McVeigh may be a terrorist of sorts, but IMHO I do not see a possibility that his overglorified firecracker did the damage that they are proclaiming to the OKC Federal Building.
Neither U-Haul or Ryder trucks are air-tight nor do they have the structural integrity to be set up as shaped charges. The media is to have us believe that a low grade fertilizer bomb outside a building was able to cause said building to partially collapse.
Without shaping the charge to cause the blast to send the shockwave to a specific area, all that McVeigh had was an overglorified firecracker.
A prime example, take gunpowder and put it in a lightly sealed can with air pockets and your effect would be a loud *boom* followed by a mild concussion. Even if you were to place this right next to a building, the effect would be a scorch mark on the building and the high possibility that glass would be shattered in the building and nearby buildings.
Take the same gunpowder and put it in a can, compress it, shape the area of effect toward the wall of the building, and you will more than likely knock a portion of the wall down.
I am aware that gunpowder does not have the devestating effect that ammonium nitrate explosives do, however the theories of the explosives remain the same.
The media would have us believe that the truck did all the damage, and in all honesty could have, if the truck was located in the parking garage near a support beam, or even better between two support beams, the enclosed area of the garage could have held the shockwave and multiplied the force to the extent that it could have knocked out 2-4 support beams... That effect would have been similar to the Empire State Building bombing of a few years back.
When a company is hired to demolish a building, look at the number of shaped charges required to cause the damage. They have to be placed exactly, or the effect will not be accomplished.
Did anyone else notice that right before McVeigh caused such an uproar that the US Government was attempting to pass an "anti-terrorist bill?" Or for that matter, when the government was attemptint to pass a stricter gun law, a guy drove from California to the White House in record time and took pot shots with an SKS?
Did anyone also notice that for something that was supposedly so well planned by McVeigh that his primary targets were not even in the building at the time? The whole ATF staff was away on "training" and all that were left in the building were a few federal workers and quite a few civilian employees?
I agree that many will see McVeigh as a martyr for their cause, which is to fight back at the Government that has done so much to them, either indirectly or directly. There will be a rash of copy-cat, as well as a rash of injuries and accidents by children attempting to make something so unstble as fertilizer explosives. When the children make a fertilizer bomb, more than likely in the pipe bomb variety and take it to school, McVeigh will not be blamed for it by the media, the Internet and games will be blamed, as is common when children commit a crime.
I am not saying that this is not a tradegy, nor am I saying that McVeigh did not have the intentions of causing mass destruction and killing numerous people. What I am saying is that even with his "accomplice," Terry Nichols, they did not have the force required in the detonation to cause the amount of destruction rendered unless they had more members in their party, and said other members had inside access to plant shaped C-4 or semtex charges directly to the concrete and steel support beams...
Flames on my opinion are gladly accepted and readily ignored
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