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Comment by downandout | Hacker News Reader

9/11 was a single horrific event carried out by a small number of radicals. I don't think it holds a candle by any metric to the lives lost and damage done in an actual government-run war scenario. We don't yet have foreign bombers blowing up cafes on a regular basis because somebody on their hit list was inside, but because of our actions, we someday might.

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And on that afternoon, there will be rage upon the twitters, and that evening, the news.

And on the following day, we'll bomb the everliving christ out of the people we think are responsible, and on some day hence, we will be bombed in response.

The wheel turns--might as well get into the drone and bomb business. :(

Actually I think you'll bomb a bunch of other random people (Iraq, Afghanistan), and continue to treat the responsible "country" (Saudi Arabia) as an ally and friend.

Just before people rewrite history, afganistan and iraq governments had nothing to do with 9/11.

Unless you're a kook, the people responsible for 9/11 were a group whose interests include overthrowing the Saudi government. The erstwhile Afghan "government", the Taliban, harbored them.

Yes, but don't be forgetting that the Taliban are a rebranded mujahideen. This crowd were US allies (or were they pawns?). Armed and trained.

And Italy was one of the Allies during WW1 before allying itself with Germany in WW2. During the fight against Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire, other nations provided assistance to Italy. Individuals jumped into the fray too. Hemingway, for example, was a volunteer ambulance driver in Italy in WW1.

Beating the USA over the head post-911 with the club of having assisted anti-Soviet fighters in the 1970s and 1980s makes as much sense as castigating Italy's WW1-era allies and people like Hemingway in the late 1930s for having come to Italy's aid twenty years earlier.

The US leaders who started these wars had no issue making comparisons to WW2 and claiming Bush compared to Churchill. Words such as 'Crusade' were used. Good versus Evil. Crappy comparisons have been a hallmark of the campaigns. What I said was, to my knowledge, fact. I was attempting to point out that friends can become enemies, so a bit of tact and care is obviously a good idea. And of course, claiming you're on a crusade and fighting evil is just plain BS. The US deserves castigation for its role in these conflicts, it has acted appallingly, as have others. My own country, New Zealand, has troops in Afghanistan and have been involved in some controversy. The only reason I can think of for this deployment is to brown nose a few so-called allies. Making the world safer one botch job, torture and killing at a time.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/1...

http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Bush-s-use-of-word-cru...

http://www.3news.co.nz/Govt-cant-rule-out-SAS-link-in-Afghan...

The Taliban are native Afghanis, mostly Pashtun. The mujahideen were Muslims from around the world who went to Afghanistan to defend it from the godless communists. Bin Laden was one of them, but not necessarily one that we armed and supported back then. (While the irony would be delicious, I don't know of any evidence that he ever had US support.)

Yes, fine, but: Saddam Hussein couldn't stand Al-Quaeda. So... what's up with that? I don't even care who did 9/11 and why, but I know how it was used. That alone is shameful enough -- with those kind of "friends" who the fuck needs enemies, right?

Iraq wasn't directly related to al-Qaeda, no. From a geopolitical standpoint, replacing one of the most hostile governments in the region with a more favorable one had some interesting long term potential. Eliminating the root causes of terrorism requires significant geopolitical and socioeconomic change in the Muslim world. Installing a new government right in the middle of the region could go a long way to helping with that over the next few decades.

So is an invasion of russia imminent? (RE: Snowden)

Harbouring criminals is a reason to declare war?

You seem to be one of those people who make bad arguments, and as soon as those bad arguments are debunked, you immediately switch to a completely separate bad argument without ever acknowledging that you were mistaken in the first place. Most likely, you're unwilling to listen to other viewpoints and just want to hear yourself talk on the internet. Have fun with that. I'm not inclined to play along.

I think you are projecting here. And attempting a moral high ground. Where was I wrong exactly? Please point it out, then you can return to your high ground.

The argument remains the same, I drew a parallel with a current situation to highlight how ridiculous it was to blame the Taliban for 9/11 (as they had NOTHING to do with it). Just as Russia had nothing to do with Snowden (except that he's there).

Radical conservatives?

Tin-foil hat aside, it strikes me as oddly coincidental that the folks who use drones these days to kill around the planet with impunity are the same folks who had several allegedly drone controlled airliners carry out an attack, garnering public support for several illegal wars.

Just saying, it's all mightily convenient. As ever.

As to foreign bombers... So? Most Americans agree drone strikes are a good thing, so surely they'd still be a good thing when they start happening on US soil?

I like how you say "tin-foil hat aside", then go on to state with what seems to be complete seriousness that 9/11 was carried out by the U.S. against the U.S. using drone-controlled passenger airplanes.

And? You thought the 9/11 commission report was good and conclusive? WTC7 just "imploded" due to "natural causes"? And of course destroying all the evidence pronto was the best way to investigate the crime?

I don't think a single word that comes out of the US (and UK) gov't is truthful. Why would they be truthful about 9/11?

No, but it was convenient in the same way the Reichstag fire was convenient.

No no, it was filthy commies that started the reichstag fire, right?

making it even more convenient. The Nurimberg Laws could be passed thanks to this event. Almost as convenient as 9/11 so that the Patrot Act could be passed.

Hm. Interestingly, I was taught at school that it was a false flag op by Karl Ernst's SA thugs, who framed Van der Lubbe. This appears to no longer be believed. Good old revisionism to suit the current political clime, I suppose. Don't want anyone drawing any parallels!

i know. i just tried being sarcastic. im sorry it didnt work out

So do you believe the official fable about 9/11? If you do, what do you find compelling about the narrative?

If you don't, then I applaud your critical thinking.

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