America was never safe before 9/11. Pursuing a war in Afghanistan and Iraq has provoked the next generation of terrorists five years later. The illusion of being “untouchable” that Americans lived under was uncovered five years ago, by experiencing a problem caused by extremists the rest of the global community has been suffering with. The attack on the World Trade Center should have brought America closer to the world community but instead; America is disliked by the rest of the world because of its selfish foreign policy.
America is not safer since 9/11. President Bush is still supporting his claim that pursuing the unpopular war on terror abroad will help fight terrorism at home. The president is not considering the global community’s opinion on the war, let alone the innocent civilians in the countries being attacked. The most recent news reports and Democratic stained opinion that have been published, suggest that the wars abroad promote terror, whether it is attacks on U.S. soil or in other countries. Terror is kept alive by the war on it.
This is what President Bush fails to realize: if the global community is not safe, America will not be either.
America is not safer because there haven’t been any attacks since 9/11. What is happening now is that the U.S. is calling all bluffs and alerting the public of every suspicious gossip of a terror plot. The national security team is even letting the public in on the possible eminent threat, differentiating the amount of fear we should have with colors.
Being safe is different than being overly prepared. Change is certain.
Just because the U.S. has not had attacks on U.S. soil after 9/11 does not mean that it has been safer since. Other countries have been attacked and this is where the aversion begins. The citizens of other countries have all the right to feel that they are unfairly attacked because extremist are indirectly trying to attack the U.S. and its foreign policy. By using these other countries in their indirect fight, the extremist are somewhat recruiting people that could join their fight. Thus, the war on terror is too broad to be won because it regenerates and transforms from revenge.
A war on terrorism is impossible and abstract. The administration should have tackled the problem more specifically like following the paper trail and only attacking al-Qaeda and the Taliban, not the country that houses them. The administration should have been narrower in their execution and cut the fat from the 9/11 attacks instead of using clever excuses to invade Iraq. The clever excuses I’m talking about magically change when it is no longer effective such as, “Weapons of Mass Destruction,” to “Freeing the Iraqi People from a Tyrannical Dictator and Delivering them Democracy.”
Declaring a war on a concept, which somewhat indirectly targets a group of people, is an insult. Then going to war on two countries and killing innocent civilians adds insult to injury.
I agree with a recent BBC news report, which states that a leaked U.S. intelligence report acknowledges that the “Iraq war fuels terror.” The report says that “the Iraq jihad is shaping a new generation of terrorist leaders and operatives,” and that the war has produced “a deep resentment of U.S. involvement in the Muslim world.” The document believes that if the small Islamic militant community is perceived as successful, that “would inspire more fighters to continue the struggle elsewhere,” thus the rebirth of terror.
I am not the only one that feels that the administration is failing in the “War on Terror”. As reported by the Washington Times, a Democrat supported group informs that the “Bush administration’s foreign policy has failed in Iraq, the war on terror, Afghanistan and other countries. The number of terrorist attacks and terrorist recruits is up worldwide, many enemy countries are now stronger and have better weapons, and America’s influence with allies has weakened.”
President Bush and his administration have brushed these reports off as a negative election tactic by the Democrats. How convenient.
The “fighters” who have “continue [d] the struggle elsewhere” have been attacking all over the world since 9/11. In early September of 2004, an extremist takes more than 1,000 hostages in a school in Beslan, Russian. Many hostages were killed or injured. In mid October a year after 9/11, car bombs kill foreign tourists outside nightclubs in Bali, Indonesia. The assailants were believed to be linked to al Qaeda. Explosions in the subways of Madrid, Spain 2 years ago was also believed to be the work of extremist.
As long as the rest of the world is suffering through this problem, the U.S. could have its turn again, until our administration learns to be a part of the world, instead of policing it.
