I guess since it has almost been a week since the terrorist attacks in the states you would think that people would be getting over it and moving on towards other news etc. I suppose that I have (or maybe I just haven't been watching the news or reading the newspapers), but for some strange reason people aren't getting over it. It's not going to go away quickly, and since it seems inevitable that the US are going to retaliate in some way (which I have no problem with), the whole situation is going to go on and on and on.

Possibly I need to specify my opinion on any retaliation, because while I have been saying that war is not going to work and shouldn't be undertaken, I do understand that the US has to do something in response. They can't just sit there saying that it's OK to bomb us because we're too chicken shit to go and do anything about it. I have just questioned the method which should be undertaken by the US government to ensure that they don't make matters worse. Because it would be very easy to get things wrong and bomb the wrong person which would lead to an international incident and the possibility of World War Three. I guess your question then would be "who's going to fight against the USA in a third world war?" For such a catastrophe to happen would require another nation or group of nations to be able to come up with an army capable of matching that offered by the USA. And that's just not going to happen, people knew that the first world war was going to happen years before it finally did; just as many people thought that Hitler would cause a second world war. Many Nazis even looked forward to it. In this case I can only really see another Gulf War happening (which I greatly do prefer to an all-out world war that might lead to my involvement), although I still seriously doubt the ability of any war to actually destroy terrorist activities. As soon as the USA bombs a country they're going to create more enemies, and this might continue on and on.

Many historians refer to the complexity of the situation in Vietnam, and how the fact that the enemy was unclear and the cause muddled led to defeat for the first time in US history. The current situation makes Vietnam look like a walk in the park. Terrorists could be anywhere, not just in the boondocks of Afghanistan - you kill Asama Bin Laden and you create hundreds of other enemies. Maybe the US needs to adapt it's policy in the first place that created such enemies rather than trying to destroy them all because it might just prove impossible.

My entry yesterday probably shook a few people up and maybe I was a little bit unjust towards the Americans. Obviously not all Americans are as 'gung-ho' as the various governments throughout the last 50 years. I'm sorry for generalising, that's something which I myself get angry at people for doing so it would be pretty stupid to commit the very crime you are criticising!

On the other hand it seems as though many Americans (and New Zealanders for that matter) are rather 'gung-ho' which does frighten me slightly. I mean how is a war really going to make things better? And who are you really going to fight a war against? It is easy to say 'all military resources are ready for the war against terrorism', but how could you ever implement such an operation without killing even more innocent bystanders. It's rather hypocritical to be killing civilians and justifying it by saying 'but they killed ours'. It just drops you down to their level and makes you aboslutely no better than those you are so angry at, and those you wish to eliminate. I am in favour of action against the perpetrators of this act of terrorism (note: NOT an act of war in my opinion) however I think that the world would be much WORSE off if there was a war.

Funnily enough I have been pleasantly surprised by the reaction of George W. Bush as yet. I have the opinion he walks around with his finger itching on the nuclear button; and has a great desire to send America into war (to live up to his father?) He has shown good restraint so far, and I think that the US has gone a long way towards finding the masterminds behind the disaster and bringing them to justice. I understand the need to make a statement saying "we cannot tolerate terrorism", but whether this statement can really be made without a diplomatic crisis is debatable. It is also debatable whether it would have any effect. The government of Saddam Hussain is no less stable than it was before US bombings of Iraq, on the contrary is has hardened the hatred many Iraqis have towards the USA and possibly increased the chances of terrorist acts. A lot of people hate the US and are willing to show this hatred in a very public manner, a "war against terrorism" is not going to change this and in fact might have the opposite effect. History shows that movements often flourish under pressure, but die out when their cause seems to be lost.

Shocking how I haven't updated this page in two weeks, that's the worst ever delay which is very bad of me. So give me a slap on the wrist, come on.... SLAP ME! OK OK enough slapping!!!

There is obviously a serious side to what I am going to write about today, no-one needs to be a genius to figure out what is in the minds of most people across the world at the moment, and if you haven't been living in a cardboard box you would know the main details so I won't repeat them here to bore you entirely. What I can hope to do is offer my opinion about what has happened, and my prediction of what is going to happen in the next few days, weeks etc.

