Ooooh. “fucko” I haven’t been called that in a while.
It ended a war in which a lot more people that are the combined population of Hiroshima and Nagasaki would have died.
How about this: 100% of the people that dies on 9/11 were non-combatants.
Dick
Sue, but we didn’t know at the time that this was an overreaction. We didn’t know if there were more to come or where they would be. Why is having extra security measures the same as running around like headless chickens?
I didn’t have to read ten posts before I saw Americans yelling at that OP. But you’re right, that was a shitty thing to say. I think he should apologize too.
I agree with everything else you say, too.
Unrelatedly, I’d like to quote this post from eleanor:
I agree, and sorry for not measuring up to the rest of the world’s expectations. Do I need to include a rolleyes?
I don’t think I’m the only person who read this as referring to frightened people in the streets of New York, not bureaucrats in the days that followed, as headless chickens.
Exactly, and I’m not sure why it took until post #52 for her to clarify that.
This is ridiculous. The whole world was uneasy in the first few days. I remember Europeans crying on TV. (did they hire them for the day-I doubt it). I do know that my sister’s Swiss owned business essentially shut down for the week. It was not the only international business to do so. Weren’t the major markets down for at least two days? The world had a hiccup–because of the postion
American holds. NOT because we’re just the greatest, but we happened to be the biggest, strongest power out there. How hard is this to understand?
No offense to the helpless old woman, but given the circumstances, I’m sure they found other ways of copinng with her disabilities.
And now I’m late for work. This has really pissed me off. I’ve lost respect for you, Nava–and thanks for attempting to undermine the good relationship with EU and UK we have here. To me, it seems you’ve tried to smear shit over it all today. Nicely done. I don’t look for 100% agreement from allies and friends, but I don’t expect malice and gloating, either. I think we can safely extrapolate that to nations, don’t you?
Completely true, but nevertheless the perception after 9/11 was that America was in some way hypocritical.
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Arguably the US response to 9/11 pushed peace in Northern Ireland closer.
The Bush Govt were at pains to make clear they were not fighting a War on Islam, but a War on Terror… this would have been untenable had they not acted against IRA terrorists if bombings had continued on the British mainland.
I’ve often wondered whether Gerry Adams and Martin McGuiness suddenly had visions of a trip to Guantanamo prior to they renunciation of violence…
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Because it never occured to me that you could be reading what I said that way!
Sorry I made you late for work, eleanorigby
Stopping all plane travel in the States was a wise and brave move. I’d say that most if not all of the security measures carried out in the States in the days that followed were justified. Security was ramped up over here as well but the level of threat wasn’t the same and most Europeans didn’t fell much more at risk that normal, apart from the worry of WWIII kicking off that is.
Making people stay in London becuase of attacks in NY is silly. For one London was/is the biggest target in Europe. Notice that it wasn’t just flying they were told not to do. Ferries etc. were banned as well. If you can’t see this as a over reaction then we’ll have to differ.
You can add me to this sentiment. Not that Nava probably cares.
Yeah, like I said: barbarians. Killing a thousand random people in the hopes of getting one or two who were sympathetic to one’s enemy is downright Stalinesque in its conception.
I can’t believe someone is actually pissed off because offers of medical aid and blood donations were turned down, due to the fact that they weren’t needed because so many people were dead instead of injured.
Jesus H. Christ.
And yeah, count me in as another who read Nava’s “headless chickens” comment as a reference to terrified people fleeing the WTC when the towers were coming down.
The “official” death toll was somewhere between 2973 and 2976 (based on the numbers I’m finding with a quick google; nobody seems to quite agree). I’m not sure what you’ve been reading, but 3000 isn’t “much higher” than that.
Well, the towers falling and the headless chickens were in the same sentence, and the same networks which showed us the towers falling showed us injured people covered in soot running through the streets on that day. I don’t recall seeing any government officials actually running in panic. It may have happened, but I didn’t see it.
I am from the NYC area and there were thousands of our own that wanted to help but there was nothing for them to do. A friend of mine put it very well “I felt helpless and wanted to do something…even if they had only handed me a broom to sweep ten blocks away it would have felt better than being sent home.” It was nothing personal against other governments.
I’m not arguing that our response hasn’t been melodramatic & laughably ineffective in some parts. But overall, has the US reaction been so very different to other terrorized countries at a comparable point in their histories? (Excluding the schmaltzy part & the waging war on Iraq) Perhaps someone could educate me on this?
You’re describing the terrorists, not the people who rolled their eyes and said “now you know how it feels”.
Indeed: that shows how hard it is to defend against such actions. However, while there are a few isolated crazies in the US, the US does not face a long-standing campaign by a large section of the population in an region to separate.
Except for the military personnel in the Pentagon, of course.
Of course, so you can understand why civilians in other nations wondered how America could be so two-faced, condemning callous slaughter when elements of their own military operated under the principle that “'it became necessary to destroy the town to save it”.
There’s no logic to this, just raw emotion and decades of simmering anger for the civilians killed by American troops.
Because it took you that long to come up with a bullshit excuse…