In fact, the reason we were attacked was explained very clearly by Osama bin Laden in an interview that he had with Peter Arnett of CNN news in March of 1997. http://www.robert-fisk.com/usama_interview_cnn.htm The aggression and war crimes committed by the US to which bin Laden refers in that interview is confirmed by many reporters, historians, and commentators but the list of crimes committed by the US goes far beyond those to which bin Laden alludes.
911 was what Chalmers Johnson refers to as "Blowback." "Blowback" is the response of other nations or organizations to the crimes that the US 'secretly' commits against citizens of those other countries. I call these crimes 'secret' because they are routinely obfuscated from public view by propaganda, lies, and disinformation perpetrated by our government with help from mainstream media. Of course the crimes can't be hidden from the people who are its victims or from foreign media sources, so the truth eventually comes out, although sometimes it can take years before it becomes common knowledge in America.
"Blowback" specifically refers to attacks against the US for which citizens have no reference point or logical framework for understanding them. Citizens are therefore easily misled by US propaganda and nonsensical reasoning like that offered by Bush immediately after the attack on the twin towers.
And now that someone decided to strike back against US treachery on behalf of some of the victims... we are told that the evil doers are at our doorstep. Well my goodness, what a surprise.
It is a sad commentary on the state of American statesmanship that none of our elected officials or mainstream news agencies has the courage, or the integrity to name this great lie for what it is. We would have nothing to fear from so called 'terrorists' if We the People, acting through our elected officials, would conduct ourselves--which is to say, conduct our foreign affairs--as decent human beings.
The truth is, that our foreign policy, contrary to popular belief, probably has never been the pursuit of world peace; and today our purpose clearly appears to be US domination over the world's key resources no matter what the cost in human carnage might be.
It is simply wrong to say that the United States is a free country if it's leaders believe the truth is too unseemly to be consumed by ordinary citizens. In my view, you are only really free if it is safe for you to tell the truth and hear the truth... all the time... in whatever company you are with. This administration considers telling the truth to be an act of treason. Someone should explain to members of Congress that just the opposite is true. If you are happy to live in a box of lies and never seek to venture outside its perimeter, you can, of course, blindly claim that you are free, but that kind of freedom is really an unhappy illusion.
If you want to know why the treatment of depression is such a major industry in this country, perhaps it's because it's our society that is sick, and not so much the people who exhibit the symptoms. Maybe it's the hypocrisy, the systemic infidelity, and the lies that we hear and live with every day that makes people sick.
Our kids are coming home from Iraq with severe mental illness. It's not the people of Iraqi who made them sick. It's the folks who sent them there with their lies and their treason that made them sick.
If five years after 911, Americans still believe that we were attacked or are in danger because we love freedom and democracy, then Americans are living in a dream world... or should I say an unfolding nightmare. We need to start telling the truth. If we want to be safe, we will need to do our homework. We will need to learn and then tell the truth about our own history. We need to identify the lies and myths we blindly accept and help propagate. And we will have to ask ourselves if we have the courage to face the truth and deal with it honorably and decently for the good of our country, our community, and our immediate and extended human family.
So far, these lies have put our dignity, our wealth, and our honor on the line. We are living on borrowed capital and borrowed time. Many of our children have paid the price with their lives, their limbs and their mental well-being. And it is not even our own children who have suffered the most. Look around... outside your little box... what do we look like to all those people in far off places who have been cheated, murdered, tortured, and defiled in our name?
Now the future of all children hangs in the balance.
We have seen the enemy and he is us. We need to make peace with ourselves and the rest of the world. The only way to do that is to start telling the truth.
http://www.gpln.com
http://www.gpln.com/childrenofiraq.htm http://www.gpln.com/therealterrorists.htm
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0404-30.htm
http://www.counterpunch.org/corseri04042006.html
http://www.westpointgradsagainstthewar.org
