The war on terrorism is a piece of propaganda. What may be happening now
in Afghanistan is one thing, the war on terrorism itself - is still
happening. It is not not going to stop because America chooses to go to
war in Iraq. Terrorists do not need a base - a country/homeland. They
act from the conviction that they love/hate whatever and will show
everyone who does not ascribe to their love/hate just how intensely they
can show the others. Terrorists are not an army/navy/air force. They
move quietly from place to place performing hit and run attacks on the
rest of us. Northern Ireland is a war of terrorism. They see the English
and the separation of Northern Ireland from the rest of the island as a
very real extrudence of being Irish. The Protestants, want to keep
themselves separate. They have been in NI some families since 1600
something, when Cromwell sent them to homestead a country that was not
the religion the Lord Protector espoused.
The problems - very much ongoing in Israel/Palestine are a war of
terrorism. You have only to read the newspapers or watch TV daily to see
that war is ongoing. It is not going to stop because America attacks
Iraq. Neither are the problems happening here in the US. The Washington
DC area had 23 days of terrorism perpetrated by 2 men - seemingly for
the joy of killing. Was it linked to any known terrorist group? I
doubt it. It did serve to show how unprepared America is against
terrorism. It also showed how we can be frightened into hiding in our
homes, afraid to move about freely lest we too become a sniper's target.
Hitler's rise - I suggest you go back and read on the post WWI
treaty/armistice. France and Germany have been competitors for many
generations. Post WWI, France took over the Saar and Ruhr - to keep
Germany from "rearming" - if Germany does not have the way to
manufacture arms, then etc. Germany's response - if we do not have a way
of manufacturing - we cannot repay the war costs put upon us by the
victors. Etc. etc. About 1921, Germany was finding ways to get around
the League of Nations and the repayments. The League was not acting as a
body - and was losing its strength to lead/guide. The US had decided to
not ratify and join the League of Nations. All of this is printed
history - political history to be sure and probably dry as dust. But it
is important to us - because it is from the past and somebody's
translation of it that makes the future. WWI saw the end of the Ottoman
Empire. A number of nations were interested in a piece of Arabia. The
nations we see today on maps - did not exist except as interest groups.
England wanted to keep German interests out of the Near East. For
starters go find yourself maps of the area before WWI. What is
happening today is from what was done in the Near East post WWI.
So what does this have to do with the Sinclair name? I suggest
everything - it has to do with our lives, the safety of the world to
live in peace. The lives of our children into the next generation. The
brother, a Captain in the Confederate Navy, of my Great grandmother
drowned in the Mersey River January 1865. His sister died in 1855 of a
yellow fever epidemic in Norfolk, VA. So, some generations later, my
brother served in the Korean and Viet Nam wars and I in the Korean war.
So where have the rest of you Sinclair's been, are the product of -
certainly not people who have been able to sit at home in peace and
harmony with the world. For whom the bell tolls - it tolls for all.
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