The attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11 was
the worst day in American history this generation has ever seen. Though we’ve
suffered terrible attacks upon this country in the past this was the first time
since the War of 1812 where a foreign enemy managed to attack directly the
homeland of the United States in such a devastating way. Over 3,000 people died
on that fateful day. And yet it seems today that it is not the loss of life
that is to be 9/11’s longest lasting
legacy but the perpetual war and totalitarian “security” acts passed by
Congress it is used to excuse. Since that day the United States has been
engaged in a worldwide war without end, against an enemy that defies
definition, and without any benchmarks or concrete measuring sticks to gage how
this war can be “won” or when it might be over.
The term “War on Terror” is intentionally vague. At
face value it means nothing, and by its very definition can never be truly won.
If, after 911, we declared war on Al-Qaida, or on the Taliban, or even Osama
Bin Laden, than the United States would have long ago declared victory and been
able to return home in peace with its military and wealth largely intact. These
would have been specific enemies which our intelligence agencies and our
military could easily identify, target, and eliminate. Once the hostilities
against these specific threats were concluded an adult and reasoned debate
could then take place discussing the cause of the attacks and what can be done
to prevent them in the future. If such a debate occurred we’d realize that
America’s foreign policy for much of the last century played a heavy role in
igniting hatred and resentment towards our country abroad and that a more
humble policy might be in order to prevent further attacks on our soil and our
soldiers. Most importantly, however, the incredible loss of life and treasure
suffered as a result of this decade of war would have been avoided.
That never happened. Instead the tragedy of 911 was
hijacked by our “representatives” as an excuse to justify the perpetual wars
and infringements on our liberties that followed. Though the war in Afghanistan
was justified as retaliation for 911 the focus of the war was quickly abandoned
as the Bush administration shifted its attention to Iraq, a nation that had no
ties to Al-Qaida, Osama Bin Laden, or 911, and posed no threat to the United
States. While the invasion of Iraq took place, Osama Bin Laden, the real enemy
of our country, was allowed to escape for another eight years.
911 truthers have been spouting the belief for years
that the government caused the destruction of the World Trade Center in order
to justify its war in Iraq and the infringement of our civil liberties, and
though I do not believe this to be the case in the end the result might very
well be the same. Iraq, an unnecessary, costly, and bloody war, did nothing to
strengthen the security of this country. The only effect that was has on the
country was the bleeding of our wealth and of our military. Trillions of
dollars and thousands of lives later we’ve gained nothing from the war and are
told that even though we’ve taken out this supposed “threat” it is necessary to
sacrifice our freedoms even more. Apparently we are in more danger today than
we were in 2003, and this despite taking out what the former administration saw
as the top threat to our security. It would appear that they were wrong.
Recently the US Senate passed a bill by a vote of
93-7 authorizing the military, at the discretion of the President, to detain
and hold indefinably American citizens merely suspected of supporting terrorism without a trial or formal
charges. This, of course, flies in the face of our 5th and 6th
amendment rights to a fair, public, and speedy trial where we are to be judged
by a jury of our peers within the state we are being charged. This bill makes
the mere suspicion of a crime enough to put American citizens behind bars for
an unspecified amount of time. All in the name of the “War on Terror.”
But what does that even mean? How do you fight a war
against a strategy? On an emotion? How can such a war be won, and how do you
judge when such a war is won even if it can be? The plain fact of the matter is
that our politicians knew exactly what they were doing when they propagated
this phony war on an inherently vague enemy instead of focusing on the actual
threat of Al-Qaida and Osama Bin Laden. Terrorists become the new boogy man. No
longer do we have Reds, or Japs, or Huns to fear but instead an unseen and
undefinable enemy which we must sacrifice every semblance of American values in
order to defeat. Never mind that one of the very corner stones of our society
is the right to a trial. Our politicians would have us believe that in order to
save our way of life against “terrorists” we must destroy that way of life.
Never mind that one must be convicted of a crime before being sent to prison.
Again, our politicians would have us believe that the only way to protect
American values is to destroy them ourselves. War becomes Peace, Freedom
becomes Slavery, and the liberties of the American people become cannon fodder
along the way. Though terrorism does still pose a threat to the United States,
the response to this threat has been a complete overreaction since the day we
shifted focus away from Bin Laden and invaded Iraq. 911 did not warrant the
unconstitutional and unjustifiable Patriot Act and the recent National
Defense Authorization Act, it did not warrant the trampling of our civil
liberties and the engagement of perpetual warfare against vague enemies that
are impossible to defeat, and it did not warrant the war in Iraq.
In the past civil liberties, for better or worse, have been sacrificed
during wartime in order to better prosecute that war. During the Civil War
Abraham Lincoln suspended the right to a fair trial; during WWII Franklin
Roosevelt threw thousands of Japanese American’s into prison camps without
trial as well. As appalling as these acts were they were made under the
assumption that once hostilities were over, than these liberties would once
again be returned. Fortunately, they were. No correlation between those wars
can be made with the current War on Terror. With both the Civil War and WWII a
clear, easily defined enemy was identified and the terms of victory made clear.
The War on Terror, on the contrary, is being waged against an enemy that cannot
be defeated and defies all definition. It is a war that will end not upon the
military victory of our armed forces, but upon the discretion of our
politicians, and so no assumption can be made that the liberties sacrificed
today may ever be returned. What
liberty we give up today we could end up never enjoying again.
The standard by which a country is to be considered as success or
failure is not upon the power of its military, the wealth of its central banks,
or the prosperity of its economy. The standard of a great nation is to be
judged by the freedoms its people enjoy. Every time the Congress
passes a bill that infringes upon the very cornerstone liberties that made this
country great we slip farther and farther into mediocrity. Ten years ago, on
September 10th 2001, the idea of our Congress and President
supporting the act of indefinite detention of American without trial would have
been unimaginable, but as we’ve seen so long as our politicians evoke the name
of our modern day boogy man they can justify just about anything. Forget that
thousands more are killed on American soil every year as a result of gang
warfare and common crime than from terrorist attacks. Never mind the odds of
being the victim of a terrorist attack are astronomically small compared to the
odds of being a victim of a serious crime besides terrorism. No, the terrorists
are out to get you, and unless you give the government the right to detain you
for whatever reason they want for however long they want, than the terrorists
will win!
If this continues, and we are asked to sacrifice
more of our rights on the altar of a false sense of security, than we as a
citizenry will face a difficult choice; to continue under the illusion of
liberty or to assert our natural rights, by force if need be, in order to gain
them back. For one thing is clear; we cannot continue to allow the federal
government to widdle away at our constitutional rights. If we do, than we shall
wake up some day and find that the boogy man we were so afraid of was not the
enemy we need fear the most, but an oppressive regime residing in Washington
DC. That cannot be allowed to happen.
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