a third of the American public suspects that federal officials assisted in the 9/11 terrorist attacks

Was 9/11 an 'inside job'?

SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE

• More than a third of the American public suspects that federal officials assisted in the 9/11 terrorist attacks or took no action to stop them so the United States could go to war in the Middle East, according to a new Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll.

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• Thirty-six percent of respondents overall said it is "very likely"
  or "somewhat likely" that federal officials either participated in the
  attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon or took no action to
  stop them "because they wanted the United States to go to war in the
  Middle East."
• "One out of three sounds high, but that may very well be right,"
  said Lee Hamilton, former vice chairman of the National Commission on
  Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (also called the 9/11
  Commission). His congressionally appointed investigation concluded that
  federal officials bungled their attempts to prevent, but did not
  participate in, the attacks by al-Qaida five years ago.

"A lot of people I've encountered believe the U.S. government was involved," Hamilton said.

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• The poll also found that 16 percent of Americans speculate that
  secretly planted explosives, not burning passenger jets, were the real
  reason the massive twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed.

Conspiracy groups for at least two years have also questioned why
the World Trade Center collapsed when fires that heavily damaged
similar skyscrapers around the world did not cause such destruction.
Sixteen percent said it's "very likely" or "somewhat likely" that "the
collapse of the twin towers in New York was aided by explosives
secretly planted in the two buildings."

• Twelve percent suspect the Pentagon was struck by a military cruise
  missile in 2001 rather than by an airliner captured by terrorists.

University of Florida law professor Mark Fenster, author of the book
"Conspiracy Theories: Secrecy and Power in American Culture," said the
poll's findings reflect public anger at the unpopular Iraq war,
realization that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass
destruction and growing doubts of the veracity of the Bush
administration.

"What has amazed me is not that there are conspiracy theories, but
that they didn't seem to be getting any purchase among the American
public until the last year or so," Fenster said. "Although the Iraq war
was not directly related to the 9/11 attacks, people are now looking
back at 9/11 with much more skepticism than they used to."

The Scripps Survey Research Center at Ohio University has tracked
the level of resentment people feel toward the federal government since
1995, starting shortly after Timothy McVeigh bombed the federal
building in Oklahoma City. Forty-seven percent then said they,
personally, feel "more angry at the federal government" than they used
to. That percentage dropped to 42 percent in 1997, 34 percent in 1998
and only 12 percent shortly after 9/11 during the groundswell of
patriotism and support for the government after the attacks.

• But the new survey found that 77 percent say their friends and
  acquaintances have become angrier with the government recently and 54
  percent say they, themselves, have become angrier -- both record levels.

The survey also found that people who regularly use the Internet but
who do not regularly use so-called "mainstream" media are significantly
more likely to believe in 9/11 conspiracies. People who regularly read
daily newspapers or listen to radio newscasts were especially unlikely
to believe in the conspiracies.

"We know that there are a lot of people now asking questions," said
Janice Matthews, executive director of 911Truth.org, one of the most
sophisticated Internet sites raising doubts about official explanations
of the attacks. "We didn't have the Internet after Pearl Harbor, the
Gulf of Tonkin or the Kennedy assassination. But we live in different
times now."

The survey was conducted by telephone from July 6-24 at the Scripps
Survey Research Center at the University of Ohio under a grant from the
Scripps Howard Foundation. The poll has a margin of error of 4
percentage points.

Thomas Hargrove is a reporter for Scripps Howard
News Service. Guido H. Stempel III is director of the Scripps Survey
Research Center at Ohio University.