Who Really Blew Up The Twin Towers?
On Professor Steven Jones’s desk at Brigham Young University in Utah, you can find shards of glass and dust that once belonged to the World Trade Centre towers. Professor Jones claims that this evidence is proof of the biggest cover-up in history, one too villainous for many to believe, but that he is determined to expose it and has even staked his academic career on doing so.
According to Jones, the attacks of September 11th were an "inside job," orchestrated by neoconservatives in the White House. Their aim was to justify the occupation of oil-rich Arab countries, increase military spending, and expand the nation of Israel. Jones and his group of around 75 professors of 9/11 Scholars for Truth challenge the official conspiracy theory that claims 19 hijackers, and some others, carried out the attack by acting alone. "We’re going to get to the bottom of this," Jones states.
While most academics in the US view these claims with suspicion, Jones is not alone in his beliefs. He is part of a recently formed group of professors called 9/11 Scholars for Truth who are using their association with prestigious universities to lend weight to conspiracy theories that have been long believed in parts of Europe and the Arab world. These theories have been gaining ground among Americans who are frustrated with the Iraq war and have opposition to President Bush’s "war on terror."
The professors’ views have provoked a response from right-wing radio shows and caused upheaval on campuses, triggering letters to newspapers, phone calls from parents, and TV cameras in lecture halls. A petition calling for the dismissal of a University of Wisconsin assistant professor, Kevin Barrett, who joined the 9/11 Scholars for Truth, was signed by 61 legislators in the Midwest. However, citing academic freedom, the university provost defended Barrett, albeit reluctantly.
According to a Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll taken during the summer, Americans are increasingly suspicious of the government’s explanation of the events of 9/11. 36% of respondents claim that it was "very likely" or "somewhat likely" that federal officials either participated in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon or took no action to stop them "because they wanted the United States to go to war in the Middle East."
The official story of 9/11 usually begins at 8.45am on September 11th, 2001, when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. However, Professor Jones’s version of events began a year earlier, in September 2000, when a neoconservative group called Project for a New American Century brought out a report arguing for a global expansion of American military and economic supremacy. The report warned that "the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalysing event – like a new Pearl Harbor."
The academics claim that the group, in concert with about 20 others, orchestrated the 9/11 attacks as an excuse for pre-emptive global aggression against Afghanistan, then Iraq, and soon Iran. They insist that they have scientific data to prove it. Jones states that the towers could not have collapsed from the collision of two airplanes since jet fuel doesn’t burn at temperatures hot enough to melt steel beams. The scholars have collected eyewitness accounts of flashes and loud explosions immediately before the fall and believe that the twin towers must have been brought down by explosives. They even claim that the nearby World Trade Center 7, which collapsed later in the afternoon, housed a secretive CIA station that was the command center for planning the attack.
Professor James Fetzer, a recently retired philosopher of science at the University of Minnesota, says that "the planes were just a distraction," while Professor Jonathan Barnett, professor of fire protection engineering at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts, calls such claims "bad science." Barnett had been a member of the World Trade Centre Building Performance Study, one of the government groups that investigated the towers’ collapse.
It is acknowledged that the collapse of the World Trade Center Building 7 during the September 11 attacks was peculiar. Firefighters usually intervene to stop fires from raging uncontrollably for seven hours, but on that day, they did not due to prioritizing the rescue of victims. Nonetheless, lack of evidence supporting a theory does not make the other theory correct, according to Barnett. Since the incident, the US government has issued three reports scrutinizing that day by consulting with numerous professors, scientists, and government officials. The National Institute of Standards and Technology examined the towers’ fall, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency inspected the response to the attacks while the 9/11 Commission meticulously investigated the hijackers’ actions and their affiliation with Osama bin Laden. Professor Christopher Pyle discredited the possibility of planting bombs because it would have required many people to keep the secret if it were true.
Barrett accuses the experts of being deceptive through psychological manipulation, a tactic that CIA interrogators use. Barrett believes that when individuals’ beliefs are shattered, people disregard any evidence that confirms the opposite. It will take America’s next generation to learn the real facts since governments tend to deceive the public to start wars. Barrett’s statement contradicts Professor Robert Goldberg of the University of Utah’s writing, which highlights that religious and political leaders perpetuate conspiracy theories to benefit their agenda. These theories usually target Jews, big government, or corporations, and the public buys it because the theories are more exciting than the truth or due to an emotional need.
Although the 9/11 scholars present themselves as rational thinkers who examine the facts, a closer look into their claims reveals increasingly absurd hypotheses. For instance, they claim that Flight 93 safely landed in Cleveland and that the phone calls from passengers’ relatives were computer-generated rather than credible. Some of the scholars have a history of defending conspiracy theories, such as the CIA plotting the Lockerbie bombing or the plane crash of John F Kennedy Jr and his wife. Some even believe in "global secret societies" that control the world.
Goldberg argues that the conspiracy theorists present their case with facts and figures, dates and meeting places, and usually name names, just like in an adventure novel. While they sound reasonable, they say hearsay as fact, treat rumours as truth, and claim that accidents are never what they appear. Goldberg highlights one theory, stating that a missile hit the Pentagon, and although the data is there, the conspiracy theorists do not discuss what happened to the plane and the passengers.
Perhaps not coincidentally, Americans’ willingness to believe conspiracy theories relates to their dissatisfaction with the Bush administration. False claims about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and unsubstantiated ties between Saddam Hussein and 9/11 left the public feeling misled. Additionally, since the National Security Agency obtained phone billing records from telecommunications companies, engaged in wiretapping without court warrants, and detained thousands of American and foreign citizens indefinitely without trial, many Americans fear that their civil liberties have been infringed upon. Those who criticize the Bush administration’s war on terror are accused of being unpatriotic.
Although the scholars’ attempts to reopen the 9/11 investigation may seem extreme, they risk caricaturing the opposition. Regardless, they continue to push forward, imploring Congress to take up the matter again.
Your assignment is to rephrase the complete text employing superior vocabulary and creating distinct phrasing utilizing the natural tone of the language. All of the results need to be crafted in English. The text for revision is as follows:
