Historian Dr. Daniele Ganser: "911 - What is the so called 'war on terror' really?" (Cologne, 06 Nov 2017)

General Video
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“The UN Charta actually bans the use of force.”

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“If people tell you, all these wars in the middle east are to promote democracy, the facts don’t support that theory. In fact, democracy is being destroyed, if democratically elected leaders in the middle east nationalise the oil; then there is no respect for democracy whatsoever.”

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Video description taken from youtube (emphasis mine):
Dr. Daniele Ganser is a Swiss Historian who is specialized in international politics after 1945. He is the director of the Swiss Institute for Peace and Energy Research (SIPER) in Basel, Switzerland. In this talk which he gave to a group of business people on November 6th, 2017 in Cologne, Germany, he asks the question whether the so called „war on terror“ is in reality a fight for oil and gas.

In the beginning of the talk Daniele Ganser explains that as a human family we today consume 96 million barrels of oil every day, that’s 47 supertankers. He explains the cheap oil in the Middle East is in muslim countries while oil sand from Canada or Deepwater oil from the Gulf of Mexico have higher production costs.

Daniele Ganser shows, that the government of Mossadegh in Iran has nationalized its oil but thereafter was overthrown in 1953 by the British secret service MI6 and the US secret service CIA. With the example of the Golf of Tonkin incident which started the Vietnam War in 1964 Ganser underlines the fact that wars were often started with lies. This was also the case when US President George Bush together with British Prime Minister Tony Blair attacked Irak in 2003 and claimed falsely that Irak had weapons of mass destruction. The talk recalls also secret warfare of the French secret service DGSE, who destroyed the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior in 1985 with bombs.

In the part on the terrorist attacks of 11th September 2001 the talk of historian Daniele Ganser focuses on the collapse of WTC7, the third tower which was not hit by a plane. While the NIST report of 2008 claims the building came down due to fire, other experts have argued that WTC7 has been brought down with controlled demolition. Ganser leaves it to his audience to make up its mind whether fire or controlled demolition destroyed WTC7 on 9/11.

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Its a massive wast of resorces and lives, it does serve the Eliets as a control stratige, with a chance for them to make a few Bucks on the side.

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I think the 9/11 conspiracy saga is a complete waste of time and energy in the pursuit of a pointless delusion. Occam’s razor dictates here, in my opinion. There was clearly stated intent and motive by al-Qaeda prior to the attack. Their relio-ideological position can be traced back to at least the late 19th century, it has pedigree, and al-Qaeda’s stocks, it may be recalled, soared in the aftermath demonstrating some very decent strategic planning.

As for the idea of stealing resources underpinning the subsequent ‘war on terror,’ it’s nonsensical. The US did not steal Iraqi oil when in occupation, instead they sacrificed tens of thousands of lives and wasted trillions of dollars on an unwinnable war. And if resources were the motivation, why bother with Afghanistan?

Sorry, i think 9/11 conspiracies are utterly discreditable. I think, at their core, is a profound underestimation of human stupidity possibly inspired by a subconscious longing for someone to actually be in control of the world, when in fact the more obvious conclusion is that no one knows what the fuck is happening and we’re all, Islamic State and the US equally, just making shit up as we go along.

Having said that, the ‘war on terror’ has been a monumental waste of money and lives, a tragedy really. As deplorably short sighted as the ‘war on drugs,’ but that doesnt mean, for me anyway, that we need to invent deep State conspiracies to justify them, we’re just all a bit stupid at times.

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I think we can agree that the ‘war on terror’ has been full of illegal invasions with devastating consequences.

My motivation for linking this lecture was not to tell you who is actually responsible for the September 11, 2001 attacks (Ganser never actually takes a position on this), but to highlight the outright illegality of all the wars that followed.

Good question. I would ask it differently: What are Afghanistan’s natural resources? What is the geostrategic significance of Afghanistan’s location and natural resources?

It was perfectly obvious to me already in 2001 as a 11yo that the true motivation for invading Afghanistan is not women’s or children’s rights.

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PS https://edition.cnn.com/2013/03/19/opinion/iraq-war-oil-juhasz/index.html

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I don’t think anyone thought the primary motivation for invading Afghanistan was to protect women from the sadistic zeal of a crazy misogynist cult, getting rid of the Taliban was merely a positive externality (though obviously the Taliban still exist though it has to be conceded that they are at least not in control of the whole country anymore). The stated goal was to attack al-Qaeda. I see no reason why a conspiracy is required here. It’s true Afghanistan has natural mineral resources but extracting them, and shipping them (yes shipping) would be close to logistically impossible. For all intents and purposes, Afghani minerals are worth zero.

Thanks for linking that cnn article. I think i remember reading it at the time, or something similar. I think perhaps we’re talking passed each other, or perhaps i didn’t articulate my position as well as i might’ve (quite likely!).

