Your Sept 11

[Lord Merciless]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
I understand your point, but doubt that this way has a chance of success. You don't pursue the terrorists, instead you attack souvereign countries, with or without a valid casus belli. Iraq is done, and what I hear is plannings about a war against the Saudis, Syria and Iran. Do you think this way you can fight terrorism? Every bomb you drop at civil victims will make 10 new terrorists.

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I understand your concern and doubt, especially about our government. I have my doubt as well. But I think they have done a great job until now. The war in Iraq must be fought, primarily for these reasons:

1. Saddam is a total bad-ass. His regime was the second worst in the world.
2. Saddam is our mortal enemy after we foiled his conquest of Kuwait.
3. Saddam is trying to get WMDs. He would sooner or later have it.
4. Sanctions hurt Iraqi people badly. The price to contain Saddam would be much higher than a short, well-executed war.
5. Iraq will be the starting point to show that democratic secular capitalism is the solution to a properous Arab country.
6. Iraqi oil will free us from the clutch of the fork-tongued Saudis. They will finally be compelled to choose sides.
7. If the Iraq does become properous under our leadership, we can hope to significantly reduce hostilities of Muslims toward us. This will also set off a chain of reforms in other Muslim countries.
8. Saddam's downfall removes a huge support for Palestinian terrorists, making ME peace process a little bit realistic.


I think our military achieved a great military victory with minimal casulties. Now our politician must step in to implement our strategy. I personally give them a year to show some good progress in Iraq.

[Worthingtons]

I want those countries that obstructed the US to pay as well, France particularly. France worked actively to undermine US policy in a time when we needed our allies. France stabbed us in the back, and the French supported their government. Any American worth a damn will remember...

100% with Lancer here. Chirac is as bad as Saddam, and the pathetic set of people they call thier populance are as bad as the fundementalist , if not worst (at least the fanatics think they are killing people for a 'reason' in thier minds). I'm annoyed with Germany for not supporting the War but with France it goes deeper. In that country the actual people felt the Americans deserved september 11th - this was confirmed when a book about how America brought 9/11 on themselves was a top seller in France. I live with a Frenchman, a man who decides America deserved 9/11 and felt it was 'justice', i dont argue with him as there is little point when one's mind is so firmly made. I'm a brit, i will never forget this, and probably will never donate a penny of money to the Tourist industry over there, despite the beauty of Paris.

[dannubis]

everybody is entitled to have their own opinion ... even if he/she doesn't share yours. And if you fail to understand that, then you really need to reflect on your views about the western freedom, which you undoubtedly claim to charish.

[dannubis]

and mind me, i am one of those people who are actually against violence of any sort ... so no, the americans didn't 'deserve' 911.

[Richelieu]

I was at work. I remember making a joke about how happy Gary Condit must be after the first plane hit. (If i had a penny for each time someone called me a smartass...)
Then when the second one hit, i remember that i mentioned Bin Laden to the other guys there. IIRC i had seen something on TV about terrorism that week.

I went to my sister's after work and tried to help her explain to my niece what a terrorist was and that there was no war going on and that we wouldn't get bombed. Turns out one iditotic teacher had told these 7-8 years old that we were now at war.

I think we are now seeing that this was not only a historic event, it was a turning point. America entered a new era on that day.

[GeneralTacticus]

I didn't really see the amount of coverage on Sept. 11 that others appear to have - about the only thing I read about it that day was from the newspaper. The sequence of events basically went like this: I woke up, as usual, and started having breakfast. My dad walked in and dropped the newspaper on the table, which, naturally, had the attacks on the front page. I read part of the front page, then finished my breakfast and got in the car to go to school. When I was dropped off at the station, I bought the same paper there (I wanted to know what the hell was going on, as my skimming the front page hadn't been terribly informative) and spent the rest of my train trip to school reading the paper. I was basically in a kind of shock; about the only actual thought I can remember having then was that newspapers were going to be selling a lot more than usual (although that was probably wrong). When I arrived at school, that was basically all anyone talked about; nobody had any clue how many people had died, and I recall soembody (it might have been me, but I'm not sure) saying it could have been anything up to 50 000. In second session (I think) a teacher anounced over the PA system that there would be a moments silence for the victims, which was obeyed; and the session after that somebody brought a radio and we heard Bush speaking about the attacks (I don't recall exactly what he said). I didn't think or hear a great deal more about it that day; I didn't watch the news on TV (still don't, for that matter), or on the internet, and I'd already read what was in the newspaper.

