Larger 9/11

[Ricardolindo]

As there was a thread asking if 9/11 hadn't happened, https://forum.sealionpress.co.uk/index.php?threads/the-2000s-without-9-11.5484/, I ask the opposite: What if 9/11 had been larger?
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plann...1_attacks#Origins_of_the_September_11_attacks: "According to the 9/11 Commission, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed envisioned hijacking twelve airplanes on both the East and West coasts, and for eleven of them to crash into the World Trade Center and the Empire State Building in New York City; The Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia; the Prudential Tower in Boston, Massachusetts; the White House and the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.; the Willis Tower (then Sears Tower) in Chicago, Illinois; the U.S. Bank Tower (then Library Tower) in Los Angeles, California; the Transamerica Pyramid in San Francisco, California; and the Columbia Center in Seattle, Washington.[13][14] Nothing came of the idea at the time, however, as bin Laden rejected the plan as being too elaborate.[5][9]"
What if Bin Laden had accepted the plan? The problem is that such a larger plan would have been easier for the authorities to find out but if it succeeded, what would have been the effects? Americans would have been even angrier than in our timeline. Would nukes have been used in Afghanistan in such a scenario?
Also, what about a worldwide attack? https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/dbwi-more-limited-9-11.414273/ is a double blind what-if thread at alternatehistory.com discussing that. In that scenario, even Mongolia is targeted in order to avenge the Siege of Baghdad in 1258. However, as pointed out in that thread, in such a scenario, with multiple world class intelligence agencies involved, I don't see how the plan wouldn't have been found out.

 

[Ricardolindo]

As there was a thread asking if 9/11 hadn't happened, https://forum.sealionpress.co.uk/index.php?threads/the-2000s-without-9-11.5484/, I ask the opposite: What if 9/11 had been larger?
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plann...1_attacks#Origins_of_the_September_11_attacks: "According to the 9/11 Commission, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed envisioned hijacking twelve airplanes on both the East and West coasts, and for eleven of them to crash into the World Trade Center and the Empire State Building in New York City; The Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia; the Prudential Tower in Boston, Massachusetts; the White House and the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.; the Willis Tower (then Sears Tower) in Chicago, Illinois; the U.S. Bank Tower (then Library Tower) in Los Angeles, California; the Transamerica Pyramid in San Francisco, California; and the Columbia Center in Seattle, Washington.[13][14] Nothing came of the idea at the time, however, as bin Laden rejected the plan as being too elaborate.[5][9]"
What if Bin Laden had accepted the plan? The problem is that such a larger plan would have been easier for the authorities to find out but if it succeeded, what would have been the effects? Americans would have been even angrier than in our timeline. Would nukes have been used in Afghanistan in such a scenario?
Also, what about a worldwide attack? https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/dbwi-more-limited-9-11.414273/ is a double blind what-if thread at alternatehistory.com discussing that. In that scenario, even Mongolia is targeted in order to avenge the Siege of Baghdad in 1258. However, as pointed out in that thread, in such a scenario, with multiple world class intelligence agencies involved, I don't see how the plan wouldn't have been found out.

So, does anyone have any thoughts on this?

 

[SinghSong]

Remembering how things went back on 9/11, you'd basically be 'tossing a coin' for 4/5 at most of those planes to hit their targets, in any potential order, before all of the others would've been evacuated at the very least, and all of the remaining planes (still controlled by the hijackers) would've gotten shot down. Which itself could lead to greater recriminations and anger against the American authorities, especially if the 4/5 planes which reach their targets don't manage to inflict as many fatalities as they did IOTL. How would Americans feel if its own military, forced to shoot the remainder of the hijacked planes out of the sky, wound up chalking up a higher death toll directly than the terrorist attacks themselves did? With the scale of the attack being so much larger, there's an increased chance that one or two of the hijacker teams gets stopped by security without even managing to board their flights at all (and/or that the first couple of attacks take place, with all air traffic getting grounded, before the last few planes earmarked to get hijacked even manage to take off). As well as an exponentially greater risk of the passengers aboard the hijacked planes fighting back, and overwhelming the hijackers, the more targets Al-Qaeda goes after and the longer that it'll take to hit them all, resulting in more 'Flight 93s'.

