Conspiracy: History’s Greatest Plots, Collusions and Cover-Ups (2 page)

This dilemma has never been clearer than when dealing with the events of 9/1l and the subsequent war on terror. The extraordinary success of Michael Moore's documentary film
Fahrenheit 911
has seen conspiracy theories go mainstream. The film takes seriously a number of conspiracy theories that might previously have been thought outlandish. As a result, audiences have been polarised. Some see the film as irresponsible, others see it as uttering the truths that the regular news media was scared to utter. Ultimately their responses tended to depend on what side of the political fence the viewer happened to be sitting on. This is hardly surprising: conspiracy theories always tend to appeal to those whose political views are in opposition to those in power.

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ONSPIRACIES
This book will attempt to offer an unbiased investigation into several aspects of the war on terror and leave the reader to make up their own mind. We'll explore the various conspiracy theories relating to the events of 9/11 itself. We'll try to make sense of the mysterious last moments of Flight 93, the plane brought down by its passengers. We'll look into the accusation that the war on Afghanistan was a war on oil and we'll investigate the tangled links between the Bush family and the Bin Ladens.

Political conspiracy theories are nothing new, of course. So we'll also look into some the classic political mysteries of yesteryear. We'll investigate the sinking of the
Lusitania
asking who really sank the ocean liner – the event that persuaded the USA to join in World War One. And what about Pearl Harbor ? Did Roosevelt really let it happen in order to persuade Americans to join in World War Two? We'll look into one of the most long-running and pernicious of all conspiracy theories as we explore just why people want to deny that the Holocaust ever happened. And on a slightly lighter note, we'll look into whether Adolf Hitler could really have escaped the bunker by a secret tunnel and fled to Antarctica with Eva Braun.

Coming closer to the present, we'll examine at the string of suspicious deaths and assassinations that occurred during the 1960s. The most celebrated of these, the murder of JFK, is perhaps the ultimate conspiracy theory, with endless books, films ant TV programmes devoted to it. The murder of radical black American leader Malcolm X, and even the death of film star Marilyn Monroe, have also attracted their fair share of speculation, and we'll also discuss these cases.

Many conspiracy theories relate to the existence of Secret Societies, and we'll be looking into several of these. We'll investigate The Bilderberg Group and attempt to establish whether this shadowy group is really running out world. And – if you're one of those who noticed that, in the last American Presidential election, both candidates belonged to the same secret society – well, we'll be looking into the weird world of Skull and Bones, the Yale-based organisation whose members include both Presidents Bush. Could it really be the American branch of the Illuminati? And who, or what, is the Illuminati? Formed in 1776, have its members, 'the illuminated ones', really been the secret power behind the throne throughout modern history?

Religion has always attracted its share of conspiracy theories, too, so we'll take a tour around the strange stories that surround the Holy Grail. Could Mary Magdalen have smuggled Christianity's most precious relic out of the Holy Land and into Western Europe, where it remains hidden to this day? Closer to the present, there is the bizarre death of Roberto Calvi, nicknamed 'God's banker'. Could the Pope's business chiefs really have been hand in glove with the Mafia?

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ONSPIRACIES
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ELEBRITY
The cult of celebrity is one of the hallmarks of the twentieth and twenty-first century, so it is not surprising that, in recent year, many conspiracy theorists have turned their attention away from politics and religion towards the lives and deaths of the famous. We'll look into the allegations that certain celebrities, like Elvis and Tupac Shakur, still remain alive, and ask whether there is any possible evidence to support these notions. And we'll also investigate the even stranger theory that Beatle Paul McCartney is actually dead.

And here we move onto the theories that read like the stuff of science fiction. One of the most enduring conspiracy theories of this type maintains that the moon landings were faked. Could this possibly be true? And what of extraterrestrial happenings and alien visitation? What really happened at Roswell? Or at Rendlesham Forest? Is there life on Mars? And how can we explain crop circles?

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ICTION
Conspiracy theories, then, come in all shapes and sizes. There are those that seem to be taken from the pages of science fiction novels or thrillers. Indeed, many of them do crop up in popular fiction, not least Dan Brown's enormously popular
Da Vinci Code
, which draws off a whole tradition of Holy Grail conspiracies dating back for over thousand years. Yet while many conspiracy theories are more entertaining than realistic, there are some that reveal genuinely disturbing information and ask important questions about secrecy in the way we are governed and receive information.

In the end it is for you, the reader, to decide which theories to believe, and which to dismiss. So turn the page, and prepare to enter into a world much stranger than fiction: the world of the conspiracy theory.

Conspiracy theorists point to the unwillingness of the United States Government to hold a full inquiry into the events of September 11, 2001. Dick Cheney initially opposed an investigation into the terrorist attacks. His reason was that resources and personnel would be taken away from the war on terrorism. It was over a year before the official investigation finally began. By contrast, the investigations into the attack on Pearl Harbor and the assassination of President Kennedy began after only nine and seven days respectively. When the 9/11 investigation finally got under way a number of inconsistent explanations were offered in response to questions relating to matters such as the failure of the military to prevent the attacks.

Perhaps the key to the prevalence of conspiracy theories is not so much the physical evidence as the belief that because of an ulterior motive the government condoned, or even positively encouraged, the terrible attacks. In the most popular of those theories, which was given a boost by the Michael Moore film
Fahrenheit 9/11
, it is reasoned that the United States Government, dominated by powerful neo-conservatives and the oil business, welcomed the disaster in order to rally public support for a war in the Middle East. Although such a war would purport to be a war on terror it would really be a war for oil. It would also have the effect of increasing defence spending, which would be good for the government-linked defence industry. Finally it would also allow the passage of repressive new legislation, such as the USA Patriot Act which granted extra powers to the Federal Government. Seen from this conspiratorial point of view, the events of September 11 were basically a present-day re-staging of the attack on Pearl Harbor or the sinking of the
Lusitania
, during which catastrophes (at least if you believe the conspiracy version) a government stood by and watched its own people massacred in order that it could drum up support for an unpopular war.

This is a scenario that has persuaded many, particularly in the wake of the widely unpopular war in Iraq. But is it really credible? Does any of it really add up to proof that the United States Government stood by and watched its citizens die?

Not according to Popular Mechanics magazine. This publication assembled a panel of experts and went through the theories relating to the destruction of the WTC twin towers. The findings of its experts suggested that some aspects of the collapse of the towers were unusual but not impossible – and, after all, how many times in the past have similar events taken place, thereby providing a comparison? In addition, the remainder of the "evidence" – the alleged cancellation of flights by Pentagon officials on the day of the attacks, for instance – was just as likely to be made up of a series of simple coincidences as anything more sinister. Also, the President's odd behaviour on hearing the news may simply have been a kind of panicked paralysis.

Overall, the suggestion that the government actively allowed the 9/11 attacks to take place is extremely farfetched. The charge of incompetence is rather more likely to stick, of course, although the fact that enormous amounts of intelligence reach the United States Government every day should be borne in mind.

On the other hand, it is hard to dismiss the allegation that the United States Government and the oil and defence industries have done very well out of the War on Terror that followed the events of September 11. This was one cloud whose lining had rather a lot of silver in it, especially if you were a Haliburton shareholder. As a result, the United States Government may well be open to accusations that it has used the 9/11 tragedy to help its friends make profits – but that is quite a different thing from suborning mass murder. The conspiracy theorists may ultimately have a point, but to claim that the United States Government masterminded the attacks is, in most people's view, stretching credibility more than a little far.