Merged "Pull It" (Stop yawning people!)

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

OK; firstly I think it is important to just throw this out there, because I don't post too often:

I believe the official account of what happened on 11 Sep 01 - I am by no means a 'twoofer'.

However; something has been bothering me for a while now concerning the whole "Pull It" debate. Just in case anyone has forgotten rolleyes Mr Silverstein's comments, here is the most complete version I have been able to find:

"I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, 'We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.' And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse."

Now, bearing in mind I do not know what has been said to/asked of Mr Silverstein before he made this comment, so I may be taking it out of context, but I have always had a problem with 'Pull it'. It would make much more sense for him to have said something along the lines of, ''We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull your guys out.'. The word 'it' in this context just seems strange to me; it is like he is referring to a single entity, not a group of firefighters. Perhaps, if the quote is not in context, he is referring to the firefighting operation, then 'Pull it' makes more sense.

To further muddy the waters; I have watched Gravy go back and forth with truthers on the use of the term 'Pull It' inside/outside the Demolition Industry, and I thought he cleared that one up nicely, until...

I was having a discussion with a work colleague (an ex oil rig worker) who knows nothing about 9/11 CTs, and was telling him (to his amazement) that there are people out there who think the WTC buildings came down as a result of CD. I started saying, "Those buildings were gonna come down anyway, so what would be the point.....", and he interrupted saying, "...of pulling them down with explosives? That's stupid!"... Bear in mind, until our conversation, he had been blissfully unaware of any 9/11 CTs, and I had not even bothered to mention the whole 'Pull it' kerfuffle.

In the grand scheme of events that day, 'Pull It' does not change the facts; if WTC7 was a CD then I'll show me arse to the Queen, but I can see how the dying Truth Movement are in a flat spin over this one, desperately clinging to it like a drowning man to a rescue ring; 'Pull it' was a very strange choice of words, but by no means does it constitute a 'Smoking Gun'.

 

[uk_dave]

Perception

I guess we can all draw different 'first impressions' from such a statement.

I first encountered it on another forum. The person who posted it was trying to promote the conspiracy theory. He made the mistake of posting the quote before telling me what to perceive from that quote. Fatal mistake for a 'truther'

"I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, 'We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.' And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse."

He's talking about an operation to fight fires in WTC7
He comments about the loss of life on that day
They agree to stop the operation (pull it) in order to save any further loss.
Only at the end he mentions the actual building collapse.

That was my first impression.

The 'truther' had to explain to me the alternative interpretation. I find that rather amusing.

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

I guess we can all draw different 'first impressions' from such a statement.

I first encountered it on another forum. The person who posted it was trying to promote the conspiracy theory. He made the mistake of posting the quote before telling me what to perceive from that quote. Fatal mistake for a 'truther'



He's talking about an operation to fight fires in WTC7
He comments about the loss of life on that day
They agree to stop the operation (pull it) in order to save any further loss.
Only at the end he mentions the actual building collapse.

That was my first impression.

The 'truther' had to explain to me the alternative interpretation. I find that rather amusing.

True enough; if I had read that quote with no prior knowledge of the 'Truth Interpretation' (tm), I wouldn't have read any sinister connotations into it, but it still strikes me as a strange choice of wording. It would have saved everyone so much bother if he had just said 'Pull the operation..', or something along those lines!

 

[Hokulele]

I haven't heard the clip myself, but I remember someone somewhere saying that the soundtrack isn't exactly clear, and Silverstein could just as well have been saying "Pull 'em", meaning pull out the people, as "Pull it".

Does anyone have a link to the clip? I am too lazy tired to go look for it.

 

[Tweeter]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WYdAJQV100

Pull It!

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

He's definately saying 'Pull it'. However, he could have said, "..maybe the smartest thing to do would be to dust off and nuke the site from orbit; it's the only way to be sure..", and it STILL wouldn't change the fact that WTC7 collapsed due to fires and damage.

 

[Hokulele]

He's definately saying 'Pull it'. However, he could have said, "..maybe the smartest thing to do would be to dust off and nuke the site from orbit; it's the only way to be sure..", and it STILL wouldn't change the fact that WTC7 collapsed due to fires and damage.

Thanks. It would have been nice if he had been less ambiguous, but that is the way life is.

In reference to your colleague, pulling a building down is the most common way for non-controlled demolitions to occur. Anyone who has tried to get rid of a barn or other such structure is probably familiar with the process of tying one of the main supports to a truck/tractor/something-else-with-a-lot-of-torque, and "pulling" it down. It wouldn't surprise me to encounter someone outside of the demolition industry using that type of terminology. Especially one who is familiar with structures (such as an oil rig worker, I have worked with several of them), but not CD per se.

