America and the free world were thrust into a war on 9/11/2001. What occurred in New York City and Washington, DC was an act of war. Let us be clear about this: the enemy made a horrific strike in a war of aggression. The entire free world, not just America, has an enemy that hates our very existence and wants to destroy us. We must go to war, now and over the coming months and years, if our civilization is to survive into the future … but go to war with whom and where, and how do we wage this war?
Former Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, speaking before a Congressional Committee on September 20th, 2001, focused briefly on the issue and objectives. Netanyahu was subdued when defining the enemy and outlining the necessary approach to this war, but it is time to take the gloves off and be clear with the American people, else a rising clamor for restraint will aid and abet a pernicious attacker that must be annihilated; America must resist the tendency to try and make peace with this particular enemy. This enemy doesn’t want co-existence, doesn’t want to try and get along; this enemy wants to end our existence, wants to destroy us.
Radical Islam (we all can call it Islamism, to set it apart from the much larger body of Islamic faith) wants to end the world as we’ve come to understand it and remake it as they choose to define it. Islamism wants to take over the larger body of Moslem faith, the religion that co-exists with the other great religions. At the outset, let us make a few subtle but vital distinctions: the history of most great religions has a period of violence perpetrated by adherents; the religion of Islam went through such a period, but settled into a peaceful co-existence with the other religions of the world and within the
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factions of Islam; radical Islamic totalitarian zeal has arisen in the last twenty years, to challenge the peaceful co-existence of religions and societies.
Reasons for this rise of radical Islam, this Islamism, are bound up in the interactions of nations, as the planet has become a world community. Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union caused the combatants to manipulate and influence the Moslem world, as tools in the struggle. The Cold War ended, promising perhaps a new co-existence among nations and religions. Islamism views the co-existence of many religions as heresy to traditions of Mohammed, asserting that compliance with the tenets must be forced if an individual doesn’t obey in free will. With this perspective, the very presence of non-Islamic peoples living and working in certain parts of the world is seen as a threat to Islamism’s. Let us also note that those Moslems practicing their faith in a less than fundamental (as defined by the Islamism’s) way are also seen as a threat, by the radicals; history records that tens-of-thousands of Moslems have been slaughtered across Northern Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Eurasia because of this clash between Islam and Islamism.
In an essay written by Free Republic’s, Iron Jack, titled Allah Must Be Proud [http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3ba5df0b331f.htm], I found the following astute observation:
The most absurd aspect of the Trade Center bombings is that the butchery was committed in the name of religion, as if there is a god somewhere who delights in
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wholesale murder carried out in his name. … The terrorists think that couching their savagery in quasi-religious or nationalistic terms elevates it above mere murder and grants it the disposition of nobility.… Apparently we have regressed to an age when religious war once again threatens civilization, as it has for centuries in the Middle East.

The butchery was committed in the name of Islamism; whether you adhere to a religion or are atheist, that’s noteworthy.
From a religious perspective, there is a god that delights in murder; the terrorists willingly serve that god and believe dying while killing non-Islamism’s is an instant pass to the paradise of this god of murder. Islamism is the tool with which this god of murder-this god that hates humankind simply because the God of creation loves us--seeks to destroy peace and reason in the world. In a real sense, the god of Islamism is the antithesis of the God of creation, the opposite of God in Christ, the antithesis of Allah, the antithesis of Jehovah, the hater of Buddha, the twister of that which is Hindu; this little god is a murderer from the start, the father of lies, a hater of men, and a lover of enmity.
The war America has been thrust into is a religious war, at least to the terrorists, and it surely threatens civilization as we know it. This war, no matter its outcome, will change everything to some degree. Hopefully, the changes will turn out to be for the betterment of all humankind, but changes are coming and we should not shy away from
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facing them squarely. With this world war, we truly have an opportunity to make world-wide changes that benefit all humankind who wish peaceful co-existence, lifting peoples and societies out of poverty and into a world community that values responsibility and self-reliance, which rewards peaceful co-existence and diligence with security, self-worth and fulfillment. But we must annihilate the enemy of those values, first! We must face down this new totalitarian threat with an eye to ending the enmities that give rise to such fanaticism.
My mind has been a blank since that terrible day almost 3 years ago. Few words have found their way to my screen as my mind searches for meaning, for clarity, for anything but the shock and numbness we have all been feeling. The images have been seared into my brain, and it has been difficult to get past them.
Like most others, I will never forget where I was that day. If ignorance is bliss, then I was certainly blissful that Tuesday. My family and I had finally tossed the dish and antenna a year ago, and this day I chose not to listen to the radio. Instead, we spent the early morning watching, of all things, a rerun of the Andy Griffith Show while I got ready for work. The kids and I was commented on how much simpler life had once been, lamenting the past while the future was unfolding a continent away. The towers had been down and thousands dead and injured for an hour before I turned on the car radio and learned that our world, the world I had been railing against a few minutes before, had suddenly ended.
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While the new reality is settling down around us, a reality of terror, warfare and sorrow mixed with resolve and an unbridled patriotism, I increasingly find myself thinking of another day in history, one which seems so far away now, yet in my mind must be remembered along with September 11.
A day like any other.
A day when the most important thing in the world was ourselves: our jobs, our families, our own problems to be resolved.
A day when firefighters in New York put out fires, saved lives and helped their fellow citizens. A day when they did their job as they always had, and few noticed.
A day when Red Cross blood banks across the country were still facing shortages.
A day when the talk around the cooler was of Barry Bonds, the beginning of the new football season the day before, of the Giants game that night, or a thousand other conversations of things of great importance.
A day when the news included stories on defense spending and lockboxes, Star Wars and tax rebates, the stock market and race relations, all tied in with images from the Middle East as Israel and the Palestinians seemed closer to war than ever. A day when this news seemed so important.
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A day when the words Republican and Democrat and conservative and liberal sparked heated debate and passion.
A day when Afghanistan was not in every thought, when the name Osama bin Laden wasn't on everyone's lips, and sorrow mixed with vengeance wasn't in every heart in America.
A day when the towers faced their final sunset at the conclusion of another day of business, standing at the tip of Manhattan as they had for so long, as familiar as Lady Liberty and the Empire State to those who know and love New York.
A day when husbands and wives, moms and dads, sons and daughters of many nations returned home, or got ready for work, or watched the game, or read to their kids, or did whatever we all do. A day when thousands of ordinary people of every background and creed, each with their own thoughts, hopes and dreams, went on with life as they always had, and thought they would for a long time to come.
A day like any other.
The next time you think of September 11, of blinding sorrow and swift, terrible justice, think also of another day, a day like any other, and remember those who were here to see it, and how they lived their lives: just like you and me.
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Here is to September 10, 2001: the last full day of the old world.
God Bless America.

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