Today is September 11, the anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that left almost 3,000 Americans dead.
I see no reason to commemorate it, beyond the half-mast flag you see here.
For one thing, there are plenty of others who will do that far better than I could, in the most lachrymose prose imaginable. For another, I'd frankly rather save the memorials for after the war, when we're victorious. To me, that would be the best memorial to my fellow countrymen who were murdered on that day. What's more, I believe in my heart of hearts that they would agree.
Frankly, the wreaths, the tears and the sentimental tolling of bells makes me want to scream. We should be working night and day towards destroying the enemy and leave the mourning until later.
I can barely tell you how angry the typical question of the day I hear makes me: `are we safer now than we were five years ago?'
Are we that spoiled and fearful? Have we forgotten our courage that thoroughly?
The real question we should be asking is `are we closer to victory?'
Well, we are and we aren't. It has taken five years - five years - for our president to begin to correctly name the enemy, instead of wallowing along in the flabby and incorrect verbiage of the `war on terror.'
What's more, except in Iraq we are still at the stage just beginning to confront the major objectives in this war, the Islamic states that finance, harbor and nurture jihad terrorism. Hezbollah, al Qaeda, Jemayah Islamiah, Hamas - they all need money, havens and bases to function.
I get quite tired of hearing that `this is a new kind of war' without borders or real enemies. That is, in a word, horse manure. Anyone who pays any attention at all knows exactly where the support network of jihad is located. And exactly where to find our enemies. As Mark Steyn memorably put it, they are hiding in plain sight.
Until we're willing to directly confront the Islamic nations that use groups like these as terrorist proxies and jihad shock troops, we will be no closer to victory in Iraq or anywhere else than we are today.
As long as 9/11 is presented as a mere `terrorist strike' and not as an act of war by the Islamist fascist states and resurgent caliphate Islam on America and the west, its meaning and symbolism are wasted.
President Bush is a decent, principled man in my opinion, but he has failed in one of the primary duties of leadership, which is not only to make policy but to articulate and sell it to the country. Given the unity and yes, the outrage that almost all Americans felt on that day, he refused to harness that energy. He has not put the country on any kind of war footing, mapped out clear objectives or called on his fellow Americans for any kind of sacrifice, whether that meant gas rationing, increased surveillance or a draft. What's more, he has allowed the most outrageous attacks on policy and on our security apparatus to take place by elements of the media and the opposition party without taking any steps to even answer them.
And the Bush Administration has still, after everything that's happened only taken half measures against the export and funding of jihad in America from `allies' of ours like Saudi Arabia or the UAE.
Is it any wonder that a significant portion of the country has gone back to sleep and doubts that we're even in a war?
And yet, it's not all bad, by any means.
Great inroads have been made in shutting down jihadi sources of funding and support, at least in the west.
Countless terorist `operations' have been thwarted, and even as some of them have gotten through our defenses we're not the sitting ducks we were on 9/11. The Bush Administration and our security services have seen to it that we have lived out the last five years without a major strike on our nation, and they deserve a great deal of credit and appreciation for that.
Increasing numbers of people are understanding who are enemy is, even as the voices of some of the clueless elites in the media and on Capitol Hill get louder as the election gets closer...and they are beginning to demand victory, and leadership that will take the fight directly to the enemy.
For all the errors and waste motion in Iraq and Afghanistan, those wars have served two purposes: to kill significant numbers and consume major resources of the enemy and to add a hard edge of battle experience to the best and most deadly military on the face of the earth, fighting in the worst conditions imaginable. The jihadis who may have been under a mistaken impression based on ineffectual cruise missile strikes on aspirin factories in the Sudan or the way our troops were ordered to retreat in Somalia now have a very different impression of the American military. Untie them from some of the ridiculous rules of engagement they've been saddled with and the lesson might be even more profound.
To win this war, we will have to become more focused, more ruthless and more willing to do what it takes to defeat an enemy with whom there is no negotiating. The smoking craters at Ground Zero and the brutally slit throats of the 9/11 stewardesses prove that, if they prove nothing else.
We need to embrace the legacy of General Patton, Stonewall Jackson and Joshua and defend our freedom and our civilization. And if that means the total destruction of our enemies, so be it. Let them be the ones to mourn the day they ever attacked us. Let them light candles and toll bells.
Unlike some of the gloom and doom sentiments that are being expressed in various quarters today, I see victory and triumph for the West in this struggle...provided we are willing to do what's necessary to win it.
And I think we will. The alternatives are simply too plainly inscribed in blood for us to ignore.
And to me, that's the real meaning of 9/11.
7 comments:
I totally understand nazar.
I too get very upset when I see womwn, children, hospitals, power stations destroyed by American and Israeli bombs.
The 'war on terror' has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives since 2001 and it has in fact, strengthened the extremists.
The only way America can be safe is to stop meddling in other countries affairs and restore justice to the the oppressed.
Otherwise these mad mullahs will only get stronger and stronger. They can't be bombed out of existence. Not because they are strong, they are not. But because every bomb recruits another 100 madmen. Iraq has proved this. Before the invasion, it was no terrorist haven, now it is breeding mad extremists with a vengence for America blood.