 

[johnny karate]

What Silverstein meant by "pull it" is entirely irrelevant to the events of 9/11 because no one has ever been able to take any interpretation other than the "official" one and make it fit into any workable hypothesis.

It's just another sad and pathetic example of CTers sniping at what they view as holes in the official explanation without bothering to come up with a cohesive narrative of their own.

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

Thanks. It would have been nice if he had been less ambiguous, but that is the way life is.

In reference to your colleague, pulling a building down is the most common way for non-controlled demolitions to occur. Anyone who has tried to get rid of a barn or other such structure is probably familiar with the process of tying one of the main supports to a truck/tractor/something-else-with-a-lot-of-torque, and "pulling" it down. It wouldn't surprise me to encounter someone outside of the demolition industry using that type of terminology. Especially one who is familiar with structures (such as an oil rig worker, I have worked with several of them), but not CD per se.

That's why I was massively suprised to hear him say, "...what would be the point in pulling them down with explosives?..."

 

[uk_dave]

It would have saved everyone so much bother if he had just said 'Pull the operation..', or something along those lines!

Similarily, it would have saved alot of bother if he'd just said "demolish the building".

But he didn't (well, not unless you're a particular 'truther' who swears he saw programme in which apparently LS did explicitly say they demolished the building. But that 'truther' is in his own little world. Literally.)

So, all we're left with is weighing up the probabilities:

He's discussing the firefighting operation and the loss of life and explains that this informed their decision to cease operations, and then they watched the building collapse.

Or

He's inadvertently admitting to instructing (parties unknown or the FDNY) to somehow demolish a badly damaged building which had been on fire for a long time, by sending in some brave demo experts with explosives (the silent type) who manage to carry out the CD in order to save further loss of life, and yet they don't want anyone to know about this brave act of humanity because........................ I kinda run out of ideas at this point.

 

[Hokulele]

That's why I was massively suprised to hear him say, "...what would be the point in pulling them down with explosives?..."

Sorry, I wasn't clear there. The point is that "pulling down" would have been the terminology and mental image in the person's mind, and explosives would have replaced the tractor/truck/something-with-a-lot-of-torque in their phrasing. Of course, I am merely speculating, but I do this all the time with computer-related terms. I have been known to use "band-width" to describe how much time I have to devote to a project.

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

Similarily, it would have saved alot of bother if he'd just said "demolish the building".

But he didn't (well, not unless you're a particular 'truther' who swears he saw programme in which apparently LS did explicitly say they demolished the building. But that 'truther' is in his own little world. Literally.)

So, all we're left with is weighing up the probabilities:

He's discussing the firefighting operation and the loss of life and explains that this informed their decision to cease operations, and then they watched the building collapse.

Or

He's inadvertently admitting to instructing (parties unknown or the FDNY) to somehow demolish a badly damaged building which had been on fire for a long time, by sending in some brave demo experts with explosives (the silent type) who manage to carry out the CD in order to save further loss of life, and yet they don't want anyone to know about this brave act of humanity because........................ I kinda run out of ideas at this point.

Yeah, I have trouble with that meself... MAYBE the Demo Experts were 'SUPERdemo Experts' by night, and mild-mannered reporters by day and did not wish to compromise their secret identities?

 

[SatansMaleVoiceChoir]

Sorry, I wasn't clear there. The point is that "pulling down" would have been the terminology and mental image in the person's mind, and explosives would have replaced the tractor/truck/something-with-a-lot-of-torque in their phrasing. Of course, I am merely speculating, but I do this all the time with computer-related terms. I have been known to use "band-width" to describe how much time I have to devote to a project.

I'm with you. I didn't ask him why he used that terminology (was too stunned at the time, and we were on a smoke break and it would have taken to long to explain the whole 'pull it' thing to him), and he will have forgotten the details of the coversation by now. What you say is plausible.

 

[Confuseling]

Lest we forget, we don't know what time that conversation occurred. There's no reason he couldn't have meant "pull it down", with explosives or cables, quite innocently.

The simply fact of the matter is that the firefighters didn't have any certainty that the building would collapse, especially not completely. They would have authorized a demolition effort for the remains, and only happenstance prevented them from having to put it into effect. The meaning could well have been something along the lines of:

"I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, 'We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it down - demolish it.' And they made that decision to pull it down - to demolish it - and we watched the building collapse of its own accord."

If that's a smoking gun then I'm a died in the wool neocon.

 

[Apollo20]

Well, here's my 5 cents on this:

I think we need to look at the whole quote by LS:

"I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, 'We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.' And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse."

So here we have the LOGICAL sequence:

1. That the fire could not be contained.
2. That LS thought it was time to "pull it".
3. A decision was made to "pull it".
4. The building collapsed.

