That is the nagging question. Was it disgruntled postal workers? Girl Guides who couldn't make their cookie quotas? Greenpeace feminists with PMS? We will never know for sure.
And to debate which ME terrorist group/freedom fighter blow-me-up/down-for-Islam may have funded the operation is a real head-banger. There are so many of them, they are all crazy and they all end prayers with "Death to Amerika". I note that Iranians have been cutting back on the last phrase ... death to.. etc.. for TV spots. They don't get along with the Taliban and they have a good idea what would otherwise happen to them after seeing the results of the Gulf War.
Which ME states really, really, really do not double deal the States is another hard one to figure. They take the position that they have to placate Islamic extremists, as internally they have more trouble with them than the US does. 100,000 have been lost in Islamic extremist "battles" in Algeria in ten years, Egypt and Syria mount continual suppressions. While taking this mentioned position, Syria, Libya, Iran, Sudan, and Pakistan all support training camps for extremist "soldiers". Is it any wonder they have home grown problems of their own? So if this is a no brainer to figure out, why has the penny not dropped with them?
Now if people in US churches trained vigilante groups that routinely harassed Muslims and middle easterners and chanted "Death to Islam" at the end of every sermon, and sent people into Islamic countries to blow up Mosques and public buildings, I could see their attitude. Can you see us doing that? To have them say that this is tied to Israel and support of Jewish settlement policies gives them pretty broad scope of self interest, that is at least faintly hypocritical. Given the secular nature of the Palestinian complaints and the degrees of freedom any of these autocratic Islamisists would allow the PLO if they got their mitts on them, it is ludicrous to allow their claims of legitimate struggle of Islamism to have any tie-in to Palestine.
The more rabid of the Islamisists make no bones about making every state in the world Islamic by force, if necessary. There may be moderate Islamics but they have to deal with this disturbing echo of Mohammed's words, where he advocated conquering the non-Islamic nations, or infidels, and "converting them by the sword if necessary." He did say that. But the Islam does not require conversion of Christians, as they are not really infidels according to Islam. They are "people of the book" as the Islam say. So, this admonition of Mohammed's does not really hold. But if the saying is twisted to suit the jingoistic primitive paranoia of a bellicose anti-American Imam, it could well be made a rallying cry for a new generation of very unreasonable enemies. How does one mollify such people? Is it possible? What will it take to turn this movement around, and stop the spread of war with this banner of religious pseudo-purity inflaming the troops to run rampant over the world? It is hard to stop groundswell movements without some hard lessons. It is a tough decision to make but we have to make it. If a people who hate us for whatever reason, are continually opposed, arming to the teeth, supporting attack from within their country with weak excuses about political realities of the ME, it is time to act, and end the threat. If their political leaders cannot stop the threat, then we must. And fast. The ME is degrading in a pool of blood, with or without our help. It's leaders have a tenuous hold on moderation, if you can believe their claims. There is no really stable ME state. They all harbour guerilla extremists who train with weapons of war in plain sight of the state's leaders. Their slogans are all about terror and destruction towards the enemies of their religions which they will have you believe is the west. Every one of these organizations wants to be boss of the ME. They think that an Islamically pure pan-Islamic state would be a fair one to live in. It would be I guess as long as you are on the right side of the gun.
War is war. Conquering is conquering. Religion is not a reason.
We must remember one thing well. The Roman empire could not stop Christianity. It eventually is credited with being a major factor in the crumbling of the edifice. It was that and the Hun's attacking from the north. We had better look at both factors with baleful eye. We are Rome with all its faults and its power. Our Hun with a gun is learning from us as the Hun did then. (The people who fought with Rome had all served in the Roman army.)
Finally though, I don't trust a religious war to conquer all. Crusades have always flagged and failed. War has to have a definite purpose and need in order to succeed. The Muslims do not have that burning need. They have fire, and they have energy. The are the new Hun, the new Mongol, lacking the military organization and technical edge, but with determination, cunning, a will to sacrifice and a technique of attrition of will by terror. But a pattern for conquest they have not, an organization of military dominance they do not possess, nor the wealth to build one.
We piously count rights of retaliation and fret about friends versus targets. So far, even with tragedy at hand we are waffling about what to do. Eventually the penny will drop even for the most Ostrich imitative thinkers. It is inevitable what we must do, if the enemy gives us no choice.
If you had been in that building you would realize the jig was up. If you had seen the jet coming towards you, you would know in one crystal instant, that if you were to survive, that there could be no compromise from then on. We have slept too long.
It is absolutely plain that the ME and its peoples have a multi pronged attack on America. Ten million fundamentalist troops of an extremist sect live amongst us in America. (the Wahabi) Their plan is plainly conquest. Like the French in Quebec, terrorists in their own right, it is victory of the cradle on one side, while their boys throw bombs on the other. Dealing with these people, politically and militarily will be no picnic.
EC<:-} |
