rate. RxS (talk) 14:47, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

And why should we just focus on his study? Why aren't his other views about the phone calls important? It seems that his opinion that the cellphone calls were faked is not in any way irrelevant to a section entitled "Claims relating to the cell phone calls". Would you mind explaining why you think that claim is irrelevant, while his claim that the phone calls were unlikely to impossible is relevant? --Haemo (talk) 18:54, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, you are mistaken that the source predates the study. The study was published between January 23rd and April 19th 2003. The MacLeans article was published on Aug 30, 2006. I do not believe the sentences are in any way misleading — they are a direct quote of what he believes about the cellphone calls. If you believe he was misquoted, or that the context is wrong, then please provide a source at odds with this quote. --Haemo (talk) 19:00, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Magic passports?

Is this really a notable or important view amount 9/11 Conspiracy Theorists? I can't find any sources that discuss this term in any depth, and it appears that section claiming it is related to the "magic bullet" is completely the opinion of the author. I'm not "up to date" on what the important views are, but I can't find one reliable source discussing these passports in the context of 9/11 conspiracy theories, or ascribing them any importance to these theories at all. --Haemo (talk) 23:32, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Does This belong anywhere?

TEHRAN, April 9 (UPI) -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has questioned whether the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks by al-Qaida really took place, an Israeli military Web site said. The man who is famous for denying the Nazi Holocaust told an audience he wonders how U.S. radar could have failed to detect two planes before they struck the Twin Towers in New York, the DEBKAfile reports. Edkollin (talk) 02:35, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

That's really odd — it's a source reporting that another source has reported that someone said something. The source for the story is this site which looks, uh, unreliable on issues of Israel-Iran-Palestine etc. So, I'm not sure. --Haemo (talk) 02:51, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, if you go to the source, they not only attack Iran in the article, but the statements they attribute to him are really bizarre — so I think we should with-hold action until better sourcing arises. --Haemo (talk) 02:54, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

It struck me as odd also that is why I put it up for discussion. I would not cite Debka.com directly as it is an a gossipy (intelligence and security matters not celebrity) source with a agenda but UPI is a a reliable source and they did not write that he has reportedly said but wrote that he did say it. Edkollin (talk)

Another cite claiming he said this Edkollin (talk) 04:24, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

If you read the source, they don't say he said it — they say an Israeli website said he said it — you can see they're being really careful with how they couch it. Second-hand from an unreliable source, in other words. --Haemo (talk) 20:12, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

The Truth Behind 9/11

It appear, to me at least that the organization The Truth Behind 9/11 is not notable, and their inclusion in this article gives them undue weight. I've already removed it once today, but User:Saint.Pierre.Pro re-added it without comment. Since I've pledged not to revert changes more than once per day, I'm referring this for discussion here. Does anyone agree with me? --Haemo (talk) 20:29, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

In fact, after doing some research, they don't appear to be a registered non-profit — they appear to be a website using freehosting a la Geocities which is so obscure I had a devil of a time finding them using Google. --Haemo (talk) 20:38, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

My Regards

I am very very sorry for confusion or anything I have caused. I wish to apologize and my article "The Truth Behind 9/11 has been removed. I am terribly terribly sorry and I wish to improve my Misplaced Pages editing skills as soon as possible. I must really apologize to Haemo for the inaccuracy of my article. The only problem is I wish to create articles not to edit others, does anyone have any suggestions? Once again, I apologize. Thank you. Saint.Pierre.Pro (talk) 21:29, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

It is much harder to create new articles, in my opinion, because (with a few exceptions) all the best subjects already have articles. I would recommend spending a little time reading the links on the welcome message I sent to your Talk page; this will help you to work with other editors editing existing wikipedia articles. Sheffield Steel_stalk 21:42, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

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