Why accept that attacking Afghanistan...?

[Ready4Change]

Why accept that attacking Afghanistan or capturing bin Laden was the ONLY method of stopping 9/11? That's all I heard all day long today.

The attacks could have been stopped by using evidence to arrest known AQ members training to fly in Florida.

I know all about the difficulties connecting the dots, yaddayadda. That's not my issue.

My question is, why do we seem to be accepting this current meme that the ONLY way this could have been stopped was attacking Afghanistan or getting bin Laden?

[ferg]

1. yep

Or, say, following up of the hijacker's "trial run" the week before 9/11.

[FloridaPat]

2. The one thing that no one is addressing is: why are we

pinning this on al Qauda? Where is the proof? The 9-11 commission is not allowed to investigate how it was done, only the intelligence lapses.

We've invaded two countries because of this claim. I would really like to know if it's true. I would like to know who was behind it, and if it's bin Ladin, when did he get off the CIA payroll.

[Journeyman]

3. Precisely. Where's the "White Paper" Powell promised. . .

would be released in late September 2001? The release he reneged on less than 24 hours later? Where's the evidence?

[neebob]

4. The problem I have with it

is the assumption it's necessary to destroy enemies as opposed to, say, not making them in the first place.

[Ready4Change]

6. That's a longer term strategy...

That's a long term strategy in which this administration doesn't seem to have any interest.

In fact, their doctrine of preemptive attacks and "Either with us or against us" mantra combined seem, to me, destined to create enemies for the foreseeable future.

And combine that with the undercutting of the US economy that's underway, and we're stuck fighting endless wars with no money.

But that's all grist for some other topic.

[RainDog]

8. If life were only that simple

I have done nothing to make the American Tali-born-again hate me, other than the fact that I support diversity, the Constitution, and my freedom FROM their religion.

Nevertheless, they engage in daily attacks against my nation under the guise of patriotism, while engaging in a Christian versin of jihad.

In the same way, there are some people who are enemies, whether we want them to be or not.

Think about Salman Rusdie. He wrote a book, The Satanic Verses, which was offensive to the leader of Iran. That leader issued a death sentence against Rusdie.

So, Rusdie's actions, his freedom of expression, were seen as an offense to Khomeni, an action against Khomeni...and there were others who agreed with him. In fact, you cannot overturn a fatwa declared by an Ayatollah, so it still exists. The current Iranian govt. simply refuses to support it...like old blue laws in America.

I'm not saying that America is innocent in its actions around the world, but I also think it's obvious that some people will take you as an enemy, no matter what you do or don't do.

Take Hitler and the Jews, for instance.

Rather, I would say that I wish my country would have the foresight and the maturity to take actions which both defend this country and do not breach the sovreignty of others.

I'm glad we went into Aghanistan to overthrow the Taliban. We should not have pulled back when we did. it was a mistake to shift our focus to Iraq, because the Taliban has not been defeated.

But that sort of war is costly, in terms of life. Nevertheless, our nation supported that war because they harbored bin Laden.

I realize that, even with bin Laden gone, terrorist cells will exist across the world, in nearly every nation in the world, with the express intent of killing Americans.

Some of those want to let us know what it feels like, and want Islamic hegemony.

Some of them are retaliating for our support of Israeli atrocities.

Seems like the mature thing to do would be to remove as many of those justifiable grievances as possible, to defuse terrorist's motivations.

Those are actions we are still involved in which make us a target.

But there are still those who want to destroy us because, like the Christian Tali-born-agains, we do not share their theocratic beliefs.

[Ready4Change]

13. I agree.

We'll never remove terrorism simply by being nice. Frankly, I don't think it will ever be possible to be free from terrorism, period. However, I don't think I should critisize without putting out my ideas for solutions:

The goal, I think, should be to reduce terrorism as far as is rationally possible. Here's how I think it should be done.

- Respect and defend international sovereignity. Basically, hands off unless one nation attacks another.