I didnt mean to imply that there weren’t powerful lobby groups all on board for a bit of biffo in the middle east. Let’s not forget the arms manufacturing industry. But you also can’t disregard George Ws determination to finish the war his Dad started combined with a nation suddenly overcome with hawkish intent due to 9/11.

It’s complicated, it always is, but i just don’t accept the conspiritorial blame for what was a series of bad policies based on poor evidence being laid at the feet of a single industry or group. It was just a monumental fuck up that has cost the US far more than it has gained in tax revenue from Iraqi oil contracts.

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Is Afghanistan in the middle of a resource war? I’d like to point people to this article: https://whowhatwhy.org/2012/09/10/the-real-reason-for-the-afghan-war/

Indeed, the stated goal was to catch Osama bin-Laden, his followers, and his allies the Taliban. But the stated goal was also to make the country democratic, with women’s rights and everything, as the Taliban was seen as the complete antithesis to everything that Western liberal democracies stand for. It is quite clear to me that the US military and its NATO allies did not even attempt to make the country democratic or to protect citizens’ rights, be it women, men or children, putting known war criminals in high-level government positions. Any semblance of democracy you see in the few elections there have been is merely a facade. The country is arguably more of a mess now than under Taliban rule. You can’t bomb democracy into a country, especially not when your allies are notorious war criminals and you take no interest in their blatant corruption. US generals know this. They have been extensively advised on the dangers of overlooking blatant corruption by people such as Sarah Chayes. It makes no difference. If democracy is not the formal objective, why are we still there, when they say that bin-Laden is dead?

You talk a lot about conspiracy theories, but all I see is a historian, specialist in covert wars, pointing out some discrepancies in the dominant narrative. Nobody is making the oil industry solely responsible for all wars in the middle east and central Asia. I agree that humanity’s dependency on oil is just one perspective to approach this from. Of course there are other perspectives. The military-industrial complex has powerful interests from the arms industry, war gives them a reason to exist.

All these wars have cost the US public a lot of resources, mental health, and attention away from domestic problems like the increasing gap between rich and poor. So the big question is:

who benefits?

Cui bono?

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Yes, the stuff by Dr. Daniele Ganser is interesting stuff - an echo of the sort of analysis done in the US by Noam Chomsky and others, but with its own interesting slant.

I’m certainly unwilling to recognise any worth in 911 conspiracy theories - sure, it was a convenient excuse which was taken advantage of, but you could say it had its cause in “blowback” from US interventions in the Arab nations.

Ganser’s analysis of the ridiculous record of the US claiming to “support democracy” in the region is however a good one. I was aware of the West’s intervention in Iran. But, equally, these days Saudi Arabia and Iran pursue their own agendas, it’s not like the Arab nations were entirely passive agents at the mercy of the West, either. They were trying to play the US and USSR off against each other to their own benefit.

While you can see the mess that US corporations have made, extracting oil with no benefit to for the general population, it is also possible to for local dictators and elites to grab oil wealth and have money pouring into the country with no benefit to the local general population - local dictators, not US puppets - independently arsehole people in their own right without a US adviser or diplomat in sight.

Still, not all dictators have been evil either - take Mossadeq for example. But, point is, US institutions have no monopoly on denying locals a fair share of the oil based wealth.

Further, not all wars are about resources, equally as he says. It is more complex than that.

I’m planning to take a look at this in tomorrow’s radio show - I’ll post something in due course - I did in fact review “Bush in Babylon” by Tariq Ali on a past show.

Simon Frew, while no longer in our party, wrote an excellent review, also linking to some very pertinent documentaries:

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John, the post I dropped in yesterday by Peter Zeihan covered a perspective on more recent events related to your subject.

Basically, he pointed out that the Americans have more food production than they need, have achieved energy Independence, are a net exporter of oil now, are down to only 10ish% of their economy depending on foreign trade and have lost interest in their historic role as international trade police (set up post WWII in Bretton Woods agreement). Notice that the US military/national security folks aren’t even involved in trade negotiations any more.

They’re walking away from it. They don’t need it anymore and the population has had enough.

Then he pointed out three international war scenarios that seem imminent, but don’t involve them.
It explains a lot about some of the otherwise apparently weird behavior of various national leaders towards Trump when he came into office, and the trade war with China (China is screwed). Europe is a financial basket case and the Russians have a short window to fulfill their expansion plans before demographics does them in (aging army, too many fronts, dwindling resources) and the middle East is just fragile with no clear protection for their only oil export routes.

What a mess.

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Andrew Downing. I make the assumption that your post was directed at me. Yes, I reviewed in part the Upload. Yes, there is merit in much of what is being spoken about.

But it is not what is going down. It is not what we are having to face up to and confront.

