As the shock changes to a numb realization that we have to go on, and as people get ready to get back to some version of their normal lives, the practical questions will -- hopefully -- begin to replace the rhetoric. We also need some solid, non-partisan analysis of how we got to where we are now.

How much of this is, we need to see how, and to what degree, did we bring this on ourselves? The point is being raised (at least in the overseas news media) that this attack did not come out of thin air. The post-Communist era has seen the US throw its weight around in way that may have seemed appropriate to our government, but which has been seen as oppressive by a fairly large percentage of the rest of the developing world. With the fall of an aggressive Soviet Union, the bi-polar system of the Cold War was thrown out of balance (albeit a balance of nuclear terror). Something had to arise to replace it. Have we just witnessed the first harbingers of that replacement?

Currently there are probably about a half dozen countries in the world that are under some sort of trade embargo imposed on behalf of the US. I could look up the list somewhere, but I am sure it includes Iraq and Afghanistan among others. These embargoes are "aimed" at the ruling regimes but, of course, they mainly affect the private citizenry through shortages of essential goods and by wrecking the economies. The person in the street does not make the connection between our action and the desired result, they just know there is no milk for their kids and no electricity and it is somehow our fault. If one of those kids dies of disease or malnutrition -- and it happens all the time -- presto, you have a potential terrorist.

A prime example of this flawed strategy is Iraq, where, with Saddam Hussein defeated, we pulled back militarily and imposed economic sanctions. As a result he still has a full belly and plenty of time to fund terrorists while his people suffer and provide fodder for fanaticism. The other prime example is Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden was initially part of a force of mujahadeen, Moslem holy warriors fighting against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. A lot of training and weapons for these forces came from the CIA. It is very possible that bin Laden learned his trade from Pakistani employees of our own intelligence forces. (Given that Timothy McVeigh learned his trade in the US Army, the ironic nature of the situation is almost unbearable.)

So, to what extent have we reaped what we have sown? This is not just finger-pointing. We need to ask the question so that we do not keep making the same mistakes over and over again. A flat-out carpet bombing of Kabul or some other location in Afghanistan, while it may (or may not) take out the man who organized the attacks of last week, will most definitely raise a new crop of anti-US sentiment as the survivors look at their dead and wounded, not ours.

A war against terrorists has all new rules and most of them are in their favor. You can score 20 points and they can score once and they are ahead. We are a nation of targets, while there is not much left to hit in Afghanistan. It is already a country with an infrastructure in ruins, a countryside sown with land mines and booby traps, millions of casualties and millions more piled into refugee camps. What more can we do to them? Without even thinking of letting the perpetrators of last week off the hook, is it time to change our basic approach to the fighting of terrorism by getting to the root of it?
posted by John Malay at 6:29 AM

The Tower: downfall, sudden change, revelation

The Moon: fear, bewilderment, illusion
posted by John Malay at 3:36 PM

Church today was packed, it was like Christmas or Easter. One parish member is missing, and of course there are a number of people missing who are friends or related to other members. Our rector, although I would characterize him as a no-nonsense guy, for the most part preaches a doctrine of peace, harmony and tolerance. But in today's sermon he summoned up the thunder and the lightning. The scriptural readings were a mixture of love thine enemy and Old Testament wrath. He did make a crucial distinction between justice and revenge.

After that I came home to read the Times. Seems some of the other countries that pledged their support to us in seeking out the culprits are, to one degree or another, already modifying their promises. I am not surprised. I have always felt that, at the end of the day, our only real allies are the other English-speaking peoples of the world. When push comes to shove, the Brits, the Canadians and the Aussies will be there with us, and that's that. For the rest it is only when it suits them.

Keep in mind it was not just Americans who died in the explosions. There are reports of many British, Irish, Japanese and other nationalities missing. New York is the center of world business. For all their troubles, I doubt the Irish have ever lost 50 people to domestic terrorists in one day. That figure is the current estimate for Irish missing in the WTC area and in the airliners.
posted by John Malay at 3:13 PM

An old metaphor is getting trotted out once again: the Maginot Line. Its origin is a line of fortifications the French built after World War I to protect their border with Germany. Its significance is that the forts, despite being very expensive and high-tech for their day, were completely useless in protecting France against the Germans in World War II because they were built to guard against the static trench warfare weapons of the previous war not the mechanised air-powered war that was to come.

