These
are the golden days for conspiracy theorists. If you believed your government
was spying on you, Edward Snowden’s revelations have shown you’re probably
right. WikiLeaks and Bradley Manning laid bare a world in which the authorities
routinely do one thing and say another. You may be paranoid, but they’re still
out to get you — or at least to detain you at Heathrow Airport for questioning.
Now,
just a week after the 16 years since a Mercedes plowed into a pillar in the
Pont de l’Alma tunnel on August 31, 1997, depriving Britain of her People’s
Princess and the young royals William and Harry of their mother, along comes a
fresh allegation in the story that has generated more conspiracy theories than
any other.
Scotland
Yard announced that it is “scoping” new information about the Paris car crash
that killed Diana, Princess of Wales and patron saint of conspiracy theorists.
The claim surfaced during the trial of a member of Britain’s elite and
secretive SAS army regiment; according to some reports, the estranged in-laws
of a key witness told the military police that the witness had alleged SAS
involvement in Diana’s death.
The
circumstances of that death, though, have been exhaustively investigated, by
the authorities in France and the U.K., most recently in the 90-day inquest at
London’s Royal Courts of Justice that reached the conclusion in April 2008 that
the Princess and her boyfriend Dodi Fayed had been “unlawfully killed.” The
verdict highlighted the “gross negligence” of the driver Henri Paul, who died
at the wheel and was found to have blood alcohol three times above the French
legal limit, and of the paparazzi, whose reckless pursuit of the couple sparked
the high-speed chase that ended in tragedy.
A
quick internet search reveals a plethora of sites devoted to “exposing” Diana’s
murder. A large and vociferous online community remains convinced, despite
evidence to the contrary presented to the inquest, that the Queen’s former daughter-in-law
was pregnant with Fayed’s child, provoking nebulous rings of vested interest at
the heart of the British establishment into ordering her assassination to
protect the monarchy. The more lurid versions of the tale claim the crash
itself never happened (the Mercedes was dented in a car crusher; the Princess
hijacked in the tunnel, forced into a vehicle masquerading as an ambulance and
slaughtered). A surprisingly persistent meme depicts Diana as the victim of
giant shape-shifting lizards that secretly control Britain. There are queries
raised too about how and when a white Fiat Uno came into contact with the
Mercedes, leaving paint traces, or whether Paul’s blood toxicology tallies with
what is known of his last movements and usual habits, or why Diana’s seat belt
was found not to work.
These
queries seem sensible enough, and if we’ve learned anything from the
whistle-blowers, hackers and leakers, it’s that the authorities don’t always
tell the truth. But we knew that already. We may be in greater danger of
forgetting that the authorities often do tell the truth too. Sometimes things
are exactly as they seem: President Obama was born in Hawaii and Diana died in
an accident, a victim not of unseen malefactors but of a collision between her
desire for a private life and public fascination with her private life.
Scotland
Yard — itself seeking to restore public trust after the twin blows of the News
Corp phone-hacking scandal and the Jimmy Savile sex-abuse revelations revealed
its tendency to protect the establishment rather than question it — has no
choice but to evaluate the information it has received. To fail to do so would
spark new conspiracies. Yet to divert more taxpayer money into a new inquiry
also risks criticism. Hence the Yard’s carefully worded statement, which made
clear: “This is not a reinvestigation.” Die-hard Diana conspiracists will be
disappointed. They will always be disappointed.
Weight
for me soon. Paul
For more information on Paul Lambis, and to order his book online,
visit www.paul-lambis.com
No comments:
Post a Comment