The graphic novel “Un tournage en enfer – Au coeur d’Apocalypse Now”.
The graphic novel“Un tournage en enfer: au cœur d’Apocalypse Now” takes us right to the heart of the creation of Francis Ford Coppola‘s famous film, brought to the screen in 1979. As the director points out, [my translation] “[…] we were in the jungle. There were too many of us. We had access to too much money and too much material, and little by little, we all went crazy…”.
It didn’t start well. Right from the start, the director was unable to convince well-known actors to get involved in his film. In turn, actors such as Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino, Robert Redford and James Caan refused to join the adventure. Coppola continues his research and interviews.
As readers, we go behind the scenes of the production and hear from those close to the filmmaker. Filming begins in the jungle of the Philippines, even though Coppola has no idea on how the film will end. This would haunt him throughout the production, causing him sleepless nights when he was already quite exhausted.
A page from the graphic novel “Tournage en enfer – Apocalypse Now”.
Cost overruns followed, and the pressure on the director from financial backers increased. He was asked to complete his film as quickly as possible, which he proved unable to do. Coppola came to guarantee the required funds by pledging to pay off the debt himself if box-office receipts failed to reach $40 million.
In addition, it was taken for granted that the U.S. government would provide the helicopter gunships required for the film’s action. But in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, the interest of American politicians in such requests waned. The director had to turn to the then President of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos, to obtain helicopters and personnel, in return for certain fees and compensation. But these aircraft sometimes left the scene on Marcos’s orders to go hunting for the regime’s enemies. Coppola was falling behind again…
A page from the graphic novel “Tournage en enfer – Apocalypse Now”.
They thought that Harvey Keitelwould be the ideal actor to play Robert Duvall. Many sequences later, the obvious becomes clear: the man just didn’t cut it for a number of reasons. On the verge of disaster, they urgently contacted Martin Sheen and beg him to replace Keitel. Multiple scenes had to be reshot with the new actor, and the delays and associated costs continued to mount.
All sorts of other pitfalls awaited the director and his crew throughout the shoot, including the language barrier with the Filipinos and a storm that destroyed the set. The widespread use of drugs and alcohol by staff and helicopter pilots didn’t help matters either.
The mosquitoes, the heat and Coppola’s constant demands took their toll on the actors. Martin Sheen fell seriously ill, and his brother had to be used for some of the secondary scenes. Rather than use only actors to simulate deaths, a staff member went to the morgue and returned with a corpse. This prompted the arrival of the police force, and the problem was solved with generous sums of money.
There were many other factors that delayed the end of the shoot and increased costs. Marlon Brando’s demands were a case in point. They managed to get him back on set for an extra day, provided that he received $70,000 more than planned.
Shooting finally ended in 1977. The team chartered a private plane to fly 381 kilometers of original film to the United States. Editing the film proved to be an ordeal. There was too much material to analyze. In 2001, Coppola presented a modified version of his original 1979 production. In 2019, he finally delivered a final 182-minute version, Apocalype Now “Final cut” , more than forty years after the initial release.
Earnings met the director’s expectations, and he ultimately won his bet. In all, the film generated $140 million from a total budget of $30 million.
To pay off her student debts quickly, Kate Beaton, a young Nova Scotia resident, decided in 2005 to go and work in northern Alberta for oil companies exploiting the tar sands. At the time, this trip west was popular with Canadians looking for a lucrative job. So she left the paradisiacal landscapes of Cape Breton to plunge into the world of Syncrude and Shellin Fort McMurray.
It was then that she realized what life was like on construction sites occupied mostly by men far from their families, many of whom had behavioral problems. Wherever she found herself, she suffered harassment in the form of derogatory remarks, insults, and eventually sexual assaults.
For these workers, loneliness and survival take on a completely different meaning than for the rest of the male employees in these isolated posts.
A multi-talented storyteller and cartoonist, Kate Beaton published a graphic novel in 2023 describing her experiences. She denounces “a harsh and complex system, which exploits natural resources as coldly as it does human beings”.
“Toxic Environment” is less about the destruction of habitat caused by tar sands mining than about the toxic working environment endured by the few women working on these sites.
Time Magazine, The Guardian and The New Yorker hailed this graphic novel, which also happened to be the winner of the Canada Reads 2023 contest. It was published in English under the title “Ducks“, probably to remember all those ducks caught in the oil that made headlines at the time.
French version of Chasing the Thunder: “À la poursuite du Thunder”.
