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Saturday-- March 30, 2002—Ground Zero Plus 200

Terrorism's Kiss Of Death
by
Cliff McKenzie
Editor, New York City Combat Correspondent News 
 

        GROUND ZERO, New York City, Mar. 30--On the 200th day following the Ground Zero attack by Terrorists at 8:46 a.m., September 11, America received a "Kiss Of Death" from the Arab world.
        It was embodied in the kiss Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, (shown on the left in the picture) offered to Izzat Ibrahim, a senior Iraqi official representing Saddam Hussein at the close of a two-day Arab League summit meeting to head off America's planned attack on Iraq.
       Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers who steered American planes into the World Trade Center, Pentagon, and were ill-fated in their attempts to drive Fight 96 into the White House, were citizens of Saudi Arabia.   Statistically, that's nearly 80% representation from the Crown Prince's home state--a signal that perhaps the backbone of Terrorism includes far more vertebrae than just Osama bin Laden.
       It was little surprise to me that in the final hour, the true colors of the Middle East flew in the face of America's idealism that it could garner the support of "brothers to attack brothers"--especially under the principle that America is an infidel, a western threat to the culture of the Middle East which embraces a far different form of politics and religious beliefs than does the western culture.
      Simultaneously, Arafat is scrambling to gain support to block Israeli attacks in retaliation of the recent massacres that ripped deep wounds in the Jewish State's sense of security at Passover.   A suicide bomber during the sacred Seder meal, killed twenty people and injured dozens more in one more slam against Israel's presence in the Middle East.
       It was the kiss that got me.
       I would have preferred the two dropping their trousers and showing the cameras their bare rear ends.   That would have been far more realistic than the guise of a kiss, the embrace of solidarity against the United States and western culture to whom the Arab world tolerates but rejects.
       The kiss was far more than a couple of "brothers" shouting to the world their loyalty to one another's roots, and alliance as a political and religious body.  It was a "Kiss of Death"--a signal to the western world that Saddam Hussein's building of Terroristic weapons, both biological, chemical and nuclear, was endorsed by the Arab community.
        It also meant any war against Iraq would mean a war against the Arab League.

        Washington's "house of cards" crumbled as the picture flashed across their intelligence screens.   I'm sure the President received a harried call instantly:  "He kissed him...the son-of-a-bitch kissed him in front of television cameras!  In front of the world!"
        Terrorism rules.
        It's ingredients, Fear, Intimidation and Complacency have won another battle, at least for the moment. 
        America made a mistake.  It tried to get a consensus of opinion and support from the Arab world.  It sent Dick Cheney around spilling the beans on all our plans to attack Iraq, hoping that during the conversation the Arab world would unwrap their turbans, bow down to the power of the west, and spread their legs in submissiveness.
        Instead, while America was trying to seek support/approval for its actions, the Arab world circled their wagons around Iraq and the head of its military power--Hussein.
        One of the greatest military weapons is surprise.
        When I was in Vietnam, I loved to go on ambushes because it meant we always had the upper hand--we were the surprise.  I hated waiting back on the front lines for the enemy to attack. 
         America folded its power through Intimidation and Fear and Complacency.   It was afraid of the reaction to a swift attack, intimidated that the Arab World might not agree, and Complacent in its belief it could gather support of "brother against brother."
         I'm sure the President of the United States is chewing nails right now.
         If he isn't, I am.
         My Israeli friends have told me from the outset of September 11th that Osama bin Laden was just a figurehead in the attack.   The real support came from the Arab world, they claimed, from a long-standing network of powerful people who want the Middle East to be contained from the rest of the world.  The only way to achieve that goal is by accruing military power, the ability to strike against enemies who try to dominate them.

        The seventy princes of the region rule it with an iron fist.  Democracy would destroy that grip, and strip them of their power and riches.   Westernization would de-culturize them, and refute the Koran's teachings about the "infidel" and the wall that must be kept between the two ways of life.
           As a Parent of Vigilance, a Citizen of Vigilance, a Grandparent of Vigilance, I worry about Complacency.  I worry our nation's leaders have once again tried to straddle the fence between Vigilance and Terrorism and have their testicles caught in the razor-sharp concertino wire separating the two polemics.
           The recent debacle of foreign policy is another example of the need Americans have, and all nations which seek to rid Terrorism from their doorsteps, to take up the Shield of Vigilance. 
          Only when nations--the citizens of them not the leaders--embrace in a "Kiss of Vigilance" will the "Kiss of Terrorist Death" be put in retreat.
          When mothers and fathers and grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, brothers and sisters wave their flags of Vigilance, then the world of Terrorism will feel the Fear and Intimidation and Complacency that America suffers today as it sees the Arab world bonding together in their "Kiss of Vigilance" against the west.
 

 Go To Mar. 29--I Can See Everything