As such it has become a metaphor for thinking you are prepared when you are not, or for being prepared for the wrong thing.

The parallels are obvious. The military (or some of it) and the administration had been lobbying for all sorts of high-tech missile shields and smart weapons that would blow a conventional enemy away (think Desert Storm) when all the while a group of 20 people armed with flight manuals and plastic knives were getting ready to cause us untold damage. Despite this we are now getting huge appropriations, much of which will still, I fear, go into hardware.

I am not sure a large bureaucracy knows how to fight the people we are up against now. I don't know that you can thwart these people by throwing money at them. There is a basic change in mind-set that will be necessary.
posted by John Malay at 8:00 AM

Around noon yesterday I drove out to my friend’s house in rural Hunterdon County, we went trout fishing for the rest of the day and then we had a nice dinner. As relaxing as that was, there was a small part of me that was contrasting the beautiful country river, the brilliant sunny day, and the good friends with what has been going on. It will be a while before that second-guessing goes away.
posted by John Malay at 7:38 AM

Cruise the 'Net enough and you will always find someone who has said it better than you can. The following is from Roger Cringely, columnist and PBS documenteur:

"'To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail,' wrote Mark Twain. In the current, context this means that the organizations charged with reacting to this catastrophe will do so by doing what they have always done, only more of it. Congress, which controls the budget and passes laws, will want to pass laws and to allocate more money, lots of money, forgetting completely about any campaign promises. The military, which is the nation's enforcer, will want to use force, if only they can find a foe. The intelligence community, which gathers information, will want to be even more energetic in that gathering, no matter what the cost to the privacy of the millions of us who aren't thinking of terrorist acts. And agencies like the Federal Aviation Administration, which regulate, will want to create more stringent regulations. Now here is an important point to be remembered: All these parties will want to do these things WHETHER THEY ARE WARRANTED OR USEFUL OR NOT."

Which to me is an eloquent way of saying to the government, please do not rush to judgment. Do what we need to do, not what we feel we have to in order to look like we are strong or brave or to prove that you are our leaders and you know what you are doing.
posted by John Malay at 7:10 AM

The "8 - 10 people" estimate of the missing in town may be accurate. My daughter came home yesterday with a written announcement from the school superintendant saying that 26 children in the district had been identified who had lost either a parent or an aunt or uncle. That seems terribly high, but that figure included multiple children with the same parent or other adult and not all aunts and uncles live in town. Then today's paper printed the list of confirmed missing as complied by the state police. At this point "missing" has become a euphemism for deceased. The list included 9 people from Basking Ridge.

After my comment yesterday on people flying the flag, my wife asked me where our's was and would I put it up? I did, and, you know, it made me feel better. So much for dispassionate logic. I still stand by my remarks vis a vis the way I would like to see justice handed out.
posted by John Malay at 6:37 AM

A lot of American flags are appearing around town. If this makes people feel better, fine, but I don’t relish a wave of blind patriotism that will encourage the administration to go off half-cocked. I don’t want swift justice as much as I want thorough justice. This is not, in my opinion, a war. It is a brutal crime perpetrated by sociopathic criminals and they need to be tracked down, tried and punished. Summary justice delivered by cruise missile is the last resort, not the first.

Unfortunately, the 21st century may see a blurring of the distinction between war and crime, as the very concept of the nation-state begins to weaken, especially in the Middle East. The only reason the Arab states are divided up into countries right now is because that was imposed on them by the colonial powers at the end of World War I. Before that they existed on a level organized by tribe or by clan, with vaguely defined territories under the overlordship of a weak de-centralized Ottoman (Turkish) Empire. The British and the French were divvying up the territory as early as 1916 and drawing imaginary lines in the sand. In a very real sense there never was a “Syria” or an “Iraq”.

Be that as it may, many tough questions will arise over the next few weeks. If the investigation leads to evidence of, as it appears so far, an international crime, then it depends on where it leads. If it leads to a country with a justice system prepared to help, then fine. If not, what is our legal recourse? We have been confronted for years with “rogue” states that will not turn over suspected criminals for trial. Do you then turn from procedural justice to summary justice? What is the legal precedent for entering another country without permission in order to bring a suspect to court? (I know it has been done illegally for years.) Should our position be, to choose an obvious example, that Afghanistan is a country without a legal or recognized government and therefore open to intrusion? Etcetera.