This book is sure to please fans who can understand French and true stories. “In pursuit of the Thunder – the story of the longest naval chase of all time” quickly hooks us, especially since it is a first in maritime history. The authors of this investigative story are two experienced journalists by the name of Eskil Engdal and Kjetil Saeter.
The information they were able to collect through multiple interviews around the world allows the reader to better understand what hides behind the theft of fishery resources in Antarctica.
This illegal fishing is a big business where the mafia, especially Spanish, does not hesitate to order the cutting of fishing nets or simply to sink a trawler to prevent the obtaining of evidence. Click on the link for a video of this maritime accident.
The chase takes place in inhospitable waters and spans several months and over 15,000 kilometers as we follow the stories of several members of the chase team as well as the illegal fishermen.
The authors discuss the squandering of resources, the lax legislation regarding illegal fishing in international waters, the methods that criminals use to remove a boat’s registration from the registers, the lack of political courage at the international level, the omerta that reigns in the villages where illegal fishermen operate, money laundering and modern slavery.
The Thunder’s captain does everything in his power to escape the pursuers. This escape leads him to sail in very risky areas through passages almost blocked by ice, hoping that the smaller pursuing ship will not dare to venture on the same route. He also steers his trawler into areas where strong waves risk sinking the pursuing ship.
Captain Peter Hammerstedt of the pursuit ship Bob Barker does not back down from any obstacle that stands in his way during the chase. He shows a determination that infuriates the Thunder’s crew and lead them to make mistakes.
The ecological thriller Chasing the Thunder was screened in 2019 at the World Biodiversity Conference.
In March 2023, more than 100 countries signed a treaty on high seas diversity, after 15 years of effort. Greenpeace welcomed the treaty, but demands that it be translated into action…
Reading this book alone will awaken the reader to many previously under-reported aspects of illegal fishing on the high seas, all in the context of a hunt unique in the history of maritime shipping.
Even though World War II is over and the armistice was signed in 1945, four Japanese soldiers continue to hide on Lubang Island in the Philippines, awaiting official orders from their superior to surrender. They have been forgotten there in the jungle and continue to survive as best they can, dodging the patrols that have gone looking for them to tell them the war is over. They continue to accumulate information on the island for the intelligence services, hoping to be useful when a possible Japanese landing takes place that will drive the Americans out of the island. Years pass and there will be only one Japanese soldier left, Hiro Onada, who will finally surrender in 1974, thirty years later!
The bookis a lesson in survival in a hostile environment. The discipline and resourcefulness that are required to survive and ensure their safety is extremely impressive. Onada, even as he gradually sank into an alternate reality, shows a remarkable tenacity.
Here is a passage that shows the reality of the jungle. I translated it as best as I could: “[…] There are also a lot of bees on the island. Huge swarms fly in the bushy areas at the foot of the mountains. I saw some that were thirty meters wide and a hundred long, flying here and there with unpredictable changes of direction. If we encountered one of these swarms, the only thing to do was to go back to the woods or, if we did not have time, to cover our heads with the canvas of our tent or our clothes and lie down on the ground. If we made the slightest move, they would attack. We had to breathe as gently as possible, until the swarm had passed. “(P.216)
In 1957, bombardments in the neighborhood reassured them that the war continued. But these were military exercises by the Philippine Air Force, not an American attack.
Onada et Qanon
As the years pass, there will be countless opportunities for those soldiers to realize that the war is over. They even had access, for a while, to a radio. It did not matter: whatever was read, heard or discovered by chance was, according to them, only the fruit of disinformation from the enemy.
On reading this real life story, it is possible to make a connection between Onada’s testimony and a follower of Qanon: both cannot accept defeat and believe in an almost divine mission. As Onada himself put it so well: “At that time, Kozuka and I had developed so many fixed ideas that we were unable to understand everything that differed from them. If something did not fit our vision, we interpreted it to give it the meaning we wanted “(p.192).
When a person is gradually made to believe in an alternate reality and decides to cling to it for their mental or physical health, or both, the same conclusion remains: regardless of the evidence, the rhetoric or the new realities that will be presented, that person will continue to persist with his line of thinking. It will take some dramatic event in his life for him to decide to change course and come back to a more objective reality.
Have a good read!
Click on the link for more books on war in my blog.
Front cover of the Florence Arthaud’s book: “Cette nuit, la mer est noire”.
Florence Arthaud is the only woman to have won the Route du Rhumtransatlantic single-handed yacht race, one of the most prestigious races in the world. She achieved her feat in 1990.
