Remembrance and Anger.

I do remember. Nine years ago today I was laying on the couch watching TV on my day off, when the news came on that the World Trade Center was on fire. I heard the first reports that a plane had struck the building. I remember thinking at first that someone had seriously screwed up their calculations with regards to altitude and location and I wondered how someone could make such a huge error. Then the next reports chilled me to the bone and pissed me off...a second plane had struck the other tower. Further reports told of the Pentagon and I knew at that point it was no mere accident, it was an act of war. The next thought that ran through my mind was of all those young men I had met the year before, just before I was discharged from the Army. They would be among the first called upon to avenge this act, all that would be needed is a name and a place. All they needed was to know who they would have to kill or capture and they would go, most of them enthusiastically.

As more reports came in throughout the day everyone was scrambling to figure out who was behind this, some of us already had our suspicions, the same ones responsible in '93. No matter what anyone wants to believe the list of groups capable and willing to do something like this is very short, then and now. You can call it profiling if you want but the one thing I learned during my short time in the Army is that you must learn everything you can about your enemy, (armored units still study the tactics of Rommel in North Africa). Muslim extremists have proven before they care nothing for anyone, not even themselves as long as they can kill innocent people, for what? to prove a point? I'm sorry but that isn't the way you prove a point. You want to fight? Then do so, face to face, man to man, as it should be. Although that would be expecting too much from a group of cowards that wouldn't stand a chance against some of our children, let alone the most deadly fighting forces on the planet.

For those that are about my age, we were just kids during the first attack, we were not expected to learn all we could about it and why it happened. I did some digging on my own, even at 12 years old you can learn a lot if you dig in the right spots and I understood then as I did nine years ago and still do now. This is an enemy that wants us all dead by any means available. Trying to appease them will only get you dead quicker, yet our leaders seem to think that if you apologize enough the problem will go away. It won't. Terrorism is a disease and the only cure is to wipe it from the face of the Earth at the point of a sword, or a bullet, whichever we happen to have available at the time.