So profound has been the deception, that it is difficult to even open a conversation.

So polarised are the punters and the commentators over issues of no consequence.

Continual destabilisation, continual war, continual confusion as to the real intent and purpose.

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More directed at John really. He’s doing an episode of his radio show on related topics, so I tossed in some perspective. John and I catch up periodically to compare notes and organize.

I haven’t been able to tell whether the scope of your concerns are national or international.

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Copy that Andrew.

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Dr Mahathir’s speech at the 73rd Session of the UN General Assembly was one of the best contemporary speeches in a long time on the use of the word “Terror”.

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Thank you @JohnAugust and others.

awesome.

Wonderful. I’m just listening now.

John, I quite agree.
Still, could you or someone explain exactly how al-Qaeda took down the third skyscraper, referred to as WTC7, which went down in free fall on the same day? I’m afraid I am among many won’t really understand 9/11 until that’s cleared up. It seems to me that there’s a fine line between making up conspiracy theories and asking questions.

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The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released its long-awaited report on the collapse of World Trade 7 following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. “Our take-home message today is that the reason for the collapse of World Trade Center 7 is no longer a mystery,” NIST lead investigator Shyam Sunder told journalists at this morning’s press conference in Gaithersburg, Md. “WTC 7 collapsed because of fires fueled by office furnishings. It did not collapse from explosives or from diesel fuel fires.”

More at source.

Is there evidence to believe the conclusion by NIST is false?

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Right on point. Thanks pip.

What you’re really asking is: could the US-government (NIST being part of the Department of Commerce) be (intentionally or mistakenly) wrong in their conclusion that an office fire on one floor, damaging one column of 81, caused the collapse of the building into its own footprint within 8 seconds?

Is there any documented case of fires causing the collapse of a skyscraper before this one?

In order for a structure to fall into its own footprint symmetrically in free-fall, all of the columns need to be severed at the same time, demolition and building safety experts say. Do you dispute that this is accepted scientific theory? Does this not point to controlled demolition as the strongest hypothesis for the collapse of WTC7? Did NIST seriously consider this hypothesis?

Controlled demolition would require explosives. Let me ask you this: did NIST look for (residues of) explosives having been present at WTC7? Some say they didn’t. I will sift through the report linked on their website to see for myself.

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I broadcast “Roving Spotlight” between noon and 2pm on Tuesdays from Radio Skid Row 88.9FM. You can also hear it over the internet, at www.radioskidrow.org - in any case, I’ll be talking about this tomorrow.

Laura - for WTC7, the fires meant that a beam in WTC7 expanded and came out of its footing, collapsing that floor and prompting the collapse of the whole building. Yes, a bit of a coincidence, but we need to look some principles from David Hand, statistician and author of the improbability principle : https://www.amazon.com/Improbability-Principle-Coincidences-Miracles-Events/dp/0374535000

First, the lever :

The buildings were designed to be innovative, and were therefore more likely to have strange faults.

Because of the fire, there was minimal water to deal with the fires in WTC7

… so other events “enabled” this rare event.

Then, selection : with something like the 911 collapse, people are going to be poring over the facts looking for stuff. If it were not the coincidental collapse of WTC7, there would have been other coincidences to focus on. This was the coincidence we ended up with.

Next, we have the fact WTC7 collapsed with a flat profile. It takes a lot of energy to turn something that large, so the next question is why one side did not collapse first. The point is that the whole building has a lot of strength, but the weakest part was that floor to start with after the beam came out. So, the collapse spread over that floor before the building above started to move, and so it went down flat.

Yes, it seems unusual … but on the other hand, we have not had many exotic buildings collapse in this way, so how come we are confident in supposing what “should” happen?

I am in fact, overall, comfortable with the mainstream explanation for the collapse of WTC7. Why was it not included in the first report? Because the people first focused on damage directly caused by hostilities. I think there is an innocent explanation.

Again, that is the explanation I am comfortable with.

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I can’t answer any of those technical questions Laura as i have zero background or knowledge in related fields. It’s not really a matter of seeking motive though, the issue is actual evidence.

As you might have noted i’m very skeptical about 9/11 conspiracy theories but i try not to be completely closed minded, i’ve been wrong before and have no doubt i will be again!

However, in the case of 9/11, i guess more of a concern for me is the utility, the political expediency, of pursuing the conspiracy. From a historical and legal angle and just because its fun to investigate and research something, i get it. But what is the benefit to a political party to actively engage with an event like this? Especially given that you know it will alienate a big portion of the electorate.

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umm … zero?

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Precisely. Zero.

Perception is everything in politics. PPAU’s biggest problem is usually getting people to take us seriously. We definitely don’t need people getting the incorrect perception that we’re all a bunch of 9/11 conspiracy theorists.

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