This is an explanation of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 to future generations. Plus a rant.
Sometimes, a perverse part of me wishes that the third plane that crashed in Pennsylvania had hit the Capitol or the White House, its two suspected targets in Washington, D.C.
If that had happened, a lot fewer imbeciles these days would dare to say that the George W. Bush Administration set the whole thing up, and a lot more politicians wouldn't be so blasé about the terrorist attacks on our soil 21 years ago. They'd have some skin in the game, so to speak.
Imagine the reaction from Congress if they were reminded of how close they came to death every time they caught sight of the ruins of the Capitol Building. Or worse yet, imagine the Truther morons today trying to twist themselves into knots explaining how Muslim terrorists crashing a jetliner into the White House somehow benefited George W. Bush's administration.
Of course, simpletons protest that there's no way some cave-dwelling savages could have pulled off such a coordinated attack, so it had to be an inside job. And if we were dealing with poo-flinging troglodytes, I might agree. But we're not.
The men who coordinated and carried out these attacks were not stupid and not uneducated. They were almost all Saudi Arabians, most from well-off families and familiar with everyday Western life. The only thing they truly had in common was Islam, and the idea that sacrificing one's self in the mass killing of infidels (non-Muslims) was an instant ticket from Allah himself to eternal paradise.
These men were not stupid, but at the same time, they were naive in the ways of Western power, especially in America. That is why the targets were chosen as they were. They showed how ignorant (not stupid, but ignorant) the terrorists were of how things work in America.
The attacks were supposed to be a decapitation strike, destroying the three types of national power: governmental, military, and economic.
Had the attacks been against a more centrally organized nation, like Saudi Arabia for instance, or a Communist nation like the old Soviet Union, it would have been more successful. But we're not them.
What target would naive terrorists from a centralized nation pick for the main economic target? Simple. Go for the ostentatiously-named World Trade Center, where one would think that America trades with the rest of the world. Of course, that's silly to us, but we live here and we know our economy is (for the time being) decentralized. We don't even have a national bank like most European nations do; we have a whole bunch of small banks alongside medium-sized banks crusing along with great big banks, with nobody dictating the price of anything.
What target would naive terrorists from a centralized nation pick for the main military target? Well that one was pretty easy: the Pentagon. Our military is part of our government, and it benefits from centralization greatly. So they didn't get that one wrong. But our military is so large, scattered out, and well protected that even the damage they did inflict was a relative scratch.
The third, unscathed target is a pretty easily located one as well - the government itself. Though if you have one plane you'd have to choose between two targets, the Capitol and the White House. The latter was probably the target, considering the terrorists' naivete - kill the "king", kill the nation. But we don't have a king (at least not yet), we have a very replaceable President and bunch of agencies to carry out his and his predecessors' policies.
In my opinion, the politicians (Republicans and Democrats) have screwed the pooch on Muslim terrorism. Their entire problem stems from a foreign policy that has devolved into a quasi-Machiavellian realpolitik, and wandered far away from common sense and effectiveness.
We were attacked by Saudis, but we didn't strike back at Saudi Arabia. It was known for years that Osama, the mastermind of the plot, hid out in Pakistan as did many other organizers of terror. We didn't invade Pakistan.
This is where the anti-war protestors have it right and wrong at the same time. It was oil that was the problem, but not Iraqi oil - Saudi Arabian oil. The oil we actually import, not the oil we could have bought under the table to avoid a messy war. We dared not (and dare not today) disturb Saudi Arabia for fear of our oil flow being cut off.
As for Pakistan, it is the only Muslim nation that truly possesses nuclear weapons. A conventional strike against it risks sparking a nuclear war between it and India, which is an unacceptable outcome.
We could solve the problem of Muslim terrorism if we had the guts and our politicians grew backbones.
Let's face it. Islam is not a religion, it is an entire socio-political worldview. One that has expressed a desire, like the Japanese Imperial worldview and the Nazi worldview, to dominate the entire world. To hide our heads in the sand and pretend its not there or that its goal is not what they themselves say it is would invite more and more attacks upon us.
The first thing we need to do is to achieve true energy independence. Say to hell with the radical environmentalists and get some more domestic energy sources online, as well as develop other sources without government dictates. We did it in regards to whale oil, we can certainly do it in regards to fossil fuels.
When we are no longer Saudi Arabia's best petroleum customer, we will no longer need to placate their every whim. They can drop off the face of the planet as far as we're concerned. We can retaliate against any group or faction coming from there without quaking in our boots from cowardice.
The other thing we need to do is let it be known we will never tolerate an organized attack from any country, whether they have nuclear weapons or not. If Pakistan is the home base for the next group to attack us, launch conventional attacks against them and dare them to use their nukes. If they ignite even one nuke in reaction, turn them into a glass parking lot. And then dare any other nation that complains to give us an excuse to vaporize them.
If they want terrorism, give them REAL terrorism.
