...Clock? Time bomb?
On the morning on 11 September 2001, I was preparing to leave early to see my eye doctor before work. Stopped in my tracks when the first plane hit, I told my ex-to-be, "Well, unless that was an accident, 'they' finally did it. May get worse."
I still wasn't prepared for the second plane or the Pentagon and most certainly not the collapse of the WTC towers,* but I'd been expecting something bad ever since things started to get weirder with Ruby Ridge during the last years of the G. H. W. Bush Presidency, the first WTC attack in '93, and so on. Looking at the availability of asymmetrical methods to apply truly devastating force, I was of the opinion the West, and the U.S. in particular, was overdue to lose a major city to one or another kind of barbarian. I still think we are.
Ten years ago, a principle T. E. Lawrence first applied in modern times against the Ottoman Empire came home to strike Manhattan; but don't kid yourself, everywhere civilization goes, so go those who would pull it down, for their God or for glory, for envy, loot or the sheer joy of making things go smash. It has never been otherwise; and that, that is what you should "never forget."
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* Because of knowing about the B-25 crash into the Empire State Building.
First plane hit made me think 1940s B-25, too, and apart from the people in the impact zone everything was going to be alright.
ReplyDeleteI hate it when things go horribly pear shaped from one's initial assumption. Horribly.
Human.
ReplyDeleteI had pretty much the same reaction on 9/11 with "well, they've finally done it".
ReplyDeleteIt's what has happened to America since then that has surprised me. I expected us to blow the crap out of something in retaliation and then get on with life. Well, we have blown the crap out of lots of somethings, and continue to do so. It's the getting on with life part that we can't seem to figure out.
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