Calling it a “war” negates all these questions, hence its appeal in the immediate aftermath. I want our heads to lead our hearts in this matter so that I can be assured that the real culprits are punished, not just someone that fits the profile. Calling it a "war" legitimatizes these criminals by granting them a status, a legitimacy, in the international system they do not actually have.
posted by John Malay at 1:54 PM

As of this morning still no official word on local casualties. The 8 - 10 estimate of yesterday has not changed.

The rescuers luck with the weather ran out last night when heavy rain and thunder storms came in. All that dust and ash covering lower Manhattan probably became a slurry within 5 minutes, adding a slippery layer on top of everything else. On the other hand it washed a lot of smoke and dust out of the air, dust containing more asbestos than anyone is admitting at this point.

Our church is being used as the local crisis center, with people manning help lines, collecting information on victims, etc. That is all we can do right now.

I am happy to report that my next door neighbor has been accounted for. He's overseas, in Amsterdam, and in any event, his ABN-Amro office was not the one in the WTC but in midtown. How he will get home, and when, is going to be interesting, but in the grand scheme of things it is a minor matter.
posted by John Malay at 10:14 AM

We still have no word on local casualties. A number of children were missing from my daughter's school yesterday, although some of them may have just been fighting the bug that has been going around. But, according to her, at least three kids in her grade have fathers killed. If that weren't enough, another girl she knows lost her father in a car accident the day previous. I heard estimates while at a municipal meeting last night that the total for Basking Ridge will be 8 - 10 people.

And this is an area where a substantial number of people no longer work in the city. People out here came because it was convenient to the interstates and they work in the immediate area or within an hour's drive. The telcos and pharmaceutical companies here employ (still, after the layoffs) many of the local work force. On my street I know of only one guy who works in NYC, the rest work in the region or are retired. (Unfortunately, I have not seen him since Tuesday. I have my fingers crossed.)

At another meeting earlier yesterday the discussion was that the news was worse as you move in toward towns closer to the city. Towns like Chatham (where I grew up), Summit and Millburn, that are on the main line for the railroad, where people specifically moved to be able to commute quickly to New York City, will be harder hit. Of course, working in "the city" covers a lot of ground. The financial district is only one area. More people work in midtown. My father did for 35 years.

Over the last decade or more the "financial district" has lost its monopoly on the financial sector. Many companies moved away from Wall Street and its environs to other parts of the city well-served by mass transit. A substantial number of offices moved across the Hudson to places like Secaucus and Jersey City to take advantage of new infrastructure and relatively cheaper rents. Technology allowed to some extent a decentralization of the markets. In fact, one of the rationales for moving some operations across to Jersey was for the very reason of not having everyone in a single place. They may have been thinking of power failures or fires, not the catastrophes of Tuesday, but the logic paid off.

All these things, plus the fact that on a beautiful, cloudless, late summer morning a lot of people dawdled on their way or walked rather than taking a subway, will have saved many lives. But there is a lot of bad news still to come.
posted by John Malay at 7:39 AM

Woke up and let the dogs out early. There was a chill in the air, both literally and figuratively. There are a lot of people in this town and in this area who work in the Wall Street area, many, I assume, at the WTC. The next edition of the local paper is going to be tough to read. Everyone still has their head down, waiting to see what happens and who among their neighbors will be effected.

For example, there was a guy at the Labor Day picnic who was talking to me about a new job he had just started "way downtown". That now has an ominous meaning it did not have at the time.

I don't know that I have anything meaningful to say about all this. The airwaves have been full of talking heads and pundits all putting in their two cents. I know we will get through this. What remains to be seen is, how will we be changed by it? I have been worrying for years about the erosion of privacy in the name of security. This will now accelerate in the aftermath of yesterday. I am pragmatic enough to realise that some changes will need to be made, but I hope that a more secure US does not mean we have to sacrifice our right to privacy. If American society changes for the worse, the terrorists will have won.
posted by John Malay at 8:17 AM

Libya to buy all Caribbean bananas

Whereupon they will place the peels on sidewalks outside strategic US and NATO installations...
posted by John Malay at 9:01 AM