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“I was afraid of the dark. It never happened before 9/11. It was a sense of security having that light on,” says Artie Van Why, a witness to the September 11 attacks in an article on bbc.co.uk. The story talks about the trauma that Van Why went through and how the harrowing memories of 9/11 made it too painful for him to continue working at his office which was located close to the towers. Before long he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.
George W. Bush made a highly debatable decision when he responded to the attacks by attacking Afghanistan, and later Iraq. For the 3,000 civilian deaths of 9/11, the United States butchered thousands of civilians in Afghanistan (women and children amongst them). Under the pretext of weapons of mass destruction, Iraq was invaded and massacred, and what was once a flourishing Baghdad was reduced to rubble. According to WikiLeaks, the civilian death toll in Iraq was over 92,000 deaths.
The ‘War on Terror’ continued with Pakistan being forced to become a coalition partner with the United States and a never-ending stream of drones still continues to annihilate the tribal areas. Noam Chomsky in his column on 9/11 titled ‘Was war the only answer’ explains that the attack on Pakistan has only radicalised the nation further, and that America has in fact helped Bin Laden on his mission. “That Washington seemed bent on fulfilling bin Laden’s wishes was evident immediately after the 9/11 attacks,” says Chomsky.
Simon Jenkins of the Guardian agrees to that and insists that waging war was not in America’s best interests. Anti-American sentiments were fuelled when America attacked a hapless Afghanistan, and later Iraq and then carried out drone attacks in Pakistan. Daniel Byman from the Brookings Institution (an American think-tank) suggests that drone strikes may kill “10 or so civilians” for every militant killed. In contrast, the CIA believes that since 2010, no civilians have been killed in the attacks — only militants were killed. Civilian deaths are seldom reported and when we hear of the casualties, they are given that seemingly benign terminology: collateral damage’. Whilst we have thousands of 9/11 survivor stories like the one mentioned in the beginning, somehow, Western media has failed to produce similar news stories that talk about the suffering of a little girl in Iraq, or someone in Afghanistan, or someone in Pakistan whose school was blown up in the fighting instigated by a nation once highly esteemed in the world.
“Pakistanis are too poor to go and seek treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder. They also realise that the trauma is far from over,” writes Mohammed Hanif in the Guardian’s ‘Comment is Free’ section. Indeed, poverty-stricken individuals in Pakistan have more pressing concerns such as proper meals and potable water.
That is most certainly not to belittle the crime that was 9/11 or the sufferings of those who went through that horrific incident. I only wish to present a simple question — why is it that when Muslims kill it is called ‘terrorism’ or ‘crime against humanity’ and when the United States massacres anyone in broad daylight, with the aid of men such as Tony Blair, we dismiss it as though the blood of those being killed is of lesser value? Is it fair to clothe the butchery of innocent civilians, who get killed alongside so called ‘militants’ under the garb of ‘collateral damage’? Moreover, why isn’t the Western media powerful enough to expose the true situation in Palestine, where the most horrific injustices take place under the approving eye of the United States?
War has been detrimental for the United States economically too. The economy collapsed after billions of dollars were deployed to fund the wars which many noted thinkers and writers have termed a mistake. The spillway effect has been the worst recession the world has seen in recent times.
There is no doubt about the fact that the attacks on the twin towers were truly terrible and every such action or intention by the militants has been condemned by Muslims all around the world, as it should be. However, America has achieved little in terms controlling terrorism – for every civilian murdered by American troops, a new Bin Laden is born. The word ‘jihad’ is in rampant misuse and young people are brainwashed as they happily blow themselves up in the name of Islam. Radicalism has placed its feet on firmer ground than before as militants use America’s crimes to fuel sentiment against America.
Amidst all this, Islam and Muslims have taken the most serious bashing. Anyone with a beard and a cap is automatically a ‘fundamentalist’, women with hijab are looked at sceptically as though they are oppressed and opting for ‘madressa’ for your child is a definite no-no — even if all they do there is teach the Arabic language.
Ten years down the line, we as a global community are worse off. Life on this planet becomes increasingly more dangerous as a doomed war continues, and we wander farther away from peace and stability. One wonders though, how Artie Van Why would have taken it if something like 9/11 happened on a daily basis, and that too for years. Someone in Iraq would know.
Mehmudah Rehman is a Dubai-based freelance writer who blogs at Ummanaal’s Musings.
The views expressed by this blogger and in the following reader comments do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Dawn Media Group.
The terrorist attacks on 9/11 were the deadliest ever on mainland America. Do you not recall that over 3000 innocent people were killed? The United States had to stand and defend itself from these stateless actors who had taken refuge with the Taliban in Afghanistan. Today, ten years later, the world is free of some of the biggest tyrants and enemies of humanity. The cost of war has been tremendous, both in treasure and human lives, but consider what has been achieved. Do we not see a democratic and free Iraq and Afghanistan? Do we not see young Afghani boys and girls fulfilling their dreams of getting an education?
