9/11 VOICES
marched in August 1914. But what comes after the celebratory gunfi re when wicked Saddam is dead? With our MacArthur Regency in Baghdad, Pax Americana will reach apogee. But then the tide recedes, for the one endeavor at which Islamic peoples excel is expelling imperial powers by terror and guerrilla war.
“They drove the Brits out of Palestine and Aden, the French out of Algeria, the Russians out of Afghanistan, the Americans out of Somalia and Beirut, the Israelis out of Lebanon. We have started up the road to empire and over the next hill we shall meet those who went before. The only lesson we learn from history is that we do not learn from history.” So it was that George W. Bush sent an army halfway around the world to invade and occupy a coun- try that did not threaten us, did not attack us, and did not want war with us — to strip it of weapons it did not have. The ultimate unnecessary war. Leading his crusade against “evil,” Bush did not understand bin Laden’s act of terror was political, crafted to infl ame America and suck us into a wilderness where a humiliat- ing defeat could be infl icted on this superpower, just as the mujahedeen had bloodied and broken the Soviet superpower. Bin Laden had snapped
“
Those who led us through the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the killing of bin Laden — President Bush, Vice President Cheney, President Obama, Vice President Biden, Secretaries of Defense Rumsfeld and Gates, and CIA Director Panetta — deserve the nation’s gratitude as do, of course, the generals who led our troops. The soldiers who won the wars deserve not only our thanks, but our commitment to their medical needs and job opportunities for as long as it takes to provide them with a decent style of living and reintegration into American society.
n, d
— Edward I. Koch | Mayor of New York City, 1978-1989 ”
a red cape in front of the American bull, and George W. Bush charged into Afghanistan and Iraq.
What President Bush failed to understand is that terrorism, even of 9/11 horror and magnitude, is the weapon of the weak. It is the last recourse of those desperate to be rid of a foreign presence.
Across the Muslim world, we Americans are seen as the last of the imperial powers, the crusader state that came after the British. And as long as we intervene in the Muslim world to impose our views and val- ues, and to maintain our
troops,
bases and satraps, we will be resent- ed and resisted, even as we came to
resent and to resist the British in our own country.
In June 1991, sitting next to the presidential reviewing stand as George H.W. Bush took the salute of the Army of Desert Storm as it marched up Constitution Avenue, I thought to myself, “This is how it must have been, when the victorious legions returned to Rome.” We were on top of the world, a decisive victor in a Cold War that had lasted four decades.
Just months later, George H.W. Bush, at the apex of his prestige and popularity, was at the United Nations, committing America to cre- ation of a “new world order.” Those
“Shoe bomber” Richard Reid tries to blow up fl ight from Paris
Authorities thwart plot to use liquid explosives to destroy 10 fl ights from the U.K.
“Underwear bomber” attempts Christmas ’09 bombing of fl ight to Detroit
2005
TSA created to replace private airport security, all knives banned, no-fl y list expanded
Passengers required to remove shoes at security check
TSA prohibits the carrying of most liquids in carry-on bags
2008
TSA accelerates rollout of controversial “full body scanners”; more invasive physical searches
2011
TSA commits to 1,000 full-body scanners serving most airports by end of 2011
SEPTEMBER 2011 / NEWSMAX / 9|11: A DECADE LATER 65
KOCH/AP IMAGES / REID/PLYMOUTH COUNTY JAIL/GETTY IMAGES / SHOES/AP IMAGES / BAGGIE/AP IMAGES BOMBER/AP IMAGES / SCANNER/AP IMAGES
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