I do not know what was more stunning last night, the news that Osama Bin Laden was killed finally or the realization that the attacks on September 11 occurred nearly ten years ago.
To drive home the point, as we watched transfixed yet again to the TV, we had to explain to my seven-year-old nephew why this was so important and why he would remember this for a long time. Indeed, it sunk in that the attacks occurred before he was even born.
I rushed off to the old 24 Hour Fitness over on Second Street to meet up with my personal trainer. When I got there I was shocked to learn that Cecilia (we would not be married until the next summer) was on the phone calling for me.
As she was trying frantically to explain that we had been attacked, I caught the TV screen and there was something not right going on.
It took a second, and things became more clear, the Twin Towers were on fire, it looked like a bomb or something hit them. As I was on the treadmill warming up, watching the TV, I could hear the news broadcaster say something about the AP, a very reputable source, saying that one of the towers had collapsed.
As I was warming up I watched, with fear and horror, the second tower collapse. It looked like someone had demolished it.
My trainer asked if I wanted to work out still, and I went to the back and worked out for about the longest 40 to 50 minutes of my life. My head was not in it. I had this cold feeling.
I was afraid to come back to the front, afraid of what the world would look like. They did not know where the other plane was. I wondered how many more there would be.
I drove home listening to the radio, and it was a like ghost town already. There was an eerie silence. No planes. Few cars. Davis was dead. My future wife was coming home.
I would spend the day on my couch, watching the news. I spent two days there. Three. I don’t even remember if I ate.
I remember a line from one of my favorite TV series, Star Trek Deep Space Nine, in which the enemies’ leader said, “You may win this war… but I promise you, when it is over, you will have lost so many ships, so many lives, that your victory will taste as bitter as defeat.”
This is not the Soviet Union after World War II, but I feel bittersweet rejoicing. Relief that Bin Laden is no longer able to reap destruction on innocent humanity. Pleased for the families of the victims of 9/11 to have some peace of mind.
But at the same time, the Iraq War was deeply divisive, destructive and expensive. It was waged, I think, at the cost of Afghanistan.
It is hard to know if this will mark a turning point in Afghanistan or if we are just throwing more lives and money into a lost cause. I have long supported withdrawing from Afghanistan.
Moreover, it is not just lives and money that we have lost in all of this. I think we have lost – at least for a time – ourselves.
What a price we have paid for a war on terror. There are the tangible images of Abu Ghraib that still sear in my memory. There is thought of Guantanamo Bay and our holding prisoners of war and enemies of the state without the due process of law.
That view is even more cemented now, as I watch the legal system and see how many flaws it has, even when there is the right to due process and the court is open and transparent.
The funniest thing, of course, was that the same flawed intelligence system that failed to see 9/11 coming, the same flawed intelligence system that took us into Iraq on the basis of the high threat levels of WMDs, would be the same basis for locking people up, under the guise that they were enemies of the state, without the possibility of a fair trial.
And do not pretend that we did not capture and hold innocents for years, without trial.
There are the infringements on our civil liberties with the government monitoring us, creating a Department of Homeland Security, wiretaps and long security lines at the airport.
I agree with Benjamin Franklin, “He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security.”
That is the true cost of the war on terror – our values. We were so scared on 9/11 we were willing to sacrifice that to which we hold most dear – at least temporarily.
In a way then, Bin Laden won by making us less American, less democratic, even less human. We like to pretend that we are above such atrocities, and we are in good times. But there is the dark underbelly of American society, and it is not just slavery and Jim Crow, but it is Japanese Internment camps, the House on Un-American Activites Committee, McCarthy, and now the Department of Homeland Security.
I think this war on terror has cost us a lot, to say nothing of the people whose lives have been turned upside down as their loved ones come home in body bags, or permanently physically or psychologically damaged.
However, the demise of Bin Laden gives us a new hope that things will get better. That we can end these destructive wars and invasive policies.
The experts are quick to state that this does not mean the end of terrorism. That this does not mean the end of Al Qaeda, but I disagree.
