911-Where Are the Whistleblowers?

Where Are the Whistleblowers?

If the 9/11/01 attack was an Inside Job, then Why Aren't There More Whistleblowers?

Thie idea that official perpetration of or complicity in the 9/11 crime implies a conspiracy that would be impossible to maintain is possibly the single biggest barrier to the serious consideration of such official guilt. Given the massive scale and coordinated nature of the assault, people naturally tend to think that it would involve large numbers of people consciously participating in pre-meditated murder, if it was an inside job. Wouldn't someone have talked and spilled the beans? (Interestingly the assumption that the attack's scale and coordination imply an unwieldy operation with too many participants is almost never applied to the official theory that it was the work of Islamic terrorists.)

A full and convincing answer to this question involves several aspects, such as a consideration of the personnel requirements and a number of observations in the Conspiracy FAQ. The most complete examination of this question that we are aware of is the essay by 9-11 Research Associate Editor Gregg Roberts, Where Are the 9-11 Whistleblowers?. Roberts' essay first builds a case for official complicity in 9/11 and then examines the key aspects of the whistleblowers question, including:

• The likely number of "insider" conspirators in a position to blow the whistle and their relevant personal characteristics
• How the government and media have treated whistleblowers who have revealed weaknesses in the handling of national security threats, without claiming any inside knowledge of how 9/11 was carried out (or even challenging the official story)
• The motivations and concerns of whistleblowers
• Attitudes and other filtering mechanisms evident in the major media

Roberts concludes that the probability of an insider coming forward and being offered widespread media coverage is quite low because of their small numbers, risk/opportunity balance considerations, and media filtering mechanisms.

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Introduction

In many personal discussions I have had about 9/11, I am often interrupted long before I can describe much of the evidence that it was an inside job, with the objection that such a large conspiracy could not have been covered up. "Hundreds, if not thousands, of people would have to have been involved. Someone would have talked," as this objection has it, or in common parlance, "someone would have blown the whistle." This objection has also been confidently raised on various Internet discussion forums, and in some instances where anyone in the corporate or Left media has bothered to dignify the issue with a response.

Gregg Roberts is a freelance technical writer and business analyst with a bachelor's degree in psychology, master's-level study in social work, and earlier education in the "hard" sciences. His history of peace and justice activism goes back 20 years, including work against US funding for Salvadoran death squads and the contra war in Nicaragua. He has been investigating the September 11 attacks since December 2003 and has provided extensive editorial assistance to the 9-11 Research website family. He is currently working with webmaster Jim Hoffman on a book based on the site.

The essay I'm offering below provides a self-contained, easily printed review of the evidence for official complicity in 9/11:

• The immediate identification of Osama bin Laden as the "mastermind" and the almost immediate identification of all 19 alleged hijackers
• Scant public evidence supporting the official account
• Lack of follow-up on advance warnings -- or outright derailment of investigations -- by law enforcement and national security officials, and numerous trip cancellations and stock transactions indicating foreknowledge
• Official statements that lack fundamental credibility, such as that a suicide attack by airliner had never been considered and that wargames conducted on 9/11 facilitated the response to the real-world emergency
• The alleged hijackers' lack of piloting skills
• The failure of all four flight crews to send a simple four-digit hijacking code
• The failure of all four flight crews to prevent unprecedented cockpit takeovers, despite their being staggered over 90 minutes
• The failure in all four cases (if we are to believe the official story) to get a jet fighter alongside the hijacked airliners
• The unprecedented, unexplained collapses of three steel-framed skyscrapers, allegedly due to fire, while exhibiting all the typical features of controlled demolition, or features that argue for it even more strongly

After the review, I discuss issues that bear on the likelihood of a 9/11 whistleblower coming forward, and of his or her case being widely covered in the mainstream media, including:

• The likely number of "insider" conspirators in a position to blow the whistle and their relevant personal characteristics
• How the government and media have treated whistleblowers who have revealed weaknesses in the handling of national security threats, without claiming any inside knowledge of how 9/11 was carried out (or even challenging the official story)
• The motivations and concerns of whistleblowers
• Attitudes and other filtering mechanisms evident in the major media

I conclude that the probability of an insider coming forward and widespread coverage being afforded such a person are quite low because of the explosive nature of the issue, the risk/opportunity balance to would-be whistleblowers, and the filtering mechanisms that operate in both the corporate and Left media.

Contents

About the Author A Respectful Request Acknowledgments Introduction The Prima Facie Case for an Inside Job      "Ignored Warnings"      They Were So Dumb, They Outsmarted Us      Media and Official Treatment of the Issues      Left Gatekeepers So Why No Whistleblowers?      Conspiracies Happen All the Time      Upstanding Members of Society      Physics Trumps Armchair Psychology      Who Is in Actually a Position to Blow the 9/11 Whistle?      If You Say It, They Will Come            Media Self-Censorship, and Ridicule of 9/11 Skeptics      The Mother of All Whistleblowers Weighs In      What Motivates Whistleblowers?      Historical Precedent: (Temporarily) Successful, Massive Cover-Ups      What Response from Authorities Could 9/11 Whistleblowers Expect?            The Case of Sibel Edmonds            The Case of Coleen Rowley            The Case of Kevin Ryan      "Trust Us, We'll Protect You"      Surely, Reforms Are on the Way Conclusion Afterword: What Can We Do?      "First, Do No Harm"      Join with Others