In 2011, as she was navigating alone aboard her sailboat, Florence fell into the water, off the Cap Corse coast. She shares her thoughts with us as she is convinced that in few hours, exhausted, she will lose her life at sea.
The book starts like this: “I went overboard in a fraction of a second. I am in the water. It is night, and pitch black outside. I am alone […]. In a few moments, the sea, my reason for living, will become my grave”.
Back cover of the book: “Cette nuit, la mer est noire”.
Here are few other translated quotes to give you an idea of the intensity of the story:
“I must move my legs to avoid drowning. Swim, swim. Fight against that fear that would like to paralyze me. I will die, that is for sure, but when? In how much time? To which miracle can I hang to? I try not to think”.
“I am fifteen miles off the coast; not a sign of life around me. The fear I am feeling has nothing to do with the one I encounter when I am racing”.
“The only thing now missing would be sharks. I chase away this childish fear of my spirit”.
But due to several little miracles, Florence will finally be saved.
An excellent book about the human will to survive.
Note: Florence Arthaud died four years later in an airplane crash.
11 Septembre – Les vérités cachées (September 11- The hidden thruth)
11— Septembre : les vérités cachées (September 11 – The Hidden Truth)
For those of you who are bilingual, here is an interesting book analyzing the September 2001 events. Two planes went through the Twin Towers. We have seen those images over and over again. A Boeing 757 crashed into the Pentagon. At least, that is what has been reported since 2001. I knew that I would eventually see live footage of the plane hitting the building, and pictures of Boeing 757 parts, like it is always the case with crashes around the world. With tens of cameras surrounding the Pentagon and the nearby buildings, and reporters on site, there were surprisingly neither credible pictures nor videos showing 757 parts. Years went by, and nothing popped up. That raised my curiosity.
I knew that it was in the American government’s interest to show photos or videos of the plane, like it did for the Twin Towers. But with the Pentagon, there was nothing. We could obviously see a small hole in the building, but nothing else. I wanted to learn more about those attacks and, among all the documents and books that I read, there was this book written by Éric Raynaud.
Éric Raynaud is an investigation journalist who has written about important personalities like Ingrid Betancourt, Benazir Bhutto, Pierre Bérégovoy and others. He has worked for twenty years for daily newspapers before becoming an independent journalist. In his book titled “11-Septembre: les vérités cachées”, the author aligns facts, studies and verifiable testimonies that can be confirmed by the reader. He provides, at the bottom of pages, his sources and original references to all the medias. That includes books, interviews, newspaper articles, TV programs, videos and multiple internet sites.
Here are some of the subjects that the reader will find in the book. I can only present them very briefly here:
Pentagon: identification of the parts found on site
The author says that [my translation]:“the Commission of inquiry established that only part of one engine was found, and that it presented, as a proof, a totally inadequate picture”. It was not a part of a 757 engine but something else. A clue is given through a citation from Barbara Honegger (former advisor in political analysis to the United States President, between 1981 and 1983) during an interview [my translation]: “Some parts found in the Pentagon have been identified as compressor pieces that are part of a turbo JT8D engine, used for the A-3 Sky Warrior fighting aircraft […]”.
Pentagon: where is the Boeing 757?
There are many other sources of concern, like the obvious lack of important pieces. Their absence is noted, without any given explanations. Bob Pugh is a reporter with twenty-five years of experience and he is the first reporter to arrive on site, five minutes after the firemen. When he is interviewed by other medias on what he just saw, he declares [my translation]: “I look for significant parts, for the aircraft’s wreck, I do not see anything that I can recognize…I don’t see the tail. I don’t see the wheels. I don’t see the engines. There are no seats…there is no luggage.” The author writes [my translation]: “nothing has been found that would even look a bit like airliner parts”.
Pentagon: no serial numbers, no landing gear, no 757 engines
George Nelson, a Colonel in the US Air Force, has a direct experience as an investigator in aircrafts accidents. He declares that a fire resulting from an airplane crash cannot destroy every significant piece like the landing gear or the engines; neither can it make all the serial numbers disappear. He says [my translation]: “I repeat: this is impossible […]. Any objective and rational investigator would only be able to conclude the following: no Boeing 757 hit the Pentagon, as opposed to the official statement”.
Pentagon: depleted uranium detected on the site where the building was damaged.
