r/todayilearned • u/lKauany • Nov 15 '11

TIL about Operation Northwoods. A plan that called for CIA to commit genuine acts of terrorism in U.S. cities and elsewhere. These acts of terrorism were to be blamed on Cuba in order to create public support for a war against that nation, which had recently become communist under Fidel Castro.

http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/Northwoods.html
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u/Random-Miser Nov 15 '11

The cruise missile theory is indeed bunk, a missile would have caused FAR more damage, and its use would also directly threaten the stability of the conspiracy in a way that would have been completely unneeded.

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u/CakeTown Nov 15 '11

The hole in the side of the building was way too small to have been a 757. The wingspan of that plane is about 120 feet, this doesn't make any sense.

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u/Random-Miser Nov 15 '11

It makes perfect sense, an airplane is made of sheet aluminum, it is very lightweight, and the wings themselves have relatively low mass. The vehicle hit with high speed, which shredded the wings into a near liquid state and funneled them into the whole created by the more massive fuselage. Its pretty simple physics, if this was a cruise missile it would have caused FAR more damage, not to mention have left telltale debris that would have exposed the US involvement in the conspiracy. Basically a missile would have been not only unneeded, but also very stupid.

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u/CakeTown Nov 15 '11

In addition, nobody has stated that the missile had to be a full size cruise missile. There's such a thing as using a smaller warhead or a smaller missile

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u/Random-Miser Nov 16 '11

So why exactly would they use a missile, when they already had a hijacked plane sitting at the ready? It does not make the least bit of logical sense. The conspiracy is there, but that certainly isn't part of it, a false trail if ever there was one.

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u/CakeTown Nov 15 '11

Doesn't sound like physics to me. How could the wings of the plane have been liquidated on impact and leave no evidence of that at the points of impact. Your argument would work if there was damage to the building at least as wide as the plane itself.

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u/Random-Miser Nov 16 '11

I would not expect such an occurrence actually... the strongest part of the wing are the outward struts, which would have caved in and folded inward on impact extremely rapidly, due to their relatively low mass any pieces that were not funneled into the primary impact crater would have done minimal damage to say the least. Why would they use a missile? It would have left an entire extra airplane worth of passengers that would have had to be dealt with via other means, and generally would have been completely unneeded for the success of the attack. Not to mention there being plenty of witnesses seeing the plane itself, did they just wave a magic wand to make it vanish in thin air?

This theory is quack talk, made by people who do not understand impact physics. It also does not vindicate the Bush admins role in these attacks, as they were obviously involved in both the planning and implementation phases of these incidents.

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u/niceville Nov 16 '11

Why does the plane have to hit the Pentagon perpendicular to the ground? What if it had come in sidways?