First let’s just say that the 9/11 attacks were appalling.
On this anniversary of those attacks we should all pay our respects to the families of those who lost loved ones.
However, am I the only one who is a little bit fed up with the American’s penchant for wallowing in self pity? For the last week or so we have been bombarded with documentaries about 9/11. Phone calls from the Twin Towers, people falling from the Twin Towers, inside the lavatories of the Twin Towers etc. etc.
Where were the programmes commemorating the 7/7 attacks in London? Conspicuous by their absence I’m afraid. Admittedly the death toll wasn’t as high as it was in the States (after all, everything is bigger in America) but does that matter? It also wasn’t the first time this country had suffered terrorist attacks in its capital city. Let’s not forget the havoc wreaked by the IRA at the height of their bombing campaigns. Let’s also not forget that the Americans very kindly sent money they’d collected to the IRA to fund those bombing campaigns. This was collected in Irish bars and in Irish strongholds like Boston and happily despatched to the terrorists to blow the hell out of London or any soldiers who happened to be within range in Northern Ireland.
Where was the “special relationship” then? It didn’t seem too special in 1940 either when the Americans were content to allow Britain to fight the Nazis alone, offering equipment but not actual physical help in the form of troops. They didn’t do that until the Japanese invited them to join the war by blowing the shit out of Pearl Harbour.
I think it was the collective gasps of disbelief from across the Atlantic that were so trying. Not the gasps of horror but the incredulity that anyone in the world would hate them enough to do something like that. A hell of a wake up call I know but at least now they know that all the regimes they’ve installed and then demolished at various times in recent history might not be too pleased with their interference.
Also, let’s not forget that Al Queda were trained by the CIA. A classic case of what goes around comes around I’d say.
