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> yet it was actually no threat at all to US security or even NY security, beyond ~two buildings. If we're talking about carried out threat and not achieved ai
by cma 2y ago
> yet it was actually no threat at all to US security or even NY security, beyond ~two buildings.
If we're talking about carried out threat and not achieved aims: there were more than those two flights and more than those two buildings targeted. And even if you are talking about achieved aims only: the Pentagon was hit as well if you are forgetting that or maybe that just belongs in the '~'. In fact more than two buildings in NYC itself were destroyed, even if only two there were targeted.
The seat of the main elected branch of government (US Capitol) was targeted and likely would have been struck without the passenger interventions (fighter jets had been sent out towards the atlantic ocean and FAA had not yet ordered all planes grounded even if NORAD had been alerted by that point). We were very lucky passengers and crew had made airphone calls and some disallowed cell phone calls to get enough critical mass to fight back.
I think the subsequent war on terror, used to invade Iraq without any relation to the attack, was terrible, but this kind of deflation is pretty insane to read.
- mmooss 2y agoI should have thought more carefully and included the DC buildings, but it's still only a few buildings and thousands of people. And that took an enormous amount of planning, plus luck, etc. He was never going to take over the US, defeat the US military, or endanger more people than the flu.
- cma 2y agoKeep thinking even more carefully, it was more than two buildings destroyed in NYC and a huge portion of legislative branch could have been killed if in session. Threat of total defeat of US, which Capitol attack wouldn't have caused, isn't exactly a reasonable benchmark for being the only thing that would balance out the response we had.
- mmooss 2y ago> Keep thinking even more carefully I suppose that should be mostly said to the mirror, at least before anyone else. > balance out the response we had That isn't an issue in my comments.
- cma 2y ago> That isn't an issue in my comments. "seemingly arbitrary state violence is an old, well-established tactic of states" You weren't referring to the subsequent "war on terror," relating the state response to that to the state reponse to this? It was just thrown in unrelated? > But because it was seemingly random, people thought it could happen anywhere. While people everywhere did fear, what was "seemingly random" about targeting: the Pentagon, the US Capitol, and the most prominent buildings in the NY skyline, which had already been targeted before in a bombing plot by the same groups?
- mmooss 2y agoHey - think some more. The curse of certainty is excluding other possibilities.