Secrets and lies
Jeremy Clarke
The Methodist church hall could have been a bit warmer. I chose a seat at the end of the row. Because I’d been kept awake for most of the previous night by rats scratching in the attic, I felt slightly more paranoid than usual. Scratch, scratch, scratch: whatever it was the rats were doing up there they were very determined about it. I’d lain awake staring up at the ceiling torn between indignation and profound admiration for the work ethic.
About a dozen had turned up on a wild night to hear ex-MI5 agent David Shayler promote his 9/11 Truth campaign. According to Mr Shayler, contrary to official reports about hijacked airliners and Islamic fundamentalists, the twin towers were actually demolished by Mossad secret agents working with a cabal of US arms manufacturers, the FBI, the CIA and the blessing of the US government.
Before we got on to that, though, he dished the dirt on the underhand activities of our own security services, of which he was once a member. He has no doubts, for example, that Diana was bumped off. Dr David Kelly ditto. Robin Cook probably as well. The rotten devils tried to assassinate Colonel Gaddafi of Libya, said Mr Shayler, but bungled the operation by placing the bomb under the wrong car.
What else? Oh, yes. He said that Tony Blair works for MI5. Even as Prime Minister he did as he was told. Frankly this last item surprised few (if any) of us because in hindsight it explained a lot. What a marvellously well placed source he’ll be when he becomes first President of Europe then the Antichrist.
Having presented his credentials in this way, Mr Shayler went on to present a film he’d made about 9/11. The attack was presented as an elaborate hoax involving hundreds of experts and accomplices. In it, we saw the twin towers collapsing in slow motion. This clearly showed, said Mr Shayler, and I almost believed him, a succession of small explosions racing just ahead of the crumbling masonry as the carefully placed charges detonated with split-second timing. Some of these explosions were audible, though it wasn’t clear whether or not the soundtrack had been augmented.
Further evidence of a hoax was the sus piciously inadequate and perfectly circular hole that the third plane had made in the outer wall of the Pentagon. The hole was shown from several angles. The damage was consistent, said Mr Shayler, and on this one I easily believed him, with the impact not of a passenger jet, but of an Exocet missile fired by the US military at its own headquarters.
After the film he took questions. Mr Shayler has an unusually forceful jaw but didn’t appear to be mad. On the contrary, he appeared calm, intelligent and rational. I have a theory about how to spot the out to lunch: they suffer from a distorted self-image and find it impossible to dress with coherence, appropriateness or style. Mr Shayler’s loafers, jeans and black polo shirt were appropriate, fitted him well, and formed a holistically stylish entirety, however.
‘So, what about the planes?’ someone asked sceptically. ‘We all saw them crashing into the towers — didn’t we?’ Those weren’t planes, said Mr Shayler. They were missiles wrapped in holograms. ‘What about the passengers?’ chimed in another. ‘And the text messages and phone calls they made just before the planes hit?’ added a second. Counterfeit, said Mr Shayler. We obviously had no idea how far voice-counterfeiting technology has advanced in the past ten years. ‘What about the look of horror on George Bush’s face?’ I said. ‘When he was at that primary school. Clearly, he hadn’t known what was going to happen in advance.’ With this question, I was only showing my parochialism. In informed circles it is now common knowledge that President of the United States is a relatively insignificant post. Mr Bush does what the heads of the CIA, the FBI and the major corporations tell him to do. When Bush met Blair at Camp David, it was more or less the equivalent of two tea boys having a smoke break.
Other members of the audience appeared to accept these and other amazing claims with equanimity. It was difficult to tell, for example, whether my nearest neighbour was asleep or awake. My mind, on the other hand, was reeling. What a pretty kettle of fish the world had become! If he came back tomorrow, what would Winston Churchill have said about deception of the people on such a grand scale? And why hadn’t Mr Shayler been hunted down and killed by the security services? Was he a hologram? Or was he an MI5 plant, designed eventually to discredit the so-called 9/11 Truth Movement with increasingly extravagant absurdities? Or was he perhaps a courageous and indefatigable individual?
On these questions and many others I pondered during the night, as the rats above my head scratched and scrabbled with renewed intensity on their long-term project.
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