If they choose not to.as over 50% (in the polls) do.then they'll suffer the consequences of ignorance. Bruce http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2006/09/01/news_opinion/dean _krenz/4aa616b0a7a00af0862571db00770ad9.txt Americans must understand the threats we face Where else but at a casual meeting of a few politically conservative men would the topic of our nation's survival under threat of the Middle Eastern barbarians come up? The consensus on that question was left unsettled but the real threat was generally agreed to. Also to be discussed was the American public's apparent indifference to the threat.
Some basic elements of the discussion. 1. Despite our national security efforts to control our borders, terrorists enter the United States from Canada and Mexico at will. 2. Terror cells made up of foreign and natural born individuals already exist here. 3. Access to explosives shipped into the country is lightly monitored. 4. Americans seem not to be concerned if any of these elements combine to create continuing chaos in this country. 5. Control of Middle Eastern oil by malevolent forces could torpedo our economy. So far public concern seems to center on removing our troops from the ill-fated campaign for democracy in Iraq. Better than 60 percent of Americans want to end the war they regard as tiresome, according to daily polls on the subject. Electioneering Democrats charge the hated George Bush as responsible for fraudulently getting us involved. The president pleads for time to finish the job. The public clearly believes what happens in Iraq has little to do with our national future except as it relates to casualties of our servicemen. The man on the street also believes national security would improve if we watched more carefully who it is that comes here without "documents." Symbolic of our failure to understand the reality of the threat is the hubbub created over communications monitoring potential terror activity, revelations of fund transfers from groups here to suspects in the Middle East, and general monitoring of communications traffic flows not affecting any individuals. As of now, these and other schemes try to find out what the terrorists are planning next. Another World trade Center disaster? Lethal gas in New York's subway system? Poisoning of water and food supplies? No one seems the least excited about these possibilities. Why not? Well, my take on the puzzle is a majority of Americans haven't a clue about what might happen. It isn't that they don't care, but they have a full plate of life's problems on their minds. Work, marriage, children, schools, health, bad neighbors, finding new jobs, the unaffordable price of gasoline ... just to name a few. And not the least is an aversion to war. Perhaps, too, there is a fatalism about what might or might not happen. Threats by terrorists to bomb the Lincoln and Holland tunnels in New York drew no outrage or even fear from those entering the tubes for quick trip to the Garden State. If it happens, it happens, nothing I can do about it, was the nature of most comment. We have the greatest military organizations in the history of the world, but they seem ineffectual in the new kinds of war in which the enemy hides in civilian areas and appears only in ways that can't be challenged with tanks, planes, artillery and troops. In this country such terrorist groups could operate with only marginal chances of being discovered before executing their plans. Still, much of the public and many politicians who know better say they think our isolation provided by two oceans will keep us safe. Fact of the matter is well financed and supplied terror groups will never militarily occupy New York or Washington, or Chicago, or Los Angeles or Sioux City. Such occupation is clearly beyond their ability. But to do grievous harm to this country, they don't need to occupy. By consolidating their control of the Middle Eastern countries they can also control the supply of oil coming from that region. Regardless of such mindless slogans as "no blood for oil," the fact is our economy desperately needs the product of wells in Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq. Short on fuel, our economy would implode like a burst balloon. Our energy needs will not be met with windmills, ethanol made from corn or efficient cars anytime soon. A nuclear-armed Iran is in itself a mortal threat to our national interests and safety. With Iran possessing nuclear weapons we will have two choices. One would be to hit their nuclear generating facilities before they gain the strength and expertise to hit us. A nuclear base there would end any possibility to influence Middle Eastern military moves with conventional military forces. It will be nuclear or nothing, and you can be your life we won't be the first to pull the trigger. You can also bet your life that what's going on in that part of the word is a deadly threat to us. Churchill awoke the British to the obvious threat of Hitler after Chamberlain assured them it was safe to doze. Bush has lost his influence, so it is up to us to understand. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? 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