We are not in the business of killing innocent civilians, but you must realize that we are fighting a ruthless enemy who use women and children as shields. The fact remains that Al-Qaida and Taliban have killed more innocent Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The events of 9/11 changed our worlds, but we are working to stabilize the world for future generations.
Quite true to the last word. It is always difficult to accept reality by some
The idea for USA to go into Iraq was not only outrageous, but irrational. Sadam Husain in spite of his evil mind was totally against the Al Qaida ideology. American invasion of Iraq have opened the Pandora Box. However, it was not the after math of 9/11 that have radicalized these terrorists; they were already radicalized, thanks to the certain irrational ideology. Progress in the Muslim world can only come if there is critical self analysis and self introspection to evaluate the reasons that have hindered the progress of Muslims instead of blaming rest of the world. It is true that colonization and western interference have poison the mind of many a person, but moving on is the best solution rather than stagnation and self pity.
In another words, US should have kept Osama running his activities in Afghanistan for the benefit of you? When US gets hit, it hits back with more power. Would not you?
An eloquent piece of writing Mehmudah, and I know it takes guts to say this. Thank you for being our collective voice.
Policies of the US government have put American lives at risk throughout the world. If it wasn't just the Muslim world, Europeans and Asians now hate US Government and its policies as much, which result in loss of tens of millions of jobs in the two continents. With China on the verge of becoming the world's biggest economy, the question soon will be Are we Friends with China? rather than, Are we friends with US? Pakistan, Iran, Middle East and Africa are clear winners when it comes to their friendship with China vis-a-vis their relationship with USA, which is clearly based on extremely selfish motives by the US.
92,000 civilian deaths in Iraq and not a single mention of Iran or Syrian backed militias that explicitly targeted civilians for years? Mehmudah, how do you expect people to take you seriously if you can’t even hold those taking credit for bombings in Iraq responsible for the civilian casualties they create?
Inside Pakistan it is even worse. When your country can come to grips with problems and violence that its own citizens create, then maybe you come to a starting point for an honest discussion. Until then that reality is a long way off. It wasn’t America that the hotel terrorists in Afghanistan and Mumbai called for instructions.
Mr. Cog, Mehmudah is in no way justifying the civilian killings of innocent beings be it in Iraq, Syria, USA or elsewhere and I feel this point is clearly made in this article. Lets not try to try to walk away from the main issue of civilian killings by the US and allied forces and simply trying to brush it under the carpet as an everyday affair just because they are called superpowers.
We in Pakistan accept that extremism has taken roots in our country but the US policy has only added fuel to the fire. Not just that, it was also instrumental in not only creating the fire in the first place but is also providing fuel to it as we speak. What is happening in the Muslim world is sad and we reject it but similarly we also reject the role US is playing in our region.
Cog, the point of the article is that 10 yrs on, the world as a whole is a less safer place. Mentioning Syrian and Iranian involvement in further exacerbating the mess, or the Pakistani govt's incapacity to deal with the mess, DOES NOT absolve America's role for leading to such a situation.
There's no point arguing whether war was good or bad, the way forward should be figuring out how to end the war and to work for lasting peace. Quoting from the movie Spiderman here: "With great power comes great responsibility" and America has failed terribly in taking responsibility for its actions, and has used the corrupt leadership of other nations as an excuse to blame for it's failures, just like you are doing here to berate the writer, who has actually done a very good job of portraying the noon-Western point of view.
You couldn’t have phrased it any better…
Perhaps it's time for Pakistanis to examine why militancy is so prevalent instead of blaming all your problems on other civilizations?
well thats what they r examining and realized that it was not so prevalent before 9/11. obviously their were some anti american sentiments, but they were not so fuelled. just think what will be your response if russia starts drone attacks in alaska, claiming that some xyz terror attack in their country was planned there.
Anyways the point is that yes we have problems, we need to solve them but the external events that are exaggerating these problems shuld also needs to be curbedd or atleast we have the right to raise voices against it
A well thought out article. But whenever acts of terror are perpetrated in foreign lands by terrorists claiming to follow Islam, do the Islamic nations really take the needed measures to curb, condemn and stop these? We all agree that the West is far from sacrosanct, but are we any better? What are we doing to stop terror when it does not impact us? Do we show the same degree of indignation when we are not the victims?
Nicely done Mr. Rehman…
Miss Mehmudah, your calculations for deaths in Iraq are wrong!
Their 9/11 is our 24/7! America's solution to terror was 400% more terror.
That is so well put
who watches the watchmen?
Its not that the western media is not powerful enough but that it is part and parcel of this war machine whose thirst for war and destruction has not limits… The biggest example is the western (specifically america) medias complete complicity while america went to war in Iraq. None of the mainstream media ever questioned the motives for going to war in Iraq and as it turned out all of that was just lies…
its horrible situation…we r moving towards doomsday
Simply true and honest description of the situation.hats off