Point taken. I don't recall saying that 9/11 could have been easily prevented. But it does seem as if certain people were asleep at the wheel. A lot of things had to go unnoticed for multiple planes to be hijacked at the same time.
I won't argue that.
No, I didn't forget. But touché for calling me on it.
Just wanted to make sure you weren't one of those no-planers :tongue:
I think we're not looking at the same thing here. My argument is that it would take a lot less manpower and government funds to increase security detail at our international airports & city centers based on the threats our nation was receiving. And our enemy would have been reduced to just a few instead of a few thousand.
I won't argue that either.
But it's not as if the military would have been alone in this. There's already Airport Security in place that could have worked alongside them. They would have been essentially the first line of defense. The ones manning the metal detectors and actually paying attention to what was in people's bags. Also, it had been argued constantly that the technology used at our Security gates needed upgrading.
Won't argue that either. But if you see how fast anything in government takes, getting updated equipment and/or better trained security personnel would take looooong time. A lot longer than 8 months, which is why this falls into the lap of more people than the Bush admin.
If you look at it from a different angle, it would look as if our nation was providing more jobs to the American people. I'm sure there would be more people willing to join the military if they didn't have to be deported to a different country to fight. They'd be more willing to fight on our own soil where we would have the bigger advantage.
If the National Guard wasn't used in deployments I think this would be the perfect job for them. You can be "full time" National Guard and not just go weekends like the Reserves does. The only slight problem with this is that a decent portion of this country gets a little uptight seeing "Military" walking amongst us daily. But I agree with that too, that would be a decent option, one I've thought of as well.
I know of the first WTC bombing. It was pulled off by explosives in a truck only a month after Clinton was inaugurated. Even so, if you've notice most of the attacks on US troops were done in other areas of the world. Sometimes I think our government focuses too much on other people's business and not their own. But that in itself is a whole different argument.
But that's how it works. These smaller acts of terrorism works much like a TV commercial does here. It's advertisement to attract more members as well as money donations from sympathizers. The more you pull off, the more viable people see you and flock to your cause allowing you to pull off larger scaled ops.
I was born & raised in Boston.
Wicked Pissah!
I was actually planning to go to a Kinko's near the WTC on 9/11 to print up resumes and go on a few job interviews... but woke up late. I can't help but think that I could have been in a train underneath the WTC when everything happened. And as I rushed to get dressed and deal with the day, I received a call from one of my best friends who told me a plane crashed into one of the towers.
I have a few friends that worked for Morgan Stanley, they were there that day but had an offsite breakfast meeting. If they didn't, they would have been I believe 5 or 6 floors below the impact area in WTC2. It was a very lucky day for some, for others.......
I agree that it's really difficult to deal with every terrorist threat, especially when most of them are just empty-handed comments. But even having Air Marshalls as you suggested would have put on an extra level of prevention that wasn't there on 9/11. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
I'm in full agreement that we could have done more. Not sure if it could have been stopped, but we could have done something to at least keep it from looking like we had our pants down around our ankles.
