[sdtPikachu]

Well, I don't really have an awful lot to add to what Marc and gekko have said.

As a pacifist, I am opposed to violence in all forms, yet I do realise that it is, at times, neccesary in order to protect others.
However, I see the reaction of America to the whole 11/9 thing as just a teensy weency bit of a knee-jerk reaction. Like gekko says, most of the Taliban had/have no part in the 11/9 attacks, and yet America happily charges in guns blazing killing every member of the Taliban it can find. If the US were only trying to find the culprits, why would they need a whole army? A small stike force could have done it. But no, the states went at it like an angry bull in a china shop and sent in a not inconsiderable force to weed them out. And, quelle suprise, the Taliban saw it as an attack on their territory and they all rallied around to try and fight america off.
America didn't make this a mission to seek out the culprits. They did it to eliminate the Taliban (who, as I've said before, were empowered by the US in the first place). They're either trying to get rid of their embarrassing mistake or they're they've appointde themselves the moral guardians of a country they should have nothing to do with. If it were a colony or some other place where American citizens resided in large numbers, then such actions might be rendered more acceptable. But this is not the case.
The government just wanted to be seen to be Getting Something Done. And if this involves lots of guns, tanks and an excuse to wave a flag about even better. The american public were begging for blood, and by jove they got it.
I just don't believe America had the right to make such a meal of the whole thing (cue: flame, flame, flame).

Sure, I think the elimination of the Taliban is a good thing - as a whoe, they're a "government" who preach bigotry and hatred to everyone who doesn't agree with them. If they take enough of a dislike to you (or if you happen to be female) then it's really quite easy to find yourself getting stoned to death as you walk down the street. I for one was pretty chuffed that they have (eventually) lost their position of power over Afghanistan, at least for the most part, even if their idealogy still lives on to an extent. But what for one minute gave the Americans the right to do that? I can understand America giving Afghan soldiers money, weapons and training to fight off the soviets with (though I still can't understand why they knowingly funded a group renowned to be a bunch of psycho bampots who were itching to be given money, weapons and training to take over the country), but i can't understand why America thinks it has the right to invade a country on the pretext of finding a small bunch of terrorists and kill them all. Maybe the "America got them into that mess, therefore we'll get them out of it whilst pretending to do something else" aspect of it.

And why is it that america only realises terrorism exists when it actually happens to them? Other countries have been sufferring terrorism for decades, centuries - and yet it only seems to exist when the WTC goes the big firework? Is it that all previous acts of terrorism were OK cos they were only say 50 people dying at once? Or is it that America feels the need to assert its superiority over others? Or even that America thinks it's done nothing wrong that could have made all these people resort to terrorism? I wonder. I don't condone terrorism by any means (quite the opposite) but to me America has taken such a "holier than thou, we have done and can do no wrong" attitude that it makes me sick.

Terrorism kills innocent people.
The backlash also kills innocent people.
Another retaliation occurs.
Go to line 1 and repeat.
Where does it all end?


You'll have to excuse my incoherence. I am tired. Expect a more flameworthy post soon.