For most intents and purposes Al Qaeda ended in the battle of Tora Bora. It drove Bin Laden into hiding, and for the most part the organization has not waged major attacks in the last decade.
Most of the so-called plots that were uncovered were amateur hour stuff. And that is not to suggest that there will not be more of those and that there is not the chance that one will get through. But the Al Qaeda that planned and executed 9/11 is long gone.
What remains is something that we should not take for granted, but at the same time not overly fear. The fact is, what occurred on 9/11 was a one-shot deal. They changed the game on hijacking planes. No longer will passengers and pilots stand by and cooperate. They will, as they have done numerous times since 9/11, rush and subdue.
From the start, I feared more than a repeat of 9/11, an overreach trying to prevent another 9/11. Sadly, that was borne out in vivid technicolor over the last decade.
And so yes, I rejoice, hoping at long last this long national and international nightmare has ended. And that sanity can replace fear in guiding our future policies.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
[quote]However, the demise of Bin Laden gives us a new hope that things will get better. That we can end these destructive wars and invasive policies.[/quote]
I wouldn’t hold my breath on things changing much but perhaps Obama can use Osama as an excuse to reduce troops in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Osama Bin Laden was an evil man. I don’t use this term lightly and sometimes one man’s terrorist is another man’s revolutionary, but OBL was just evil.
[quote]And so yes, I rejoice[/quote]OK… we have now established that you support the death penalty, in a violent manner (cruel & unusual), in circumstances that involve no “due process”, and at great financial expense (and deaths of ~ 4 others, who had varying degrees of complicity — collateral damages?). You are not alone in this. Acknowledge your (our) humanity (or, lack thereof)… one could argue (and I am not) that perhaps a cold-blooded murder of a police officer should have not been arrested, just “taken out”. I DO NOT advocate this, I just want to point out, if that had happened, it would be as understandable as the circumstances surrounding the demise of Osama bin Laden.
“And so yes, I rejoice”
lol, doesn’t sound like it!
god bless seal team six.
Ben Laden has now been transformed into a martyr and will likely spawn new attacks in his name. The killing of Osama Ben Laden at this moment has effectively driven the Libya fiasco, namely the attempt to assassinate Gadaffi and the killing of his son and grand chldren, off the front pages. As someone who gives weight to the idea that political decisions are a significant part of a strategy of political theater to shape the “consent of the governed”,it is interesting that over the past decade, Osama Ben Laden remained at-large and morphed into a valuable piece in the US domestic political theater game.
Good bless our military… the most effective force of freedom and justice in the world.
Now that the military has corrected the fatal policy missteps of Bill Clinton, the US has to address the problem with Pakistan. Bin Laden was obviously protected by higher-ups in the Pakistani government and military.
Despite the dreams of the Israeli-hating peaceniks in this county, we are no more loved by the fanatic Islamists under Barack Hussein Obama than we were under George Walker Bush. In fact, there are many indications that the Obama apologizing-style foreign policy has led to much less stability in the Mid East as it has emboldened the fanatics.
The US contributes so much good to the world. Our resources are always ready for any country in need. Yet, it will never be enough for some so consumed with hateful envy of us. We may have killed Bin Laden, but if we don’t put pressure on other countries to enforce zero tolerance of terrorism, it will all be for naught and our children will carry the bigger burden to protect the American way of life.
My memories and impressions of the aftermath are quite different. Well do I remember watching w horror the second twin tower getting hit by a jet plane; people jumping out windows to escape the searing fire; the twin towers crashing down and killing all those trapped inside. I remember frantically trying to get through to my parents living in Washington, D.C. to make sure they were okay.
I was proud of those on the PA flight who bravely brought the plane down before it reached its target – the plane meant either to crash into the White House or Congress. I was aghast at the last cell phone calls to loved ones from some of the passengers on the plane that hit the Pentagon and other targets. We had been attacked on our own soil – we were not immune from the world’s frightful evildoers. Isolationism as a foreign policy clearly was not going to be successful.
