09/11/2002

EDITORIAL NUMBER=0-10122

WOLFOWITZ ON TERRORISM

With the anniversary of September 11^th, Americans and people around the world reflected on the nature and purpose of the terrorist attacks. "It was certainly no mistake," as U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said, "that the World Trade Center, a symbol and hub of America’s economic dynamism, was a target. And when the American market was damaged, shock waves reverberated – and rumble still – around the world."

The attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon building outside Washington demonstrated the real intentions of the terrorists. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida targeted not just America but Islam by attacking the ideals of tolerance, justice, and openness that are the aspirations of both Americans and of millions of Muslims around the world. Mr. Wolfowitz said, "If the terrorists are successful in destroying these ideals...East and West alike will suffer."

"The terrorists target their fellow Muslims," said Mr. Wolfowitz, "upon whom they aim to impose a new kind of violent tyranny. A tyranny that pretends to be based on Islam but which owes more to the totalitarian impulses of the twentieth century than to the great religion that the terrorists are attempting to hijack. The hundreds of millions of Muslims who aspire to modernity, freedom, and prosperity are just as much on the front lines of the struggle against terrorism as are we [in the U.S.]."

Nowhere was this struggle more evident than in Afghanistan, where the oppressive Taleban regime gave sanctuary to terrorists with a radically backward-looking distortion of Islam. The U.S.-led coalition mobilized against that grave threat, and helped the Afghans remove the Taleban from power and kicked al-Qaida out of its safe haven.

"Our challenge," said Deputy Defense Secretary Wolfowitz, "is to preserve what has already been achieved and to build on it to help the Afghan people establish a peaceful, just, and prospering society. We can’t expect to solve all the problems of the last two and a half decades overnight.... But...over the last eleven months there has been much more good news from Afghanistan than bad."

As President George W. Bush said, "America will lead by defending liberty and justice because they are right and true and unchanging for all people everywhere. We have a greater objective than eliminating threats and containing resentments," said Mr. Bush. "We seek a just and peaceful world beyond the war on terror."