I was woken up on Wednesday morning by my father telling me that there had been a terrorist attack, I really didn't think much of it initially, thinking that maybe a bomb had gone off somewhere in Israel, London or the US. That happens all the time, and while obviously bad for those involved, surely wouldn't be of such a scale that it turned out to be. However that quickly changed as I saw the frontpage of the newspaper showing smoke billowing out of the World Trade Center, and was informed that these two buildings had subsequently collapsed. Well that woke me up good and proper! So the person I am, interested in current affairs and news, I jumped out of bed to turn CNN on so that I could get a clearer picture of what had happened in New York. Knowing that the twin towers are some of the biggest office buildings in the world I knew that a lot of people would have been killed, along with every single person in the aeroplanes (no-one ever seems to survive an air-crash). I was also immediately worried about what the response of George W. Bush would be - I don't have particularly great faith in him because of his 'Star Wars' defence systems and his rejection of the Kyoto Agreement so I was worried that he might go 'ape-shit' and end up blowing everyone to hell. So here I am, sitting on the couch watching something that seemed to be out of a Hollywood disaster film: a kind of cross between 'Air Force One', 'Die Hard with a Vengeance' and 'The Siege'. It seemed unreal, and because very very little information was actually reaching CNN, and therefore me, I really had no idea what was going on. Throughout the day I frequently checked the CNN website which was very informative about the day's events and gave me a better understanding of what had happened.

So that was my experience of September 12th (NZT). I became even more worried through hearing that various friends have family members living in New York City, although subsequently I have found out that none of them was involved in the disaster which is a great relief. Throughout the rest of the day everyone was talking about this, as I passed people in University you could hear the words "terrorism" and "New York" and "World Trade Center" where normally you would catch phrases to do with impending assignments or weekend parties. It was like the whole world had been captured by such a large event and that it was affecting everyone: not just those in New York and not just those in the USA. Some time later that day it really began to hit me what had happened - the two things which really impacted upon me were the magnitude of the disaster and the threat of what any American response might lead to. Sure there have been terrorist attacks in the past which have led to hundreds of people being killed - US embassy bombings in 1998, the Lockerbie incident of 1989, IRA bombings in Britain, and of course the Okalahoma bombing of the early 1990s. However the sight of watching the trade towers collapse was on an entirely new scale for me, and obviously for the rest of the world. It was clear that not hundreds, but thousands of people were being killed, and that I was watcing it happen before my eyes on television. Gone were two of the most famous buildings in the world, two buildings that are in my Sim City 3000 computer game, and that have starred in many many movies (most famously King Kong). And even more clearly, gone were thousands of lives which really hammered home to me how precious life is and how easily it can be taken away.

Secondly, I was worried about the response of the American government, calling this disaster an 'act of War' does not make me feel very good as I felt the world had been moving into an era of greater peace where resources could be funneled into more important areas such as healthcare, education and welfare. Obviously the hysteria caused by the event is going to result in increased security, a possible "war on terrorism" (although no-one actually knows how or if this war can be fought), and more misery throughout the world. While I do feel sorry for the American people, I don't think that any war is going to make things better for anyone - chances are it's only going to make things worse (which is what wars tend to do.... duh?) Moreover, since no nation was actually responsible for the attack, can the term "war" even be applied? It's quite possible that the actual perpetrators of the terrorist attack are a private organisation with factions located all around the world, therefore any military response would probably lead to more innocent people being killed which is rather hypocritical since that is what the US seems to be defending against if they were to take any military action.

The US are also calling this attack an unprecented attack on freedom, and are pushing the fact that innocent civilians were killed. Anyone would think that the US had never attacked or killed any innocent civilians, which is completely and utterly incorrect. During the Gulf War Baghdad was repeatedly targeted by US bombings, these were aimed not only at military targets but also innocent bystanders; during the bombings of Belgrade civilians were killed by US bombings. Admittedly these attacks were in response to invasions by the Iraq and Serbia, and that by-in-large the targets were either industrial or military. However this cannot be argued in the nuclear bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The citizens of these two cities were minding their own business just in the way that New Yorkers were minding their own business on Tuesday morning (EDT), sure the US were at war with Japan and the Japanese had killed many thousands of American troops and civilians - but then again Asama Bin Laden claims to be at war against the US, and America has killed many thousands of troops and civilians in the middle east in the past ten years. Roughly 400,000 people were killed in the two atomic bombings in July 1945 while a maximum (hopefully) of 10,000 people were killed in the recent terrorist attacks. That just puts things into context doesn't it? In no way am I saying that what the terrorists have done is right, I just think that the US should stop being such arrogant pricks and realise that they too have commited atrocities throughout the 20th century which continue today in many countries (economic sanctions in Iraq starve thousands and have practically no effect on the strength of Sadam Hussain's government), that in some cases (such as the atomic bombings of 1945) far outweigh what has happened recently.

I feel sorry for the families who have lost loved ones, I really really do. But it would be racist of me to feel any more sorry for those families than I do for ones starving in Iraq, being killed in Palestine, or those many many thousands murdered in Japan at the end of WW2. America should stop being so hypocritical, and stop thinking of themselves as being so superior to the rest of the world, and maybe then not so many people would want to attack them.