In the mysteriously continuing hoorawhaw over whether the Twin Towers were brought down by an “inside job,”I have often ignited the fury of the extraordinarily sensitive Truthers, who believe in intentional demolition,. My sin was pointing out that demolition is a physical undertaking. It is not metaphorical. Physical explosives in specific quantities must be put in actual places. If it cannot be shown that this would be physically possible, an inside job did not happen.

It is hard to get specifics from Truthers, but the centerline story is that Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, blew up the Towers. This was to provide a pretext for the US to attack Iraq. Sometimes the CIA and President Bush II are said to be involved.

Stories differ considerably. Several Truthers have said or implied that all 110 floors must have been rigged for demolition. This would explain why structural materials were converted into fine dust and why floors collapsed consecutively at a higher rate than (say the Truthers) can be explained by gravity. Well, OK. Whatever brought the Towers down did indeed do it rapidly.

Another centerline assertion is that nanothermite was used to melt through the steel columns supporting the buildings This stuff burns at a horrific temperature and can in fact be used to melt through things.

Using these assumptions, we will make worst-case baseline calculations and then modify the assumption as desired.

The Towers were held up by an exoskeleton of massive steel columns, fifty-nine on each of their four faces, for a total of 236). The 236 column segments visible on a single floor would require the placing of 236 charges. If we assume that a Mossad Demolition Expert (hereinafter MDE) can place one charge per night, then a single MDE would require 236 nights, or 7.87 months, to place charges on an entire floor. Of course, 236 Mossad agents could rig a floor in one night.

There being 110 floors, the entire Tower would have about 110 times 236 column segments or, to a close approximation, 25,960. This would take one MDE a bit over 71 years, though 236 MDEs could do it in110 nights, or just under four months. Of course, 25,960 MDEs could rig the entire building to blow in one night, but this seems improbable.

Let us assume that each column segment would require ten pounds of nanothermite. Thus a single floor would require 2,360 pounds or 1.18 tons. All 110 floors would then require 129.8 tons. We may guess, without really knowing, that several eighteen-wheelers would bring this from wherever Mossad gets its nanothermite.

Inside the Twin Towers. Note the steel column segments, completely visible from within offices. Key phrase: Completely visible. Since the Towers were office buildings, all or virtually all would be visible to office workers.

But things become more complicated. To place the charges, the MDEs would have to remove the cosmetic covering from the column segments. It looks like plaster. Thus each MDE would have to be accompanied by a Trained Traceless Mossad Plasterer, or TTMP, to replace the covering unnoticeably. He could perhaps dry it quickly with a hair dryer. Of course if the covering is other than plaster, another sort of workman would be necessary. We will here not investigate the tonnage of plaster needed if indeed plaster was used.

Presumably Mossad has rapid replacers of various types of material, wood, drywall, wallpaper, what have you.

A minor complication would be getting rid of the fire-retardant insulation that usually covers structural steel, it being well known that heat both weakens steel and causes it to expand.

Doing all of this without drawing the attention of the office workers would seem problematic. (Unless they were Mossad Trained Suicide Office Workers, of course.) Another problem is that the janitorial and maintenance staff might wonder why strangers were running about with nanothermite and detonators and tearing plaster off column segments. The best explanation is that they were in the pay of Mossad.

Now, as aforesaid, these calculations can be modified to reflect different assumptions. For example, if we assume that only five pounds of nanothermite are needed to melt through a massive steel column, instead of ten, then the tonnage of nanothermite per floor can be reduced to just over half a ton . If only one pound per column segment is needed, then only 2390 pounds, a a bit over a ton, would serve for the whole building. If a tenth of a pound of nanothermite could cut a massive steel column, then 239 pounds would bring down the whole building.

If we further assume that only every other column has to be blown to bring the building down as observed, this halves the nanothermite weight again to a quarter ton, and so on.

If Truthers do not find these admirable calculations satisfactory, then by all means they should offer others. They may suggest a means of destruction that I have never heard of. The point is that a theory should be physically plausible.

Truthers might argue that dropping just one floor would be sufficient, which floor would jar loose the one below and so on in a chain reaction, thus requiring the placing of nanothermits on only one floor. This comes perilously close to the Official Story.

Since the Towers clearly began collapsong at or near the site of the plane strikes, the Israeli Suicide Pilots would have to know just what floor to run into. This would take good flying, but is certainly possible. I have heard that the suicide pilots trained by running El Al airliners into mock-ups of the Towers secretly built into a mountainside near the Dead Sea, but I regard this as speculative.

Now, Building Seven. Why blow it up at all? Doing so throws doubt on the desired conclusion that the Towers were knocked down by the airplanes since Building Seven didn’t have an airplane but dropped anyway. I have read several times that the CIA had incriminating documents in its office in the building, and planted charges to destroy them.

Now, Gentle Reader, if you or I wanted to destroy embarrassing documents, we would feed them into a paper shredder and burn the chaff in an incinerator. It seems that when the CIA wants to destroy documents, it blows up the building.

But enough on the housekeeping peculiarities of the ClA. Tell me a story, any story, but please, please make it physically possible.

Write Fred at [email protected]. Put the letters “pdq” anywhere in the subject line, quotes not needed, to avoid autodeletion. Reply not guaranteed due to volume.