How many of you remember 9/11/01? Do you remember where you were when the towers were hit? I certainly do. Virtually all New Yorkers knew people who were directly affected by the terrorist attack, people who died, as well as survivors.
I began writing this entry on the day where the last US serviceman/woman was evacuated from Kabul, with the idea that this would be the rare post to appear on the day being discussed.
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Politicians certainly know how to get us into wars - the loss of roughly 3,000 people in one set of attacks was more than enough to justify this war. But once Bin Laden was killed, it was time to leave. And leaving a war zone when a nation hasn't really won a war will always be messy. We saw this in Vietnam, and we just saw this in Afghanistan. We ended up depending on our enemy to provide security while we exited the theater of war.
Politicians will be long arguing about what Biden did right and what he did wrong. But the deal to get out was made by Trump (one of the few good things for which I'll give him credit), and left for others to implement. As for me, on the whole, I think Biden did the right thing. Yet, there was much room for improvement. At least we got over 100k people evacuated before the Taliban took over.
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But how many of us remember what it was like before 9/11/01?
20 years ago, airports and other public spaces were relatively free from "Security Theater". (Much of what we see is meant to impress the public. What the public doesn't see is really meant to protect us.) One could meet family at the arrivals gate, going through minimal security inspections which were meant to keep people from bringing firearms on planes. If one wanted, one could go to the airport, go shopping inside (why, I don't know - but Pittsburgh once advertised its airport shopping), and then go home. I could bring my soft drinks through security, and not have to pay outrageous prices to quench my thirst.
One of my trips had me traveling from San Antonio, TX to White Plains, NY with a change of planes in Chicago, IL. However, the plane coming from Denver, CO was late, and I'd never make my connection to New York. Luckily, the gate agent changed the booking the second leg of my trip fly on on another airline (something not done today), and said that I had 30 minutes to make it from American Airlines' terminal to United airlines' terminal. Little did I know that I'd be running from the far end of one part of the airport to the far end of another part of the airport, going through security (exit and reentry) in the process with only 2 minutes to spare. I could not have made this connection less than a decade later.
Two decades ago, corporations were much more lax regarding building security. I could go to a job interview without having to present any identification when I entered a building. In the years that followed, I'd eventually have to go through 2 or 3 sets of security checkpoints in one building to get to a job interview.
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We were much better off 20 years ago. But once our image of being secure was punctured, we went crazy trying to restore it - and went to war. No politician would "man up" and say it's time to "bug out". Americans never want to look weak. Our politicians kept making excuses to justify staying in the war zone. I am very thankful for our president being smart enough to exit this war, and keep future generations of American servicemen/women from dying in a "forever war".
PS: I'd love to find out what Joe Haldeman would think of our exit from Afghanistan.
PPS: I think you may be interested in this song by Gilbert O'Sullivan:
So appropriate for 9/11, don't you think?