Also worth mentioning- the greater the scale of the attack relative to OTL's 9/11, if it does still happen, the greater the traction that TTL's 9/11 conspiracy theories are going to get, and the greater the cultural impact that they'll have. The culture of America succeeding the attacks is noted for heightened security and an increased demand thereof, as well as paranoia, anxiety and xenophobia, particularly regarding future terrorist attacks. Enough to get the Tea Party movement taking over the Republican Party, and effectively become 'pre-Trump MAGA'? Who knows? Psychologists also confirmed a greatly increased amount of national anxiety in commercial air travel (which would be at least 2-3x as bad ITTL, potentially killing off the US airline industry altogether, and threatening several commercial airlines across the globe). Whilst Islamophobic hate crimes rose nearly ten-fold in 2001 and have subsequently remained "roughly five times higher than the pre-9/11 rate" (and would likely rise even further ITTL, proportionate to the scale of the attacks ITTL relative to OTL). How much worse would Americans' levels of hatred, directed towards Muslims and Arabs especially, but affecting all Asians in general, rise to become ITTL? And how might this affect foreign policies, relative to OTL?

 

[Kimkatya]

Real upbeat question this one, huh?

 

[JesterBL]

I actually think a larger 9/11 will produce less conspiracy theories, personally, and that conspiracy theories about it will be less respectable than IOTL.

 

[SinghSong]

I actually think a larger 9/11 will produce less conspiracy theories, personally, and that conspiracy theories about it will be less respectable than IOTL.

Wouldn't an even larger 9/11 lead to even more people being inclined to believe that the conspiracists' argument that "the people with power must have either known about it beforehand and just let it happen, or conspired to make it happen in the first place, otherwise there's no way such a massive and co-ordinated terrorist attack could have happened"?

 

[History Learner]

So, does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Not the exact scenario you outlined, but on the day of the historical attack the Australian PM was due to give remarks before both chambers of Congress, the Supreme Court, and most of the Bush Administration's senior figures; Bush himself was in Florida, obviously, so a sucessful hit on the building would've decapitated pretty much the entire Federal Government sans the President and maybe a few others. Likewise in this vein, on an average day the WTC Towers had about 50,000 people in them, peak usually being around 11 AM IIRC. Had the attackers waited a few more hours, you easily would've had a five digit death toll, especially if they had hit lower on the buildings.

 

[JesterBL]

Wouldn't an even larger 9/11 lead to even more people being inclined to believe that the conspiracists' argument that "the people with power must have either known about it beforehand and just let it happen, or conspired to make it happen in the first place, otherwise there's no way such a massive and co-ordinated terrorist attack could have happened"?

I tend to think the opposite- 9/11 conspiracies focus a lot on the flights that missed (and on the relative lack of damage to the Pentagon). If you have a 9/11 that has a much larger and real impact than OTL's I think that there will be less conspiratorial thinking around it happening and people will be much less likely to entertain any conspiracies.

 

[Ricardolindo]

I actually think a larger 9/11 will produce less conspiracy theories, personally, and that conspiracy theories about it will be less respectable than IOTL.

Wouldn't an even larger 9/11 lead to even more people being inclined to believe that the conspiracists' argument that "the people with power must have either known about it beforehand and just let it happen, or conspired to make it happen in the first place, otherwise there's no way such a massive and co-ordinated terrorist attack could have happened"?

I tend to think the opposite- 9/11 conspiracies focus a lot on the flights that missed (and on the relative lack of damage to the Pentagon). If you have a 9/11 that has a much larger and real impact than OTL's I think that there will be less conspiratorial thinking around it happening and people will be much less likely to entertain any conspiracies.

It depends on exactly how large it is. If it's a global 9/11 on the scale that the Double Blind What-If thread proposed, I don't see how conspiracy theories wouldn't be the average belief. How could such a massive worldwide attack, with even Mongolia targeted, have been orchestrated without the support of at least one major state?