I was heartened by Bush’s speech at ground zero, and the way the country pulled together. Other nations, some not even that friendly, rallied ’round in support of America against the Taliban and Sadam Hussein. It was imperative from a psychological point of view to answer the vicious attack, or suffer more of the same. I was heartened when the Afghani’s voted for the first time, after the Taliban were rousted – as the people held up their purple fingers defiantly to show they had indeed voted. Or when the statue of the evil Sadam Hussein came down, it was a signature moment. I felt nothing but deep satisfaction when Hussein was captured, and proud of the fine performance of our soldiers so far away from home in stark, desert conditions.
However I was later dumbfounded at the naivete of the Bush administration’s thinking that democracy would take hold easily bc the oppressed Afghani’s and Iraqi’s would somehow embrace democracy immediately. Nation building is a long, complicated process, especially in underdeveloped countries. It does not happen overnight. And there will always be interference from outside forces trying to undermine democracy at every turn. America has always had a problem with its staying power and long range goals.
My feeling at the time, and it still has not changed, is this: if you go in to fight, you go in to win, or you don’t go in at all. Our soldiers, who put their lives on the line, deserve no less than absolute commitment. You don’t wait for the United Nations to dither – it is a collection of mostly despotic dysfunctional gov’ts w/o moral compass. I much preferred Reagan’s solution – a well placed single bomb aimed at the proper target. Too bad Qaddafi wasn’t there when Reagan’s bomb landed. But it quieted Qaddafi down for a long, long time. And Reagan was brilliant at psychological warfare, as w his SDI that ultimately spelled the destruction of the Berlin Wall and the U.S.S.R.
Frankly I would rather see this country do a little more in the way of psy-ops, and a little less in the way of “trench warfare”. We, as a nation, have got to stop denigrating our way of life, be proud of what we stand for, and stop buying into the notion that other nations should somehow “like” us. I really don’t care what other nations think – they certainly don’t have a lock on purity or come away w clean hands. This nation needs to pull together as one, stop obsessing about perceived past mistakes, and forge ahead for a better tomorrow. Every nation makes missteps – the wise nation learns from those mistakes and moves on. True victory is not a destination, but a process, by which we bring other nations along to share in the freedoms we as a nation are privileged to enjoy.
One last thing – Bush said we would hunt Bin Laden down no matter how long it took. Bush was right.
Musser: “god bless seal team six.”
Amen!
Jeff Boone: “The US contributes so much good to the world. Our resources are always ready for any country in need. Yet, it will never be enough for some so consumed with hateful envy of us. We may have killed Bin Laden, but if we don’t put pressure on other countries to enforce zero tolerance of terrorism, it will all be for naught and our children will carry the bigger burden to protect the American way of life.”
Excellent point…
dmg: “There is thought of Guantanamo Bay and our holding prisoners of war and enemies of the state without the due process of law.”
Apparently Obama has come around to Bush’s way of thinking on this one – military tribunals are the only answer…
I’d like to offer one more point: and a radically different take on the situation. I don’t want to go into politics: Bin Laden vs. the west, Bush vs. Obama, and the like.
I have read a few articles on how bin laden was captured, which even the vanguard admits was a good thing. What really stands out in hose articles is that the capture happened largely because the government was HIGHLY SECRETIVE about the mission. Nobody knew what was going to happen, even our allies didn’t know. Heck, it is questionable how much the president even knew about what was going to take place. Seal Team Six (if that is what they truly are called) continue to maintain they do not exist. The pakistani government did not know, because like Boone says, there is reason to believe they have al-qaida/taliban sympathizers.
But Bin Laden’s capture is precisely why the government at times, as much as some people want to cry foul, NEEDS TO OPERATE IN TOTAL DARKNESS. I am personally glad that I knew absolutey nothing about what was going to happen, and because of that fact, we have the inevitable result. I also think bin laden’s destruction illustrates why WIKILEAKS is a dangerous organization, treading on dangerous ground. Suppose that wikileaks got ahold of information that our government knew about bin laden’t whereabouts in Pakistan? More than likely Bin Laden would still be alive.
anyway, that is my $.02.
