Why terrorists attack America

[Valandil]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
...You seem to be just a member who is hiding behind a new name and doesn't have the guts to state your opinions on your own name...

JD... you don't suppose this is 'The Return of Blackbreathalizer', do you?

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Valandil
JD... you don't suppose this is 'The Return of Blackbreathalizer', do you?

No - he was just a jackson lover. He didn't get involved with political debates or anything that actually took brains.

[Valandil]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
No - he was just a jackson lover. He didn't get involved with political debates or anything that actually took brains.

Just wondered if he'd try another route to 'get under your skin'!

[Lizra]

What's so fun about getting under JD's skin anyway? Man...if that's supposed to be some kind of fun... ....well....I think I'll go overdose on estrogen, excuse me!

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Lizra
What's so fun about getting under JD's skin anyway? Man...if that's supposed to be some kind of fun... ....well....I think I'll go overdose on estrogen, excuse me!

What is that supposed to mean? So I guess you can take cracks at me - but you get all pissy if I use the rollyeyes.

[Lizra]

That's supposed to mean I think people who purposely post to get under your skin need a new (interesting) hobby.
We don't seem to speak the same language. I have to walk on eggshells when you are near. It would be fun to talk in person! You'd know what I meant then!

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
Actually - you obviously have no idea about McDonalds. Their menu is geared toward each country. That is why McDonalds in India serves Indian food.

in the uk, McDonalds dont serve english food,
and we even have to call chips 'fries' if we want any from McDonalds
not exactly geared towards our country, is it?
they dont serve full english for breakfast, pie and mash for lunch, or toad in the hole for dinner, with jam roly poly and custard for pudding

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Last Child of Ungoliant
in the uk, McDonalds dont serve english food,
and we even have to call chips 'fries' if we want any from McDonalds
not exactly geared towards our country, is it?
they dont serve full english for breakfast, pie and mash for lunch, or toad in the hole for dinner, with jam roly poly and custard for pudding

You don't have special diets. If you had a problem with the mcdonalds - I guess you should talk to them - like the other countries did. The other countries talked to McDonalds - France also has special food geared more toward France - although they also have the standard menu I think.

[GrayMouser]

I think if you walked into any seafood fast-food restaurant in the States and tried to order 'fish and fries' you'd get some funny looks.

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
You don't have special diets. If you had a problem with the mcdonalds - I guess you should talk to them - like the other countries did. The other countries talked to McDonalds - France also has special food geared more toward France - although they also have the standard menu I think.

to be honest, most people inour country don't like to cause a fuss, we tend to reserve our opinions a bit

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by GrayMouser
I think if you walked into any seafood fast-food restaurant in the States and tried to order 'fish and fries' you'd get some funny looks.

Yeah - we did have fish and chip places here.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Last Child of Ungoliant
to be honest, most people inour country don't like to cause a fuss, we tend to reserve our opinions a bit

Then how do people know how you feel? What your opinions are? By the way - that isn't really true anyway - there were plenty of demonstraters not being reserved when Bush went out there for the state visit.

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
Then how do people know how you feel? What your opinions are? By the way - that isn't really true anyway - there were plenty of demonstraters not being reserved when Bush went out there for the state visit.

yes, but most people in our country dont like bush, and there certainly weren't 60 million protestors there ...

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Last Child of Ungoliant
yes, but most people in our country dont like bush, and there certainly weren't 60 million protestors there ...

Yes, I am aware the don't like Bush - but they weren't reserved either in expressing their opinions.

[jerseydevil]

I missed this post.

Originally posted by Lizra
That's supposed to mean I think people who purposely post to get under your skin need a new (interesting) hobby.
We don't seem to speak the same language. I have to walk on eggshells when you are near. It would be fun to talk in person! You'd know what I meant then!

okay. Maybe I am taking what you mean wrong and maybe you are taking what I mean wrong.

