This page is part of our special coverage Global Voices 9/11 Retrospective [1].
While the world took to mourning the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States (U.S.), former Malaysia Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohamad, has come out to again maintain his opinion that it was not the work of Muslim extremists.
Having famously proclaimed [2] that ‘if they can make Avatar, they can make anything’, this time Mahathir has said in his blog [3] that former U.S President George W. Bush has lied to the American people:
I believe Arab Muslims are angry enough to sacrifice their lives and become suicide bombers. But they or their handlers do not strike me as capable of planning and strategising such attacks so as to maximise the damage to the enemy.
But consider the attack on 9/11. The planning must have taken a considerable length of time. The candidates had to learn to fly in tiny aircrafts. Unless they were already airline pilots familiar with big passenger aircraft, their pupil pilot licenses would not be of much help to fly the four aircrafts to their targets which were not an the route of the planes.
Planning to hijack four aircrafts simultaneously would require great precision in timing and logistics. One aircraft maybe. But four simultaneously!! I don’t think Arab terrorists from Saudi Arabia can carry out this highly sophisticated operation with such success.
It is now the 10th anniversary of 9/11. Bush lied about Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction. As a result hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Afghans and a few thousand of young American soldiers died, thousands more are wounded, maimed for life, suffering mental breakdowns. Two countries have been devastated and fratricidal wars have become endemic. And still no democracy.
This is the legacy of George W. Bush. If they can lie so as to kill Iraqis, Afghans and American soldiers, it is not unthinkable for Bush & Co. to lie about who was responsible for 9/11. Human lives do not seem to mean much to Bush!!
Gary Brecher, writing in The Exiled [4], wrote:
Brilliant. That’s the way to win Muslim hearts’n’minds. It’s not even sensible; there are (well, there used to be) some reasonably intelligent people at the top of Al Qaeda. And the idea of using a plane to hit a tower, though it’s a very good plan, isn’t all that complicated.
Here are some reactions to Mahathir’s post: ray2467 [5] advises the former Prime Minister to keep his ‘poisonous’ theories to himself:
Keep your theories to yourself
Many lives were lost and you have this silly theory to poison everybody against the west.Bush is better man than you!
Dtan [6] is not impressed with this latest conspiracy theory:
Conspiracy Theorists focus on all the extraneous events. Why the building didn’t fall the way they expected and come up with BS Theories using fantastical explosives like Thermite. They themselves have no evidence on how these explosives were placed. As if, there was a great plan whereby dozens of building or elevator technicians sneaked around placing the precise explosives did not draw any attention months before this event. Their mentality like yours (its been researched) is to draw concentric circles around your imagination to explain or deny what you want or not to believe.
Many people were murdered in those buildings. Do you think you honour their memory with your conjecture? Do you think God Almighty equates Conspiracy Theorists to Slanderers?
Dr Syed Alwi Ahmad [7] tells Mahathir to retire from politics:
I hate to say this publicly but with all due respect and with the interest of Malaysia and ASEAN in mind – I think the time has come for both you and LKY (Lee Kuan Yew, former leader of Singapore) – to walk into the sunset and forget anymore publicity. Both you and LKY are making a fool of yourselves publicly and it does not do justice to your lifetime achievements.
I say this with no regrets. ASEAN has to move on and please – both Tun and LKY – you both have one last contribution to make – and that is – LEAVE THE SCENE.
This page is part of our special coverage Global Voices 9/11 Retrospective [1].