I also want to add one final point, an anecdote if you will. I remember specifically hearing on the news on several occasions that the government “thinks it knows bin laden is hiding somewhere in pakistan” which I wish those same networks at the time would have just shut the hell up when they said it. quite frankly with the media and their big mouths, I’m suprised it worked.
I wouldn’t be in a rush to do too much rejoicing just yet. I suspect that there are more than a few just like him, or maybe worse, waiting to step in and fill his shoes. And I also strongly suspect there will be some sort of retaliation. I know security is being *upped* in a lot of places, but they can’t watch everywhere all the time.
[b]Despite the dreams of the Israeli-hating peaceniks in this county, we are no more loved by the fanatic Islamists under Barack Hussein Obama than we were under George Walker Bush.
[/b]
Keep dreaming. The fact is the Prior Administration failed to enter Pakistan and failed the mission to Get Bin Laden. No matter what spin you (or Fox News) want to use We (led by Our President) won and the Terrorists lost.
Several things come to my mind.
The U.S. has failed many times when trying to pull off high profile missions like this. This mission proves we can succeed – we got the target and none of our guys were hurt. There was a backup plan so the loss of one helicopter had no impact on the success of the mission.
The body was dumped in the ocean – there will be no place to memorialize this martyr.
Besides all of the human suffering caused by this person I will always consider our loss of personal freedom. For the past ten years I have thought of this guy every time I have gone through a security line . Also whenever I go on a trip I waste two hours of my life beause of this person – one hour at each end of the trip. Now the aggitation I feel will be comforted knowing he was deep sixed!
[i]”[b]Ben[/b] Laden has now been transformed into a martyr and will likely spawn new attacks in his name.”[/i]
Ben?
It was exactly four years ago that we hunted down Abu Ayyub al-Masri, the Jordanian-born fanatic who created and led Al-Qaeda in Iraq. After he was killed, the scale of violence from AQI dropped off dramatically. It still has not disappeared. But as an organization, AQI hardly exists anymore.
My point in bringing that up is that leadership matters. Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda has no other strong leaders, no one who inspires, no one with charisma, no one else who can raise millions of dollars. It’s possible someone else will take over his role–Anwar al-Awlaki? But it’s more likely that Al-Qaeda will slowly fall apart. (I would guess we will be left with various national Islamist groups, but no transnational movement.)
It seems to me this has been a horrible year for the radical Islamist cause. Revolution after revolution has struck the Muslim world, and in no instances were the leaders or provokers of these uprisings Islamists. The one thing the religious fanatics have always counted on is to have corrupt, authoritarian regimes in power, portraying themselves as the alternative. Perhaps a new reality is brewing, where democrats are actual alternatives.
Beyond the rebellions, the most wicked Islamist regime–Iran–is sturggling to hold on to power in the face of popular unrest. No doubt the Ayatollahs would stand no chance in Iran to win a free and fair election. And they know it.
Even the evil Hamas regime appears to be falling apart. When a government unleashes its police to rob banks in Gaza ([url]http://arabnews.com/middleeast/article299189.ece[/url]), and when Jew-hating European communists cannot avoid being murdered in Gaza ([url]http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/04/2011414194735306181.html[/url]) by ultra-fanatics, things are not going well. If Hamas had to face a truly democratic election today, they would be crushed.
Rejoicing or gloating is not the proper response–though it looks like the typical response among both left and right populists (as with the confused republocrats of .[url] http://new-worlds.org/blog/?p=10808 [/url]”New Worlds”, high fiving the murder).
OBL may have been evil, but he was entitled to a trial, of some sort, however difficult that would have been. The seals could have used tear gas, nets, stun guns, etc. Instead, the macho men took over, and the gunfight ensued.
Life under the Obushma -Hitllery regime
Birth of the “deathers”:
[url]http://bigpeace.com/jmwaller/2011/05/02/display-bin-ladens-body-at-ground-zero-then-destroy-the-al-qaeda-legacy/[/url]
[b]”The Seals could have used tear gas, nets, stun guns, etc. Instead, the macho men took over, and the gunfight ensued. “[/b]
I am sure they gave him a choice-
Walk outside with hands over head, without weapons and give up.
or
Die
You might consider the 9/11 casualties were not given any choice.
