Northcom Says Terrorist Attack Imminent

I can't believe these creeps think we can be bullied, whatever you do to us will be returned on your sorry asses ten fold.

 

Do these guys realize that if they keep poking the lion with a stick that the lion will eventually grow weary and quit playing with his food, but actually eat it?


I mean, at some point, the USA will tell the Saudis to quit funding Al Quieda or they are next.

DaDakota

 

Lots of serious warnings all of the sudden.

Sounds like Europe might be targeted at the same time we are.

 

One more serious attack, and I agree that the pressure on the Saudis will increase exponentially.

I heard a report the other day that some Saudi textbooks have been changed that were anti-semitic. I imagine some anti-Americanism is being dealth with also, but it's probably too late from many respects.

 

I hope this never occurs, but consider this scenario:

Al Queda executes a large scale attack on the US. Many people die and fear is rampant. How do we respond? Who do we retaliate against this time? Afghanistan is basically a parking lot now. Let's say *another* attack after this hypothetical attack occurs. Then what? Do we attack Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, on down the line? tough questions

 

I agree that if another attack occurs, that the pressure on the Saudis will increase and the proverbial lion will do this or that...

However, I don't think the US citizens and the US economy can withstand another massive attack (psychologically). If another 3 or 4 thousand lives are lost (God for bid) does it really matter how bad we will get them back? Don't get me wrong, I'm all for blowing those a-holes off the map, but I'm more worried about what will happen to us right now.

 

I hate to say this, but if there is another attack similar to the twin towers, I think the government needs to seriously look at more racial/religous profiling and possibly internment camps. We need to feel safe in our own country. Obviously, some of the terrorists are among us. I think safety of the country has to supercede political correctness.

I also would be very disappointed in our government if another attack happens. 9/11 should have been enough of a wake-up call to crack down on these guys. I know you can't be everywhere at once, but we should have the intelligence and man power to stop these guys.

 

Originally posted by NJRocket
I agree that if another attack occurs, that the pressure on the Saudis will increase and the proverbial lion will do this or that...

However, I don't think the US citizens and the US economy can withstand another massive attack (psychologically). If another 3 or 4 thousand lives are lost (God for bid) does it really matter how bad we will get them back? Don't get me wrong, I'm all for blowing those a-holes off the map, but I'm more worried about what will happen to us right now.


Americans can withstand more psychologically than you would expect.

The economy is resilient. Over time, a market economy can recover from anything.

I'm more worried about people's lives.

 

That goes without saying...maybe I should have made that point as well. I think it really depends on what part of the country you are from as to how badly it would affect Americans psychologically.

I, for one, consider myself a fairly strong person in that sense. I lost several business associates and friends in the trade center attack and I've been able to deal. However, if another attack were to take place in NYC (i.e. the Empire St Bldg, Madison Sq Gdn, nuclear plant, etc) or anywhere else that I have a "tie" to, I'd be pretty devastated.

 

Originally posted by NJRocket
That goes without saying...

I hope it didn't sound like I implied otherwise.

I, for one, consider myself a fairly strong person in that sense. I lost several business associates and friends in the trade center attack and I've been able to deal. However, if another attack were to take place in NYC (i.e. the Empire St Bldg, Madison Sq Gdn, nuclear plant, etc) or anywhere else that I have a "tie" to, I'd be pretty devastated.

Sorry to hear about your losses on 9-11, NJRocket.

In my mind, 'devastated' and 'ability to withstand' are very different. I know many people will have severe difficulties with another serious attack, but overall I expect Americans to react like other people in similar circumstances; to steel their resolve.

I hope we would react, over time, as well as the Londoners did in WWII.

 

not at all...i was actually hoping i didnt imply otherwise

maybe so...at least I hope you are correct

 

Saudi Arabia truly is a powder keg waiting to explode. The problem is that it is the people that bear the animosity towards the United States, not the "government"

I quote government, because their government is just the Saudi "royal" family and all the brothers, sisters, nephews etc ruling the entire country with one goal in mind. Control the population and not allow the wealth to trickle down to the populace. I have been to Saudi Arabia and have seen how the people are oppressed. Even the government teaches a very strict form of Islam known as Wahhabism in order to maintain their strict dictatorial control over the populace.

The reason the populace bears animosity towards the United States is that the people know the US troops are stationed their more to protect the Saudi royals from their own people more than anything else. The people are sick and tired of an oppressive regime and wish the fight against tyranny. They see the US as a blockade to their freedom. The US will never attack Saudi, but it could implode within itself.

 

FD Khan,

Quite a mess.

I think the US trroops are there for protection from Iraq. If I am correct, US troops did not show up en masse until the Kuwait incasion. The Saudi people have not yet taken up arms against the royal family, nor would US troops fight civilians if it did.

