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The following article by ANDREW SULLIVAN appeared in the London Times:
No eloquence can match the impact of their evil. Americans'
critical weakness in the past two decades has been their reluctance to shed
blood for their goals. They believed they could construct a huge military
and never have to fight real wars and suffer real casualties. They thought
they could alter history and advance their interests from the air alone.
With the exception of the Gulf War, which they hesitated to finish, they
have shrunk from the fight.
When the current enemy struck again and again throughout the 1990s, Bill
Clinton responded without real credibility, struck back without real
endurance, engaged the terrorists without truly hurting them. We are now
living with the consequences of his appeasement, and of his refusal to
challenge Americans beyond what the polls said they already wanted to do.
Whoever launched this war on Americans has now accomplished the task Clinton
didn't dare embark on. America has been bloodied as it has never been
bloodied before.
I would be a fool to predict what happens next. But it is clear that Bush
will not do a Clinton. This will not be a surgical strike. It will not be
a gesture. It may not even begin in earnest soon. But it will be deadly
serious.
It is clear that there is no way that the United States can achieve its
goals without the cooperation of many other states - an alliance as deep
and as broad as that which won the Gulf War. It also is clear that this
cannot be done by air power alone. As in 1941, the neglect of the
military under Bill Clinton and the parsimony of its financing even under
Bush must now not merely be ended but reversed. We may see the biggest
defense buildup since the early 1980s - and not just in weaponry but in
manpower.
It also is quite clear that the U.S. military presence in the Middle East
must be ramped up exponentially, its intelligence overhauled, its
vigilance heightened exponentially. In some ways, Bush has already
assembled the ideal team for such a task: Powell for the diplomatic dance,
Rumsfeld for the deep reforms he will now have the opportunity to enact,
Cheney as his most trusted aide in what has become to all intents and
purposes a war cabinet.
The terrorists have done the rest. The middle part of the country - the
great red zone that voted for Bush - is clearly ready for war. The
decadent Left in its enclaves on the coasts is not dead - and may well
mount what amounts to a fifth column. But by striking at the heart of New
York City, the terrorists ensured that at least one deep segment of the
country, ill-disposed toward a new president, is most passionate in his
defense. Anyone who has ever tried to get one over on a New Yorker knows
what I mean. The demons who started this have no idea of what kind of
people they have taken on.
But what the terrorists are counting on is that Americans will not have the
stomach for the long haul. They clearly know that the coming retaliation
will not be the end but the beginning. And when the terrorists strike back
again, they have let us know that the results could make the assault on the
World Trade Center look puny. They are banking that the Americans will then
cave. They have seen a great country quarrel to the edge of constitutional
crisis over a razor-close presidential election. They have seen it respond
to real threats in the last few years with squeamish restraint or surgical
strikes. They have seen that, as Israel has been pounded by the same
murderous thugs, the United States has responded with equanimity. They
have seen a great nation at the height of its power obsess for a whole
summer over a missing intern and a randy Congressman. They have good reason
to believe that this country is soft, that it has no appetite for the war
that has now begun. They have gambled that in response to unprecedented
terror, the Americans will abandon Israel to the barbarians who would
annihilate every Jew on the planet, and trade away their freedom for a
respite from terror in their own land.
We cannot see the future. But we know the past. And that past tells us
that these people who destroyed the heart of New York City have made a
terrible mistake. This country is at its heart a peaceful one. It has
done more to help the world than any other actor in world history. It
saved the world from the two greatest evils of the last century in Nazism
and Soviet Communism. It responded to its victories in the last war by
pouring aid into Europe and Japan. In the Middle East, America alone has
ensured that the last hope of the Jewish people is not extinguished and has
given more aid to Egypt than to any other country. It risked its own
people to save the Middle East from the pseudo-Hitler in Baghdad. America
need not have done any of this. Its world hegemony has been less violent
and less imperial than any other comparable power in history. In the
depths of its soul, it wants to dream to itself, to be left alone, to
prosper among others, and to welcome them to the freedom America has helped
secure.
But whenever Americans have been challenged, they have risen to the task.
In some awful way, these evil thugs may have done us a favor. America may
have woken up forever. The rage which may follow from this grief and
shock may be deeper and greater than anyone can now imagine. Think of what
the United States did to the enemy that bombed Pearl Harbor. Now recall
that American power in the world is all but unchallenged by any other
state. Recall that America has never been wealthier, and is at the end
of one of the biggest booms in history. And now consider the extent of this
wound - the greatest civilian casualties since the Civil War, an
assault not just on Americans but on the meaning of America itself. When
you take a step back, it is hard not to believe that we are now in the
quiet moment before the whirlwind. Americans will recover their dead, and
they will mourn them, and then they will get down to business. Their
sadness will be mingled with an anger that will make the hatred of these
fanatics seem mild.
I am reminded of a great American poem written by Herman Melville after the
death of Abraham Lincoln, the second founder of the country:
There is sobbing of the strong,
And a pall upon the land;
But the People in their weeping
Bare the iron hand;
Beware the People weeping
When they bare the iron hand.
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Crustiest of the OLD COOTS
Airline ticket to Afghanistan $800
High powered rifle with scope $1000
Hotel room with roof access $100
A clean Head shot on that sack of Horse Manure Usuma Bin Laden PRICELESS!
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