9-11, a year later

I had started to write out a big thing for 9.11, but became so frustrated

half way through that I stopped.  I find it very difficult to talk about the

tragedy that is 9.11 without talking about the 'why' of 9.11.  Inevitably, I

can't help but come to the conclusion that we (our government, our country)

brought it all upon ourselves and the same people that caused the attackers

to hate us in the first place are only making it worse.  So rather than

focus on the tragedy, I want to look at the impact of what happenned on our

what's going on now.

I can't explain it as well as others, so here ya go.  The article below is

from www.commondreams.org.



enjoy.



-c





As Terror War Expands, Failures Multiply

by William D. Hartung



Are you safer now than you were a year ago? If public safety were a function

of dollars spent and promises made, the answer would have to be a resounding

yes.

Within days of the September 11th attacks, President Bush and Congressional

leaders authorized $40 billion in emergency anti-terror spending. Within two

weeks, President Bush had declared war on "terror networks of global reach,"

warning friends and foes alike that "you're either with us or against us" in

this new international campaign.



Within less than a month, the U.S. and a few close allies had launched a

major air war in Afghanistan that deposed the ruling Taliban movement and

sent them and their Al Qaeda associates fleeing into the mountains.



As the dollars continue to flow, the scale of the anti-terror effort has

been growing along with it. U.S. arms, training, and military personnel have

been dispatched not only to Afghanistan but to Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan,

Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, the Philippines, and Yemen.



Forward bases for U.S. forces have been established or expanded at thirteen

sites in nine countries, and administration policymakers are now taking aim

at a new adversary, Iraq.



Although there is no credible evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime provided

support for the September 11th attackers, and little to suggest that Baghdad

is currently in a position to attack the United States with nuclear,

chemical, or biological weapons, the "whack Iraq" faction in Washington

supports U.S. military action to overthrow him nonetheless.



The stated rationale for going to war against a nation that poses no

immediate threat to the United States or its allies is provided by a new

doctrine of "pre-emption" which argues that if a nation or organization

might pose a threat to the United States at some unknown future date, that

assumption alone justifies U.S. military intervention, with or without the

approval of Congress or the United Nations.



Meanwhile, on the home front, steps have been taken to federalize airport

security, round up citizens and immigrants suspected of terrorist ties or

knowledge of terrorist activities, and create a vast new department of

Homeland Security to coordinate the protection of U.S. territory.

Fundamental democratic rights, from the right to legal counsel to freedom of

speech, have been jeopardized in the process.



In short, in the name of fighting terrorism, the Bush administration has

been waging an undeclared war on international law and the United States

Constitution.



It would be one thing if the administration's war on terrorism was working.

If Al Qaeda and other global terror networks were being systematically

dismantled and policies were being put into place that would make future

attacks less likely and far more difficult to carry out, many Americans

might conclude that the expenditure of vast sums and the (hopefully

temporary) restrictions on basic freedoms were worth the cost. Instead, by

emphasizing a militarized approach to fighting terrorism tied to a

constantly expanding definition of who the enemy is, the Bush administration

has crafted a policy that promises minimal success at maximum cost.



The costs of the terror war are mounting rapidly. In its 21 months in

office, the administration has already sought more than $150 billion in new

military spending, while funding for homeland security has more than

doubled, from $18 billion to $38 billion. While only about one out of every

four dollars in new military spending has been expressly targeted towards

equipment or operations related to fighting terrorism, the Bush

administration's increasingly expansive, intellectually undisciplined view

of the problem has led to a situation in which virtually any military

expenditure is now being rationalized as a contribution to the war on

terror.



But even as expenditures rise, the effectiveness of the military campaign is

diminishing. In Afghanistan, U.S. "search and destroy" missions aimed at

capturing or killing remnants of the Taliban and Al Qaeda have faltered, and

top Al Qaeda operatives remain at large. To make matters worse, the U.S.

policy of financing and arming Afghan factions in exchange for assistance in

hunting down Taliban and Al Qaeda threatens to undermine the already fragile

coalition government of Hamid Karzai, plunging Afghanistan back into the

state of armed chaos that made it an attractive base for terror groups in

the first place.



While the military effort against terrorism has reached a stalemate, the

administration has made minimal headway in forging the kinds of intelligence

and law enforcement cooperation that will be needed to cut off political and

financial support for Al Qaeda. Efforts on this broader front are likely to

be far more effective in undermining Al Qaeda's ability to operate than a

series of hit-and-run military operations guided by questionable

intelligence information. In fact, the administration's unilateralist

approach to foreign policy, as evidenced by its opposition to the

International Criminal Court, the Comprehensive Test Ban treaty, and efforts

to strengthen the Chemical and Biological Weapons Conventions - not to

mention its go-it-alone policy on intervention in Iraq - has undermined the

possibilities for enthusiastic international cooperation in de-funding and

politically isolating terror networks like Al Qaeda.



For all the Pentagon's talk of waging a "new kind of war" in the wake of

September 11th, its emphasis on high tech military prowess, expensive

weaponry and search and destroy efforts comes straight out of the Cold War

playbook. Non-military tools, from strengthening international

non-proliferation agreements to dramatically increasing foreign aid in an

effort to reduce the number of "failing states" that are available to host

terrorist cells, have been rejected out of hand by the conservative

ideologues who hold the balance of power within the Bush foreign policy

team. And U.S. diplomatic initiatives to resolve longstanding tensions in

regions that are at the epicenter of terrorist ferment, from Kashmir to the

Israeli-Palestinian conflict, have been reduced to meaningless gestures

designed to distract public attention from these dangerous confrontations

long enough to launch the next stage in the Bush administration's war

without end - the invasion of Iraq.



The recent wave of high profile criticism of the Bush foreign policy - from

Democratic presidential contenders like John Kerry, respected Republican

elders like James Baker and Brent Scowcroft, and substantial numbers of

active and retired military officers - has served to slow the momentum of

the war planners in Washington for the moment. But unless the debate shifts

from the significant but secondary question of how to prepare for war to the

fundamental issue of whether war and preparation for war should be the

centerpiece of United States global policy, the political, financial, and

security costs of the war on terrorism will continue to distort our foreign

relations and undermine our democracy for many years to come.