The Ashes of Hiroshima Cloud the Skies of 9-11

Howard Zinn wrote about the willingness of Americans and the American media to time and again fall prey to the lies of the government when it came to accepting the call to war. He attributed it to two things. Time and place. The dimension of time, Zinn said, was the inability of Americans to have a historical perspective. We fail to remember the lessons of history and continue to repeat the same insane mistakes. The dimension of place Zinn described as the inability of Americans to think outside of nationalistic boundaries. We Americans think everything outside the borders of the US is inferior to our nation. We still hold on to the concept of a "manifest destiny" despite all evidence that demonstrates this type of thinking is toxic.
This is the week leading up to the tenth anniversary of the 9-11 terrorism attack on the World Trade Center's twin towers in 2001. All week we are bombarded by the media hyperbole of that day when over 3,000 Americans died in the worst case of terrorism on American soil. Unless we count the hundred plus years of slavery from the time of the original Constitution until the Civil War's end. And the Jim Crow laws following that until the 1970s.
There is no doubt we should stop and remember that awful day in 2001. No doubt we should reflect on the meaning of such an attack and where it has led us since that day. We should ask the questions if two wars have made us safer or more hated? We should ask the question if giving up basic freedoms for a sense of security that is very transient in nature is the path we should continue. Would the victims and survivors of the attacks have wanted Americans to live in constant fear and forfeit basic freedoms as a result of their sacrifice?
All across the land there will be tributes and commemorations. The Nationalistic Football League will wave large flags and sing the anthem and God Bless America and mention the sacrifices made to honor America by our military heroes.
Like Dave Zirin said in his blog today, there'll be no mention of Pat Tillman. Nor Camilio Mejia, Pablo Paredes, Kelly Dougherty, Garret Reppenhagen, Cindy Sheehan or all the other heroes who have spoke out against the immorality of the wars. All except Cindy served. Cindy lost her son, Casey.
Noam Chomsky wrote an article today that questioned the way we look at 9-11. I haven't read it yet because I want to put my own thoughts down first.
By chance or some karmic force, I picked up John Hershey's book, HIROSHIMA yesterday. It was written days after the nuclear bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima in 1945. It's a hidden masterpiece of the true cost of nationalism and terrorism. American terrorism. Howard Zinn wrote about Hiroshima and the sacrosanct history most Americans choose to hold onto. Again, we have to keep in mind the perspective of time and place. In the first blast of the bomb over 100,000 people were killed in minutes. Tens of thousands more died hours and days after the bomb being dropped. The huge majority of the dead were non-combatants. Hiroshima was far from a military target. It was a psychological target. Days later, another bomb was dropped on Nagasaki with the same type of casualties.
The mushroom clouds of Hiroshima and Nagasaki obscure the cloud of the Twin Towers falling on September 11, 2001. But the dead Japanese weren't Americans, they were non-whites and their government was at war with our government. The dead children and families weren't Americans. The bombed Red Cross Hospital John Hershey writes about didn't have American patients. And besides the American government would tell us all the bombs incinerating Hiroshima and Nagasaki saved upwards of a half million American lives. A fallacy but something they'd like us to believe.
The 6000 plus dead American troops and at least one million dead Iraqis obscure the number of dead at "ground zero" of the 9-11 attacks. And there are still no weapons of mass destruction nor any connection to Iraq and the attack on the World Trade Center. The shock and awe of the first wave of attacks on Iraq killed mostly innocent civilians. Thousands of them children. Our democratic reform has been a sham and what has happened is an American occupation leading to sectarian hatred and violence. And increased hatred for Americans in the Muslim world and around the world. What victory have we gained in our vengeance? The same scenario has taken place in Afghanistan. A corrupt regime like the regimes put in power by the American government in Vietnam and Central America has brought only shame to the thought of bringing democracy to that nation.
Of course, the end game was always dictated by big businesses like Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater and the multinational oil companies.
What we have done in the wake of the attack of 9-11 brings only shame to the memory of those who died. From the immoral and illegal wars to the fear mongering, renditions, water boarding torture, profiteering of huge coporations to the waste of American youth and innocent civilians, we have failed to bring honor to the victims of 9-11. We have not protected freedom in their names. We have stripped freedoms promised to all Americans out of fear that is fanned by the rhetoric and hatred of our government and the media acting as the megaphone for our government.
And we speak of terrorism like we are the greatest victims of it. And we fail to acknowledge our terroristic acts in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Baghdad, Fallujah and Afghanistan.
This Sunday I won't watch the hypocrisy of the NFL waving the flags of militarism in phony honor of those who have served and paid the ultimate sacrifice. Not when their jingoism blinds them to all the victims of terror by all the masters of war.