Hello, Anonymous.
I will take it on faith that you are a patriotic American who loves their country.
So, I have a piece of news for you...if Israel didn't exist, the WTC still would have been bombed.
The jihad against America and the west - of which Israel is merely one of the fronts - is endemic in nature, and the sort of isolationism and appeasement you appear to propose, far from making America `safer' would encourage this jihad.
What you don't understand is that America, and Israel for that matter is a contradiction to the Islamist belief system.
According to that mindset,submission to Islam and sharia are the highest and most successful way for man to live. If the west was weak, poverty stricken and enslaved, that would be one thing, but in fact, the opposite is the case and it is the Muslim world that is largely a failed society. This directly brings the Islamist belief system into question...and that is intolerable for these people.
By the way, that's `why they hate us'. in case anyone needs to know.
You mention `meddling in other countries affairs'. What was the expropriation of millions of dollars of American property back in the seventies and the use of OPEC as a weapon against us if not `meddling'? What about the ongoing attempts to Islamize the West? Or the repeated terrorist attacks on Israel and other western countries? That's not `meddling'?
I can appreciate that you and others who feel as you do would like it all to go away. Unfortunately, the jihadists are not going to cooperate, no matter how much you are willing to abase yourself.
America was attacked not for anything we have done, but for who we are.
There is no `coexisting' with evil.
Oh, one more thing. Please do a search on this blog under the words Salpack or Imad Mugniyeh to find out more about Iraq as a haven of Islamic terrorism.
Like the WTC bombings, that happened rgardless of anything America did or didn't do.
ff said,
I will take it on faith that you are a patriotic American who loves their country.
you blew that one.
look at the sentence structure and syntax.
a troll(er).
to anon i would say that the US is an industrialized nation.
we still have a tremendous manufacturing capability.
if we had a president he could use that capacity as it should be used.
and that is to build enough bombs to do what you say can't be done.
and for the record the hospitals and power stations you speak of were either built by the joooos or americans. arab/muslims don't build anything. they only destroy.......anything/everthing they touch.
careful with that keyboard attawannabe.
I would argue that at least in the case of the United States, any `meddling' we've done has been to the benefit of the Arab people rather than to their detriment..
Saving them from Nazi extermination and slavery, Eisenhower's interventions in Suez and Lebanon,The beginnings of the Aswan project that revolutionized agriculture in Egypt,Billions in American humanitarian and military aid...I could go on for hours.
Sorry,Nazar..it really does come down to jihad, the need for fresh plunder to refurbish a stagnant Islamic economy and the cognitive dissonance of a wealthy powerful infidel West that drives this, IMO
That's why Israel could disappear tommorow, every Americaninthe Arab world could leave and the jihad would still go on.
"Are we closer to victory?"
That IS indeed the question to ask. Thank you.
One thing that struck me as odd in the days after 9/11 was Bush saying "We will not tolerate conspiracy theories [regarding 9/11]". Sure enough there have been some wacky conspiracy theories surrounding the events of that day. The most far-fetched and patently ridiculous one that I've ever heard goes like this: Nineteen hijackers who claimed to be devout Muslims but yet were so un-Muslim as to be getting drunk all the time, doing cocaine and frequenting strip clubs decided to hijack four airliners and fly them into buildings in the northeastern U.S., the area of the country that is the most thick with fighter bases. After leaving a Koran on a barstool at a strip bar after getting shitfaced drunk on the night before, then writing a suicide note/inspirational letter that sounded like it was written by someone with next to no knowledge of Islam, they went to bed and got up the next morning hung over and carried out their devious plan. Nevermind the fact that of the four "pilots" among them there was not a one that could handle a Cessna or a Piper Cub let alone fly a jumbo jet, and the one assigned the most difficult task of all, Hani Hanjour, was so laughably incompetent that he was the worst fake "pilot" of the bunch. Nevermind the fact that they received very rudimentary flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station, making them more likely to have been C.I.A. assets than Islamic fundamentalist terrorists. So on to the airports. These "hijackers" somehow managed to board all four airliners with their tickets, yet not even ONE got his name on any of the flight manifests. So they hijack all four airliners and at this time passengers on United 93 start making a bunch of cell phone calls from 35,000 feet in the air to tell people what was going on. Nevermind the fact that cell phones wouldn't work very well above 4,000 feet, and wouldn't work at ALL above 8,000 feet. But the conspiracy theorists won't let that fact get in the way of a good fantasy. That is one of the little things you "aren't supposed to think about". Nevermind that one of the callers called his mom and said his first and last name, more like he was reading from a list than calling his own mom. Anyway, when these airliners each deviated from their flight plan and didn't respond to ground control, NORAD would any other time have followed standard operating procedure (and did NOT have to be told by F.A.A. that there were hijackings because they were watching the same events unfold on their own radar) which means fighter jets would be scrambled from the nearest base where they were available on standby within a few minutes, just like every other time when airliners stray off course. But of course on 9/11 this didn't happen, not even close. Somehow these "hijackers" must have used magical powers to cause NORAD to stand down, as ridiculous as this sounds because total inaction from the most high-tech and professional Air Force in the world would be necessary to carry out their tasks. So on