Greens are peace oriented and many don’t believe in war for any reason. I tend towards that position myself. In my initial reactions to this tragedy I found myself wanting to say we should find those responsible and bomb them, go to war. But is that the right reaction? Is that what we should do as a country? Perhaps not.
We need to be rational, especially in moments like these, when we are tried to the extreme. We need to show that we are bigger than terrorists, that we are BETTER than terrorists, and not act like them. Bombing and Air Strikes are the language the terrorists understand. We should not play into their hands. We should not emulate them.
One of the things we do need to look at is why was America a target? Why was the World Trade Center a target? Why was the Pentagon a target? These targets are “symbols” of America, our financial district and our consumerism. The Pentagon, the Military Industrial Complex, is an obvious target. In any war, it is expected that the Pentagon would be attacked.
There are Arab factions that have claim Jihad, or holy war, on America for our foreign policies. I saw a program just the other night from Frontline on Osama bin Laden. He is the prime suspect, and indeed it looks likely that he and his followers would do something like this. Why? We have left our troops in their Holy Land of Saudi Arabia. American Armed Forces are still sitting in Saudi Arabia over 10 years after the Gulf War. Why? (No, this is not a reason I believe for killing American civilians; it is his reasoning. I don’t believe in killing.)
We need to look at our foreign policies, examine them, and see if there is a possibility that our policies are on the wrong track. Maybe we are in places we don’t belong, interfering when we should leave our nose out of it. Why does America have to stick their nose in to so many places? To secure our interests, would be the typical response. What interests? So oil can continue to be produced at a cheap price and Americans can still count on their under $2/gallon price for gas? Is that why we should go to war? I suppose the answer to this is yes, since we did before (remember the Gulf War).
