We can't go back and change things, but we can change how we respond and do things now. There have been many things that occurred in the past that people felt were completely morally ok and no longer acceptable in any civilized nation, like slavery.
If we are defending our own country, that is one thing. But going into someone else's needs to stop. 9/11 was not first strike, it was retaliation. We need to focus on making the world better, not spending billions and countless lives to exact "justice".
I agree with this. The Taliban, in charge of Afghanistan was given a choice at the time: give us bin Laden, allow us to dismantle Al Qaeda, or face the consequences.
This was not an "easy" division of lines like it is with war between a nation. al Qaeda is not a nation, neither is the Taliban. the rules are different. No one else would shelter bin Laden, but the Taliban, so the only option is to classify them as our enemy. The Taliban chose to go to war with the US.
We had no other option. not retaliating for 9-11 was not an option. At that point, it really doesn't matter that 9-11 was, in itself, a retaliation. Say what you will, but our actions in the middle east have never been agaisnt civilians. Civilians die, and that is certainly unfortunate. I'm not going to say that we have always acted in a just manner and to the best wishes of the innocents living within these nations, but we have operated against leaders and governments that would prefer to see the USA off the map.
We really have no choice, here. Of course, there is no excuse for being in Iraq in 2003. There is simply no defensible reason for that action. in 91, we failed to remove Saddam, at a time when it seemed we are moving away from the idea of nation building. I'm not going to say whether or not that decision was wrong, but it certianly kept us in Iraq until this day--and it was us being in Iraq after the Gulf War that lead to WTC 1, the USS Cole, and WTC 2 (Iraq). I believe there was an embassy attack, too? Egypt?