[Zero]

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
I didn't really see the amount of coverage on Sept. 11 that others appear to have - about the only thing I read about it that day was from the newspaper. The sequence of events basically went like this: I woke up, as usual, and started having breakfast. My dad walked in and dropped the newspaper on the table, which, naturally, had the attacks on the front page. I read part of the front page, then finished my breakfast and got in the car to go to school. When I was dropped off at the station, I bought the same paper there (I wanted to know what the hell was going on, as my skimming the front page hadn't been terribly informative) and spent the rest of my train trip to school reading the paper. I was basically in a kind of shock; about the only actual thought I can remember having then was that newspapers were going to be selling a lot more than usual (although that was probably wrong). When I arrived at school, that was basically all anyone talked about; nobody had any clue how many people had died, and I recall soembody (it might have been me, but I'm not sure) saying it could have been anything up to 50 000. In second session (I think) a teacher anounced over the PA system that there would be a moments silence for the victims, which was obeyed; and the session after that somebody brought a radio and we heard Bush speaking about the attacks (I don't recall exactly what he said). I didn't think or hear a great deal more about it that day; I didn't watch the news on TV (still don't, for that matter), or on the internet, and I'd already read what was in the newspaper.

what time did you goto school? I remember when I woke up late 8ish the second tower wasnt even hit.

[GeneralTacticus]

7-8 PM Melbourne time; not sure what that is NY time.

[Zero]

Originally posted by CapitanGarlic
Saw the same thing over and over for the whole damn day. Nothing else happened at school.

I hear ya. There was like 12 of us drinking and playing cards but our attention was mainly on the news. And even though it was repeating the same thing over and over again, we kept watching!

[Jac de Molay]

Crashed my car that day leaving work to go home and watch the news.

Between cars crashing and planes falling out of the sky, I took two weeks off to hole up in the neighborhood bar, drink myself to oblivion, and wait for blood-red moons and mutant locusts.

[gsmoove23]

Brooklyn was just this weird surreal place that day. People were out on the street all over with these weird looks on their faces. The wind was blowing in from Manhattan and the black smoke drifted directly over us.

On Flatbush Avenue there was a strange parade. People walking out of Manhattan over the Manhattan bridge with soot covered faces, sadness and fear. I remember thinking it was a little bit like Mardi Gras without the cheer and alcohol.

We got tired of watching the TV and wanted to do something, anything to help so we walked to a hospital to give blood. We were turned away from 2 hospitals before we gave up, I guess other people had the same idea. After that we walked to the Brooklyn Promenade where theres a beautiful view of Manhattan and just stared at where the towers should have been in all the smoke with a crowd of dazed looking people. Freaky day.

[Arrian]

I was at work (I get in late, around 9am EST) when I heard my boss saying something about a plane hitting the WTC, and muttering something about nuking somebody

I asked what was going on, and was told a plane had hit one of the Towers. I responded that it could have been an accident, like the plane that hit the Empire State Building way back when. Nope, I was told, it was a jumbo jet. I still wasn't sure until I got to the corner conference room where a TV was on, and saw the video of the first impact. It was quite clear that it was deliberately flown into the tower. Then they showed the second impact. And over and over and over.

Shortly thereafter, our office closed. We were all sent home. IIRC, the office remained closed the next day too. I made sure my family was ok, and for the most part it was (my brother-in-law's cousin was lost that day, but that's all. I never even met him).

I spent nearly that entire time watching TV. My eyes were fried. I watched the actual footage of the impacts & the towers coming down for a while, but then started looking for analysis and such. I ended up watching CBC for a while (Canadian Broadcasting), which had a forum discussion with audience participation going on. Very, very anti-American "you had it coming" in tone. Tons of recriminations about US policy and whatnot. A few older Canadians attempted to defend the US, but did it rather poorly. Then I saw the footage of celebrations in Palestine, which for a brief period of time had me extremely angry. I later decided not to put too much stock in one clip of video. Then I watched a bunch of ITN (British). Then I started checking out the web for print media reaction.

-Arrian

[chequita guevara]

It was the day after I moved into my new apartment. Got a ride to work with my boss and was pluging away coding HTML when I heard the office know-it-all (and it wasn't me) talking about how people hate us because we stand for freedom, etc. I'm thinking, shut-up, moron, people hate us because we overthrow their democracies and support corrupt dictators and then someone mentions a plane crash in NYC.

I didn't put two and two together. I wander over to ask my friend what's going on and he gives me the 411, and several people mention they can't get any news. I say, I know where I can get some news, and I log on to Poly OT. It was surreal. Between what was real and the rumors of other attacks, it felt like we were at war.

I never doubted for a moment that it was OBL, and said so as soon as the 2nd plane hit. Later we were able to get a tv in one of the breakrooms to get CNN (it was normally tuned to a company channel). Later that day we had an office meeting. No work got done that day.

That night, I had to get things for my new place: a blanket, pillows, an inflatable matress (slept on a bean bag the night before), a phone, a radio. Watched the wall of tvs at Target for a while.