 

[Arthur_Phuxache]

So, does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Because of the US timezones, the element of surprise would have been shattered by the attacks on the WTC/Pentagon/Capitol/Whitehouse etc, and the errant aircraft would have to be hijacked in the very early morning, and then be flown into largely empty buildings whilst evading interception/ramming by USAF aircraft, or Flight 93-style passenger fightback.

As @History Learner says, just shifting the attack plan forward by two hours would dramatically increase the death toll of the existing attacks.

It would be nigh-on impossible to fly hijacked aircraft during the ground stop without being tracked, as all aircraft still airborne/nordo would be regarded as hostile.

Some airliners might be destroyed by accident by awakened air defences.

Also, conspiracies get leakier as they grow in size, and the FBI would get more interested as their information grew.

I think the maximum you could realistically hope for is six successful attacks on the Eastern seaboard, between 08:45am and 11:00am.

There's no shortage of alternate targets in New York City for aircraft hijacked from Newark, Logan etc, even just in Lower Manhattan.

Destroying the UN building would paralyse the world's reaction to the attack, to a limited extent.

 

[SinghSong]

I tend to think the opposite- 9/11 conspiracies focus a lot on the flights that missed (and on the relative lack of damage to the Pentagon). If you have a 9/11 that has a much larger and real impact than OTL's I think that there will be less conspiratorial thinking around it happening and people will be much less likely to entertain any conspiracies.

Well, ITTL, you'd almost certainly have had several more flights that missed, rather than just Flight 93; which would boost even that aspect of the 9/11 conspiracies. Like I said, it'd probably be a toss-up to see which 4-5 planes at most hit their targets- and unlike IOTL, where Flight 93 didn't actually get shot down by a fighter jet or SAM, with the 9/11 conspiracies you're referring to focusing predominantly upon how Flight 93 allegedly did get shit down, you'd almost certainly have any and all of the remaining hijacked planes which are still en-route to their targets an hour or so after the second successful attack getting shot out of the sky by the US military. And ITTL, the US government would be most likely to openly admit this to the American people, to increase faith in national security and the general population's faith in the protection offered by the US military; thus taking the wind out of the sails of any such conspiracy theories about the flights that missed ITTL.

Also worth mentioning though, the larger/much larger scale of 9/11 ITTL would also being likely to result in an even greater shift towards militarism, revanchism and far-right extremism in the USA. How much larger do you lot reckon 9/11 would have to be, for the USA to make the decision to break diplomatic ties with, or potentially even go to war with, Saudi Arabia (whose agents like Omar al-Bayoumi would inevitably have had to provide even greater fiscal and logistical support to Osama bin Laden and TTL's 9/11 hijackers, including making the arrangements to provide them with temporary accommodation in the US, to pull it off- meaning that, while "there is a 50/50 chance al-Bayoumi had advanced knowledge the 9/11 attacks were to occur" IOTL, according to a report declassified by the FBI in March this year, it'd be more like a 90-99% chance ITTL), rather than just Afghanistan as IOTL? And what'd be the geopolitical repercussions if they did?

 

[Ricardolindo]

Because of the US timezones, the element of surprise would have been shattered by the attacks on the WTC/Pentagon/Capitol/Whitehouse etc, and the errant aircraft would have to be hijacked in the very early morning, and then be flown into largely empty buildings whilst evading interception/ramming by USAF aircraft, or Flight 93-style passenger fightback.

Couldn't it have worked if they hijacked the airplanes simultaneously hours later than in our timeline with people on both the East Coast and the West Coast being awake?

 

[TruthOfAngels]

Couldn't it have worked if they hijacked the airplanes simultaneously hours later than in our timeline with people on both the East Coast and the West Coast being awake?

Very difficult to arrange, as public transport doesn’t necessarily depart at the time it’s supposed to, and planes aren’t any less susceptible to this than, say, trains. The fourth bomber in the UK 7/7 bombings blew up a bus because the train he was originally going to board wasn’t running, for example.

Trains are evil, is what I’m sa- [BANNED]