Another surprising discovery was made by two scientists, Leuren Moret and Janette Sherman. Leuren Moret spent her career in the nuclear field, working among other places in California in the Livermore Nuclear Weapons Laboratory. She says [my translation]: “What happened at the Pentagon appeared highly suspicious to me. That led me to contemplate the use of a missile fueled by depleted uranium, and to make an immediate research with my colleague and great friend, Dr Janette Sherman. Janette went to take radiation measurements using a Geiger counter, a very short time after the crash. From fifteen kilometers, under prevailing winds from the Pentagon, she detected radiations that were eight to ten times higher than normal…” They learned, only four years later, that other experts had also detected similar levels where the Pentagon had been damaged.
WTC7 (building 7): bombs explode in the lower floors.
Numerous witnesses heard powerful explosions in the basements of the two towers (WTC1 and WTC2) and in the building 7 (WTC7), all while the Twin Towers where still standing.
Barry Jennings, the Assistant Director of the Emergency Services Department of New York was trapped in the superior floors of the building 7: he could no longer go down since the lower floors had been blown away. He declares [my translation]: “Once we arrived on the sixth floor, the level supporting the stairs we were about to use had disappeared! There was an explosion and the floor disappeared…the whole level had given in. I found myself there, suspended in the air! I had to climb back to go up to the eight floor…the explosion happened just beneath us…and when it exploded, we were projected backward…and the two buildings [the Twin Towers] where still standing…we were trapped there for hours. I was still there when the towers went down”.
This capital witness died two days before he was scheduled to testify. His testimony would have contradicted the main version. The Commission of inquiry, across its six hundred page report, does not mention the WTC7 name.
Twin Towers: bombs explode in the basements.
William Rodriguez, an employee with twenty years of experience, was at the B1 level of the WTC1 tower. He says that there were six basements, called B1 to B6. There was such a powerful explosion between B2 and B3 that they were lifted off the floor. Soon after, they heard another BOUM and it was the plane arriving in the tower. Many other testimonies, also visible on videos, show the employees and firemen reacting in surprise toward the series ofexplosions that they were able to hear.
How were the Twin Towers built?
Nine months before the attacks, one of the designers of the towers, Franck Martini, explains how the Twin Tower’s construction was thought through. He knew that there had already been a crash against the Empire State Building during the Second World War. A bomber, lost in fog, had hit the building straight on (a building that stayed up). Now knowing that a passenger jet could mistakenly hit the new towers that would be built, he explains [my translation]: “the steel networks structure is built as “mosquito screen”. A plane colliding with the towers would have the same effect as a pen going through a mosquito screen: the hole stays, but the global structure around it does not change. The Twin Towers (WTC1 and WTC2) are conceived to resist the impact of an airliner, even many…”
And if the architects had planned the possibility of one or more impacts against their new towers, they also knew that once the crash would occur, the fuel would start burning. There is no surprise here.
The steel’s melting point.
Steel melts at 1538 Celsius degrees. According to Thomas Eagar, teacher of material physics at the renowned MIT, a kerosene fire generates temperatures between 870 and 930 degrees. The author declares [my translation]: “In 2008, an engineer who participated in the FEMA inquiry admitted that even their studies could not demonstrate with absolute certainty that the [Twin Towers] fires had generated temperatures higher than 300 or 400 degrees […]”.
The abnormal falling rate of the buildings
The towers went down at free fall speed. Between 9 and 10 seconds, according to observers; this is totally impossible without the use of accelerators. The most pessimist scenario, applied to the “pancake theory” collapse, requires a minimum of 21 seconds… The author writes [my translation]: “Numerous expert calculations hover around thirty to forty seconds”.
Kevin Ryan, from Underwriter Laboratories, a well-known institution in USA, says this [my translation]: “We tested the floor very well, by means of faithfully reconstituted models, in August 2004”. These tests totally refuted the main theory, the “pancake theory”.[…] Months later, the government published an update on its own conclusions, indicating not only the absence of the floors collapsing but also that examinations of the areas touched by fire proved that the temperatures…were very low”.
We are then back to the unexplained free fall. Or even the multiple unexplained free falls. Such gigantic buildings crashing down 1) totally, without leaving major parts standing 2) in a perfectly vertical way and 3) at free fall speed are sure to attract the attention and comments of experts in controlled demolition. On this subject, there are lots of testimonies.
In 2009, a crucial discovery from Danish scientists radically modified the main version.
2009: Niels Harrit and the nanothermite
In 2009, an internationally renowned scientific researcher, Niels Harrit, writes an article in the Open Chemicals Physics Journal. This magazine’s editorial team is composed of one hundred scientists coming from five continents. The article, which is written in collaboration, is titled: “Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe”. They are nine scientists to announce that they have discovered nanothermite, a new and extremely powerful explosive, in the World Trade Center.
