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Sept. 11, 2006 I can remember exactly where I was when I heard the news. Of course I am not alone in this, everyone knows where they were when they heard about the terrorist attacks on 9-11. I was in college at the time, in the library, when someone mentioned a plane hitting the world trade center. I basically spent the rest of the day watching CNN and feeling angry that some turban wearing freak had managed to pull off the big one. Have we forgotten that day though? Oh we remember it with moments of silence and memorials, but the pain of that day has faded for most Americans. Quite simply, we have moved on. Fighting terrorists is so 2001. Is our morale so easily sapped that we are willing to throw in the towel after a few years and a couple of thousand deaths? I could explain that compared to other wars we have fought in the past our campaign against the terrorists is the least like a quagmire. But the truth is Americans don't really want to hear it. They have bought into a very narrow view of the war(and I thought it was conservatives who were supposed to be narrow) that unless it has to do with Al-Qaida it is of no concern to us. As if Hezbollah isn't as lethal, or Hamas not as anti-American. Toppling an Islamic Fascist regime in Afghanistan was a good thing, but toppling an equally brutal terrorist regime in Iraq was somehow a deviation from the war on terror, and was nothing more than a crusade for cheap oil. They moan that we have not yeat captured Osama Bin Laden, five years after the attacks on New York, and Washington D.C. and he still roams free. That's true. But five years later and his organization is reduced to making obnoxious little videos which are nothing more than a depserate attempt by the Al-Qaida remnants to remind the world they are still alive. And while nothing would make Americans happier than seeing Bin Laden dead or captured(myself included) such monsters rarely face the justice they so richly deserve. Pol Pot's regime was overthrown in 1979, but he managed to avoid capture for the rest of his life until he died in his sleep in 1998. Despite a massive attempt to find Pancho Villa after his raid into New Mexico we never captured him. But Villa, though never captured, was never a threat after the expidition the U.S. launched into Mexico. It could be the same with Bin Laden. He probably never will be caught. He has enough followers to protect him in one of the most remote regions in the world, but he probably never will be the powerful figure he was five years ago. His position will be usurped by someone else within his organization or he will die an old man in the mountains of Pakistan. Either way he's finished. But that is part of the problem. Bin Laden is just one man. We launched a war against terrorism, or more specifically a war against Islamic terrorism and that includes much more than Usama Bin Laden. It includes Iran and Hezbollah, it includes Hamas, it includes the Muslim Brotherhood, and yes it included Saddam Hussein and his regime. So five years later we have toppled two regimes, weakened Al-Qaida to the point where it has to beg for attention, but we have slipped into a September 10th state of mind. Extremists on both ends believe that the terror attacks were cooked up in Washington, and that Iraq posed no problem to the U.S. We're tired of hearing about bombs in Baghdad, and IED's killing our soldiers, and now we want out. We've had enough. That's what they really mean when they talk about a time table. While most Americans are against leaving Iraq before the job is finished they wish we had never gone in. Leaving Saddam in power would have made us safer somehow. We should never forget what happened five years ago. If not for our own sakes, then for the soldiers who have died fighting and for the victims of those cowardly assaults. We can ill afford to grow too comfortable or to forget why we fight. ------------ About the author: Craig Chamberlain has written more than 100 articles for Useless-Knowledge.com. Email: craig_chamberlain@hotmail.com Comment on this article here! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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