a sept. 10 world no more

A Sept. 10 world no more

Friday, September 10, 2004


Recall the world of Sept. 10, 2001, three years ago today. It was for most Americans a time of ordinary worries and joys. Coloradans, like their fellow Americans, were experiencing a flat economy following the dot.com stock market bust, and a new school year; the approaching end of a baseball season and beginning of football season; the glory of autumn in the Rocky Mountains and worries about continuing drought.

That everyday world changed the following day when Islamist terrorists hijacked four jet airliners, slammed two of them into the Twin Towers of New York’s World Trade Center and one into the Pentagon. The fourth would likely have been flown into the White House or the Capitol had not the heroic passengers aboard Flight 93 counterattacked and forced the plane to auger into the Pennsylvania countryside.

It’s been said by this corner and others that there are now two kinds of individuals: Sept. 10 people and Sept. 12 people. The former believe that nothing really changed on Sept. 11, 2001, that there was no need to drastically revamp our foreign policy or the way we view “militants” in other lands.

The Sept. 12 types, in contrast, understand that the world changed dramatically on 9/11. Even if they disagree with the way President George W. Bush has handled the war on terror, they realize that terrorists can no longer be ignored as violent oddities who kill people only in far corners of the globe. Sept. 12 people have no truck with such fatuous platitudes about “root causes” or “legitimate grievances” against the United States as explanations for the barbarism of Islamic terror.

Given the stated goal of Osama bin Laden and others to wreak more havoc in the United States, it is surprising that the past three years have not seen another terrorist attack in this country. Despite the frustrating confusion of yellow and orange alerts and the inconvenience of beefed-up airport security, it’s evident that the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the CIA have actually managed to thwart terrorists before they could attack again.

No one can argue now that an attack on U.S. soil is impossible. However, a distressingly large number of people — those Sept. 10 folks — believe that the horrible day three years ago was an aberration. If only the United States wouldn’t act so belligerently — if we would embrace global treaties and U.N. policies, stop using words like “axis of evil” and stop sending aid to Israel — why the Islamist killers would leave us alone.

They’re dead wrong. The Islamo-terrorist hatred for the West and its culture of individual freedom began long before George W. Bush became president and will continue long after he leaves the White House. Evidence of their monstrous philosophy continues to mount on a weekly basis. Last week it was a school in southern Russia where innocent children were slaughtered in the hundreds. This week it is the Australian embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia, where at least eight people were killed by a radical Islamic group with links to al-Qaida.

Like it or not, this is no longer a Sept. 10 world. Those who believe otherwise are deluding themselves.