Apostate prophet reflects on Quran structure; Did Uthman decide placement of sura Tawba?

In answer to the video "Who (Really) Wrote The Quran?"

When Islam spread to territories where the people hadnt yet received an oral transmission of the Quran, but only the script, they were confused on the proper pronouciation of the words. The basic nature of the early script, especially the lack of headings or separations between the suras, could have most probably been the reason for some people to have confused the beginning and ending of certain suras.

There are for instance 2 reports attributed to Abu Ubaid and Aisha, reports that are deemed unauthentic and unreliable by hadith scholars, on sura Ahzab. In one report the person argues that there was a time when sura Ahzab, which currently counts 73 verses was similary in length to surah Baqarah which now has 286 verses. Some people thought that al ahzab and others were longer than they actually were. This could easily be explained by the fact that both al ahzab and al baqara were revealed in Medina. But sura Baqara was revealed over 10 years and so it could have been that at the time the comment was made on sura Ahzab's length, al baqara was also around 70 verses in length until a time came where it became longer. Assuming for argument's sake that al Ahzab did count 200+ verses, one would have to explain the intricate internal coherence of this short sura as we have it today. It has no inappropriate gaps, no discordant passages or unexplanable blanks the likes of which one would expect finding in a sura out of which a chunk of 200 verses was taken away, leaving only a mere 70. Even if we forget the issues regarding this hadith's authenticity, this misunderstanding could have been due to the basic early Quranic script as noted before, with no seperations between verses and suras.

Similarily some companions were unsure whether sura tawba/bara'a and sura anfal, the one preceding it, were one and the same sura. Hence the famous absence in today's Quran, of the opening formula from sura tawba, the bismilla

"What is your reasoning with Surah Al Anfal, which has less than a hundred verses, and Surah At-Tawbah, which has more than a hundred verses, yet you put them together without writing in the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful between them and you placed them with the seven long surahs. Why did you do that? Uthman said: Al-Anfal was among the first to be revealed in Medina and At-Tawbah was among the last of those revealed of the Quran and their discussions resemble each other, so we thought that they were part of each other. Then the Messenger of Allah died and it was not clear to us if they were part of each other. For this reason, we put them together without writing in the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful and we included them with the seven long surahs".

Even a superficial reading of that report reveals the inconsistencies. Uthman himself in that hadith states that Anfal and Tawba/Bara'a were revealed on different occasions, meaning he knew they were seperate. In addition the prophet never said they were a single unit. He recited on several occasions sura Tawba on its own. His companions prior to Uthman's compilation, treated sura tawba as a seperate sura

“I entered the mosque on a Friday when Muhammad was delivering the sermon. I went and sat near Ubayy. The Prophet recited Surah Bara’ah/tawba.” "Umar ibn Khattab had written the directive: “Learn Surah Bara’ah and teach your women Surah Nur.”

Further ibn Abbas states that the companions divided the Quran into 7 portions, composed of 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13 suras and then the last portion which extends from the mufassal to the end. This grouping can only be correct if anfal and tawba are seperate. All these facts, as well as the suspicion on the personality of 'Awf or of Yazid al Farisi who is the sole narrator from ibn Abbas, make it highly unlikely that Uthman was unsure about the seperation between anfal and tawba.