[My translation]: “According to what we choose to do with it, it can be an extremely powerful explosive, or it can melt metal at high speed.” Thermite has been known for a long time, but nanothermite is much more recent. The more the mixture is refined, the more it is powerful [my translation]: “ Activated to melt steel, for example, nanothermite will only take a fraction of a second to pass from the ambient temperature to 2500 degrees…steel, itself, melts at a little above 1500 degrees. I let you conclude…” The author finally understands [my translation] “the pockets of molten metal that were found in the Twin Towers debris and in WTC7, that New-York firemen took two months and a half to definitely neutralize”.
We then learn that nanothermite is [my translation] “made under license, to the exclusive use of the army and under the seal of secret defense”. The author refers to an interview given by Niels Harrit where the scientist says that ten tons of nanothermite are needed to cause the fall of the towers. And how is it possible to bring ten tons of that product in a place with such tight security? He writes that the company in charge of the security had forsociety director the President Bush’s brother and as general director the President Bush’s cousin.
It is possible to see the interview (with French subtitles) on: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x273rhq_de-la-nanothermite-le-11-septembre-2001-par-le-scientifique-niels-harrit_webcam
Obstructions made against the Congress inquiry
The senator Tom Daschle complained several times, and on many different medias, of obstruction problems he was facing from Dick Cheney and from President Bush, that were asking him no to investigate and even to stop the Congress inquiry.
The money allotted to the new 2004 independent Commission of inquiry.
The author notes that in order to understand everything about the sexual scandal involving Bill Clinton, 100 million dollars were spent. In order to know what happened on September 11 2001, the Commission of inquiry was given 3 million dollars. It is only after multiple complaints that this amount was finally reviewed to 14 million. Three thousand American lost their lives in that tragedy but a battle was necessary to get more than three million dollars…
The facts discarded by the independent Commission of inquiry.
The Commission seems to have found an easy way to deal with the most troubling testimonies: when this happens, instead of writing the details in the report and risk raising even more troubling questions, the subject is simply avoided. There is nothing written. So, in 600 pages, there is no mention of WTC7 whose lower floors were destroyed by explosions even before the planes arrived in the towers.
Nothing can be found about the Minister of Transport Norman Mineta’s testimony as to what he saw and heard with regards to Dick Cheney before the attacks. Mineta was nonetheless a direct witness; he was in the room with Cheney. Éric Raynaud cites what Mineta said and it is obvious that if those words would have found their way in the Commission’s report, this would have created a crisis.
There have been multiple testimonies received by the FBI as to the fact that something smaller than a B757 hit the Pentagon. Nothing can be found on those testimonies in the Commission’s report.
On that subject, you can read a Washington Post article dated from August 2, 2006 and signed by Dan Eggen: “9/11 Panel Suspected Deception by Pentagon Allegations Brought to Inspectors General”. Another book written on the subject in 2009, whose author, John Farmer, is a former General Attorney of the New Jersey State, is available: “The Ground Truth: the story behind America’s Defense on 9/11”. He says [my translation]: “The public has been seriously duped with regards to what happened on the morning of the attacks”.
Cases of insider trading
Numerous cases of insider trading were detected, starting September 6th, which is five days before the attacks. They involved “put option” to sell United Airlines, American Airlines, as well as reinsurance giants like Munich Re and AXA and financial companies that would be impacted within a few days like Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Bank of America, etc. However, enormous amounts of shares were bought on Raytheon, a military armament producer, just before the attacks. There was an inquiry, but no details were released.
The Osama Ben Laden case
The book’s chapter 8 holds surprising details about Osama Ben Laden. This information, that most of us ignored, brings a new light on what is generally known about him. It is said that Ben Laden rapidly denied being involved with the attacks. Normally, an attack is quickly reclaimed with pride by its mastermind. It is not the case here. I remember having seen Ben Laden on the news at the moment where he was saying that he was not behind the 9/11 attacks. Some details are given in the Éric Raynaud’s book as to why Ben Laden was not behind those attacks.
On this subject, the reader might, for example, take note of Bénazir Bhutto’s testimony, the woman coming back to Pakistan with the intention of running her own country once more [my translation]: “Osama Ben Laden has been killed by a former member of the Pakistani secret services, Omar Sheikh”. This link is available on dailymotion.com. The Omar Sheikh name often surfaces when the 9/11 attacks are concerned.