- Approach interfering with internal conflicts (civil wars) with utmost caution. Solutions imposed by outside forces are rarely successful, or even less bloody. OTOH internal solutions, allthough at times slow and painful arrived at, are are usually longer lived. So again, hands off.

- Promote benign governments via favorable trade statuses and cordial diplomacy.

- Hinder malignant governments via sanctions and combative diplomacy.

- Declare terrorism to be an international CRIMINAL problem. Either small crime, like the Oklahoma bombing. Or Dr. Evil large organized crime, like Al Quaida. The former can be handled by individual nations police forces. The latter can be handled by international coalitions of special forces, scaled appropriately to the task.

Since we'll never end terrorism completely, nor will we ever be free of "rogue nations," we do still need a viable military force. It should just be used more wisely, imho.

[DrWeird]

5. Exacto knives.

They used fucking exacto knives.

If the public had been informed that terrorists were going to attempt to hijack airliners and fly them into buildings the whole thing could have been prevented. If the airline industry, which apparently was informed, had done their job, they would have reinforced the cockpit doors. Which also would have prevented it.

[leesa]

7. Because Americans love to bomb things?

The worst possible method to capture someone or to end terrorism is invading and/or bombing a country. Virtually NEVER works at the expense of tens of thousands of innocent lives. Nothing was accomplished by bombing Afghanistan for over ten months. It cost a ton of money, murdered tens of thousands of people who had nothing to do with 9-11, and Al Qaeda, if it ever existed, seems to be alive and well, Taliban is thriving, the Afghan women are as oppressed as ever, the drug trade is at it's best. Stupid response to what should have been an efficient international investigation and arrest/trial of suspects.

Instead the US behaves like children out for revenge against anybody they can beat up.

[Bandit]

9. Wolfowitz said the exact opposite yesterday

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=1274921&mesg_id=1274921

[Ready4Change]

10. Exact opposite isn't the point.

Even by saying the exact opposite, it isn't addressing the issue. I don't really care whether going into Afghanistan or getting bin Laden would have worked or not. They've already said it wasn't "doable" in the existing climate. Fine.

THOSE WEREN'T THE ONLY OPTIONS!

They should start asking why they didn't get the hijackers. THAT would have stopped 9/11, and that would have been far more politically and tactically "doable."

The intelligence community knew AQ wanted to hit the US. They knew hijacking airliners and using them as weapons was an option being planned. They knew AQ members were training in Florida. They knew all they needed to know.

- Where in the process of analysis, recommendation and action did a failure occur?

- How can we keep it from happening again?

- And was anyone criminally responsible?

That's what I want from this commission.

[Vladimir]

11. Because it helps

promote the meme of neo-colonialism/imperialism/liberalism

If you are PNAC, the best way to get what you want is to have a 9/11 commision that says: "The whole problem is we didn't hit them early enough" Then you say: "See, we told you preemption is a good thing"

V

[Ready4Change]

14. That's one possibility I'[m keeping in mind.

While watching these proceedings I'm wondering about that.

Another possibility is less sinister, yet still deplorable. And it seems to fit with what I'm hearing.

Arguing whether methods which all agree weren't viable would have worked or not only serves to absolve both administrations of responsibility. It's a big CYA operation, politically expedient, and a total disservice to the American people and our nation.

[Vladimir]

15. Yah, that's possible too

most likely they are going to pick whichever interpretation Rove judges to be most useful before the election...

V

[Ganja Ninja]

12. That's exactly the problem with these hearings.

A full out invasion of Afghanistan before 9/11 was impossible to justify. We wouldn't have gotten the support we have from Pakistan or Russia and the other 'Stans.

The real questions are why did the Bush Administration give 43 million to the Taliban in the spring of 2001? Then after they had received a threat assessment by the FBI that al Qaeda was expected to hit domestic commercial airlines. Why didn't they act to protect the public? Instead they acted to protect themselves by flying on privately leased aircraft and avoiding commercial air flights altogether.