Now what I see here is that the "pulling" RESULTED in the collapse. The word "and" in the phrase "they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse" logically connects the decision to pull with the observed collapse.

Cause (pull it) -> Effect (collapse)

LS did NOT say: "We made the decision to pull, THEN the building collapsed.

In fact LS expresses no surprise that the building collapsed after the decision to pull (it). He did NOT say: "We made the decision to pull and to our surprise the building collapsed." Nor does he say: "We made the decision to pull, to let the fire burn itself out, but the building suddenly collapsed." No! LS makes it clear that the building collapsed because of the decision to "pull".

And one final point: if I was building a "command bunker" to deal with a potential terrorist threat I would definitely consider incorporating a "self-destruct" mechanism. The military do this all the time.........

Edited to add: Interestingly LS refers to the loss of life on that day. In LS's mind "pulling" WTC 7 was done to save lives. However, I believe there was nobody in WTC 7 at the time LS spoke to the fire commander. The fire commander presumably knew this, but did not correct LS; thus the fire commander knew what LS meant by "pull it."

 

[uk_dave]

In fact LS expresses no surprise that the building collapsed after the decision to pull (it). He did NOT say: "We made the decision to pull and to our surprise the building collapsed." Nor does he say: "We made the decision to pull, to let the fire burn itself out, but the building suddenly collapsed." No! LS makes it clear that the building collapsed because of the decision to "pull".

So what came before the infamous quote? What were they talking about? Could it have been WTC7 and it's collapse?
So why is LS to be expected to express any surprise in a conversation where the premise that the building collapsed has already been established and he is explaining that the reason it collapsed was that they pulled the firefighting operation and let the fires burn?

And one final point: if I was building a "command bunker" to deal with a potential terrorist threat I would definitely consider incorporating a "self-destruct" mechanism.

Yeah, you would.

The military do this all the time.........

Source? I'm sure employees at these military installations would be interested to know that a 'self destruct' mechanism has been in place for a number of years.

"Don't drill into the wall there!!!!"

OOOOPS

 

[uk_dave]

Edited to add: Interestingly LS refers to the loss of life on that day. In LS's mind "pulling" WTC 7 was done to save lives. However, I beleive there was nobody in WTC 7 at the time LS spoke to the fire commander.

Interestingly you've become new and improved and self debunking.

Since there was no one in wtc7 at the time of the discussion his comment about saving lives couldn't have referred to demolition of the building (no lives to save) so it must have referred to pulling any proposed attempt at fighting the fires which would have put lives in danger (lives saved).

 

[DC]

Well, here's my 5 cents on this:

I think we need to look at the whole quote by LS:

"I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, 'We've had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.' And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse."

So here we have the LOGICAL sequence:

1. That the fire could not be contained.
2. That LS thought it was time to "pull it".
3. A decision was made to "pull it".
4. The building collapsed.

Now what I see here is that the "pulling" RESULTED in the collapse. The word "and" in the phrase "they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse" logically connects the decision to pull with the observed collapse.

Cause (pull it) -> Effect (collapse)

LS did NOT say: "We made the decision to pull, THEN the building collapsed.

In fact LS expresses no surprise that the building collapsed after the decision to pull (it). He did NOT say: "We made the decision to pull and to our surprise the building collapsed." Nor does he say: "We made the decision to pull, to let the fire burn itself out, but the building suddenly collapsed." No! LS makes it clear that the building collapsed because of the decision to "pull".

And one final point: if I was building a "command bunker" to deal with a potential terrorist threat I would definitely consider incorporating a "self-destruct" mechanism. The military do this all the time.........

Edited to add: Interestingly LS refers to the loss of life on that day. In LS's mind "pulling" WTC 7 was done to save lives. However, I believe there was nobody in WTC 7 at the time LS spoke to the fire commander. The fire commander presumably knew this, but did not correct LS; thus the fire commander knew what LS meant by "pull it."

i think i agree, while on the other hand, would that count as evidence in a trial? it is very hard to prove what he really ment, and after all he still can say, he missspoke or ment pull it (the firefigther batallion) for example

the only thing about that quote that is really wondering me, why did Popular Mechanics claim they asked all the major demolition companies and non of them was aware of the term pull it? while a major if not the biggest demolition comp sayd " we are ready to pull building 6" (with cables)

 

[DC]

Interestingly you've become new and improved and self debunking.

Since there was no one in wtc7 at the time of the discussion his comment about saving lives couldn't have referred to demolition of the building (no lives to save) so it must have referred to pulling any proposed attempt at fighting the fires which would have put lives in danger (lives saved).

one sided damage and asymetrical uncontrolled fires, i think the chances that the building could topple over was given.

 

[kosai]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WYdAJQV100

Pull It!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCV5yGKWjv4

Push It!!