A few weeks after she confessed what she knew about this delicate subject to Al Jazeera in 2007, Bhutto herself was killed. She was not the only one to have publicly spoken on that subject. A former very high ranking CIA manager, David Baer, also confirms to Persian CNN, in 2009, that [my translation]: “ Ben Laden died many years ago, and videos and sound recordings that are episodically broadcasted are obviously false…” (www.persiancnn.com).
This book reports that the Dalle Molle Artificial Perceptual Intelligence Swiss Institute studied the messages supposedly recorded and sent to medias by Ben Laden throughout the years. The result [my translation]: “None of the recordings provided by the CIA or Al Jazeera correspond to the real voice of Ben Laden”.
United 93
Few pages are dedicated to the United 93 flight, which in itself was an issue that has given rise to many comments. We read about visual witnesses who see an aircraft explode in flight. The official story is also presented, which says that the aircraft crashed in a field. [My translation]: “The big, the huge problem, is that the rescuers, firemen, witnesses, and even the Shanksville mayor, who arrived quite rapidly on the site, effectively found a crater, but…absolutely empty”.
I’ve been interested in aviation all my life. Wanting to understand as soon as possible what had just happened, I had rapidly watched the live news and videos released by the media. At the time, it was not yet a question of conspiracy. News reports were live and journalists were doing their best to describe the scene. It was quite something to see a nearby farmer, who had rapidly gained access to the site. He was certainly anticipating, like everybody, to find many dead people here and there around the site. But he was talking to the camera and saying that there was nobody. He did not understand how it was possible.
It was also something to hear that reporter, on board a news helicopter, trying to describe what he was…not seeing. The helicopter’s camera was pointing to the site where the crash supposedly happened. All the viewers could see the scene at the same time as the reporter. But there was almost nothing to comment about. We could not see anything that would look like something we are used to see when there is a crash. And God knows we’ve seen a lot throughout the years. The reporter was unsure, he was improvising to kill time.
Conclusion
Through all the quotations and references offered in the book, among which some of David Ray Griffin, the author wants the reader to understand the following facts: in order to maintain its global domination, the United States needed to control the vast oil reserves of Central Asia. In 2001, there was a meeting between American and Taliban representatives. The Americans wanted to build an oil pipeline and needed the consent of the Taliban. This project having been refused by the Taliban, the latter were advised that a war would be started against them in October 2001. But a war lead by USA in a foreign country needed the strong support of the American population. In order to gain that kind of support, many neoconservatives like Zbigniew Brzezinski and Philip Zelikow had underlined, over different decades, that a new “Pearl Harbor” would be necessary.
What I understand of the book is that an attack without a very strong visual impact would not mobilize the American population and ensure that the latter would support a war in a foreign territory. Airplanes crashing in the Twin Towers, but more importantly the towers crumbling down would constitute this new “Pearl Harbor”. The freefalling towers would be played and replayed by all the media, reinforcing the desired impact.
But there had to be a certainty that the towers would both completely come down to reach that visual impact. The majority of viewers would certainly not notice that the buildings were all freefalling.
But there was nonetheless a major obstacle: the towers had been built in such a way that many airliners could hit them without destroying them totally, due to the “moustiquaire” design. Added help was required. And this is why there are so many testimonies, from firemen and workers that were present in the buildings, of multiple explosions in the buildings, down to the basements, and this just before the planes hit the buildings. Nobody expected the 2009 discovery of nanothermite in the Twin Towers ashes made by Niels Harrit and his team of scientists. This nanothermite created molten steel. It transformed steel into a metal softer than butter.
To suggest that Ben Laden was still alive, even though his death had been announced by many political personalities and intelligence sources, led the American public to concentrate their attention on a number one public enemy. There was no more moral dilemma to authorize military attacks in Afghanistan, supposedly to kill the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks. The promised war against the Taliban was now a reality. They did not support an oil pipeline controlled by the Americans and they paid the price for a while.
The reader has to decide what to make of that information. As a controversial subject, I could not find a better one. If you want to look deeper into the subject, there are many books available. Other than Éric Raynaud’s book, published in French, there is no doubt that David Ray Griffin’s analysis and research, initially published in English, might surprise you. The title is: 9/11 Contradictions – An Open Letter to Congress and the Press (ISBN: 978-1-56656-716-9). There are also many documentaries on the subject, among which the well-known video, available on You Tube: 2014 New Loose Change 3rd Edition.
September-11 attacks are the only event in which it is not acceptable to be curious. Here, there is only black and white. You are either on the government side, or you are an advocate of conspiracy theories. Like Bush would put it: “You are either with us, or against us”.