[The Gaffer]

An observation on this thread:

Hardly anyone has actually attempted to answer the question, apart from Sween.

Clearly, the answer is a complex mix of factors, but I wonder if it's possible to even ask this question without getting shouted down?

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by The Gaffer
An observation on this thread:

Hardly anyone has actually attempted to answer the question, apart from Sween.

Clearly, the answer is a complex mix of factors, but I wonder if it's possible to even ask this question without getting shouted down?

Well the question is incorrect thogh - because we are NOT the only country being attacked. In actuality we have only been attacked once in the US and that was 9/11. Why not say - "why are the terrorists attacking the western world" - this would include France- since they just got a threat from Al Qaeda the other day.

[Glorfindel_of_Gondolin]

Just to chime in on a raging arguement...

I read the first post as saying that the US is attacked by terrorists, but is not the only one. I think the contention is WHY they are attacked.

I agree with The Gaffer, no one has tried to answer the question.

For example, why did 9/11 happen at all? What where the motives?

[Valandil]

Originally posted by Glorfindel_of_Gondolin
For example, why did 9/11 happen at all? What where the motives?

I thought that was pretty well established long before this thread was started.

Some murderous Moslim extremists didn't like American troops on Saudi Arabian soil during and after the Gulf War - and decided to make an attempt to hit America hard, in hopes that the USA would get out of the Middle East and leave it to people like them.

[GrayMouser]

Firstly, what do we mean by terrorists?

In this case we seem to be using it as a short-hand for "al-Qaeda and related or sympathizing groups of Islamic fundamentalist extremists", though some posters seem to be extending it to use of terror as a tactic in itself, which would include groups like ETA and the Tamil Tigers, maybe even Aum Shinrikyo in Japan. (Timothy McVeigh?)


Referring just to Islamic fundamentalists, I'd say the origin is the humiliation and frustration they feel when they see the comparative strength of the West and the Muslim nations. As jd said, their enemy is the entire Western world. (Eastern world, too, eventually)

In traditional Islamic thought there is no separation of Church and State; the Community of Believers is (ideally) a single polity, as in the days of Mohammed or the early Caliphate. Since Islam is the true religion, the Islamic community should be the strongest society around, again as in the days of the Caliphs, or at least strong enough to stand up to the infidels of East and West.

Instead, since the 16th Century, culminating in the fall of the Ottoman Empire (referred to by Osama in his communiques after 9/11), the Islamic world has suffered a constant string of defeats and conquests by the West.

The strongest reaction to this was the secular pan-Arab nationalism typified by Nasser in Egypt and the Baath in Syria and Iraq. The Six-Days War in 1967 was an overwhelming setback for this ideology, especially given the nature of the enemy. To be defeated by Christendom was one thing, to be crushed by the despised Jews was total humiliation.

The Arab (and most other Islamic) nations were a dispiriting collection of corrupt Sheikdoms or ineffectual secular tyrannies, capable of oppressing their own people, but not of standing up to the West or (as they saw it) its surrogate Israel. Islamic fundamentalism was an an alternative.

The turning point was the Afghan War. In their eyes, the defeat of the Soviet Union and its subsequent collapse was the sign that the forces of Islam could prevail, first against the atheist Communists and then against the decadent and morally weaker West.

Osama bin Laden was (is?) a Saudi, and his concerns were pretty parochial as Valandil pointed out- Infidel troops on Saudi soil- it seems it took al-Zawahiri (an Egyptian) to get him to at least put some emphasis on Palestine and the wider picture.

They focussed their main attacks on America because it is the strongest power and the center of the Western world. I think it's significant that their main target was the WTC- emblem not just of the USA, but of the whole process of globalisation, modernisation, and (from their point of view) immoral and decadent secularism.

So, yeah, their enemies are just about everybody- Western countries, Muslim states like Turkey and Morocco, "Marxists" like Saddam, the despised Shia heretics - anybody except fellow Sunni fundamentalists.