SECRETS+CONSPIRACIES :.

NEW BOOK EXPLORES CIA INVOLVEMENT IN 9/11 ATTACKS

  Posted Sep 9.03

Original headline: Sept. 11 conspiracy claims find large readership

As the second anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks approaches, a book that claims the stunning events of that day were supported and perhaps organized by U.S. intelligence services is nearing the top of the bestseller charts in Germany.

Die CIA und der 11. September. Internationaler Terror und die Rolle der Geheimdienste (The CIA and Sept. 11: International Terror and the Role of the Secret Services) was up two places to No. 5 in the non-fiction segment of this week's Der Spiegel list, probably the country's most authoritative ranking of book sales. It was also No. 5 on the list put out by a rival weekly newsmagazine, Focus, having risen four places.

The author, Andreas von Bülow, a former member of the German cabinet, does not directly accuse the Central Intelligence Agency or any other arm of the U.S. government of crashing two planes into the World Trade Center, aiming a third plane into the Pentagon or causing a fourth to go down in Pennsylvania. But in 270 pages “full of the subjunctive: would have, could have, may have,“ as Der Spiegel put it, von Bülow sets out to demolish what has become the conventional version of the Sept. 11 events and to strongly suggest a CIA link to the attacks.

Von Bülow, who claims that such audacious and well-organized strikes could not have occurred without the “support of the intelligence agencies,“ disputes that the 19 Arabs identified as the hijackers were really responsible, claiming that they were not Islamist extremists and that seven of them were still alive after Sept. 11. He also explores, over 20 pages, the theory that huge charges were secretly planted in the World Trade Center beforehand and then detonated when the planes struck, assuring that the explosions would be powerful enough to cause the landmark skyscrapers to collapse.

Rejecting the official claim that Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network were behind the worst terrorist attacks in American history, von Bülow suggests that the four hijacked jets had been secretly fitted with equipment that allowed unknown parties on the ground to deprive the pilots of control and then direct the aircraft, by remote control, into their targets.

When asked to identify his sources, von Bülow told Der Spiegel in an interview that “a lot came from the Internet,“ where a number of Web sites put up by private individuals argue that the attacks were arranged by U.S. intelligence officials. The rationale, according to von Bülow: To “secure American global dominance“ by mobilizing an ambivalent American public into supporting military action in the Middle East that would secure U.S. control of the region and its oil supplies.

Faced with hostile questioning by Der Spiegel, von Bülow said it was legitimate to advance conspiracy theories without proving them. His main point, he said, is that so many questions surrounding the attacks have either not been explained or sufficiently explored that people should be skeptical of the official version.

“I don't have the burden of proof,“ he added. “The burden of proof is on the American government.“

Susanne Grünbeck, a spokeswoman for the book's Munich-based publisher, Piper Verlag, said about 70,000 copies of Die CIA und der 11. September have been purchased in Germany so far. “We will do the usual and offer it on the English market,“ she said.

While many Americans may find von Bülow's theories outlandish, even offensive, there is clearly a market for them in Germany, where President George W. Bush and leading neoconservatives in his administration are widely unpopular. A Forsa opinion poll conducted in July of last year found that 19 percent of Germans considered it possible that the U.S. government, or elements within it, had organized the Sept. 11 attacks.

Von Bülow, 66, once a rising star on the German political scene, hardly fits the standard image of the paranoid conspiracy theorist: A lawyer with a doctorate degree in jurisprudence, he was Germany's federal research minister between 1980 and 1982, and for four years before that served as parliamentary secretary in the German Defense Ministry.

During much of the Social Democrat's 25-year parliamentary career, which ended in 1994, he served on parliament's intelligence committee. Information gathered there, von Bülow said, led to an earlier book, Im Namen des Staates (In the Name of the State). It alleged that German and American intelligence agents had used the protective cover of their espionage activities to carry out a broad range of criminal activities and to forge secret alliances with far-right groups. Sep. 5

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