It’s been 18 years since that fateful day in 2001 when the World Trade Center in NYC was attacked, killing and injuring thousands of Americans. The US military has spent 18 years and nearly 5 TRILLION dollars on the ‘war on terror’ since the attack. This morning, war-hawks on Fox News upset me enough to inspire me to write about foreign policy for the first time in my life. While this is an informal rant, I will back up everything I say with reliable sources. Below are six simple reasons we must abandon the miserable failure that politicians refer to as the ‘war on terror’:
1) At best, the war is a stalemate; we have made roughly zero progress in curtailing Islamic terrorism, middle-eastern terrorism, or universal terrorism in 18 years. The US government initially attacked the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan using the full force of the US military – by far the most powerful military in the history of humanity. In 2003, the politicians began a war in Iraq as well, though they did not have the spine to formally declare war, making the entire war technically illegal according to US law. Despite the most powerful force in existence spending 18 years, $5 trillion, and using all resources and allies at their disposal, Al Qaeda and the Taliban remain after 18 years of the strongest military in history ‘trying to eradicate them’, and the Taliban just launched a rocket near a US embassy last night. Iraq may actually be worse off then it was under Saddam, and the groups of rebels that the US government supported with weapons and training have grown to become yet another threat to the US and now refer to themselves as ‘ISIS’.
Additionally, many more middle-eastern citizens have grown to resent Americans due to our politicians meddling endlessly in their affairs and due to the corruption and abuse that some soldiers commit in their countries. The US military is currently supporting multiple sides of the same complicated battles in Syria and possibly other countries in the middle-east. These wars have become so ridiculous that now CIA-supported rebel groups are fighting against pentagon-supported groups. And you are paying for all of it. Since 2001, 7,000 innocent American soldiers were led to their death by politicians and many more will suffer from injuries and illnesses for the rest of their lives. We must demand that politicians abandon this futile effort.
2) Perpetual war is expensive. The ‘war on terror’ that began in 2001 has cost US taxpayers FIVE TRILLION DOLLARS, which means that every hour, you are being robbed of over $32 million, which politicians use to fight a war which we all know could never be successful in any way – and which will likely never end.
3) The perpetual war is costing our brave soldiers their lives, it’s hurting thousands of American families and costing us billions in veterans’ healthcare. Americans are robbed by politicians of millions of dollars per hour in order to pay for healthcare for the veterans of the ‘war on terror’ that began in 2001. This total cost is approaching a third of a TRILLION dollars as of this writing. (factored into the $5 trillion total cost figure)
4) The perpetual war on terror does make more enemies, regardless of your views on nation-building. Foreign intervention does not work, and Al-Qaeda, Taliban, and even ISIS are not taking over the world anytime soon. If they try to, the other 180 countries – or the millions of armed Americans would stop them without the politicians robbing us of trillions of dollars to funnel the money to their friends in the ‘defense industry’.
5) I don’t trust politicians (Trump, Obama, Clinton, Bush, Bolton, Pompeo, Tillerson, etc.) to make the most important decisions, such as who to go to war with, when to go to war, how to conduct the wars, and which people are forced to fund the wars (US taxpayers, obviously).
6) Americans who value freedom and privacy are increasingly considering that the primary reason that our politicians are keeping us at war with ‘terror’ is to justify ever-increasing levels of domestic surveillance. Of course, the ‘Patriot Act’ was passed by Congress with massive majorities just a few weeks after the attacks on 9/11/2001. The massive bill written by politicians gave politicians the power to essentially scrap due process and destroy the concept of privacy for all 330 million innocent Americans.
Why shouldn’t we trust politicians?
The official US government story is that Saudi Arabia supported, trained for, and essentially carried out the 9/11 attack, and that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi citizens. Osama Bin Laden was also a Saudi citizen. The official US government story also states that the US government recently gave the Saudi government tons of weapons – the biggest weapons deal in US history, to be specific. Am I crazy, or is the US government guilty of treason?
Lockheed Martin and Boeing made a fortune on this weapons deal between the US government and the country responsible for 9/11. Interesting.
If they attacked us for our freedom, they’ve won. The typical patriotic theory for 9/11 is that Muslim terrorists attacked the US because they hate that we have freedom. Assuming that this is accurate, the terrorists have won! Since the attack, the US has been consistently losing freedom in terms of increasing taxes, spending, debt, regulation, gun rights, politicians spying on us, and in nearly every other way freedom could possibly be measured. If you really want to show the terrorists that they can never defeat the American tradition of freedom, let’s stop the enormous taxation and spending on these perpetual wars and repeal the Patriot Act and other such laws that give politicians power over us.
While the attacks were vicious and greatly damaging, many veterans of the post-9/11 wars believe that the wars were not designed by US politicians to ever be winnable. Again, despite the official government story being that the Saudis/Al Qaeda were responsible for the attack, the US invaded Iraq, which led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians and soldiers.
Orwell said of authoritarian governments utilizing a perpetual state of war to control their citizens: “The war is not meant to be won; it is meant to be continuous.”
We do not even need to delve into any conspiracy theories about DC politicians’ involvement in or negligence relating to the attack on 9/11 to make a sound case for ending the ridiculous and endless ‘war on terror’. There are many conspiracy theories alleging that top members of the US government orchestrated or allowed the attack to occur. From the claims that Clinton knew about the plan to the claims that Bush orchestrated the attack as justification for invading the land of endless oil, to the theories about the US government perpetrating the attack in order to justify passing ever-increasing amounts of domestic surveillance on Americans, the theories are endless. There are many conspiracies alleging that top agents in the US government orchestrated or allowed the attack to occur. On Saturday, the New York Post published an article about how Robert Mueller repeatedly disrupted the investigation into the 9/11 attacks and “helped Saudi Arabia cover up its role in 9/11 attacks” when he was the FBI Director from 2001 to 2013.
The good news
John Bolton, widely considered to be the most pro-war adviser in the US government has been fired by President Trump.
Anti-war sentiment grows due to Americans growing sick of perpetual war and due to the instantaneous nature of technology allowing people to see the truth and communicate with people around the world – and see that most middle easterners are not our enemies. Over the past few years, many Americans have opposed entering into regime change wars in Syria, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, and other countries, all of which were supported by war-hawks like John Bolton and other misled and/or corrupt politicians.
Veterans are becoming the greatest voices opposing perpetual war, corruption, and domestic surveillance. Maybe we could start listening to the veterans on this 9/11?