The US is in a tough position, do they abandon an ally in need to avoid angering the population of that very same ally? Do they remove the troops for any reason, now that it can be viewed as ceding to a terrorist demand?

I think the US will need to remove support for the monarchy once it is apparent that the people no longer support it; we don't need to blunder like we did with the Shah and Iran. Apparently, you think that time has passed?

 

These new warnings are supposedly not derived from new information, but increased "chatter" from Al Qaeda.

So it's the same type thing we have been getting. No specific info.

The Terrorism alert hasn't changed from yellow either. Of course, that doesn't mean to be any less vigilant.

 

I see the point about the Saudis, but the analogy IMO is more like a lion and a gnat. A lion can get angry and energetic, but it's still hard to catch and kill a gnat when you're that big.

I know that's not original, but (to mix metaphors) me thinks this weed must be killed at its roots. We're not going to be able to just blow all the terrorists up. For every dead terrorist, the current world is ready to bring forth two more. I like Khan's post, because the situation he describes is the root system of this problem, IMO.

 

Bin Laden stated that much of the animosity of Arabs/Saudi's ( the strong majority of Al-Queda and Terrorists in 9/11 were Saudi's or the Surrounding Arab states) towards the United States was based on the support of the regime in Saudi Arabia.
Going to that country taught me much of the deplorable situation in the country that is allowing extremism to spread like wild fire. Though the wealth because of oil allows for many free social/health services, the freedom of speech and thought are almost non-existant. Similar to in Iran, religion is manipulated to maintain strict control over the people and consolidate and maintain their power.

I truly don't feel that the US army was there to protect Saudi, in that Iraq had never had or made any statements / actions that would lead us to believe he wanted to attack Saudi Arabia. Kuwait used to be a part of Iraq and many in the Ba'ath party in Iraq felt it was a rogue part of Iraq, and with the US non-intervention in the Iran-Iraq war, Saddam felt the US and the world would not step in.

What it boils down to is that the Saudi people want freedom. Who are we to support a dictatorial regime that oppresses their people. All that does is create the animosities that creates groups like Al-Queda. I think we need to pull our troops out of Saudi Arabia, and not because we are giving in to terrorist demands, but because it is not our country and our war to fight. People seem to think that a different regime would not sell us oil or would create a shortage in the world marketplace but that is a farce. To this day, Iran and Iraq (two of the largest producers in the world) have embargos and economic sanctions not allowing them to sell their oil without provisions like for food, etc. If we ended the embargo tommorrow, then do you believe they would say no to US dollars?? I seriously doubt it, after all even during the embargo they sold 80 million barrells of oil to an Israeli Jew Marc Rich for half the price of the market and allowed him to make billions selling it on the open market at a slight discount to market price. If they are willing to sell it to a citizen of a country in which they despise as much as Israel for half of the market price, i'm sure they would have no quams with selling it for the market price to the US.

 

Wahabism is the breed of Islam Bin Laden is purportedly touting. So if there's some revolution in Saudi Arabia, do we support a dictitorial government that clashes with the essence of our very ideals? How much worse could it be in Saudi Arabia than it already is now... If there's another regime with an extremist Islamic position it's not like they can't be bribed with power and money like their predecessors...

On the back of my mind, I hope the US loses Saudi Arabia as an ally so we can finally get off oil and freely develop cleaner energy alternatives. If we plunge into yet another recession, who's to say it wouldn't happen when we finally run out of places to dig...

 

Isn't the problem that we have met an enemy where this doesn't matter?

The US (as with many other empires) uses the concept of defeat or, in some cases, eliminate the enemy. What if you can't defeat them? What if they will just exist and continue to attack for decade after decade? What if destroying every Muslim nation and every Muslim person or person sympathetic to the cause doesen't fix it even if we assume that were possible, which it isn't?

I'm being dramatic (not realistic) to illustrate a point. In this "war", it is unlikely if not impossible that we could ever completely neutralize this threat. And, what is worse, the more that we retaliate, the worse it gets. It's an inverse response.

The more we rain down violence (in retaliation for violence or the threat of violence) on these groups of people, the more we strengthen their resolve to destroy us. Has the Israeli/Palestinan conflict taught us nothing?

We talk big about our military and how powerful we are. But that is against nations and groups that line up against us on a battlefield and duke it out. This is not that kind of enemy. Until we realize that we can't just line up the tanks and missles and blow them away, we are going to be saddled with this problem. I don't know the answer, but it should be fairly obvious that obliteration of the enemy isn't possible, so that strategy ultimately won't work.

 

The Commies didn't figure it out in Afghanistan until they decided to tear down the wall...