Thank you for all these responses. It will help to improve the paper under discussion.
The focus in the paper is clearly on the evidence of events at Canary Wharf, and two points of differece on train times and what happened to the four men after the tube trains exploded. Daniel Obachike is not the focus of the paper and is introduced only to provide evidence that Peter Power's account is contested (more below). In any attempt at advancing knowledge, it will be the case that points are challenged and clarifications will be achieved through dialogue with other people so I'm grateful to people for reading the paper and identifying new arguments that can be considered in producing a new version next year.
You advanced the theory that the four bombers were part of Power's "exercise," but the only corroboration you offered that it was
not desk/office-based was Obachike's claims. You therefore have no corroboration. This is quite apart from the fact that if it
did involve people on the ground, why is there no other witness or documentary evidence to back that up?
As to the question of what I believe - I have no firm view yet other than that the official account does not make sense. The fact that men may have been attacked or shot at Canary Wharf does not mean that these are the four men who were blamed for the tube explosions (nor does the paper claim this). It does point out, however, that John Hill's theory is better able to account for something that no other theory of 7th July is able to explain. This being the case, due consideration should be given to this alternative theory. The paper advances the debate by providing all the newspaper / blog / discussion forum references to the shootings that it was possible to find with the resources available to me. These references do not support the official government account. That's not a controversial statement, in my view. As a result, a different account of the day is required.
Nobody is disputing that the newspaper, blog, etc. reports exist; what is disputed is that they are true, rather than merely wild rumour. Thousands of people work at Canary Wharf, yet no-one has subsequently come forward as an eye-witness. There has been no leak from within the security services. If the men supposedly shot were the bombers, that would mean that the pathologists who carried out the post-mortems on their bodies are lying, along with all the other forensic experts who placed them at the bombing sites. What is more credible? A vast and seemingly water-tight conspiracy, or people just repeating rumours in the heat of the moment, some of which found their way into predominently foreign media in the least position to confirm their veracity?
As for Daniel Obachike, reference to his interview with Alex Jones and his book are provided only to show that Peter Power's account is contested. I make no claim beyond this. Given that it has been raised, it is worth discussing the interview with Alex Jones. In this interview, Obachike provides detailed and specific information on the person he alleges was 'faking' injury. Alex Jones himself says that he and his staff (however controversial or problematic this may be) checked out the story themselves and verified with people involved with the bus that it was singled out on the day for diversion. Daniel Obachike's account is contested - I can point this out in revisions - so there is a question that needs to be answered by all here.
You are just digging yourself deeper. The No. 30 was not the only bus that was diverted; the diversion was a perfectly natural one, given that the No. 30 route would have taken it past the front of Kings Cross station, which at the time had become congested with emergency service vehicles attending it as an access point to the Piccadilly line train. The route the bus took to and through Tavistock Square is a major thoroughfare, with plenty of pedestrian traffic at that time of the morning, not some sleepy side-street. There would have been scores of potential euewitnesses, yet not have reported seeing anything along the lines of Obachike's claims. Alex Jones has an agenda that makes anything he claims effectively worthless.
Why do people believe those who attack Daniel Obachike's account rather than Daniel Obachike's account? Why do people believe Peter Power (who has a career advantage in manipulating the media) over other witnesses (who have no experience of manipulating the media). These are pertinent questions.
Is this a case of believing who you want to believe to avoid the dissonance created by a controversial account or theory? Researchers are aware of the impact of 'cognitive dissonance' (indeed, I discuss the effects of cognitive dissonance with new researchers). It is the psychological process by which all people (including researchers) reduce their distress by accepting false accounts. It enables them to avoid examining controversial or contradictory evidence.
You might also wish to aquaint yourself with the concept of "lying". Obachike not only could not have made the journey he claims that would have resulted in him being on the No. 30 bus, but the very fact that he would chose to take that route makes no sense in relation to where he was living.
I've not read Obachike's book, but I have read discussions of his book by those who have read it. Daniel Obachike's book is a publication that captures the material in his internet blog. However imperfect that may be, others who have read the book state clearly that it documents the treatment he received by the police/anti-terrorist authorities after he was found on / near the Tavistock Square bus. He didn't cash in by writing a book straightaway. He started a blog documenting his treatment. After 7 months there were 440,000 people reading his blog (creating the market for a book). This being the case, the book is based on the blog (and retains spelling mistakes etc.). This does not appear to me to be the work of someone who set out to write a book about the 7/7 bombing - it was an accident of history that people were sufficiently interested in what was happening to him to make a book possible.
I don't expect - if it is a blog - for it to be an accurate detailed history. It does, however, provide clear evidence that there is a challenge to the official account of the fourth bomb. Nor is this the only evidence. The J7 web-site details another woman who refused to confirm there was only one bomb. She maintained there were two. (She was later found dead, allegedly committed 'suicide'). There is sufficient evidence, from more than one source, to question the official account of what occured at Tavistock Square, nor is Daniel Obachike the only person claiming that planted 'witnesses' were talking to the media. Further examples are available at J7 (based on YouTube video footage) of people talking about events, and their injuries, before people from the tube network had time to reach the surface.
I would suggest that you actually read Obachike's book before you continue to defend his claims. That fact that he IDed an actual Russell Square victim as his Tavistock Square "actor" does not make it true. Obachike has also presented what he claims is CCTV footage of himself in Tavistock Square to "prove" that he was there minutes after the explosion, even though close examination of that footage shows that it was shot at least an hour
after he says he left the area.
I presume that the woman you are referring to is Richmal Oates-Whitehead, the New Zealand-born fantasist who fabricated medical qualifications to get a job with the BMA, and died of a natural cause a few weeks after 7/7:
New Zealand Herald: The colourful life and sad death of a fabulist
The Guardian: The fantasy life and lonely death of woman hailed as heroine of July 7 bombing
Clearly not the most credible of witnesses.
I am open to revising the paper for next year's classes based on the conversations we have here, providing the information provided can checks out (in the same way that John Hill's account was not presented in a paper until it too had checked out against the sources used).
A note on sources. The idea that some sources are 'credible' and some are not is the argument of a partisan person who is not interested in the truth. Whatever account is given, there is a reason for it. A good social scientist, particularly one writing from a critical perspective, does not dismiss a person's account without evidence, and does not dismiss a person's account if part of it turns out to be untrue. The BBC documentary can be seen in the same light. Even though it contains statements that are problematic - it was made to serve a purpose and contains some useful information not available elsewhere. It was produced for a reason, in a particular political context (i.e. the sending of 7/7 Ripple Effect to a judge in a court case about 7/7). The political/social reasons for producing misleading accounts can be as interesting as the reasons for providing a 'truthful' one.
Those in this thread, therefore, who are not interested in false statements are not social scientists. They are using natural science logic which should be rejected when dealing with issues of social science. Natural science logic is not helpful in seeking to understand accounts of events that serve various social or political purposes. These purposes are discussed in the paper and the 'bias' (if this is the term you prefer) of both documentaries is assessed and drawn to the attention of the reader.
Why some people chose to lie is, of course, interesting, but that does not mean that their claims should be treated with anything other than the contempt they deserve. A witness may be mistake by confusion, what they actually saw, etc., but if they make multiple claims of events and actions that are literally impossible, what credibility can be placed on the things they claim that can't be verified or disproved?