the most important day in its history the Air Force was totally worthless. Then they had to make one of the airliners look like a smaller plane, because unknown to them the Naudet brothers had a videocamera to capture the only known footage of the North Tower crash, and this footage shows something that is not at all like a jumbo jet, but didn't have to bother with the South Tower jet disguising itself because that was the one we were "supposed to see". Anyway, as for the Pentagon they had to have Hani Hanjour fly his airliner like it was a fighter plane, making a high G-force corkscrew turn that no real airliner can do, in making its descent to strike the Pentagon. But these "hijackers" wanted to make sure Rumsfeld survived so they went out of their way to hit the farthest point in the building from where Rumsfeld and the top brass are located. And this worked out rather well for the military personnel in the Pentagon, since the side that was hit was the part that was under renovation at the time with few military personnel present compared to construction workers. Still more fortuitous for the Pentagon, the side that was hit had just before 9/11 been structurally reinforced to prevent a large fire there from spreading elsewhere in the building. Awful nice of them to pick that part to hit, huh? Then the airliner vaporized itself into nothing but tiny unidentifiable pieces no bigger than a fist, unlike the crash of a real airliner when you will be able to see at least some identifiable parts, like crumpled wings, broken tail section etc. Why, Hani Hanjour the terrible pilot flew that airliner so good that even though he hit the Pentagon on the ground floor the engines didn't even drag the ground!! Imagine that!! Though the airliner vaporized itself on impact it only made a tiny 16 foot hole in the building. Amazing. Meanwhile, though the planes hitting the Twin Towers caused fires small enough for the firefighters to be heard on their radios saying "We just need 2 hoses and we can knock this fire down" attesting to the small size of it, somehow they must have used magical powers from beyond the grave to make this morph into a raging inferno capable of making the steel on all forty-seven main support columns (not to mention the over 100 smaller support columns) soften and buckle, then all fail at once. Hmmm. Then still more magic was used to make the building totally defy physics as well as common sense in having the uppermost floors pass through the remainder of the building as quickly, meaning as effortlessly, as falling through air, a feat that without magic could only be done with explosives. Then exactly 30 minutes later the North Tower collapses in precisely the same freefall physics-defying manner. Incredible. Not to mention the fact that both collapsed at a uniform rate too, not slowing down, which also defies physics because as the uppermost floors crash into and through each successive floor beneath them they would shed more and more energy each time, thus slowing itself down. Common sense tells you this is not possible without either the hijackers' magical powers or explosives. To emphasize their telekinetic prowess, later in the day they made a third building, WTC # 7, collapse also at freefall rate though no plane or any major debris hit it. Amazing guys these magical hijackers. But we know it had to be "Muslim hijackers" the conspiracy theorist will tell you because (now don't laugh) one of their passports was "found" a couple days later near Ground Zero, miraculously "surviving" the fire that we were told incinerated planes, passengers and black boxes, and also "survived" the collapse of the building it was in. When common sense tells you if that were true then they should start making buildings and airliners out of heavy paper and plastic so as to be "indestructable" like that magic passport. The hijackers even used their magical powers to bring at least seven of their number back to life, to appear at american embassies outraged at being blamed for 9/11!! BBC reported on that and it is still online. Nevertheless, they also used magical powers to make the american government look like it was covering something up in the aftermath of this, what with the hasty removal of the steel debris and having it driven to ports in trucks with GPS locators on them, to be shipped overseas to China and India to be melted down. When common sense again tells you that this is paradoxical in that if the steel was so unimportant that they didn't bother saving some for analysis but so important as to require GPS locators on the trucks with one driver losing his job because he stopped to get lunch. Hmmmm. Yes, this whole story smacks of the utmost idiocy and fantastical far-fetched lying, but it is amazingly enough what some people believe. Even now, five years later, the provably false fairy tale of the "nineteen hijackers" is heard repeated again and again, and is accepted without question by so many Americans. Which is itself a testament to the innate psychological cowardice of the American sheeple, i mean people, and their abject willingness to believe something, ANYTHING, no matter how ridiculous in order to avoid facing a scary uncomfortable truth. Time to wake up America.
Hello, `Enlightenment'.
You are one of a number of 9/11 conspiracy theorists who have visited this site.
I find your views despicable,but you have successfully completed the main requirement for a post on this site and been reasonably polite, and deserve the same.
There were a number of eyewitnesses who saw the planes hit the Towers, we have the cell phone calls fromthe passengers,the plot and many of the plotters themselves were identified (please research Able/Danger) and Osama bin Laden himself happily took credit for the murder of three thousand of your fellow Americans.
And you might want to ask yourself what Donald Rumsfeld was doing at work at the Pentagon that day, in proximity to the crash site if it was all some pre-planned neocon conspiracy.
I personally know people who saw the planes hit the Towers, and I still retain, on my hard drive, the Howard Stern radio show of that day and the reactions from Stern and his fellow broadcasters as they watched this happen.
I won't dignify the rest of this ridiculous rant with an answer..except to say that you should be ashamed.
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