It is a date which will live in infamy probably more so than the attack on Pearl Harbor. That was a military attack on a military base. And the Americans were able to exact a horrific revenge. They will never be able to collectively punish the entire race or nationality of their enemy this time. It is easy to fight a war with another country. It is almost impossible to fight a war with a disparate group of anonymous people whose only common denominator is a lust for your destruction.
6 comments:
Excellent post, interesting to hear about pilots perspective.
It is a shame how we have devolved into a large number of shouting, hate-filled individuals. While I think there is still a silent majority of decent Americans, I am surprised by the number of people who swear, curse, and vilify the other side. Led on by media personalities that deliberately boost controversy in order to boost their ratings, these groups seem to live to hate. Couple that with our actions overseas, and Americans have squandered all of the goodwill we had after 9/11.
Just doing a second comment to turn email on.
Bush and the particular ilk had managed by this time, i.e. late 2001 to make many in Europe very angry at the good old USA and to tell the truth, many of us were expecting something to happen. That it was the twin towers was also something that did not surprise. It had been bombed earlier by as it turns out, folks with the same connection and religion. But not as bad as what actually had happened so the sentiment that-- one reaps what one sows--died in the throat. It became a morbid drama filled with expressions from King James itself, chubby yanks rushing about and for me, an ex policeman, the memory that will live the longest was watching the rescuers going into the towers and then seeing the collapse knowing that the ones who had entered had been surely killed.
We noticed that there were efforts to make Rumsfeld a pentagon hero and some mystery about Cheney disappearing underground. The New York Mayor was interesting.
So what was I doing when this happened. Oddly, I had just returned home from Friboug where I had been negotiating to buy an ancient Koran. I am not religious and if forced, I am catholic. I love old books. I had gone home to think about the price and turned on CNN and noticed that something was happening in New York. So I watched. A friend came in and I said... hey, look at this. She looked and then carried on with whatever it was she was doing. Later she asked... ok.. so what happened... I said some terrorist types had flown a couple of planes into the twin towers.
anybody killed she asked. I said looks like a whole bunch of people some were even jumping out of windows. horrible really.
Middle east she asked. Yep I said. And that was that. I never did buy that old book.
The other thing about these attacks is they were made for television.
Even those who didn't know anyone in New York, or even anyone in the US saw it all happen live on television. That gives you an involvement. Until then, terrorist attacks were rather abstract things to anyone who hadn't actually lived through one. This one gave everyone an idea of what all the others might be like.
Or at least it should have.
I grew up with terrorist attacks back when the ANC was a terrorist organisation. Whenever there was any mention of terrorism in the news I mostly shrugged it off as I do with small earthquakes. This event was much bigger than anything I'd ever seen at home. And I had to go to the land of the free to see it.
I don't know if the TV made it more real or not. People are desensitised to violence on TV. And we've all seen movies with large buildings tumbling down.
I think high profile terrorist attacks are more vivid after you've experienced something similar in person. Otherwise it's just more stuff blowing up on TV.
Garry, you should have bought the book. It's probably more valuable now.
Skinny, I think one of the reasons for America's upcoming downfall as the world's leading superpower will be the American inability or unwillingness to see any view but their own.
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