P: “OBL may have been evil, but he was entitled to a trial, of some sort, however difficult that would have been. The seals could have used tear gas, nets, stun guns, etc. Instead, the macho men took over, and the gunfight ensued.”
And where do you propose this trial be held? No country would want to hold a trial for OBL…NOT ONE. IMHO the world is a better place w/o OBL in it… And I think it perfectly acceptable to feel relief a very evil and bad thug is no longer around to hurt anyone else… Now at least OBL becomes part of the earth as does some good for the people he cared so little about…
Musser: ” I am personally glad that I knew absolutey nothing about what was going to happen, and because of that fact, we have the inevitable result. I also think bin laden’s destruction illustrates why WIKILEAKS is a dangerous organization, treading on dangerous ground. Suppose that wikileaks got ahold of information that our government knew about bin laden’t whereabouts in Pakistan? More than likely Bin Laden would still be alive.”
Excellent point!
Alphonso: “Besides all of the human suffering caused by this person I will always consider our loss of personal freedom. For the past ten years I have thought of this guy every time I have gone through a security line . Also whenever I go on a trip I waste two hours of my life beause of this person – one hour at each end of the trip. Now the aggitation I feel will be comforted knowing he was deep sixed!”
Another very good point!
[i]The seals could have used tear gas, nets, stun guns, etc. Instead, the macho men took over, and the gunfight ensued.[/i]
The news reports are saying that Bin Laden was firing at the US forces, was asked to surrender and refused, and was shot… though it really should not make much difference based on how little he valued human life. At least now he can finally give back a little for all that he has taken… as fish food.
“OBL may have been evil, but he was entitled to a trial, of some sort, however difficult that would have been. The seals could have used tear gas, nets, stun guns, etc. Instead, the macho men took over, and the gunfight ensued.
Life under the Obushma -Hitllery regime”
I’m glad we have the macho men to take over because if we relied on people who think like you we wouldn’t last very long as a nation. Would you want your son going in to that fight with tear gas, nets and stun guns? Hooray for the Seals.
Everyone on this blog knows I’m no big Obama fan, but I stand up and clap for him and America. If he gave the orders not to take Usama alive and to dump his body quickly at sea I’ll stand up and give him an even bigger ovation. We didn’t need an Usama circus for the next who knows how many years if we’d taken him alive. Great job Mr. President.
[i]”OBL may have been evil, but he was entitled to a trial”[/i]
No, he wasn’t entitled to any trial. We were at war with him. He was at war with us. He may have been a criminal, but he was also effectively a general. We have every legal right to kill our enemies in a war.
[i]”The one thing the religious fanatics have always counted on is to have corrupt, authoritarian regimes in power, portraying themselves as the alternative. Perhaps a new reality is brewing, where democrats are actual alternatives.”[/i]
And the US has often supported these regimes to hedge risks that something worse might take power. Islamic fanatics are not the source of the unrest, but there exists plenty of risk that they will fill the vacuum of leadership… or at least secure some legitimate positions of power after elections. I thought Hamas would mature a bit after Arafat kicked and they took over the Gaza Stip. The fanatics are not so easily tamed it seems.
[i]you might consider the 9/11 casualties were not given any choice [/i]
was OBL flying the plane? No, or he’d be dead. Maybe he ordered it. Maybe not. That’s what trials are about–proving, or attempting to prove guilt. Trusting BushCo’s word (as ObushMa did)–hardly superior than a vigilante squad
[b]”Trusting BushCo’s word (as ObushMa did)–hardly superior than a vigilante squad”[/b]
You might remember OBL claimed responsibility for 9/11 multiple times. I think he enjoyed laughing at us.
[i]”was OBL flying the plane? No, or he’d be dead. Maybe he ordered it. Maybe not.”[/i]
He said that he ordered it. He also said he was surprised that the buildings collapsed completely. He said he thought only the top floors would collapse. He based that on his civil engineering education.
