Columbia disaster: bring on the conspiracy theories
The loss of the space shuttle Columbia and the tragic deaths of the crew of seven will have less impact than the Challenger disaster in 1986. I remember very well how the loss of Challenger, dramatically exploding just after takeoff, by some Americans was compared to the JFK assasination. It was one of those events that everybody could remember for ever where they were, and what they were doing, at the time when they first heard about it.
 Post 9/11, it takes more. While the loss of Columbia may continue to dominate the news for some days, maybe weeks, the word is already out that this should be a signal to move on. CBSNews summed up the comments on its message boards by saying "By far the most common sentiment our writers expressed is that the space program ought to go on, despite the losses."
And while every disaster that hits America is the subject of countless conspiracy theories and speculations, I think the loss of Columbia would have passed into obscurity in the annals of conspiracy theories if it wasn't for one very crucial fact: this was the first space flight ever by an Israeli astronaut, Colonel Ilan Ramon. Everything Israeli and Jewish attracts conspiracy theorists like flies to honey.
Some theorists have already pointed out some remarkable coincidences. The US is, or so it appears, at the brink of war with Iraq. The close US-Israeli relationship is at least at the core of Arab tension with the US over the Iraq question, and very possibly a major reason why the US wants to intervene in the first place.
Immediate popular reaction in Baghdad on Saturday to the loss of the U.S. space shuttle Columbia and its seven-member crew -- including the first Israeli in space -- was that it was God's retribution.
Reuters just reported the Iraqi reaction to the disaster, and to nobody's surprise it was gleeful and tasteless:
""We are happy that it broke up," government employee Abdul Jabbar al-Quraishi said.
"God wants to show that his might is greater than the Americans. They have encroached on our country. God is avenging us," he said."
 However, Iraq has not even been able to shoot down a single manned coalition aircraft that has been patrolling the northern and southern "no fly zones" in its own country for years, dispite having fired at them countless times. To target the returning space shuttle, 200,000 feet above Texas, is beyond any weapon known to be possessed by any nation on Earth, with the possible exception of the US itself. It is surely beyond the capabilities of Iraq or Al Qaeda. If there is any speculation that this was an act of terror, which is denied by all officials, it would have to be sabotage.
While it is extremely unlikely at this stage that the break-up of the oldest space shuttle, first launched in 1981, is anything but a technological mishap, this shuttle flight in particular, at this time, would have been a very obvious target for terrorists. And that is all the "evidence" conspiracy theorists will need.
The components are already there. Just pick and mix, add credulity, and you can have your own post-shuttle conspiracy theory. Serve lukewarm.
In the 1980s, while the world was still tolerant to Saddam Hussein's outragousness, Israel was deeply concerned about Iraq building a nuclear reactor at Osirak Colonel Ilan Ramon, who later should become Israel's first astronaut and who tragically died yesterday, was the youngest of eight pilots who participated in the daring 1981 Israeli air strike that devastated the reactor and no doubt is a major reason that Saddam Hussein does not have nukes today.
Also, the Columbia disintegrated and fell down over Texas, the home state of President Bush, the main personal force behind the drive to oust Saddam Hussein.
Naturally, there is enough material just in the above to drive conspiracy nuts for days.
There is more, of course.
Vought Aircraft Industries, owned by the Carlyle Group, made heat tiles for the shuttle . Underreported but still widely known: the Bush family and a serious number of major conservative officials, like former US secretary of state James Baker and former UK prime minster John Major, are signed up to promote the Carlycle group and its powerful clients.
Under executive orders, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which from March 1 will sort under Tom Ridge, the new Homeland Security secretary, is coordinating the federal side of the response to this tragedy. Expect to see Ridge and the word "cover-up" in lots of conspiracy theory texts in the future.
And, perhaps for the first time, blogs may be prominent in news coverage of a major disaster. Look at this perfect parody of an alleged Arab protest in Charles Johnson's little green footballs blog. The parody, written at the time of Columbia's launch, has Arabs protesting Col. Ramon's presence in space:
"This is surely but the first step towards complete and outright illegal Zionist occupation of space," said Arab League spokesman Abr Souffla. "We will not sit idly by and permit this usurpation of a cosmos that by birthright belongs to the Palestinian people and their Arab and Muslim brethren."
And, in a line that could be interpreted as strangely prophetic, if you really believe in conspiracies, the piece continues:
"In Gaza City today, thousands of Palestinians marched in the streets, many firing weapons into the air. "With our blood and our souls, we will strike the orbital Zionists," chanted the protestors. Sheikh Yermani-Makr, appearing on Palestinian television, said, "It is not enough that the unbelievers have come on our land, but now they also take our heavens? How can this be permitted?""
This parody received much attention after the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz picked up the story a few days later and reprinted it, apparently thinking it was real.
Fact and fiction often makes strange bedfellows.
1:10:45 PM 
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