An interesting twist in the discovery of Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts is being reported in today’s Washington Post ([url]http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/bin-laden-discovered-hiding-in-plain-sight/2011/05/02/AFEljUbF_story_2.html[/url]): that we used torture to uncover his location.
I am not particularly strong one way or the other on torturing the terrorists: I realize the loss of moral force doing so brings on us; I also recognize that torture can be effective and can save American lives, especially when it uncovers an eminent attack.
With Bin Laden’s hideout being discovered, it’s a case where using torture seems to have been effective. (Opponents of torture argue that torture never works. They are simply letting their idealism get in the way of the facts.)
What the Post story says is that we knew that Osama was communicating with his lieutenants using couriers; and that we tortured once courier who led us to the courier who was transmitting Osama’s communications, ultimately leading us to his mansion in Pakistan.
[i]”CIA analysts for years had been scrutinizing a small network of couriers who carried messages to and from the al-Qaeda leader.
“A crucial break appears to have come on May 2, 2005, when Pakistani special forces arrested a senior al-Qaeda operative known as Abu Faraj al-Libi, who had been designated bin Laden’s “official messenger” to others within the terrorist organization. [b]Libi was later turned over to the CIA and held at a “black site” prison where he was subjected to the harsh methods that the Bush administration termed “enhanced interrogation techniques.”[/b][/i]
Bin Laden was absolutely entitled to be captured and tried. He chose not to. The situation is not a parallel to the death penalty or execution without trial, it is parallel to the gun man who is hulled up in a building and refusing to come out. At some point they have no choice but to shoot the guy if he is shooting at them.
Assuming the media reports are accurate, yes, OBL and his associates did choose to shoot it out with the special ops–though with copters above and commandos coming down ropes- doesn’t look much like an attempt to apprehend Binladen but an assasination (as does the …ugly death pic of OBL–assuming it really was OBL). Fine, but don’t think for a minute they wanted to negotiate or wait for the courts (and press, etc) to decide Binladen’s fate. The point being– Consumerland doesn’t really know f*ck about it, except what the corporate media provides.
dmg: “Bin Laden was absolutely entitled to be captured and tried.”
Under what law? Those protections are guaranteed for U.S. citizens, period. OBL was not a citizen of the U.S., but an enemy combatant. However, I find it hilarious that the Obama administration is putting out to the public the story that the order was to put OBL “under arrest” and if he resisted, use whatever force necessary. The last I knew, our Navy Seals don’t have jurisdiction in Pakistan, and certianly aren’t law enforcement officers who can put anyone under arrest either. LOL
The fact of the matter is that life doesn’t always fit into neat little packages. It’s inherently messy, where normal models/processes/systems oftentimes just don’t work. Sometimes you have to fight fire w fire…
To Perezoso: I agree that we only know what the feds/Obama choose to tell us in regard to what happened. I am perfectly willing to concede there very well may have been an order to take out OBL, rather than capture him. I don’t have a problem w that, and think that was preferable to capture. To capture OBL would have caused all sorts of headaches.
ERM: [i]I agree that we only know what the feds/Obama choose to tell us in regard to what happened.[/i]
Does this mean that you accept, based on what the White House is saying, that OBL is dead?
How does that particular assertion get through your filter of skepticism?
Interesting and extremely disheartening that we have come to the point where we can prefer and even applaud the death of another human being, even one who was capable of great evil. I fear that in his ability to cause us to abandon many of our principles OBL has had a much greater success than we would like to admit.
“Does this mean that you accept, based on what the White House is saying, that OBL is dead? How does that particular assertion get through your filter of skepticism?”
lol! WDF1, all bin laden would have to do to disprove the white house claim is issue another videotape of himself holding up a current newspaper. the white house could not afford that, especially during an election season. sorry WDF1, but your conspiracy theory is total garbage.
[b]”Interesting and extremely disheartening that we have come to the point where we can prefer and even applaud the death of another human being, even one who was capable of great evil. I fear that in his ability to cause us to abandon many of our principles OBL has had a much greater success than we would like to admit.”
[/b]
Agreed! We should also remember the other 900 thousand people who died (in Iraq and Afganistan) who died in our effort to “get him”.